Zhōuyì ChéngZhū zhuànyì zhézhōng 周易程朱傳義折衷
Balanced-Selection of the ChéngYí Tradition and the ZhūXī Meaning of the Zhōuyì
by 趙采 (Zhào Cǎi, zì Déliàng 德亮, hào Lóngzhāi 隆齋, fl. early-mid Yuán, of Tóngchuān 潼川 in Sìchuān)
About the work
A 33-juan Yuán-period combined-edition of Chéng Yí’s Yì zhuàn (KR1a0016) and Zhū Xī’s Zhōuyì běnyì — methodologically distinct from Dǒng Kǎi’s Zhōuyì zhuànyì fù lù (KR1a0061) by adding Zhào Cǎi’s own zhézhōng (balancing-and-selecting) judgments at the end of each entry. The work uses the Wáng Bì zhùshū 注疏 (commentary-and-sub-commentary) base text, with Chéng Yí’s Yì zhuàn and Zhū Xī’s Běnyì extracted, supplemented by Zhū Xī’s Yǔlù materials, and the editor’s own opinion appended.
The exposition covers only the upper-and-lower jīng (canonical text proper); the Xìcí and below are not treated. The Sìkù tiyao explains: “the gloss-extends-only to upper-and-lower-jīng — likely because Master Chéng’s transmitted [Yì zhuàn] does not reach the Xìcí and below.”
The auto-preface (preserved at the head of the Sìkù base) gives a substantial intellectual-historical framing for the work. Zhào Cǎi’s narrative:
Until in Sòng there was Kāngjié Master Shào pushing-and-illuminating Fúxī’s-and-Wén-king’s hexagram-strokes — and so the imagery-and-numerology learning was made manifest. There was Yīchuān Master Chéng pushing-and-extending the Master [Confucius]‘s intent — and so the hexagram-strokes’ principle was clarified. Reaching down to Wǔyí’s Master Zhū composing the Běnyì — fixing-and-correcting the upper-and-lower jīng and the Ten Wings, restoring their old [structure]; composing the Qǐméng, rooted in Master Shào and developing Xiāntiān. Although the Běnyì specifically masters divination, in disciple-Q&A [Zhū Xī] further took the position that the Yì*‘s previous-ru’s old-expositions cannot all be discarded — only that hùtǐ, fēifú, nàjiǎ and the like types had not yet been extended to thinking. Therefore I consider: present-time scholars’ reading of the* Yì should follow Shào, Chéng, Zhū three masters’ expositions, tracing upward — to combine the heart of Fúxī, Wén-king, Duke-of-Zhōu, Confucius — only then can it be permitted to discuss the Yì.*”
The methodological program: a triple-canon synthesis of Shào Yōng (for xiàngshù) + Chéng Yí (for yìlǐ) + Zhū Xī (for bǔshì and gǔyì recension), augmented with HànWèiTáng xiàngshù technical apparatus (hùtǐ, fēifú, nàjiǎ) where the ChéngZhūShào triad had not extended.
The Sìkù tiyao’s judgment: “Therefore his book, although master-on-Chéng-Zhū, also extends to imagery-and-numerology and transformation-and-interlocking expositions; evidently joining-and-preserving Shào-learning. The recognition is still bright-and-penetrating; not what one-school-narrow-stickler can compare.”
Bibliographic-historical correction: Gù Yánwǔ 顧炎武 (1613–1682, the major early-Qīng evidential-studies scholar) had argued that the splitting-and-attaching of the Běnyì into the Chéngzhuàn structure (WángBì recension) “began with Hú Guǎng’s compilation of the Dàquán” (the Míng Yǒng-lè-period Zhōuyì dàquán, 1415). The Sìkù editors correct this:
But [Zhào] Cǎi and Dǒng Kǎi already used Master Chéng’s base and split-the-Běn-yì-to-attach to it; therefore the precedent had a gradient (qí lái yǒu jiàn yǐ 其來有漸矣). Yánwǔ’s exclusively blaming Hú Guǎng — perhaps he did not see these two books?
