There is a double interpretation going on here: a Tokugawa read of a Han interpretion of Confucian ideas. I am suspicous of the Han move to discipline Confucian thought to the Legalist practices of the state: thus the defense of bureaucracy and postion above all else. And I suspect the Tokugawa were even more interested in the defense of entrenched interest and power.

With that said, I wonder if a pre-Han Confucian sensibility (if we can construct one)would be sympathetic toward the caretaker, assuming that he is speaking the truth. He is helping the Emperor understand that truth. On the other hand, the official is not necessarily doing anything wrong. Perhaps his “being in charge of the park” is a CEO type thing, more concerned with budgets and personnel than getting down with the animals themselves. His silence could be perfectly appropriate, since we should let out actions “speak” before our words. Indeed, the better argument would be that the official is to be rewarded because he has found and retained such a good caretaker.

Bottom line: I think Zhang Shizhi is full of it. He is a Legalist apologist looking to rationalize state power with a Confucian gloss (I am starting to sound like Kim Jong-il!) While it might be right to suggest to the Emperor not to punish the official, the reasons given are a shallow defense of his, Zhang’s, own bureaucratic interest (he doesn’t want one of his underlings to talk their way into his position). The better reason for keeping the official is that he is doing a good job: the fact that the good caretaker is there and doing a good job reflects positively on the official. That is what Zhang should have said.

I’m not sure I’d equate “sweet words” with “bullshit” in the context of this story either. As far as I can tell the subordinate’s words in this story are supposed to be true, i.e. not bullshit, but they should still not make a difference. Suck-ups should never be rewarded -especially- when they are right.

I suppose I should have explained the stories of the two guys they are compared to. Zhou Bo and Zhang Xiangru “were of notable virtue in the Han period during Emperor Wen’s time. They were men of few words and consequently there were never any complaints or misunderstandings regarding their speech or conduct.” I take that to mean they were not players in the game of bureaucratic politics and sucking up and thus were the type of people who should rewarded.

Is anyone else struck too by some of the 20th century parallels? I’m thinking especially of Mao’s mistrust of ‘expertise.’ Now, Mao might not have wanted to put his trust in a bureaucratic machine, but he might have agreed that, “if Wen accepted the clever speech of the caretaker as a virtue and raised him in rank, the world must then bow to [the vagaries of] the winds. People will compete in clever speech and truth will become unimportant.”

Lee Kuan Yu and the PAP party in Singapore are similarly obssessed…

The caretaker was not attempting to gull anyone. He was doing part of his job — or possibly part of the job of the official at his side. To be caretaker of a zoological garden means, among other things, to be a docent. Nothing in the story suggests the caretaker was trying to undermine the official. He was just doing his job noticeably well. And it is implied that the official may have been doing his job noticeably poorly.

That does not prove the caretaker should have taken the official’s place. But it suggests that the caretaker was worth a closer look, to check whether the system was using him to full advantage; and that the official was worth a closer look, to check whether he had already been promoted to his level of incompetence. If the only lesson contemporaries — and later generations — drew from this story was, “… there must be a reason for it … Trust Human Resources,” then there must have been a lot of wasted talent at the bottom (& deadwood at the top) of those bureaucracies!