Instructions for Practical Living (Chuanxi lu)

Introduction

The title, “Record of Instructions for Practice”, alludes to Analects 1.4, where a disciple asks himself whether he has practised what was handed down to him. The book collects conversations and letters of Wang Yangming in three parts: the first was published by his disciple Xue Kan in 1518, further parts with letters and later dialogues were added in the 1520s and after Wang’s death. Among them is the story of how he and a friend tried to investigate the principle of bamboo by staring at it for days until they fell ill. The work is the main source for Wang’s School of Mind; Wing-tsit Chan’s English translation of 1963 gave it its English title.

Connections

Criticizes

• Commentaries on the Four Books1190 · Zhu Xi

Taken up in

• Eastern and Western Cultures and Their Philosophies1921 · Liang Shuming
• Intellectual Intuition and Chinese Philosophy1971 · Mou Zongsan
• Neo-Confucian Thought in Action: Wang Yang-ming’s Youth (1472–1509)1976 · Tu Weiming

Criticized in

• Commentary on Zhang Zai’s Correcting the Unenlightened1685 · Wang Fuzhi