Yàozhēng 藥徵 / Yakuchō
Testimony of Drugs by 吉益爲則 (Yoshimasu Tamenori 吉益爲則, hào Tōdō 東洞, 1702–1773, 江戶)
About the work
The Yakuchō is the foundational pharmacological statement of the Kohōha 古方派 (“Classical Formula school”) of Edo-period Japanese medicine, and one of the most distinctive pharmacological monographs of the East Asian tradition. Yoshimasu Tōdō completed the work in 1771, two years before his death; it was the systematic exposition of the doctrinal programme he had been preaching in Kyōto since the 1730s — namely that the speculative apparatus of JīnYuán medicine and the Goseihō school it spawned in Japan (Manase Dōsan 曲直瀨道三 KR3ec076) had buried the true clinical pharmacology of the Shānghán lùn under centuries of metaphysical accretion. The Kohōha programme: strip away the speculative apparatus, return to Zhāng Zhòngjǐng’s actual clinical use of substances in his formulae, and “test” (徵 zhēng) each substance against its documented Hàn-period deployment.
The method is austere. For each substance, Yoshimasu (a) states the substance’s zhǔ zhì (主治, primary indication) in a single phrase, (b) gives the páng zhì (旁治, secondary indications), (c) provides kǎo zhèng (考證, “evidence-verification”) consisting of quotations from every Shānghán lùn and Jīnguì yàolüè formula in which the substance appears, (d) provides hù kǎo (互考, “cross-examination”) discussing inconsistencies in the textual record, (e) provides biàn wù (辨誤, “error-distinguishing”) refuting later commentarial errors, and (f) closes with pǐn kǎo (品考, “substance-verification”) on identification and procurement. The cumulative effect is to ground each substance entry in evidence — the formula deployments of Zhòngjǐng — rather than in pharmacological theory.
The opening entry, on shígāo 石膏 (gypsum), exemplifies the method: Yoshimasu argues that the Míng yī bié lù characterisation of shígāo as “extremely cold” — which had caused later physicians to avoid the drug — is empirically wrong; Zhòngjǐng uses it in formulae where there is no fever, and Yoshimasu’s own clinical practice confirms that it is not a “drastic” drug. Táo Hóngjǐng’s 陶弘景 claim that shígāo “produces sweating” is also false: any drug that resolves the underlying disorder will produce sweating where appropriate. This empiricist, anti-speculative critique is sustained throughout the work.
The work in 3 maki covers 53 substances. The selection is restricted to substances that Zhòngjǐng actually uses; later additions are deliberately excluded. The work was completed in 1771 and printed in 1785 (Tenmei 5), after Yoshimasu’s death.
Prefaces
The local repository preserves the substance body. Standard editions preserve Yoshimasu’s own preface (1771), explanatory editorial conventions, and (in later editions) prefaces by his disciples Murai Kin 村井杶 (author of the Zoku yakuchō KR3ec078) and 中神琴溪 Nakagami Kinkei.
Abstract
Yoshimasu Tōdō (吉益東洞, 1702–1773). See his person note. The work is the systematic exposition of his clinical-philosophical programme and is the principal Japanese pharmacological work of the 18th century.
The Yakuchō’s significance is multifold. Within Japanese medical history, it is the founding text of the Kohōha — the dominant Japanese medical school of the late Edo period, which broke with the prevailing Manase-school Goseihō and re-grounded Japanese clinical practice in the Shānghán lùn. Within East Asian pharmacology, it is the most thoroughgoing implementation of the jīngfāng (classical-formula) programme of pharmacological exegesis — far more radical than the contemporary Chinese works of Huáng Yuányù 黃元御 KR3ec064 KR3ec065 and Zōu Shù 鄒澍 KR3ec066, because Yoshimasu rejects the Běnjīng itself as an authority and admits only Zhòngjǐng. Within early-modern Japanese intellectual history, it is one of the principal expressions of Edo-period empiricism and anti-speculative kogaku 古學 (Ancient-Learning) thought, parallel in spirit to Itō Jinsai’s and Ogyū Sorai’s Confucian kogaku. The Kohōha tradition that the Yakuchō founded was decisive for subsequent Japanese clinical pharmacology and continues in modified form in modern Japanese Kampō medicine.
The catalog meta gives the dynasty as 清 (Qīng), which is true to the Chinese-calendar dating of the work (Qiánlóng 36 = 1771) but the work is Japanese, not Chinese.
Translations and research
- Trambaiolo, Daniel. 2014. “Writing, Authority, and Practice in Tokugawa Medicine, 1650–1850”. PhD diss., Princeton. — extensive treatment of Yoshimasu and the Kohōha.
- Hattori Toshirō 服部敏良. 1978. Edo-jidai igakushi no kenkyū 江戸時代医学史の研究. Yoshikawa Kōbunkan.
- Daidōji Keiko 大道寺慶子. 2014. Edo-jidai no kanpōigaku: Yoshimasu Tōdō to Kohōha 江戶時代の漢方醫學: 吉益東洞と古方派.
- Sakai Shizu 酒井シヅ. 2002. Nihon no iryō shi.
- Yakuchō (Otsuka Yasuo 大塚敬節 ed.). 1971. Created Press.
- No complete Western-language translation. Partial discussion in Trambaiolo (2014).
Other points of interest
The work’s epistemological stance — that pharmacological knowledge must be grounded in textually attested clinical use rather than in metaphysical theory — represents one of the most distinctive contributions of early-modern East Asian medicine to the history of pharmacology. It is among the principal parallels to early-modern European pharmacological empiricism, though it arises from entirely independent intellectual roots in the Edo-Confucian kogaku movement.
Links
- Wikipedia (ja): 吉益東洞.
- Wikidata: Q11540866 (Yoshimasu Tōdō).
- 藥徵 jicheng.tw
- Kanseki DB