Chūnqiū jízhuàn xiángshuō 春秋集傳詳說
Detailed Discussions of the Collected Commentaries on the Spring and Autumn Annals
by 家鉉翁 (撰)
About the work
The Chūnqiū jízhuàn xiángshuō in thirty juan is the Chūnqiū commentary of Jiā Xuànwēng 家鉉翁 (1213–after 1297), hào Zétáng 則堂. Composed in captivity in Yíngzhōu 瀛州 (Héjiān 河間) after Jiā was detained in the north as a Sòng qíqǐngshǐ 祈請使 and refused to take Yuán service, the work has the moral weight of a Sòng-loyalist instruction-text. The colophon by Gōng Sù 龔璛 reports: “In the bǐngzǐ 丙子 year of Zhìyuán (1276), with the fall of Sòng, Master Zétáng was relocated to Yíng for ten years, and there completed this book; from Yíng he sent it to Xuānzhōu 宣州 to entrust to his friend Hán Sùzhāi 肅齋潘公 for safe-keeping at Cóngdà 從大.” The text is therefore datable to the decade roughly 1276–1290. The book’s central thesis — Chūnqiū zhǔ hū chuífǎ, bù zhǔ hū shuōshì 春秋主乎垂法，不主乎説事 (“the Chūnqiū is principally a transmitter of law, not a recounter of events”) — is set out in a substantial gānglǐng 綱領 (general programme) preceding the jīng commentary. The gānglǐng is divided into ten essays (shí piān 十篇): (1–2) the dual rationale for tuōshǐ yú Yǐn 託始於隱 (taking Yǐngōng as the Chūnqiū’s opening), (3–5) three essays on xiàzhèng 夏正 — the Chūnqiū uses the Xià calendar (refuting the dominant Zuǒ-school view that it follows the Zhōu zǐ-month), (6) míng wǔshǐ 明五始, (7–8) two essays evaluating the three commentaries, (9) míng bà 明霸 (on the hegemons), (10) míng fánlì 明凡例 (on the apparent and real fánlì).
Jiā explicitly rejects the xiàshí guàn Zhōu yuè 夏時冠周月 view of Chéng Yí 程頤 and Hú Ānguó KR1e0036 in favour of a stronger thesis: the Chūnqiū is wholly in the Xià calendar — which means there is no calendrical schism between the jīng’s “spring” and Confucius’ personal calendrical preferences. The work also marks the transition from “discarding the commentaries” (fèizhuàn jiějīng 廢傳解經) to “weighing the commentaries against each other” — the SKQS editors note that Jiā’s “balanced and lucid” handling of the three commentaries far surpasses Sūn Fù.
Tiyao
The Sìkù tíyào (translated, here merged with the yuánxù preserved at the head of the book):
We your servants respectfully report. The Chūnqiū xiángshuō in thirty juan is by Jiā Xuànwēng of Sòng. Xuànwēng, hào Zétáng, served as Duānmíng diàn xuéshì qiānshū Shūmìyuàn shì. Gōng Sù’s 龔璛 colophon says: “In the bǐngzǐ year of Zhìyuán (1276), Sòng having fallen, Master Zétáng was conveyed to Yíng for ten years, and completed this book. He sent it from Yíng to Xuān to be entrusted to his friend Hán Sùzhāi 肅齋潘公 for transmission to Cóngdà.”
The Sòng shǐ biography records that when the Mongol forces drew near, Xuànwēng was acting as qíqǐngshǐ and was held in their hostel; on hearing of Sòng’s fall he refused food and drink for several days. He was transferred to Héjiān, where he took up the Chūnqiū to teach disciples. The book is therefore reliably a post-relocation product.
Xuànwēng’s view: “the Chūnqiū is for transmitting law, not for recounting events. Whether detail or summary, whether recording or omitting, every entry is bound up with the yǔduó yìyáng 予奪抑揚 (granting/taking, lifting/lowering) of moral judgement; its grand framework and deep thrust transcend literal language. The interpreter must work out where the sage’s heart-method lies, then check it against received commentary, then seek the truth.” Hence his discussions are calm, balanced, and clear-thinking — a different order from the books that “discard the commentaries to read the jīng”, or that “drive out received teaching to set up private theories.” Sūn Fù et al. cannot match him. Add his personal record of integrity — one of the zhēngzhēng 錚錚 figures of the closing Sòng years — and consider the book recommended through respect for the man: this work cannot fail to be promptly catalogued.
