《南華真經口義》Vol. 9
About this page. The original text of 《南華真經口義》 Vol. 9 (Dongshen 洞神部, 32 volumes) is shown in Classical Chinese as transmitted in the Kanripo (Kyoto University) edition. An English interpretation of the 11 passages on this page accompanies it: select a passage or press “Interpretation” to show it. All texts in English
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Source textInterpretation
Zi Si, Zi Yu, Zi Li, and Zi Lai were together one day and said: “Whoever can take Non-being as the head, life as the backbone, and death as the tailbone—whoever truly understands that death, life, survival, and perishing are one single body—we will be friends with that person.” The four looked at one another and smiled; their hearts were in accord, and they became friends.
Before long Zi Yu fell ill. Zi Si went to see him. Zi Yu said, “How grand the Creator is—he is really making me into this shape: hunched and bent, with sores on my back and several open wounds, my chin tucked into my navel, my shoulders hunched higher than the crown of my head, my hair-knot pointing at the sky. Yin and Yang are out of balance and that is why I am ill—this is what is called having disordered affliction (youli).” Yet inwardly he was quite at ease and did not treat the illness as a burden. Leaning on his staff he went to the well to look at himself in the water and said, “Alas—the Creator is going to make me into this contracted, twisted form again.”
Zi Si asked, “Do you resent this?” Zi Yu said, “No—why should I resent it? Suppose my left arm were gradually turned into a rooster: I would use it to crow at dawn. Suppose my right arm were gradually turned into a sling: I would use it to shoot birds and roast them. Suppose my buttocks were gradually turned into wheels and my spirit into a horse: I would ride them wherever I went—what need would I have for any other carriage?” He also said, “To obtain is the work of timing; to lose is yielding to what must be. Resting in timing and standing in yielding—grief and joy cannot enter the heart. The ancients called this ‘suspended release’ (xuanjie), as when someone hanging upside down has the rope cut. Those who cannot release themselves are bound by outward things. Moreover, outward things cannot overcome Heaven’s mandate. This has been so for a long time—why should I resent it?”
Gist of Lin Xiyi’s oral commentary: Head, backbone, and tailbone simply mean from beginning to end, from first to last; “non-being” comes first, “being” comes after; only once there is “being” do life and death arise. The four being “in perfect accord in heart” means each had awakened and they matched one another. The lines such as “How grand the Creator is” describe the sick body: qu-lu is bending at the waist; fa-bei is sores on the back; wu-guan are the ulcer openings; the chin hidden in the navel and shoulders higher than the crown depict the distorted form; ju-zhui is the hair-knot, and “pointing at the sky” means a bald, exposed crown. Yin and Yang not in harmony produces illness, called youli. “Nothing in the mind” means not taking the sickness as worry; bian-duo is dragging the ill body as one walks. Sighing while looking into the well is still saying the Creator has made him contracted and twisted. Zi Yu’s answer “why should I resent it?” and the three “gradually suppose” passages mean going along with transformation and not being burdened by the bodily form. Gain, loss, timing, and yielding, together with “suspended release,” mean accepting fate and penetrating life; things do not overcome Heaven, hence no resentment.
(Continued from above) This is also asking you: would you hate being turned into something else? Zishi is pressing the point in a playful way. “Jianjia” (gradually, as if) means suppose, little by little. This passage is most striking: with that single notion of “gradually,” the mood becomes unusual—suppose the Creator slowly reshaped my body into something else, I would go along with that change and use that new form. That is following the transformations of creation without picking favorites. Though it is parable, it still makes sense: when the time comes, you meet it; when it passes, you yield. It is the same theme as “when the season arrives, welcome it; when it goes, follow”—still about the principle of life and death.
Xuanjie (suspended release): the mind is not tied down, not clinging. If you are bound by outer things, you cannot free yourself—hence “cannot release yourself.” Wu you jie (things have knots): all things are tangled in attachments; how could they surpass Heaven? All of this means settling into what is natural; the “Heaven of nature” here is the same “Heaven,” the same “Great Ancestor,” spoken of in The Great Ancestor (Dazongshi).
