Confucian Analects, The Great Learning \u0026 The Doctrine of the Mean by Confucius

Confucian Analects, The Great Learning \u0026 The Doctrine of the Mean Reviews

• 
  Lewis Weinstein

  thoughtful assertions and questions ... worth thinking about ... so different from Mao's nonsense
  
  ... The Master said, “To rule a country of a thousand chariots, there must be reverent attention to business, and sincerity; economy in expenditure, and love for men; and the employment of the people at the proper seasons.”
  
  ... Chi K’ang asked how to cause the people to reverence their ruler, to be faithful to him, and to go on to nerve themselves to virtue. The Master said, “Let him preside over them with gravity—then they will reverence him. Let him be final and kind to all—then they will be faithful to him. Let him advance the good and teach the incompetent—then they will eagerly seek to be virtuous.”
  
  ... the ruler will first take pains about his own virtue. Possessing virtue will give him the people. Possessing the people will give the territory. Possessing the territory will give him its wealth. Possessing the wealth, he will have resources for expenditure. Virtue is the root; wealth is the result.
• 
  Bernard

  Rereading these works. This version has material I haven't seen. Great stuff to live by - The Way of the Mean.
• 
  James Henderson

  Over the past few weeks I considered, meditated upon and read the classic translation of Confucius by James Legge entitled, Confucian Analects, The Great Learning and The Doctrine of the Mean. All works distilled over centuries from the teachings of Confucius who lived from 551 to 479 B.C.
  
  Elias Canetti summed it up neatly: "The Analects of Confucius are the oldest complete intellectual and spiritual portrait of a man. It strikes one as a modern book." It also strikes this reader as a very un-western book and difficult to decipher. In spite of that there is a lot that Confucius' thought has in common with the wisdom of the west. One of the most famous doctrines is that of "reciprocity".
  
  15.24 Zigong asked: "Is there any single word that could guide one's entire life?" The Master said: "Should it not be reciprocity? What you do not wish for yourself, do not do to others." (Simon Leys trans., p 77)
  
  
  That is complementary to the more familiar "Golden Rule" that says one should "do unto others as one would have them do unto you." From reading the aphorisms one comes away with an appreciation for culture, family and what seems to be a conservative view of man. It also is a very humane, even humanistic, view of society.
  Apparently this was just what was needed during the lifetime of Confucius as there was great change in his society. He lived during a period of acute cultural crisis. Confucius, like thinkers in the West from Socrates to Gandhi, demonstrated a confidence that in turn drew followers to him and his thought. We can thank them for what little of Confucius' thought that we have. In these books and fragments we have the distillation of his thought and it impresses me as worth meditating on. It is a treasure of humanity.
• 
  Alex

  Confucius left me severely underwhelmed. I didn't have any concrete expectations when I picked this book up, but I can say that I did expect more.
  
  My first problem is with Confucius' method. He has a few things to say on learning, at least, although his epistemics are frustratingly vague and with few practical precepts, but he doesn't seem to apply any logical method to his reasoning. Nor does he apply a dialectical method like
  Mencius did. Another method he could've used was that of
  Lao Tzu, who, while hardly arguing in the logically stringent manner of the hellenic tradition, presented cosmology, metaphysics and ethics in such a way that you could see how he drew his conclusions from the one field to the other. Indeed, Confucius did something similar when he grounded his politics in his ethics. In his view, social relations in the state should mirror those within the family, with the emperor loving his subjects like children and the subjects obeying the father like good sons. Confucius made a lot of filial piety, too much, I think. That brings me to how his argument from ethics isn't conclusive when he has no rational basis for his ethics.
  
  Confucius offers moral edification, but without talking about the transcendental nature of morality. He tells you the rules and how to follow them, but I don't think he ever talks about the "why". Why are these precepts the way they are? Why should I strive for a moral life? Why according to his way, and not to those of Lao Tzu or Mozi, for example? I don't blame Confucius for not defending his philosophy against these later teachers, but I will say his lack of argumentation left the door wide open for disagreement. What I find worse, however, is that Confucius gives the impression that his morality is indeed unthinking, suited for mechanistic imitation, and ultimately headed for heartless and soulless Phariseeism.
  
