| Chapter 1: | The Transnational Travels of the Yijing 易經 or Classic of Changes |
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preceded it, the Nguyễn regime sponsored the publication of nôm editions of the Confucian classics and related works, including, of course, the Yijing, and it adopted the commentaries of Cheng Yi and Zhu Xi as the official standard for interpretations of the Changes in the Vietnamese civil service examinations.
A typical example of the way nôm writing and Cheng-Zhu textual analysis came together in support of state orthodoxy can be found in a work by Đặng Thái Bàng 鄧泰滂 (b. 1674), titled Chu dịch quốc âm ca 周易國音歌 (Songs [explicating] the Zhou Changes in national pronunciation), which was printed in 1815. This work—which includes four prefaces, a poetic inscription, and an account of a milfoil divination ritual based generally on the model established by Zhu Xi—consists primarily of divided pages in which the literary Sinitic text of the Yijing, with nôm annotations, occupies the top horizontal section of each page (it is described as an explanation, 解義), and a series of songs in “six-eight” verse corresponding to it appear in the bottom horizontal section of the page (described as “versified explanatory formulas in the national pronunciation,” 國音歌訣). The songs and commentaries consist mainly of Chinese characters interspersed with a number of nôm characters. (See figure 3.)
For the most part, the prefaces to this work express routine opinions about the Changes, reflecting the School of Meanings and Principles, but they make a special point of applauding the author’s decision to offer a verse interpretation in “national pronunciation” as a means of introducing novices to the Yijing. Take, for example, the preface written by Phạm Quý Thích, who, as discussed, produced important work on the Changes. In this preface, Pham begins with a discussion of how commentaries on ancient works elucidate the ideas of the Confucian sages, noting that without such explanations, the “meanings and principles” (義理) expressed by the sages cannot be fully understood. He emphasizes the difficulty of the document (which he describes as “more subtle and profound than any other book”); Dang’s deep familiarity with the classic; and the need to