Analects 3.23: 八佾 (Ba Yi)
Confucius and his disciples · Classical Chinese original · new English translation and commentary by Text Atlas
Overview
Book 3 examines what gives ritual its authority and meaning. Household displays borrow the forms of rulers, while humaneness, restraint, grief, and reverence test what those forms can express. Questions about poetry, inherited rites, sacrifice, and music show understanding at work: a learner carries an image further, the Master asks about everything, and a musical whole holds its parts together. Rulers and ministers each receive a standard of conduct. The book ends by distinguishing beauty from goodness and by asking what high office, ritual, and mourning are worth without the qualities they require.
Analects 3.23
子語魯大師樂曰、樂其可知也、始作、翕如也、從之、純如也、繳如也、繹如也、以成。
The Master spoke about music to the chief musician of Lu: “Music can be understood. At the opening, the sounds gather together. As it unfolds, they blend, remain distinct, and flow without interruption, all the way to the close.”
Commentary
ritual Together, distinct, continuous The description moves from an opening in which sounds gather to an unfolding whole. 純 suggests blending or unity, and 繹 continuity. On the reading adopted here, distinct parts remain audible within that unity. The passage addresses the chief musician of Lu in the terms of a performance, giving the musical counterpart to the book’s attention to ordered action.
Basis: textual-inference
Confidence: medium
source variant A doubtful word in the music The Chinese here prints 繳, a character associated with cord. The Chinese Wikisource text reads 皦, “bright, clear”; the two characters share the sound element 敫. Legge’s “severally distinct” agrees with that sense. “Remain distinct” follows it within the sequence of gathering, blending, and continuity. The displayed Chinese keeps 繳.
Basis: translation-comparison
Confidence: medium