| Confucianism, Buddhism and Daoism are usually considered to be the cornerstones of Chinese culture. However, Buddhism is not indigenous to China, and Daoism was classified as "non-Confucian philosophy" in the Guan Xiu Bibliograpy, therefore the most important components of traditional Chinese thought are not Confucian at all. Confucianism therefore refers to Scholastic Confucianism which is based upon the "five classics":the Book of Poetry, the Book of History, the Book of Changes, the Book of Rites, the Spring and Autumn Annals, and the Book of Music (which was lost quite early in history; however fragments are preserved within the Book of Rites). Beginning in Qin times, there was a trend towards "grasping both the New text and Old Text traditions" in the official government academies. From the Han onwards, however, the exams for holding official positions were essentially monopolized by Scholastic Confucians. In later times, scholars expanded beyond the "five classics" to include the "nine classics" and the "thirteen classics" and even the "four books" of the philosophers as the basis for traditional scholarship. These were all basically expansions and extractions from Confucian and Mencian Thought. Therefore, one can say that throughout the two thousand years of Chinese history, both the continuance and development of Scholastic Confucianism have been inextricably linked to the development of Chinese thought. The trajectory of Confucianism, then, begins with Confucius's editing of the Six Classics, it then underwent extensive changes during the reforms in the Qin and Han periods due to specific historical conditions, and ultimately culminated in the development of two distinct schools of thought-the Old Text and the New Text schools of interpretation.The debate between these two schools has been like a horse that cannot be put back in the gates; once started it has never ceased, extending from Han times all the way up to the present day. Therefore, if one wants to grasp the essence of Chinese traditional scholarship, one must first comprehend the nature of this debate. As Zhang taiyan once said, "Studying "National [Chinese] Scholarship" without distinguishing between schools of interpretation is like looking out over the ocean-one feels overwhelmed with its vastness." Chinese medical classics, especially the Yellow Emperor's Classic, were also deeply influenced by the writing reforms of the Qin-Han period. On the theoretical level, yin-yang and the five phases were given emphasis due to the work of the Han dynasty Scholastic Confucians. Scholastic Confucianism dominated traditional Chinese scholarship for two thousand years, and therefore also had a major impact on the study and interpretation of the medical classics. This paper will attempt to answer the question of exactly how the Old and New text schools of interpretation influenced the tradition of interpretation of the Yellow Emperor's Classic.Confucius's editing of the Six Classics was the first large-scale literary editing project in Chinese history. However the relationship between Confucius the classics was a subject of debate between the Old and New text schools with each supporting a different version. The New Text school claimed that Confucius personally wrote the Six Classics. The Old Text school, on the other hand, claimed that they were passed down from antiquity and were merely edited by Confucius. Regardless who was right in that regard, the five classics were indisputably altered by deliberate changes by dynastic courts, book burning, and Chinese script reforms. From the Western Han onward, it was no longer possible to recover the original versions from the Spring and Autumn periods. Therefore, after the beginning of the Western Han and the introduction of the influence of the Huang-Lao cultivation culture, the Five Classics were passed down through oral tradition and one needed to find a master who would agree to teach and explain them to you as their disciple.Beginning from the later Han Wu period, the discovery of manuscripts of the classics from the pre-Qin period radically altered the way in which adherents of the New text school studied and passed down the classics. The script used in these pre-Qin manuscripts differed markedly from the classics used by the New Text school and were therefore challenging for Han Confucians to read and understand, leading to a change in emphasis from interpretation to literal memorization. The distinctions between the scope of scholarship pursued by the New and Old Text schools became clear from this time forward.Against this cultural and historical background, the Liu xiang father-son team embarked upon their grand project to collate and annotate the classics so that they could be passed down more accurately and authentically. In terms of Chinese medical classics, the Yellow Emperor's Classic was first given the title by which it is known today at the peak of the debate between the Old and New text schools during the two Han periods. Many medical texts, including the Inner Classic, along with the five classics and numerous other scholarly works, were all edited and preserved through the work of the father-son team of Liu xiang and Liu xin. Although they were father and son, the two had some differences of opinion. Liu xiang advocated New Text ideas and methods, while Liu xin leaned more towards the Old Text school. The Biography of Liu xiang in the Han Book states that "Liu xin debated with his father on numerous occasions using the Spring, Autumn and Zuo Annals to point out contradictions in his father's thinking, however, Liu xiang steadfastly held to the views of the Gu Liang." One can see that the gulf between the two schools was already quite wide at that time.Regardless of the dating of the content of the thought of the Yellow Emperor's Classic, there is no disputing that it was edited into the book we know today during the Han period. Therefore, since the New Text school dominated the Western Han, and the differences between the New Text and Old schools gradually led to the production of very different scholarship, we can ask the question, "How did these conditions influence the Inner Classic?" Specifically, this dissertation will examine in detail exactly how the tradition of interpretation of the Inner Classic, which is deeply embedded in traditional Chinese culture, was shaped by the scholarship of these two schools.Since the Old-New text debate began with differences in script, this dissertation will also take this as a starting point and, using the Five Classics as a reference, will analyze examples of Old and New Text influence in the various editions of the Inner Classic. It will be apparent that the editions of the Inner Classic, like the Five Classics, also underwent the unification of script under the Qin and the reforms under the Han.In addition, using differences in correspondences between the five phases and the five zang-organs in the New and Old text schools as a foundation, as well as passages from the inner Classic that do not match the correspondences in mainstream New Text works, I will show that the theory of the five phases in the currently extant version of the Inner Classic was influenced by New Text thought during the Han. A comparison of traces of the influence of other schools of thought that are still preserved in the Inner Classic will further bring this to light.Finally, I will examine the differences in attitude towards scholarship between the two schools by using the annotations in Yang shangshan's Tai Su and Wang bing's Su Wen as examples. This will show that the Old and New Text schools not only influenced the scholarship of the Inner Classic in terms of written script and theory, but they also deeply influenced the tradition of annotation and understanding of later generations of scholars.
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