五行大義

Wǔxíng dàyì 五行大義

Compendium of the Great Meaning of the Five Phases by 蕭吉 (撰)

About the work

The Wǔxíng dàyì 五行大義 is a five-juàn systematic treatise on five-phases (wǔxíng 五行) cosmology compiled by Xiāo Jí 蕭吉 under the Suí. Organized into twenty-four numbered chapters (篇) grouped under broader headings — origins and names of the phases, their numbers and stems-and-branches correlations, their mutual production and conquest, their correlations with the body, the sounds, the calendar, the directions, the spirits, divination, omens, and so on — it is the most comprehensive surviving pre-Táng synthesis of correlative cosmology and an essential conduit for material from Hàn apocrypha (wěishū 緯書), the Hóng fàn wǔ xíng zhuàn 洪範五行傳 tradition, and Hàn–Six Dynasties weft-and-divination lore that is otherwise lost. The work was already prized in Táng and Sòng China but disappeared from Chinese circulation by the late Yuán/early Míng; the entire received text is preserved through Japanese transmission, where it became a foundational reference for the onmyōdō 陰陽道 tradition, and was only reintroduced to China in the late Qīng. No local Kanripo source directory exists for this text under /home/Shared/krp/KR3g/[[KR3g0052]]/, so the present note is compiled from external evidence rather than from a local edition.

Tiyao

Abstract

Authorship and date. Authorship by Xiāo Jí 蕭吉 (zì Wénxiū 文休; d. 614) is uncontested: he is identified as compiler in every transmitted line of the text, in his Suíshū 隋書 (j. 78, 藝術傳) biography (which lists the work among his writings), and in the Suíshū “Jīngjí zhì” 經籍志 子部·五行類. Xiāo’s biography places his major court career under Suí Wéndì 隋文帝 and Yángdì 隋煬帝; the work is therefore conventionally dated to the late sixth or very early seventh century, with the latest defensible terminus ante quem being Xiāo’s death in 614. The frontmatter window 581–614 reflects this — 581 being the founding of the Suí, when Xiāo’s court career began. No internal preface gives a more precise date.

Structure and content. The received text is in five juàn and twenty-four piān 篇. The first juàn treats the names and substance of the five phases, their numbers, and their correlations with the ten heavenly stems (天干) and twelve earthly branches (地支); the second their mutual production (相生), conquest (相剋), miscellaneous correlations, and the so-called “four seasons” sequencing; the third the various forms of “lodging” (寄) and “burial” (墓) of the phases; the fourth their correlations with the human body, sounds and music, the calendar, and the directions; the fifth their correlations with the spirits, divination, omens, the sexagenary cycle, and the system of “punishments and virtues” (刑德). Throughout, Xiāo cites by name dozens of earlier works — the Hóng fàn 洪範 chapter of the Shàngshū, the Bái hǔ tōng 白虎通, the Lǐjì 禮記 monthly ordinances, the Huáinánzǐ 淮南子, Xiào jīng yuán shénqì 孝經援神契, Shī wěi 詩緯, Yì wěi 易緯 corpus, Wǔxíng dàquán (Hàn-era), and many wěishū now lost — making the work indispensable as an indirect witness to the Hàn weft-and-prognostication corpus.

Transmission. The Wǔxíng dàyì is recorded in the bibliographical monographs of the Suíshū, the Jiù Tángshū 舊唐書, and the Xīn Tángshū 新唐書, and is cited extensively in Táng-period leishu (notably the Wǔxíng dàyì extracts in Tàipíng yùlǎn 太平御覽). It still appears in the Sòngshǐ 宋史 “Yìwénzhì” 藝文志 and in the Chóngwén zǒngmù 崇文總目, but disappears from Chinese bibliographies by the late Yuán; Wénxiàn tōngkǎo 文獻通考 already notes its rarity. The entire received text in five juàn is preserved in Japan, where it was repeatedly copied and printed from the Heian period onward and integrated into the onmyōdō curriculum; the standard kanbun edition is that of Nakamura Shōhachi 中村璋八 (see below). It was reintroduced to China through the Cōngshū jíchéng 叢書集成 and Jíkǔzhāi cōngshū 佚存叢書 lineages of late-Qīng Japanese-sourced reprints, and is now standard.

Significance. The Wǔxíng dàyì is the principal pre-Táng surviving compendium of correlative cosmology and is the single most important text for reconstructing Hàn–Six Dynasties five-phases theory; for many quoted weft texts it is the fullest extant witness. It also provides crucial evidence for the technical vocabulary of Suí court divination and for the institutional setting of yīnyáng wǔxíng learning at the Tàicháng 太常 on the eve of the Táng synthesis.

Translations and research

• Marc Kalinowski, tr. and annot. Cosmologie et divination dans la Chine ancienne: le Compendium des cinq agents (Wuxing dayi 五行大義, VIe siècle). Publications de l’École française d’Extrême-Orient, 166. Paris: EFEO, 1991. The standard critical study and complete annotated French translation; remains the indispensable scholarly point of entry. (Cited at Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual, §39.16 on Five Agents.)
• Nakamura Shōhachi 中村璋八. Gogyō taigi kōchū 五行大義校註. Tokyo: Meitoku 明德出版社, 1973; rev. ed. Kyūko shoin 汲古書院, 1984; further reprints. The standard kanbun-school critical edition with collation against the principal Japanese manuscript and printed witnesses.
• Nakamura Shōhachi 中村璋八, Nihon Onmyōdō-sho no kenkyū 日本陰陽道書の研究 (Tokyo: Kyūko shoin, 1985; rev. 2000) — situates the Wǔxíng dàyì within its Japanese reception.
• Liú Guózhōng 劉國忠. Wǔxíng dàyì yánjiū 五行大義研究. Shenyang: Liaoning jiaoyu, 1999. Modern Chinese monograph, useful especially on Hàn weft sources cited in the work.
• Marc Kalinowski, “La transmission du Dispositif des Neuf Palais sous les Six Dynasties,” in Tantric and Taoist Studies in Honour of R. A. Stein, ed. Michel Strickmann (Bruxelles: Institut belge des hautes études chinoises, 1985), III: 773–811 — uses the Wǔxíng dàyì extensively.

Other points of interest

The Wǔxíng dàyì is one of the small handful of substantial Chinese texts of the early-medieval period that survives only by Japanese transmission (alongside the Tang court ritual Dàtáng kāiyuán lǐ 大唐開元禮 fragments and certain yīnyáng manuals); its survival is directly tied to the institutional life of the Japanese Onmyōryō 陰陽寮 and to the scholarly families (Kamo, Abe) who guarded the onmyōdō curriculum.

Links

• Wikipedia (Japanese)
• Wikidata
• Endymion Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual , §39.16 (Five Agents).
• Suíshū 隋書 j. 78 (蕭吉 biography) and “Jīngjí zhì” 子部·五行類 (work entry), via ctext.org.