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列子 (釋文)

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Text ID
KR5c0125
Date
300–370
Dynasty
東晉

Lièzǐ 列子 (with Zhāng Zhàn’s 張湛 commentary and Yīn Jìngshùn’s 殷敬順 Shì wén 釋文)

Master Liè — with Zhāng Zhàn’s foundational Eastern-Jìn commentary and Yīn Jìngshùn’s Táng philological glosses

attributed to 列禦寇 (Liè Yùkòu; traditional Warring States; received text early 4th cent. CE); commentary by 張湛 (Zhāng Zhàn; fl. 370); philological glosses (shì wén 釋文) by 殷敬順 (Yīn Jìngshùn; Táng Dāng tú chéng 當塗丞)

The canonical Wén yuān gé Sìkù quánshū edition of the Lièzǐ, comprising the base text in 8 juàn, the foundational commentary of Zhāng Zhàn 張湛 (fl. 370), and the Táng shì wén 釋文 (philological-phonetic glosses) of Yīn Jìngshùn 殷敬順. Preserved in the Wén yuān gé Sìkù quánshū (V1055.15, p573) in the zǐ bù 子部 Dào jiā lèi 道家類, and in the Hóng fǎ liú 洪氏流 reprint under the title 列子沖虛至德真經釋文 Lièzǐ Chōng xū zhì dé zhēn jīng shì wén.

About the work

Tiyao

The 1778 Wén yuān gé Sìkù quánshū editorial tiyao provides a substantial scholarly account of the text, covering its attribution history, archaeological-textual evidence, and commentarial tradition. Key points (translated and summarised):

  1. The traditional attribution to Liè Yùkòu — “a man of Zhèng under Duke Mù” (per Liú Xiàng’s 劉向 preface).

  2. Liǔ Zōngyuán’s 柳宗元 challenge — “Duke Mù was several hundred years before Confucius; Lièzǐ’s book speaks of the Zhèng state in terms of Zǐ chǎn 子產 and Dèng Xī 鄧析 — how could Xiàng [Liú] have said this? The Shǐ jì records ‘Zhèng Rú gōng Zǐ’ 14th year, when Chǔ Dào wáng 4th year [= 385 BCE] besieged Zhèng and killed its chancellor Sī Zǐyáng 駟子陽 — this is exactly Lièzǐ’s time. That year was Lǔ Mù gōng’s 10th year — perhaps Xiàng said ‘Lǔ Mù gōng’s time’ and this was mistakenly written as ‘Zhèng’?” Liǔ Zōngyuán’s textual detective-work is one of the foundational documents of Chinese text-critical scholarship.

  3. Zhāng Zhàn’s awkward admission — Zhāng Zhàn subsequently acknowledged that “the book also has many additions and is not its [Lièzǐ’s] actual words”, citing references to Wèi Móu 魏牟 and Kǒng Chuān 孔穿 who lived after Lièzǐ — though he failed to recognise other anachronisms.

  4. Gāo Sìsūn’s 高似孫 polemic — in his Wěi lüè 緯略, Gāo went further, suspecting Lièzǐ of being a figure on a level with Hóng méng 鴻濛 and Yún jiāng 雲將 (purely legendary characters in the Zhuāngzǐ) — i.e., doubting the historicity of Lièzǐ altogether.

  5. Chapter 5 Tāng wèn problem — additional anachronisms including Zōu Yǎn 鄒衍 (c. 305–240 BCE) “blowing the pitch pipes” — further evidence that the text is not from Lièzǐ’s own hand.

