The literary giants of the late Ming Dynasty began by copying books

After hearing Wang Wenlong's question, the supervisor naturally answered: "If the story of the book's circulation is as recorded and there is no forgery, then this book is true. If the story of the book's circulation is fabricated, this book is true. No need to ask more questions."

Wang Wenlong didn't seem to understand the student's answer very well. He said doubtfully: "But if the circulation process of the book is false, but the content of the book is true, it is just that the person who originally circulated the book changed the truth for various reasons. If the spreading process is kept secret, can your argument still be valid?"

"This..." The student in question opened his mouth and didn't know what to say.

"Then let me ask further," Wang Wenlong continued: "Is it possible that the contents of this book are not all true, nor are they all false, but that there were indeed fragments of the "Guwen Shangshu" that were circulated in the world, and later generations People found fragments of the text, and in order to make sure that the Jin Ou was not lacking, they filled in their own writing, and finally wrote a half-true and half-false text. Although such a text is false, there is some truth in it. Is such a text valuable? "

The student was stunned for a long time and replied: "This... value must have been greatly reduced..."

"No, such words are equally valuable!" Wang Wenlong said categorically: "If a text was originally written by Confucius, 70% of it was lost when it was circulated. Later, these seven layers were supplemented by the people of the Han Dynasty using their own conjecture. , then the original 30% of this text can naturally reflect the thoughts of Sage Confucius at that time. If it can be found, wouldn’t it also reveal the Samadhi in Sage Confucius’ thoughts?”

A student in the audience couldn't help but ask: "So, sir, you want to use the method in "Shangshu Ancient Wen Shuzheng" to find out that the chapters in "Shangshu Ancient Wen" are indeed written by the pre-Qin Dynasty, so as to eliminate the unnecessary and retain the good?"

"Not necessarily," Wang Wenlong said with a smile, "The 30% of the original text of Kong Sage is naturally valuable, and the 70% that was added reflects the thoughts of those who made up the work during the Han Dynasty or the Jin Dynasty, so it is also valuable."

The students in the audience showed puzzled expressions, and Wang Wenlong asked back:

"Think about it, everyone, if "Guwenshangshu" is really a forgery, but it can still be regarded as a standard by the world and studied for thousands of years, doesn't it also show that the thought of this work is profound and meaningful?"

Everyone couldn't help but be stunned. After thinking about it, they realized that Wang Wenlong was indeed right. Even if "Guwen Shangshu" was a forgery, its writing level was still high enough. Otherwise, what would those who study "Guwen Shangshu" study?

Wang Wenlong continued: "So who wrote this book? When was it written? And which school of scholars did it? How come it didn't leave any traces in the history of the world?

If "Guwen Shangshu" is authentic, then the entire story has been told, and there is nothing more to study. Everyone can just continue to study the twenty-five texts.

But if this book is a forgery, then all the above problems will arise one after another. From now on, the research that can be carried out on "Gu Wen Shangshu" will not be less, but more! "

Everyone in the audience was dumbfounded. No one expected to have such a research attitude towards historical documents.

Wang Wenlong said: "In the past, when people studied ancient books and relics, they often adopted the attitude of 'supporting the classics and supplementing history.' When they saw any ancient books and relics, they often compared them with existing historical records, regardless of the fact that it was impossible for historians to record them. All the historical events at that time, when forced to compare the things discovered with history, will often lead to all kinds of ridiculous mistakes."

"Even a sage would inevitably make this kind of mistake. For example, "Historical Records" mentions the "Special Vehicle for Bone Joints". The sage thought that these bones were the bones of the Fangfeng family. However, if you go to Kuaiji Mountain and check it out, you will know that the large bones produced here are They are animal bones, not human bones."

"When we study a historical document, we can see that the writing habits, speaking habits, phonological customs, place names, people, etiquette and customs of the person involved are not known from historical records. Therefore, it can be seen that most of the content that can be obtained by studying ancient historical materials will be More than reading history books.”

"In this case, when studying ancient documents, we should not use the method of 'supporting classics and supplementing history', but 'archaeological writing of history.' Only through various analyzes can we understand the original intention of the ancients in writing documents and the origin of the situation at that time."

