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孫氏春秋經解

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Text ID
KR1e0025
Date
1080–1090
Dynasty
宋

Sūnshì Chūnqiū jīng jiě 孫氏春秋經解

Master Sūn’s Explanation of the Classic of the Spring and Autumn Annals

by 孫覺 (撰)

About the work

The Sūnshì Chūnqiū jīng jiě 孫氏春秋經解 in thirteen juan is the surviving Chūnqiū work of Sūn Jué 孫覺 (1028–1090). Sūn was a pupil of Hú Yuán 胡瑗 (993–1059) — one of the Sòng chū sān xiānshēng 宋初三先生 — and inherited Hú’s Chūnqiū lessons; the work is foundationally Hú’s oral teaching as redacted by Sūn. The principal hermeneutical position is “suppress hegemons, honour the king” (yì bà zūn wáng 抑霸尊王). The Sòng catalogues record under Sūn’s name: Chūnqiū jīng jiě in 15 juan (per the Sòng shǐ yìwén zhì and Chén Zhènsūn) or 13 juan (the present text); a Chūnqiū xué zuǎn 春秋學纂 in 12 juan (per Sòng zhì and Wáng Yīnglín’s Yùhǎi); and a Chūnqiū jīngshè yào yì 春秋經社要義 in 6 juan. The Sìkù tíyào (and modern scholarship) hold that Chūnqiū jīng jiě and Chūnqiū xué zuǎn are alternative names for the same work, leaving only the Yào yì (lost) as a separate composition.

Tiyao

The Sìkù tíyào (text from the Kyoto Zinbun digital Sìkù tíyào):

By Sūn Jué of Sòng. Jué, zì Xīnlǎo 莘老, was a man of Gāoyóu 高郵; passed the jìnshì examination; rose to Yùshǐ zhōngchéng 御史中丞. Career detailed in the Sòng shǐ biography. The work is titled “Master Sūn the Lóngxué” (Lóngxué Sūngōng 龍學孫公) — at retirement he held Lóngtúgé xuéshì 龍圖閣學士 with concurrent appointment as Tíjǔ Lǐquánguàn 提舉醴泉觀. He studied early under Hú Yuán 胡瑗, transmitting the latter’s Chūnqiū learning. The major thesis is “suppressing hegemons and honouring the king” (yì bà zūn wáng 抑霸尊王). The author’s preface says: “The Zuǒshì tells the events more, the Gōngyáng and Gǔliáng preserve the outline. Now I weigh the three traditions for relative correctness — the Gǔliáng most penetrating and deep, hence I take the Gǔliáng as foundation.” On praise-and-blame regulatory items, the work draws eclectically on the three traditions, on the works of historical Confucians, and on the DànZhùZhàoKuāngLù school; what is best in each is followed. What none of them resolves, he resolves with the explanations of Master Āndìng (Hú Yuán). At present Hú Yuán’s Kǒu yì 口義 in five juan is lost; his transmitted teachings on the Chūnqiū survive only in this work.

Zhōu Línzhī 周麟之’s postface says: “Initially Wáng Ānshí 王安石 wished to make a Chūnqiū commentary to enforce throughout the realm; but Xīnlǎo’s zhuàn had already appeared, and Wáng on first seeing it conceived a deep envy, knowing he could not surpass it; he then disparaged the sage’s classic and abandoned it.” Shào Jí 邵輯’s preface says the work was composed in Sūn’s late years, and that Wáng’s abandonment-of-the-Chūnqiū was due to it — but probably this is not literally true; nonetheless we can see that contemporaries valued the work very highly, hence such accounts.

The Sòng shǐ yìwén zhì records Chūnqiū jīng jiě in 15 juan and Chūnqiū xué zuǎn in 12 juan and Chūnqiū jīngshè yào yì in 6 juan; Zhū Yízūn’s Jīng yì kǎo follows it, marking the jīng jiě as extant and the xué zuǎn and yào yì as lost. But the present text is in fact 13 juan, complete from Yǐngōng 1 to the capture of the unicorn — the head and tail intact, with no defect — at variance with the Sòng zhì. Examining Chén Zhènsūn’s Shū lù jiětí: it gives Chūnqiū jīng jiě in 15 juan and Chūnqiū jīngshè yào yì in 6 juan but no Xué zuǎn. Wáng Yīnglín’s Yùhǎi gives Yào yì in 6 juan and Xué zuǎn in 12 juan but no Jīng jiě. The Yùhǎi note under Xué zuǎn says: “Its argument takes the Gǔliáng as foundation, drawing on the Zuǒshì, the Gōngyáng, and the merits of historical Confucians, with his teacher Hú Yuán’s interpretation interspersing as adjudicator. Zhuānggōng is divided into upper and lower [juan]” — perfectly matching the present text. So Chūnqiū xué zuǎn and Chūnqiū jīng jiě are alternative names for one work; the Sòng zhì erroneously divided one into two and got the juan-counts wrong; the Shū lù jiětí mis-recorded 13 juan as 15 juan; only the Yùhǎi records the truth.

Abstract

The Sìkù tíyào makes the principal points: that this work is the principal Northern-Sòng Chūnqiū commentary in the Hú Yuán line, transmitting Hú Yuán’s lost teachings; that its hermeneutical position takes the Gǔliáng as foundation while drawing eclectically on the other two commentaries and on the DànZhàoLù school; that its principal political-ethical thesis is yì bà zūn wáng (suppressing hegemons and honouring the king); that contemporary anecdote credits the work with deterring Wáng Ānshí from his planned imperial Chūnqiū commentary; and that the bibliographic record needs to be corrected — Jīng jiě and Xué zuǎn are alternative names for one work, leaving only Yào yì (lost) as a separate composition.

The work is also methodologically distinctive in its choice of the Gǔliáng as primary commentary — the Gǔliáng having been historically the weakest of the three, this preference (anticipated by Liú Xiàng in the Hàn) places Sūn Jué in a small minority within the Northern-Sòng Chūnqiū tradition, where the Zuǒzhuàn was usually primary.

Translations and research

  • Lǐ Wěitài 李偉泰, Sòng-rén Chūnqiū xué dōu lùn 宋人春秋學論衡 (Tāiběi: Wénjīn 1995).
  • Sūn Wěimíng 孫衛明, Sòng dài Chūnqiū xué yánjiū 宋代春秋學研究 (Bēijīng: Zhōngguó shèhuì kēxué chūbǎnshè 2009) — covers Sūn Jué’s relation to Hú Yuán.

Other points of interest

The Wáng Ānshí anecdote is one of the central legends of Northern-Sòng Chūnqiū historiography. Wáng’s reported dismissal of the Chūnqiū — calling it “a fragmentary court gazette” (duàn làn cháo bào 斷爛朝報, recorded in Sòng shǐ 327: 10550 and discussed in Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual §48.1.1) — was understood by his contemporaries as motivated less by genuine philological criticism than by the strategic calculation that Sūn Jué’s commentary had pre-empted his own intended programme. The anecdote, even if exaggerated, is a useful index of the political weight that an authoritative Chūnqiū commentary carried in the late Northern Sòng.

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