Analects 12.21: 顏淵 (Yan Yuan)
Confucius and his disciples · Classical Chinese original · new English translation and commentary by Text Atlas
Overview
Book 12 asks how humaneness takes shape in conduct: self-mastery and ritual, care toward others, and words answerable to action. Its political exchanges test government through trust, the people’s livelihood, and the example of those who lead. Questions about clear sight and genuine accomplishment make understanding people more demanding than knowing their reputation. The account of promoting the upright brings that judgment into public service, while Zixia’s examples place the distancing of the inhumane beside the claim of reform. The closing sayings return to friendship as a practice of advice, restraint, learning, and support for humaneness.
Analects 12.21
樊遲從遊於舞雩之下。曰、敢問崇德、修慝、辨惑。子曰、善哉問。先事後得、非崇德與、攻其惡、無攻人之惡、非修慝與、一朝之忿、忘其身以及其親、非惑與。
Fan Chi was walking with the Master below Wuyu. He said, “May I ask how to elevate virtue, correct hidden faults, and recognize delusion?” The Master said, “A good question! Put the work first and the gain after—is that not elevating virtue? Attack your own faults, not the faults of others—is that not correcting hidden faults? For a moment’s anger, to forget yourself and put your parents at risk as well—is that not delusion?”
Commentary
translation A place for the walk 舞雩, Wuyu, names the place beneath which Fan Chi walks with the Master. Legge identifies the setting with rain altars and adds trees. Keeping the name in the English leaves that fuller scene in explanation. Fan Chi uses the occasion to join two questions already asked by Zizhang to a third, about hidden faults.
Basis: translation-comparison
Confidence: medium
ethics Work, faults, and anger The three answers shift attention in three ways: from gain to the work, from another person’s faults to one’s own, and from immediate anger to its consequences. 慝 suggests wrongdoing kept within or concealed. The last question joins forgetting oneself to reaching or involving one’s parents; “put your parents at risk” draws out that implication. 一朝 gives the anger a brief span, making its possible cost disproportionate.
Basis: textual-inference
Confidence: medium