Analects 8.2: 泰伯 (Tai Bo)
Confucius and his disciples · Classical Chinese original · new English translation and commentary by Text Atlas
Overview
Book 8 places personal conduct beside the use and relinquishment of power. Taibo’s yielding opens the book; praise of Shun, Yu, Yao, and Zhou closes it. Between these stands a sequence in Master Zeng’s voice, beginning in illness and extending to the lifelong burden of humaneness. Ritual gives qualities their measure, while poetry and music form a person’s response. Learning is tested against talent, salary, public service, and withdrawal. The book ends with Yu’s choices: little for personal comfort, full care for ritual and waterworks.
Analects 8.2
子曰、恭而無禮則勞、慎而無禮則葸、勇而無禮則亂、直而無禮則絞。君子篤於親、則民興於仁、故舊不遺、則民不偷。
The Master said, “Respect without ritual becomes toil; caution without ritual becomes timidity; courage without ritual becomes disorder; uprightness without ritual becomes harshness. When those in high positions are devoted to their kin, the people are stirred to humaneness. When they do not neglect old friends, the people do not grow callous.”
Commentary
ritual Ritual gives qualities their measure Respect, caution, courage, and uprightness each become harmful without ritual. The four repeated conditions show ritual shaping the exercise of a quality: respectful effort becomes toil, caution shrinks into fear, courage disrupts, and uprightness can turn harsh. Courage without measure returns in the warning about disorder later in the book.
Basis: textual-inference
Confidence: high
politics Leading through durable attachments 君子 stands opposite 民, the people, so “those in high positions” follows the political reading also taken by Legge. Their conduct toward kin and old friends becomes an example others follow. 偷 here is the thinning of concern for others: the contrast is between enduring attachments and callousness.
Basis: translation-comparison
Confidence: medium