The Analects of Confucius

Confucius gives two students opposite answers to the same question. Zilu needs to slow down; Ran Qiu needs encouragement to act. He explains the difference in 11.22. Much of the Analects works this way: someone asks how to behave, and the answer depends on who's asking.

The Analects collects sayings and conversations attributed to Confucius and his circle. He didn't write it. Traditionally dated to 551 to 479 BCE, he lived as Zhou authority weakened and rival states competed for power. Early accounts describe a teacher who held office and sought rulers willing to employ him. They disagree about his career, and some were written centuries later.

The collection also took shape over generations. Early versions differed; one had twenty-two books. This reader follows the received text, the version handed down through later editions. We can't treat every conversation as a transcript of the historical Confucius.

A recurring question is how to become a junzi, usually translated as a gentleman or an exemplary person. The word carries an association with noble birth, but the book repeatedly judges people by their conduct. You learn from others, practice what you've learned, and correct your mistakes. In 2.4, Confucius describes a lifetime of this work, from beginning to learn at fifteen to following his desires without overstepping at seventy.

Ren, often translated as humaneness, is central to that work. Asked what it means, Confucius says to love people (12.22). Elsewhere he says to restrain yourself and return to ritual (12.1), or to help others establish themselves as you would wish to establish yourself (6.30). When asked for a single lifelong guide, he names shu, reciprocity: don't impose on others what you wouldn't want yourself (15.24).

Li, ritual, includes ancestral sacrifice and court ceremony, but also ordinary manners. How you care for a parent matters as much as whether you provide food (2.7). At a funeral, real grief matters more than a polished performance (3.4). The forms are supposed to teach respect. Confucius also asks what ritual is worth without humaneness (3.3).

Poetry and music belong to this education too. Students learn the Odes, a collection of old poems they can use in conversation and public life. In 8.8, Confucius puts poetry, ritual, and music together as parts of a person's formation. He enjoys music himself: after hearing the Shao, the text says, he didn't notice the taste of meat for months (7.14).

His politics depends heavily on the ruler's example. Punishment can make people evade the law; virtue and ritual are supposed to give them a sense of shame (2.3). A ruler must act as a ruler and a father as a father (12.11): a title brings obligations. This demand to make names fit their use is explicit in 13.3. The book also allows opposition: a minister should contradict a ruler openly (14.22), and a son should gently correct a parent (4.18). That still leaves a question about protection when those in power refuse correction.

The hierarchy still has hard consequences. In 13.18, Confucius places uprightness in fathers and sons concealing each other's wrongdoing. 17.25 groups women with xiaoren, translated here as servants or petty people, and calls them difficult to deal with. The second term is disputed; the dismissive treatment of women is there in the text.

Heaven, tian, also matters. Confucius says Heaven gave him his virtue (7.23), then cries that Heaven has bereaved him when Yan Hui dies (11.9). He puts serving people before questions about spirits and death (11.12), but he takes part in sacrifice. Calling him simply secular leaves too much out.

Zhu Xi's twelfth-century Four Books curriculum helped make the Analects central to education in China, Korea, and Japan. That later tradition developed arguments this book leaves open. Here, even a short line can admit different readings. The notes below offer a reading of each passage; the translations let you check it.

The notes offer a reading of each passage. Legge is the only complete English text here. Muller appears for most passages; the other editions are selected excerpts. Numbering follows the Chinese Text Project, alongside its Chinese text. Other editions sometimes divide passages differently.