  On metaphysics or spirituality, Confucius is entirely silent. Nothing in these books relates to cosomology, and on the spiritual realm and the afterlife, we have one instance of Confucius evading the question of whether the ancestors are indeed alive, and we have one sentence to the effect that Confucius never talked about these things. Given how much Confucius makes of honoring and worshipping your ancestors, this silence confirms what I said above.
  
  As this book will no doubt be judged as an anthology of sayings rather than as a comprehensive treatise (and for good reason, as it is an anthology) I've selected a few, good and bad:
  

  The Master said, “What the superior man seeks, is in himself. What the mean man seeks, is in others.”

  
  This accords very well with an insight I gained thanks to
  Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn: To inferior men, being part of a mob is fulfilling. To a superior man, it is oppressing. The dynamics of the mass make up for a weakly developed conscience, but they have nothing to add to a strongly developed one.
  
  

  1. The Master said, “Ts‘ze, you think, I suppose, that I am one who learns many things and keeps them in memory?”
  2. Tsze-kung replied, “Yes,—but perhaps it is not so?”
  3. “No,” was the answer; “I seek a unity all-pervading.”

  
  Learning should not be about memorizing factlets, it's about anchoring what you learn to what you already know, in such a way that everything relates to everything else. Doing so means resolving contradictions, by correcting what you are learning, or what you have already learned. I don't know if this is what Confucius meant, but that is how I read these sentences and I fully agree.
  
  

  When a country is well governed, poverty and a mean condition are things to be ashamed of. When a country is ill governed, riches and honour are things to be ashamed of.

  
  It is popular these days (and not just these days) to complain about the rich. Confucius neatly describes when this may be appropriate and not just motivated by envy. I find John Rockefeller very respectable, but not some of today's crony capitalists.
  
  And here are two disagreeable ones:
  

  The Master said, “It is only the truly virtuous man who can love, or who can hate, others.”

  
  I believe the contradiction here to the teaching of our Lord is plain for everyone to see. You shouldn't hate others. Hate the sin, love the sinner. I hope the real meaning got lost in translation.
  
  

  The subjects on which the Master did not talk, were,—prodigious things, feats of strength, disorder, and spiritual beings.

  
  This is what I meant when I said that Confucius is silent on the transcendental. Also, I personally love hearing about "feats of strength".
  
  Overall, this book left me cold. It is entirely worldly, without deeper truths to offer. While Confucius easily rivals and often surpasses the best philosophers, lawmakers and religious figures west of China in influence, I wouldn't rank him as playing in the same league as them as far as quality goes. He is no Plato, nor, I suppose, a Mohammad or Buddha, figures with whom he is often mentioned in the same breath. With Moses, who was divinely inspired, or Christ Himself, no comparison is adequate.
• 
  Tyrel Sorensen

  I found The Analects and the Doctrine of the Mean to be tedious, murky, and outright boring. I assume that each of these is better in the original Chinese and that other, better translations exist. The Great Learning, on the other hand, was excellent. To it, I would assign four stars. Unfortunately, the two other works contained herein pulled the whole book down considerably for me.
• 
  Eric Smith

  I first read these works in either the fall of 1998 or the spring of 1999, and few works of philosophy or theory have ever so profoundly affected me. The idealism of Confucian thought and the way of thought and living it imbues, it's emphasis on liberal education​ and service, self-cultivation and rectification, values that are genteel without knightly pretensions.... all of these amaze me with each reconsideration. But it is the simple understanding of Confucius as to what the ordering principal of government should of right be that truly compels my admiration. Nature, Heaven, Earth all in their vastness cannot be understood but their will can, and that will is that human beings fulfill their nature, their natural potential, and that good government does that through doing what is right for the people while limiting the burdens on the people... anything else is wrong because it is exploitation and nature demands harmony, balance, equilibrium and exploitation, profiting from others in a way that is intentionally taking more from them than one gives, is manifestly imbalancing and unjust. A lot to chew on, and I haven't scratched​ the surface. There are perhaps twenty must-read works of political philosophy in the world: the Analects, Great Learning, and Doctrine of the Mean easily make that list.
• 
  Mart