Master Yuexuan once said: In Zhuangzi’s thirty-two chapters, the heart of the matter is nothing but the two words “ziran” (naturalness).
Before long, Zilai fell gravely ill, gasping hard, near death. His wife and children gathered around him weeping. Zili came to see him and said, “Get out! Do not startle the one who is about to transform!” Then he leaned on the door and spoke with him:
“How vast, O transformation of things! What will it make you into next? Where will it send you? Will it turn you into a rat’s liver, or an insect’s arm?”
Zilai said, “When parents tell their children to go east, west, south, or north, the children can only obey. Yin-Yang and the transforming process are even closer to us than parents. If it wants me to die and I refuse, that is rebellion—what fault would transformation have? The Great Clod (the vast furnace of heaven and earth) gave me a body, used life to wear me out, used age to give me ease, used death to give me rest. So whoever knows how to arrange my living also knows how to arrange my dying.
Now, when the great smith smelts metal in the furnace, if the metal leaps up and cries, ‘I must become a sword like the Mo Ye blade!’ the smith will surely take it for ill-omened metal. Once a person has received human form and keeps insisting ‘I must stay human, stay human,’ the transforming process will also see an ill-omened person. Now that we take heaven and earth as the great furnace and transformation as the great smith, what destination, what new shape, could not be acceptable?”
To perish is like sinking into sleep; to awaken is like dying as if asleep and waking as if from a dream, suddenly clear.
(Notes on wording)
Zengzi’s deathbed change of mat (yi ze) illustrates the learning of the sages; Zhuangzi’s discussion here also carries a heroic boldness.
- Chi: to scold, to shout down.
- Bi: to make wife and children step back.
- Da: alarm, fear—the idea is not to frighten the one about to transform with weeping.
- Rat’s liver, insect’s arm: the tiniest of forms, a metaphor that creation may shape you into any minute thing.
Zilai hands life and death to the “great smith,” unlike Zengzi’s ritual propriety at the end; Zhuangzi uses his characters to voice another path: accepting fate and following transformation—not clinging to human form, not hating death, not panicking at change.
What was said above belongs to the kind of discourse exemplified by Zhao Zhou’s remark that after the fire only a single reed of thatch remained. The line “only follow what fate commands—if I do not obey, that is defiance” still carries the earlier theme that things cannot overcome Heaven (tian); the image of casting metal is equally striking—Jia Yi’s “Yin and Yang as charcoal, the myriad things as copper” grows out of the same line of thought. If gold could speak and pass judgment on people, people would surely find it uncanny; the Creator (zaowuzhe) looks upon people as the master smelter looks upon metal. Analogies of this sort—who but Zhuangzi could have written them?
“Chengran” describes settling peacefully into sleep; “juran” describes waking with a start—treating birth as sleep and death as awakening. The six characters that follow are precisely how that passage gathers the marvel of the preceding authentic text.
Zisang Hu, Mengzi Fan, and Ziqin Zhang became friends. They said: Who can keep company with one another yet hold no thought of “keeping company”? Who can act for one another yet do so in the spirit of Wuwei (non-action)? Who can ascend to Heaven, wander in the mist, roam free without limit, and in the course of life forget one another without end? The three looked at one another and smiled, their hearts in accord, and thus became friends.
Before long Zisang Hu died. He had not yet been buried. When Confucius heard of it, he sent Zigong to assist with the funeral. Mengzi Fan and Ziqin Zhang were weaving mats for the bier and playing the lute, singing back and forth:
Alas, Zisang Hu! Alas, Zisang Hu!
You have returned to the true state (zhen), while we remain among the living!
Zigong stepped forward quickly and asked, “Singing facing the corpse—is that in accord with ritual (li)?” The two looked at each other and smiled. “You do not yet understand the real meaning of ritual!”
Notes on key phrases
- Xiangyu yu wu xiangyu (“associate in non-association”): to meet in friendship without clinging to the thought “I am befriending you.”
- Xiangwei yu wu xiangwei (“act for one another in non-acting”): to help one another in Wuwei, without clinging to “I am doing something for you.”
