A Brief Discussion of the Merits and Demerits of Lu Wenchao’s Baojingtang Collated Edition of Jia Yi’s Xinshu
01-13-2026
International Social Science Journal (Chinese Edition)
No.3, 2025
A Brief Discussion of the Merits and Demerits of Lu Wenchao’s Baojingtang Collated Edition of Jia Yi’s Xinshu
(Abstract)
Poon Ming Kay
During the Qing dynasty, the study of textual collation (jiaokanxue) flourished. In Catalogue and Questions on Books (Shumu dawen), Zhang Zhidong noted that as many as 31 scholars were renowned for their work in textual collation. Among these, Lu Wenchao’s Collated Edition of the Xinshu produced at his Baojingtang Studio stands as a monumental work in the Qing scholarly tradition of collating Jia Yi’s Xinshu (The New Book). Yu Yue once remarked that when Lu collated a text, the text itself benefited from his efforts. This is an accurate observation indeed. An examination of Lu Wenchao’s Baojingtang Collated Edition of the Xinshu reveals several notable features: he based his work primarily on Song editions while drawing on the strengths of various other versions; he clarified punctuation and sentence divisions, thereby illuminating the text’s proper mode of reading; his focus was on textual collation, though he also engaged in interpretation; he placed great value on the achievements of earlier collators. In addition, Lu was inclined to make emendations to the Xinshu himself. During his process of collation, he frequently compared multiple texts as corroborative evidence, and beyond this, he sometimes used other works to revise the Xinshu.