Family Instructions of the Yan Clan

CORE DEFINITION

The Family Instructions of the Yan Clan, written by Yan Zhitui of the Northern Qi dynasty, was completed in the early Sui dynasty. The book consists of seven volumes and twenty chapters, namely: 'Preface', 'Teaching Children', 'Brothers', 'Remarriage', 'Managing the Household', 'Manners and Customs', 'Admiring the Worthy', 'Encouraging Learning', 'Literary Works', 'Name and Reality', 'Engaging in Affairs', 'Economizing on Matters', 'Stopping at Contentment', 'Warning Against Military', 'Nurturing Life', 'Returning to the Mind', 'Textual Evidence', 'Pronunciation and Words', 'Miscellaneous Arts', and 'Final Arrangements'. Centered on traditional Confucian thought, it also emphasizes practical learning and skills such as agriculture, industry, and commerce, educating the younger generations of the Yan family in self-cultivation, family management, social interaction, and scholarship. It also discusses calligraphy, painting, phonetics, textual criticism, and literary criticism. Among them, the chapter 'Returning to the Mind' promotes Buddhist ideas; 'Textual Evidence' and 'Pronunciation and Words' discuss textual exegesis and phonology; 'Literary Works' discusses literature; and 'Warning Against Military' discusses military affairs. Yan Zhitui himself said: 'The reason I wrote this is not to set a model for the world, but to regulate my family and instruct my descendants.' The exact date of completion is unknown. The 'Final Arrangements' mentions 'now that the world is unified', indicating it was written after the fall of the Chen dynasty in 589. According to Li Baiyao's 'Book of Northern Qi: Biographies of Literati', 'During the Kaihuang era (581-600) of the Sui dynasty, the crown prince summoned him as a scholar and treated him with great respect; soon after, he died of illness.' Yan Zhitui likely died of illness at the end of the Kaihuang era.