Book 3: 《八佾》 Ba Yi (Eight Rows)
《八佾》 Passage 3.10
Legge Translation (1861)
The Master said: "At the great sacrifice, after the pouring out of the libation, I have no wish to look on."Word by word
- 子曰 zǐ yuē
the Master said
- 子 honorific title: the Master (Confucius)
- 曰 said, spoke
- 禘 dì
the di sacrifice, a grand royal rite honoring a dynasty's founding ancestors
A state sacrifice properly reserved for the Zhou king; most translators transliterate it (di/ti) rather than translate it.
- 自…而往者 zì … ér wǎng zhě
from that point onward, that which follows
- 自 from, starting from
- 而 conjunctive particle: and, and then
- 往 to go onward, to proceed forward in time
- 者 nominalizing particle: that which, the one that
- 既灌 jì guàn
the libation has already been poured, marking the rite's opening stage
- 既 already, marking a prior completed action
- 灌 libation-pouring rite: offering wine to summon ancestral spirits
灌 is the specific act of pouring an aromatic wine libation to summon the ancestral spirit at the start of the sacrifice.
- 吾 wú
I, me
- 不欲 bù yù
do not wish, have no desire to
- 不 not
- 欲 to wish, desire, want to
- 觀…矣 guān … yǐ
to watch, observe, look on
- 觀 to watch, observe, look on
- 矣 clause-final particle marking assertion or finality
矣 marks the clause as a settled, assertive statement; none of the eight translators render it with a separate word.
- 之 zhī
it, referring to the sacrifice
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