Yì yuán ào yì 易源奧義
Profound-Meanings on the Yì’s Source
(with companion Zhōuyì yuán zhǐ 周易原旨 in 8 juan)
by 保巴 (Bǎobā, zì Pǔān 普菴, fl. early Yuán, Sèmù 色目 [Yuán-period non-Hàn-Chinese ethnic class] resident in Luòyáng — Tàizhōng dàfū 太中大夫, former Huángzhōulù zǒngguǎn 黃州路總管 / Magistrate of Huángzhōu Circuit; the catalog 保巴 corrects the old-base spelling 保八)
About the work
A combined two-component Yì-treatise by Bǎobā 保巴 — one of the few Yuán-period Sèmù 色目 (non-Hàn-Chinese, mostly Inner-Asian) scholars to compose substantive Confucian-canonical works. The Sìkù base preserves both components together under a single tiyao: Yì yuán ào yì 易源奧義 (1 juan, on the Hé túLuò shū / XiāntiānZhōngtiānHòutiān foundations) + Zhōuyì yuán zhǐ 周易原旨 (8 juan, on the canonical text). The two together form what Bǎobā titled Yì tǐ yòng 易體用 (“Yì-Substance-and-Function”) — explicitly drawing on Chéng Yí’s doctrine that “by means of hexagram-substance, [we] expound hexagram-function”: jí guàtǐ yǐ chǎn guàyòng 即卦體以闡卦用.
The Yì yuán ào yì opens with three foundational charts — Xiāntiān tú 先天圖, Zhōngtiān tú 中天圖, Hòutiān tú 後天圖 — and substantial discursive exposition. The Zhōngtiān chart is a distinctive contribution: a number-position scheme placing Gèn at 1 and 7 (start-and-end), Duì at 2, Kǎn at 3, Lí at 4, Zhèn at 5, Xùn at 6, Kūn at 8, Qián at 9 — with the rationale “[motion] starts at Gèn and ends at Gèn; Shuō guà says: Gèn — the hexagram of the northeast, the place of all things’ completing-end and forming-beginning. Hence: yuán to hēng, hēng to lì, lì to zhēn, zhēn to yuán. So Zhōuzǐ’s zhōngzhèngrényìzhǔjìnglìrénjí (centeredness-correctness-humanity-rightness-master-stillness-establishing-the-human-pole); Gèn and stillness; Zhōu starts in stillness and stops in stillness.”
The Yì yuán xīn fǎ 易源心法 chapter (within Yì yuán ào yì) gives an unusually systematic 8-step Yì-pedagogical framework:
- Dìng guàzhǔ 定卦主 (settle the master-line of the hexagram): per the Xìcí “yáng hexagrams have many yīn — take yáng as master”, “yīn hexagrams have many yáng — take yīn as master.”
- Jiū guàyì 究卦義 (investigate the hexagram-meaning): per Shuō guà’s 8-trigram virtues (Qián firm, Kūn yielding, etc.).
- Qiú guàwèi 求卦位 (seek the hexagram-position): each line’s position assigned to lord/minister/sky/earth/etc.
- Tuī zhōngzhèng 推中正 (push centeredness-and-correctness): the yīnyáng / line-position match.
- Jiū yáoyì 究爻義 (investigate the line-meaning): pattern-by-pattern reading of the 192 yáng and 192 yīn lines according to their Qián-or-Kūn origin.
- Qióng shìlǐ 窮事理 (exhaust the events-and-principle): hexagrams = events; lines = times; what-is-naturally-so = principle; why-it-is-so = the Yì’s great root.
- Míng Yìdào 明易道 (clarify the Yì-Way): the cíbiànxiàngzhān four-fold framework.
- Jìn Sān Yì 盡三易 (exhaust the Three Yì’s): tiān Yì 天易 (Heavenly Yì — natural-cosmological), shèng Yì 聖易 (Sage Yì — canonical-textual), xīn Yì 心易 (Heart Yì — observation-and-derivation).
The Sān Yì (Heavenly / Sagely / Heart) classification is one of the more methodologically clean Yuán-period typologies of the Yì-Way’s three-fold mode of presence.
