Chūnqiū míngzhì lù 春秋明志錄
Record of Clarifying Intent in the Spring and Autumn Annals
by 熊過 (撰)
About the work
The Chūnqiū míngzhì lù 春秋明志錄 in twelve juan is the Chūnqiū commentary of Xióng Guò 熊過 (zì Shūrén 叔仁, hào Nánshā 南沙, of Fùshùn 富順 in Xùzhōu 敘州, modern Sìchuān). Xióng Guò passed the jìnshì in Jiājìng jǐchǒu (1529) — also the catalog meta date for this work, although the fuller composition span runs through Xióng’s mid-career (he served as Lǐbù cíjì sī lángzhōng before being banished to Yúnnán in xīnchǒu = 1541, where his other major work, the Yìjīng commentary KR1a0098 Zhōuyì xiàngzhǐ juélù 周易象旨決錄, was completed under the encouragement of the exiled Yáng Shèn 楊慎). The Chūnqiū míngzhì lù belongs to Xióng’s broader programme of mid-Míng xiàngshù 象數 / Hànxué 漢學 revival, here applied to the Chūnqiū.
The work’s title — “Record of Clarifying Intent” — derives from Xióng’s own preface (cited in the tíyào): “The way exists in intent, the intent is made clear in words” (道存乎志，志明諸言). The principal thesis is anti-Sòngzhuàn: signal Hú Ānguó’s Zhuàn and GōngyángGǔliáng are systematically corrected, and the Zuǒzhuàn in particular receives detailed critical re-reading.
Tiyao
The Sìkù tíyào: The Chūnqiū míngzhì lù in twelve juan was composed by Xióng Guò of the Míng. Guò, zì Shūrén, of Fùshùn, jìnshì of Jiājìng jǐchǒu (1529), reached Lǐbù cíjì sī lángzhōng. Guò once annotated the Yì, specifically taking xiàngshù as his concern; commentators rank him alongside Lái Zhīdé 來知德 (1525–1604) — broadly speaking he does not master earlier Confucians’ old explanations. This book likewise extensively gathers earlier explanations and adds refutation for each. The principal purport: believing the canonical text and not believing the traditions (信經不信傳). His self-preface says: “The way exists in intent, the intent is made clear in words” — hence “Clarifying Intent” as the name. Within it, against Gōng and Gǔ and Hú Ānguó’s tradition, all are corrected, but the Zuǒzhuàn most of all.
For example: taking the moving of Xíng to Yíyí as Xíng moving on its own and not [Duke] Huán removing it; taking the walling of Chǔqiū as Lǔ defending against the Róng and walling, not Huán walling for [Duke] Wèi; taking the seizure of Yúgōng by the Jìn as preserving him within his state and forcibly preventing him from leaving for elsewhere, not seizing-and-bringing-back; taking the Níngmǔ assembly’s Qí refusing of [Duke] Zǐhuá as not actually so; taking the Táo league’s “plan against the royal house” as a forgery; taking the use of the Zēngzǐ as coming from the Zhū people, not Sònggōng’s command; taking Jìn’s Huáigōng as the posthumous title of Zhuózǐ — that Wéngōng never killed Zǐyǔ; taking Zhào Dùn as never having sent Xiān Mè to bring Prince Yōng back from Qín; taking Wèi’s Shí È as the Sūn faction, not the Níng faction; taking Chǔ’s executing Qìng Fēng as not by criminal punishment, having no axe-and-banner-display-among-the-army practice — all unable to escape záokōng lìshuō 鑿空立說 (chiselling-empty and erecting-explanations), repeatedly self-contradictory.
Again: taking Guōgōng 郭公 as the name of a bird, calling it a strange occurrence like locusts and yú-pests; taking the fall of Liáng as what the Lǔ great officers heard at meetings and reported back — not from official announcement, hence not noting the cause of the fall — also mostly arising from speculative judgment, with the fault of using thought to excess.
