Analects 18.3: 微子 (Wei Zi)
Confucius and his disciples · Classical Chinese original · new English translation and commentary by Text Atlas
Overview
Book 18 places different responses to failed public life beside one another. Withdrawal, continued service, and fatal protest can all receive praise, while Confucius himself leaves when employment fails or court duties are neglected. The long encounters with a singer, two plowmen, and an old farmer turn departure into an argument: can personal integrity be preserved by leaving the human world behind? Confucius insists on human company, and Zilu defends duty even without the prospect of success. The later judgments distinguish kinds of withdrawal; a dispersal of musicians and advice about employing people return the question to the relationships that sustain public life.
Analects 18.3
齊景公待孔子、曰、若李氏、則吾不能、以李孟之閒待之。曰、吾老矣、不能用也。孔子行。
Duke Jing of Qi spoke of how he would treat Confucius: “I cannot give him the standing of the head of the Ji family. I will give him standing between the heads of the Ji and Meng families.” He also said, “I am old; I cannot employ him.” Confucius left.
Commentary
politics Standing without employment The duke first measures Confucius against the Ji and Meng families, then says he cannot employ him. The movement is from relative standing to the absence of actual service. Confucius leaves after this second statement. 用 takes the person as its implied object; Legge instead makes the object Confucius’s teachings.
Basis: translation-comparison
Confidence: medium
source variant Ji in two forms The Chinese displayed here uses 李 in both family references; the Chinese comparison text has 季 in both places. The English uses Ji for 季, agreeing with Legge’s identification of the family. The displayed 李 remains visible.
Basis: translation-comparison
Confidence: high