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高氏春秋集註

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Text ID
KR1e0037
Date
1131–1153
Dynasty
宋

Gāoshì Chūnqiū jí zhù 高氏春秋集註

Master Gāo’s Collected Annotations on the Spring and Autumn Annals

by 高閌 (撰)

About the work

The Gāoshì Chūnqiū jí zhù 高氏春秋集註 in forty juan (catalog meta gives this number; SKQS recovery reorganised the original 14 juan into 40) is the Chūnqiū commentary of Gāo Kàng 高閌 (1097–1153). Composed in the Shàoxīng era over many years; submitted to the throne in 1131. Methodologically, the work takes Chéng Yí’s 程頤 Chūnqiū zhuàn (in 2 juan only — too sparse) as its base, supplementing with eclectic selections from TángSòng commentators without naming them. The Sòng shǐ biography records the title as Chūnqiū jí jiě; the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn and Chén Zhènsūn’s Shū lù jiětí both have Chūnqiū jí zhù. The Sìkù base is the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn recovery, expanded into 40 juan for ease of reading.

Tiyao

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

By Gāo Kàng of Sòng. Kàng, zì Yìchóng 抑崇, was a man of Yínxiàn 鄞縣 (Níngbō 寧波). In Shàoxīng 1 (1131), through the Shàngshè xuǎn 上舍選 he was awarded jìnshì; rose to Lǐbù shìláng 禮部侍郎. Career detailed in the Sòng shǐ rúlín zhuàn. The work takes Master Chéng’s [Yí’s] Chūnqiū zhuàn as its base, hence still bears Master Chéng’s original preface. The interpretation eclectically draws on TángSòng schools, integrated with his own ideas, without flagging the source authorities.

The Sòng shǐ says Qín Guì 秦檜 suspected Gāo of having recommended Zhāng Jiǔchéng 張九成, and demoted him to prefect of Yúnzhōu 筠州; Gāo refused to take up the post and died. But Lóu Yuè’s 樓鑰 preface to this work says: “Through straightforward speech he antagonised the dominant minister; once dismissed, he never returned. He ate at home for years, paying not the slightest attention to outside matters; he had a fixed daily syllabus of work, unbroken by wind or rain.” So Gāo’s death came after a long period of seclusion; his late energies all went into this work; the Sòng shǐ account is incomplete.

Although Gāo’s main thesis follows the Chéng tradition, on cases such as: Master Chéng (citing the Hàn Bó Zhāo 薄昭’s letter to the Prince of Huáinán 淮南, “Qí Huán’s killing of his younger brother”) taking Zǐjiū 子糾 as Qí Huán’s younger brother — Gāo follows the Sān zhuàn, Shǐjì, and Xúnzǐ: Zǐjiū and Xiǎobái 小白 were both younger brothers of Lord Xiāng 襄公, Jiū being the elder, properly the heir. Gāo refuses to acquiesce in school-loyalty preservation. Other cases — interpreting “the men of Wèi installed Jìn” 衛人立晉, “the lady Shì’s mourning came back from Qí” 夫人氏之喪至自齊, “took the Jǐxī fields” 取濟西田 — all catch the sage’s subtle intent. The interpretation of “[the lord] joined Xiàng Xū at Liú in covenant” reads: “Whenever a covenant is made on the basis of an envoy’s visit, it must be within the country. Liú is part of the royal estate (Wángjī cǎidì 王畿采地); how could one come on a state visit to Lǔ and then covenant in distant Liú? The text below has ‘Liú Xià’ 劉夏; transmitters took the xià in ‘spring’s xià’ (春夏) — paralleling the Wén 4 entry “summer, fetched the bride Jiāng from Qí” — and erroneously inserted ‘于劉’ (at Liú).” Reading “Zhōu Pú” 州蒲 as a corruption of “Zhōu Mǎn” 州滿 likewise yields a sound reading. But the Yǐn 9 Fáng 防 (where the meeting was held, near Lángyá 琅邪) and the Yǐn 10 Fáng (where it was taken, near Gāopíng 高平) are different places; and the Wén 12 Yùn 鄆 (where the city was built, near Chéngyáng 成陽) and the Chéng 4 Yùn (built in Dōngjùn) are also different — Gāo confuses each pair, somewhat lacking in textual scrutiny.

The original work has long been lost, only scattered in the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn. We arrange the surviving text in order, completing it from citations in other works to recover the head and tail. Chén Zhènsūn’s Shū lù jiětí gives the work as 14 juan; we, finding the text-pages excessive, divide it into 40 juan. The Sòng shǐ biography gives the title Chūnqiū jí jiě; the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn gives jí zhù, matching Chén Zhènsūn — the Sòng-period title. We follow accordingly. The recorded jīng-text is mostly from the Zuǒ, but with occasional readings from the Gōngyáng and Gǔliáng; Sòng scholars typically used all three commentaries together, unlike Hàn-period strict-school learning.

Abstract

The Sìkù tíyào makes the principal points: that this is Gāo Kàng’s Chūnqiū jí zhù, taking Chéng Yí’s Chūnqiū zhuàn as base and elaborating eclectically; that despite his school-affiliation Gāo is not afraid to depart from Chéng on specific points (e.g., the Zǐjiū / Xiǎobái lineage relation); that the work makes interpretive innovations on several entries (the Liú covenant, Zhōu Pú / Zhōu Mǎn) but is occasionally weak on geographical scrutiny (confusing the two Fángs and the two Yùns); that the Sòng shǐ account of his death is incomplete (Lóu Yuè’s preface gives the fuller picture); that the work was lost between the Sòng and the Míng, surviving only in Yǒnglè dàdiǎn fragments, expanded into 40 juan by the Sìkù editors.

The work is methodologically distinctive in its eclecticism without source-attribution — a mode of presentation that makes intellectual genealogy hard to trace but produces an integrated commentary text. It belongs to the Chéng-school Chūnqiū line that runs through Hú Ānguó KR1e0036 and that became the imperial-examination orthodoxy under the Míng.

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).

Other points of interest

Gāo Kàng’s appointment as Erudite of the Imperial Academy under Sòng Gāozōng was politically charged: the Tàixué under Qín Guì had become the principal site for indoctrinating the appeasement programme, and Gāo’s refusal of the Yúnzhōu posting (after Qín suspected him of recommending the anti-appeasement Zhāng Jiǔchéng) is one of the cases of Chūnqiū-scholar resistance to the Qín regime that subsequent generations honoured.

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