Tainan Confucius Temple

The Tainan Confucius Temple was built in 1665. Over the past 300 years, it has undergone several major renovations, making it a spectacular Confucian temple in Taiwan and a designated historical site. Besides tourists, most visitors are students, seeking blessings for their studies.

Taiwan's first school

Taiwan's First School - Dachengfang: The name "Dachengfang" comes from Confucius' title of "Great Sage and Teacher," a tribute to his virtue. The fang is a gatehouse, with a cross-shaped load-bearing wall for added stability. Six dovetail ridges rise from the top of the wall, supporting the hipped roof. A plaque inscribed "Taiwan's First School" hangs atop the fang, truly embodying the island's reputation as Taiwan's first Confucius Temple. Embedded in the left wall of the Dachengfang is a "dismounting tablet" welcoming visitors. A high, red wall surrounds the temple. Confucius lived during the Zhou Dynasty, and contemporary culture revered the color red. Crowns, robes, and palaces were adorned with this noble red, a color also found on the walls of the Confucius Temple.

Dacheng Hall: The high walls are also called "palace walls," a reference to an allusion in the Analects of Confucius: Zigong compared learning to "palace walls," his own walls reaching his shoulders, while Confucius's were several ren high. One ren is seven feet, and several ren is quite a height. Later generations even compared Confucius's knowledge to "the palace walls of the people." Passing the Pan Palace stone archway and the ten-thousand-ren palace walls, one enters the East Dacheng Archway and glimpses the beauty of the hall. The spacious and open space, with towering ancient trees, has earned the reputation of "Xingtan Summer Shade." The side of the archway once housed an official office and a land temple. Due to years of disuse, it is now a "Cultural Relics Exhibition Room," with an administrator's office located adjacent.

The Confucius Temple, also known as the "Confucius Temple," is a traditional courtyard building with three halls and two wings. It evolved according to the traditional temple-style layout of "school on the left, temple on the right," and "hall in front, pavilion in the back." However, through numerous renovations and the passage of time, some structures have been destroyed by natural disasters or war. For example, the Zhuzi Shrine, Lingxing Gate, the Professor's Pavilion, and the school office have all vanished, leaving only empty spaces. Most of what remains today is a reconstruction from 1917, the sixth year of the Taisho era (1917), largely maintaining the style and specifications of the Qing Dynasty. This temple is Taiwan's first Confucius Temple and a representative example of traditional Minnan-style architecture.

Minglun Hall: "Zuoxue" refers to Minglun Hall, located to the left of the Dacheng Hall in the Confucius Temple. It was the site of Taiwan's provincial academy. Here, incoming students received guidance from professors, cultivating their character and ambitions, and deliberating on policy. The banners above Minglun Hall's three gates read "Gate of Virtue," "Sacred Realm," and "Gate of Virtue." Passing through these gates and gazing upward, students are reminded of the Confucian emphasis on moral cultivation and the aspiration to sagehood through the spatial allusions.

Dacheng Gate and Dacheng Hall: Dacheng Gate is the most magnificent of the Confucius Temple's architectural complex. Its pillars are not inscribed with couplets, a design meant to avoid the scorn of "showing off before Confucius." Each pair of door panels is adorned with 108 nails. Nine is the ultimate yang number, and multiples of this represent the temple's majesty and reverence, a distinction worthy of an emperor. At each end of the Dacheng Hall's main ridge are two "scripture cylinders," also known as "pillars reaching heaven," symbolizing Confucius's virtue, equal to heaven and earth, and his teachings, which transcend time and space. Eight bells hang from the four corners of the double-eaved eaves, signifying that Heaven will use Confucius as a wooden bell to awaken the world.

Wenchang Pavilion: Wenchang Pavilion, also known as "Kuixing Tower", is located to the left and rear of Minglun Hall. It is the only tower-shaped building in the Confucius Temple complex.

Pangong Stone Archway: "Pangong" symbolizes the location of a school. Students admitted through the county examination and entering the school (Pangong) were called "shengyuan." "Entering the Pan," "visiting the Pan," "picking celery," or "traveling on the Panshui" all refer to students' matriculation. The Pangong Stone Archway was originally the outermost entrance to the Tainan Confucius Temple. During the Japanese colonial period, it was moved eastward due to the construction of Nanmen Road. It now faces Dacheng Archway, the "First School in Taiwan," across Nanmen Road from the Confucius Temple.