Q: What are the Four Books?

A: Song Dynasty scholar Zhu Xi 朱熹 conceived of the Four Books 四書, crafting a systematic curriculum by selecting these texts, writing commentaries, and publishing them as a collection in 1190. This Four Books with Collected Commentaries 四書章句集注 in time replaced the Five Classics 五經 as the central pillar of education. For six centuries it served as the foundational material for China's civil service examinations from 1313 to 1905. Its influence extended to Korea, Japan, and Vietnam, where it significantly shaped culture across the centuries. In elevating these four texts to classics and creating a teachable curriculum, Zhu Xi profoundly impacted the trajectory of East Asian thought.

Although numerous other texts exist, the most commonly referenced canonized works are these nine, called the Four Books and Five Classics. Master Zhu gave the following advice on how to read them:

I would ask that people first read the Great Learning 大學 in order to establish the [Confucian Way’s] framework. Next the Discourses 論語 to ground its fundamentals. Then the Book of Mengzi 孟子 to observe its development. And finally the Doctrine of the Mean 中庸 to strive for the ancients’ subtly mysterious insights. (Yulei 14:1:3)

The Discourses and Mengzi require less effort but will yield more result, whereas the Five Classics (Book of Changes 易經, Book of Poetry 詩經, Book of History 書經, Spring and Autumn Annals 春秋, and Book of Rites 禮記) require more effort but will yield less result. (Yulei 19:1)

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Q: Where can I find an English copy of the Four Books?

A: For an introduction, Wing-tsit Chan's partial translation of the Four Books in his Sourcebook is the best starting point. The Great Learning and Doctrine of the Mean are translated in full, while the Discourses and Book of Mengzi capture the essential passages. This gives a concise “essentials” edition in a mere hundred pages. As a public domain work, it is also hosted on this site, converted to modern pinyin. See Wing Tsit-chan: A Sourcebook in Chinese Philosophy, The Four Books: pg. 14-114.

For a complete Four Books you may consult James Legge's translation with notes, an impressive if slightly archaic tome spanning over a thousand pages. Living in the Qing Dynasty in the 1800s, Legge consulted the proper commentaries in making his translation. While some may consider it dated sounding, what matters is that Legge truly understood and translated it with reverence. See: James Legge: The Four Books.

For a complete translation of the Discourses, Slingerland's “Analects” is the clear choice, representing the height of scholarship. Yet in my assessment, it does not transmit the Confucian “mind” well, as the English does not mirror classical prose (Chan does this better), and is written from the position of the academic not the practitioner. See Edward Slingerland: Analects with Selections From Traditional Commentaries.

For a complete translation of the Book of Mengzi, I can make no definitive recommendation. Van Norden's version from Hackett Publishing, companion to Slingerland's Analects, suffers from layout problems. Moreover, I do not find the English prose style of the main text or the bits of Zhu Xi's commentary particularly inspiring. See Bryan Van Norden: Mengzi with Selections from Traditional Commentaries.

However, a fundamental problem remains: these translations are NOT of the actual books that became canonized classics. English scholars translate the Lunyu (the “Discourses”), but it was the Lunyu Jizhu (the “Discourses with Collected Commentaries”) that elevated the basic text. These are not the same books. Before, the Lunyu was a disjointed set of passages, well-known but lacking coherence. It was the Lunyu Jizhu that spread throughout East Asia to become a pillar of education. This crucial point seems lost on everyone in the English world, and the result is unsurprising: people cannot synthesize all these passages and understand these texts, the very problem that Chinese themselves faced—a problem which Zhu Xi already solved.

By the way, for the source text I recommend this high quality hardcover edition of the Four Books with Collected Commentaries from Zhonghua Book Company. This edition is Classical Chinese and traditional characters without any modern commentary. It can be ordered from Book City in Shenzhen and on Amazon, among other places. See 四書章句集注 (精); 新編諸子集成 (北京：中華書局，2016). Also, note that this print version is the source of the CTEXT digitized version which you can find here.

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Q: What is the book of “Discourses”?

