This English version was translated from the Chinese original with AI assistance. The Chinese text is authoritative.
Many of the ancient maxims we know so well in daily life have often come to us through generations of quoting out of context, intentionally or not. Here are a few examples:
1. “While your parents are alive, do not travel far”
Original text: The Master said: “While your parents are alive, do not travel far; if you must travel, you must have a fixed destination.” (Analects, “Li Ren”)
Meaning: if you go traveling, you must tell them where you are going and why.
Comment: It’s not that you’re forbidden to go, see?…
2. “My life has a limit, but knowledge has no limit”
From the Zhuangzi, “The Secret of Caring for Life.” Many people have used it to encourage learners to treasure their time and study hard, but they overlook the sentence that follows: “To pursue the limitless with the limited is perilous.”
Meaning in brief: pursuing unlimited knowledge with a limited life is bound to fail.
Comment: In other words, don’t force yourself to do what can never be done…
3. “Think three times before acting”
Original text: “Ji Wenzi thought three times before acting. When the Master heard of it, he said: ‘Twice is enough.’” From the Analects, “Gongye Chang.”
Nowadays most people misunderstand it, thinking one should think things over three times or even more before doing anything.
Comment: Just do it
4. “Wine and meat pass through the gut; the Buddha stays in the heart”
The second half: “If people of the world imitate me, it is like entering the demonic path.” Spoken by the Chan master Daoji (the living Buddha Jigong).
This saying originally comes from a tragic and heroic story. It is said that when Zhang Xianzhong of the Ming dynasty attacked the city of Yu (Chengdu), he camped in a temple outside the city and forced the monks to eat meat. A monk named Poshan said: “As long as you promise not to massacre the city, I will eat meat.” Zhang Xianzhong agreed, and so Poshan ate while reciting this saying. He broke the precept to save the lives of the thousands of people in the city.
Jigong held that only great saints with great supernatural powers eat meat, and only in special circumstances, to save sentient beings. Jigong himself could eat two dead pigeons and then spit out two live ones. If you can do that too, go ahead and eat meat; if not, you had better keep the precepts honestly!
Comment: Ignorant mortals, never confuse the concepts. A cliff a lion can leap across will only kill a rabbit that tries.
5. “Old age brings forgetfulness”
“Old age brings much forgetfulness; only longing for you I never forget.” (Bai Juyi, “Written by Chance, Sent to Langzhi”)
Comment: Old Bai wanted to tell his wife something romantic: however old he grows, however much he forgets, he will never forget to miss her. He wasn’t saying that he had become senile with age! Why are kids so clueless these days?
6. “Building a cart behind closed doors”
Zhu Xi, Questions on the Four Books, juan 5: “The old saying ‘a cart built behind closed doors fits the ruts outside the door’ means that the methods are the same.”
It means that as long as the same specifications are followed, even a cart built behind closed doors will match the ruts on the road exactly when used. (In ancient times the distance between a cart’s two wheels was fixed; if it met the standard, it fitted the ruts.)
7. “Moistening each other with spittle”
Zhuangzi, “The Great and Venerable Teacher”: “Moistening each other with spittle is not as good as forgetting each other in the rivers and lakes.”
Comment: This is practically vernacular already… Sure enough, since ancient times the truth comes out in the second half!
