Zhōulǐ zhùshū shānyì 周禮註疏刪翼
The Annotation-and-Sub-Commentary of the Rites of Zhōu, Trimmed and Winged
by 王志長 (撰)
About the work
Wáng Zhìcháng’s 王志長 (1585–1663) thirty-juan late-Míng Zhōulǐ commentary, structured as a careful condensation of the canonical Zhèng Xuán–Jiǎ Gōngyàn Zhōulǐ zhùshū (KR1d0003) — shān 刪 (“trim away” the prolixity of the HànTáng commentary) — supplemented with selected SòngMíng exegetical material — yì 翼 (“wings”). Composed during Wáng’s late-Wànlì–Tiānqǐ–Chóngzhēn career (i.e., before the Míng’s collapse in 1644), the work represents a late-Míng return to the conservative zhùshū-rooted approach to the Zhōulǐ at a time when Míng scholarship had drifted into either the textually-aggressive Yú Tíngchūn–Wú Chéng tradition or the superficial line-glossing of the Zhū Shēn–YuánMíng tradition.
Tiyao
We respectfully submit that Zhōulǐ zhùshū shānyì in thirty juan was composed by Wáng Zhìcháng of the Míng. Zhìcháng (zì Píngzhòng, native of Kūnshān) was a jǔrén of the Wànlì era; the Míngshǐ Wényuàn zhuàn attaches his biography to that of his elder brother Wáng Zhìjiān, noting that “he too was deeply versed in classical learning.”
The book trims the prolixities of Zhèng’s note and Jiǎ’s sub-commentary, hence “trim”; and incorporates selected accounts from various scholars to develop the meaning, hence “wings.” On the Zhōulǐ — once Zhèng’s note made the glossatorial sense clear, and Jiǎ’s sub-commentary completed the verification of names-and-things and the institutional system — the later writers were unable to surpass them. Zhōu, Zhāng, [the two] Chéng, and Zhū — all the various Confucians — judged for themselves that learning rooted in evidence cannot rise above the HànTáng standard, and so wrote no specialised work on it. The transmitted Zhōulǐ studies of Wáng Ānshí and Wáng Zhāoyǔ first ventured to set up alternative interpretations; Wáng Yǔzhī first tried to combine many voices; Yè Shí and Zhèng Bóqiān first borrowed the classic to set out their own arguments. By then classical meaning had drifted into the in-between of departure and return; kǎozhèng learning gradually transformed into discursive learning, and Zhèng and Jiǎ were almost abandoned.
Wáng Zhìcháng’s book also draws extensively on post-Sòng accounts; some surface verbiage obscures the essentials — this is unavoidable. But by taking the zhùshū as foundation, he is able to alter without departing from the orthodoxy. Furthermore, after Zhū Shēn followed simplification and excised the xùguān; after Yú Tíngchūn and Qiū Kuí again let their personal opinions run free and garbled the ministries; the wave of decline in the Míng has continued — even the classical text itself is no longer original. Zhìcháng is able strictly to follow the ancient version and works hard to dam the flood. In an era when classical learning is wasteland, he stands tall on the deep ground; he may be called one who has set his mind on the ancient meaning.
Huì Dòng 惠棟 in Jīnghuá lù xùnzuǎn picks up Jīn Róng’s 金榮 wrong citation and on that basis lumps Zhìcháng with the village-school books. This is excessive disparagement and not entirely fair.
Respectfully revised and submitted, twelfth 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
The Zhōulǐ zhùshū shānyì is the principal late-Míng Zhōulǐ commentary in the Sìkù, and the only one to take a systematically conservative position toward the canonical ZhèngJiǎ zhùshū tradition rather than either the speculative SòngYuán “Dōngguān not lost” school or the simplified YuánMíng line-gloss tradition. Wáng Zhìcháng’s “shān + yì” (trim + wing) method — keeping the substance of the HànTáng commentary, condensing its repetitions, and selectively incorporating later glosses where they genuinely illuminate the classical meaning — anticipates the Qīng Hàn xué method of the Sūn Yírǎng Zhōulǐ zhèngyì tradition.
The Sìkù tíyào explicitly contextualises Wáng’s project as a counter-current against late-Míng decline: “in an era when classical learning is wasteland, he stands tall on the deep ground” (在經學荒蕪之日，臨深為髙). The editors take the further step of defending Wáng against Huì Dòng’s 惠棟 dismissive remark in the Jīnghuá lù xùnzuǎn — pointing out that Huì had relied on Jīn Róng’s 金榮 misquotation rather than reading Wáng’s text directly.
The dating “1605–1644” brackets Wáng Zhìcháng’s adult Wànlì-era jǔrén career through the end of the Míng.
Translations and research
No substantial secondary literature located. Treated in surveys of late-Míng classical scholarship as a forerunner of the Qīng Hàn xué approach to the Zhōulǐ.
Other points of interest
The Sìkù editors’ rebuke of Huì Dòng — one of the founding figures of the Wúpài Hànxué movement — for unfairly dismissing Wáng Zhìcháng is a notable instance of the Sìkù-editorial board’s willingness to correct even revered Hànxué predecessors when documentation showed them to have been factually wrong. The note is also an indication of how the Sìkù editors situated themselves: critical of late-Míng scholarship in general, but discriminating about which late-Míng works deserved preservation.
Links
- Chinaknowledge: http://www.chinaknowledge.de/Literature/Classics/zhouli.html