Confucius and the Analects: New Essays (review)

Confucius and the Analects represents the state of the field in Analects scholarship for a number of reasons. One is that Bryan W. Van Norden, the editor of this collection of essays, provides an excellent Introduction, covering the life and times of Confucius, issues in the textual analysis of the Analects, and many of the key concepts involved. Another is that the collection includes an excellent annotated bibliography prepared by Joel Sahleen. Finally, we have the arrangement of essays under two headings: part ., "Keeping Warm the Old," and part 2, "Appreciating the New." This reflects the fact that many scholars today are still content to treat the Analects as a coherent text representing the thought of Confucius, while others insist on responding to problems raised by scholarship concerning the integrity of the received text of the Analects, the dating of its parts, the perspectives of various redactors, and the like. Naturally, this situation is familiar to many scholars involved in the study of ancient religious and philosophical texts, whether Confucian, Daoist, Buddhist, or Christian. Recently, the situation has reached a critical point in Analects studies because of certain conceptual and textual work, especially that of E. Bruce Brooks and A. Taeko Brooks, who contributed an essay to this collection.¹

As suggested in the essay by Lee Yearley, because the situation is similar to that of New Testament scholars half a century ago, we can still benefit from an examination of their work. Indeed, a comparison of the two situations provides a window into the current dilemma in Analects scholarship. A contemporary student of the Analects does not have the same faith-based issues confronting Christian scholars looking for the true Jesus. Nonetheless, those who believe that the thought of the historical Kong Qiu can positively affect the way that they practice contemporary philosophy feel the need to hear the true voice behind the words attributed to Kong Qiu in late Zhou and early Han texts. Assuming that one desires to learn from Kong Qiu, should one pay special attention to scholarship that aims to demonstrate the constructed nature of the Analects? Or should one fear the tendency toward deconstructing "Confucius" and the "Analects" because this will ultimately distract us from the true goal of the hermeneutical enterprise: to understand oneself through the mediation of the other? There are many ways to confront this issue. The essays in Confucius and the Analects represent several of the options available to scholars involved in Analects studies today and, moreover, some comment on the situation in more depth and detail than I can offer here.

I begin with the essay by Robert B. Louden, "'What Does Heaven Say?': Christian Wolff and Western Interpretations of Confucian Ethics." Although it is placed among the "Keeping Warm the Old" essays, it provides a strong caution against taking the Analects as offering a coherent account of a "Confucius" who can help solve today's philosophical problems. Louden asks us to look at our motives when we produce interpretations of Confucian ethics, especially since we often feel duty bound to provide favorable coverage of Confucius in giving our students a good multicultural education. In analyzing the approach to Confucius in a 1721 lecture by Christian Wolff, a key figure in the German Enlightenment, Louden shows how Wolff's approach served mostly to portray Confucius as an advocate of Wolff's own philosophical ethics. He also shows that the denigration of Confucius by later German philosophers, such as Kant and Hegel, was equally self-serving. In view of this, what are we to make of positive portraits of a philosophical "Confucius" by twentieth-century sinologists? According to Louden, they tell us more about the state of Western sinological scholarship than about what Confucius meant (p. 79). He aims to show that, contra Wolff as well as more recent interpreters, the ethics of Confucius was grounded in...