五道一以貫之

[Zerg]

Hi everyone, I've just started learning 文言文 and a line has me completely stumped:

子曰：參乎！五道一以貫之。

First off, what's with the 乎？I thought that was basically the ancient 嗎? (And can this man really be Mister Ginseng?)

Then...the second sentence I just don't get at all. I've translated it as 'My path may be condensed to a single thread', for no reason at all. I guess the 貫 must be a verb if the 之 is a pronoun...is it a pronoun here? Or is it acting like the modern 的?

Any help would be hugely appreciated!

[valikor]

Your first character is a typo (should be 吾, not 五). Probably just your Sougou pinyin, though.

Here, the 乎 is a 語氣詞, maybe similar to 啊. It has no meaning here. As you pointed out, it also has other meanings, sometimes important grammatical ones which cannot be ignored.

Your are right about the verb and pronoun.

子曰：參乎(Oh Master Shen)！吾道 (my path, my teaching) 一以 (takes one, uses one) 貫(runs through, holds together, pervades) 之(pronoun-it)。

I believe there is some logic to the order of the 一以... as opposed to 以一... but I can't think of it now. Sometimes the objects of verbs are put before the verbs themselves, which might be what is done here (meaning "to use one, to use a single concept, or take a single concept"); I'm not sure. In English, this verb would probably be superfluous, but I think it's useful to try to understand each character, whenever possible.

If translating to English, maybe I'd say something like "One common thread runs through my teaching" or "One concept forms the core of my teaching".

Hope this helps.

David

[pheasant]

Yes. David is great. His translation is correct. 乎 in ancient time not only 吗 ？ Sometimes can be tone words. Try hard...

[Zerg]

That's awesome; thank you.

 

(sorry for belatedness of reply!)