Guānwù piān jiě 觀物篇解
Explanation of the Guān-wù piān (of Shào Yōng’s Huáng-jí jīng-shì*), with appended* Huáng-jí jīng-shì jiě qǐ-shù jué Number-Starting Knack for Explaining the Huáng-jí jīng-shì by 祝泌 (Zhù Bì, fl. 1235–1241, 宋, zhuàn 撰)
About the work
Zhù Bì’s 5-juan commentary on the Guānwù piān 觀物篇 (Observing-Things Chapter) of Shào Yōng’s KR3g0005 Huángjí jīngshì shū, with a 1-juan appendix Huángjí jīngshì jiě qǐshù jué 皇極經世解起數訣 (Number-Starting Knack for Explaining the Huángjí jīngshì). The author’s self-preface to the Guānwù piān jiě is dated Duānpíng yǐwèi 端平乙未 (1235, in the reign of Sòng Lǐzōng); the Qǐshù jué carries its own internal preface dated Chúnyòu xīnchǒu 淳祐辛丑 (1241), six years later.
The work’s substantive intervention is to construct a divinatory system anchored on the guàyī tú 掛一圖 (Hung-up-One Diagram) and operating on the sìxiàng 四象 (four images) rather than on hexagrams directly. Zhù Bì’s method requires sìyáo cángrùn 四爻藏閏 (four-line hidden-intercalation) for the preparatory step and sìyáo zhíshì 四爻直事 (four-line direct-service) for the operative step; the dàyùn 大運 (greater cycle) is computed starting from the Tài 泰 hexagram, the xiǎoyùn 小運 (lesser cycle) from the Shēng 升 hexagram. Across his exposition Zhù Bì systematically corrects the earlier Huángjí-related divination treatises of Niú Sīchún 牛思純 (Bǎojú 寶局) and especially of 張行成 (KR3g0008 Yì tōngbiàn).
Zhù Bì also introduces several innovations beyond Shào Yōng’s own apparatus. Where Shào Yōng spoke of the four images intercrossing to make sixteen things (sìxiàng jiāo ér chéng shíliù shì 四象交而成十六事), Zhù Bì develops a doctrine of èrshíwǔ biàn 二十五變 (twenty-five transformations). Where Shào Yōng treated Gòu 姤 and Fù 復 as the “lesser father-and-mother” (xiǎo fùmǔ 小父母), Zhù Bì develops a system in which the Tóngrén 同人 hexagram serves as origin and divides at the level of fēn (minute) and miǎo (second). The Sìkù editors regard these innovations as chéngyì bùfú 乘異不合 — at variance with the Sòng Jīngshì shū tradition — and judge his method of running through two, three, or four transformations whenever a single transformation fails to harmonize as “particularly not from naturalness” (尤非出於自然).
The phonological half of Zhù Bì’s system is treated even more skeptically. Shào Yōng inherited his shēngyīn lǜlǚ 聲音律呂 framework from his father and codified it in the standard zhèngyīn xùlù 正音敍錄; the technical tradition is recoverable. Zhù Bì instead uses the sānshíliù zìmǔ 三十六字母 (thirty-six initials) of the fǎnqiè (rhyme-table) tradition, “taking sound to start number; taking number to combine with hexagram” — a procedure the Sìkù editors find indistinguishable in spirit from the liùrén dùnjiǎ 六壬遁甲 prognostic techniques, and that “seeking depth, instead arrives at shallowness”. Specific terminology (rén yòng fēnshù, wù yòng miǎoshù, “humans use fractional minute-counts, things use second-counts”; numbers commencing from Tóngrén) is dismissed as forced.
The Sìkù editors nevertheless preserve the work — and grant it a back-handed respect — on two grounds. First, the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn 永樂大典 separately preserves a set of Zhùshì zhànlì 祝氏占例 (Zhù-clan divination cases) and the cases recorded there are remarkably accurate (所言實皆奇中). Second, the Yuán-dynasty Chuògēng lù 輟耕錄 by Táo Zōngyí 陶宗儀 records that Zhù Bì was an acknowledged master of Huángjí shù, that his nephew Fù Lì 傅立 inherited the technique, and that Fù Lì later divined for Yuán Shìzǔ (Khubilai Khan) with predictive success. The editors conclude: “his learning is in the line of Kāngjié [Shào Yōng], but he also has his own [findings]; therefore his examples diverge from the Jīngshì shū but his divination is often verified by experience”. A xiǎodào zhī kěguān zhě 小道之可觀者 (“a small art worth observing”).