A: The Lunyu 論語 (“Discourses”) is second among the Four Books. It preserves fragmented dialogues from around 500 BC, centuries before the invention of paper, transmitted through generations and compiled by descendants of the Ru School 儒家 (“Confucian School”). It likely took shape by 200 BC through the disciples of Zengzi 曾子 and Youzi 有子, themselves students of Kongzi 孔子 (“Confucius”). These three and others discourse within, embodying passed-down traditions of the early Confucian school and the roots of what would become broad East Asian culture. This text should not be read as mere pithy “Confucius said” wisdoms, but philosophical discourses and practices that shaped civilization. Admittedly disjointed and lacking literary polish, Zhu Xi's Song Dynasty classic Lunyu with Collected Commentaries 論語集注 elevated it among the Confucian Classics by linking passages and illuminating meaning to render it more coherent and understandable. Zhu Xi said the first chapter of the Discourses contains “the fundamentals of the [Confucian] Way.”

As for the English title, James Legge translated this text as “Confucian Analects” in the 1800s. However, Confucian “Discourses” or “Dialogues” is a more literal translation and more descriptive of the book's contents. For an essay exploring the history of this title, see The Analects of Confucius: A Rectification of Names.

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Q: Who is Zhu Xi?

Zhu Xi 朱熹 (1130–1200) could rightly be called the sage of education. A diligent scholar, his life mission was to transmit the knowledge in the Classics to Chinese society. He crafted a systematic curriculum, wrote or selected commentaries, and published them as a collection in 1190. His “Four Books” curriculum eventually replaced the “Five Classics” as the central focus of education, becoming the standard way Chinese have studied the Confucian Classics for over six hundred years. This standardized interpretation made it possible to test applicants for the prestigious civil service examinations. Master Zhu's success ultimately surpassed his own goals, with the spread of this philosophy to Korea, Japan, Vietnam, and Singapore following his passing. One of the many strange gaps in Western education is the complete lack of awareness of this entire period of history. Yet among the 1.5 billion people in East Asia, everyone knows the name of Zhu Xi, the Eastern equivalent of Aristotle.

His most important innovation, so far as books are concerned, is his gathering the Great Learning, the Analects, the Book of Mencius, and the Doctrine of the Mean as the “four masters” in 1190, an innovation seemingly insignificant but having long and extensive effects on Chinese education, civil service examinations, and thought. For decades he had been working on them [forty years]. The grouping is the culmination of this effort. Ever since 1190, discussions on Confucian thought have been centered on these works. From 1313 to 1912, they were the basic texts in civil service examinations and in school education. It is not an exaggeration to say that they provided the framework for Chinese thought for 600 years. In this set of books, Zhu Xi presented a systematic methodology in the study of Confucian principles. – Wing-tsit Chan, Chu Hsi: Life and Thought, p. 42-43

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Q: Who all wrote the commentaries on the Four Books?

A: The ancient Confucian texts were written in the Eastern Zhou Dynasty (771–256 BC). Roughly a millennium and a half later during a classical revival in the Song Dynasty (960–1279), commentaries were written by the “Five Masters” of Northern Song: Zhou Dunyi 周敦頤 (b. 1017), Shao Yong 邵雍 (b. 1011), Zhang Zai 張載 (b. 1020), Cheng Hao 程顥 (b. 1032), and Cheng Yi 程颐 (b. 1033). Then in the Southern Song, a great synthesis occurred (ji dacheng 集大成, “gathering into a great completion”) under Zhu Xi 朱熹 (b. 1130). Born later, he viewed all that had transpired with perspective and synthesized it into a coherent philosophy. Thus, his Collected Commentaries 集注 include thoughts from himself, the Five Masters, and their disciples. These Middle Ages sages engage in a temporal discussion with the Ancient sages: Kongzi 孔子 (b. 551 BC), Mengzi 孟子 (b. 372 BC), and their various disciples such as Zengzi 曾子 (b. 505 BC) and Youzi 有子 (b. 518 BC). Chinese philosophy is not a monologue, nor did it end in 256 BC—it is a living and evolving tradition, occurring through commentaries and respect for the knowledge of predecessors.

