"Confucius Say..." Jokes

What is a "Confucius Say..." Joke? Where did these silly little one-liners arise, and what, if anything at all, do they have to do with Confucius?

A Brief History

Confucius was a famous Chinese social philosopher from the Zhou Dynasty (551-479 BC). For many centuries he has been considered the "Great Master" and originator of many traditional themes in Chinese (and Asian) philosophy and beliefs. His influence has greatly shaped the progress and history of Chinese culture, as well as many other Asian societies. His teachings encompassed a variety of subjects, from morality and ethics to social relationships, politics, justice, and sincerity.

A fair amount of mystery surrounds his life and works. Most of today's accounts are in the form of stories, lessons, and information passed down by word of mouth for thousands of years. Nobody can truly say what his exact words were, but his impact on Chinese society, and philosophy in general, have been stupendous to say the least.

He is not known to have written any formal work of literature regarding his teachings. Fortunately, his direct disciples and followers carried on his thoughts and philosophy for centuries after his death, giving rise to several literary works. The most well known of these texts was "The Analects of Confucius," a compendium of fragmented sayings, fables, lessons, and brief ideals, a basis for the religious following known as Confucianism.

What is a "Confucius Say..." Joke?

Okay, great, so Confucius was a really influential Chinese philosopher from a long, long time ago. What does this have to do with jokes?

Honestly, the "Confucius Say..." joke has practically nothing to do with the teachings of the man himself. Confucius' teachings, particularly accounts in "The Analects of Confucius", tended to be in the form of short, terse sayings, often no more than a sentence. These sayings would relate an every day practice to a "big picture", or often have multiple meanings and/or interpretations. A normal Confucius saying would be something like this:

Confucius say: "don't count your chickens until they've hatched."

The statement is about chickens, but the lesson could be applied to many other life situations. Many different small lessons like this make up the Analects.

The "Confucius Say..." Joke is basically a variation on this style of teaching, only replace the philosophy with comedy (often involving sex or poo) and you have yourself a great little joke that is easy to remember, and often quite funny.

Here are some common "Confucius Say..." jokes:

Confucius Say...

* Man standing on toilet is high on pot.

* Man who walk through airport turnstile sideways going to Bangkok.

* Man who run in front of car get tired.

* Man who run behind car get exhausted.

* Man that is stuck in pantry has his ass in jam.

* Man who eat many prunes get good run for money.

* Man who fishes in other man's well often catches crabs.

* Man who sit on tack get point!

* Man who jumps off cliff, jumps to conclusion!

* Man who scratches ass should not bite fingernails.

* Man who fight with wife all day get no piece at night.

* Foolish man give wife grand piano. Wise man give wife upright organ.

* Passionate kiss like spiders web - soon lead to undoing of fly.

* Panties not best thing on earth, but next to it.

* Secretary not permanent fixture until screwed on top of desk

* Baseball is wrong - man with four balls cannot walk.

* War doesn't determine who is right, war determines who is left.

* It take many nails to build crib but one screw to fill it.