劉向《詩》學傳承問題及其與西漢政治現實關係重探

Another Look at the Problem of Inheritance in Liu Xiang’s Scholarship on the Book of Odes and Its Relationship with the Political Realities of the Western Han

劉向 (77 B.C.-6 B.C.) 無《詩》學專門著述，而《詩》說散見《列女傳》、《說苑》、《新序》與所上疏奏之中，是兩漢引《詩》頻率最高之學者。本文由此並就《漢書．楚元王傳》中論其《詩》學問題及其與政治之關係，爰釐三題：一、劉向為「魯詩說」之疑礙及其所序三書相關問題；二、劉向所序三書關涉之政治現實及其稱《詩》問題；三、本傳所載劉向疏奏引《詩》考論。經討論，本文以為：以劉向傳《魯詩》之說多有疑礙，當以宏通視野觀之；所序書中，唯《列女傳》最切時弊，具強烈之政治現實目的，與《說苑》、《新序》全面論述王道之政不同；最後，本文以為劉向所上元、成二帝疏奏，以陰陽災異扣合《詩》說，異於三書，是其直接著作，而切合潮流與其學術歷程，更是其諫官本色之展現。

In academic circles, Liu Xiang’s劉向(77 B.C.-6 B.C.) conception of the Book of Odes is mostly regarded as belonging to the tradition of the Lu Odes. However, there are no works specifically devoted to the Book of Odes in Liu’s extant literary corpus. His discussions of the Odes are scattered throughout his Biographies of Exemplary Women, Garden of Anecdotes, New Prefaces and the memorials he submitted to the throne. On the basis of the positions expressed in these writings, he became the most frequently praised scholar of the Odes in the Western and Eastern Han dynasties. This study of his views on the Odes is divided into three parts:
I. An inquiry into whether Liu Xiang refers to the Book of Odes as the Lu Odes and related questions about the three books he authored.
II. The political realities involved in Liu’s composition of the three books and the problems connected with identifying his tradition of scholarship on the Odes.
III. An analysis of Liu Xiang’s memorials that cite the Odes recorded in the Han History’s“Biography of Chu Yuanwang.”
The findings of this article cast doubt on the theory that Liu Xiang wrote the Lu Odes, arguing that it is more appropriate to view this issue from a broad perspective. Among the three books written by Liu Xiang, only the Biographies of Exemplary Women focuses on contemporary problems and has a strong practical political purpose. The content of the Biographies of Exemplary Women differs from the comprehensive discussions of kingship found in the Garden of Anecdotes and the New Prefaces. Ultimately, this study argues that the memorials sent by Liu Xiang to Emperor Yuan and Emperor Cheng, which discuss the Odes in connection with yinyang陰陽correlative theory, are different from the views of the text he expressed in his three books. The position he adopts in his memorials is in line with contemporary scholarly trends and the practices of remonstrance officials at the time.