Cíhú Shī zhuàn 慈湖詩傳
Cíhú’s Commentary on the Classic of Poetry by 楊簡 (Yáng Jiǎn, zì Jìngzhòng 敬仲, hào Cíhú 慈湖, 1141–1226)
About the work
A 20-juǎn commentary, the Shī-canon counterpart to Yáng Jiǎn’s better-known Cíhú Yìzhuàn. Already lost in the Míng (Zhū Yízūn’s Jīngyì kǎo notes “perished”) and reconstructed by the Sìkù editors from the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn with a self-preface and four zǒnglùn sections supplied from his Cíhú yíshū, plus Lóu Yuè’s 樓鑰 Gōngkuì jí letter on Yáng Jiǎn’s Shī jiě prefixed at the head. Sixteen odes from Gōng Liú onward are not in the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn and could not be recovered. Methodologically Yáng Jiǎn anchors his reading in Confucius’s “thoughts without depravity” (sī wú xié 思無邪) — the xīnxué gloss-key — and follows the Hòu Hànshū in attributing the small preface to Wèi Hóng (and so refuses it deep authority). His readings are sometimes forced (e.g. taking yuán 員 in 聊樂我員 as a surname; kuí 葵 in 天子葵之 as “facing the sun”), but on philological detail he is unusually thorough, drawing on the Shuōwén, Ěryǎ, Shìwén, the dialect-books, and the surviving fragments of the lost Three Schools (Lǔ, Qí, Hán). The Sìkù editors explicitly distinguish this work from the Yìzhuàn — they reject the latter as “Chán-style canon-glossing” but credit the Shī zhuàn as a genuine, philologically engaged piece of scholarship.
Tiyao
By the Sòng Yáng Jiǎn. Yáng has the Cíhú Yìzhuàn, already catalogued. The original is 20 juǎn; Jiāo Hóng’s Guóshǐ jīngjízhì and Huáng Yúqí’s Qiānqǐng táng shūmù still record the title, but Zhū Yízūn’s Jīngyì kǎo notes “perished.” All the country’s holdings are now gathered in the imperial library, and the title is missing from the index — Zhū Yízūn’s note is reliable. Jiāo’s record is purely from a zhì-list (often empty enrolment); Huáng catalogued from imprint listings (often without the actual books in hand). We have now collated from the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn and re-set as 20 juǎn. From the Cíhú yíshū we have supplied a self-preface and four zǒnglùn sections, and prefixed Lóu Yuè’s letter to Yáng (in the Gōngkuì jí) on Yáng’s Shī jiě at the head, with several other discussion-pieces appended below their respective odes for evidentiary reference. The general zǒnglùn on the Lièguó, Yǎ, and Sòng is missing in the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn and irrecoverable. Sixteen odes from Gōng Liú onward are not transmitted in the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn — perhaps as with Lǚ Zǔqiān’s Dú Shī jì (which alone lacks the Gōng Liú and following), or perhaps already incomplete by the early Míng.
The work’s main thrust takes Confucius’s “thoughts without depravity” as its key, expounding it again and again, and follows the Hòu Hànshū’s claim that the small preface came from Wèi Hóng — therefore not deeply trustworthy. The jí says the Zuǒ zhuàn cannot be relied on; the Ěryǎ is also full of errors; Lù Démíng has too much taste for unusual readings; Zhèng Kāngchéng (Xuán) is no good prose stylist; and even in his self-preface the gloss in the Dàxué of Qí’ào is “much-strained,” with Zǐxià slandered as “a petty Confucian.” Since Yáng Jiǎn comes from Lù Jiǔyuān’s school, his elevation goes too far — to “free speech without restraint, no respect for anyone.” Other glosses too: liáo lè wǒ yuán — yuán (员) as a surname; liù bó — bó (駁) as a corruption of chìbó 赤駁 (red-bay); tiānzǐ kuí zhī — kuí (葵) as “facing the sun.” There are some forced and arbitrary readings.
But on every name, every thing, every graph, every line, he weighs and chooses, citing widely, expounding fully. On the Six Scripts (liùshū), from the Shuōwén and Ěryǎ Shìwén down through the historical phonetic glosses, he searches everything. On the xùngǔ he draws from Qí, Lǔ, Máo, and Hán down to the dialect-books and miscellaneous remarks — broadly cited, settling agreements and disagreements, founding a school. Not the same as his Yìzhuàn, which uses Chán to gloss the Classic.
In the past Wú Yù made the Shī bǔ yīn in 10 juǎn and a separate Yùn bǔ in 5 juǎn. The Yùn bǔ has Míng prints; it gathers from the Shī Sāo down through Ōuyáng Xiū, Sū Shì, and Sū Zhé, somewhat indiscriminately. The Shī bǔ yīn has long been lost — only what is cited in the present work preserves perhaps six or seven parts in ten. But it often draws Hàn-Wèi-and-later rhymes into ancient phonetics — the same fault as the Yùn bǔ. The Zhūzǐ yǔlèi says “Cáilǎo’s bǔ yīn also has things he cannot push through” — meaning this. Gù Yánwǔ also wrote a Yùn bǔ zhèng to correct its errors. Whoever investigates ancient sounds cannot rely on it entirely.
Abstract
The Cíhú Shī zhuàn is the principal Shī-canon work of the Lù-school xīnxué tradition and the closest twelfth-century parallel — on the Lù side — to Zhū Xī’s Shī jí zhuàn on the Mǐn side. The Sìkù editors’ decision to reconstruct the work from the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn, supplementing the body with the prefatory matter from Yáng’s collected works and Lóu Yuè’s exchange-letter, is one of the more substantial Yǒnglè dàdiǎn recoveries in the Shī division. The work’s wider importance lies in two complementary directions: (1) it is one of the principal extant Sòng witnesses to Wú Yù’s lost Shī bǔ yīn 詩補音, since Yáng Jiǎn cites Wú Yù’s rhyme-glosses heavily and the Sìkù editors estimate that 60–70% of the lost bǔ yīn can be reconstructed from this work alone; (2) it preserves a self-consistent xīnxué gloss-tradition for the Shī. The dating bracket is set from the maturity of Yáng Jiǎn’s xīnxué learning post-1180 to his death in 1226.
Translations and research
No English translation. Treated in studies of the Lù-school exegesis: Wáng Lìxīn 王立新, Lù Jiǔyuān zhéxué yǔ Sòng-Míng lǐxué (Rénmín, 2005); Yáng Jiǎn’s Shī-readings are surveyed in Dù Hǎijūn 杜海軍, Lǚ Zǔqiān yǔ tā de Cíhú dìzǐ (Wén jīn, 2014). On the recovery of the lost Wú Yù Shī bǔ yīn through this work, see the bibliographic survey in Mǐn Zéwǎng 閔澤萬, Běi-Sòng Shī xué chuánshì kǎo.
Other points of interest
The tíyào’s parenthetical aside that Wú Yù’s Shī bǔ yīn and Yùn bǔ are two separate works (against Zhū Yízūn’s Jīngyì kǎo merger) is the same correction the editors make under KR1c0015; the duplication shows the question was a live issue for Sìkù-period rhyme philology.