Confucius: Not Easy to Know a Person 孔子：知人不易

Yan Hui 颜回

Yan Hui, also known as Zi Yuan and Yan Yuan, was one of the outstanding students in the early teaching career of Confucius. He is from the country Lu. He also followed Confucius as he travelled around the countries. He was the most accomplished student in the category of morality and had great success in virtue and the classics. He was the only person to be praised by Confucius as a humane man. His hair went white when he was twenty-nine, and he died when he was thirty-one years old.

It was recorded that a small action by Yuan Hui had caused Confucius to misunderstand him. Although the misunderstanding was finally cleared up, the incident led Confucius to sigh with emotion that it is not easy to know a man well. Even a sage like Confucius can be confused, how about ordinary people like us?

Here is a story selected from the Lu’s Spring and Autumn Annals:

Confucius and his followers were once stranded in the bordering area between the state of Chen and the state of Cai, where he was in such adversity that for seven days he hadn’t eaten a single grain of rice and had to relieve his hunger with only weeds from the woods. As he was taking his nap at midday, his pupil Yan Hui brought back some rice obtained by begging and started cooking. As the rice was almost done, Confucius saw Yan Hui eating some of it. When the rice was done, Yan Hui offered the rice to Confucius with great respect. Confucius pretended not to have seen anything, got up and said, "I have seen my deceased father in my dream, and would like to make an offering to him with this meal."

"You can’t offer the rice, it is not pure," Yan Hui said. "During the cooking, there was coal dust in the pan. Since it is a pity to throw away food messed with coal dust, I picked out the dirty grains and ate them."

After a deep sigh, Confucius said, "I always rely on my eyes to judge, but at times my eyes cannot be trusted; I always rely on our hearts to judge, but our judgment is not always reliable. People, please take note: it is not easy to know a man well."

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颜回，又称子渊与颜渊，是孔子早期的一个杰出的学生。他来自鲁国，跟随孔子周游诸国。在孔子的弟子中，颜渊以“贤”而著称，是唯一被孔子称赞为仁者。他的头发29岁时变白，31岁就去世。

据说，有一次颜回的一个小小的举动，却招致了孔子的误会。虽然误会最终冰释，孔子却不由得发出“知人不易”的感慨。连“圣人”孔子在“知人”方面都有困惑的时候，何况我们常人呢!

以下故事选自《吕氏春秋》：

孔子穷乎陈蔡之间，藜羹不斟,七日不尝粒，昼寝。颜回索米，得而 之，几熟，孔子望见颜回攫其甑中而食之。选间食熟，谒孔子而进食。孔子佯装不见之。孔子起曰："今者梦见先君，食洁而后馈。"

颜回对曰："不可，向者煤 入甄中，弃食不祥，回攫而饮之。"

孔子叹曰："所信者目也，而目犹不可信;所恃者心也，而心犹不足恃。弟子记之，知人固不易矣！"