論語集解義疏

Lúnyǔ jíjiě yìshū 論語集解義疏

Sub-commentary on the Collected Commentaries to the Analects

何晏 (Hé Yàn, ca. 195–249) — jíjiě; 皇侃 (Huáng Kǎn, 488–545) — yìshū

About the work

Hé Yàn’s Lúnyǔ jíjiě (KR1h0005) with the Liáng-period subcommentary (yìshū 義疏) of Huáng Kǎn 皇侃; 10 juàn. The principal early-medieval Lúnyǔ commentary, lost in China by the Southern Sòng but preserved in Japan, recovered in the Qiánlóng era and incorporated into the Sìkù quánshū.

Tiyao

We respectfully submit: Lúnyǔ jíjiě yìshū in 10 juàn — by Hé Yàn 何晏 of the Wèi (jíjiě) and Huáng Kǎn 皇侃 of the Liáng (yìshū). The Jìnshū 晉書 records that Zhèng Chōng 鄭沖, with Sūn Yōng 孫邕, Hé Yàn, Cáo Xī 曹羲, Xún Yǐ 荀顗 and the rest, jointly assembled the best of the Lúnyǔ commentaries of various schools, emending whatever they found unsatisfactory; they named this jíjiě. Yet the present text is attributed to Hé Yàn alone. Examining Lù Démíng’s 陸德明 Jīngdiǎn shìwén 經典釋文, under Xué ér dìyī 學而第一 the title-line reads jíjiě, with the note “one edition reads Hé Yàn jíjiě” — so the sole attribution to Hé Yàn is of long standing; perhaps because Hé Yàn, by reason of his rank as imperial son-in-law (qīnguì 親貴), assumed overall direction of the project.

Huáng Kǎn — written 偘 in the Liángshū, a graphic variant — was a native of Wújùn, ninth-generation descendant of the Wú-period qīngzhōu cìshǐ Huáng Xiàng. Under Wǔdì he served as Guózǐ zhùjiāo 國子助教, then was made sànqí shìláng 散騎侍郎 while continuing as zhùjiāo; he died in Dàtóng 11 (545). His biography is in the Liángshū Rúlínzhuàn. The biography lists his works as Lǐjì yì 禮記義 in 50 juàn and Lúnyǔ yì 論語義 in 10 juàn. The Lǐjì yì has long been lost. As for this book, the Sòng Guóshǐ zhì, the Zhōngxīng shūmù, Cháo Gōngwǔ’s Dúshū zhì, and Yóu Mào’s Suíchūtáng shūmù all still record it; from the QiánChún era onwards no further citation of it is heard, and Chén Zhènsūn’s Shūlù jiětí indeed does not list it — we know it had perished in the Southern Sòng. Only the Táng-period old text survived in transmission overseas. In Kāngxī 9 (1670), Yamai Kanae 山井鼎 of Japan and others compiled the Qījīng Mèngzǐ kǎowén 七經孟子考文, which says that “in our country this book exists, but in China none can be obtained.” Hence Zhū Yízūn’s Jīngyì kǎo notes “unseen.”

Now, in this glorious era, with our August Sovereign right-handed in letters and reverent toward antiquity — the way of the Classics flourishes; and so the light of this book has been brought forth from the realm of the whale-waves and the sea-pearl chambers, ferried hither by ships and ascended into the imperial library, as if some divine force were guarding it, preserving one strand of the HànJìn classical tradition, awaiting its reappearance in this enlightened age — its arrival in our times is no mere coincidence.

The text and the present (Sòng-line) text often differ; for instance under the line “jǔ yī yú 舉一隅” (Lúnyǔ 7.8), the present recension has “ér shì zhī 而示之” — three more characters than seem necessary, but in agreement with the Wénxiàn tōngkǎo 文獻通考 citation of the stone-cut Lúnyǔ. Under “fūzǐ zhī yán xìng yǔ tiāndào, bù kě dé ér wén yě 夫子之言性與天道，不可得而聞也” the present text adds “yǐ yǐ 已矣” — agreeing with the High-Korean (Gāolì) old-text witness cited in Qián Zēng’s 錢曾 Dúshū mǐnqiú jì. The subcommentarial text, where excerpted in Yú Xiāokè’s 余蕭客 Gǔjīngjiě gōuchén 古經解鈎沈, agrees in substance (with minor wording variants) with the present recension — confirming that this is a genuine old text, not a forgery. At “lín zhī yǐ zhuāng zé jìng 臨之以莊則敬” (Lúnyǔ 2.20) the recension reads “lín mín zhī yǐ zhuāng zé jìng 臨民之以莊則敬” — the Qījīng kǎowén itself suspects the mín 民 to be a stray addition, but conserved the old text without emendation, confirming that in Japan the chain of transmission has occasionally suffered minor scribal slips, but no deliberate alteration.

