Yìxiàng túshuō 易象圖說
Diagrammatic Treatise on the Yì-Images by 張理 (Zhāng Lǐ, Zhòngchún 仲純, Yuán, zhuàn 撰)
About the work
Zhāng Lǐ’s 6-juan diagrammatic-cosmological treatise on the Yìjīng-image tradition, in two divisions of 3 juàn each:
Inner Edition (內篇): Běn túshū 本圖書 (Source-of-Diagram-and-Writing); Yuán guàhuà 原卦畫 (Origins of Hexagram-Drawing); Míng shīcè 明蓍策 (Clarifying Yarrow-Stalk Procedures).
Outer Edition (外篇): Xiàngshù 象數 (Image-and-Number); Guàyáo 卦爻 (Hexagrams-and-Lines); Dùshù 度數 (Degrees-and-Numbers).
The work parallels Zhāng Xíngchéng’s KR3g0006 Suǒyǐn and KR3g0007 Wàipiān yǎnyì in being a systematic Shào-shì-school cosmological exposition. Zhāng Lǐ has another work catalogued separately in the Sìkù — the Dàyì xiàngshù gōushēn tú 大易象數鉤深圖.
The Sìkù 提要 establishes that Zhāng Lǐ’s diagrammatic apparatus derives from the Cāntóngqì 參同契 (the foundational alchemical-and-cosmological treatise), with the round-figure (yuántú) and square-figure (fāngtú) diagrams cited from the Cāntóngqì by name. Through this lineage, the work transmits the Daoist-alchemical xiāntiān (Pre-Heaven) cosmological apparatus that Chén Tuán 陳摶 had popularized at the early Northern Sòng. Wáng Shì 王湜 (Sòng) had already noted that “the diagram-and-writing study from before Chén Tuán has no recorded source” — i.e., that the xiāntiān tradition was hidden among Daoist circles before Chén Tuán brought it into mainstream Confucian cosmology.
The Sìkù editors note that Huáng Yúzhī 黃虞稷 had asserted both Dèng Qí 鄧錡’s Dàyì túshuō and Zhāng Lǐ’s present work are recorded in the Dàozàng 道藏; the editors verify this by consulting Bái Yúnjì 白雲霽’s Dàozàng mùlù, finding the work in the Dòngzhēnbù Língtúlèi Líng division. The Daoist-canonical provenance of the work is thus confirmed.
Tiyao
[Full text in source file. Dated Qiánlóng 46 (1781), tenth month.]
For the broader Yìjīng-cosmological tradition, see KR3g0001, KR3g0005, KR3g0007, KR3g0013, KR3g0014.