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孝經集傳

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Text ID
KR1f0010
Date
1638–1643
Dynasty
明

Xiàojīng jízhuàn 孝經集傳

Collected Tradition on the Classic of Filial Piety

by 黃道周 (撰, 1585–1646)

About the work

The most ambitious late-Míng commentary on the Xiàojīng. Composed by Huáng Dàozhōu 黃道周 — Hànlín scholar, official, painter, calligrapher, and ultimately Lóngwǔ-court loyalist martyr — during the four years between his caning at court (tíngzhàng 廷杖) and imprisonment in 1638 (Chóngzhēn 11) and his completion of the work in 1643 (Chóngzhēn 16). The work consists of 4 juàn and explicates the Xiàojīng through systematic citation from the Yílǐ 儀禮, Liji 禮記 (both Dà Dài and Xiǎo Dài recensions), and the Mencius; Huáng’s own argument is offered as a xiǎo zhuàn 小傳 (“lesser tradition”) and the supporting citations from the Liji etc. as a dà zhuàn 大傳 (“greater tradition”). The work is the most explicitly philosophical Xiàojīng commentary of the late Míng and a key document in late-Míng moral-political thought.

Tiyao

We have respectfully examined the Xiàojīng jízhuàn in four juàn, composed by Huáng Dàozhōu of the Míng. Dàozhōu’s Sānyì dòngjī 三易洞璣 is recorded separately. This work was composed at the time of his caning and imprisonment. The intent of the work, as recorded by his disciples, runs: “Xiàojīng — from ‘not damaging one’s own person’ to ‘not harming the empire,’ from ‘not despising one man’ to ‘serving the most-high,’ it really sees that liáng zhī 良知 and liáng néng 良能 fill heaven and fill earth.” And again: “Xiàojīng has five great meanings: (i) it founds jiào 教 in xìng 性 and grounds zhì 治 in xīn 心 — making us know that without xiào there is no jiào, without xìng there is no dào: this is the root of all sage-and-worthy learning. (ii) It binds jiào to lǐ 禮, binds lǐ to jìng 敬, by jìng attains zhōng 中, by xiào induces hé 和: this is the deep source of imperial governance. (iii) It models on Heaven, follows Earth, ever takes the way of Earth as its station, walks in compliance and yielding, makes the empire dissolve its rebellious heart, makes the Wǔxíng 五刑 (Five Punishments) and Wǔbīng 五兵 (Five Weapons) find no purchase: this is the deep source of order and disorder ancient and modern. (iv) It returns from formality to substance — uses the way of Xià and Shāng to remedy Zhōu. (v) It refutes [Yáng] Zhū 楊朱 and condemns Mò 墨, so that the doctrines of Buddhism and Daoism cannot disturb the constant principles.”

By these five [great points] he distinguishes the chapter divisions, and afterward orders chapters of the Liji under each as connecting and adornment. The “five subtle meanings” (wǔ wēiyì 五微義) and “twelve manifest meanings” (shí’èr zhuó yì 十二著義) of the present preface do not stretch beyond this; these are in fact the structural pillars of the whole book. In an early version, the citations of the Shī were each made into independent sub-chapters (in the manner of the Zhōngyōng’s shàng jiǒng 尚絅 chapter); in the present recension they are placed at the end of each chapter — Dàozhōu evidently came to feel his earlier arrangement was unsettled. He had also intended at first to set out the structure first by chapter, then to discuss the deep source of xiào and jìng, and lastly to discuss the return from formality to substance — apparently wanting to make the work a freestanding scholastic treatise on the model of the Dàxué yǎnyì 大學衍義. The present recension instead follows the canonical text in order, with miscellaneous citations from the canon and the jì in evidence — different from his initial plan.

Long ago, in the postface to his Kānwù (see KR1f0006), Master Zhū wrote: “I should like to take up phrases from other books that can illumine this canon, and make them into a separate Wàizhuàn.” Dàozhōu’s book in fact realizes Master Zhū’s plan, and his amplification is exceedingly profound. The diction of his own zhù takes after the manner of Zhōu and Qín ancient writings, with no scholastic zhāngbǐzìzhì 章比字櫛 manner. He is the equal of Liú Chǎng’s 劉敞 Chūnqiū zhuàn. Shěn Héng 沈珩 said: “His citations from the Yílǐ, the two Dài records, and the words of Zǐsī and Mèngzǐ — these he calls the dà zhuàn 大傳; under each entry of canon and zhuàn, the master’s own qióng lǐ 窮理 expositions, that fully exhibit the principle — these he calls xiǎo zhuàn 小傳. Begun in wùyín 戊寅 of Chóngzhēn (1638), completed in guǐwèi 癸未 (1643), it is a clearly arrived-at dà chéng 大成 — not like Master Zhū’s Yílǐ [reorganization] which still left regrets behind.” Chén Yǒudù 陳有度 said: “The Xiàojīng jízhuàn takes the Liji in its entirety as its sub-commentary and the Mencius in its seven sections as its guide; what Zhèng [Xuán] and Kǒng [Yǐngdá] could not perceive, what Xíng [Bǐng] and Zhū [Xī] could not reach by analogy.” Although these claims push the praise too high, the elucidation of the canonical meaning is deeper and more pointed than other commentators. The author’s own great moral conduct in his lifetime was not unworthy of this book — and this is even more not the kind of book that can be classed with mere empty talk by other commentators. Submitted respectfully on the imperial command, fourth month of Qiánlóng 45 (1780). General editor: (your servant) Jì Yún 紀昀, Lù Xīxióng 陸錫熊, Sūn Shìyì 孫士毅. General collator: Lù Fèichí 陸費墀.