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Q: Why not just study the original books without the commentaries?

A: Because that is not the way. In East Asia, the Classics have always been studied through the traditional commentaries. That is how one deciphers what they mean. These “commentaries” are works of art in themselves, not merely clarifying but evolving the concepts, and in many cases surpassing the original text. Without the Wang Bi commentaries, one cannot know the Daodejing 道德經; without the Guo Xiang commentaries, one cannot know the Zhuangzi 莊子; without Zhu Xi's collected commentaries, one cannot know the Four Books 四書. Attempting to navigate without these leads to odd interpretations that do not match reality, i.e., not how East Asian thinking and culture actually evolved. Such “knowledge” is both false and irrelevant. Unfortunately, this approach is quite popular in the English-speaking world, where their own philosophy often emphasizes having opinions, showing creativity, and a general disregard for tradition and study. But are we here to merely retrace more modernistic Western thinking? Or are we here for a different way? Thus, if one wants to learn, one should not make this mistake.

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Q: Have they ever been translated?

A: Unfortunately, the Four Books with Collected Commentaries 四書章句集注 have never been fully translated into English. English scholars have used the commentaries to understand the books for themselves but denied their readers that privilege, offering their own commentaries and explanations. Yet how could these modern commentaries surpass those that have already proven their influence in one of the most successful runs in human history? It is quite beyond reason. To avoid making the same error, in my own modest translation of merely the first volume of the Lunyu, I will provide only the original verses and traditional commentaries without translator comment or opinion. This respects the legendary influence of the traditional commentary, which seems unlikely to be improved upon by our modern Western additions and subtractions. As an emperor of the Qing Dynasty put it:

Even if the sages were to return, they could not surpass his achievements. Zhu Xi brought the teachings of the ancients to a pinnacle and revived the scholarship that had been lost for thousands of years. He established definitive principles for countless generations. This understanding is critical for all people. – Kangxi Emperor 康熙帝

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Q: Did this Song Dynasty movement have a name?

A: The scholars of the Song Dynasty referred to their intellectual occupation as Daoxue 道學 (lit. “Way Studies”). The renowned Cheng brothers and Zhang Zai first used this term in the 11th century, and later Zhu Xi, who brought the movement to its height in the 12th century. In modern Chinese, it is referred to as Lixue 理學 (“Philosophy of Principle” or “Rationalistic School”). In Korean, it is called Seongnihak 성리학 性理學 (“School of Nature's Principle”), the most descriptive term. In English, it is unfortunately termed Neo-Confucianism, the least descriptive, ignoring that it was the great synthesis of Confucian, Daoist, and Buddhist thought. During this lively intellectual era, the Chinese studied themselves, embarking on introspection into their own philosophies and revisiting the classic texts of the chaotic Warring States period. For the first time, from a distant temporal position that allowed perspective, those thoughts could be clarified and synthesized into a complete system encompassing Rujia 儒家 (“Confucianism”), Daojia 道家 (“Daoism”), and Fojia 佛家 (“Buddhism”).

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Q: How far did this movement spread?

A: The Daoxue movement, or Lixue as it is now called, might quantifiably be the most successful movement in the history of philosophy. It began in the 11th century with Zhou Dunyi 周敦頤 (b. 1017), and its curriculum was perfected by Zhu Xi 朱熹 (d. 1200). It then spread throughout China, gaining popularity, and in 1313 Zhu Xi's commentaries were declared the orthodox interpretation of the Confucian Classics, with government officials studying them to pass the prestigious civil service exams. This continued for 600 years, with Master Zhu's curriculum being the standard of education in China until 1912 with the end of the Qing Dynasty. During this time, it spread to Korea, with the Joseon Dynasty also being a revolution of this "New Confucianism" over Buddhism, as well as to Japan and Vietnam. We speak of a run of 900 years encompassing billions of people. Westerners not knowing anything about this is quite shocking and likely explains their issues with understanding East Asian culture and thought.

