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ollie.com. That's o-l-l-y.com. Hey

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everyone, Laszlo Montgomery here with a nice

0:32

new Chinese saying for you at the

0:34

podcast show that stayed true to

0:36

its name since 2016. The Chinese

0:39

Sayings Podcast. And

0:41

since 2023 at least, it's also available

0:43

on the very same podcast RSS feed

0:46

where you can find the China History

0:48

Podcast. Today's Chengyu

0:50

is one of those that deals with

0:52

the feelings of respect a student has

0:54

for their teacher. And, well,

0:57

while the story isn't the same, it sort of

0:59

reminded me of that scene near the end of

1:01

Zhang Yimou's 1999 film, The

1:04

Road Home, Woda Fu Chin Woo

1:06

Chin. Every time I

1:08

see that movie, I have to

1:10

keep a box of tissues close by for that

1:12

tearjerker of an ending. So

1:14

this is a much different story with a different

1:16

ending, but there's some similarity in

1:19

the emotional feelings of

1:21

reverence some of us feel, or

1:24

have felt for teachers who meant a lot

1:26

to us. Chengmen li

1:28

shui. Let's pick it apart and

1:30

see what it literally says. Cheng,

1:33

there's a whole bunch of meanings, but

1:35

in this Chengyu, it's the surname of

1:37

two of the characters. Man

1:40

is a door, entrance, or gate.

1:43

Li means to stand, and shui

1:45

means the snow. Cheng's

1:48

door stands snow. Yeah,

1:51

in the face of it, these four characters

1:53

aren't terribly helpful in revealing the meaning,

1:55

so you know what that means. We'll

1:57

have to tell the story behind it.

2:00

these four syllables and then

2:02

everything will be as clear as rain. Like

2:06

more than a few past sayings featured on

2:08

this podcast show, this one

2:10

comes to us direct from the

2:12

book of Song, the Song Shu

2:15

that was compiled during the succeeding

2:17

Yuan Dynasty, and it stars the

2:19

northern Song philosopher, literary figure, and

2:22

upright official Yang Shih.

2:24

Now besides his service to the government,

2:27

Yang Shih is also remembered as

2:29

a student of the renowned brothers

2:32

Cheng Ha and Cheng Yi, and

2:34

together with You Zuo, Liu Da

2:37

Lin, and Xia Liang Zuo, he

2:40

was known as one of the four

2:42

major disciples of the Chengs, the

2:44

Chengmen Se-da-di-ze. Cheng Ha

2:47

and Cheng Yi, the Cheng brothers, were

2:50

two of the five founders of

2:52

Neo-Confucianism and the Song, and

2:54

they were both extremely revered for

2:56

their contributions to this Song

2:59

Shu as it came to be

3:01

known in Chinese, Song Studies, they

3:03

didn't call it Neo-Confucianism. Come

3:06

to think of it, they didn't even

3:08

call Confucianism Confucianism. I

3:11

spoke at length about the Cheng brothers

3:13

in the history of Chinese philosophy series,

3:15

some of you may recall. So

3:18

Yang Shih was this remarkable

3:21

scholar and writer of prose who,

3:23

like a few of the greatest

3:25

scholar literati throughout Chinese history, exhibited

3:28

so much talent at an early age,

3:31

and as he grew older he

3:33

threw himself even more wholeheartedly into

3:35

the study of history

3:37

and philosophy. Then

3:40

in 1076, at only 23 years of age during the time of Song

3:44

emperor Shansong, he placed first

3:46

in the imperial civil service examinations,

3:49

earning his Jin-shir degree. This was

3:51

highly unusual and quite a remarkable

3:53

achievement as most aspirants to the

3:56

civil bureaucracy didn't earn a Jin-shir

3:58

degree till. into their

4:00

thirties and forties. It was

4:02

by far the most difficult degree to obtain,

4:05

but if you passed, and especially

4:07

if your score ranked near the top, you

4:09

were guaranteed a nice future and a plumb

4:12

position in government. After

4:14

obtaining his Jinshir degree, Yangshir could

4:16

have had his pick of any

4:19

official position, but rather than take advantage

4:21

of the situation he found himself in,

4:23

he turned down all the offers and

4:25

chose to stay where he was and

4:28

continued to further his learning. He

4:30

traveled to Loyang in Henan

4:32

Province, where the famous Neo-Confucian

4:34

scholar Cheng Hao lived. Cheng

4:37

Hao agreed to take on Yangshir as

4:39

a student, and the two of them

4:41

lived together as student and teacher and

4:44

the greatest of harmony until 1081,

4:47

when Yangshir took his leave of Cheng Hao

4:49

and returned to the south of China.

4:51

As Cheng Hao watched

4:53

his protege depart, he

4:56

remarked contentedly to himself, Now

4:58

I feel sure that my ideas will

5:00

spread even to the far south. Four

5:05

years later in 1085, Yangshir

5:07

received word of Cheng Hao's

5:09

death. This, of course, was

5:12

devastating news and to honor his

5:14

revered teacher, despite their lack of

5:16

actual kinship, he set up

5:19

an ancestral shrine for Cheng Hao in

5:21

his own family home. And later on,

5:23

when Yangshir was about forty

5:25

years old, he decided to

5:27

pursue further education and went to

5:29

seek out a master with an

5:31

equal reputation to his former teacher.

