Tǎnzhāi tōngbiān 坦齋通編
Comprehensive Compilation of the Studio of Levelness
by 邢凱 (Xíng Kǎi, fl. early 13th century; zì Tíngjǔ 廷舉, hào Tǎnzhāi 坦齋; of Wǔníng 武寧, modern Jiāngxī)
About the work
A short Southern Sòng bǐjì of textual and historical criticism in one juan, on the kǎozhèng model of Chéng Dàchāng’s 程大昌 Yǎn fánlù 演繁露 and Hóng Mài’s 洪邁 Róngzhāi suíbǐ 容齋隨筆. The original recension is lost; the present text is a Sìkù reconstruction from passages preserved in the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn 永樂大典. Although only a few dozen entries survive, they are unusually substantive: textual cruxes in the Confucian classics, the Hàn shū and Táng shū, refutations of received attributions (e.g., the proverbs cháiláng dāng dào 豺狼當道 do not begin with Zhāng Gāng’s 張綱 máilún 埋輪 incident, but with the Qián Hàn shū; zhìniǎo lěi bǎi 鶩鳥累百 does not begin with Kǒng Róng’s 孔融 recommendation of Mí Héng 禰衡, but with Zōu Yáng’s 鄒陽 letter), and reasoned positions on contested institutional questions (the impropriety of seating Yán Huí 顏回 and Zēng Shēn 曾參 in the main hall while their fathers stood in the side rooms, which view the later Qǐshèng cí 啟聖祠 institution actually adopted). Catalogued under Záxué zhī shǔ 雜學之屬 of the Zájiā 雜家 division (subdivision zákǎo 雜考).
Tiyao
We respectfully submit that Tǎnzhāi tōngbiān in one juan does not bear its compiler’s name; the Shuōfū 說郛 entitles it “by Xíng Kǎi of the Sòng,” but does not detail his rank or native place. The matters recorded include seeing Lěng Shìguāng’s 冷世光 disquisition on surnames during the Chúnxī 淳熙 era (this is in the time of Xiàozōng 孝宗), and the Qìngyuán 慶元 incidents of Gāo Bǐngwén 高秉文 setting the topic and Jīng Táng 京鏜 attacking the eunuch Wáng Déqiān 王德謙, and the recent reading of Yáng Chéngzhāi’s 楊誠齋 [Wànlǐ 萬里] Yì zhuàn 易傳 — so the book was finished after Níngzōng’s 寧宗 reign. He further records that in Qiándào xīnmǎo (1171) Wáng Níng 王寧, magistrate of Wǔníng, had his family enrolled there as lǐzhèng 里正 (ward-head) — so he was a Wǔníng man.
The book mostly does kǎozhèng of the classics and histories, roughly on the model of Chéng Dàchāng’s 程大昌 Yǎn fánlù 演繁露 and Hóng Mài’s Róngzhāi suíbǐ. Examples: he cites the Sīqí 思齊 ode in evidence that Wénmǔ 文母 is Tài Rèn 太任 and not Tài Sì 太娰; he cites the Shuō yuàn 說苑 in support of the Chūnqiū “shǐ yú 矢魚” reading; he cites the Shì shuō 世說 in support of “Yuánlóng bǎichǐ lóu 元龍百尺樓”; he cites the Hàn shū to argue that the title Fúbō 伏波 is not used absolutely; he cites Zhèng Xuán’s 鄭玄 commentary on the Míngtáng wèi 明堂位 in support of the Hàn shū “tūwēng 秃翁” reading; he cites the biographies of Zhū Mǎichén 朱買臣 and Zhāng Tāng 張湯 to show internal inconsistencies in the Hàn shū; he cites the biography of Lǐ Jífǔ 李吉甫 to show the discrepancies between the earlier and later Táng shū; he cites the Qián Hàn shū in support of the cháiláng dāng dào 豺狼當道 phrase pre-dating Zhāng Gāng’s 張綱 máilún 埋輪 incident; he cites Zōu Yáng’s 鄒陽 letter to show that zhìniǎo lěi bǎi 鶩鳥累百 pre-dates Kǒng Róng’s 孔融 recommendation of Mí Héng 禰衡 — all of these are close and accurate.