  I’m giving 2 stars to the edition and 4 to Confucius, so that rounds up in 3 stars.
  Confucius has a coherent system of ideas that is mainly focused on the requisites, advantages and characteristics of a virtuous life. I think it is worthy of praise to be so self-aware and conscious of the importance and impacts of righteousness.
  As much as the main ideas of the text are clearly explained, I found the book hard to read in some parts. This could be due to the lack of explanatory notes or to the excess of names, titles, people, events and other particularities that are constantly referred to with no background whatsoever. I do think that this style makes up for a hard and disorienting read. In any case, I am willing to grant it the 2,500 years of age and the cultural distance, but that’s where notes or a sound introduction should make their appearance. Without them it’s hard to get a well rounded approach to these works. Only the main ideas are easily accessible and although they are indeed noteworthy and remarkable, I am disappointed not to have been able to access the whole content. I will be looking for a better edition as I was impressed by Confucius’ great ideas and personality and certainly want to explore him further.
• 
  Jeff

  Book #2 in 2012's survey of holy shit (#1 was
  Tao Te Ching).
  
  Simply put, virtually everything about this book was not what i wanted.
  
  The Dover edition of
  James Legge's translation provides same-page Chinese, English, and footnotes, which briefly allowed me to think i could learn some Chinese. Comprehension of some recurring nouns and verbs can be acquired through simple code/pattern recognition but live instruction would be better.
  
  After that brief excitement faded, only Confucian tedium remained. I slogged through ~70 uninspiring, mind-numbing pages of the Analects before desperately skipping to the Great Learning (TGL) and the Doctrine of the Mean (Mean Doc). I knew they were shorter so i wished and hoped (i almost prayed!) that they would also be livelier, juicier, or at least relevant to my belief that i was supposedly reading texts with religious value.
  
  My faulty anticipation of encountering spiritual insights lead directly to my dissatisfaction. How can millions allegedly belong to a Confucian religion? They ought to be proud of themselves for finding meaning in writings with so much vagueness. I conclude that Confucianism as a discipline or way of life depends more on what is conveyed within the guru-devotee relationship than on what can be gleaned as a private reader of a primary text or two. *sigh* Since that's probably true of every religion, how about we say it's more true of Confucianism than any others i can think of at the moment?
  
  Though Legge's copious prolegomena epitomize everything of value within this book—the history of Chinese political thought—these prefatory essays yielded no additional insights relevant to my search for meaningfulness in Confucianism as a religion. It's not you, Confucius; it's me (this reader contains the fault, not the author or his book).
  
  This Kung Fu-tzu guy was a very practical fellow. He believed in the here and now, not some mystical afterlife or metaphysical interaction with supernatural power(s). And i'm not the right guy for his book.
  
  Example of what's in Analects: The Master said, "The governments of Lû and Wei are brothers." (bk XIII, ¶vii [p.266])
  That's all. Nothing more. Discernible wisdom might be packed deep into that statement, but how many folks have knowledge capable of unpacking it? Even Legge's frustration comes through more than once, most notably to me in a footnote on p.418: "The whole chapter is eminently absurd, and gives a character of ridiculousness to all the magniloquent teaching about 'entire sincerity'."
  I'm the proverbial bad student/athlete: When the teacher/coach asks, "Son, what's your problem? Is it ignorance or apathy?," the kid replies, "Sir, i don't know and i don't care." I'm not really sure anymore, but maybe TGL boils down to

  If you know the extremes, then you will know the everything in between.

