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聞見後錄

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Text ID
KR3l0069
Date
1138–1157
Dynasty
南宋

Wénjiàn hòu lù 聞見後錄

Later Record of Things Seen and Heard by 邵博 (撰)

About the work

A thirty-juàn bǐjì 筆記 by 邵博 Shào Bó 邵博 (zì Gōngjì 公濟; fl. 1138–1157), explicitly conceived as the continuation (hòu lù 後錄, “later record”) of his father 邵伯溫 Shào Bówēn’s twenty-juàn Wénjiàn qián lù 聞見前錄 (KR3l0066); together the two works form the Shàoshì wénjiàn lù 邵氏聞見錄 cycle, one of the principal bǐjì sources for late-Northern-Sòng intellectual and political history through the Southern crossing. Shào Bó dates his own preface to the first day of the third month of Shàoxīng 27 (1 April 1157), a bǐngyín day; internal references to events as late as the Shàoxīng settlement (after 1141) bracket the active composition period to c. 1138–1157. Where the Qián lù concentrates on great affairs of court that “supplement the standard histories” (Sìkù compilers’ phrase), the Hòu lù mixes court anecdote with substantial kǎojù 考據 on the Classics, jīnshí 金石 epigraphy, shīhuà 詩話 poetic criticism, and occasional shénguài páixié 神怪俳諧 (supernatural and humorous) material — the Sìkù compilers judge it “rather more miscellaneous” (pō wéi suǒzá 頗為瑣雜) than the father’s volume.

The work’s defining intellectual posture is its open break with the ChéngZhū 程朱 dàoxué lineage. Shào Bówēn had revered the Chéng brothers; Shào Bó, by contrast, pái Chéngshì ér zōng Sū Shì 排程氏而宗蘇軾 — repudiates the Chéng school and aligns with the Sū Shì 蘇軾 circle. The Sìkù tíyào explains this rupture as a family quarrel: after his grandfather Shào Yōng 邵雍 died (1077), the Chéng brothers’ disciples (游酢 Yóu Zuò, 謝良佐 Xiè Liángzuǒ) sought to elevate the Chéng shīmén by suppressing Shào — Shào Bó’s polemic is the family’s retaliation. The work’s three full juàn of Yí Mèng 疑孟 (“doubts about Mencius”) collations, its defence of the Bìyún xiá 碧雲騢 attribution to Méi Yáochén 梅堯臣, its attack on Zhào Dǐng 趙鼎 for following the Luò school, and its scornful treatment of the Yīchuān Yì zhuàn 伊川易傳 (i.e., Chéng Yí’s Yì commentary) all flow from this stance — and all are felt by the Sìkù compilers to violate the jiāfǎ 家法 of Shào Yōng himself.

Tiyao

Your servants report: Wénjiàn hòu lù in 30 juàn, by the Sòng Shào Bó. Bó zì Gōngjì, son of 邵伯溫 Bówēn. This compilation continues his father’s book — hence the title “Later Record.” Several entries within it on the restoration of Empress Mèng (Fù Mènghòu 復孟后) are duplicated from the Qián lù. Yet what Bówēn recorded is mostly great court affairs of value as supplement to the standard histories; this book extends to Classical exegesis, historical argument, and shīhuà, mixed with the supernatural and humorous, and so is rather more miscellaneous than the prior record. Again: Bówēn’s book vigorously promotes the Two Chéng, while Bó repudiates the Chéng school and follows Sū Shì. Looking at his records of 游酢 Yóu Zuò and 謝良佐 Xiè Liángzuǒ, one knows that after Kāngjié (Shào Yōng) died, the Chéng-followers wanted to exalt their teacher by suppressing Shào — so Bó’s stance is a polemical reply. Now those who clutch power must first unite to attack a rival party; once the rival is finished, they fall on each other within the same lineage when the spoils are no longer to be monopolised. Likewise those who debate learning must first unite to attack a rival party; once the rival is finished, they fall on each other within the same lineage when the name is no longer to be monopolised. Such is the inevitable bent of the situation — hardly to be wondered at.

As for his compilation of the various Yí Mèng (“doubts about Mencius”) writings filling three juàn; his attestation that the Bìyún xiá really came from Méi Yáochén’s hand; his record of the Wáng Zǐfēi 王子飛 affair to praise the spiritual efficacy of the Buddha-Dharma; his record of the Tāng Bǎohéng 湯保衡 affair to extol the manifest power of Daoism; his attack on Yàn Shū 晏殊 for stingy burial-rites; and his deprecation of Zhào Dǐng for following the Luò school — all these depart from the jiāfǎ of Master Shào. Other instances: taking a Yuán Zhěn 元稹 poem to be of the Huáng Cháo 黃巢 genus — his citations are likewise rather loose.

Yet his vindication of Empress Xuānrén 宣仁 from slander (recording supplementary memorials beyond Sīmǎ Guāng’s 司馬光 collected works) is useful for kǎozhèng 考證; his discussion of the Tōngjiàn’s 通鑑 mistaken excision of Qū Yuán 屈原; his refutation of Wáng Ānshí 王安石’s misappropriation of Féng Dào 馮道; his discrimination that the Yīchuān Yì zhuàn is not properly the Chuílián 垂簾 work; his proof that the Shàoxīng imperial seal is not in fact the [Bian]-Hé 和 jade-disc — all argue with discernment. And his remarks on poetry are likewise many of them worth picking up. Of Sòng shuōbù the perfectly polished are rare; selective extraction from this one is enough. Respectfully checked, Qiánlóng 43 (1778), 3rd month. Chief Compilers: Jì Yún 紀昀, Lù Xīxióng 陸錫熊, Sūn Shìyì 孫士毅. Chief Collator: Lù Fèichí 陸費墀.

