Analects 15.6: 衛靈公 (Wei Ling Gong)
Confucius and his disciples · Classical Chinese original · new English translation and commentary by Text Atlas
Overview
Book 15 tests exemplary conduct under pressure: hunger, going unrecognized, bad government, and the pull of clever speech. Its sayings ask how learning becomes judgment, how humaneness directs action, and how ritual gives that action form. The portraits of unwavering straightness and timely withdrawal leave room for different responses to public disorder. Praise must answer to examination, and responsibility repeatedly returns to oneself. Short assurances sit beside difficult tensions about reputation and the cost of humaneness. The book closes with the Master guiding a visitor through a room, giving the call for consideration a precise human setting.
Analects 15.6
子曰、直哉史魚、邦有道如矢、邦有道如矢。君子哉、蘧伯玉、邦有道、則仕、邦無道、則可卷而懷之。
The Master said, “How straight Scribe Yu is! When the state has the Way, he is like an arrow; when the state lacks the Way, he is like an arrow. What an exemplary person Qu Boyu is! When the state has the Way, he serves in office; when the state lacks the Way, he can roll it up and keep it close.”
Commentary
source variant With and without the Way The displayed text repeats 邦有道, “when the state has the Way,” in both clauses about Scribe Yu. The Chinese comparison text reads 邦無道, “when the state lacks the Way,” the second time; Legge’s English also contrasts good and bad government. The translation follows that contrast, with the printed Chinese left unchanged. The following description of Qu Boyu already has 有 and 無 in the displayed source.
Basis: translation-comparison
Confidence: medium
ethics Straightness and withdrawal 史 gives Yu his role as scribe. The arrow image praises unchanged straightness; Qu Boyu is praised for judging when to serve and when to withdraw. 卷而懷之 pictures rolling something up and keeping it close. Its object is left implicit: gifts, principles, or the capacity to serve can be held in reserve. The two examples leave room for different forms of exemplary conduct.
Basis: textual-inference
Confidence: medium