The huà guà yáng jìn yīn tuì zhī lì 畫卦陽進隂退之例 (Hexagram-Drawing’s Yáng-Advancing Yīn-Retreating Example) gives a procedural-numerical reading of the eight-trigram derivation: Qián (1) advances 2 to 3 strokes; Duì (2) advances 2 to 4 strokes; Lí (3) advances 1 to 4; Zhèn (4) advances 1 to 5; Xùn (5) retreats 1 to 4; Kǎn (6) retreats 1 to 5; Gèn (7) retreats 2 to 5; Kūn (8) retreats 2 to 6 strokes. This is a methodologically distinctive yángjìn yīntuì (yáng-advances yīn-retreats) framework for understanding the eight-trigram structural-derivation.
A Qiánmín shísān guà 前民十三卦 (Thirteen Hexagrams of Cosmic-Cultural-Origins) chapter follows, listing the 13 hexagrams the Xìcí identifies as cosmic-cultural origins (Lí, Yì, Shìkè, Qián, Kūn, Huàn, Suí, Yù, Xiǎoguò, Kuí, Dàzhuàng, Dàguò, Guài) — with each hexagram associated with a specific cultural invention (Lí = nets-and-fishing-traps; Yì = plows-and-spades; Shìkè = markets; QiánKūn = clothes; Huàn = boats-and-paddles; Suí = ox-carriages; Yù = doors-and-watch-towers; Xiǎoguò = mortars-and-pestles; Kuí = bows-and-arrows; Dàzhuàng = palace-and-house; Dàguò = coffins; Guài = writing-tablets-and-records).
Bibliographic state: the work was originally three components: Yì yuán ào yì 1 juan (extant), Zhōuyì yuán zhǐ 6 juan per Zhū Yízūn’s Jīngyì kǎo (the catalog meta and Sìkù base have 8 juan — slight discrepancy, possibly from internal-juan reorganization), and Zhōuyì shàng zhān 周易尚占 3 juan (Zhū Yízūn notes “lost”). Huáng Yǔjì 黃虞稷’s Qiānqǐngtáng shūmù records two original prefaces by Fāng Huí 方囘 and Móu Yàn 牟巘 — both late-Sòng / early-Yuán figures, placing Bǎobā firmly in the early Yuán.
The Sìkù tiyao discusses the Zhōuyì shàng zhān fraud-question. Chén Jìrú 陳繼儒’s Huì mì jí 彙秘笈 contains a Zhōuyì shàng zhān in 3 juan, with a Dàdé dīngwèi (1307) preface bearing Bǎobā’s name. But: the preface says the book was composed by Yīngchánzǐ Lǐ Qīngān 瑩蟾子李清菴 (a Daoist), not by Bǎobā himself. The content is a coin-divination manual: replacing yarrow-stalks with coins; six-yáo matched to 12-hour-cycle, Five Phases, six-relations (liù qīn 六親), six-spirits (liù shén 六神), combined with month-establishing day-time to judge auspiciousness. The Sìkù verdict:
[The book is] also not the original meaning of shàng zhān. The preface is rude; especially not like a scholar’s words. Evidently the fāngjì (mantic-art) family had this book; with Bǎobā’s lost book the title accidentally coincided. Míng people loved making forgeries; therefore composed Bǎobā’s preface to attach to it. They do not know that Bǎobā’s Yì-discussion is grounded in Sòng ru, expounding meaning-and-principle, with not a single character touching the Jīng-Fáng-Jiāo-Gàn-apocrypha-and-prognostication exposition. How would he take this book as the ancient divination method?
The Sìkù editors therefore (a) cataloged the Zhōuyì shàng zhān fraud separately under shùshù lèi (mantic-arts) as a bié cún mù (separate-name-keeping); (b) preserved the genuine Bǎobā Yì yuán ào yì + Zhōuyì yuán zhǐ in the Yì lèi. Their methodological rationale: “better incomplete-and-genuine than complete-and-fraudulent” (quē ér zhēn yóu shèng yú quán ér wěi 闕而真猶勝于全而偽).
The composition window 1290–1310 reflects: the late-Sòng / early-Yuán prefacers (Fāng Huí, Móu Yàn) implying composition under the early Yuán; Bǎobā’s Tàizhōng dàfū and post-Huángzhōu circuit-magistrate career placing the work post-Mongol-conquest consolidation (post-1280); upper bound by the early-14th-century period when other Yuán Yì-corpus references appear.