Reverentially examined and submitted, Qiánlóng 42 (1777), fifth month. Chief compilers: Jì Yún 紀昀, Lù Xīxióng 陸錫熊, Sūn Shìyì 孫士毅. Chief proofreader: Lù Fèichí 陸費墀.
Abstract
Jiā Xuànwēng’s exile-from-Sòng Chūnqiū is one of the rare Southern-Sòng-loyalist commentaries written in the north under Mongol rule. Its principal thesis — that the Chūnqiū is xiàzhèng throughout, no two-calendar schism — is positioned explicitly against the dominant xiàshí guàn Zhōu yuè 夏時冠周月 framework of Chéng Yí 程頤 and Hú Ānguó 胡安國 KR1e0036. Jiā argues at length (in juan-front essays Yuán xiàzhèng shàngzhōngxià 原夏正上中下) that the “nánzhì zài jiànzǐ yuè 南至在建子月” claim of the Zuǒzhuàn must be a Hàn intrusion, that no pre-Sòng evidence supports the claim, and that the Shī, Shū, the two Lǐjì compendia, and Lúnyǔ-and-Mèngzǐ all consistently use xiàshí. The argument anticipates by centuries the modern philological literature on the Chūnqiū calendar (e.g. Yáng Bójùn’s 楊伯峻 Chūnqiū Zuǒzhuàn zhù 春秋左傳注 introduction).
A second salient feature is the míng bà 明霸 essay. Jiā draws sharp moral distinctions among hegemons: Qí Huán and Jìn Wén are zhōngguó zhī zhūhóu (Central-States lords) acting in defence of the Zhōu, hence partial sanction; Chǔ Zhuāng is the jīngmán sēngwáng (a Jǐngmán claimant of royal title), totally repudiated; the Chūnqiū never confers hegemonic status on a southern barbarian. The argument has obvious force in 1280s Yíngzhōu, where the writer is a Sòng official under Mongol rule.
The dating bracket here is 1276 (the year of his relocation, per Gōng Sù) to roughly 1290 (Gōng Sù’s “ten years”), set conservatively. Jiā’s catalog fl. 1295 refers to his being still alive that year, not to composition.
Translations and research
- Sūn Wěimíng 孫衛明, Sòng dài Chūnqiū xué yánjiū 宋代春秋學研究 (Bēijīng: Zhōngguó shèhuì kēxué chūbǎnshè 2009).
- Lǐ Wěitài 李偉泰, Sòng-rén Chūnqiū xué dōu lùn 宋人春秋學論衡 (Tāiběi: Wénjīn 1995).
- Wáng Tài-pèi 王太沛, “Jiā Xuàn-wēng Chūnqiū jí-zhuàn xiáng-shuō yán-jiū” 家鉉翁春秋集傳詳說研究 (M.A. thesis, Guó-lì Gāo-xióng shī-fàn dà-xué 國立高雄師範大學, 2010).
- Zhāng Gāo-píng 張高評, Chūnqiū shū-fǎ yǔ Zuǒ-zhuàn xué shǐ 春秋書法與左傳學史 (Tāiběi: Wǔ-nán 2002).
Other points of interest
The gānglǐng 綱領 (the ten programmatic essays) is an unusual structural feature for a Sòng Chūnqiū commentary; it amounts to a small monograph in front of the verse-by-verse commentary, and is in many ways more important than the latter. The essays’ refutation of Shāng Jìwén 商季文 (a contemporary who claimed Confucius “personally invented a new calendrical convention” by relabelling the zǐ-month as “spring”) is a particularly forceful piece of Sòng philological argument.
Links
- Catalog meta:
data/catalogs/meta/KR1e.yaml - CBDB person 26431 (Jiā Xuànwēng)
- Sòng shǐ biography (j. 421)