Zhuangzi · 養生主第三
Read the witness. Inspect a construction. Follow the evidence.
Original source spelling · punctuation belongs to the digital witness · pronunciation tools follow your language focus.
A route through this passage
53 Han characters · 39 distinct forms · 9 units separated by the witness’s punctuation
- Establish the frame. Read the surrounding chapter. Who speaks, what is being discussed, and which earlier words supply the context?
- Test one unit.
庖丁釋刀對曰：
Mark a possible predicate and its participants. Record what you have supplied rather than found explicitly in the text. - Reconstruct the argument. Connect the units in your own words. Where does a description, question, contrast, or consequence depend on your interpretation?
Investigate 8 written forms in this passage
Matched by spelling. These are candidate reading procedures, not assigned grammatical analyses.
Watch recurrence: 之 × 5 臣 × 3 牛 × 3 所 × 2 者 × 2 也 × 2. Repetition of a graph need not mean repetition of a sense.
Computed from this exact witness · Contextual interpretation awaits editorial review. The guide is a set of reading prompts, not a translation. Sources & methods
Make this passage yours.
Use the reading guide above, build your interpretation, then test what you can recover. Your notes and schedule stay on this device.
1 · Explain it in your own words
2 · Recover the wording
Select a source unit, then hide the passage and reconstruct it. This checks textual recall, not understanding.
3 · Explain, then revisit
Without the source in front of you, explain the passage’s main point and one choice you made in reading it. Then reopen the text and check the evidence.
Rate your understanding yourself. These reminders use a simple schedule; they do not certify mastery.
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Read this beside…
Each connection states its purpose. Comparisons are editorial learning aids; shared wording alone does not prove influence.
Different contextual sensesA compact formula and a practitioner’s explanationThe opening formula and Cook Ding’s narrative offer different kinds of evidence for interpreting 道.
A question to take further
Shared wording
Computed exact phrases in the pinned witnesses. These links do not assign a sense or assert borrowing.
韓非子 · 十過第十之所好者平公曰：「寡人之所好者，音也，願試聽之。」師曠不得已，援琴而鼓。
荀子 · 彊國篇第十六之所好者者何也？曰：汙漫、爭奪、貪利是也。人之所好者何也？曰：禮義、辭讓、忠信是也。
莊子 · 人間世第四方今之時方今之時，僅免刑焉。福輕乎羽，莫之知載；禍重乎地，莫之知避。已乎已乎，臨人以德！
Follow a connection
Shared teaching construction · an editorial learning connection, not evidence of common authorship or origin.
Select a character to find its other occurrences in these texts.
Edition, source, and reuse
- Work
- 莊子 · Zhuangzi
- Attribution
- Traditionally associated with Zhuang Zhou; the received collection includes multiple voices and layers.
- Digital witness
- Kanseki Repository · KR5c0126 · base edition CHANT
- Contributors
- Kanseki Repository (Kanripo) contributors; upstream base-edition labels retained in each original file.
- Source position
- KR5c0126_003.txt, lines 52–61. ZHUANG 3.2.3; Guo Qingfan 119; Wang Shumin 105; Fang Yong 93; Chen Guying 96
- Version
abb9cd323dfd9520894b56b3b8ba2ec0ea50554f- Reuse
- CC BY-SA 4.0. Text extraction and teaching additions share this licence.
- Text policy
- Source spelling and punctuation retained. Encoding headers, page markers, paragraph markers, whitespace, and leading section numbers are removed from the reading view. No silent script conversion or textual correction.
- Teaching
- zimai · AI-assisted editorial notes. English renderings are excerpt-level reading aids, not a full published translation. Editorial pilot · not independently reviewed.
Source-file SHA-256: ba7f4021e79ad6eb99b916368aee2245525d1866d39b62157bb1d0df9f0ccac0. A source comment that cites a translator is an upstream reference, not the attribution of a translation imported here.