Changzhou School of Thought () was the
Changzhou-centered influential school of scholarship that existed during the late
Ming and
Qing
The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing,, was a Manchu-led imperial dynasty of China and the last orthodox dynasty in Chinese history. It emerged from the Later Jin dynasty founded by the Jianzhou Jurchens, a Tungusic-speaki ...
dynasties in China. Scholars of this school are best known for their contribution to the
New Text Confucianism.
Ming
Tang Shunzhi (唐順之; 1507–1560), the famous Ming mathematician and advocate of the ancient prose style, is considered the precursor of the school, since his work underlined importance of calendaric studies and mathematics in the
Han scholarship. Tang's argument for the "concrete studies" (''shixue''), as well as concern about diluting influence of the Buddhist and Daoist teachings on Confucianism of
Wang Yangming became an important feature of the Changzhou intellectual framework.
Tang Shunzhi was married to the grandmother of Zhuang Qiyuan (1559–1633), who compiled genealogies of Tangs and Zhuangs and claimed intellectual affinity to his predecessors. Qiyuan was influenced by Catholicism and
Diego de Pantoja in particular, praising it as superior to Buddhism. Zhuang Qiyuan's sons kept the proclivity for practical knowledge: Zhuang Yinqi (''jinshi'' 1643) reissued a Ming book on children diseases, expanded with his own commentaries; Zhuang Yinghui (''jinshi'' 1628), with help of his brothers and sons, compiled a work on military history, extolling the "Confucian technical expertise".
Qing
By the beginning of Qing, "Changzhou ''shixue''" was distinct from the
Suzhou
Suzhou (; ; Suzhounese: ''sou¹ tseu¹'' , Mandarin: ), alternately romanized as Soochow, is a major city in southern Jiangsu province, East China. Suzhou is the largest city in Jiangsu, and a major economic center and focal point of trade ...
and
Yangzhou traditions. However, its proponents were less interested in the Han learning, sticking to the
Cheng-Zhu orthodoxy as a reliable way to examination success.
In the middle of Qing, however, Changzhou had a plethora of Han learning scholars:
Sun Xingyan
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is a nearly perfect ball (mathematics), ball of hot plasma (physics), plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core. The Sun radiates this energy mainly as ...
,
Hong Liangji (1746–1809),
Huang Jingyan,
Zhao Huaiyu,
Zhao Yi, Li Zhaole (1769–1849). The spread of Han learning was stimulated by
Lu Wenchao, a Hangzhou native, who moved to the Changzhou Longcheng Academy after being the head of the Jiyang Academy 暨陽書院 in the nearby Jiangyin in 1790–96.
Zhuang Youke 莊有可, though largely unknown outside Changzhou, was recognized as a fine scholar dealing with the Old text/New text controversy. He was praised for mastery of the
Shuowen dictionary and produced a number works on the ''Change classic'' and the ''Chunqiu''. His support to
Yan Ruoqu-
Hui Dong's refutation of the Old Text ''Shangshu'' chapters stood in opposition to
Zhuang Cunyu's politics-bound view: Cunyu held that the ''renxin-Daoxin'' 人心 道心 notion of the "Councils of Yu the Great" chapter was crucially important for the imperial ethics, while the ''Han xue'' proponents, including Youke, interpreted it as a heterodox Buddhist influence on the Confucian doctrine.
Zhuang Cunyu (another prominent native of Changzhou), however, had an intellectual influence other than textological: he was an embodiment of the message that scholarly activity for a Confucian cannot be divorced from the political. Besides, he was the tutor of the younger generations of his lineage, including
Zhuang Shuzu (cousin),
Zhuang Shoujia and
Liu Fenglu (grandsons). Shoujia was instrumental in publishing grandfather's works, restraining from popularization of his own writings.
Due to the diplomatic and scholarly success of Liu Fenglu (
劉逢祿, 1776—1829) in Beijing, the Changzhou school obtained national fame. Thus, he persuaded
Ruan Yuan (1764–1849) to include a number of Changzhou-originated studies of classics into the ''Huang Qing jingjie'' 皇清经解.
The new intellectual generation in Chanzhou showed interest in paleography. Zhuang Shoujia, developing the ideas of Shuzu, authored the ''Shi shuming'' (Explication of writing and names), providing a history of ancient calligraphy with etymological () and paleographic () insights. Among the sources of his studies, Shoujia used remnants of the
Xiping Stone Classics (Han dynasty). Shuzu's pupil
Song Xiangfeng
A song is a musical composition intended to be performed by the human voice. This is often done at distinct and fixed pitches (melodies) using patterns of sound and silence. Songs contain various forms, such as those including the repetition ...
宋翔風 (1776–1860) developed specialization in etymology, studying the
Erya
The ''Erya'' or ''Erh-ya'' is the first surviving Chinese dictionary. Bernhard Karlgren (1931:49) concluded that "the major part of its glosses must reasonably date from the 3rd century BC."
Title
Chinese scholars interpret the first title chara ...
dictionary. However, quite in spirit of Zhuang Cunyu, he claimed: "In antiquity, those who studied the Classics did not drown in etymological glosses... Etymologists, if they reach farfetched explanations, and theorists, if they wind up in airy and distant studies, must both be criticized... if the Tao is not put into effect, then the empire will not be ordered. The blame will fall on no one else but on scholars."
[Elman, 204.]
References
Literature
* Elman, Benjamin A. ''Classicism, politics, and kinship: the Chang-chou school of New Text Confucianism in late imperial China''.
{{Qing dynasty topics
Confucian education
Confucian schools of thought
Qing dynasty culture
Education in Changzhou
Chinese Classical Studies