"Let's start with "Gu Wen Shangshu". The place names and conditions annotated in "Gu Wen Shangshu Yu Gong" are all after the era of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty. This can mean that this book was mostly added after the era of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty. However, this Is there nothing to study after that?

No.

I investigated the place names in question and found that three of them were used by Wang Mang before the restructuring in the Eastern Han Dynasty. These three were not changed back after the Eastern Han Dynasty. The other two were changed by Wang Mang. So I can guess that this article has been changed at least twice. Supplementary: once after Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty and before Wang Mang, and once after the Eastern Han Dynasty and before the Wei and Jin Dynasties. So what did the people who made the two changes think? What is the difference between their thoughts..."

Wang Wenlong had already prepared his lecture notes, and now he started speaking in one breath, and he spoke fluently for most of an hour. The students in the audience listened intently, and they all felt enlightened.

Confucian scholar-bureaucrats have always believed that the past is not the present, and believe that all ancient books are good, just like the ancient artifacts in myths and stories are the most powerful. The older the things, the more authoritative they are, but these things are still being circulated. What was lost in the process, and what was newly added, Confucian scholar-bureaucrats often thought was not worth mentioning. Therefore, everyone here used to study ancient books with an attitude of admiration, thinking that they would know more things if they read more ancient books. However, what Wang Wenlong talked about today was the idea of ​​"suspicious archeology", which made everyone suddenly enlightened.

On the one hand, Wang Wenlong believes that ancient books are not entirely true. On the other hand, he opposes everything and respects ancient books. He should have an objective judgment on things.

Confucianism made too many mistakes on this issue.

The most typical one is the story of Confucius’ special car with joints.

Wu Fayue found a large bone that could fill a cart on Kuaiji Mountain. The King of Wu didn't know what it was, so he sent someone to ask Zhongni. The envoy did not directly tell the King of Wu's question, but wanted to After investigating Confucius' knowledge, he asked: "What bone is the biggest?" Zhongni said: "Dayu asked the gods to gather at Kuaiji Mountain. Fangfeng came later. Dayu killed him. His bones could fill a cart. A car is the biggest bone in the world.”

When the King of Wu heard about this, he admired Confucius' knowledge very much.

——In later generations, the place surrounded by Tiantai Mountain and Kuaiji Mountain in Siming Mountain was called the Xinchang Basin. There was the "Xinchang Petrified Wood National Geopark", which contains early Cretaceous strata and is rich in dinosaur fossils.

Most of the ancient people dug up fossils locally, so there was a legend that Dayu killed Fangfeng, who was a giant. Confucius, who had learned from many schools of thought, heard this legend and told the envoy Wu.

This is the problem of "supporting the classics and supplementing the history". If the original classics and histories are wrong, and you follow the classics and historical records to compare and study them, in the end the more you study, the more mistakes you will make.

"Mr. Jianyang, according to you, we should study ancient books regardless of whether they are authentic works of sages. Wouldn't this lose the true meaning of sages?"

Wang Wenlong knew that it was impossible to develop archeology independently in this era, and he still had to wear the hat of researching the true meaning of sages, so he shook his head and replied: "Use various methods to analyze which texts that have been passed down to this day were written by the sages themselves. Use Using a comparative method to explain the true translation of the sages’ texts is also a way to better understand the sages’ texts.”

Wang Wenlong studied related majors in university in his previous life. Today he is not here to mess around. Textual criticism is the predecessor of archeology. He started to explain more professional content on the spot:

"Today I will talk about the research methods I used in "Shangshu Ancient Prose and Comprehensive Evidence"."

"If you want to understand the original meaning of the data, you need to study various aspects such as dating, understanding, and investigation. Let's talk about dating first:

Only by understanding the time when the material was written and copied can we know the value of the text. Dating can be roughly divided into the following methods: The first is dating based on content, including dating by dates, dating by inscriptions, dating by famous objects, and dating by historical events, among which dating by dates Attention needs to be paid to dating…”

During the lecture, from the initial introduction to the debate to the in-depth content, Wang Wenlong presented the real thing, and his various dazzling dating methods impressed everyone.

Document dating cannot be explained clearly in a few hours. Wang Wenlong talked for half the morning and the whole afternoon, but it was just the beginning.

(End of this chapter)