Chuánjiā jí 傳家集
The Family-Transmitted Collection (of Sī-mǎ Guāng) by 司馬光 (撰)
About the work
Chuánjiā jí 傳家集 (also titled 溫國文正公文集 / Wēnguó Wénzhèng gōng wén jí in the SBCK Sòng base) is the 80-juǎn literary collection of the great Northern-Sòng councillor and historian Sīmǎ Guāng 司馬光 (1019–1086, zì Jūnshí 君實, posthumous Wénzhèng 文正, enfeoffed Wēnguógōng 溫國公) — author of the Zīzhì tōngjiàn 資治通鑑 KR2b0001 and the principal political-historical mind of the late Northern Sòng. The collection is one of the better-preserved late-Northern-Sòng biéjí, transmitted at near-original size from the Southern-Sòng witnesses.
Tiyao
No tíyào in source — the SBCK file is digitized from the Sòng base carrying instead the major preface (translated below). The Sìkù WYG 80-juǎn tíyào is not in the local file. The Sòng preface (preserved at the head of the SBCK file) is the principal contemporary editorial document: it cites the Lúnyǔ on Yán Huí as exemplar of déxíng and applies the same pattern to Sīmǎ Guāng — he is the moral exemplar of the age, his Zīzhì tōngjiàn and his collected works inseparable, his wén the yǔyì of liùjīng and the míngjiào of his school. The 80-juǎn arrangement is in 28 categories (shī, fù, zhāngzòu, zhìzhào, biǎoqǐ, záwén, shūzhuàn, etc. — completely subdivided), all included.
Abstract
Sīmǎ Guāng’s career is one of the principal pillars of Northern-Sòng political-intellectual history. Jìnshì of Bǎoyuán 1 / 1038 at age 20. Held a long sequence of Yánguān and provincial offices; in Yīngzōng and early Shénzōng time held Hànlín xuéshì and Yùshǐ zhōngchéng; with Wáng Ānshí’s Xīníng reforms (1069) decisively broke with the New Policies and resigned in 1070, retiring to Luòyáng for fifteen years to complete the Zīzhì tōngjiàn (presented in 1085). On Shénzōng’s death and the Yuányòu accession (1085) recalled to court as Tóng zhōngshū ménxià píngzhāngshì (Zǎixiàng); led the swift dismantling of the New Policies; died of overwork in Yuányòu 1 / 1086 age 67, weeks after taking the Zǎixiàng office. Posthumously canonized Wénzhèng 文正 (the most prestigious civil canonization, shared only with Fàn Zhòngyān among Northern-Sòng Zǎixiàng). The contents of the Chuánjiā jí include the famous Lún Lǐ Yǔjūn jiàn 論李于君諫 memorial against the New Policies, the Yírén lùn 疑人論, the principal political-philosophical lùn (notably the Cáiyòng lùn and Sìyán), the zīzhì tōngjiàn jìnbiǎo (the famous Yǔ Wáng Jièfǔ shū exchange with Wáng Ānshí), and substantial shī, fù, and bēizhì prose. Sīmǎ’s prose style is the late-gǔwén mature register — sober, classical, controlled — and is conventionally regarded as the principal Northern-Sòng model for serious political writing. The dating bracket marks Sīmǎ’s death (1086) to the Southern-Sòng terminus ante quem of the 80-juǎn recension recorded by Cháo Gōngwǔ.
Translations and research
- Bol, Peter K. 1992. “This Culture of Ours”. Stanford UP. Extensive treatment of Sī-mǎ Guāng’s intellectual program.
- Pulleyblank, E. G. 1961. “Chinese Historical Criticism: Liu Chih-chi and Ssu-ma Kuang.” In Historians of China and Japan, ed. Beasley and Pulleyblank.
- Sariti, Anthony William. 1972. “Monarchy, Bureaucracy and Absolutism in the Political Thought of Ssu-ma Kuang.” JAS 32.1.
- Ji Xiaobin. 2005. Politics and Conservatism in Northern Song China: The Career and Thought of Sima Guang (1019–1086). Hong Kong: Chinese University Press. Standard recent Western monograph.
- Liu, James T. C. 1959. Reform in Sung China. Harvard. Foundational study of the Sī-mǎ / Wáng Ān-shí debate.
Other points of interest
The Yǔ Wáng Jièfǔ shū 與王介甫書 — Sīmǎ’s celebrated 1070 letter to Wáng Ānshí publicly explaining his break with the New Policies — and Wáng’s reply Dá Sīmǎ Jiànyì shū are two of the most consequential documents of Northern-Sòng political thought. Both are preserved in this collection and in Wáng Ānshí’s Línchuān jí KR4d0067.
Links
- Sima Guang (Wikipedia)
- Wikidata Q367676
- Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual, §44 (Sòng government); §28.1 (Sòng biéjí).