5:34

The natural choice was, of course,

5:37

Cheng Hao's younger brother Cheng Yi.

5:40

Brothers they were, but Cheng Hao

5:42

and Cheng Yi had one profound

5:45

and fundamental difference in

5:47

their Confucian thought, and

5:49

it revolved around their interpretation of

5:51

the Confucian concept of Li and

5:53

Qi, which could be translated as

5:56

principal and vital energy,

5:58

respectively. Cheng Hao

6:00

believed in the innate goodness of

6:03

human nature, but younger brother Cheng

6:05

Yi believed human nature

6:08

was a dichotomy of good

6:10

and evil, and he emphasized the

6:12

importance of cultivating one's

6:14

moral character to overcome all

6:17

these innate tendencies we all

6:19

come pre-loaded with that leads

6:21

us towards wrongdoing. Anyway,

6:24

Yang Shui and his traveling companion, who

6:26

also sought out Cheng Yi as his

6:28

teacher, made that long

6:31

journey north to Hunan Province

6:33

to that most ancient

6:35

and consequential city of Loyang,

6:37

and in the dead of winter, with

6:40

a heavy snow falling, they finally made

6:42

it to Cheng Yi's front gate. Just

6:46

as they were about to announce themselves, they

6:48

quickly learned that Cheng Yi, right at

6:50

that time, happened to be taking

6:52

an afternoon siesta, and

6:54

not wanting to disturb the master's rest,

6:57

Yang Shui and his friend stood as

7:00

still as statues outside his door, where

7:02

the snow was continuing to fall thick

7:04

and fast, and

7:06

there they waited patiently. By

7:09

the time Cheng Yi awoke, a foot

7:12

of snow had gathered, and when he

7:14

opened the door and saw these two

7:16

would-be students standing quietly outside, covered head

7:19

to toe in snow, he quickly invited

7:21

them inside and welcomed them, and

7:23

this story from the book of Song

7:26

is often trotted out whenever one wants

7:28

to point to someone's dedication to scholarship

7:31

and for the respect a

7:34

student has for their master or teacher.

7:37

The essence of that respect is manifested

7:39

in this four-character saying,

7:41

Cheng Man Li standing

7:44

in the snow outside Master Cheng's

7:47

door. This is a

7:49

Cheng Yu that describes someone dedicated

7:52

to the pursuit of scholarship and

7:54

who is extremely respectful and reverential

7:56

of their teachers. Just

7:59

like that ending in the book. the Changi-Mo

8:01

film. The son thought, who's going

8:03

to honor his mother's demand that his father,

8:05

a school teacher for his whole life who

8:08

taught in a small village in rural

8:10

Shanxi, receive a traditional burial.

8:12

The son didn't think anyone would bother

8:14

to show up to help carry his

8:17

father's coffin all the way home

8:19

from the city where he had died back

8:21

to his village. But in the end,

8:24

hundreds of his former students, upon

8:26

hearing the news of their teachers

8:28

passing, came from all over

8:30

the country to show their respect

8:32

for their teacher. In a way,

8:34

you could say they all came

8:37

to Changmenli-Shu. Changmenli-Shu, the

8:39

great scholar, literatus Yang Shih,

8:41

rather than disturb the rest

8:43

of this, revered

8:46

and celebrated neo-Confucian philosopher-teacher

8:48

Chang Yi, elected

8:51

to stand before his door in

8:53

the cold, covered in snow, until

8:55

his teacher awoke from his afternoon

8:58

rest. Some of us might

9:01

not have much use for this Changyu,

9:03

but for those who are perhaps in

9:05

academia or who went through school and

9:07

remember some of the people who educated

9:09

them, we can recall

9:11

this story of Yang Shih

9:13

and how he Changmenli-Shu rather

9:15

than disturb his teacher's afternoon

9:17

slumber. So, Changmenli-Shu,

9:21

remember that one when you need a

9:23

phrase to describe the reverence and respect

9:25

either yourself or someone else

9:28

exhibits for a teacher. I've had

9:30

a few myself whose doors I'd

9:32

gladly stand before in the falling

9:34

snow rather than disturb or inconvenience

9:36

them. And that's going to

9:39

be it, my fine friends. Emma had

9:41

a nice pleasant rest over the spring

9:43

festival holiday. The Year of the Dragon

9:45

is now officially off and flying. All

9:48

the staff and administrators at

9:50

the Changyu-Yen-Chiou-Jong-Shing are working

9:52

on this season's lineup under Emma's

9:54

capable leadership. This

9:56

is Laszlo Montgomery signing off from

9:58

Los Angeles, California. Do think

10:01

about coming back again next

10:03

time for another exciting episode

10:05

of the Chinese Sayings Podcast.