Abstract

Shào Bó (CBDB id 20866; CBDB span fl. 1138–1158, index year 1095) was the third generation of the Hénán 河南 (Luòyáng) Shào lineage of xiāntiān 先天 Yì-numerologists — grandson of 邵雍 Shào Yōng 邵雍 (1011–1077, Kāngjié), son of 邵伯溫 Shào Bówēn 邵伯溫 (1057–1134). The Hòu lù’s composition window is fixed by Shào Bó’s own preface, dated 1 day, 3rd month, Shàoxīng 27 (= 1 April 1157), as terminus, with the earliest Shàoxīng-period (post-1138) entries fixing the terminus a quo. The work was therefore essentially complete by 1157 — Shào Bó’s “mature” decades — and bears no internal evidence of revision after that year.

The Hòu lù’s contribution beyond the father’s work is fourfold. First, its substantial kǎojù on the Classics: the three-juàn compilation of Yí Mèng dossiers — Sīmǎ Guāng 司馬光’s Yí Mèng 疑孟, Lǐ Gòu 李覯’s Cháng yǔ 常語, Zhèng Hòu 鄭厚’s Yì Mèng 藝苑 Mèngzǐ objections, Féng Xiū 馮休’s Shān Mèng 刪孟 — is the principal Sòng anthology of the Yí Mèng tradition, and the basis on which modern study of pre-Zhū-Xī Mencian critique rests. Second, its jīnshí and material-culture entries: Hàn-stele transcriptions, Táng-era inscription readings, observations on calligraphy and inkstone production. Third, its shīhuà observations on the Sū Shì circle (Sū Shì, Huáng Tíngjiān 黃庭堅, Chén Shīdào 陳師道, Sū Chè 蘇轍, Qín Guān 秦觀) — the Sìkù compilers single these out as “much worth picking up.” Fourth, its political-historical material on the Yuányòu 元祐 period and the Xuānrén dowager-empress regency (1085–93), defending her against the later Shàoshèng — Chóngníng slander campaign by citing yìwài zhāngshū 集外章疏 (memorials outside Sīmǎ Guāng’s collected works) — material critically dependent on Shào Bó’s Luòyáng-network access.

Shào Bó’s open repudiation of the Chéng brothers and embrace of Sū Shì makes the Hòu lù one of the most polemical anti-dàoxué documents within the bǐjì genre. The work was therefore controversial: although Lù Yóu 陸游 and other Shàoxīng — Lóngxīng literati cite it appreciatively, the dominant ChéngZhū dàoxué tradition of the Chúnxī 淳熙 and later periods marginalised it; the Sìkù compilers preserve it but flag its partisan distortion. The duplicate entries with the Qián lù on the Empress Mèng restoration — noted by the tíyào — indicate Shào Bó was working from family papers / zhājì 札記 that overlapped with his father’s collection rather than from a clean fresh corpus.

Standard modern edition: Liú Déquán 劉德權 / Lǐ Jiànxióng 李劍雄, coll., Shàoshì wénjiàn lù 邵氏聞見錄 + Wénjiàn hòu lù (Zhōnghuá 1983 TángSòng shǐliào bǐjì cóngkān series, in two volumes binding the Qián and Hòu records together).

Translations and research

  • Liu, James T. C. China Turning Inward: Intellectual-Political Changes in the Early Twelfth Century (HUP 1988). Uses Wén-jiàn hòu lù and Qián lù as principal sources for the Shào family’s intellectual trajectory across the Northern–Southern Sòng divide.
  • Bol, Peter K. Neo-Confucianism in History (HUP 2008). Cites the Hòu lù on the Chéng-Sū schism within the Luòyáng intellectual milieu.
  • Tillman, Hoyt Cleveland. Confucian Discourse and Chu Hsi’s Ascendancy (UHP 1992). Uses the Hòu lù’s anti-dào-xué polemic to reconstruct pre-Zhū-Xī Sòng intellectual diversity.
  • Smith, Kidder; Bol, Peter K.; Adler, Joseph A.; Wyatt, Don J. Sung Dynasty Uses of the I Ching (PUP 1990). Uses the Hòu lù for the Shào xiān-tiān transmission lineage and the Chéng-Yí Yì-commentary controversy.
  • Hartman, Charles. The Making of a Confucian Hero: The Reception of Yue Fei (1103–1142) (CUP 2021). Cites the Hòu lù on the Shào-xīng settlement and Zhào Dǐng.
  • de Bary, Wm. Theodore. The Message of the Mind in Neo-Confucianism (CUP 1989). Cites the Yí Mèng material.
  • No full European-language translation of either record has been located; selected entries appear in Chaffee, John W., and Denis Twitchett, eds., Cambridge History of China, vol. 5, part 2 (CUP 2015).

Other points of interest

The Hòu lù’s Yí Mèng compilation is itself the single most important source for the lost Yí Mèng writings of the Northern Sòng. Sīmǎ Guāng’s Yí Mèng survives independently; Lǐ Gòu’s Cháng yǔ survives in his wénjí; but Féng Xiū’s Shān Mèng and Zhèng Hòu’s Yì Mèng objections survive principally through Shào Bó’s quotations — making the work a primary witness to the Northern-Sòng anti-Mencian tradition that Zhū Xī’s later canonisation of Mencius effectively buried.

The grandfather-father-son lineage Shào Yōng → Shào Bówēn → Shào Bó constitutes one of the unusual three-generation intellectual transmissions of Northern-into-Southern Sòng that is documented from within: Shào Bówēn’s Yìxué biànhuò (KR1a0017), the Qián lù (KR3l0066), and the Hòu lù together preserve the family’s account of itself in a way that few other Northern-Sòng lineages enjoy.

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