Analects 11.6: 先進 (Xian Jin)
Confucius and his disciples · Classical Chinese original · new English translation and commentary by Text Atlas
Overview
Book 11 studies the people around the Master through remembered companionship, distinct abilities, rebukes, and grief. The death of Yan Yuan brings intense mourning beside disputes over what a fitting burial requires. Other exchanges test how to judge character, when to act, and what limits service to a ruler must keep. The same advice cannot serve every temperament: one student needs encouragement, another restraint. In the long final conversation, four wishes reveal different ways of imagining a life. The Master’s approval of Dian’s spring outing remains beside his judgment that governing requires ritual and a willingness to yield.
Analects 11.6
李康子問弟子孰為好學。孔子對曰、有顏回者好學、不幸短命死矣、今也則亡。
Ji Kangzi asked which of the disciples loved learning. Confucius answered, “There was Yan Hui, who loved learning. Sadly, his life was short, and he died. Now there is no one like him.”
Commentary
ethics The empty place left by a learner The question asks who loves learning, and the reply names Yan Hui before announcing his death. “Now there is no one like him” makes the loss the measure of the present. The wording gives this death its weight through the loss of a particular kind of learner, preparing the mourning scenes that follow.
Basis: textual-inference
Confidence: high
source variant The questioner’s name The printed 李康子 corresponds to 季康子 in the Chinese comparison witness and to Chi K’ang in Legge. The English uses Ji Kangzi, retaining the final 子 in the name as given in Chinese. The displayed text keeps its printed 李.
Basis: sourced
Confidence: high