The Analects: Twelve Chapters

In the final years of the Spring and Autumn period, ritual crumbled and music fell into ruin. In a shabby alley in the state of Lu, a young man from humble beginnings began a lifetime of questioning. His name was Kong Qiu, courtesy name Zhongni. His father died when he was three, and his mother when he was seventeen. He worked as a minor official overseeing the granaries, then as a keeper of cattle and sheep. He had no illustrious family, no vast fiefdom, no powerful position to rely on. All he had were scroll after scroll of bamboo slips and a mind that refused to stop thinking. He studied, devoting himself to learning at fifteen and following his heart without crossing the line at seventy. He never stopped. He taught: beneath the apricot trees, he had three thousand disciples. He cared nothing for their social standing; if they were willing to learn, he was willing to teach. He traveled with a group of disciples through Wei, Chen, Cai, Song, and Chu. Trapped between Chen and Cai, they went seven days without food, yet never stopped singing to the strings. He asked questions about benevolence, ritual, governance, and the gentleman, asking what it meant to live as a human being ought to. The twelve chapters of the Analects, from “To learn and practice what is learned from time to time” to “Do not worry that others do not know you,” comprise only a few hundred words, yet they capture the essence of Confucius’s life. They do not recount his achievements, only the words he spoke: about learning, self-cultivation, filial piety and fraternal duty, integrity, and the way of the gentleman. Yet over the past two thousand five hundred years, countless people have recited, practiced, and passed on these words, making them an everlasting light in the spiritual world of the Chinese people. This is not a book. It is one man’s answer to what it means to be human, found amid a chaotic age. “To learn and practice what is learned from time to time, is that not a pleasure? To have friends come from afar, is that not a joy? To remain unresentful when others do not know you, is that not the mark of a gentleman?” The apricot trees at the lecture grounds have long since withered, yet the young people who study beneath them continue to appear, generation after generation.