溫故知新 Old wisdom, today’s insight — ONGO
Must One Count a Parent's Age with Both Joy and Fear at Once?
In watching a parent grow older, which is the more honest feeling — joy, or fear?
A parent's age must never go unknown — for one part of it brings joy, and one part brings fear.
Confucius's insight — to hold joy and fear together — grew, in later Confucian filial ethics, into the practical rule: do not postpone caring for parents, thinking there will always be time. The later saying from the Han Shi Wai Zhuan — "the tree wishes to be still, but the wind will not cease; the child wishes to provide, but the parent will not wait" — pushed this fear to its furthest point. Daoism, by contrast, answered the same question more calmly, urging one to dwell in the present togetherness rather than rush ahead into worry.
Even today, with medicine and lifespans extended, these two feelings that rise each time we count a parent's age have not diminished at all.
Confucius told us never to forget a parent's age, and split the reason into two: it is joyful that they have lived long, and fearful that the days left are fewer.
📝I, Too, Stand Before It
Confucius told us never to forget a parent's age, and split the reason into two: it is joyful that they have lived long, and fearful that the days left are fewer. I learn from this line that the two feelings must stand side by side, neither erasing the other. Lead only with fear, and you miss today's joy of being together; lead only with joy, and you fail to prepare for the parting to come. I too, each time I count a parent's birthday, hold both at once.
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