之

[Pravit]

I found myself an old coffee-stained Classical Chinese reader at the local second-hand bookstore. I thought it'd be fun to try reading a bit when I'm not working on the other stuff. My question is on the use of 之. In the first passage(列子学射) there's the sentence:

子知子之所以中者乎?

What role does 之 play in this sentence?

The other sentence where I didn't understand the 之 was after Guanyinzi had asked him the second time if he knew why he was able to hit the target, to which Liezi responds with "知之矣。"

Thanks for any help!

[skylee]

子 - you

知 - know

之所以 - the reason that

中 - hit the target

乎 - indicate question

子知子之所以中者乎? - Do you know the reason that you've hit the target?

知 - know

之 - it (the reason)

矣 - indicate timing

知之矣 - I know it now.

A modern translation of the story -> http://lylong.wx-e.com/gdyy110.htm

... althouth this may not have answered your question about the function of 知.

[Pravit]

Thanks, skylee. So 之所以 is one word? The reader lists only 所以 as "reason", and I thought 之 was some sort of grammatical particle.

[skylee]

sorry. i am unable to explain chinese grammar. maybe someone else could help you better.

[xiaocai]

在“子之所以中者乎”里面：

“子”，“你”的意思。

“所以中者”，用现在的话来说就是“中的原因”。其中“所以”是表示原因的词，可理解为“……的原因”；“者”是语助词，表示停顿。

“之”，相当于现代汉语中的“的”，属于结构助词，表示修饰关系。

“乎”，疑问助词。

我的古文学得比较差劲，不过以上的解释应该不会有什么问题。

[skylee]

I think xiaocai is right.

[Pravit]

Thanks for your explanations. My book told me that "者" was like "的" but they didn't explain “之". But it does make much more sense for "之" to be in the meaning of "的" and "者" to be some kind of pause.

[Altair]

From what I understand, 之 has at least five different uses in Classical Chinese.

1. It can be used as a verb, meaning to "go (to a place)."

2. It can be used as a demonstrative pronoun, meaning "that/those."

3. It can be used as a third person object pronoun, meaning "him," "her," "it," or "them."

4. It can be used between a subject and a verb to turn the clause in which it occurs into a noun.

5. It can be used as the equivalent of modern Chinese 的.

The last usage has been retained to a certain degree in modern Chinese. The rest have disappeared.

In 子知子之所以中者乎, I think the 之 represents usage number 4 above and turns the clause after 子知 into the direct object of the sentence. In 知之已, the 之 represents usage number 3.

[Pravit]

Thanks for the explanation, Altair! I guess I will go with your explanation combined with the book, then, because I don't like to think dear old Sean G. Leung is lying to me. BTW, I have not been able to find any references to this book on the net.

http://www.imagehosting.us/?id=124362&type=viewpic

Does anyone recognize this book? BTW, there's another book in the pic, it appears to be some kind of workbook for grade school students. Those second-hand bookshop fellows thought they could make a penny off selling workbooks like this that had already been filled in; however, I managed to find an unused one, I did. Do you think it will be any use to me to work through it?