One Must First Rectify Names

answered by Analects of Confucius, Zi Lu

기원전 5세기(공자 언행록)

🎬 TODAY'S FILM — IT ASKS THIS

The Return of Martin Guerre (1982)

dir. Daniel Vigne · France

When a community decides to believe a comfortable story, even a name that no longer matches reality is taken by all as true. Before the question of who a person really is, do we choose the agreeable lie over the uneasy fact?

THE QUESTION THE FILM ASKS

Because it is agreeable, do I believe as true a story whose name no longer matches the reality?

THE CLASSIC'S ANSWER · ORIGINAL

必也正名乎

必也正名乎名不正則言不順

📜 THE CLASSIC'S ANSWER

One must first rectify names; if names are not right, words do not accord with reality.

💡 TL;DR

Confucius made the rectifying of names the first step of governance.

📝The Classic Answers

Confucius made the rectifying of names the first step of governance. When name and reality diverge, words diverge; when words diverge, affairs go astray. When a community decides to believe a comfortable story, a whole town is built on a mismatched name. To ask who a person truly is is uneasy, but fold that question away and a lie takes the seat of the true. Before an agreeable story, I choose first to check whether its name matches the reality.

— ONGO · Curator

🌱Apply It Today

If there is a story everyone takes as true today, check once, on your own, whether its name matches the reality.

📖 Classic Source: Analects of Confucius, Zi Lu. Ancient text in the public domain; rendered and interpreted independently by ONGO.
The film is honored as an equal questioner; its plot is rendered only as a universal dilemma. The classic source is an ancient text (Public Domain), and the reflection is 100% original ONGO content.