This is methodologically interesting: the Běnyì-into-Chéng-form structural transformation was not a single-event Míng-period innovation but a multi-generation Yuán-period editorial development. Dǒng Kǎi started it (KR1a0061); Zhào Cǎi continued it; Hú Guǎng standardized it. Modern Zhū-Xī-school Yì scholarship now recognizes this multi-stage development.
The composition window 1290–1320 reflects Zhào Cǎi’s Yuán-period mature scholarly career. CBDB has multiple Sòng-period Zhào Cǎi entries (id 99699, 110360, 688206); the Yuán-period author of this work is most plausibly id 110360 (placed as Yuán dynasty 18, no dates).
Tiyao
We respectfully submit that Zhōuyì ChéngZhū zhuànyì zhézhōng in 33 juan was composed by Zhào Cǎi of the Yuán. [Zhào] Cǎi, zì Déliàng, hào Lóngzhāi, a man of Tóngchuān. His book uses the zhùshū base, abridging Master Chéng’s Yì zhuàn and Master Zhū’s Běnyì’s expositions; supplemented by yǔlù and various books; arranged at the front; with each one his own exposition appended at the back — what is called zhézhōng (balancing-the-middle). The gloss extends only to the upper-and-lower jīng — likely because Master Chéng’s transmitted [text] does not reach the Xìcí and below.
At the front [Zhào] Cǎi has an auto-preface, saying: “*There is Kāngjié Master Shào pushing-and-illuminating Fúxī’s-and-Wén-king’s hexagram-strokes — the imagery-and-numerology learning is made manifest. There is Yīchuān Master Chéng pushing-and-extending the Master’s intent — the hexagram-strokes’ principle is clarified. Reaching down to Wǔyí’s Master Zhū composing the Běnyì — fixing-and-correcting the upper-and-lower jīng and the Ten Wings, restoring their old [structure]; composing the Qǐméng, rooted in Master Shào to develop Xiāntiān. Although the Běnyì specifically masters divination, [Zhū Xī] in disciple-Q&A also takes the Yì’s previous-ru’s old-expositions as all cannot-be-discarded — only that hùtǐ, fēifú, nàjiǎ, and the like, had not yet extended-to-thinking. Therefore I consider: present-time scholars’ reading of the Yì should by Shào, Chéng, Zhū three masters’ expositions trace upward.”
Therefore his book, although master-on ChéngZhū, also extends to imagery-and-numerology and transformation-and-interlocking expositions — evidently joining-and-preserving Shào-learning. The recognition is still bright-and-penetrating; not the type of one-school-narrow-stickler.
Gù Yánwǔ said: splitting-the-Běn-yì-to-enter-the-Chéng-zhuàn began with Hú Guǎng’s compiling-the-Dà-quán. But [Zhào] Cǎi and Dǒng Kǎi already used Master Chéng’s base and split-the-Běn-yì-to-attach to it — so the precedent had a gradient. [Gù] Yánwǔ’s exclusively blaming Hú Guǎng — perhaps did not see these two books?
Respectfully revised and submitted, eighth month of the forty-second year of Qiánlóng [1777].
General Compilers: Jǐ Yún 紀昀, Lù Xīxióng 陸錫熊, Sūn Shìyì 孫士毅. General Reviser: Lù Fèichí 陸費墀.
Abstract
Zhào Cǎi (趙采, fl. early-mid Yuán; lifedates not securely recorded), zì Déliàng 德亮, hào Lóngzhāi 隆齋, of Tóngchuān 潼川 in Sìchuān (modern Sāntái, Sìchuān). CBDB has multiple Sòng-period entries; the Yuán author of this work is most plausibly CBDB id 110360 (placed as Yuán dynasty 18, without dates).
