Editing Analects (section)

=== Creation of the text ===
[[File:Manuscript of Lunyu, text by Kong Anguo with commentary by Zheng Xuan.jpg|thumb|Fragment from the manuscript of ''Analects'', text by [[Kong Anguo]] with commentary by [[Zheng Xuan]]. This fragmentary manuscript has been found at [[Mogao Caves]]. It is dated era Longji, 2nd year (i.e. 890&nbsp;AD), but it could be copied in the middle of the 8th century. [[Bibliothèque nationale de France]]]]
[[File:Analects.JPG|thumb|The ''Analects'', from [[Östasiatiska Museet]] in Stockholm]]
According to [[Ban Gu]], writing in the ''[[Book of Han]]'', the ''Analects'' originated as individual records kept by Confucius's disciples of conversations between the Master and them, which were then collected and jointly edited by the disciples after Confucius' death in 479&nbsp;BC. The work was titled ''Lunyu'' during the Han dynasty: in this context the character for ''lun'' means 'discuss' or 'dispute',<ref name="ni">{{Cite book |last=Ni |first=Peimin |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xEMSDgAAQBAJ&pg=PA77|title=Understanding the Analects of Confucius: A New Translation of Lunyu with Annotations |date=2017-02-07 |publisher=State University of New York Press |isbn=978-1-4384-6452-7 |pages=77&ndash;78|language=en}}</ref> while ''yu'' means 'speech' or 'sayings'.{{sfnp|Kim|Csikszentmihalyi|2010|p=25}} ''Lunyu'' therefore may mean 'edited conversations',{{sfnp|Knechtges|Shih|2010|p=645}} or 'selected speeches' (thus "{{linktext|analects}}").{{sfnp|Kim|Csikszentmihalyi|2010|p=25}} This broadly forms the traditional account of the genesis of the work accepted by later generations of scholars, for example the [[Song dynasty]] neo-Confucian scholar [[Zhu Xi]] stated that ''Analects'' is the records of Confucius's first- and second-generation pupils.{{sfnp|Kim|Csikszentmihalyi|2013|p=26}}

This traditional view has been challenged by Chinese, Japanese, and Western scholars. The Qing dynasty [[philologist]] Cui Shu argued on linguistic ground that the last five books were produced much later than the rest of the work. [[Itō Jinsai]] claimed that, because of differences he saw in patterns of language and content in the ''Analects'', a distinction in authorship should be made between the "upper ''Analects''" (Books 1–10) and "lower ''Analects''" (Books 11–20). [[Arthur Waley]] speculated that Books 3–9 represent the earliest parts of the book. E. Bruce Brooks and A. Taeko Brooks reviewed previous theories of the chapters' creation and produced a "four stratum theory" of the text's creation.{{sfnp|Van Norden|2002|p=12}}{{sfnp|Slingerland|2003|pp=xiii-xiv}} Many modern scholars now believe that the work was compiled over a period of around two hundred years, some time during the [[Warring States period]] (476–221&nbsp;BC), with some questioning the authenticity of some of the sayings.<ref name=":0">{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ID4gMCaLr0MC&pg=PA10 |title=Confucius and Confucianism: The Essentials|author=Lee Dian Rainey |page=10|publisher=Wiley-Blackwell|year=2010 |isbn=978-1444323603 }}</ref><ref name=":1">{{cite book |url=https://hdl.handle.net/2022/23420 |title=The Analects of Confucius |translator-first=Robert |translator-last=Eno |year=2015 |publisher=Indiana University |hdl=2022/23420 |last1=Eno |first1=Robert }}</ref> Prior to 2015, no manuscript dated earlier than {{circa|70&nbsp;BC}} has been discovered, and because the ''Analects'' was not referred to by name in any existing source before the early Han dynasty, some scholars have proposed dates as late as 140 BC for the text's final compilation.{{sfnp|van Els|2012|pp=21–23}}  In 2015, the Anhui University acquired a corpus of excavated Warring States period [[Anhui University Bamboo Strips#Content|bamboo strips]], and they contained fragments of the ''Analects'' corresponding to the received text.<ref name=Anhuibamboostrips>{{cite web |url=http://m.bsm.org.cn/?chujian/8788.html |title=安大簡《仲尼曰》“古之學者自為”小議|last= |first= |publisher=武漢大學簡帛研究中心 |date=2022-09-09}}</ref>
 
Regardless of how early the text of the ''Analects'' existed, most ''Analects'' scholars believe that by the early Han dynasty (206 BC–220 AD) the book was widely known and transmitted throughout China in a mostly complete form, and that the book acquired its final, complete form during the Han dynasty. However, Han dynasty writer [[Wang Chong]] claimed that all copies of the ''Analects'' that existed during the Han dynasty were incomplete and formed only a part of a much larger work.{{sfnp|Kim|Csikszentmihalyi|2010|pp=25–26}} This is supported by the fact that a larger collection of Confucius's teachings did exist in the Warring States period than has been preserved directly in the ''Analects'': 75% of Confucius's sayings cited by his second-generation student, [[Mencius]], do not exist in the received text of the ''Analects''.{{sfnp|Waley|1938|p=23}}