A Re-study Of The Age And Nature Of "Confucius's Jiayu"

According to the so-called Kong An-guo's preface, the second preface and the memorial to throne signed for Kong Yan (Kong An-guo's grandson), Kong-Zi Jia Yu spreaded so far seemed to be Pre-Qin classic which was arranged by Kong An-guo, however, it had been suspected from Ma Zhao contemporary with Wang Su who annotated Kong-Zi Jia Yu. It had been judged by a book forged by Wang Su or Wang Su's student Since Doubt Thought rising in 20th century. A considerable number of bamboo and silk books written in Warring States and Western Han Dynasty has been excavated successively since seventies of 20th century, some of which not only are found in Kong-Zi Jia Yu, but also are found in other books handed down from ancient times. That is why we have richer and more reliable materials to compare when researching on book compiled time and nature of Kong-Zi Jia Yu. At the same time, because of excavation of these materials, the time of some classic which were suspected is confirmed, and styles of classic in Pre-Qin are recognized more clearly. We could get rid of some misconceptions of Doubt School on identfying counterfeit ancient books and analysis previous studies objectively when we review the research on relationship with Kong-Zi Jia Yu and other ancient books by senior scholars. It also has some significance for correct evaluation of Reconstruction of Chinese Classics's merits and demerits since Modern times.As excavated classics compared with Kong-Zi Jia Yu has not been studied thoroughly, including in comparing with some excavated classics and Kong-Zi Jia Yu superficially and collecting excavated classics could be compared with Kong-Zi Jia Yu incompletely, and each chapter in Kong-Zi Jia Yu has not been studied intensively, there is a big difference on the conlusions of scholars who study in book compiled time and nature of Kong-Zi Jia Yu currently. It is also short of ideal summary on views and experiences of scholars since Song Dynasty, especially in Qing Dynasty, who studied this subject. In this paper, we collected comprehensively materials in excavated and handed down from ancient classics about Kong-Zi Jia Yu, one chapter as a unit (the part of comparing with excavated classics dept into one sentence as a unit), fully absorbed other scholars'opinions on relationship with Kong-Zi Jia Yu and other ancient books, and discovered some illustrations on other ancient books being plagiarized by Kong-Zi Jia Yu, which was used as basis for speculating book compiled time and nature of Kong-Zi Jia Yu.In the introduction of this paper, there are two valuable methods and ideas on scholars'research of book compiled time and nature of Kong-Zi Jia Yu, that is, comparing with the content which could be found in Kong-Zi Jia Yu and other ancient books, and noting on distinguish different editions of Kong-Zi Jia Yu belonging to different times. The former also is most important method in this paper. Recently, a scholar questioned the feasibility of researching on book compiled time and nature of classics by comparison of the same and similar content in different classics, which was analyzed in the introduction from the point of view of methodology. In the excavated materials associated with Kong-Zi Jia Yu, there are not only entire chapters but also individual sentences. The examples of former are RuJiaZheYan and AiGongWenWuYi excavated in a tomb of Ding County Eastern Han Dynasty, some chapters'titles in a wooden slip and Shuo Lei incomplete bamboo slips excavated in a tomb of FuYang Eastern Han Dynasty, Min Zhi Fu Mu on Chu bamboo slips of Warring States collected by ShangHai museum, while the examples of latter are Chu bamboo slips of Warring States excavated in XinYang, GuoDian, collected by ShangHai museum, bamboo slips of Qin Dynasty collected by YueLu academy, silk book of Eastern Han Dynasty excavated in MaWangDui, and so on. In the first chapter, these materials were comparied with Kong-Zi Jia Yu in detail. In addition, two DunHuang manuscripts copied some chapters of Kong-Zi Jia Yu collected by England and Russia, S.1891 and?X.10464, could correct some corruptions in extant edition of Kong-Zi Jia Yu.In the second chapter, it was comprehensive studied the original relationship on Kong-Zi Jia Yu and other ancient books by three types of the content repeating in some books, only being found in one another book, and only being found in Kong-Zi Jia Yu.There are some inconsistencies with other historical datas on Kong's genealogy, Kong's three generals divorcing their wives and KongAn-guo offering books,etc. We summarized and analyzed ancient and modern scholars'suspicions and disputations, and found some new doubts in the third chapter.Based on the investigation of the above, it was proposed that our tendentious comments on book compiled time and nature of Kong-Zi Jia Yu in the conclusion, that is, the extant edition of Kong-Zi Jia Yu was a book appearing in late which was compiled by some one in WeiJin Dynasty (it was most likely KongMeng who was WangSu's student and twenty-second generation descendant of Confucius) in extensively collecting other ancient books and adding his or their own comments and ideas, which was not the same as Kong-Zi Jia Yu recorded in Hanshu Yiwenzhi. It seemed not to be denied the opinion of ancient scholars that the extant edition of Kong-Zi Jia Yu was a counterfeit book. It now appears that it was more gains than loss that Doubt School in the first reconstruction of Chinese Classics inherited ancient scholars'opinion of identfy counterfeit ancient books on Kong-Zi Jia Yu.