Zhù jiě Shānghán lùn 註解傷寒論
Annotated Commentary on the Treatise on Cold Damage Disorders by 張機 (Zhāng Jī, 東漢) — original; 王叔和 (Wáng Shūhé, 晉) — Western-Jìn editor; 成無己 (Chéng Wúyǐ, b. ca. 1063, fl. into 1156, 金) — commentator
About the work
The first sustained commentary on the Shānghán lùn, in ten juan, by the Jīn-dynasty physician 成無己 Chéng Wúyǐ. Chéng’s annotation, completed in 1144 and printed shortly thereafter, glosses the canonical text section-by-section with the standard Jīn-period Neoclassical apparatus of Sùwèn-derived doctrine. This commentary became the standard reading of the Shānghán lùn through the Yuán and the Míng, and was supplanted only by 方有執 Fāng Yǒuzhí’s Tiáobiàn (KR3ef015) and 喻昌 Yú Chāng’s Shànglùn piān (KR3ef026) in the late 16th century.
Abstract
The composition date is fixed at 1144, the date of Chéng Wúyǐ’s preface (in some witnesses signed 紹興十四年甲子). 嚴器之 Yán Qìzhī, Chéng’s friend and disciple, provided the principal supporting preface, dated Shàoxīng 紹興 16 (1146), which is the source of most biographical detail on Chéng. 張孝忠 Zhāng Xiàozhōng’s 拔 of Kāixǐ 開禧 1 (1205) provides the second early biographical witness. Chéng’s commentary explicitly grounds the Shānghán lùn’s clinical prescriptions in the Sùwèn 素問 and Língshū 靈樞 doctrinal apparatus — a synthesis that was the great Jīn-period contribution to clinical theory. The work pairs with Chéng’s Shānghán mínglǐ lùn 傷寒明理論 (KR3ef040) and the Lùn fāng 論方, which together form a unified commentary-and-treatise system on the Shānghán canon.
The Sòngběn base text of the Shānghán lùn underlies Chéng’s annotation, transmitted through the校正醫書局 collation of 1065. Chéng’s recension was reprinted multiple times under the Yuán and Míng, and is preserved both in the Zhòngjǐng quánshū 仲景全書 (仲景全書) of 趙開美 Zhào Kāiměi (1599) and in the Sìkù quánshū.
Translations and research
- Endymion Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual, §35.7.1 notes Chéng Wúyǐ’s commentary as the central Jīn-Yuán contribution to Shānghán exegesis.
- Hinrichs and Barnes (eds.), Chinese Medicine and Healing (Harvard Belknap, 2013), pp. 119–145 (Goldschmidt) on the Jīn medical reception.
- Goldschmidt, Asaf, The Evolution of Chinese Medicine: Song Dynasty, 960–1200, London: Routledge, 2009 — chapter 7 specifically treats Chéng Wúyǐ.
- Mǎ Jìxīng 馬繼興, Shānghán lùn jiào zhù 傷寒論校註, Beijing: Rénmín Wèishēng, 1991.
- No substantial English-language translation located.
Other points of interest
The JīnYuán “Four Masters” — 劉完素, 張從正, 李杲, 朱震亨 — all argued against Chéng Wúyǐ’s strict Shānghán-doctrine line, advocating various Sūnwèn-derived alternative therapeutic strategies. Nonetheless Chéng’s annotation remained the standard pedagogical commentary into the early Qīng.
Links
- ctext.org
- See also KR3ef040 (Chéng’s parallel Shānghán mínglǐ lùn).
- 註解傷寒論 jicheng.tw
- Kanseki DB