“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.”
Sunzi (Sun Tzu) · Military strategy
knowledgepower
Paraphrase or translation
Philosopher
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Sunzi (Sun Tzu)
traditional 5th century BCE; text later · Military strategy · Ancient
The Art of War is a short Chinese military classic, traditionally credited to a general Sun Wu, Sunzi, in the late sixth or fifth century BCE. Many historians treat the received thirteen chapters as a composite assembled later, in the Warring States period, which is why the cards credit the book rather than a single datable author, and mark the English as a translation.
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The book is strategy. It calculates factors before battle, treats deception as basic to war, and ranks the excellence of breaking an enemy's resistance without fighting above the excellence of winning every battle you actually have to fight. It is not an ethics, and it is not a leadership blog. Lionel Giles's 1910 English is the door most English readers still walk through.
The migration of the book into business and sport is a twentieth-century habit, and it regularly drops the fact that the enemy is an enemy and the craft is war. Knowing the other side and knowing yourself is a condition of victory in chapter 3, not a moral justification for every conflict. Cite the chapter, name Giles if you are using Giles, and keep the authorship uncertain in view.
Start here
The Art of War, chapters 1 and 3, in Giles, compared with a modern translation if you can.
You see the calculations, the deception line, and the praise of winning without battle in their military setting.
Quotations
“All warfare is based on deception.”
Sunzi (Sun Tzu) · Military strategy
powerknowledge
Paraphrase or translation
“To fight and conquer in all your battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting.”
Sunzi (Sun Tzu) · Military strategy
powerethics
Paraphrase or translation
“Now the general who wins a battle makes many calculations in his temple before the battle is fought.”
Sunzi (Sun Tzu) · Military strategy
knowledgepower
Paraphrase or translation
“There is no instance of a country having benefited from prolonged warfare.”
Sunzi (Sun Tzu) · Military strategy
powersociety
Paraphrase or translation
Key ideas
Calculation first
The general who wins has done many calculations before the fighting, not only felt ready.
Deception
Warfare, in the opening chapter, is said to be based on shaping what the enemy believes.
Winning without battle
Supreme excellence is breaking resistance without fighting, which is still a way of defeating an enemy.
Major works
The Art of War (traditional Warring States text)
Thirteen chapters in the received book; Lionel Giles's English translation appeared in 1910.
Influences
- Warring States military practice
Influenced
- Later Chinese military writers
Common misreadings
- A strategy maxim is not a moral rule for ordinary life, and winning is not the same as being in the right.
- Giles's 1910 phrasing is one English, not the Chinese, and a single historical Sunzi is not secure.
Famous lines Sunzi (Sun Tzu) never said
None of the lines this library files for Sunzi (Sun Tzu) is marked Questionable or Misattributed. That is only a fact about these cards. It is not a certificate that every popular sentence is theirs.
FAQ
What is the best book to start with?
The Art of War, chapters 1 and 3, in Giles, compared with a modern translation if you can. You see the calculations, the deception line, and the praise of winning without battle in their military setting.
What is the most famous quote?
This library does not measure fame, and it does not rank lines by how often they are shared. The first line it files for Sunzi (Sun Tzu) that is not marked Questionable or Misattributed is “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.” (The Art of War, chapter 3, in the tradition of Lionel Giles's translation, Paraphrase or translation).
What is the most misquoted line?
None of the lines this library files for Sunzi (Sun Tzu) is marked Misattributed or Questionable. That is a fact about these cards, not a certificate that every popular sentence is theirs.
What is one key idea, in a sentence?
Calculation first: The general who wins has done many calculations before the fighting, not only felt ready.