Analects 12.3: 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 12.3
司馬牛問仁。子曰、仁者其言也訒。曰、其言也訒、斯謂之仁矣乎。子曰、為之難、言之得無訒乎。
Sima Niu asked about humaneness. The Master said, “The humane person is reserved in speech.” “Reserved in speech—is that what you call humaneness?” The Master said, “Doing it is difficult. How could one speak of it without reserve?”
Commentary
ethics Why speech meets resistance Sima Niu repeats the answer as a challenge: can reserve in speech amount to humaneness? The Master grounds 訒, speaking with difficulty or reserve, in the difficulty of doing what is said. The reply turns a manner of speech into a relation between words and action. It leaves the work of humaneness larger than a verbal habit.
Basis: textual-inference
Confidence: medium