作義要訣

Zuò yì yào jué 作義要訣

Essentials for Writing the Examination Essay by 倪士毅 (撰)

About the work

The Zuò yì yào jué 作義要訣, in one juǎn, is a late-Yuán handbook on the composition of the jīngyì 經義 examination essay, by the Huīzhōu Zhū-Xī-school scholar Ní Shìyì 倪士毅 (1303–1348). It belongs to the same post-1313 genre of “rules for the new examination prose” as Chén Yìzēng’s 陳繹曾 Wén shuō (KR4i0046); but where Chén worked in the immediate aftermath of the 1313 Yányòu reform, Ní writes a generation later, after Yuán-tǒng-era (1333–) further adjustments had once more increased the jīngyì component of the exam. The text frames itself as a digest of model methods, set out as a sequence of compositional rules: the first principle is “to understand the dàolǐ (the rational principle) penetratingly”; the second is “to understand the meaning of the classical text clearly”; the third is “to understand the great body of ancient and recent order, disorder, peace, and danger.” Subsequent rules govern length-and-brevity, novelty-and-cliché, choice of diction. The Sìkù editors recognise the work as one of the principal antecedents of the Míng bāgǔ wén 八股文 — “the jīngyì form is thereafter substantially developed from this”.

The book is explicitly a guide to the examination essay: the jīngyì genre formally established by Wáng Ānshí 王安石 under Sòng Shénzōng’s Xīníng 4 (1071) reform; revived by Yuán Tàizōng on Yēlǜ Chǔcái’s 耶律楚材 recommendation; restored and regulated by Yuán Renzong in Huángqìng 2 (1313); and (under the Yuántǒng adjustments of 1335 onward) given enhanced weight by the addition of a jīngyì paper for Mongol and sèmù candidates. Ní’s manual was thus produced for a moment of intense official interest in jīngyì form, and for a candidate population that had grown to include the conquering elite.

Tiyao

Zuò yì yào jué, one juǎn. By Ní Shìyì of the Yuán. Shìyì wrote the Sì shū jí shì 四書輯釋, already catalogued. This volume sets out the contemporary form of the jīngyì examination essay.

Since the Sòng emperor Shénzōng’s Xīníng 4 (1071), examinations have been set by jīngyì. Yuán Tàizōng, on Yēlǜ Chǔcái’s recommendation, used three subjects in his examinations, of which the jīngyì was one. Under Renzong, in Huángqìng 2 (1313), the conditions of the examination were finalised: Mongols and sèmù candidates in the first session answered five jīng wèn (questions on the classics); Hànrén and Nánrén in the first session answered two jīng yí (doubt-resolutions on the classics) of three hundred characters or more, without prosodic constraint. From Yuántǒng onward the Mongol and sèmù candidates likewise had one jīngyì added. The Míng-and-later examination prose is in substantial part the descendant of this.

The remarks of this book, although narrow in scope and not entirely getting to the bottom of literary composition, include such formulations as: “The first essential is to grasp the dàolǐ penetratingly; the second is to grasp the meaning of the classical text clearly; the third is to grasp the great body of ancient and modern order-and-disorder, peace-and-danger.” And: “A long essay that turns a new meaning is not harmed by being long; a short essay whose meaning is fully ramified is not harmed by being short. Pursuing height too much leads to obliqueness; pursuing novelty too much leads to oddity. To drop a word into clumsiness, with overworked construction, results in jagged language; to set a thought against the conventional, with too-thorough searching, produces backwards reasoning.” These are the canonical tortoise-and-mirror for later examination prose.

In our day too the empire takes scholars by examination, and jīngyì still leads the way. Our August Sage-Imperial commands have repeatedly clarified and re-set the standard of literary form, so that scholars all know to walk in the footsteps of the earlier orthodox masters. This book also pre-dates the Míng. Although the rules differ in detail, the principles are the same. To enter it into the record and preserve it is in keeping with the principle “first the small streams, then the great sea.”

