Gǔ Zhōuyì dìng gǔ 古周易訂詁
Settled Glosses on the Ancient Zhōuyì by 何楷
About the work
A late-Míng Yìjīng commentary in sixteen juàn by Hé Kǎi 何楷 of Zhāngzhōu 漳州, completed in Chóngzhēn guǐyǒu 崇禎癸酉 = 1633 while Hé was managing tax affairs in Sūzhōu 吳中. The work is structurally a hybrid: it preserves the gǔ Yì 古易 division of canonical scripture (juàn 7 onward — the Ten Wings printed in their original separate-volume form, in deference to Tián Hé 田何’s archaic recension) while in juàn 1–6 it follows the jīn Yì 今易 layout (the Wáng Bì 王弼 / Fèi Zhí 費直 arrangement of interleaving Wing material with the canonical text). Hé’s compromise: the canonical text is laid out flush left; quoted Wing material is indented (lowered one space) to mark its non-canonical status. He further introduces additional internal divisions — chū 初 (initial), zhōng 中 (middle), zhōng 終 (final) — within the upper and lower scriptures, an editorial innovation the Sìkù editors note as Hé’s own (我作古). An appendix preserves a Jiě jīng chù dá kè wèn 解經處答客問 (“Answers to Questions on Difficulties of the Canon”) — explicitly framed as a vehicle for late-Chóngzhēn political commentary “borrowing the canon to speak of the times.”
The work is methodologically inclusive: Hé draws on the entire HànWèiJìnTángSòngYuán glosses-tradition without committing to one school. The Sìkù editors describe his learning as “broad but not refined” (博而不精) yet praise him for sufficiently rich materials and refusal to adhere to a single house, with citations always grounded in sources rather than free conjecture. The closing assessment is characteristic: in the desert of late-Míng jīngxué, Hé’s broad-source compilation is “still sufficient to be drawn upon for selection.”
Tiyao
Sìkù tíyào (translated): Respectfully submitted: the Gǔ Zhōuyì dìng gǔ in sixteen juàn was composed by Hé Kǎi of the Míng. Kǎi, zì Yuánzǐ, was a man of Zhāngzhōu. He was a jìnshì of the yǐchǒu year of Tiānqǐ (1625), and his offices reached as far as Supervising Secretary of the Office of Scrutiny for Personnel. The Táng prince Yùjiàn proclaimed himself in Mǐn [Fújiàn] and made Kǎi Minister of Rites; he was then crushed by Zhèng Zhīlóng and died of indignation. The book was completed in Chóngzhēn guǐyǒu (1633) — apparently composed during his tax-management period in the Wú region. Appended at the end of the volume is a Dá kè wèn — borrowing the glossing of the canon to speak of contemporary affairs.
Examining his self-preface’s argument against the partition of canon and joining of zhuàn as not ancient — yet he also cites Wèi Chún Yújùn 魏淳于俊’s reply to the Lord of Gāoguìxiāng 高貴鄉公 — so he was not opposed to the appended-arrangement either, by reason of convenience. Hence in the front he divides the upper and lower scripture into six juàn, and the Tuàn, Xiàng, Xìcí, and the various zhuàn passages remain laid out under each hexagram, still in line with Fèi Zhí’s intent; while juàn 7 and after still lay out the original Ten Wings in their original text, restoring the old form of Tián Hé. This is to divide the canon and divide the zhuàn in order to preserve the old recension; yet the Ten Wings’ material laid out under the canon is cited as cross-confirmation, hence is all written one space lowered, so as to be distinguished from the proper text behind. That he still puts “gǔ Zhōuyì” as the title-frame is by reason of this. Only in the upper and lower scriptures does he further establish the names chū, zhōng, zhōng — that is his own self-making-of-antiquity.
Kǎi’s learning, although broad, is not refined; yet his materials are richly drawn from the old doctrines of Hàn and Jìn onward, miscellaneously gathered and jointly displayed, without holding to one house’s words. Moreover his words always have a basis, and he does not engage in suspended-in-air conjectural verdicts or forced piercing-and-attribution; one can often see in him the surviving threads of earlier Confucians. Of Míng-period classical glosses many are empty and shallow; selecting against shortness and taking against length, Kǎi’s book is still sufficient to be drawn upon for selection — one ought not to dismiss it for being mixed and miscellaneous.
Respectfully collated, the twelfth month of the forty-fifth year of Qiánlóng (1780). Editor-in-chief: Jì Yún 紀昀, Lù Xīxióng 陸錫熊, Sūn Shìyì 孫士毅. Chief proofreader: Lù Fèichí 陸費墀.
Abstract
Composition is fixed by the Sìkù notice to Chóngzhēn guǐyǒu = 1633; the catalog meta gives “date: 1625,” which is the year of Hé’s jìnshì rather than the work’s composition. The bracket here adopts the 1633 completion date.
The work is one of the most carefully calibrated late-Míng Yì compositional formats: a hybrid that preserves the ancient gǔ Yì / jīn Yì tension by physically encoding it through a typographic device (canonical text flush; quoted Wing material indented). This is more sophisticated than the more thoroughgoing gǔ Yì recoveries of the earlier Sòng (Lǚ Zǔqiān) and Yuán (Wú Chéng) periods, and reflects Hé’s editorial conviction that both arrangements have their use.
The appended Dá kè wèn is an explicit late-Chóngzhēn political document — the Sìkù editors’ brief notice that it “borrows the glossing of the canon to speak of contemporary affairs” understates this. The 1633 composition date is roughly contemporary with Lǐ Zìchéng’s 李自成 first major risings, and Hé’s broader fate (Southern-Míng Minister of Rites, conflict with Zhèng Zhīlóng, death of indignation by 1645–1646) places the work in the immediate run-up to the Míng collapse.
The work’s transmission profile is settled — it entered the Sìkù quánshū through normal channels — and the Sìkù editors’ assessment (“broad but not refined; nonetheless still useful”) is the standard view.
Translations and research
No substantial monograph in Western languages located. Hé figures briefly in Lynn Struve, The Southern Ming, 1644–1662 (Yale, 1984), in the context of the Lóngwǔ court and Hé’s conflict with Zhèng Zhīlóng.
Other points of interest
The hybrid typographic encoding of the gǔ Yì / jīn Yì distinction (flush canonical text, indented Wing citation) is one of the more elegant late-Míng Yì layouts, and would repay study as a small case in the typographic history of Chinese commentary printing. The complementary entries on Hé’s Shī writings and his Southern-Míng career would deepen the picture; the broader Yì / Shī corpus of late-Míng Zhāngzhōu philology is a small but coherent regional school.