Tiyao
We respectfully submit that Yì yuán ào yì in 1 juan and Zhōuyì yuán zhǐ in 8 juan were composed by Bǎobā of the Yuán (note: Bǎobā in the old base is written 保八; today corrected). [Bǎo-]bā, zì Pǔān, a Sèmù person, residing at Luòyáng. His career in office cannot be researched.
This book has at the front a Memorial-to-the-Heir-Apparent, with the [signature]-rank giving “Tàizhōng dàfū, former Huángzhōulù zǒngguǎn concurrent-managing Quànnóngshì” — one does not know in what office he ended. The memorial does not bear year-and-month.
Huáng Yǔjì’s Qiānqǐngtáng shūmù says: “the old [version] had Fāng Huí and Móu Yàn’s two prefaces”; Huí and Yàn are both late-Sòng old-people, so [Bǎo-]bā must be an early-Yuán person.
This book originally divided into three; comprehensively-titled Yì tǐ yòng, [it] roots in Master Chéng’s exposition: jí guàtǐ yǐ chǎn guàyòng (by means of hexagram-substance to expound hexagram-function). Zhū Yízūn’s Jīngyì kǎo records Yì yuán ào yì in 1 juan — extant; Zhōuyì yuán zhǐ in 6 juan — extant; Zhōuyì shàng zhān in 3 juan — lost.
We examine: Chén Jìrú’s Huì mì jí contains a Zhōuyì shàng zhān in 3 juan — book-title and juan-number match; the front of the book also has a Dàdé dīngwèi [1307] [Bǎo-]bā preface — the person-name also coincides. But the preface says it is composed by Yīngchánzǐ Lǐ Qīngān, does not say [Bǎo-]bā himself made [it]. The book uses the coin-replaces-yarrow-stalk method, with the six lines matched to 12 hours, Five Phases, six-relations, six-spirits, combined with month-establishing day-time-and-cyclic-day to judge auspiciousness — also not the original meaning of shàng zhān. The preface is rude; especially not like a scholar’s words.
Evidently the fāngjì family had this book; with [Bǎo-]bā’s lost book the title accidentally coincided; Míng people loved making forgeries; therefore composed [Bǎo-]bā’s preface to attach to it. They do not know that [Bǎo-]bā’s Yì-discussion is grounded in Sòng ru, expounding meaning-and-principle, with not a single character touching the Jīng-Fáng-Jiāo-Gàn-apocrypha-and-prognostication exposition. How would he take this book as the ancient divination method?
We today distinguish-and-clarify its falsity, separately preserving its name in the shùshù category; while [Bǎo-]bā’s original-book is still by [its] preserved two species recorded — better incomplete-and-genuine than complete-and-fraudulent.
Respectfully revised and submitted, intercalary-fifth-month of the forty-sixth year of Qiánlóng [1781].
General Compilers: Jǐ Yún 紀昀, Lù Xīxióng 陸錫熊, Sūn Shìyì 孫士毅. General Reviser: Lù Fèichí 陸費墀.
Abstract
Bǎobā 保巴 (lifedates not recorded; fl. early Yuán, c. 1290–1310), zì Pǔān 普菴. A Sèmù 色目 (Yuán-period non-Hàn-Chinese ethnic-class designation; principally Central Asian and West Asian peoples — Mongolian, Uighur, Tangut, Persian, Arab, etc.) scholar resident at Luòyáng. Career: held Tàizhōng dàfū 太中大夫 (Grand Master of the Imperial Treasury, an honorific title) and prior to that Huángzhōulù zǒngguǎn 黃州路總管 (Magistrate of Huángzhōu Circuit) concurrent with Guǎnnèi quànnóngshì 管內勸農事 (Within-Circuit Agriculture-Promotion Office).
Bǎobā is a methodologically-significant figure as one of the relatively few Yuán-period Sèmù scholars to compose substantive Confucian-canonical works. His Yì-program — substantively grounded in Sòng yìlǐ (Chéng Yí + the Zhū-school) — represents the Yuán-period Sèmù-Confucian-scholarship integration that helped the post-Mongol-conquest Sòng Dàoxué survive into the new political order.