  Mean Doc = i definitely don't remember the gist. I flipped through the pages and skimmed my notes; it might be slightly more philosophical and moral in nature than Analects or TGL.
  
  I rarely agreed with anything written. I rarely cared to notate my quibbles marginally. Of the few quibbles that resulted in scribbles, i don't care to share even one.
  
  But i'm trying to be positive. Seriously: what preceded this is me trying to be positive. Or less negative. More effort. Here's some marginally noteworthy wisdom from Master Kung.
  
  Tsang said, "The doctrine of our master is to be true to the principles of our nature and the benevolent exercise of them to others,—this and nothing more."
  {Legge's footnote: The one thing or unity intended by Confucius was the heart, man's nature, of which all the relations and duties of life are only the development and outgoings.... [There is the] "center heart" = I, the ego; and the "as heart" = the I in sympathy with others. [Character 1] is duty-doing, on a consideration, or from the impulse, of one's own self; [Char 2] is duty-doing, on the principle of reciprocity. Confucius only claimed to enforce duties indicated by man's mental constitution. He was simply a moral philosopher.}
  (Analects, bk V, ¶ xv [pp. 169-170])
  
  The Master said, "To be poor without murmuring is difficult. To be rich without being proud is easy."
  (Analects, bk XIV, ¶ xi [p.279])
  
  "Without knowing the force of words, it is impossible to know men."
  (Analects, bk XX, ¶III.3 [p.354]. This is the ultimate sentence of the Analects.)
  
  [To this attainment of sincerity] there are requisite the extensive study of what is good, accurate inquiry about it, careful reflection on it, the clear discrimination of it, and the earnest practice of it.
  (Mean Doc, ch XX, ¶ 19 [p.413])
  
  By the way, i did go back and read the last 150pp of the Analects after reading all of TGL and Mean Doc.
  
  Next up in the survey of holy shit, Hinduism's
  Upanishads.
  
  +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
  The following is comprehensible only to a couple of my friends, so feel free to skip it.
  Dick Puzzle #3
  Tsang Wan kept a large tortoise in a house, on the capitals of the pillar of which he had hills made, with representations of duckweed on the small pillars above the beams supporting the rafters.—Of what sort was his wisdom?
  (Analects, bk V, ¶ xvii [p.179])
• 
  Dipped Died

  The best philosopher! You have simply got to read Confucius. He is essential. I loved this book and I love Confucius! Confucius is now one of my favourite philosophers. The book largely discusses virtue, righteousness and the qualities of the superior man etc. The book gets better towards the end in a crescendo as it describes how virtue and righteousness can be applied to the state and the masses of people as a whole by the ruler being righteous, respectful and virtuous etc. You definitely want to read this book!
• 
  Nicholas Wilhelm

  Gives a great blueprint of how to be respectful or virtuous. With benevolence, righteousness, propriety, empathetic understanding with wisdom, & dutifulness like loyalty to ritual... Everything is laid out and connected.
  
  The writings get very repetitious and what I believe is very specific to the Chinese government but helps to give the reader the understanding of the importance of the virtues.
  
  After seeing all the great Confucius quotes around, I'm glad I sat down to read this and receive a better understanding of the context behind them.
• 
  Bookreadingnarcissist

  Assumes the harmony of nature, assumes nature is good, assumes harmony is good - just nonsense. I've read probably 9 Chinese philosophical works now and they all suffer from similar problems. They all start with assumptions that can seriously be debated. Don't waste your time with this. 0/5
• 
  Ryan Enser

  I learned a lot studying these foundational books of traditional Chinese religion and morality.
• 
  Milo

  to say hes one of the greatest eastern philosopher of all time i was expecting a lot more.
• 
  Brian

  Not much I would argue with in here
• 
  Oldpa Payne

  Good read
  
  Good book, it just that I feel the Author was too opinionated at the beginning of the book. Ok read
• 
  James Bird

  It was ok. Not bad.