- Raotiao: a leaping, carefree manner; wuji: without boundary or end.
- Dengtian youwu (“ascend Heaven and wander mist”): to roam beyond things, free of the burden of form and implements.
- Xiangwang yi sheng, wu suo zhongqiong (“forget one another in life, without end”): as in the earlier “do not seek where it ends”—in life they forget one another and do not chase a final terminus.
- Moran: a calm, empty stillness; youjian: a brief interval.
- Wang daishi: to go and attend to funeral matters (in the same spirit as Yuan Rang preparing his own coffin).
- Bian qu: weaving mats for the bier; yi: a modal particle in the song; jielai: the sigh that opens the chant; fan qi zhen (“return to the true”): return to the original, authentic state.
Modern Interpretation
These are the striking points in the original passage. “The meaning of ritual” (li yi) refers to the root of ritual itself. Zhuangzi is speaking in parable, yet Yuan Rang’s “Fox-head” song in the Book of Rites shows that from antiquity there has been this path of leaving the world behind and cutting off vulgar ties. People today often say Buddhism only reached China under Emperor Ming, unaware that such persons did not need to wait for Buddhist learning to exist.
Zi Gong returned and told Confucius: “What sort of man was that? In cultivation he has nothing to show as virtue, yet outwardly he still wears a body; he sang facing the corpse and his color never changed—there is no name that rightly fits him.” Confucius said: “He is one who roams outside the square (fang wai)—the domain beyond convention—while I, Qiu, roam inside the square (fang nei), within the world of norms. When inner and outer do not align, yet I sent you to offer condolence, I was crude and shallow. He makes the Creator of things his companion and wanders in the single qi of heaven and earth. He treats birth as an appended excrescence or hanging wart, and death as the lancing of a boil or the bursting of a sore—the sense of ‘toil me with life, rest me with death.’ ‘Borrowing from diverse things’ is the teaching of earth, water, fire, and wind in the Complete Enlightenment Sutra: the four greats combine into a body, hence ‘entrusted to the same body.’ Liver and gall, ears and eyes—he forgets and casts them all away. He turns through end and beginning without knowing where it starts or stops, drifting beyond the dust of the world, at ease in the work of wuwei (non-action). How could he willingly fuss over the worldly rites of li, just to perform for the crowd’s eyes and ears?”
Commentary on the Nanhua Zhenjing Kouyi (Oral Explanations of the True Scripture of Southern Florescence) in Plain Language
“The eyes themselves do not know”—that is the meaning of “forgetting the body.”
The eyes do not know on their own—that is what “forgetting the body” means.
Going back and forth between beginning and end, yet unable to see where things start.
One turns over beginning and end but cannot find the thread. It means clinging only to “root and branch” while missing the very first impulse.
To seek the origin and grasp the outcome, yet never glimpse the initial moment.
It speaks of wanting to exhaust the root and settle the end, yet never seeing that first thought.
“Wandering”: the sense of drifting and floating; “dazed”: the look of seeing and knowing nothing.
“Wandering” (panghuang) is floating and roaming; “dazed” (mangran) is blank confusion—unable to see clearly or say what one knows.
“Beyond dust and grime” is “beyond the square” (outside worldly rites); “the work of wuwei” is what is natural.
“Beyond dust and grime” is the “beyond the square” (fang wai)—outside secular ritual and law; “the work of wuwei (non-action)” is following nature.
“Muddled and confused”: the look of dulling oneself; acting for the ears and eyes of the world while performing ritual—only exhausting and befuddling oneself.
“Muddled and confused” (kuikuiran) is the appearance of dulling one’s own mind. Performing ritual to please worldly onlookers is nothing but pointless toil that leaves one confused.
This matches Laozi’s idea that “ritual is used to force the world.”
This aligns with Laozi’s sense that ritual is employed to coerce and prop up the age.
“Guan (to observe)” means “to display, to show.” (The note “sound guan” is for pronunciation.)
“Guan” means “to show” or “to display.” (“Sound guan” is a phonetic gloss.)
Zigong said: Then, Master, on which side do you rely—within the square or beyond it?