We should ask ourselves: given that this mode of thought was so widely successful, what did it contain that we should know? Regardless, it is required for understanding the world, here, in what many are calling the “Century of Asia.” Keep in mind that if one tries to understand modern East Asia by way of the ancient classics (typically Analects and Daodejing), one cannot possibly succeed. Better to start with this more recent movement and understand the Classics through it. Then add in modern developments, and this thought-lineage will start to make sense.

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Q: What is this writing style called?

A: Chinese philosophy is written in Classical Chinese, different from Modern Chinese called “Mandarin.” When reading ancient texts, they are written in this guwen 古文 (literally “ancient writing”). Its characteristics are formal yet sparse, extremely direct, open causation, with repeated geometric patterns of characters called “parallelism.” In the Middle Ages, the famous writer Han Yu 韓愈 advocated for a return to this hard-hitting direct style, instead of the flowery style which had circulated since the Han Dynasty. This gave rise to guwen yundong 古文運動 (“Classical Prose Movement”), the style in which these commentaries are written. It is still Classical Chinese, but evolved, with new colors of expression and more specific grammar, making meaning less vague than in the ancient texts. In reading the Four Books with Collected Commentaries, one reads the ancient guwen passage, followed by guwen yundong commentary, which works well for clear understanding.

Note: You must not make the mistake of using a modern dictionary to understand terms, instead get Kroll’s “A Student’s Dictionary for Classical and Medieval Chinese” (an add-on for the Pleco app).

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MODERN ERA

Q: Who is Wing-tsit Chan?

A: Chan Wing-tsit 陳榮捷 (1901–1994), in the Chinese tradition of last names first, grew up in a small village in China during the fall of the Qing Dynasty. He studied the Four Books for the civil service examinations from age six, thus becoming both a native speaker of Classical Chinese and a recipient of traditional Confucian education. When news of the abolition of the state exam system finally reached his village at age eleven, he shifted focus to Western education at Lingnan Christian College 嶺南大學 in China, where he gained ability in English and familiarity with Western religion and philosophy. At age 23 he entered Harvard philosophy and completed his dissertation on Zhuangzi 莊子 under James Houghton Woods and William Ernest Hocking.

Chan taught as a professor of Chinese philosophy for over 35 years (1929–1966) at Lingnan University, University of Hawaii, and Dartmouth College. He continued teaching another 15 years in retirement at Chatham College and as a guest at institutions across the nation. In the early years, he was one of only three tenured professors of Chinese background in America, and developed what was likely the first regular undergraduate Chinese philosophy course in America. He authored most of the encyclopedia entries on Chinese Philosophy and collaborated with Charles Moore from Yale on pioneering East-West philosophical conferences, lecturing with Bertrand Russell at one point.

Later in life, in his 60s as China opened and source materials became more available, Chan published prolifically in both America and China. Having lamented the scarcity of correct knowledge in Chinese philosophy departments and the lack of a suitable textbook during his teaching in the United States, he dedicated a decade to create A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy (published when he was 62), which before his passing he made public domain. He also published complete translations of the Daodejing, the Platform Sutra, and Chen Chun's Explanation of Confucian Terms, though he increasingly focused on Song Confucianism.

It is not an exaggeration to say that Chan accomplished more than any person in transmitting the Way into American scholarship, and that he personally embodied the values he taught. I thus consider Chan a worthy, approximately on the level of Zhu Xi's renowned pupil Chen Chun. Therefore, this site follows the orthodox Confucian line of transmission, while adding an English branch: Kongzi and Mengzi >> Chengzi and Zhu Xi >> first transmitted into English by James Legge in the 1800s, then refined and expanded for American scholarship by Wing-tsit Chan in the 1900s. As a Confucian would say, “learning must have a source.”

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GENERAL QUESTIONS ON CHINESE PHILOSOPHY

Q: I thought Confucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism were separate things?

A: This is a twofold problem: not having learned Middle Ages history and not understanding Chinese syncretism.

