| “Shu†was a kind of literature aboutopinions of the emperors and the courtiers in the administrative process which are recorded and sorted out by official historians. The main genre of “Shu†is narration of “government affairsâ€. In Qin Dynasty, “Shu†was spread in the form of “Lei†without fixed contents and texts. “Shang Shu†and “Yizhou Shu†exist today are anthologies of a certain kind of “Shu†of Qin Dynasty which spread to Han Dynasty and were compiled, therefore, they do not include all “Shu†of Qin Dynasty and some texts can hardly be classified as “Shuâ€.Among the bamboo slips of Warring States Period collected in Tsinghua University, nine pieces are “Shuâ€. Among them, “Jin Tengâ€, “Huang Men†and “Jigong Guming†could be referred to the handed-down texts; “Yin Gaoâ€, “Fuyue Zhiming†and “Cheng Wu†were also quoted in the handed-down literatures; but “Yin Zhiâ€, “Hou Fu†and “Fuyue Zhiming†were newly found. By comparing these texts with the handed-down literatures, we notice some phenomena which are related with their formation and spread.The formation of “Jing Teng†experienced a process of accumulation. Its first half recorded the prayers of Zhou Gong and the latter half was added in the Spring and Autumn Period and Warring States Period. One slip of the original edition of the simple edition may lose in the spreading process. As for “Huang Menâ€, there are more mistakes in the original edition compared with the simplified edition. Also, there are many incompatible words and sentences as well as wording taboos. Therefore, it should have experienced systematic trimmings and transliterations in Han Dynasty. “Jigong Guming†covertly quoted the contents of “Shu†formed in early Zhou Dynasty for many times, which may indicate that “Shu†written in Mu Period and formed in early Zhou Dynasty had relatively fixed texts. “Yin Zhi†and “Yin Gao†were originally arranged in one slip, so they should be one chapter. Also, by the quotations of “Lv Shi Chun Qiuâ€, there are close relationships between “Yin Zhi†and “Yin Gaoâ€. Although there are no handed-down texts about “Cheng Wuâ€, its texts constantly changed from Han Dynasty which can be seen from the citations of Han, Jin, Tang and Song Dynasties. “Hou Fu†was quoted by “Menciusâ€, but the citations are slightly different from the contents of the simple edition, which indicates that the simple editions of Jin and Chu are different from the editions seen by Mencius. The structure of “Xufeng?s Ming†is the same as that of Ceming commonly seen in inscriptions on ancient bronze objects of Zhou Dynasty, which is on behalf of the standard format of “Ceming†category of “Shuâ€. Seen from the many inscriptions retained in simple edition, “Xufeng?s Ming†did not spread and were not copied widely. It was probably transcribed from an ancient bronze in Warring States Period.Combing the Tsinghua bamboo slips and the relevant records in ancient books, it can be generally inferred that “Shu†formed due to the constantly sorting and processing of official historians and the “superposed†spreading. In the spreading process, the single “Shu†was named by the collectors according to the principles of “naming by picking wordsâ€, “naming by affairs†and “naming by people†to distinguish. Then, they were made into ordinals according to the times and places the authors lived in. As the name of “Shu†was added later, it is inappropriate to divided “Shu†into “six types†and “ten categoriesâ€. The most important genres of “Shu†include three categories of “Xun Gaoâ€, “Ce Ming†and “Shi Daoâ€.With the shifting down of official school in Eastern Zhou period, “Shu†spreading in single-piece were collected and selectively compiled by folk scholars for the use of preaching or teaching. The different conte nts in which he different selective editions were due to the regions, schools and causal factors. The handed-down “Shang Shu†and “Yizhou Shu†are probably the result of the spread of selective edition of Confucian. “Shu†of the Tsinghua bamboo slips are very likely affected by “Shu†of Mohist. The selective editions of “Shu†not only differ in contents, their texts are also in constantly evolving. The changes include natural evolutions due to scattering of simple editions in the spreading process and subjective changes due to taboos, rhymes and thinking approaches of future generations. |
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