It is human nature to dislike the poor and love the rich, and this is true in ancient and modern times. Confucius also said that poverty and lowliness are what people hate, and wealth and honor are what people want. But Confucius's views on how to face poverty and how to get rid of poverty and seek wealth are different from ours.

First of all, Confucius believed that poor and humble people should be content with poverty.

Confucius said: It is difficult to be poor without resentment, but easy to be rich without arrogance.

Although a person has no money, he does not complain, does not blame society, does not blame the government, and does not blame life for his suffering. It is very difficult to do this. It is easier for a person to be rich but not arrogant or despise others.

Zigong said: There is no flattery in the poor, and there is no arrogance in the rich. How. Confucius said: Yes. It is not like being poor but happy, but being rich is also a courtesy. Zigong said: Poems are like cutting, like discussing, like plowing, like grinding. This is called with. Confucius said: If you give it, you can just write a poem about it and tell everyone who has gone to know what is coming.

This is called an inverted structure, and it is used as an auxiliary word. The normal word order should be: Its predicate is Si and? For example, "He is called General Li."

Zhu is the homophonic word of "zhiyi", telling "zhiyi" to go and know what is coming. Such as "Yao and Shun were still sick"? "Zhu" should be the homophone of "Zhihu", and this sentence should be "Yao and Shun were still sick"?

The current version of "The Analects" only has three words "poor but happy", while in Huang Kan's "The Analects of Confucius" there is a word "Tao" after "乐". In fact, it should be "poor but happy". Happy Tao" is the right thing to do. The latter is rich and courteous, as opposed to poor and cheerful, and people who have no money have to be cheerful for no reason. This is what fools do.

Zigong asked his teacher: If a person is poor but does not flatter others, and if a person is rich but does not have the air of arrogance, what about this person? Confucius once said, "It is difficult to be poor without resentment, and it is easy to be rich without arrogance." Therefore, at this time, Zigong fully thought that the teacher would confirm his statement. Unexpectedly, Confucius said: If you can do this, it is not bad, but you should go one step further. Be poor but be happy with Taoism, and be rich but be good at courtesy. This is a higher state.

Zigong seemed to have some enlightenment after listening to Confucius's words, so he quoted two lines of poetry: "It's like cutting, like discussing, like polishing." He also said, this is what these two lines of poetry refer to. ? What does it mean? How does "cutting like learning, like polishing" have any relationship with the rich and poor discussed by the master and the disciple before? What did Zigong understand that made him think of these two lines of poetry?

Based on the previous opinions, the brothers can only come up with the following explanation:

As the saying goes, if jade is not polished, it will not become a useful tool. Discussion and consideration are all steps in making jade. Jade can only become a beautiful object after being cut, consulted, polished and polished. The same goes for people. Only by constantly studying and studying can one become a wise man and a gentleman. Therefore, Xunzi said: "The poem says: It is like cutting, like discussing, like plowing, like grinding. It is called learning." That's right, if you hadn't become a disciple of Confucius and asked him for advice, how would you have understood that "the poor are happy with Taoism, the rich are fond of etiquette" is the highest state? After listening to the teacher's words, Zigong understood that people must be like jade and constantly study and study in knowledge to become a true gentleman.

Zigong could understand such a truth from two lines of poetry. Confucius was very happy and said to him, "Ci, I can start discussing poetry with you. Tell you the past, and you can Can know how to face the future. What I want to say here is that poetry is not an ordinary knowledge. Only after a disciple has learned a certain level, Confucius will teach him poetry. About poetry, my brothers will talk about it in detail later.

Confucius said: Eat sparingly with rice, drink water, and bend your arms and rest on them, and you will enjoy it. Being rich and noble without justice is like a floating cloud to me.

Sparse food means whole grains. "Eat sparingly and drink water" means that what you eat on weekdays is simple meals.

To bend your arms and rest on them is to use your arms as a pillow.

To me, they are like floating clouds: floating clouds are far away in the horizon, erratic, disappearing, and have nothing to do with me. Wealth and honor obtained through unrighteousness are like floating clouds. I will not be moved by them and will not take them to heart at all. The popular saying some time ago, “All gods and horses are just floating clouds”, comes from here.

Confucius said: The virtuous man returns home. A basket of food and a ladle of drink, in a back alley.

People can't bear their worries, and they won't change their happiness even after returning home. Xianzai returns.

Tao, Yindan, is an ancient bamboo vessel used to hold rice.

Today's basket basket should be similar to the basket basket in the Spring and Autumn Period.

A mature gourd is divided into two parts to form a gourd. There are many uses for ladles. They can be used to hold water or rice or noodles. When the brothers were young, it was a necessity for daily household use in rural areas, but now it has basically disappeared.

Shi, a basket of food, should be read as food, which is a basket of rice.

Drink, the inlet of water is drinking. It can be used as a verb or a noun, and it can be extended to mean what is drunk. Drinking a ladle is a ladle of water. If the family is so poor, the tea in the ladle must not be exquisite.

Confucius could only eat simple meals and had no pillow, so he could only sleep with his arms as pillows. As for Yan Hui, he could only use bamboo utensils to serve food, not even pottery pots or bowls, use ladles to drink water, and didn't even have tea. He lived in poor streets and alleys. It can be seen that both master and disciple were poor to a certain extent. But one of them can enjoy it, and the other can not change his joy.

When I read these two chapters for the first time, my brother was very puzzled. They were so poor that they could still be happy. What were they happy about? Doesn’t it sound like saying sour grapes without eating them? Only later did I understand that they were "poor but happy with Taoism". It is very difficult for a person to live in poverty. It is even more difficult for a person to be happy with Taoism. It is even more difficult for a person to be poor and happy at the same time. To add to the difficulty, it was precisely because Yan Hui was able to live in poverty and live in peace that Confucius praised him and said, "How virtuous Hui Ye is!"

Yan Hui deserves the title of virtuous person. The ancients said, "Select the worthy and capable." The capable are everywhere, but the wise are rare. Among many disciples, Confucius alone called Yan Hui a virtuous person. Confucius asked Zigong: "Is it virtuous to give him a gift?" It shows that he cannot be called a virtuous person. Zigong once asked Confucius: "Which one is wiser, Master or Shang?" The Master is Zi Zhang, and Shang is Zi Xia. Confucius said that if one of them is too good and the other is not as good as others, they cannot be called virtuous. Confucius praised Yan Hui for being a virtuous person, which was not a polite statement.