Yielding Archives - understand-culture

Six-Foot Lane

In Tongcheng, Anhui, there is a narrow lane six chi wide. Tradition says that in the Kangxi era, the family of the grand secretary Zhang Ying quarreled with their neighbors, the Wu family, over a boundary wall. The family wrote to him.

He answered with a poem: “A letter sent a thousand li, only about a wall. Let them have three feet, what harm is that? The Great Wall still stands today, but no one sees the First Emperor of Qin.” Some versions begin “A letter came, only about a wall.” The Zhang family moved back three chi. The Wu family did the same.

On October 17, 2024, Xi Jinping visited the lane. He said that it shows “the historical wisdom of our ancestors in resolving conflicts.”

Kong Rong Gives Up the Pears

The Three Character Classic, a primer for children, has the line 融四岁，能让梨: “Rong, at four, could yield the pears.” It refers to the story that Kong Rong, as a small boy, gave the bigger pear to his older brother and took a small one himself. “I am the youngest, so I should take a small one.”

The earliest record of the story is a family biography quoted in a Tang dynasty commentary on the History of the Later Han. The story is used to teach children to yield to others.

Between the Butcher’s Legs

A young butcher in Huaiyin insulted Han Xin in the market. “You are tall and like to carry a sword, but inside you are a coward.” In front of a crowd he said: “If you are not afraid to die, stab me. If you are, crawl between my legs.” Han Xin looked at him for a long time. Then he bent down and crawled between his legs. The whole market laughed at him as a coward.

Years later, as King of Chu, Han Xin sent for the young man and made him an officer. He told his generals: “This is a brave man. When he insulted me, could I not have killed him? Killing him would have brought me no name. So I endured it, and came to where I am.”

A Hundred Times Endure

Zhang Gongyi of Shouzhang in Yunzhou lived with nine generations of his family under one roof. During the Linde era, the Tang emperor Gaozong passed through on his way to Mount Tai and visited the house. He asked how the family held together.

Zhang asked for paper and brush. He wrote the character 忍, endure, more than a hundred times. The emperor wept and gave him silk. The story is in the Old Book of Tang.

Let It Dry

The Tang official Lou Shide was known for his self-control. The New Book of Tang says that when others offended him, he gave way and showed no anger. When his younger brother left to govern Daizhou, Lou told him to be patient.

The brother said: “If someone spits in my face, I will just wipe it off.” Lou answered: “Not yet. Wiping it off goes against his anger. Let it dry by itself.” The idiom 唾面自干, letting spit dry on one’s face, comes from this exchange.

Like Water

Chapter 8 of the Daodejing: “The highest good is like water. Water benefits all things and does not contend. It stays in the low places that people dislike, and so it is close to the Way. Because it does not contend, it incurs no blame.”

Chapter 22 ends: “Because he does not contend, no one in the world can contend with him.”

Gentle, Kind, Respectful, Frugal, Yielding

In the Analects, Ziqin asks Zigong how Confucius comes to hear about the government of every state he visits. Does he ask for it, or is it offered to him? Zigong answers: “The master gets it by being gentle, kind, respectful, frugal and yielding.” In the original, the five virtues are 温、良、恭、俭、让.

Shun Goes to Farm

Han Feizi tells a story about the sage Shun. The farmers of Mount Li were encroaching on each other’s field boundaries. Shun went to farm among them, and after a year the boundaries were in order. The fishermen on the river bank fought over the shoals. Shun went to fish with them, and after a year they yielded to their elders.

Confucius sighed: “Farming, fishing and pottery were not Shun’s office. He went to do them to put right what was wrong. He took the hard work on himself, and the people followed him.” Han Feizi then questions the story. If Shun had to set things right, he asks, what had the ruler Yao done wrong?

Sayings on Enduring

小不忍，则乱大谋 Lack of patience in small things ruins great plans. (Analects)

宰相肚里好撑船 A boat can be poled in a prime minister’s belly. A person of standing can tolerate a great deal. Also 宰相肚里能撑船.

忍让 To bear something and give way.

忍辱负重 To bear humiliation in order to carry a heavy task. From the Records of the Three Kingdoms.

礼让 To observe courtesy and yield. The Analects asks: “Can a state be governed by courtesy and yielding? What difficulty would there be?”

Repaying Resentment

Someone asked Confucius: “What do you think of repaying resentment with kindness?” Confucius said: “Then with what would one repay kindness? Repay resentment with uprightness, and repay kindness with kindness.” (Analects)

Chinese dictionaries define 以直报怨 as meeting resentment with an upright attitude. 以德报怨, repaying resentment with kindness, is the view Confucius did not accept.

Here Confucius declines to make kindness the answer to every wrong.