Beijing Updates a Classic to Make a Case for a Dose of Filial Piety

大陸新二十四孝 說易行難

By Andrew Jacobs and Adam Century

BEIJING – Reading it now, six centuries after Guo Jujing wrote this paean to parental devotion, “The 24 Paragons of Filial Piety” comes off as a collection of scary bedtime stories.
郭居敬（元朝人）6百年前寫了「全相二十四孝詩選」，讚頌子女對父母的孝行，如今讀來卻像是令人心驚肉跳的睡前故事集。

There is the woman who cut out her own liver to feed her sick mother, the boy who sat awake shirtless all night to draw mosquitoes away from his slumbering parents and the man who sold himself into servitude to pay for a father’s funeral.
一個媳婦從身上割下肉來熬湯餵重病的婆婆（譯注：原文為切下肝臟，有誤）；一個男孩整晚打赤膊不睡覺來餵蚊子，以免蚊子去叮他熟睡的父母；還有個男子賣身為奴葬父。

But when the government, in an effort to address the book’s glaring obsolescence, issued an updated version in August in the hope that the book would encourage more Chinese to turn away from their increasingly self-centered ways and perhaps for the backlash.
中國大陸政府為處理書中故事顯已不合時宜的問題，於今年8月發行了現代版的「二十四孝」，欲以鼓勵更多中國人從日益嚴重的自我中心路線回頭，卻沒料到會引起反彈。

The new book brims with suggestions for keeping parents happy in their golden years. Readers are urged to teach them how to surf the Internet, take Mom to a classic film and buy health insurance for retired parents.
新書裡提出多種建議，好讓父母開心地安享晚年。要求子女們教父母上網，帶媽媽去看部經典名片，並為退休的父母買健康保險。

“Family is the nucleus of society,” said Cui Shuhui, the director of the All-China Women’s Federation, which, along with the China National Committee on Aging, published the new guidelines.
中國全國婦女聯合會辦公室主任崔淑惠說：「家庭是社會的核心」。婦聯會與中國老齡協會攜手出版了這本新的孝道指南。

So far, those good intentions appear to have prompted mostly ridicule. But they have also unintentionally kicked up a debate on whether the government, not overextended children, should be looking after China’s ballooning population of retirees.
這本書用心良苦，然而到目前為止多數人顯然把它當笑話看。而出版單位始料未及的，反而是因此激起了一場論戰：全國急速增加的退休老人是否應由政府，而非已經自顧不暇的子女來照料。

In a fast-aging nation where hundreds of millions of people have left their former homes in the countryside in search of jobs, “The New 24 Paragons of Filial Piety” strikes many as nearly as out of touch.
在一個人口快速高齡化、卻有數億人離開農村老家到外地找工作的國家，這「新二十四孝」對許多人來說都是遙不可及的事。

Take, for example, the responsibility to “take one’s parents traveling frequently.” While feasible for successful professionals, the obligation is all but impossible for working people, especially the nation’s roughly 252 million migrant workers.
舉例來說，其中一條是子女有責任「經常帶父母旅遊」。事業有成的專業人士或許可以做到，對廣大的勞工而言卻幾乎是不可能的事，對為數約2億5千2百萬的民工而言更是如此。

According to the National Bureau of Statistics, their numbers are rising 4.4 percent annually, meaning that nearly 11 million rural migrants arrived in Chinese cities last year alone and most likely left their aging parents behind.
根據國家統計局的數字，民工每年增加4.4%，這意味去年又有近1千1百萬的農村民工來到各大城市工作，而大部分人都把年邁的雙親留在老家。

Zhang Yang, a fruit vendor in Beijing, said that he rarely stops working or has time to visit his parents in their hometown in Henan Province, roughly 640 kilometers south of the capital.
北京一名水果販張揚就說，他幾乎從不休息，根本沒空回北京南邊640公里外的河南老家探望父母。

“One time I didn’t get to go home for four years,” he said sheepishly. “Business here is good, but I feel guilty for not being with my parents.”
他羞怯的說：「我曾經有四年沒回過老家。這裡買賣好，但我也因為沒能待在父母身邊而覺得慚愧。」

Li Ji, a popular columnist at the state-run Legal Daily newspaper, lashed out at the new guidelines. “If the national health insurance was up to par, children wouldn’t have to worry so much about their parents’ health, and if companies were required to provide a certain number of vacation days, children would be able to go home more often,” he wrote in the newspaper.
國有「法制日報」的名專欄作家李記對這套新指南大加撻伐。他在報上撰文指出，「如果國家的健康保險能夠達到一定的水平，子女就不必這麼擔心父母的健康；如果企業依法必須給員工一定數量的假期，子女便能更常回家。」

Still, the Confucian idea of filial devotion is deeply embedded in Chinese society.
然而孔夫子所提倡的孝道，仍然深植於中國社會。

This has proved challenging in recent years to the huge numbers of only children born after the introduction of strict family-planning rules in the late 1970s.
大陸從1970年代晚期開始推動嚴格的計畫生育法規，在那之後出生的獨生子女們，近年來正開始面對挑戰。

One result, demographers say, is a skyrocketing number of so-called empty nests filled by older people who live alone while their children build their own roosts in distant cities.
人口學者指出，結果之一，就是所謂「空巢族」的老人急速增加；他們都在老家獨居，子女卻在遠處的城市落戶。

A 2011 report by the official Xinhua news agency said that nearly half of the 185 million people age 60 and older live apart from their children – a phenomenon unheard of a generation ago.
大陸官方的「新華社」2011年曾報導，大陸60歲以上的1億8千5百萬老年人之中，接近一半沒跟子女住在一起，這在上一代是聞所未聞的事。

Chen Xuena, who works for a public relations company in Beijing, said she was torn between chasing a career and tending to her parents in far-off Zhejiang Province.
在北京一家公關公司上班的陳雪娜就說，她一直在追求事業和侍奉遠在浙江老家的父母之間，痛苦地煎熬著。

“Every time I visit home I see signs that my parents are getting older, and it really brings me down,” said Ms. Chen, sitting at one of the capital’s coffee bars. “But once you get used to the opportunities and culture of Beijing, it’s hard to leave.”
她坐在北京一間咖啡吧裡對記者說，「我每回老家一趟，就覺得父母老了不少，真讓我難受。然而一旦你習慣了北京的機會和文化，就很難再離開。」

“The New 24 Paragons of Filial Piety,” despite its ham-handedness, tries to address the root causes of loneliness.
「新二十四孝」儘管陳意過高，作法拙劣，但也在試圖解決老人家們寂寞的病根。

It urges children to throw their parents a birthday party each year and listen attentively to their stories.
其中便要求子女每年都要為父母慶生，而且聆聽他們的心聲。

It even asks that children help widowed parents remarry, a task that some parents found objectionable.
甚至還要子女協助鰥寡的父母再拾「第二春」，但有些父母根本就無法接受。

“I would be really embarrassed if my son tried to help me remarry,” said Xu Zhihao, a retiree who was sunning himself with friends in a Beijing park on Wednesday. “That’s not part of Chinese tradition.”
已經退休的許志浩最近跟朋友們在北京的公園裡曬太陽；他說，「如果兒子要幫我再找對象，還真尷尬。這不是中國的傳統。」

原文參照：
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/06/world/asia/beijing-updates-parables-the-24-paragons-of-filial-piety.html

2012-09-18聯合報/G5版/UNITEDDAILYNEWS 任中原譯 原文參見紐時週報四版下