Zigong asked: Then, Master, what do you rely on and practice—within the square or beyond it?
Confucius said: I, Qiu, am one whom Heaven has marked for punishment. Even so, I will share it with you.
Confucius said: I, Kong Qiu, am one whom Heaven has branded (tian zhi lümin)—born bound by ritual and unable to dwell freely beyond the square. Nevertheless, I wish to go with you into the joy beyond the square.
Zigong said: May I ask the reason?
Zigong said: May I ask why?
Confucius said: Fish meet and sustain each other in water; people meet and complete each other in the Dao. Those who meet in water dig a pond and think they have enough; those who meet in the Dao are unoccupied and life settles of itself. Hence it is said: fish forget each other in rivers and lakes; people forget each other in the arts of the Dao.
Confucius said: Fish encounter and nourish one another in water; people encounter and fulfill one another in the Dao (the Way). For those who meet in water, digging a pool seems sufficient for survival; for those who meet in the Dao, with nothing to do, the mind naturally settles. Thus: fish forget one another in the great rivers and lakes; people forget one another in Daoist practice.
Zigong said: May I ask about the “eccentric person” (jiren).
Zigong said: May I ask what an “eccentric person” is.
He said: The eccentric is odd among people yet matched with Heaven. Hence: Heaven’s petty person is the world’s gentleman; the world’s gentleman is Heaven’s petty person.
The answer: the eccentric is one who diverges from ordinary people yet is aligned (mou) with Heaven. So: what Heaven counts as petty, people call a gentleman; what people call a gentleman, Heaven may count as petty.
“On which side do you rely?” means: does the Master rely and act within the square or beyond it?
“Which side do you rely on?” asks whether the Master’s reliance and conduct are fang nei (within the square) or fang wai (beyond it).
“One whom Heaven has marked for punishment” is the earlier “one under Heaven’s punishment”—the bonds of ritual are hard to loosen.
“Heaven’s branded one” is the same as the earlier “one under Heaven’s sentence”—the fetters of ritual are not easily released.
It means he admits he cannot yet be a full person beyond the square.
It means Confucius acknowledges he cannot yet be wholly a person of the beyond.
“I will share it with you” means he wants to speak with Zigong of the joy beyond the square.
“I will share it with you” expresses his wish to discuss with Zigong the freedom beyond worldly forms.
“May I ask the reason” is the same as asking for the grounds or rationale.
“May I ask the reason” is equivalent to asking for the principle behind it.
“Fish meet in water” carries the sense that “moistening each other with foam” is inferior to “forgetting each other in rivers and lakes.”
“Fish meet in water” alludes to the idea that saving each other with spit and foam is not as good as forgetting one another in the vast waters.
“Dig a pool and sustain them”—they still think they have enough.
Digging a pool to keep fish—they still believe their supply is adequate.
It means: once there is water, it does not matter how much—life goes on.
Having water, quantity does not matter—they can live.
One who has attained the Dao lives according to capacity; with nothing to do, the mind settles of itself—that is wuwei.
One who has the Dao lives as much as their measure allows; with no busyness, the heart steadies on its own—that is wuwei (non-action).
“Eccentric” (ji) means alone, singular—a person who stands apart; “mou” means to match, to align with.
“Ji” is solitary, different—one who is unlike others; “mou” is to join, to be in accord with.
Eccentric means not pairing with people, but matching Heaven.
To be eccentric is not to pair with the crowd, but to be in tune with Heaven.
What Heaven calls a gentleman, people may call a petty person; what people call a gentleman, Heaven may call a petty person.
By Heaven’s measure one may be a gentleman while people see a small man; by people’s measure one may be a gentleman while Heaven sees a small man.
Zhuangzi’s “gentleman” carries a tone of mocking sages and worthies.
In Zhuangzi, the “gentleman” often implies ridicule toward sages and the ritual order.
The drift is that ritual, music, law, and measure are not spontaneous nature; one must smash measures and break balances so people stop contending—only then is one Heaven’s gentleman.
The underlying point: rites, music, standards, and laws do not arise from nature; only by destroying bushels and breaking steelyards to stop strife does one become a gentleman in Heaven’s sense.