The differences from Hé Yàn’s jíjiě are particularly numerous. Some of the Japanese readings — e.g. Bāo 苞氏 for Bāo 包氏, Chén Héng 陳恒 for Chén Huán 陳桓 — cannot stand; but in many places the Japanese text is preferable to that of the Míng-period jiānběn 監本 [Imperial Academy edition], a useful collateral resource for textual collation. — Respectfully revised, eleventh month of the 46th year of Qiánlóng [1781].

General Compilers: Jǐ Yún 紀昀, Lù Xīxióng 陸錫熊, Sūn Shìyì 孫士毅. General Reviser: Lù Fèichí 陸費墀.

Abstract

The Sìkù tíyào above is the principal account of the work’s textual history. Three distinct points are worth emphasising.

(1) Composition. Huáng Kǎn’s yìshū was composed in his years at the Guózǐjiān under Liáng Wǔdì, ca. 510–530. It is a sub-commentary in the strict medieval sense — discussing each of Hé Yàn’s jíjiě glosses in turn, expanding their references, citing additional sources from the lost WèiJìn commentaries (notably Wáng Bì 王弼 on the Lúnyǔ, otherwise lost), and supplying philosophical-metaphysical remarks of its own that align broadly with Liáng-period Buddhist-influenced xuánxué readings. It thus preserves a substantial cross-section of Six Dynasties Lúnyǔ scholarship that would otherwise be wholly lost.

(2) Loss in China and survival in Japan. The book disappeared from Chinese transmission between the Northern and Southern Sòng — apparently displaced by the new Sòng zhèngyì of Xíng Bǐng 邢昺 (KR1h0007) and, more decisively, by Zhū Xī’s Lúnyǔ jízhù. In Japan it was studied and copied throughout the Heian and Kamakura periods (notably at the Kamakura Buddhist go-monjo 御文書 collections); the early-Edo Yamai Kanae Qījīng kǎowén (1731) recorded its survival, and a printed Japanese edition (the so-called Hōreki 寶曆 cutting of 1750, by 根本武夷 Nemoto Buí) was the basis of the text reimported into China.

(3) Reception in Qing scholarship. The reimport of the text in the early Qiánlóng era prompted a wave of philological work at the Sìkùguǎn, beginning with the Sìkù tíyào and continuing in works like Yú Xiāokè’s Gǔjīngjiě gōuchén and the philological notes appended by Lù Wénchāo 盧文弨 and others. The Northern Qí Lúnyǔ yìshū studies of the modern era — e.g. Wáng Sùzī 王素之, Hé Yàn Lúnyǔ jíjiě jiàoshì (BāShǔ shūshè, 1992), and the work of Hironaka Yumi 廣中由美 — all build on this 18th-century reimport.

Translations and research

The yìshū has been intensively studied in Japan: standard editions are 武内義雄 Takeuchi Yoshio, Rongo gisho kō 論語義疏考 (1933, repr.); 高橋均 Takahashi Hitoshi, Rongo gisho no kenkyū 論語義疏の研究 (Sōbunsha, 2013) — the most thorough modern monograph. In Chinese: Gāo Shàng-jǔ 高尚舉, Lúnyǔ jíjiě jiàoshì 論語集解校釋 (2002); Liú Jīn-zhōu 劉金舟, Huáng Kǎn Lúnyǔ yìshū yánjiū 皇侃論語義疏研究 (Wén-shǐ-zhé 2018). Western: John Makeham, Transmitters and Creators: Chinese Commentators and Commentaries on the Analects (HUP, 2003), with substantial discussion of Huáng Kǎn (chs. 4–5).

Other points of interest

The Japanese transmission of this text is of independent textual-historical interest: Huáng Kǎn’s yìshū was used by Kūkai 空海 and other early Heian Buddhist scholars at the imperial court, and remained part of the curriculum of the Daigaku-ryō 大学寮 throughout the medieval period — one of the few non-Buddhist Chinese commentaries to enjoy continuous Japanese transmission from the Nara through the Edo eras.

Links

• Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual §28.4.4.
• John Makeham, Transmitters and Creators (HUP, 2003).
• Liáng shū 48 (Huáng Kǎn 皇侃 biography)