Yet his successful explanations often have concise-and-judicious purport, the great meaning brilliantly clear, in the end not what other authors of gleaning-empty-talk could match. Hence Zhuó Ěrkāng 卓爾康 said it is “rather has originality, often hits the mark — also a brilliant stroke of Chūnqiū [study].” Compared with his Yì-notes, this is far more substantive. Submitted at Qiánlóng 43 (1778), 9th month.
Abstract
The Chūnqiū míngzhì lù is one of the principal mid-Míng xìnjīng bùxìnzhuàn 信經不信傳 (“trust the canonical text but not the traditions”) works. The position itself is not original to Xióng Guò — it has Sòng precedents in Liú Chǎng’s Quánhéng and Sūn Fù’s Zūnwáng fāwēi, and is the broad programme of Zhàn Ruòshuǐ’s KR1e0076 Chūnqiū zhèngzhuàn of just slightly earlier — but Xióng Guò’s specific contribution is the systematic philological critique of the Zuǒzhuàn’s factual reportage. Many of his rereadings (Xíng moving on its own; Wèi’s defensive walling at Chǔqiū; Jìn’s restraint of the Yúgōng) treat Zuǒzhuàn claims as inferences not actually warranted by the canonical text. The Sìkù editors are sceptical — they catalog instance after instance of what they take as overcorrection — but ultimately concede the work’s general philological merit: “his successful explanations often have concise-and-judicious purport.”
The catalog meta dates the work to 1529 (Xióng Guò’s jìnshì year). This is the earliest possible date, but the work was likely revised over Xióng’s mid-career; the notAfter date here is set to 1554 to allow for the Yúnnán exile period (1541–) when Xióng continued to write actively. The tíyào’s submission date of 1778 reflects only the Sìkù entry, not the original composition.
The relationship to Xióng’s Yìjīng commentary KR1a0098 Zhōuyì xiàngzhǐ juélù 周易象旨決錄 is intellectual-methodological. Both works share the mid-Míng Hànxué 漢學 revivalist orientation: against the yìlǐ 義理 readings of the Sòng Lǐxué tradition, in favour of careful philological-historical engagement with the canonical text on its own terms. Xióng Guò is therefore properly grouped, as the tíyào does, with Lái Zhīdé as a precursor of Qīng evidential scholarship — although the editors note that Xióng’s philological apparatus, while careful, occasionally rests on dubious sources.
The work’s place in mid-Míng Chūnqiū scholarship is alongside Zhàn Ruòshuǐ’s KR1e0076 Chūnqiū zhèngzhuàn and Lù Càn’s KR1e0078 Chūnqiū Húshì zhuàn biànyí — three substantial mid-Jiājìng monographs all converging on a programme of xìnjīng 信經 reading and rejection of yìlì mechanism, but each from a different intellectual base (Zhàn from Xīnxué, Lù Càn from political-ethical zhèngdà, Xióng Guò from xiàngshù / Hànxué).
Translations and research
- Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual §28.5 for general orientation on Chūnqiū studies.
- Pǔ Wěizhōng 浦衛忠 et al., Míng dài jīng-xué yánjiū lùnjí 明代經學研究論集.
- Zhuó Ěr-kāng 卓爾康, Chūnqiū bǐ-jǐ 春秋辨疑 (Sìkù), evaluates the work positively; the tíyào preserves his judgment.
- Yǐng-yìn Wén-yuān-gé Sì-kù quán-shū vol. 168 (Tāiběi: Tāiwān shāng-wù 1986).
Other points of interest
The reading of Guōgōng 郭公 (Zhuāng 24.2 in the Chūnqiū) as the name of a bird is one of the most striking — and idiosyncratic — readings in the work, classified by Xióng with strange-occurrence entries like locusts and parasites. The Sìkù editors note the reading sceptically but preserve it as an instance of the work’s fresh-cut (新裁) approach. The episode is a useful index of the lengths to which the xìnjīng bùxìnzhuàn programme could be pushed in mid-Míng Chūnqiū scholarship.
Links
- KR1a0098 Zhōuyì xiàngzhǐ juélù (Xióng Guò’s Yì-commentary).