Gōngshì Qī jīng xiǎo zhuàn 公是七經小傳
Master Gōngshì’s Brief Commentary on Seven Classics by 劉敞 (撰)
About the work
A short Northern-Sòng work in 3 juàn of miscellaneous philological remarks on seven classical books — Shàngshū, Máoshī, Zhōulǐ, Yílǐ, Lǐjì, Gōngyáng zhuàn, and Lúnyǔ. Liú Chǎng 劉敞 (“Master Gōngshì” 公是先生) was one of the great Qìnglì-era classicists; this small book is famous less for its textual yield than for being routinely cited (by Cháo Gōngwǔ 晁公武 and Zhū Xī 朱熹) as the first Sòng work that broke openly with HànTáng zhāngjù zhùshū 章句注疏 deference and substituted the author’s own conjectural emendations for the received text. Both supporters and detractors of Wáng Ānshí 王安石’s Xīn jīngyì 新經義 located the founding gesture of Sòng evidential boldness in this book.
Tiyao
The KRP source for this entry contains only _001.txt, _002.txt, _003.txt — no _000.txt, hence no in-source 提要. The WYG tíyào is recovered here from the Kyoto University Zinbun digital Sìkù tíyào 四庫提要 (Liǎngjiāng Governor-General submitted copy):
By Liú Chǎng of the Sòng. Chǎng has a Chūnqiū zhuàn — already catalogued elsewhere. This compilation is the miscellany of his sayings on classical doctrine. The “seven Classics” of the title are: (1) Shàngshū, (2) Máoshī, (3) Zhōulǐ, (4) Yílǐ, (5) Lǐjì, (6) Gōngyáng zhuàn, and (7) Lúnyǔ. Yet the Gōngyáng portion contains only one item, and even that merely corrects an interpolated character in the commentary — it makes no doctrinal point. Following it are also one Zuǒzhuàn item and one Guóyǔ item, which makes it strange that the entry should be marked solely under Gōngyáng. Presumably Chǎng had originally meant to compose seven jīng zhuàn (七經傳); only the Chūnqiū one was completed (the materials he had collected having already been incorporated into the five works of Chūnqiū zhuàn, Yìlín 意林, Quánhéng 權衡, Wén quán 文權, and Shuō lì 說例). Of these three brief items, one corrects an interpolated character, one discusses the regulation of capital walls (dū chéng bǎi zhì 都城百雉), and one discusses the dìjiāo zǔzōng bào 禘郊祖宗報 sacrifices — none of them attaches itself to the Gōngyáng text properly. The original chapter-heading must have been “Chūnqiū”, which would naturally include the outer commentary (Guóyǔ); a copyist saw that the first item was on Gōngyáng and that the second ended with the word Gōngyáng, and accordingly retitled the chapter “Gōngyáng” with a sub-note “Guóyǔ appended”. The original sense was lost.
The Lúnyǔ entries are mostly of the same form as the other Classics, but some print the canonical text in full and embed glosses below in note form, like a regular zhùshū — Liú evidently had begun to do a Lúnyǔ commentary which remained unfinished, and the materials were mixed in here.
Wú Zēng’s 吳曾 Nénggǎizhāi mànlù says: before the Qìnglì era, the zhāngjù zhùshū tradition was generally venerated; only when Liú Yuánfǔ wrote the Qī jīng xiǎo zhuàn did anyone begin to differ from the various Confucians. Wáng Jīnggōng’s (Wáng Ānshí’s) Jīngyì 經義 was modelled on Yuánfǔ. (We note: the Dúshū zhì of Cháo also records this passage, but attributes the saying to the Yuányòu-era historiographers.) Cháo Gōngwǔ 晁公武 in his Dúshū zhì corroborates this with such examples as Liú’s reading of “Tāng fá Jié shēng zì Ér 湯伐桀升自陑” — which is identical with Wáng’s Xīn jīngyì — as evidence that Wáng plundered Liú’s interpretation. The general tenor of both authorities is unfavourable to Liú. Zhū Xī’s Yǔlèi on the other hand says: “the Qī jīng xiǎo zhuàn is very good.” Their views are at odds.
If we now look at the book itself: he proposes that Shàngshū’s yuàn ér gōng 愿而恭 should be yuàn ér tú 愿而荼; that cǐ jué bù tīng 此厥不聽 should be cǐ jué bù dé 此厥不德; that the Máoshī’s zhēng yě wú róng 烝也無戎 should be zhēng yě wú shù 烝也無戍; that the Zhōulǐ’s zhū yǐ yù qí guò 誅以馭其過 should be zhū yǐ yù qí huò 誅以馭其禍; that shì tián jiǎ tián 士田賈田 should be gōng tián jiǎ tián 工田賈田; that the Jiǔ shì 九簭 fifth, wū yì 巫易, should be wū yáng 巫陽; that the Lǐjì’s zhū hóu yǐ lí shǒu wéi jié 諸侯以貍首為節 should be yǐ què cháo wéi jié 以鵲巢為節 — in all of which he alters the canonical character to suit his own reading. For the Lǐjì’s “ruò fú zuò rú shī 若夫坐如尸…” passage he suspects there is missing bamboo; for the “rén xǐ zé sī táo 人喜則斯陶” nine-clause passage, lost text; for the “lǐ bù wáng bù dì 禮不王不禘”… “shù wáng yì rú zhī 庶王亦如之” passage, dislocated lines. As to the Shàngshū’s Wǔ chéng 武成 chapter — he reorders its chronology, in fact preceding Cài Shěn 蔡沈 in this. Truly the fashion of altering canonical text by personal opinion, breaking with the simple and straightforward style of the older Confucians, began with Liú Chǎng.
