Zhōulǐ shùzhù 周禮述註
A Transmissive Annotation of the Rites of Zhōu
by 李光坡 (撰)
About the work
Lǐ Guāngpō’s 李光坡 (1651–1723) twenty-four-juan early-Qīng commentary on the Zhōulǐ (KR1d0001), part of his complete Sānlǐ shùzhù 三禮述註 set covering the three Ritual Classics (Zhōulǐ shùzhù in 24 juan; Yílǐ shùzhù KR1d0040 in 17 juan; Lǐjì shùzhù KR1d0071 in 28 juan). Lǐ Guāngpō was the younger brother of the major early-Qīng court scholar-official Lǐ Guāngdì 李光地 (1642–1718) and remained at home in Fújiàn his entire life, devoting himself to classical scholarship. The Zhōulǐ shùzhù takes the zhùshū of KR1d0003 as its foundation, trimming the prolixity of the HànTáng commentary, and supplementing with selected post-Sòng material; Lǐ’s avowed goal is pedagogical accessibility — a middle path between Hàn-evidential breadth and Sòng-Daoxue speculation.
Tiyao
We respectfully submit that Zhōulǐ shùzhù in twenty-four juan was composed by Lǐ Guāngpō of the present dynasty. Guāngpō (zì Sìqīng, hào Màofū, native of Ānxī) is the younger brother of Grand Secretary [Lǐ] Guāngdì. Háng Shìjùn’s Róngchéng shīhuà says he remained at home without taking office, immersing himself in classical learning, and authored a Sānlǐ shùzhù — this work is one part of it.
The book takes the text of the zhùshū, trimmed of prolixity and pointed to essentials, to display the source of glossatorial meaning; and laterally adopts various scholars, mixed with his own intent, to bring out the sense of institutional design. Although on Zhèng’s and Jiǎ’s names-and-things and measurement passages there is much excision, the analysis is clear and the wording terse — quite suitable as a beginner’s bridge. Examining his elder brother [Lǐ] Guāngdì’s Róngcūn jí contains Zhōuguān bǐjì in one juan, which similarly highlights essential meanings without taking kǎozhèng and rebuttal as its strength. His nephew [Lǐ] Zhōnglún also has Zhōulǐ zuǎnxùn KR1d0020 of similar editorial pattern with this book — apparently this is the family learning.
The Sòng Confucians liked discussing the Three Dynasties, and so Zhōulǐ expositors are particularly numerous; furthermore, with the Xīníng New Policies in mind, they constantly drag in the abuses of late-imperial regimes and rambling refute-and-attack the zhùshū. The arguments swell while classical meaning is correspondingly muddled. Guāngpō’s book does not reach the breadth-and-depth of Hàn learning, nor extend to the spreading of Sòng learning; with even mind and quiet temper it works steadily for the meaning to be clear and the wording fluent. Among classicists this may be called the way of the proper mean.
Respectfully revised and submitted, tenth 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 shùzhù is one of the principal early-Qīng Zhōulǐ commentaries and the Zhōulǐ component of Lǐ Guāngpō’s complete Sānlǐ shùzhù set — a remarkable single-author achievement covering all three Ritual Classics. The Sìkù tíyào characterises Lǐ’s method as the “way of the proper mean” (shì zhōng zhī dào 適中之道) between the breadth of HànTáng evidential scholarship and the discursive expansion of Sòng Dàoxué. The work was composed during Lǐ’s long Ānxī retirement; the dating bracket “1690–1720” covers the most plausible period of intensive composition.
The Sānlǐ-family-tradition aspect — Lǐ Guāngpō, his elder brother Lǐ Guāngdì (Grand Secretary, author of the Zhōuguān bǐjì), and his nephew Lǐ Zhōnglún (author of KR1d0020 Zhōulǐ zuǎnxùn) — represents one of the most concentrated lineages of Qīng Zhōulǐ scholarship. Lǐ Guāngdì himself was a deputy compiler on the Qīndìng Zhōuguān yìshū commission (KR1d0018).
Translations and research
No substantial secondary literature located. Discussed in surveys of early-Qīng classical scholarship and in studies of the Lǐ family’s Ān-xī classical tradition.
Other points of interest
The Sìkù editors’ explicit framing of Lǐ Guāngpō as a “proper mean” between Hàn and Sòng learning is one of the more revealing instances of Qīng court-classical taxonomy. The early-Qiánlóng court positioned itself precisely on this mean, before the high-Qiánlóng Hàn xué movement (Sūn Yírǎng tradition) drove classical scholarship decisively toward the Hàn side.
Links
- Chinaknowledge: http://www.chinaknowledge.de/Literature/Classics/zhouli.html