Zhōuyì tú shū zhì yí 周易圖書質疑
Inquiring Into the Charts-and-Writings of the Zhōuyì by 趙繼序
About the work
A Qiánlóng-period Yìjīng commentary in twenty-four juàn by 趙繼序 Zhào Jìxù (Yìmén 易門) of Xiūníng 休寧 (Ānhuī). The work speaks of the Yì through symbol-and-number but explicitly rejects the 陳摶 Chén Tuán / 邵雍 Shào Yōng Hé tú-Luò shū tradition: “those who made the charts based [their work] on the Yì; later ones turned around and said the Yì was made on the basis of the charts — these words are clearly-decisive enough to settle the doubt of the past thousand years.”
The original text was unpaginated. The Sìkù editors organized it as: ancient-canon thirteen-chapter (gǔ jīng shí sān piān 古經十三篇) at the head; per-line gloss without canonical text reproduction (using the Hàn-Confucian jīngzhuàn separately-running convention); 32 charts each accompanied by discussion; closing with Dàyǎn xiàng shù kǎo 大衍象數考, Chūnqiū zhuàn lùn Yì kǎo 春秋傳論易考, Yì tōng lì shù 易通厯數, Zhōuyì kǎo yì 周易考異, guà yáo lèi xiàng 卦爻類象, and a discussion of the textual recensions of 吳仁傑 Wú Rénjié and 費直 Fèi Zhí (preserved without title before the Zhōuyì kǎo yì, where the Sìkù editors suspect it had been at the end of the Kǎo yì in the original and was displaced by transmission). The total is 24 juàn as organized by the Sìkù editors.
Doctrinally the work principal-takes hexagram-variation as the source of symbol, jointly drawing on Hàn and Sòng commentators with “level-and-proper” position-taking. The Sìkù editors’ chief objection: Zhào’s identification (following 程智 Chéng Zhì) of Dì chū hū Zhèn 帝出乎震 as the surviving substance of the Xià-dynasty Lián shān 連山 and Kūn yǐ zàng zhī 坤以藏之 as the substance of the Yīn-dynasty Guī cáng 歸藏 is “unavoidably forced” — Confucius praised the Zhōuyì not other-Yìs, and would not have inserted old-method-explanations to disorder his own example.
Tiyao
Sìkù tíyào (translated): The Zhōuyì tú shū zhì yí in twenty-four juàn was composed by Zhào Jìxù of our [Qīng] dynasty. Jìxù, hào Yìmén, was a man of Xiūníng; Qiánlóng xīnyǒu jǔrén. The book speaks of the Yì by symbol-and-number but does not principal-take the ChénShào HéLuò doctrine. He says: “those who made the charts were based on the Yì; on the contrary, [people] said those who made the Yì were based on the charts — these words are clear-and-decisive, can settle the doubt of the past thousand years.”
The original recension does not divide juàn-counts. Head-place is gǔ jīng shí sān piān; next is line-by-line glossing of the canonical meaning without laying out the canonical text but only marking hexagram-and-line — using the Hàn-Confucian jīngzhuàn separately-running example. Next 32 charts each with appended discussion. Closing with Dàyǎn xiàng shù kǎo, Chūnqiū zhuàn lùn Yì, Yì tōng lì shù, Zhōuyì kǎo yì, and guà yáo lèi xiàng — yet another chapter discriminating the Wú Rénjié recension and the Fèi Zhí recension, without setting up a section-title, listed before the Zhōuyì kǎo yì. We suspect this is the Kǎo yì’s end-section displaced by transmission. Now we make it follow by category, ranking front-and-back, fixing it as twenty-four juàn.
His main import mostly takes hexagram-variation as the source of symbol, and jointly draws on HànSòng doctrines. His position-taking is quite level-and-proper. Only his taking Dì chū hū Zhèn as the Xià’s Lián shān and Kūn yǐ zàng zhī as the Yīn’s Guī cáng, on the basis of Chéng Zhì’s doctrine, and pushing-and-extending it, fails to escape forced-reading. The Master praised the Zhōuyì; how could he suddenly insert speech of the old method, self-disordering his example?
Respectfully collated, the tenth month of the forty-sixth year of Qiánlóng (1781). 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 bracketed by Zhào’s 1741 jǔrén and the 1781 Sìkù recension; the bracket here adopts these dates. The catalog meta’s “date: 1741” almost certainly refers to Zhào’s jǔrén year rather than the work’s composition.
The work is a substantively interesting Qiánlóng-period Yì commentary. Methodologically it occupies an unusual position: speaking of xiàngshù but rejecting the chart-tradition. The diagnostic formulation — “the charts were based on the Yì, not the Yì on the charts” — is one of the more pithy methodological statements in the kǎozhèng lineage and represents a substantive engagement with 胡渭 Hú Wèi’s KR1a0138 Yìtú míng biàn program.
The work’s structural complexity (canonical commentary + 32 charts + five major appendices) makes it one of the more elaborate mid-Qiánlóng Yì-corpora; the Sìkù editors’ substantial reorganization (numbering it 24 juàn from an unnumbered original; relocating the textual-recension essay) is also unusually extensive.
The Chéng Zhì-derived Lián shān / Guī cáng attribution is a substantively eccentric identification that the Sìkù editors firmly reject; it represents a small case in the late-Qing fascination with the lost pre-Zhōuyì hexagram-systems.
Translations and research
No substantial monograph in Western languages located.
Other points of interest
The work’s combination of symbol-and-number method with rejection of the chart-tradition is methodologically substantive and represents a third-way position between the strict yìli school (程廷祚 Chéng Tíngzuò KR1a0159) and the Wú pài Hàn-school (惠棟 Huì Dòng KR1a0155–KR1a0157). The diagnostic formulation about charts being made on the basis of the Yì is pointedly memorable and represents the high-Qiánlóng kǎozhèng consensus.