This too is the voice of one embittered by the age—hence an excessively lofty argument.
This is also the product of righteous anger at a corrupt world—hence an argument pitched too high.
Yan Hui asked Confucius: “Meng Sun Cai’s mother has died. He weeps but sheds no tears, feels no grief in his heart, and does not even seem sorrowful while keeping mourning observances. He lacks all three of the usual signs of mourning, yet in the state of Lu he enjoys the fine reputation of being ‘skilled at funeral rites.’ Can someone really win such a name without genuine feeling? Yan Hui has often found this puzzling.”
Confucius said: “Meng Sun has already taken the way of mourning rites as far as it can go; his attainment has advanced beyond ordinary ‘knowing.’ He wished to simplify the rites still further, yet could not simplify them to the end—in fact he had already simplified them greatly. Meng Sun neither understands how one comes to live nor how one comes to die; he does not cling to the beginning or to the end. He is like someone who transforms along with the myriad things, quietly awaiting a transformation that cannot be known in advance. Moreover, when change is about to occur, who can be sure it will not change? When no change is about to occur, who can be sure it has already changed? I fear that you and I are still people whose dream has not yet ended.”
Oral explanation (in plain language)
“Enjoying the reputation in Lu for skill in mourning” means he was famous throughout the state for being good at funeral rites. “壹” here means “always”—Yan Hui was constantly puzzled by this, and had wondered about it for a long time.
“Advanced beyond knowing” means his cultivation rose level by level until he had awakened to a higher principle. “Wished to simplify but could not get there” refers to matters in mourning custom such as weeping: he wanted to cut them down as much as possible, yet could not cut them away cleanly. Though he could not eliminate them entirely, what he actually did was already extremely spare—hence the line “he had already simplified a great deal.”
“Does not know how one comes to live, does not know how one comes to die” repeats that he never gets a firm grasp on life and death. “Knows the before, knows the after”—“before” is the start, “after” is the end; that is, he does not fixate on origin or terminus. To follow the transforming process and become one thing among the myriad is called “as if transforming into a thing”; “to await the transformation one cannot know” is to leave things to nature and not guess rashly. “已乎” is a particle of tone. Since one leaves things to nature, how can one know whether change is coming, has come, or will never come? Such language is Zhuangzi’s way of stirring and opening the reader’s mind. When the other party has already awakened and can leave things to nature, yet we still find it strange, that shows we are still in a dream and have not woken.
It is also said: the body may startle one because of the shift between youth and age (“startling the form”), yet the heart is not harmed; the heart is as if the sun dwells in its lodging (temporarily residing in this body), hence no clinging attachment in facing death (“no genuine feeling toward death”). “Feeling” here means stubborn, possessive attachment. Meng Sun simply realized that when others weep he weeps too—that is only following the crowd. That is exactly the portrait of “wanting to simplify yet not being able to.”
The following is a modern vernacular reading of this passage from the Kouyi (oral exegesis) on the Nanhua Zhenjing (the true scripture of Southern Florescence, i.e., the Zhuangzi). It follows the original order and explains the meaning; specialized terms are briefly glossed on first appearance.
On “cannot” and the six characters built from “thus”
The sense of “cannot” (不得) really hinges on reading three characters in sequence—“thus therefore” (所以乃)—as a unit of six characters; the reasoning is most unusual. The phrase “the subtlety of attaining it for oneself” (自得之妙) was meant to be put briefly, yet in the end it could not be shortened, so one had only to weep along with everyone else. This line is hardest to clarify, which is why in several editions the “thus” (乃) of the previous sentence and the “and” (且) of the next are forcibly read together—splitting and pairing two characters in that way is rather laughable.
“And yet we merely call each other ‘I’”
The scripture says: “And yet we merely call each other ‘I.’ How could you know what I mean by my ‘I’?”
Here “and” (且) simply adds the particle “also” (也) after “and”; this pattern appears several times in the earlier chapters. “I” (吾) means “me.” Since we are now together and already use “I” to reproach one another, how could you know what sort of “I” I mean when I say “I”? Hence Zhuangzi often says, “And yet we merely call each other ‘I’—how could you know what I mean by my ‘I’?” Zhuangzi’s writing is generally like this, with surging turns of phrase; unless the reader has a separate eye for it, the text is hard to follow.
