Seven Notes on Exegesis in Shangshu
《상서》훈고찰기칠칙
The successive discoveries of unearthed documents have brought an opportunity for the interpretation of related handed down documents. This thesis mainly combines the documents, and suggests that (1) the ‘shi (世)’ of “shi xuan er lao (世選爾勞: calculate your credit for generations)” in Shangshu be read as ‘she’ (揲) since it is interpreted as counting; (2) the ‘zhi (植)’ of “zhi bi bing gui (植璧秉珪: put the jades on the altars and hold an elongated pointed-tablet of jade in hand)” as ‘dai’ (戴); (3) “yu bu gan bi yu tian jiang wei (予不敢閉于天降威: I dare not block the power of heaven.)” as a sentence; (4) “gao nai ting (高乃聽: expand your knowledge)” as a possible mistake of “shu nai de ( (淑)乃德: beautify your character)”; (5) “jun yi yue shi wo” be sentenced probably as “jun. yi! yue shi wo (君。已 (嘻)!曰時我: Jun! sigh! God be kind to us.)” since ‘shi (時)’ means ‘to be kind’; (6) the ‘zai wei (在位)’ of “xiao zi tong mei zai wei dan wu wo ze (小子同未在位誕無我責: I am an ignorant young man, but no one among the officials in office will blame me.)” belong to the preceding sentence, which ought to be translated as “I am ignorant but in the big position” ; and (7) ‘da yin (達殷)’ of “yong ke da yin ji da ming (用克達殷集大命: To defeat the Yin dynasty and achieve national destiny.)” bear the meaning of Yin.