Chūnqiū zhèngzhuàn 春秋正傳
The Correct Tradition of the Spring and Autumn Annals
by 湛若水 (撰)
About the work
The Chūnqiū zhèngzhuàn 春秋正傳 in 37 juan is the principal Chūnqiū work of Zhàn Ruòshuǐ 湛若水 (1466–1560), founder of the Gānquán xuépài 甘泉學派 and the principal mid-Míng exponent of suí chù tǐ rèn tiānlǐ 隨處體認天理 (“everywhere embody-and-recognise tiānlǐ”). The book was first cut for printing in Jiājìng jiǎwǔ (1534) at the initiative of Zhàn’s disciples Biàn Lái 卞萊, Shěn Rǔyuān 沈汝淵 (of Jiāngdū) and Gāo Jiǎn 高簡 (of Western Shǔ); Gāo Jiǎn supplied the publisher’s preface.
The book’s organising thesis, set out in Zhàn’s own self-preface, is twofold: first, the Chūnqiū is the imperial xíngshū 刑書 (punishment book) of the sage — those who depart from lǐ enter into xíng — but the sage’s heart is to be sought “in the events” (事), not in any single character of the canonical text; second, the orthodox yìlì 義例 tradition (deriving from Gōngyáng and Gǔliáng and culminating in Hú Ānguó’s 胡安國 KR1e0036 commentary) has fundamentally misunderstood the Chūnqiū by reducing the sage’s broad moral judgment to mechanical readings of cosmetic phrasal differences. The work’s title — “The Correct Tradition” — is a deliberate riposte to the Sòng tradition: “Zhèngzhuàn yún zhě, zhèng zhū zhuàn zhī miù ér guī zhī zhèng yě” 正傳云者，正諸傳之謬而歸之正也 (“‘Correct tradition’ means correcting the errors of the various traditions and returning them to correctness”). The work’s procedure: cite Zuǒ, Gōngyáng, Gǔliáng in turn; then cite the various Confucians (especially Hú Ānguó); then offer Zhàn’s own balance, often explicitly invoking Lù Jiǔyuān 陸九淵 and Wáng Yángmíng 王陽明.
Tiyao
The Sìkù tíyào: The Chūnqiū zhèngzhuàn in thirty-seven juan was composed by Zhàn Ruòshuǐ of the Míng. Ruòshuǐ, zì Yuánmíng, of Zēngchéng, jìnshì of Hóngzhì yǐchǒu (1505), reached Nánjīng Bīngbù shàngshū; retired and died, posthumously Wénzhuāng 文莊. His career-record is in the Míng shǐ basic biography. This book’s principal thesis: that the Chūnqiū is the original text of the Lǔ historiographers, and that one should not forcibly construct yìlì on it and pollute it with personal opinion’s surmise; one should only investigate it through the events and seek it in the heart. When the events are got, then the sage’s heart and the Chūnqiū’s meaning may both be obtained. He accordingly takes the various schools’ explanations and corrects them. The title “Zhèngzhuàn” 正傳 means correcting the various traditions’ errors and returning them to correctness. The general method: first to quote the three traditions; then to list the various Confucians’ words; then to reach his own opinion as final judgment — fairly close to Liú Chǎng’s Quánhéng.
In the middle, for example, on Yǐngōng not recording the jíwèi: he says it was because there was no announcement, hence not recorded — a matter of historiographer’s text, not what the Master removed. On Sònggōng, Chénhóu, Càirén, Wèirén attacking Zhèng: he says, if praising-or-blaming were intended in the styling jué (爵, rank-title) versus rén (人, “people”), then rén Wèi would be acceptable — but why would rén Cài and not rén Sòng — certainly not the sage’s meaning. On the Wèi-people setting up Jìn: he says “Wèi-people” is just the appellative of another state, and the various explanations cannot be pinned down. On Ténghóu’s death: he says feudal lords ought to die hōng (薨, said of a feudal lord’s death), but recording zú (卒, said of a commoner’s death), or zàng (葬), or not — these are all the old Lǔ historiographers’ practice, on which the sage neither added nor reduced. On Sònggōng and Wèihóu meeting at Chuí: he says the historiographer recorded what was reported, the sage preserved what the historiographer recorded.
His earlier and later discussions all proceed on this basis. The Chūnqiū is the book of the disordered age; that the sage must have had no special brushwork in it — this too cannot but be taken as overcorrecting. Yet bǐshì shǔcí 比事屬辭 (comparing-events, joining-words) is the Chūnqiū’s teaching. Ruòshuǐ has been able to lift up wholesale the past’s chiselled-in-shards routine examples and sweep them empty, seeking [the meaning] from real events to obtain the sage’s purport. As compared to other works of classical exegesis, this is the more accessible and acceptable. The book in Jiājìng jiǎwǔ (1534) was published by Ruòshuǐ’s disciple Biàn Lái at his own expense, with Gāo Jiǎn supplying the preface. Submitted at Qiánlóng 43 (1778), 2nd month.
