Zhào Nánxīng 趙南星 (1550–1627)
Zì Mèngbái 夢白, hào Cháihè 儕鶴 (the cháihèrén — companion of cranes); posthumous title Zhōngyì 忠毅. Native of Gāoyì 高邑 (Héběi). Late-Míng Dōnglín 東林 leader.
Jìnshì of Wànlì jiǎxū (1574). Career: rose through Lìbù shàngshū 吏部尚書 (Minister of Personnel) under the Tiānqǐ emperor (1620–27) — the most senior office a member of the Dōnglín faction held. Together with Gù Xiànchéng 顧憲成, Gāo Pānlóng 高攀龍, and Yáng Liǎn 楊漣, one of the principal anti-eunuch leaders against the Wèi Zhōngxián 魏忠賢 administration.
In Tiānqǐ 5 (1625), as Wèi Zhōngxián’s purge of the Dōnglín faction reached its peak, Zhào Nánxīng was demoted to the magistracy of Dàizhōu 代州, then exiled to Shānxī. He died in exile in 1627 (Tiānqǐ 7), shortly before the death of the Tiānqǐ emperor and the accession of Chóngzhēn that finally rehabilitated the Dōnglín martyrs. Posthumously canonised Zhōngyì 忠毅 (“loyal and resolute”); biography in Míngshǐ 243.
Surviving Kanripo work:
- KR1h0049 XuéYōng zhèngshuō 學庸正說 (3 juàn, WYG) — a doctrinal exposition of the Dàxué and Zhōngyōng. The Sìkù tíyào (preserved at the head of the WYG) praises him for refusing the Wáng Yángmíng zhī běn gloss of the Dàxué (i.e. the Xīnxué dissident reading) and for sticking with Zhū Xī’s géwù bǔzhuàn — and likewise for refusing the “wúshēng wúxiù xūnǐ xìngtiān” 無聲無臭虛擬性天 (groundless-sounded, void-imagined Heaven-and-nature) reading of the Zhōngyōng, returning instead to the orthodox doctrine of shèn dú 慎獨 (vigilance-when-alone) — both diagnostic of his disciplined orthodoxy.
His collected works are ZhàoZhōngyìgōng wénjí 趙忠毅公文集 (KR4d corpus). The Cǎotíng zhělùn 草亭折論 — political essays of the late Wànlì period — is also his.
(CBDB id 132172; dates 1550–1627 firm from Míngshǐ 243 and the standard Dōnglín genealogies.)