Likewise his interpretations are sometimes forced. He says that of the Shàngshū’s “niǎo shòu qiāng qiāng 鳥獸蹌蹌”, the ancients composed music sometimes modelled on birds, sometimes on beasts. On the Máoshī’s “Gé zhī tán xī 葛之覃兮”, he says: when gé grows luxuriantly there are persons who go and cut it for zhī gě 絺綌 cloth, just as when an empress is virtuous and ample-natured at home, the king goes to seek her hand to make her empress. On the Lúnyǔ’s “Chéng fú fú yú hǎi 乘桴浮於海”, he says: the Master travelled the various states like a raft adrift at sea — flowing without anchor. These readings are forced and identical in spirit with Wáng Ānshí’s, and so vulgar transmission has caused the slander. But examining his own Dìzǐ jì 弟子記, the censure of Wáng Ānshí is repeated, and the work is notably at odds with the New Learning. Moreover Wáng Ānshí was rigid and stubborn, hardly the man to follow Liú step for step. To say that Liú’s classical interpretation opens the way to Southern-Sòng arbitrary judgment — this Liú cannot deny. To say that Wáng Ānshí’s learning derived from Liú’s — this is the suspicion of “the missing axe” (qiè fū zhī yí 竊鈇之疑), without firm ground. Setting aside the dross and gathering the kernel — much of his exegesis is solidly forged. How could one, on account of the failings of his epigones, scrap the book of Liú himself?
Abstract
The Gōngshì Qī jīng xiǎo zhuàn (or Qī jīng xiǎo zhuàn simpliciter) is the foundational text in the Northern-Sòng turn from zhāngjù zhùshū 章句注疏 deference to conjectural emendation. Liú Chǎng’s preface is lost; the work was completed during his middle career (he was jìnshì in 1046 and died in 1068, so the date bracket is 1046–1068). The catalog meta gives Liú’s birthyear as 1009, but CBDB and the Sòng shǐ liè zhuàn (劉敞 person note) give 1019; followed here. Coverage is asymmetric: the Lǐjì gets the most extensive treatment, the Yílǐ a fair share, the Lúnyǔ an unfinished commentary mixed in, and the Gōngyáng essentially a misplaced Chūnqiū fragment. The book’s reception in the Sòng was deeply ambivalent: Wú Zēng 吳曾 and Cháo Gōngwǔ 晁公武 named Liú as the precursor of Wáng Ānshí’s Xīn jīngyì (a serious charge during the Yuányòu reaction); Zhū Xī, by contrast, praised it. The Sìkù compilers’ verdict — that Liú is the originator of Sòng-classicism’s habit of conjectural rewriting (hǎo yǐ jǐ yì gǎi jīng 好以己意改經), but that this should not detract from the genuine philological merits of the book — has remained the standard view.
The work circulated in 3 juàn (per WYG) and 5 juàn (in some Sòng catalogues, perhaps including the Lúnyǔ fragment as additional). Note Liú’s reordering of the Shàngshū Wǔ chéng chapter — anticipating Cài Shěn’s much-cited reordering by over a century, a fact already noted by the Sìkù compilers.
Translations and research
- Cherniack, Susan. “Book Culture and Textual Transmission in Sung China.” HJAS 54 (1994): 5–125. The standard English study of Sòng textual scholarship; Liú Chǎng features.
- Bol, Peter K. This Culture of Ours: Intellectual Transitions in T’ang and Sung China. Stanford UP, 1992. Pages on Liú’s place in the Qìnglì-era turn.
- Cháo Gōngwǔ 晁公武, Jùnzhāi dúshū zhì 郡齋讀書志, passim — earliest substantive secondary discussion.
- Wú Zēng 吳曾, Néng-gǎi-zhāi mànlù 能改齋漫錄.
- Zhū Xī 朱熹, Zhūzǐ yǔlèi 朱子語類, scattered references.
- Yāng Yùshēng 楊裕生. Liú Chǎng jí qí Qī jīng xiǎo zhuàn yánjiū 劉敞及其七經小傳研究. PRC dissertation, 2000s.
Other points of interest
The work’s role as proximate forerunner of Wáng Ānshí’s Xīn jīngyì was a persistent and politically charged claim under the Northern Sòng — and is interesting for what it tells us about the prosopography of evidential boldness as a partisan signal under the Yuányòu reaction.