 Both questions, however, are important ones with respect to translation and textual exegesis, for both can generate significant insights. Asking whether Confucius may be legitimately construed as a closet consequentialist, or feminist, can enlarge the reader’s view of these ethical orientations, as well as illumine a number of dimensions of the Master’s views. On the other hand, striving to give an account of a thinker or group of them at the time they lived allows readers more conceptual room to form their own judgements about the value of the views in the translation and/or exegesis.