Zhuangzi · 外物第二十六
Read the witness. Inspect a construction. Follow the evidence.
Original source spelling · punctuation belongs to the digital witness · pronunciation tools follow your language focus.
言者所以在意，得意而忘言
Words are a means for reaching meaning; once meaning is grasped, the words are forgotten.
zimai · AI-assisted editorial notes · Editorial pilot · not independently reviewed · CC BY-SA 4.0A route through this passage
46 Han characters · 20 distinct forms · 7 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.
荃者所以在魚，
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 7 written forms in this passage
Matched by spelling. These are candidate reading procedures, not assigned grammatical analyses.
Watch recurrence: 得 × 4 而 × 4 忘 × 4 言 × 4 者 × 3 所 × 3. Repetition of a graph need not mean repetition of a sense.
Computed from this exact witness · 1 contextual editorial excerpt also available. 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
What does the fish-trap comparison help identify?
Compare the editorial answer
Words as an instrument related to an aim, rather than as the aim itself.
zimai editorial draft · not independently reviewed. Applies to 言者所以在意，得意而忘言
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Read this beside…
Each connection states its purpose. Comparisons are editorial learning aids; shared wording alone does not prove influence.
Grammar contrastA performer and a topic of explanation善行者 and 荃者 show why 者 must be read with the full construction rather than always as a person.
Question in commonUsing words to investigate wordsCompare the formula about naming with the trap analogy and its final wish for conversation. No direct borrowing is asserted.
Compare argumentsWhich features survive the comparison?Test what transfers from runners to government, and from traps to words. Neither analogy makes its two domains identical.
Different contextual sensesA stone for jade, words for meaningThe Shijing line depicts a material useful for working jade. Zhuangzi explicitly treats words as a means toward meaning after trap-and-snare analogies. The connection is editorial: both invite attention to means and ends, but only one develops a stated argument about language.
A question to take further
Shared wording
Computed exact phrases in the pinned witnesses. These links do not assign a sense or assert borrowing.
論語 · 衛靈公篇第十五而與之言曰：「可與言而不與言，失人；不可與言而與之言，失言。知者不失人，亦不失言。」
Follow a connection
Shared teaching construction · an editorial learning connection, not evidence of common authorship or origin.
論語 · Read the relationship between clauses學而時習之論語 · Read the relationship between clauses本立而道生論語 · Identify means, basis, and purpose使民以時論語 · Identify means, basis, and purpose為政以德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_026.txt, lines 434–441. ZHUANG 26.13.1 Guo Qingfan 944; Wang Shumin 10i2; Fang Yong 750; Chen Guying 725
- 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: 6a6a9040782ddc11cb002fcb93ce150ed21da7eecb885c985c9d740f22cdb2da. A source comment that cites a translator is an upstream reference, not the attribution of a translation imported here.