加密数字货币交易所-《论语》详解：给所有曲解孔子的人-子曰：由诲女，知之乎！知之为，知之；不知为，不知；是知也！

The Master said: “You, You, I teach you—do you understand? To know is to know; not to know is not to know; this is wisdom!”

Yang Bojun: Confucius said: “You! Let me teach you the correct attitude towards knowing or not knowing! Knowing is knowing, not knowing is not knowing—that is wisdom.”

Qian Mu: The teacher said: “You! Let me teach you how to understand what it means to know! Only when you know what you know, and can also know what you do not know at the same time, can you be considered truly knowledgeable.”

Li Zehou: Confucius said: “Zilu, let me tell you what it means to seek knowledge: knowing is knowing, not knowing is not knowing—that is true knowledge.”

Detailed explanation:

The above three interpretations and the usual punctuation are “You! I teach you—do you understand? To know is to know; not to know is not to know; this is wisdom.” The key question is: what exactly does “You” refer to? Is it the commonly believed disciple “Zilu”? In the chapter “You! Teach you—do you understand?” it has already negated the consistent view that “You” refers to “Zilu,” and the same applies here. Regarding this, I will now provide a specific analysis. In the Analects, Confucius consistently addresses Zilu with a fixed phrase, namely “You.” For example: “You! I like bravery more than I do, but I do not take it as a basis,” “You! A thousand-chariot state, can it be governed by its taxes without knowing its benevolence?” “You! Did you really go into politics?” “You! You have ascended the hall! Not yet entered the room!” “Those who can settle a case with a few words, it is you!” and so on. Moreover, this grammatical phenomenon is not limited to Zilu; in the Analects, Confucius also consistently uses “Hui” to address Yan Hui, such as “Excellent, Hui!” “Hui! You are not helping me!” etc. Especially this sentence, it even includes Zigong: “Zi also, how dare I hope for Hui? Hui, hearing one thing, knows ten; Zi, hearing one thing, knows two.” From this, it is clear that this is the standard usage in the Analects, treating “You” as “Zilu” is absolutely mistaken. I am now correcting a grammatical error that has persisted for over two thousand years: “You” absolutely cannot be taken as “Zilu.” Also, what exactly does the “zhi” in “knows” refer to? Usually, translations omit this “zhi.” If that is the case, why does the original text not directly say “knows as knowing, does not know as not knowing, this is wisdom”?

Setting aside grammatical issues, the usual explanation is equally ridiculous: knowing is knowing, not knowing is not knowing—that is true knowledge, that is wisdom? You know what you know, and can also know what you do not know—that is knowledge? If that were true, the most knowledgeable and wisest would be a machine with the following program: it only answers questions about whether it knows or does not know, with only two answers: “knows” and “does not know”; then it is strictly set to give answers based on fixed “knows” and “does not know” procedures. Such an explanation is a typical fooling of the masses. One question can expose this trick: how does one know how to know, why to know; how does one know how to not know, why to not know; how is the distinguishability between knowing and not knowing determined? If this discernibility cannot be judged as “knowing” or “not knowing,” then what is the point of knowing or not knowing? This kind of trick, like various “Luo-style” tricks mentioned earlier, is a similar kind of idiotic logic from the same source.

The correct punctuation is: “You! I teach you—do you understand? To know is to know; not to know is not to know; this is wisdom.” In fact, both “You” and “knows” in this chapter follow from the previous chapter’s “The people can be made to follow, or be made to know.” “You,” meaning practice or action; in a more common term, “practice”; “teach,” meaning instruct; “you,” a phonetic substitution for “your,” meaning your intention, broadly referring to all humans. “Do you understand?” “Zhi,” referring to “You,” “knows,” meaning to be wise through practice taught by it. “Wei,” meaning “false” or “pseudo.” What is “pseudo”? It is non-innate, man-made. All creation and innovation are human-made; without human effort, how could there be creation or innovation? “Wei” is “You,” representing the practical human action. “Zhi zhi wei,” to act with knowledge, to practice based on wisdom. “Zhi zhi,” to be wise through it, to have wisdom from practicing what is taught by it. “Wei,” again, is “You,” representing further practice. “Bu zhi wei,” not to act with knowledge. “Shi,” referring back to the previous “Zhi zhi wei,” and making a conclusion: “This,” meaning “this is,” “this is”—the meaning of “This is” or “This is it.”

Within the “Heaven, Earth, and Humanity” framework, Taoism’s stance of “Wu Wei” (non-action) holds great skepticism towards “human effort.” What is “Wu Wei”? It is non-human effort. Taoism believes that within the “Heaven, Earth, and Humanity” structure, there exists a primordial natural way, hence the doctrine of “Humans follow the Earth, the Earth follows Heaven, Heaven follows the Tao, and the Tao follows Nature.” It further assumes that humans’ initial state is closest to nature, thus advocating returning to simplicity and truth, being like a baby, and breaking all artificial human efforts. Confucianism does not assume any innate natural way; it does not believe in any so-called innate wisdom or pre-existing innate knowledge, nor does it believe that simply finding such wisdom makes one omniscient or a saint or an immortal. Confucianism only believes that wisdom is human-made, practical, and derived from practice.

“You Wei” (active effort), the fundamental stance of Confucianism, is based on human practical activity; all human wisdom depends on practical experience, and practical experience depends on the summarization of wisdom. From this, it is clear that Confucius and Marx share this view. In the previous chapter, the issue of “You” and “Knowledge” was emphasized. This chapter aims to reveal the relationship between these two: “You” is the foundation of “Knowledge”; without “You,” there is no “Knowledge”; but “You” cannot be separated from “Knowledge.” “You” is based on “Knowledge,” and “to act” (“Wei”) is based on “Knowledge” and “You.” Only then can there be new “Knowledge,” creation, and innovation. This is the most fundamental form of wisdom. And this fundamental wisdom does not come out of nowhere; it is derived from human historical practice. Moreover, this process of practice and wisdom is “Yi” (change), the endless cycle of human survival itself.

Chánzhōng’s plain translation of Zen teachings