誠、信二字，古義互通。誠與信起初既為事天致神的宗教性私德，又是維繫社群存續發展的關鍵公德。孔子處春秋末季，親見禮崩樂壞，信義淪喪，畢生致力恢復周禮，重建秩序。因此孔門教學，對「信」義的強調、闡發與踐行，尤為著力。《論語》中涉及「信」義的篇章甚多，其核心內涵涉及修己為學、立身交遊及為政治世幾個層面，彼此貫通，統合儒家的道德規範、社會倫理及政治哲學。兼具個體私德及社會公德屬性的誠信，可為道德體系與法治體系的重要交集與連結，也是需要立足傳統、因應現實加以重建，以維繫社會健康運作的關鍵機制。

The original connotations of cheng (誠, sincerity) and xin (信, trustworthiness) are mutually referred in classical Chinese, which refer not only to the personal religious virtue in serving the Heaven and Gods but also to the key ethics in maintaining the existence and development of a society. Lived in the last phase of the Spring and Autumn Period and thus witnessed the collapse of social rituals and loss of trustworthiness, Confucius devoted his whole life into the restoration of the rites of Zhou and the reconstruction of an ideal social order, he therefore attached great significance in explicating and practicing the true meaning of being trustworthy. In The Analects, there are plenty of quotations about “xin” with its core implications concerning to the inter-connected aspects of self-cultivation, social contacts, and statecraft, which integrate the Confucian moral codes, social ethics, and political philosophy. As both personal virtue and social ethics, chengxin (誠信) functions as a crucial connection between moral system and legal system. It is also a key mechanism to be re-constructed based on tradition and reality so as to maintain a heathy society.