Abstract

Huáng Dàozhōu (1585–1646), zì Yōuxuán 幼玄 / Yōupíng 幼平, hao Shízhāi 石齋, native of Zhāngzhōu 漳州 in Fújiàn, was one of the most striking late-Míng officials. He passed the jìnshì in 1622 (Tiānqǐ 2), served as Hànlín biānxiū 編修, shídú 侍讀, and Lǐbù shìláng 禮部侍郎; was caned at court in 1638 for opposing Yáng Sìchāng 楊嗣昌’s policy of compromise with the Manchus, and imprisoned for several years thereafter. After the fall of Beijing in 1644 he served the Lóngwǔ 隆武 court at Fúzhōu, was captured by the Qīng in 1646 and executed at Nánjīng. He is venerated as one of the great MíngQīng transition martyrs (jointly with Liú Zōngzhōu 劉宗周, Shǐ Kěfǎ 史可法, and others), and is also a major figure in late-Míng calligraphy, painting, and astronomical theory.

The Xiàojīng jízhuàn was begun in prison in 1638 and completed in 1643 — i.e. in the same five years in which Huáng wrote his major Yìjīng commentary Yìxiàng zhèng 易象正 and his astronomical work Sānyì dòngjī 三易洞璣. The work explicitly takes as its goal the realization of Zhū Xī’s never-realized programme (in the Kānwù postface) of an “outer tradition” (wàizhuàn 外傳) that would gather citations from outside the Xiàojīng to elucidate it. Huáng’s “great tradition” (dà zhuàn) consists of citations from the Yílǐ, the Liji (both Dà Dài and Xiǎo Dài), the Zhōngyōng, and the Mencius; his “lesser tradition” (xiǎo zhuàn) is his own running exposition. The five “subtle meanings” (wēi yì 微義) and twelve “manifest meanings” (zhuó yì 著義) of the preface frame the Xiàojīng as a comprehensive blueprint for a Confucian polity — much in the manner of his contemporary Liú Zōngzhōu’s reading of the Liji in the Lijǐng 禮經.

The work returns to the unedited jīnwén recension of the Xiàojīng — neither following Zhū Xī’s Kānwù deletions (see KR1f0006) nor Wú Chéng’s reorganization (see KR1f0008). The dating window above is set tightly to the composition (1638–1643) per the Tíyào’s information.

Translations and research

  • See KR1f0001 for general Xiàojīng translations and research.
  • 陳鐵凡 Xiàojīng xuéshǐ 孝經學史. Taipei: Guólì biānyìguǎn, 1986.
  • 鄭吉雄 (Zhèng Jíxióng), Huáng Dàozhōu Xiàojīng jízhuàn yánjiū 黃道周《孝經集傳》研究. Taipei: Wàn juàn lóu, 2010. The standard modern monograph.
  • 何冠彪 (Hé Guānbiāo), Sǐ wáng yǔ bù xiǔ 死亡與不朽. Taipei: Lián jīng, 1997. Treats Huáng Dàozhōu’s death and reception in the Míng-Qīng transition.
  • Lynn A. Struve, The Southern Ming, 1644–1662. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1984. For Huáng’s role in the Lóngwǔ court.

Other points of interest

The Tíyào notes are unusually warm — citing the praise of Shěn Héng and Chén Yǒudù — and even concede that the work surpasses Zhū Xī’s never-realized “outer tradition” plan. The closing remark, “his great moral conduct in his lifetime was not unworthy of this book,” is a tacit recognition by the Sìkù editors of Huáng’s status as a Ming loyalist martyr — the Sìkù under the Qīng emperor would normally have been more reserved about so politically sensitive an author, and the warmth of the entry is a signal that, three reigns after the dynastic transition, late-Míng martyrs had become safe to praise.

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