The Qǐshù jué appendix is a fragment. It was originally accompanied by a separate Yòngfǎ 用法 (Method-of-Use), which is lost; only a Shēngyùn pǔ 聲韻譜 (Sound-and-Rhyme Chart) survives from the original apparatus. The Sìkù editors append it to the Guānwù piān jiě as a separate juan to preserve what remains.
There is also a bibliographic puzzle. Zhū Yízūn’s 朱彝尊 Jīngyì kǎo 經義考 lists a Zhù Bì work titled Huángjí jīngshì qián 皇極經世鈐 in 12 juàn — neither the same title nor the same extent as the present Guānwù piān jiě in 5 juàn. Yet the Jīngyì kǎo also preserves a Zhù Bì self-preface whose substantive content is close to the present book’s organization. The Sìkù editors hypothesize that the same work may have circulated under two titles, with later editors combining or splitting versions — a possibility they decline to resolve.
For the parent text, see KR3g0005 Huángjí jīngshì shū by 邵雍. For Zhāng Xíngchéng’s contrasting Tōngbiàn (Zhù Bì’s principal target of criticism), see KR3g0008. For Zhù Bì’s biography, see 祝泌.
Tiyao
The source directory /home/Shared/krp/KR3g/[[KR3g0009]]/ is not present in the local KRP mirror; the 提要 below is taken from the Kyoto University Zinbun digital Sìkù quánshū zǒngmù tíyào at http://kanji.zinbun.kyoto-u.ac.jp/db-machine/ShikoTeiyo/0223401.html.
Compiled by Zhù Bì of the Sòng. Bì — style-name Zǐjīng, native of Póyáng — styled himself Guānwù lǎorén (Old Man of Observing Things). At the head of the book his office is given as Chéngzhíláng, charged with the Sì Coinage Office for the circuits of Jiānghuái, Jīng, Zhè, Fújiàn, and Guǎngnán; while inside the Qǐshù jué he again signs himself as administrator of the same office. We do not know what office he ended his career in.
We note that Zhū Yízūn’s Jīngyì kǎo lists a Huángjí jīngshì qián by Bì in 12 juàn. The present recension is titled Guānwù piān jiě and is in only 5 juàn — its catalog entry does not match what Yízūn records. Yet [Zhū Yízūn] separately records a Bì self-preface whose stated principal contents are quite close in pattern to the present recension’s organization. Perhaps it is one book under two names, that later editors have combined.
We also note: Bì’s self-preface is signed Duānpíng yǐwèi (1235); inside the Qǐshù jué, the inner preface is dated Chúnyòu xīnchǒu (1241) — beyond the yǐwèi by six years, after the Huángjí jīngshì qián had already been completed. Moreover, the current Qǐshù jué is a separately-circulating fragment, while the fourth juàn of the Guānwù piān jiě records “*and the methods-of-starting and methods-of-use are separately recorded into a juàn”. This shows that [the Qǐshù jué] was originally a separate book together with [a missing] Yòngfǎ (Method-of-Use); but the Yòngfǎ has been lost. As for what survives in the Qǐshù jué, only the Shēngyùn pǔ remains, no longer the original. We have for the time being appended it to the Guānwù piān jiě in order to preserve its outline.
Of the dàxiǎo yùnshù (greater and lesser cycle-numbers) that Bì discusses: although they are all anchored on the Guàyī tú, his method of divination is not exclusively in hexagrams but in sìxiàng (four images). Its general purport: first using four-lines hidden-intercalation, then using four-lines direct-service. The dàyùn (greater cycle) starts from Tài; the xiǎoyùn (lesser cycle) starts from Shēng. On Niú Sīchún’s Bǎojú and Zhāng Xíngchéng’s Tōngbiàn, [he] has many points of correction.
However, where Shào Yōng spoke of “four images intersecting to make sixteen things”, Bì proceeded to invent the doctrine of “twenty-five transformations”. Where Shào Yōng spoke of “Gòu and Fù as lesser father-and-mother”, Bì proceeded to invent the doctrine of “Tóngrén starting at fraction-minute-second”. All of these diverge from the Jīngshì shū. His method of computing greater-and-lesser cycles, in which when one transformation does not harmonize, [he] tries another, [going] up to three or four transformations in order to seek harmony, is particularly not of the order of nature.