Other matters: he discusses the falsity of the diviners’ day-selection and the five-tone-to-surname correspondence; he finds fault with Yáo Chá’s 姚察 “set aside human matters and entrust them to fate”; he argues that famine relief must include checking villainy; he refutes the absurd notion that Luófú 羅浮 mountain has a Fēilái peak 飛來峯; he discusses Hàn Gāozǔ’s same-crime-different-punishment; he discusses the search for longevity, the destruction of unauthorized shrines, Gōngyí Xiū 公儀休’s anger at the woven silk — his arguments are upright and large-minded throughout. As to his thesis that “though the son be a sage as Qí, he ought not eat ahead of the father,” that it was therefore wrong to seat Yán Huí and Zēng Shēn in the main hall while their fathers stood in the side rooms, and that a separate hall ought to be erected — later generations established the Qǐshèng cí 啟聖祠 (Hall for Inspiring the Sage) precisely on this argument: this can truly be called knowing the meaning of ritual.
The Sòng [shǐ Yìwén] zhì and other catalogs do not record this book; its original juan-count cannot be reconstructed. We have now gathered the surviving passages from the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn by rhyme-category and edited them into one juan. Although only some dozens of entries remain, those that are valuable are conspicuously many.
Respectfully revised and submitted, ninth month of the forty-sixth year of Qiánlóng [1781].
General Compilers: Jǐ Yún 紀昀 (note: 均 in the original is a typographical slip for 昀), Lù Xīxióng 陸錫熊, Sūn Shìyì 孫士毅. General Reviser: Lù Fèichí 陸費墀.
Abstract
Xíng Kǎi 邢凱 (fl. early 13th century), zì Tíngjǔ 廷舉, hào Tǎnzhāi 坦齋, of Wǔníng 武寧 (in modern Jiāngxī), has no Sòng shǐ biography and is not recorded in the standard bibliographic catalogs. Both his identity and his book come down to us only through the Sìkù editors’ reconstruction from Yǒnglè dàdiǎn fragments and a Shuōfū attribution. The internal references — to Chúnxī (1174–1189) and Qìngyuán (1195–1200) events, to Yáng Wànlǐ’s 楊萬里 Yì zhuàn as a “recent” reading — place the composition securely in the early years of Níngzōng’s reign or shortly after; the dating bracket adopted here (notBefore 1194, notAfter 1240) reflects the earliest possible composition (the start of Níngzōng’s reign) and a generous upper bound consistent with a fl. date of 1208 (the CBDB datum) plus continued composition into Lǐzōng’s early years.
The book is one of the more accomplished representatives of the late twelfth- / early thirteenth-century kǎozhèng bǐjì tradition, and the Sìkù editors single it out for the soundness of its institutional and ethical arguments — particularly the proposal that the Confucian temple ought to seat Yán Huí and Zēng Shēn separately from their fathers, a position later codified in the founding of the Qǐshèng cí 啟聖祠 (1530, in the Jiājìng reformation of state-ritual). The fact that a Mín-end administrative reform took up an obscure Sòng bǐjì author’s argument verbatim is the work’s chief claim to wider importance.
The Yǒnglè dàdiǎn origin means the surviving text is partial: the original juan-count is unknown, and only “several dozen” entries (the Sìkù’s phrase) remain. The Sìkù one-juan reconstruction is therefore the only text we have.
Translations and research
No substantial secondary literature located. The text is briefly noted in the standard handbooks (Liú Yèqiū 劉葉秋, Lìdài bǐjì gàishù 歷代筆記概述; Wú Wéi 吳偉’s Sòng-dài bǐjì yánjiū) but has not been the object of monographic treatment in any language. A modern punctuated edition is included in Zhū Yìxuán 朱易安 et al. (eds.), Quán Sòng bǐjì 全宋筆記.
Other points of interest
The Sìkù editors’ connection between Xíng Kǎi’s separate-hall argument and the eventual Míng-dynasty institution of the Qǐshèng cí is striking: it is one of the few cases where a minor Sòng bǐjì entry can be shown to have anticipated, by some three centuries, a major state-ritual reform. The Qǐshèng cí was established by Míng Shìzōng 明世宗 in 1530 to enshrine the fathers of Confucius, Yán Huí, Zēng Shēn, Zǐsī 子思, and Mèngzǐ separately from their sons — exactly the structural arrangement Xíng Kǎi proposed.
Links
- Sìkù quánshū zǒngmù tíyào 四庫全書總目提要, Zǐbù · Zájiā lèi 2 · Zákǎo zhī shǔ, Tǎnzhāi tōngbiān entry.
- Wikidata: no entry located.