Dreaming as a bird, dreaming as a fish
“And suppose you dream you are a bird and soar sharply heavenward, or dream you are a fish and sink into the deep abyss—do you know whether the one speaking now is awake or dreaming?”
To dream one is a bird and fly sharply in the sky, or dream one is a fish and plunge into the deep pool—that is the same line of thought as the earlier “butterfly transformation” (化蝶). Is the person speaking now awake or still in a dream? That is the question: did the butterfly dream it became Zhuangzi, or did Zhuangzi dream he became a butterfly?
“When rushing toward what suits you, there is no time even to laugh; when laughter is offered to you, there is no time even to arrange it.”
Sometimes one is so urgent in hurrying toward what is fitting that there is not even time to laugh—meaning the rush is too intense. Du Fu’s poem has “only after the shock subsides does one wipe away tears”; Master Yuexuan also said, “only when I could weep had the shock already settled”—there the subject is shock (惊). “Rushing toward what suits you” (造适) concerns joy (喜). Shock and joy differ, but the idea of “not yet in time for” is the same.
“Arrange” (排) means to set in order. Laughing because of external things is the thing “offering laughter” (献笑) to you; such laughter arises naturally and need not be deliberately arranged—hence “offered laughter cannot be arranged in time.” The word “arrange” (排) here and the “arrange” in the next line are the same character, but tone and thread differ; do not read it as one continuous clause with the word above.
What is arranged and “the vast unity of heaven”
Between the creations of the transforming process (造化), everything is already set in place: life and death, obscurity and success, gain and loss, fortune and calamity—all are already determined. One need only rest in the position assigned and go wherever transformation leads, and only then can one enter the subtle realm of transformation.
“Vast unity of heaven” (寥天一) means the transforming process (造化). “Vast” (寥) is remoteness and breadth. The “one” (一) in “vast unity of heaven” is the same “one” as in “whether he likes it or not, it is one”—Zhuangzi then turns it into a kind of proper name.
Main Idea of thePassage (Narrative Portion)
What Zhuangzi is “writing” with his brush here is the episode in which Yierzi goes to see Xu You.
Xu You asked, “What did Yao send you for?” Yierzi said, “Yao told me I must personally practice benevolence and righteousness, and speak clearly to distinguish right from wrong.”
Xu You said, “Then why have you come at all? Yao has already tattooed your face with benevolence and righteousness, and cut off your nose with right and wrong. How can you still roam on that vast road of carefree release, arbitrary drift, and ceaseless transformation?”
Yierzi said, “Even so, I still wish first to walk a little within his outer courtyard.”
Xu You said, “No. A blind man cannot appreciate the beauty of brows and features; a deaf man cannot appreciate the splendor of blue, yellow, brocade, and embroidery.” (Meaning: you lack the foundation; you cannot hear these teachings.)
Yierzi said, “Wuzhuang lost his beauty, Jubang lost his courage, and the Yellow Emperor lost his wisdom—all these transformations happened within the furnace and hammer. How could I know that the Maker of things does not think my tattoo insufficient, and will mend the wound of my severed nose, so that I may ride this completion and follow the Master?”
Xu You said, “Alas, that is still uncertain. Let me tell you roughly: my teacher—my teacher! He orders the ten thousand things yet does not deem himself righteous; his grace extends through ten thousand generations yet he does not deem himself benevolent; he is older than high antiquity yet does not deem himself aged; he covers and bears heaven and earth, carves and shapes the myriad forms, yet does not deem himself skillful—that is the realm in which he roams.”
Plain-Language Oral Commentary
- 资汝 (zi ru): to teach you.
- 明言是非 (ming yan shi fei): to clarify and speak plainly about distinguishing right from wrong.
- 为 (wei): a particle with no independent meaning.
- 軹 (zhi): also a particle.
- 奚来为 (xi lai wei): why come at all?
