Punishment

  • The Analects – Chapter 13.3

    Zilu asked Confucius, “If the ruler of Wei were waiting for you to take charge of government, what would you do first?”The Master said, “Certainly, I would rectify the names!”Zilu replied, “Really? How impractical you are! What’s there to rectify?”The Master said, “How uncultivated you are, You! When a noble person does not understand…

  • Li Boyan, the temporary Yama

    A scholar named Li Boyan, from Xishui, Shandong, was a straightforward, upright and brave man. Suddenly he collapsed with some kind of acute illness.

  • Sharp Knife

    During the last years of the Ming Dynasty, there were many bandits in the territory of Jinan, Shandong Province. Troops in the various counties were reinforced and they killed all they arrested.

  • Candidate for the City God

    My brother-in-law’s grandfather Master Song Tao, a local recipient of a government stipend for bachelors of letters, was lying sick in bed one day when an officer bearing a summons and leading a white-blazed horse came to him and said, ”You are requested to be present at the examination.”

  • The wild goose sentry

    The smallest and the most alert of a flock of wild geese is often chosen to keep vigil for the others during the night. At the slightest untoward sound it raises the alarm and the flock start from their sleep and make off.

  • White dragon in fish disguise

    Once the white dragon went down from heaven to a cool lake, taking the form of a fish.