The original preface notes that the work also incorporates the methods of one Mr Xiè and one Mr Zhāng. The Yǒnglè dàdiǎn annotation says that these were already included in the Jǔyè quántí 舉業筌蹏 juǎn — hence not repeated here. The present juǎn is incomplete on that side and we follow the old recension as it stands, leaving the lacuna. The principal substance is, however, sufficiently in hand.

Abstract

The Zuò yì yào jué is one of the very few extant Yuán handbooks on the jīngyì examination essay, and the principal late-Yuán representative of the genre (Chén Yìzēng’s KR4i0046 Wén shuō is the principal early-Yuán representative). It is therefore a primary source for the textual history of the late-medieval Chinese examination essay — the genre that became MíngQīng bāgǔ wén 八股文 — at the moment of its transformation from the relatively free Sòng jīngyì into the increasingly schematic YuánMíng form. Ní’s own preface (transmitted in the source file) explicitly sets out the structural history of the genre: the Sòng jīngyì was “rambling and long-winded” (lěifán fánfù 累煩繁複) with a fixed sequence (the màozǐ 冒子 prelude in three sub-parts — pò tí / jiē tí / xiǎo jiǎng; the guān tí 官題 main statement in two sub-parts — yuán tí and dà jiǎng; the yú yì 餘意; the yuán jīng 原經; and the jié wěi 結尾); the present Yuán jīngyì is freer in form, but still divides into four parts — mào tí, yuán tí, jiǎng tí, jié tí. The Sìkù editors’ description of Zuò yì yào jué as a precursor of Míng bāgǔ method is thus literally correct.

Ní’s biographical situation matters. As a private tutor under late Yuán Huīzhōu (Qímén), he was the local point of contact between the ZhūXī school of Chén Lì and the candidate population. His other major work, the Sì shū jí shì, became one of the most-used early-Míng examination digests; the Zuò yì yào jué is the rhetorical companion to that doctrinal manual.

Composition window: the catalog meta gives “fl. 1341”, which is consistent with Ní’s preface (dated zhìyuán 5 = 1339, or thereabouts; the zhìyuán graphs in the text identify the late-Yuán reign-titles unambiguously). The work was completed in the late-Yuán-tǒng / early zhìzhèng era; a defensible window is 1335–1348 (Ní’s death), narrower than the catalog’s “fl. 1341” alone would allow.

The book was lost in independent transmission by the early Míng; the Sìkù recension was reconstructed from the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn and is the basis of all modern editions. The Lìdài wénhuà huì biān (Wáng Shuǐzhào ed., 2007) reprints it with collation.

Translations and research

• Benjamin A. Elman, A Cultural History of Civil Examinations in Late Imperial China (UC, 2000), discusses the Yuán jīng-yì and its descent into bā-gǔ — Ní’s manual is one of the principal Yuán witnesses.
• Hé Mèng-méi 何夢梅, Yuán-dài kē-jǔ yán-jiū 元代科舉研究 (Tiān-jīn gǔ-jí, 2008).
• Mao Hai-chien 毛海建, Sòng Yuán jīng-yì kǎo 宋元經義考 (Hé-běi rén-mín, 2009).
• Wáng Shuǐ-zhào 王水照, ed., Lì-dài wén-huà huì biān 歷代文話彙編 (Fù-dàn dà-xué, 2007).
• Theodore de Bary and J. W. Chaffee, eds., Neo-Confucian Education (UC, 1989), background on the Yuán Zhū-Xī school in Huī-zhōu and on Ní’s Sì shū jí shì.

Other points of interest

The work’s most consequential aphorism — “[Pursuing height too much leads to obliqueness; pursuing novelty too much leads to oddity. The result of overworking construction is jagged language; the result of over-searching meaning is backwards reasoning.]” 務高則多渉乎僻；欲新則類乎怪。下字惡乎俗，而造作太過則語澀；立意惡乎同，而搜索太甚則理背 — became one of the touchstones of MíngQīng bāgǔ style criticism and is quoted in nearly every Míng examination-essay manual.

Links

• Wilkinson, Chinese History: A New Manual §30.5; also §28 (kējǔ).
• Kyoto Zinbun Sìkù tíyào
• Wikidata Q11067391 (作義要訣).