- 黥、劓 (qing, yi): tattooing and cutting off the nose—metaphors for how Yao’s “benevolence and righteousness” and “right and wrong” have marred and defiled you, as if you were morally disfigured by such teaching.
- 遥荡、恣睢、转徙 (yao dang, zi sui, zhuan xi): the same idea as the earlier “roaming boundlessly in the infinite” and “wandering beyond the dust and grime”—carefree expansiveness, free roaming, and unceasing change.
- 藩 (fan): fence or outer enclosure; here, the periphery of a courtyard. He dares not seek the inner hall, but only hopes to hear something general from beyond the fence.
Below, the metaphors of blindness and deafness mean you lack the aptitude to hear the Way.
- 无庄 (Wu Zhuang): a figure famed in antiquity for beauty.
- 据梁 (Ju Liang): a figure famed in antiquity for courage.
The point is that one with the Way can transform you so that the beautiful no longer know they are beautiful, the brave no longer know they are brave, and the wise no longer know they are wise—shedding old habits and awakening to oneself. All of this turns in a single shift of mind, hence “all lie within the furnace and hammer.”
- 乘成 (cheng cheng): to act by riding the principle of nature.
- 自然之理 (zi ran zhi li): to cast off past habits and act according to nature, in order to follow the Master.
Xu You says “still uncertain,” then describes “my teacher”: he orders the ten thousand things without claiming righteousness; his favor reaches ten thousand generations without claiming benevolence; he predates high antiquity without claiming age; he enfolds heaven and earth and carves the myriad forms without claiming craft—that is where he roams.
Modern Interpretation
(Earlier section: On the “Great Master” and the Way of Nature)
To serve the “Great Master” means to quiet the “tattoo” (the shame of being marked) on one’s person and to repair the “mutilation” (the loss of the nose) on one’s person, so that one may ride upon this and succeed, following this teacher in compliance. Alas, one must sigh: it is still uncertain—meaning that it is not yet clear that you (Yan Hui) can truly do this.
The lines beginning with “My teacher!” are precisely what give this chapter its title, “The Great Master”: it moistens all things, yet cannot be named by a single word “righteousness”; it benefits all ages, yet cannot be named by a single word “benevolence.” The gist is accomplishment through wuwei (non-action) and spontaneity; I have no deliberate intent, so these labels cannot pin it down. The Yijing says that it “stirs the myriad things yet does not share the sage’s worries”—the same idea.
“Elder than highest antiquity” means before Heaven and Earth; “thus from age to age, forever”—no term of youth or age applies. Above, the canopy of Heaven, sun, moon, and stars; below, the bearing of Earth, mountains, rivers, and hills—how many subtle transformations within! For example, Heaven turns leftward; the fixed stars cling to Heaven and do not move, while the sun, moon, and five planets turn rightward, now slow, now fast, sometimes direct, sometimes stationary or retrograde; streams, cliffs, water, and stone—how many strange forms, all the work of creation. Among the multitude of shapes, like the hundred plants and groves of trees, how many marvels—is this not “craft”? Only one cannot bluntly call it “craft.”
The sentences above all depict the Way of nature. When the mind wanders in the natural, one sees Heaven and Earth born together with me and the myriad things as one with me—hence “this is what I wander in”—the realm I roam is just this.
(Yan Hui and Confucius on “sitting in forgetfulness”)
Yan Hui said: I have made progress. Confucius asked: What do you mean? Yan Hui said: I have forgotten benevolence and righteousness. Confucius said: Good enough, but not yet enough. Another day he came and said: I have progressed again. Asked what he meant, he said: I have forgotten ritual and music. Confucius said: Good enough, but not yet enough. Again he came and said: I have progressed once more. Asked what he meant, he said: I sit in forgetfulness. Confucius asked in astonishment: What is sitting in forgetfulness?
Yan Hui said: Dropping limbs and body, darkening keen hearing and sight, leaving form and shedding knowing, becoming one with the Great Penetration (the state in which the great Dao pervades all)—this is called sitting in forgetfulness.
Confucius said: Sameness then has no partial liking; transformation then has no fixed shape—you are truly more worthy than I; I, Qiu, would follow behind you.
