Teacher Lai, a well-known expert in Chinese studies, a practitioner of classic reading education, the founder of cumulative education and the editor-in-chief of reading textbooks for Yuxin classics, thinks that "reading classics" means two words, one is reading and the other is classics. Literally, it is easy to understand, but in practice, these two words are often misinterpreted, which makes the education of reading classics have many variables and makes people feel at a loss.
Reading is reading, not reciting, not understanding, not acting. Just watch, keep watching, a day or two, it doesn't matter, a week or two, it doesn't matter. You just have to read, read well, and read through. One day, you suddenly understand, suddenly understand. Even if you never understand, it doesn't matter Reading is easy, at least it won't do you any harm. I believe that no one will not understand at all. Otherwise, the ancients wouldn't value reading so much.
You don't have to understand all the classics. Being able to read a few words has become an indispensable connotation in life, and it is also very valuable. I don't think anyone can fully understand the classics. What we know is only some contents in the classics. Since everyone can't fully understand them, we can understand a little. You should be happy for yourself and keep working hard.
Classics, as a group, are simple, difficult and difficult. The so-called difficulty is also for those who want to read and try to understand. If you don't put understanding in the process of reading the Bible, or don't think about understanding for a while, then there is no difference between difficulty and difficulty. Now some classics are promoted as a certain classic, such as Disciple's Rules, Sanzi Jing, Analects of Confucius, Tao Te Ching and so on. They are classical subsets, not collections. A child's precious time, reading only a few classics, is certainly better than not reading, but it is still a pity for those who can study classics systematically.
So how many famous books do you want to read, which is more systematic? It depends on what kind of talents we want to train our children. High-rise buildings naturally need a lot of building materials, and if you just build a thatched cottage, a pile of thatch and a few pieces of wood will be enough.
We believe that to read the classics systematically, we should consider at least three levels: basic level, structural level and decorative level, and read the related classics accordingly. Just like building a building, it has a foundation, a structure, steel bars, cement and refractory bricks, and the materials are comprehensive. Educating children well is also very comprehensive, and it can't be done in one book. So we educate our children to be systematic, and the system is the classification we just made. There must be a foundation, a structure, a decoration, and a variety of comprehensive. This is a systematic classic reading.
Cultivating a person, like building a house, requires laying the foundation, making the structure and finally decorating. From the functional point of view, we classify the classics:
1. Basic categories: including San Amethyst, Qian Wen Zi, Di Zigui, The Analects of Confucius, Daxue, The Doctrine of the Mean and Mencius. Such classics are all about being a man. Being a talented person is the foundation, while learning knowledge and doing things is the latter.
2, do the structure: this is a classic. I ching, filial piety, book of songs, Tao te ching, diamond sutra, Huangdi Neijing, etc.
3. Decorative categories: pre-Qin poetry, Tang poetry, Song poetry, ancient prose, historical records, historical books, and history books.
So many classics, which three should we start with first?
The first way of thinking is to learn these classics. The Book of Changes+Huangdi Neijing+Daodejing+Filial Piety are all classics.
The second main line is to learn the Canon, and the category of Analects of Confucius+University+Doctrine of the Mean+Mencius is also in the middle.
The third main line is to learn the Classic of Three Characters+Hundred Family Names+Thousand-character Writing+Disciple Rules+idioms solitaire+Poetry Enlightenment+Literature Enlightenment, which is decorative and relatively basic.
Three lines, in classic terms: classic+classic+other; In terms of difficulty, difficulty+medium+easy; Take architecture as an example: steel bar+cement+others; The aspect of eating: it is food+rice+soup; Eating tools: bowls+chopsticks+spoons.
We don't need profound theories to seek wisdom from life. The Tao is in life, and life is always full of wisdom. However, many of us have gone a long way, asking for advice from many masters and looking for educational methods that can never be implemented.
These three threads can be learned very solidly in two years. If you are worried about the lack of time, you can study for three years and consolidate in the third year, so you can learn well. This is a systematic education plan, assuming that without this plan, we may not have learned so much in ten years.
(Most of the contents and opinions in this article are taken from the book "Freshman Education-A Million Speeches on Children's Education" by Lai, a classic of spiritual education. )