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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 4231403" data-attributes="member: 4937">Master Kung did not claim there existed a relationship between you and a stranger or enemy.  He did however provide a guide to benevolent behavior:"Do not do unto others what you would not have done unto you."But this formulation is expressively passive, as it asserts what behavior to avoid (murder, for example), but it doesn't exhort you to take any sort of particular action.  So, you might avoid cruelty, but there is no particular impetus toward charity unless you have a duty to the individual because of a relationship - in which case it is not charity.Of course, I'm not a scholar and haven't been instructed in the texts, but the critical point it would seem to me is how much value that Master Kung placed on forming friendships.  If you are under no obligation to create the friend relationship, you are also under no obligation to practice kindness to strangers.  It still might be advisable, but it would be a matter of rational self-interest at that point, and not a moral necessity.I leave the answer to that to an actual expert.</blockquote>