First, the historical development: The Song Dynasty movement largely solved the problem of synthesizing the three great traditions. The synthesis began much earlier around the fall of the Han Dynasty with the so-called “Neo-Daoists” (another unfortunate English term, as they were actually Confucians who explored Daoist texts and experimented with those ideas in counter-culture). He Yan 何晏 (b. 195 AD), Wang Bi 王弼 (b. 226), and Guo Xiang 郭象 (b. 252) made progress with that Han synthesis, but their movement was interrupted by the collapse of civilization and the rise of Buddhism.

By the Song Dynasty, this synthesis resumed, now including Chan Buddhism as a target of absorption. Many of those so-called “Neo-Confucian” thinkers started as Buddhists or with interest in Daoism. Finding those insufficient as solutions to society’s practical problems, they turned to studying the Confucian Classics. Yet they carried forward knowledge from their Buddhist and Daoist studies. By the end of the Song Dynasty, Daoist cosmology and Buddhist concentration, plus various other themes, were synthesized into “Confucian” thought, creating a cohesive mode of thinking that used the functional parts of all schools. This synthesis proved so successful across hundreds of years and numerous countries that it continues to be the dominant influencer on modern East Asian thought and tradition.

Second, regarding Chinese syncretism in general: Things are not as monotheistic as in the West—people are generally not specifically identifiable as “a Daoist” or “Buddhist” or “Confucian.” Because of this history of syncretism, schools tend to be used together by practitioners (e.g., Confucian-Christians, Confucian-Communists, etc.) without consciously thinking about it.

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Q: I thought "the Dao" was a Daoist thing?

A: This idea requires correction. In the ancient period, in addition to the common meaning of “road,” the term Dao 道 was used by all schools to refer to “the Way” of their teachings, and this continued in the Middle Ages. We might rightly call them “Wayists” (daozhe 道者) rather than the foreign term “philosophers,” as the term "philosophy" (zhexue 哲学) did not even exist until the late 19th century when China encountered the Western conception.

Thus a strange gap in Western education is this sole association of dao with the “Daoists” and the Daodejing 道德經. In reality, Confucian use of “the Way” in texts absolutely dwarfs any other school. Consider the statistics: even in the ancient period, dao appears 4,100 times in Confucian texts, while only 1,800 times in Daoist texts. In the Middle Ages text the Zuzi Yulei 朱子語類 (“Collected Conversations of Master Zhu”) dao appears nearly 9,000 times!

One of the important aspects of this Daoxue (“Way studies”) movement was its reclaiming of this character: after hundreds of years of Buddhist popularity, and Daoism riding along with that, the famous writer Han Yu 韓愈 (b. 768) unsheathed a scathing attack on Laozi’s “The Way” and the Way of Chan Buddhists, successfully urging a return to the historic mean—the Confucian Way. This has remained the case for the last millennium, with the Confucian Dao being the dominant of the three across East Asia. That said, significant parts of the Daoist and Buddhist Dao were incorporated into “Confucian” philosophy during this Song Dynasty synthesis, so it is not as simple as the Western tendency toward “this vs that-ism.”

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Q: What is the “Confucian Dao”?

A: The Confucian Dao 道 is the principle that underlies human affairs, thus “the Way by which civilization” should develop. In general, it is the road on which all of mankind travels; specifically it is to follow one’s nature as endowed by Heaven. Such are the self-directing “right principles of the Way” of man (daoyi 道義).

The Confucian Way is concrete and humanistic, unlike the Daoist and Buddhist Dao, which are by their own proclamations vacuous and empty—this is not meant as an attack, but a factual differentiation of the three. Consider: the Daodejing is literature, while the Confucian Dao is East Asian civilization itself (i.e., concrete behaviors, values, and laws). Or we might understand their relation thus: the Confucian Dao is the application of the Daoist Dao (“the Way of Nature”) in human society (“the Way of Man”)—after all, nature and man form a unity in Chinese philosophy—one is the general; one is the specific. But since we are man, the latter is what is important for us.

As Chen Chun 陳淳 said in his definition of Confucian terms, “The general principle of Dao is the principle people should follow in their daily affairs and human relations” (Ziyi 15:1). In Western philosophy, this “organizing natural principle” (li 理) that man should follow might be called “natural law.”

