中庸指歸

Zhōngyōng zhǐguī 中庸指歸 (with three other short texts)

Pointing-up the Direction of the Doctrine of the Mean (and Other Short Treatises)

黎立武 (Lí Lìwǔ, zì Yǐcháng, ca. 1242–1305)

About the work

A combined entry comprising four short Lí Lìwǔ treatises in 1 juàn each:

1. Zhōngyōng zhǐguī 中庸指歸 — the principal piece, expounding the Zhōngyōng in the Guō Zhōngxiào 郭忠孝 lineage (where zhōng 中 = xìng 性, yōng 庸 = dào 道).
2. Zhōngyōng fēnzhāng 中庸分章 — Lí Lìwǔ’s distinctive 15-chapter division of the Zhōngyōng, departing from Zhū Xī’s 33-chapter division.
3. Dàxué fāwēi 大學發微 — short essays on the Dàxué, arguing that Zēngzǐ 曾參 transmitted the dào through the doctrine of yīguàn 一貫, awakened to it through zhōngshù 忠恕, and reached it through the Yì’s Gèn 艮 hexagram. Centres the Dàxué on zhǐyú zhìshàn 止於至善 and chéngyì 誠意.
4. Dàxué běnzhǐ 大學本旨 — uses the Lǐjì old-text Dàxué (without Zhū Xī’s jīng / zhuàn split or the supplementary chapter), and reads the Zēngzǐ yuē 曾子曰 line as the words of Zēng Xī 曾晳 (Zēngzǐ’s father) — close to Wáng Yángmíng’s later gǔběn Dàxué position.

The four texts together transmit Lí Lìwǔ’s distinctive Sòng-loyalist Lǐxué — preserved as a marker of the Jīnxī 金谿 / GuōXiè branch of the Zhōngyōng tradition.

Tiyao

We respectfully submit: Zhōngyōng zhǐguī 1 juàn; Zhōngyōng fēnzhāng 1 juàn; Dàxué fāwēi 1 juàn; Dàxué běnzhǐ 1 juàn — by Lí Lìwǔ 黎立武 of the Sòng. Lìwǔ, zì Yǐcháng 以常, native of Xīnyú; took the jìnshì third place in Xiánchún (1265). Served to Jūnqì shǎojiàn 軍器少監 兼 Guózǐ sīyè 國子司業. After the fall of the Sòng he did not serve, residing in retirement for thirty years until his death.

When Lìwǔ was an officer of Fǔzhōu, examining candidates, he chose Wú Chéng 吳澄 to be a gòngshì candidate; hence Wú Chéng wrote his tomb-inscription, calling himself “ménrén” (disciple). The inscription also says that when Lìwǔ was at the Mìshěng he read official books and loved the second Guō [Zhōngxiào]‘s Zhōngyōng; that Guō [Zhōngxiào] of Hénán transmitted from the Chéng school, and that Xiè shàngshū of Xīnyú had served as governor of Yílíng 夷陵 and had transmitted Guō’s learning. Lìwǔ wished to trace, through Xiè back to Guō, and so to inherit the transmission. Hence his discussions of the Dàxué, Zhōngyōng and other books frequently differ from the orthodox views.

The Zhōngyōng tradition runs from Chéngzǐ; afterwards each disciple set out the master’s words. The branches diverge: Yóu Zuò’s 游酢 and Yáng Shí’s 楊時 readings were taken up by Zhūzǐ. Guō Zhōngxiào’s Zhōngyōng shuō — taking zhōng as xìng and yōng as dào — is also reported as Chéngzǐ’s late-life settled view. Lìwǔ’s Zhōngyōng zhǐguī fully expounds this thesis.

His Zhōngyōng fēnzhāng divides as follows: Tiānmìng zhī wèi xìng and what follows = zhāng 1; Zhòngní yuē and what follows = zhāng 2; Jūnzǐ zhī dào fèi ér yǐn and what follows = zhāng 3; Dào bù yuǎn rén and what follows = zhāng 4; Jūnzǐ sù qí wèi ér xíng and what follows = zhāng 5; Jūnzǐ zhī dào pì rú xíng yuǎn and what follows = zhāng 6; Guǐshén zhī wéi dé and what follows = zhāng 7; Āigōng wèn zhèng and what follows = zhāng 8; Chéng zhě tiān zhī dào yě and what follows = zhāng 9; Wéi tiānxià zhìchéng and what follows = zhāng 10; Chéng zhě zìchéng and what follows = zhāng 11; Dà zāi shèngrén zhī dào and what follows = zhāng 12; Zhòngní zǔshù Yáo Shùn and what follows = zhāng 13; Wéi tiānxià zhìshèng and what follows = zhāng 14; Shī yuē “yījǐn shàng jiǒng” and what follows = zhāng 15. All of these expound Guō’s zhǐ; their argument is well-arranged.

