Guōdiàn Chǔjiǎn · Yǔcóng Sān 郭店楚簡·語叢三
Bamboo Slips from the Chu Tomb at Guodian — Miscellaneous Sayings, Third Collection
About the work
Yǔcóng Sān 語叢三 (“Miscellaneous Sayings, Third Collection”) is one of four collections of philosophical maxims recovered from tomb 1 at Guōdiàn 郭店, Jīngmén 荊門, Húběi, excavated in 1993 and sealed around 300 BCE. Designated the seventeenth text (Guōdiàn Chǔjiǎn shíqī 郭店楚簡十七) in the editio princeps, it preserves a single section of aphoristic sayings focused primarily on social ethics, the distinction between natural and acquired moral dispositions, and the nature of proper conduct toward ruler (jūn 君) and father (fù 父). It is the shortest of the four Yǔcóng collections.
Abstract
Yǔcóng Sān is an anonymous anthology of miscellaneous moral maxims without attributed author or received-tradition parallel. Its sayings are terse and often gnomic, resisting continuous paraphrase; they are best understood as working notes on Confucian ethics rather than as an integrated argument.
The collection opens with a sustained meditation on the relationship between ruler and father: the ruler is “like a father” in the sense that one does not hate either; but the relationship to the ruler differs in that one may leave the ruler’s service if the relationship is unsatisfactory (bù yuè kě qù 不悅可去) or if injustice is imposed (bù yì ér jiā zhū jǐ, fú shòu 不義而加諸己，弗受). Friendship (yǒu 友) and ruler-and-subject are likened in their structure: both are chosen relationships, unlike the unchosen relationship with father.
The text then offers a catalogue of social behaviors that yield benefit (yì 益) and harm (sǔn 損): benefiting from association with the righteous, the grave, and those who practice habit and rule; being harmed by association with the improper, the unlearned, and by showing one’s capacities. The self-revelation of inadequacy is beneficial; the self-display of capability is harmful — a counterintuitive maxim consistent with the Confucian emphasis on modesty.
A series of reflections on moral categories follows: rén 仁 (benevolence) is the “tip of thickness” (始端 for the cultivation of virtue); yì 義 (righteousness) is the advance of virtue (dé zhī jìn 德之進); love (ài 愛) is benevolence; yì is “dwelling in it” (chǔ zhī 處之); lǐ is “acting upon it” (xíng zhī 行之). The text stresses that not choosing well is not wisdom; not equipping oneself with all things is not benevolence. Love of kin is the “method of loving others.”
The closing portion becomes increasingly fragmentary, with lacunae (│) suggesting a damaged original: references to avoiding obstinacy (wú gù 毋固), self-centeredness (wú wǒ 毋我), and compulsion (wú bì 毋必) echo the famous Lúnyǔ 論語 9.4 characterization of Confucius’s fourfold avoidance (勿意，勿必，勿固，勿我). Other closing aphorisms invoke the Lúnyǔ 7.6 passage “志於道，狎於德，依於仁，遊於藝” (“Set the will on the Dao, be familiar with virtue, rely on benevolence, take recreation in the arts”), suggesting awareness of a proto-Lúnyǔ tradition or a common sayings-collection from which the Lúnyǔ also drew.
The editio princeps is Jīngménshì Bówùguǎn 荊門市博物館, 《郭店楚墓竹書》 (Wénwù, 1998), with slips designated no. 17 in the collection.
No tiyao found in source.
Translations and research
- Cook, Scott, tr. The Bamboo Texts of Guodian: A Study and Complete Translation. 2 vols. Cornell East Asia Series, 2012. — full translation and commentary.
- Holloway, Kenneth. Guodian: The Newly Discovered Seeds of Chinese Religious and Political Philosophy. OUP, 2009.
- Li Ling 李零. Guōdiàn Chǔjiǎn jiàodú jì 郭店楚简校读记. Enl. ed. Rénmín dàxué, 2007.
- Liu Zhao 刘钊. Guōdiàn Chǔjiǎn jiàoshì 郭店楚简校释. Fújiàn rénmín, 2003.
- Chan, Shirley, ed. Dao Companion to the Excavated Guodian Bamboo Manuscripts. Springer, 2019.
Other points of interest
The parallel between Yǔcóng Sān’s closing aphorisms and Lúnyǔ 9.4 and 7.6 is textually significant. The Lúnyǔ 9.4 formulation (勿意，勿必，勿固，勿我) appears in Yǔcóng Sān as 毋意，毋固，毋我，毋必 — the same four items in a slightly different order, preceded by the pipe-character lacunae marker. This is evidence that these maxims circulated as common stock in late Warring States Confucian sayings-collections before being attributed to Confucius in the received Lúnyǔ, and supports the view that parts of the Lúnyǔ were compiled from earlier anthologies of this type.
Links
- Wikipedia (Guodian Chu bamboo slips): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guodian_Chu_bamboo_slips