Sìshū yíjié 四書疑節
Sectional Doubts on the Four Books
袁俊翁 (Yuán Jùnwēng, zì Mǐnzhāi, fl. mid-14th century)
About the work
A 12-juàn “exam-preparation” companion to the Four Books, in yí 疑 (question-and-answer) format: each entry sets a question juxtaposing two Sìshū passages that “appear different but are substantively the same” or “appear the same but are substantively different”, and supplies a model answer. The work is a section of a larger lost compilation, the Dàiwèn jí 待問集, whose other principal section (the Jīngshǐ yíyì 經史疑義) is no longer extant.
Tiyao
We respectfully submit: Sìshū yíjié in 12 juàn — by Yuán Jùnwēng of the Yuán. Jùnwēng, zì Mǐnzhāi 敏齋, native of Yuánzhōu. Three prefaces are at the front: Lí Lìwǔ 黎立武, Lǐ Yìngxīng 李應星, and Péng Yuánlóng 彭元龍 (two of his — front and back). Yìngxīng and Yuánlóng’s prefaces all call him Jùnwēng, only Lí Lìwǔ writes him Jùnwēng (with graphic variant 雋), a transmitted-character difference. His shìlǚ (career) is not traceable.
Lí Lìwǔ’s preface speaks of “yǐ chóng wú bǎng 以重吾榜” (gracing our examination roster); Yìngxīng’s preface speaks of “yìyì kuíwén 奕奕魁文” — we know he had once first-ranked in the xiāngshì (provincial examination).
Lí Lìwǔ’s, Yìngxīng’s, and Yuánlóng’s earlier prefaces all annotate the side-text “Jīngshǐ yíyì”; Yuánlóng’s later preface annotates “Sìshū jīngyí”; the juànshǒu biāotí (chapter-head title) reads Dàiwèn jí: Sìshū yíjié 待問集四書疑節 — interlocking confusedly. Examination of Yuán Jùnwēng’s tící (head-line) says: “the examination uses Sìshū to set its yí-questions; the jīngshǐ (the Classics-and-Histories section) supplies its cè-prompts; I therefore took the Sìshū and the Jīngshǐ and divided them by category for ease of analysis.” So Dàiwèn jí is the overall name; Jīngshǐ yíyì and Sìshū jīngyí are its two zǐbù (sub-sections). Today the Jīngshǐ yíyì portion has perished; hence the prefaces and the book do not align with each other.
Only the title yíjié itself is not very intelligible. The chapter-head has the words “Xīshān jiāshú kānxíng” 溪山家塾刋行 — perhaps in re-cutting some sections were excised, hence the changed title to jié (sectional / abridged). Zhū Yízūn’s Jīngyì kǎo lists it, marked “wèi jiàn”. The present text is an old Yuán-block manuscript copy. Its fánlì: it takes Sìshū passages and pairs them up as topics — “appearing different but substantively the same”; “appearing the same but substantively different”; some focus on yìlǐ, some use kǎozhèng; all cast the question first and the answer after — the genre of the day.
Although it is kējǔ learning, it is not the kind of Míng exam-preparation that follows the topic and spins-out without root. Without thoroughly digesting the jīng sense, one could not put a single phrase to it. — Respectfully revised, sixth month of the 43rd year of Qiánlóng [1778].
General Compilers: Jǐ Yún, Lù Xīxióng, Sūn Shìyì. General Reviser: Lù Fèichí.
Abstract
The Sìshū yíjié is one of the principal surviving witnesses to the Yányòu 延祐-period examination format for the Sìshū jīngyí 經疑 questions: the new requirement, instituted by the Yányòu reform of 1313, that examination candidates juxtapose two seemingly-contrasting (or seemingly-converging) Sìshū passages and analyse their relation. Yuán Jùnwēng compiled this work as a model-answer training book; it is the parallel to Wáng Chōngyún’s KR1h0037 Sìshū jīngyí guàntōng.
The Sìkù editors are unusually warm in their assessment, distinguishing the Yuán jīngyí genre from the later, more vacuous Míng bāgǔwén curriculum. They note approvingly that one cannot answer Yuán jīngyí questions without genuine engagement with the jīng sense — whereas the Míng bāgǔ could be filled with hollow performance. (Compare the parallel argument at the close of KR1h0037.)
The textual history is partial: only the Sìshū yíjié portion of the original Dàiwèn jí survives; the Jīngshǐ yíyì portion is wholly lost. The 1313 institutional context for the work is firm.
Translations and research
No English translation. Modern Chinese: 點校本 in Yuán-rén Sì-shū wén-xiàn jí-chéng (Hé-nán-rén-mín 2005). Studies: Benjamin Elman, A Cultural History of Civil Examinations in Late Imperial China (UCalP, 2000), incidental notice; Cài Fāng-lù 蔡方鹿, Sòng-Yuán Sì-shū xué shǐ. Wilkinson §28.4.4 on the Yán-yòu reform.
Other points of interest
The genre of jīngyí — paired-passage analytical questions — was the Yuán’s principal methodological innovation in the Cheng-Zhu examination curriculum. It demanded comparative-analytical thinking rather than rote memorisation, and was abandoned in the Míng (per Sìkù tíyào at KR1h0037: “in 1390 the Hóngwǔ examination format was revised; the jīngyí method was thereafter abolished”). The Sìshū yíjié and the parallel work KR1h0037 are therefore the principal witnesses to a now-extinct examination-cultural form.
Links
- Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual §28.4.4.
- Benjamin Elman, A Cultural History of Civil Examinations (UCalP, 2000).
- 全國漢籍データベース 四庫提要