His Dàxué fāwēi says: Zēngzǐ transmitted the dào in the yīguàn, was awakened to it in zhōngshù, and reached it in the Yì’s Gèn 艮 hexagram. The broad argument centres on zhǐ yú zhì shàn and on chéng yì as the essential. His Dàxué běnzhǐ uses the old text in full, taking the Dàxué whole as Zēngzǐ’s; it does not split jīng and zhuàn; and reads the “Zēngzǐ said” line as the words of Zēng Xī 曾晳 [the father]. Yet on the zhǐguī and the conclusion, it is in no contradiction with Chéng and Zhū — quite unlike Wáng Shǒurén 王守仁 [Yángmíng] and others, who borrowed the old text to extend their own argument.

Only his thesis that the Zhōngyōng and the Dàxué are both penetrated by the Yì — with charts and chains of supporting argument — verges on extravagant high discourse.

The four books were originally one bound volume; the Dàdé 8 (1304) preface by Zhào Bǐngzhèng 趙秉政 places them in this order: Zhōngyōng first, then Dàxué — following the Lǐjì original sequence. The present text follows the modern Sìshū sequence and moves Dàxué before Zhōngyōng; this misplaces Zhào’s preface in the middle of the four texts, distorting the original sense. We have here corrected it back to the old order. — Respectfully revised, twelfth month of the 46th year of Qiánlóng [1781].

General Compilers: Jǐ Yún, Lù Xīxióng, Sūn Shìyì. General Reviser: Lù Fèichí.

Abstract

Lí Lìwǔ’s four-piece treatise is a notable late-Sòng / early-Yuán retrieval of a non-orthodox Zhōngyōng / Dàxué tradition: the Guō Zhōngxiào lineage of Zhōngyōng exegesis, with its formula zhōng = xìng, yōng = dào, traceable back to Chéng Yí’s late-life teaching but routed around the orthodox Yóu Zuò / Yáng Shí line that Zhū Xī inherited. The work is therefore precious as the principal surviving witness to this branch of Cheng-school commentary.

The Dàxué portion is more striking still: Lí Lìwǔ uses the unrearranged Lǐjì gǔběn of the Dàxué, treats the entire chapter as Zēngzǐ’s, refuses Zhū Xī’s jīng / zhuàn division, and refuses the supplementary “gé wù bǔ zhuàn” 格物補傳. This pre-empts by some 200 years the gǔběn Dàxué 古本大學 movement of Wáng Yángmíng (1472–1529), but with a different theoretical motivation — Lí Lìwǔ is no Wáng-Yáng-míng-style Xīnxué dissident; rather he is a Sòng-loyalist Lǐxué purist who insists on transmitting the Lǐjì text intact. The Sìkù tíyào is careful to distinguish the two positions.

The 1304 publication date in Zhào Bǐngzhèng’s preface places the Sìshū portion at the end of Lí Lìwǔ’s life. The Sìkùguǎn re-ordering — restoring the original Zhōngyōng / Dàxué sequence — is a typical example of the Qiánlóng editorial intervention.

Translations and research

No English translation. Modern Chinese: 點校本 in Sòng-Yuán xué-àn jí-bù 宋元學案輯補 (Lín Yáo-yú 林耀瑜 ed., Tái-běi 2002). Studies: 黄宗羲, Sòng-Yuán xué-àn 宋元學案 (esp. Bāolíng xué-àn 寶林學案); Cài Fāng-lù 蔡方鹿, Sòng-dài Sì-shū xué yánjiū; Wú Chéng 吳澄, Wú-wén-zhèng-gōng wén-jí 吳文正公文集 (the tomb-inscription).

Other points of interest

The work’s transmission of the GuōZhōngxiào Zhōngyōng tradition — and its anticipation of the gǔběn Dàxué — make it a particularly valuable witness to the heterodox currents within Sòng Lǐxué that the post-1313 institutional fixation of Zhū Xī’s Sìshū jízhù would subsequently suppress.

Links

• Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual §28.4.4 and §28.7.3.
• 黄宗羲, SòngYuán xuéàn 寶林學案.
• 全國漢籍データベース 四庫提要