As to the science of shēngyīn lǜlǚ: Shào [Yōng] learned [it] from his father. The book is set out in detail in the Zhèngyīn xùlù, with clear rules and tracks. Bì on the other hand takes the fǎnqiè of the thirty-six initials, and uses sound to begin number, number to combine with hexagram — merely the same operation as Réndùn (Six-Rén / Dùnjiǎ) [prognostic systems]. Seeking depth, [he] instead arrives at shallowness. What the Shēngyīn yùnpǔ further says — taking “fú-pǔ-X-mǔ-zì” as instance of the zìmǔ’s function — is already fragmented; even more so when it says “humans use fractional-minute-counts, things use second-counts; numbers begin from Tóngrén” — this is especially obscure and difficult, and seems unlikely all to derive from Shào’s original meaning.
However, the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn separately preserves a Zhùshì zhànlì, whose statements are all in fact remarkably accurate. Táo Zōngyí’s Chuògēng lù records that Bì was a master of Huángjí shù, and that his nephew Fù Lì transmitted the technique and divined for Yuán Shìzǔ, still able to predict in advance. Then [the work] is among the small arts that are worth observing.
In sum: his learning, while in the line of Kāngjié [Shào Yōng], also has its own [findings]; therefore his examples diverge from the Jīngshì shū, but his divination is often verified by experience. The technical schools each carry one technique; Shào Yōng did not necessarily exhaust the Yì, and Bì did not necessarily exhaust Shào — there is no need to question on grounds of similarity or difference. The two books that the world has copied have transmissional corruptions and gaps; the various copies are all the same, and there is no [other] source to correct them by. We for the time being follow [the text as received].
Abstract
Composition window: 1235–1241. The Guānwù piān jiě proper carries an authorial preface of 1235; the appendix Qǐshù jué carries an inner preface of 1241; both occur within Sòng Lǐzōng’s Duānpíng / Chúnyòu reigns. The catalog meta gives a date of 1274, which appears to be either a confusion with a later edition or a misreading of the work’s circulation date (Zhù Bì’s nephew Fù Lì was active under Khubilai in the 1270s, which may have produced the slip); the prefaces are followed here. CBDB person id 44260 lists Zhù Bì as fl. 1274–1276, which is likewise inconsistent with the dated prefaces and should be corrected to 1235–1241.
Zhù Bì occupies a distinctive position in the Southern-Sòng Huángjí-divinatory tradition. He worked in the same general field as 張行成 of the previous generation, but on the divinatory rather than the cosmographic side: where Zhāng Xíngchéng’s KR3g0008 Yì tōngbiàn elaborates Shào Yōng’s cosmic-historical apparatus (rise-and-fall of eras, flourishing-and-decay of persons-and-things), Zhù Bì develops a practical divinatory method that calculates particular outcomes from a hexagram-and-four-image starting configuration. His method’s empirical track record — recorded in the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn’s Zhùshì zhànlì and corroborated in Táo Zōngyí’s account of Fù Lì’s Yuán-court service — is the Sìkù editors’ decisive ground for preserving the book even when they reject its theoretical innovations as deviations from Shào Yōng’s original system.
The phonological half of the system — using the sānshíliù zìmǔ to generate predictive numbers — is treated by modern scholarship as a (failed) intersection of xiàngshù numerology with the late-Sòng rhyme-table tradition; the Qǐshù jué’s surviving Shēngyùn pǔ is an important early witness to zìmǔ-based numerological technique even if (as the Sìkù editors charge) the underlying procedure is forced.
The work’s title-history is unsettled. The Jīngyì kǎo lists a Zhù Bì work as Huángjí jīngshì qián in 12 juàn; the surviving recension is Guānwù piān jiě in 5 juàn. The Sìkù editors hypothesize a single underlying work transmitted under multiple titles and with later editorial combination/splitting, but do not resolve the question.
Translations and research
- Smith, Kidder Jr. et al. Sung Dynasty Uses of the I Ching. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990. Treats the Shào-shì line, including Zhù Bì’s place in it.
- Wyatt, Don J. The Recluse of Loyang: Shao Yung and the Moral Evolution of Early Sung Thought. Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 1996. Background on Shào Yōng’s system.
No dedicated Western-language study of Zhù Bì’s Guān-wù piān jiě located.
Other points of interest
The Sìkù editors’ explicit reliance on the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn Zhùshì zhànlì and on Táo Zōngyí’s anecdote about Fù Lì’s Yuán-court divinations — to argue for an empirical warrant for an theoretically deficient text — is one of the more methodologically self-conscious passages in the Sìkù shùshù-class tíyào. The editors are openly distinguishing the truth-value of the doctrine from the predictive-success of the practitioner, and preserving the book on the latter grounds.