Yùdìng Xīnglì kǎoyuán 御定星歷考原
Imperially Determined Examination of the Origins of Astrological-Calendrical [Selection] imperially determined by 聖祖玄燁 (the Kāngxī emperor); compiled under 李光地 (Lǐ Guāngdì) et al.
About the work
A 6-juan imperial reference for xuǎnzé 選擇 (auspicious-day selection) — the technical practice of identifying auspicious days for important undertakings (marriages, burials, building, official appointments, etc.) — based on the yīnyáng wǔxíng (yīnyáng five-phase) cosmological principles. Imperially determined by the Kāngxī emperor in Kāngxī 52 (1713), with editorial direction by Lǐ Guāngdì 李光地 (the principal Kāngxī-period imperial advisor on mathematical-and-cosmological matters; cf. KR3f0026).
Background (per the 提要): in Kāngxī 22 (1683) the imperial court had ordered the revision of the Xuǎnzé tōngshū (Auspicious-Day Selection Manual) and the Wànnián shū (Ten-Thousand-Year Calendar) for unified promulgation, but the resulting works “were unable to be made uniform; the rest [of the divinatory tradition] continued the old sayings, also mostly unable to be corrected”. The Kāngxī emperor accordingly commissioned the Méngyǎng zhāi (the imperial mathematical academy) to compile algorithm-and-music books and to incorporate Cáo Zhènguī’s 曹振圭 Lìshì míngyuán 厯事明原 — with Lǐ Guāngdì leading the re-determination — to produce the present 6-juan synthesis.
Structure (6 juàn, one topic each):
- Xiàngshù kǎoyuán 象數考原 — image-and-number sources
- Niánshén fāngwèi 年神方位 — year-spirit directions
- Yuèshì jíshén 月事吉神 — monthly auspicious spirits
- Yuèshì xiōngshén 月事凶神 — monthly inauspicious spirits
- Rìshí zǒnglèi 日時總類 — day-and-hour comprehensive categories
- Yòngshì yíjì 用事宜忌 — appropriate-and-prohibited matters
The 提要 articulates a defense of the xuǎnzé tradition’s substantive grounding: while admitting that the various shénshà (spirit-ghost) names assigned to different days appear arbitrary, the underlying wǔxíng shēngkè (five-phase generation-and-restraint) reasoning is genuinely cosmological. “[The] gànshén (spirit) names — although appearing groundless — yet things are originally without name; all names are added by people. Like the heavens’ arrayed mansions each have their names, also added by people, not originally so. So the called one-spirit two-spirit are no more than borrowed [forms] for recording their direction-positions and distinguishing their nature-feelings; one need not let the words harm the meaning”.
The 提要’s verdict: “[the work] simplifies-and-cleanses the various schools, deletes their vulgar-vexations and brackets-the-essential-outlines — by which to follow the heavens’ way and benefit the people’s use”. The work is preserved as the foundational Kāngxī-period imperial reference for xuǎnzé practice, superseded only by the Qián-lóng-period KR3g0051 Qīndìng xiéjì biànfāng shū.
For Kāngxī’s broader scientific-and-cosmological project, see 聖祖玄燁 and KR3f0048 Shùlǐ jīngyùn. For Lǐ Guāngdì, see his appearances in KR3f0026 Lìsuàn quánshū’s 提要.
Tiyao
[Full text in source file. Dated Qiánlóng 46 (1781), tenth month.]