Rúmén shìqīn 儒門事親
The Confucian’s Filial Service [Through Medicine] by 張從正 (Zhāng Cóngzhèng, zì Zǐhé, hào Dàirén, ca. 1156–1228, 金)
About the work
The doctrinal manifesto of the JīnYuán Gōngxià school (攻下派) — the school of purgative-attack therapy — by Zhāng Cóngzhèng, the second of the canonical JīnYuán “Four Masters” alongside Liú Wánsù, Lǐ Gǎo, and Zhū Zhènhēng. The work is in 15 juan, with multiple textual genres — shuō 說 (discussion), biàn 辨 (distinction), jì 記 (record), jiě 解 (analysis), jiè 誡 (admonition), jiān 箋 (note), quán 詮 (annotation), shì 式 (template), duàn 斷 (judgment), lùn 論 (essay), shū 疏 (memorial), shù 述 (account), yǎn 衍 (elaboration), jué 訣 (mnemonic) — plus the Shíxíng sānliáo 十形三療 (ten-types-three-treatments) and Liùmén sānfǎ 六門三法 (six-gates-three-methods) systematic frameworks. The title — “The Confucian’s Filial Service” — derives from the Confucian principle that “one who cannot be a son cannot fully serve his parent without knowledge of medicine” (為人子者不可不知醫). The work is the canonical source for the hàntǔxià 汗吐下 (“sweat-vomit-purge”) three-method doctrine. The work was extensively criticized in its own time as too aggressive; Zhū Zhènhēng of the Yuán explicitly criticized Zhāng’s emphasis. Subsequent transmission was hampered by these doctrinal criticisms, although the work remained influential in the school-tradition.
Tiyao
Rúmén shìqīn, 15 juan, by Zhāng Cóngzhèng of the Jīn. Cóngzhèng, zì Zǐhé, hào Dàirén, was a man of Suīzhōu Kǎochéng. In the Xìngdìng period (1217–1222) he was summoned to fill an Imperial Physician (Tàiyī) post; soon resigned. With Má Zhījī, Cháng Zhòngmíng, and others he discussed medical theory and gathered material for this book.
The work has shuō, biàn, jì, jiě, jiè, jiān, quán, shì, duàn, lùn, shū, shù, yǎn, jué, Shíxíng sānliáo 十形三療, Liùmén sānfǎ 六門三法 — many sub-categories, somewhat fragmenting; but the principal thrust is the use of attack [therapy]. The title “Rúmén shìqīn” follows the principle that “only the Confucian can clarify the medical principle, and one who serves his parents must know medicine.”
Cóngzhèng followed Liú Shǒuzhēn (= Liú Wánsù) of Héjiān; his medication was largely cold-cool. His sweat-vomit-purge three methods drew much disagreement at the time; therefore the book contains many entries defending against criticism. Zhū Zhènhēng (Dānxī) also criticized his over-emphasis. Later writers, on the basis of these criticisms, set the book aside.
But disease-states are countless, and each requires its appropriate treatment: when one ought to attack and does not attack, and when one ought to supplement and does not supplement, the harm is the same. To over-emphasize his method is wrong, but to dismiss it entirely is also wrong. Only — in the middle of his work, his self-righteous fight-to-win approach is at times too vehement. In trying to correct the failure of the conservative-tonification school, he sometimes goes too far in the other direction. And those who transmit his learning, not knowing how to examine the pulse-emptiness-and-fullness or the duration of the disease, generally apply harsh-and-sharp treatment — which has given critics their handle. In sum, they have not understood Cóngzhèng’s original intent.
(Respectfully verified, 3rd month of Qiánlóng 43 [1778]. Chief Compilers Jì Yún, Lù Xīxióng, Sūn Shìyì; Chief Collator Lù Fèichí.)
Abstract
Composition window: 1217–1228 — bracketing Zhāng’s Xìng-dìng-period imperial-physician appointment (the upper bound of activity) and his death. The work was likely completed in his late mature period after his retirement from court.
The work’s significance:
(a) The doctrinal manifesto of the hàntǔxià “sweat-vomit-purge” school: Zhāng Cóngzhèng’s most lasting contribution. The doctrine — that disease pathogens should be eliminated by aggressive expulsion (sweat-vomit-purge) before any tonification (bǔ 補) is attempted — represents the most aggressive pole of JīnYuán therapeutic thinking, in deliberate contrast to the conservative tonification-school of the Héjì jú fāng tradition. The doctrine remains a recognized therapeutic strategy in modern Chinese medicine.
(b) The “Confucian medicine” framing: Zhāng’s work title and his appeal to the Confucian principle of filial-service-through-medical-knowledge represents one of the more articulate SòngJīnYuán statements of medicine as a Confucian moral discipline (rúyī 儒醫). The framing was foundational to the late-imperial Chinese identification of physicianhood as Confucian-scholarly profession.
(c) The literary-genre diversity: the work’s use of multiple textual genres — discussion, distinction, record, analysis, admonition, note, annotation, template, judgment, essay, memorial, account, elaboration, mnemonic — is unusually rich for a Chinese medical work and reflects Zhāng’s commitment to discursive engagement with criticism and contemporary medical debate.
(d) The contemporary and Yuán-period reception: the work was contemporaneously controversial (provoking the biànbàng “anti-criticism” passages within the book itself) and remained controversial through the Yuán (Zhū Zhènhēng’s criticism). The SKQS tíyào’s balanced reading — rejecting both the over-application and the over-rejection of Zhāng’s method — is a useful piece of mid-Qīng medical-historical reading.
The catalog meta gives the fl. dates as 1217–1231; the actual lifespan dates (per modern scholarship) are ca. 1156–1228 — the fl. is consistent with the lifespan but the catalog format (“fl. 1217–1231”) is a less-than-ideal abbreviation. The person note has been corrected.
Translations and research
- Mǎ Bóyīng 馬伯英, Zhōngguó yī-xué wén-huà shǐ 中國醫學文化史, 2 vols., Shànghǎi: Shànghǎi Rénmín, 2010 (extensive treatment of Zhāng Cóngzhèng).
- Unschuld, Paul U. Medicine in China: A History of Ideas, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985 (treats Zhāng in detail among the four masters).
- Goldschmidt, Asaf. The Evolution of Chinese Medicine: Song Dynasty, 960–1200, London: Routledge, 2009 (broader Sòng-Jīn medical-school context).
- Liào Yùqún 廖育群, Yīxué yǔ chuántǒng wénhuà 醫學與傳統文化, Tianjin: Bǎihuā Wényì, 2002 (chapter on the Jīn-Yuán four masters).
- Mǎ Jìxīng 馬繼興, Zhōng-yī wénxiàn xué 中醫文獻學, Shànghǎi: Shànghǎi Kēxué Jìshù Chūbǎnshè, 1990 (entry on the Rú-mén shì-qīn).
Other points of interest
The “Confucian medicine” 儒醫 (rúyī) movement of the SòngYuánMíng — the codification of Chinese medicine as a learned-scholarly Confucian discipline — has its principal Sòng-period statement in this work. The Confucian framing was a major sociological factor in the professionalization of Chinese medicine and the elevation of the physician’s status from craftsman to scholar.
The polemical character of the work — many entries defending the hàntǔxià method against contemporary critics — makes it one of the principal Chinese medical-debate texts of any period. Through it we can read the Jīn-period medical-theoretical controversy at first hand.