The work’s two surviving components — Yì yuán ào yì (1 juan) + Zhōuyì yuán zhǐ (6 or 8 juan) — combined under the title Yì tǐ yòng. The methodological framework: hexagram-tǐ (substance) → hexagram-yòng (function), with the ào yì providing the foundational-cosmological HétúLuòshū / Sāntiān structures and the yuán zhǐ applying these to the canonical text running gloss.
The 8-step Yì yuán xīn fǎ methodological framework (dìng guàzhǔ / jiū guàyì / qiú guàwèi / tuī zhōngzhèng / jiū yáoyì / qióng shìlǐ / míng Yìdào / jìn sān Yì) is one of the cleaner Yuán-period systematic Yì-pedagogical-method articulations. The framework moves from technical-hexagram-analysis (steps 1-5) through interpretive-application (steps 6-7) to comprehensive canonical-tradition mastery (step 8: the Three Yì’s — Heavenly, Sagely, Heart).
The Sān Yì triple-classification (tiān Yì / shèng Yì / xīn Yì) is methodologically distinctive in placing the Yì simultaneously in three modes: natural-cosmological (Heavenly Yì), canonical-textual (Sagely Yì), and observational-derivative (Heart Yì). The classification anticipates the Míng-period xīnxué Yì developments while preserving the canonical-textual orthodox center.
The Zhōuyì shàng zhān fraud — a Míng-period coin-divination forgery falsely attributed to Bǎobā — is one of the cleaner cases in the Sìkù Yì lèi of careful-fraud-detection. The Sìkù editors’ principled separation (the real Bǎobā work in Yì lèi; the fraudulent forgery in shùshù lèi with separate-name-keeping) is methodologically clean.
The composition window 1290–1310 reflects the early-Yuán dating implied by the late-Sòng / early-Yuán prefacers and Bǎobā’s career-status.
Translations and research
No European-language translation. Treated principally in the secondary literature on Yuán-period non-Hàn-Chinese-ethnicity Confucian scholarship.
- John D. Langlois Jr., China under Mongol Rule (Princeton, 1981) — context for Sèmù Confucian scholarship in the early Yuán.
- Igor de Rachewiltz et al. (eds.), In the Service of the Khan (Otto Harrassowitz, 1993) — biographical studies of Yuán-period Sèmù officials.
- Chen Yuan, Western and Central Asians in China under the Mongols: Their Transformation into Chinese (translated by Chien-tsing Ch’ien and L. Carrington Goodrich, Monumenta Serica, 1966) — survey-study including Bǎobā.
- Zhū Bóqūn 朱伯崑, Yìxué zhéxué shǐ, vol. 3 — Bǎobā treated.
- Wáng Tiějūn 王鐵均, Yuándài Yìxué shǐ — chapter on Bǎobā.
- Modern punctuated editions on the Sìkù base.
Other points of interest
The Sèmù status of Bǎobā gives the work a distinctive cross-cultural location in the Yuán Yì tradition. The Mongol Yuán dynasty (1271–1368) classified its subject populations into four ranks: Mongols, Sèmù (Central / West Asian), Hànrén (Northern Chinese), Nánrén (Southern Chinese — i.e., former Southern-Sòng populations). Bǎobā’s Sèmù status meant he was in the second-highest social-political class but expressed his scholarship through the canonical Hàn-Chinese tradition. His work — methodologically grounded in Sòng Dàoxué — represents the Yuán-period Confucianization of Sèmù elites that helped the post-Mongol cultural integration.
The Sān Yì (tiānshèngxīn) typology is methodologically more articulated than the standard LiánshānGuīzàngZhōuyì triple-Sān Yì classification (which is historical-textual). Bǎobā’s typology is modal: each mode of the Yì’s presence (Heavenly = natural-cosmological; Sagely = canonical-textual; Heart = observation-and-derivation) is methodologically distinct. The framework prefigures the Míng-period xīnxué Yì without abandoning the textual-canonical foundation.
The Zhōuyì shàng zhān fraud’s persistence into the Míng-period (Chén Jìrú’s Huì mì jí preserves it as a coin-divination manual under Bǎobā’s name) is a small documentary monument of the Míng book-trade’s casual production of attributional forgeries. The Sìkù editors’ careful separation — preserving the genuine Bǎobā work in the Yì lèi canonical-classics category and consigning the fraud to the shùshù lèi mantic-arts category — is methodologically articulate Qīng evidential-bibliographic discipline.