Abstract
Zhàn Ruòshuǐ’s lifedates: the catalog meta gives 1466–1570, but this is wrong — the standard biographical record (Míng shǐ j. 283 Rúlínzhuàn; CBDB id 131191; Wikidata) gives 1466–1560 (some sources 1466–1559 by Western reckoning), with the deathdate at age 95 suì. The figure is followed here as in the person note for 湛若水; the catalog meta’s “1570” should be read as a transcription slip for “1560.”
The work was composed during Zhàn’s middle years, after his major doctrinal work the Gé wù tōng KR3a0094 (presented to Jiājìng in 1528) and before the major collations of the Gānquán wén jí. The published edition of 1534 reflects substantive revisions over the preceding period of teaching and disputation. The work’s intellectual position is clear: it is a Xīnxué 心學 (Mind-school) reading of the Chūnqiū, drawing explicit precedent from Lù Jiǔyuān (“Hòu shì zhī lùn Chūnqiū zhě duō rú fǎlìng, fēi shèngrén zhī zhǐ yě” 後世之論春秋者多如法令，非聖人之指也 — “Later disputants on the Chūnqiū have mostly read it like statute-law; this is not the sage’s intent”) and developing the position alongside Wáng Yángmíng. The Zhèng shuò yuè shù lùn 正朔月數論 (essay on calendar and month-counting), prefacing the work, includes a recorded exchange between Zhàn and “Yángmíng zǐ” 陽明子 (Wáng Yángmíng) on the question of whether the zǐyuè 子月 may be taken as “spring.”
The work’s significance is methodological: by foregrounding bǐshì shǔcí and rejecting the verbal-formulary tradition, Zhàn participates in the broader sixteenth-century Mind-school turn against verbal-philological orthodoxy. The Sìkù editors approve cautiously — they note Zhàn’s overcorrection in arguing that Confucius added nothing to the Lǔ historiographers’ text, but credit the substantive method. The reading remains influential through the late-Míng Yángmíng school’s Chūnqiū studies.
The work’s principal departure from the orthodox Hú Ānguó line is its sweeping rejection of bāobiǎn 褒貶 (praise-and-blame) readings of cosmetic textual differences (rank-titles versus rén, presence/absence of burial-records, etc.). In this respect Zhàn aligns himself with the earlier polemic of Huáng Zhòngyán KR1e0050, whose Chūnqiū tōng shuō 春秋通說 (1230–1236) had taken a similar anti-bāobiǎn stance under Zhū Xī’s authority — although Zhàn does not cite Huáng directly.
Translations and research
- Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual §28.5 (Spring and Autumn) and §62 (Ming Confucianism) provide general orientation.
- Mizoguchi Yūzō 溝口雄三, Chūgoku zenkindai shisō no kussetsu to tenkai 中国前近代思想の屈折と展開 (Tōkyō: Tōkyō daigaku shuppankai 1980), discusses Zhàn Ruòshuǐ’s place in the late-Míng Lǐxué fragmentation.
- George L. Israel, Doing Good and Ridding Evil in Ming China: The Political Career of Wang Yangming (Brill 2014) — incidentally treats the Zhàn-Wáng correspondence, including their debate on the Chūnqiū.
- Yáng Bǔ-jūn 楊葆均, Zhàn Ruòshuǐ jí Gānquán xué-pài yánjiū 湛若水及甘泉學派研究 (Tāiběi: Tāiwān shāng-wù 1995).
- Yǐng-yìn Wén-yuān-gé Sì-kù quán-shū vol. 167 (Tāiběi: Tāiwān shāng-wù 1986).
Other points of interest
Zhàn Ruòshuǐ’s Zhèng shuò yuè shù lùn (the prefatory essay on calendar and month-counting) is one of the relatively rare passages in the corpus of Míng Chūnqiū scholarship that records a substantive philosophical exchange between Zhàn and Wáng Yángmíng on a technical philological question. Wáng Yángmíng there says: “Hòu shèng yǒu zuò zhě qí yǐ zǐyuè yáng shēng wéi chūn hū” 後聖有作者其以子月陽生為春乎 (“Should later sages arise, will they not take the zǐyuè, where yáng arises, as spring?”); Zhàn replies that the earlier kings did so, but Confucius approved the Xià calendar — the principle that “yīnyáng wú jiérán zhī lǐ” 陰陽無截然之理 (“there is no absolute cut-off principle between yīn and yáng”) emerges through this exchange. The passage is a useful primary source for the doctrinal positions of the two figures.
Links
- Míng shǐ j. 283 (Rúlínzhuàn) for Zhàn Ruòshuǐ’s biography.