While reviewing information for the China unit exam, I came across the small section in Craig’s text in which “Confucius defines the gentleman” (16). To be completely honest, I do tend to skip the extra sections added throughout the textbooks I read even though they have interesting and important information. When I decided to read the section, I found that Confucius had a short saying that compares with the Christian saying “to turn the other cheek”. His saying is as follows: “to repay an injury with straightness”. The author of the book, Craig, was trying to make the reader decide which saying is more accurate or correct, and I thought they were the same thing so why ask which is better? After reading the rest of the section and thinking a more deeply, I believe that Confucius’ saying may be “better”. I say this because rather than turning a blind eye to a person who mistreats you, why not attempt to “straighten” the situation. I’m not insinuating the idea of fighting fire with fire, but to simply make it known what they did wasn’t okay so that they can learn from their mistakes, while continuing to be the bigger person.
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That’s an interesting pattern there. This mantra of forgoing retaliation might be due to the reliably unhelpful nature of seeking revenge. Being honest and calculative with someone who one feels has wronged them seems vastly more productive than ignoring the disconnect in boundaries and just crossing fingers that it won’t come up again. I think it’s always helpful here to clarify that this does NOT constitute seeking anything resembling conventional revenge, but rather to compose oneself and try to make known the difference in comfort/etc.