Confucianism: The Third Change

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The third change was the institutionalisation of a new collective consciousness which means a set of shared beliefs, ideas or moral practices. Unlike the pre-axial collective consciousness, which was founded on rituals and mysticism, the axial collective consciousness was founded on rational thought (Eisenstadt and Giesen, 1995; Eisenstadt, 1998; 2000; 2011). Mainly, these thoughts were articulated by new groups of autonomous elites who became carriers of a specific ‘axial vision’ (Eisenstadt, 1982; 2000; 2011) whether they were: social (such as new forms of social arrangement); political (such as Confucianism); or religious (such as Buddhism or Christianity). These various visions changed the way people perceived society. For example, in ancient