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Q: Why all the different spellings: Lao Tzu or Laozi; Confucius or Kongzi?

A: The difference in renderings stems from two systems: the old Wade-Giles system, invented by Westerners, and the newer Pinyin system, developed by the Chinese. Wade-Giles was created by Thomas Wade and Herbert Giles in the mid to late 1800s as the first system to transcribe Chinese characters into the Latin alphabet. This system was widely used by scholars and translators throughout the 1900s.

Pinyin was developed by a Chinese committee of linguists and officially adopted by the People’s Republic of China in 1958. Here in the 21st century, English scholarship and most new translations have shifted to this standard. Pinyin is a phonetic system designed to standardize pronunciation and facilitate the input of Chinese characters on an English keyboard. It provides a more accurate representation of pronunciation and includes intuitive punctuation marks for tones.

Examples of the change include: Dao not Tao, Laozi not Lao Tzu, Zhu Xi not Chu Hsi, and Kongzi not Kung Fu-tzu or Confucius (the latter being a term coined by Jesuit missionaries for Kong Fuzi). Wade-Giles has been largely replaced by Pinyin in contemporary scholarship, with some texts even being republished using the newer system. It is therefore advisable to adopt the new standard. This site exclusively uses the Pinyin system.

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Q: Is Daoism a religion or a philosophy? And what about American Daoism?

A: We need to understand distinctions and use correct terms: there is philosophical Daoism (daojia 道家 “Daoist School,” the scholarly political doctrines) and there is religious Daoism (daojiao 道教 “Daoist Religion,” a broad term for the many folk religions). As scholar Wing-tsit Chan said, “In the Chinese tradition the two have been separate, but in the West they have often been confused under the name Daoism.”

The Western interpretation of Daoism, as popularized by Alan Watts and others, represents a third distinct development. This English language tradition tends to be spiritual in nature and differs from traditional interpretations of the texts and their historical political function in Chinese philosophy. It draws more from Western esotericism (e.g., New Age; mindfulness) and tends to emphasize concepts like “the Dao that can be spoken is not the true Dao.” The clearest evidence of its distinct character is that these interpretations would be unfamiliar to most East Asians—matching neither philosophical nor religious Daoism as traditionally practiced. Similar patterns can be observed in Western interpretations of Buddhism or “Zen.”

This site adheres to the Chinese lineage of scholarly philosophical Daoism (daojia 道家) and Chan Buddhist philosophy (chanzong 禪宗), which contributed to the evolution of the School of Nature's Principle (lixue 理學).

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Q: Is Chinese philosophy really “philosophy”?

A: Not by your English definition. Chinese philosophy is a parallel thought-lineage that evolved independently of Western thought, with virtually no contact for thousands of years. In fact, a term for “philosophy,” zhexue 哲學 (literally “wisdom studies”), was not created until the late 19th century, following contact with the Western conception. Previously, it was simply called jiao 教 (“doctrines”), xue 學 (“learnings”), or dao 道 (“ways”). Therefore it does not follow the culturally specific modern English definition: “the study of the fundamental nature of knowledge, reality, and existence, especially when considered as an academic discipline” nor the ancient Western definition of “the love of wisdom.” The fundamental difference was well articulated by Wing-tsit Chan:

The chief reason [for the American resistance to Chinese Philosophy] is the Western concept of philosophy, which insists that it must be a theoretical study of concept and laws of knowledge, reality, and value. Chinese philosophy fulfills this definition only to a limited extent. While there are theoretical discussions on the principle and nature of things, they are intended not for knowledge for its own sake, but to support a way of life the conclusions and convictions of which are arrived at not through idle speculation but through actual handling of human affairs. – Professor Wing-tsit Chan, “Reflections on Teaching Chinese Philosophy to American Students” (1959)

These represent the most common gaps in knowledge that I encounter in discussions, and things that I had to get past as well. The quicker one discards false impressions without clinging to them obstinately, the quicker one may advance their learning.

– Sol 솔