(Commentary by Kou Yi)
This passage borrows Yan Hui’s name to portray the subtlety of cultivating the Dao. Zhuangzi also treated Yan Hui as a kind of “kingly sage”; the doctrine of “sitting in forgetfulness” is originally Zhuangzi’s own. To force that framework onto the historical Yan Hui would miss the point.
On “Benefit” and “Sitting in Forgetting”
Yi says he has “gained something.” First forget benevolence and righteousness (ren and yi); then forget rites and music—so rites and music sit above ren and yi (this is one of Zhuangzi’s layered ways of speaking). The “ren and yi” Zhuangzi usually means leans toward love and hate, partiality—not quite the ren and yi of the sages. Forget ren and yi first, then forget rites and music, like first “setting the world outside yourself,” then “setting the myriad things outside yourself.” When you reach sitting in forgetting (zuowang), you have forgotten everything. That is the moment when both being and non-being are let go. “Today I have lost myself” means the same: the four limbs and the ears and eyes no longer feel as if they are operating, hence sloughing off the bodily form and shutting down cleverness—dropping the physical frame and turning off discriminating intelligence. Great penetration (datong) is the Great Dao; the sage is one who penetrates everywhere—“keen perception makes the sage,” and “keen” here means penetrating. Read the two characters “sitting in forgetting,” and they belong in the same family as the Chan story of facing the wall: united with the Dao, there is no liking or disliking; when transformation is complete, one does not stay fixed in one place yet the mind can still arise. Hence “sameness means no preferences; transformation means no constancy.”
“Please go ahead and lead” means: you walk in front—you are stronger than I am, and I fall behind you. Here worthy (xian) means surpassing others, being more outstanding than they are.
Ziyu and Zisang (Poverty and Success Are Fated)
Ziyu and Zisang were friends. It rained for ten days straight. Ziyu said, “Zisang is probably ill,” wrapped some food, and went to see him. At Zisang’s door he heard something like singing and weeping at once—playing the zither while chanting: “Is it Father? Is it Mother? Is it Heaven? Is it a human?” The voice could not hold out; he had to rush through the lines. Ziyu went in and asked, “Why does your song sound like this?”
Zisang said, “I was thinking: what exactly brought me to this state, and I cannot figure it out. Would parents want me to be poor? Heaven covers all without partiality; earth bears all without partiality—would heaven and earth deliberately make me poor? To chase down ‘who caused this’ gets you nowhere—and yet when a person reaches such an extremity, that is ming (fate).”
Brief notes on terms
- Sitting in forgetting (zuowang): Sitting until the self is forgotten, united with the Dao.
- Sloughing off the bodily form and shutting down cleverness: Forgetting the body and turning off discriminating mind (Zhuangzi’s phrasing).
- Facing the wall: A Chan/Zen metaphor for sitting facing a wall in meditation until awakening.
- Ming: Here means fate or life’s circumstances—not simply “command.”
On lines such as “hurrying to lift one’s parents”
“Words pressed tight” and “the song cannot form a coherent thread”—hence the phrase “hurrying to lift one’s parents.” In the original Zhuangzi passage, the wording is cramped and rushed, and the song cannot be sung as one clear line.
“Could heaven and earth mean to impoverish me?”
“Could heaven and earth mean to impoverish me?”—could heaven and earth really intend to make me poor? These lines are among the most pointed and striking in the text.
Ming and the principle of the natural
If you ask who reduced you to this state, there is no answer: it is neither heaven nor earth, neither father nor mother. Then who brought you to this condition? Ming (fate/destiny).
What matters here is that the principle of the natural (ziran) stands above heaven and earth; “Ming” is the transforming nurture of the natural and its inherent order—that is what is meant by the Great Ancestor-Master (Da Zongshi), the teacher who takes the Dao as the ultimate ground.
Reading this chapter of the Zhuangzi shows how the “Force and Destiny” chapter of the Liezi falls far short—Zhuangzi goes deeper and cuts more cleanly.
Source text: Kanripo 漢籍リポジトリ（KR5c0128）; Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0 · Report an error / feedback