  6. The Sìkù verdict: “These things were not from Lièzǐ’s brush — there is no doubt.”

  7. But counter-evidence for pre-Qín antiquity: The Shī zǐ guǎng zé piān 尸子廣澤篇 (cited in the Ěr yǎ 爾雅 commentary) lists Lièzǐ among the pre-Qín masters: “Mòzǐ values the universal; Confucius values the public; Huángzǐ values the balanced; Tiánzǐ values the equal; Lièzǐ values the empty; Liàozǐ values separation” — “their schools oppose each other for several generations, yet all fall short of the true principle”. This confirms that in the pre-Qín period Lièzǐ was treated as a historical philosopher with a distinctive doctrine of xū 虛 (“emptiness”), not as a Zhuāngzian literary invention.

  8. Mù tiān zǐ zhuàn 穆天子傳 evidence — The Zhou Mu wáng 周穆王 chapter of the Lièzǐ tells of King Mù being driven by Zào fù, reaching Jù sōu, ascending Mt Kūn lún, meeting Xī Wáng Mǔ at Yáo chí — these details match those of the Mù tiān zǐ zhuàn, which was recovered from an early Jìn (Tàikāng, 280–289) tomb. The Mù tiān zǐ zhuàn was not available to HànWèi scholars, so Liú Xiàng could not have forged the Lièzǐ passage from it — which argues for the Lièzǐ’s pre-Qín origin.

  9. “The book that can be transmitted through its follower-school” — The Sìkù editors propose the synthetic view that the Lièzǐ was composed after Liè Yùkòu’s time by his followers, recording his teachings but including post-Liè events — parallel to the Zhuāngzǐ’s later-added “death of Zhuāngzǐ” passages.

  10. Zhāng Zhàn’s commentary — The Sìkù editors praise it as “inferior only to Wáng Bì’s Lǎozǐ commentary” (KR5c0073). They note that Zhāng’s mother was a cousin of Wáng Bì, and Zhāng was fluent in míng lǐ 名理 philosophical discourse.

  11. Yè Mèngdé’s 葉夢得 criticism — In Bì shǔ lù huà 避暑錄話, Yè argued that Zhāng knew the Lièzǐ was close to Buddhist sutras but, by explaining passage by passage, often lost the overall meaning. The Sìkù editors respond that this is measuring Jìn-period Daoist scholarship by post-Tāng Chán 禪 standards.

  12. Yīn Jìngshùn’s shì wén — a 2-juàn Táng philological apparatus, here integrated into the text as phonetic notes beneath each line. The edition notes that in some Míng prints the shì wén is garbled or mixed with Zhāng Zhàn’s commentary.

Prefaces

The Wén yuān gé edition preserves only the Sìkù editorial tiyao. Earlier prefaces include Liú Xiàng’s preface (preserved as a separate document, discussing the text’s transmission) and Zhāng Zhàn’s commentary-preface (discussing his maternal-Wáng Bì lineage).

Abstract

The edition is the canonical Wén yuān gé Sìkù quánshū presentation of the Lièzǐ with its two key scholarly apparatuses: Zhāng Zhàn’s commentary (which has been integrated into virtually every subsequent Lièzǐ edition) and Yīn Jìngshùn’s philological shì wén (which provides pronunciations and variant-readings for difficult characters). See KR5c0049 for comprehensive background on the Lièzǐ itself.

Dating. Per the project convention: the received Lièzǐ is Eastern-Jìn 東晉 c. 300–370 CE (Graham’s analysis). The frontmatter gives 300–370 as the composition window. Dynasty 東晉.

Translations and research

See KR5c0049 for the full bibliography. Primary modern edition: Yáng Bójùn 楊伯峻, Lièzǐ jí shì 列子集釋 (Běijīng: Zhōnghuá, 1979).

Other points of interest

The integration of Yīn Jìngshùn’s shì wén into the body of the text — rather than as a separate appendix — is a distinctive feature of the Wén yuān gé edition. In some Míng prints (as the Sìkù editors note), the shì wén and Zhāng Zhàn’s commentary become confused, with philological notes attributed to Zhāng and interpretive comments attributed to Yīn. The Wén yuān gé edition makes some effort to disentangle these, though not with perfect consistency.

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