Methodologically Zhào Cǎi is a triple-canon synthesizer of Shào Yōng (for xiàngshù) + Chéng Yí (for yìlǐ) + Zhū Xī (for bǔshì and gǔyì recension), augmented with HànWèiTáng xiàngshù technical apparatus (hùtǐ, fēifú, nàjiǎ) where the ChéngZhūShào triad had not extended. This is methodologically more comprehensive than Dǒng Kǎi’s strict-Chéng-Zhū Fù lù (KR1a0061) but more orthodox than the heterodox-leaning xiàngshù writers (Zhū Yuánshēng KR1a0063, Léi Sīqí KR1a0067).
The work’s bibliographic-historical significance — that Zhào Cǎi (and Dǒng Kǎi) already split-and-attached the Běnyì into the Chéngzhuàn structure, anticipating the Míng Yǒnglè Dàquán by a century — provides a key data-point in the YuánMíng Běnyì-textual-tradition development. Modern Yì-scholarship (following the Sìkù editors against Gù Yánwǔ) now recognizes the multi-stage development from Dǒng Kǎi (1266) → Zhào Cǎi (early-14th c.) → Hú Guǎng (1415).
The synthesis with xiàngshù technical apparatus (hùtǐ, fēifú, nàjiǎ) makes Zhào Cǎi distinctive among the Yuán-period ChéngZhū combined-edition writers. Where Dǒng Kǎi was strict-Chéng-Zhū, Zhào Cǎi reincorporates the Hàn-tradition technical apparatus that Zhū Xī had recognized as legitimate but not extensively developed.
The composition window 1290–1320 reflects Zhào Cǎi’s mature Yuán-period scholarly career; precise dating within this window is difficult.
Translations and research
No European-language translation. Treated principally in the secondary literature on Yuán-period Zhū-school Yì-canonization.
- Hoyt Cleveland Tillman, Confucian Discourse and Chu Hsi’s Ascendancy (Univ. of Hawaii, 1992) — Yuán-period transmission context.
- Joseph A. Adler, Reconstructing the Confucian Dao (SUNY, 2014) — Běn-yì canonical structure context.
- Zhū Bóqūn 朱伯崑, Yìxué zhéxué shǐ, vol. 3 — Zhào Cǎi’s zhé-zhōng synthesis discussed.
- Wáng Tiějūn 王鐵均, Yuándài Yìxué shǐ — chapter on Yuán-period combined-editions.
- Modern punctuated editions on the Sìkù base.
Other points of interest
The Sìkù-correction-of-Gù-Yán-wǔ on the Běnyì-restructuring history is one of the more substantively-articulate Sìkù-period historiographical interventions in the Yì lèi. Gù Yánwǔ was the most authoritative early-Qīng evidential-studies scholar; his attribution-of-blame to Hú Guǎng (the Míng Yǒnglè Dàquán compiler) was widely accepted before the Sìkù editors examined Zhào Cǎi’s and Dǒng Kǎi’s earlier Yuán precedents and corrected the historical narrative.
The xiàng-shù-and-yìlǐ triple-synthesis (Shào + Chéng + Zhū) recognizes a tension in the Sòng Dàoxué tradition: Shào Yōng’s xiàngshù and Chéng Yí’s yìlǐ are methodologically distinct, with Zhū Xī’s Běnyì attempting (but not fully completing) their synthesis. Zhào Cǎi’s zhézhōng completes the synthesis at the running-commentary level — using Shào-line xiàngshù materials at points where Chéng-Zhū-line yìlǐ readings underspecify the canonical text.
The methodological openness to the Hàn-tradition technical apparatus (hùtǐ, fēifú, nàjiǎ) makes Zhào Cǎi a small but real bridge between the Yuán-period Zhū-school orthodoxy and the broader pre-Sòng xiàngshù tradition. The Sìkù editors’ approval — “the recognition is still bright-and-penetrating; not what one-school-narrow-stickler can compare” — is methodologically articulate appreciation.