The Quzhou-Based Yangming Community and Its Characteristics

Zhou Jihuan and Zhou Xinyi

Detailed Abstract： In 1129， Kong Duanyou 孔端友 （1078–1132）， forty-eighth generation descendant of Confucius， accompanied Emperor Gaozong of the Southern Song dynasty to Jiangnan （the lower reaches of the Yangtze River） with the wood carvings of Confucius and his wife. Kong was given a residence in Quzhou， Zhejiang. Quzhou thus became a kind of holy land for the southern branch of Confuciuss lineage. In the area of Quzhou in Jiangnan， cultural pride was derived from being “near the Sage” （jinsheng）， deriving from the geographical proximity to the abode of Confuciuss descendants. This cultural pride was subconscious and cohesive， and the Jiangnan people gradually developed a cultural aspiration to believe in and practice Confucianism. Some renowned Confucian scholars， such as Zhu Xi 朱熹 （1130–1200）， Lü Zuqian 呂祖谦 （1137–1181）， and Zhang Shi 张栻 （1133–1180）， visited Quzhou and contributed to the dissemination and growth of Confucianism in this region.

The Yangming school of Neo-Confucianism rose and grew increasingly prominent in the Ming dynasty （1368–1644）. Thanks to its solid Confucian tradition and geographic advantage， Quzhou became one of the centers of Yangming thought. When Wang Yangming 王阳明 （1472–1528） left his hometown Yuyao of Shaoxing for his travels to Jiangxi， Fujian， Guizhou， Guangdong， and Guangxi， Quzhou was an important stop on his way. Wangs social activities in Quzhou and the poems he penned there exerted influence on local culture. Many Quzhou Confucian scholars went to Nanjing and Shaoxing to attend the lectures given there by Wang Yangming and his disciples， and returned to disseminate Wangs theory of intuitive knowledge. The Chronicle of Wang Yangming [阳明年谱] has four concentrated descriptions of a dozen students from Quzhou.

It is a pity that the famous A Case-by-Case Biography of Ming Confucian Scholars [明儒学案] penned by Huang Zongxi 黄宗羲 （1610–1695） failed to record the Quzhou disciples of Wang Yangming. Several present-day scholars have paid more attention to them， but have only focused on those who were mentioned in the Chronicle of Wang Yangming. It should be noted that the Quzhou Yangming community， as an indispensable part of the Zhejiang Yangming school， played a significant role in the dissemination of Wangs teachings. In this paper， they include the first， second， and third generation disciples of Wang Yangming， as well as admirers of his teachings who had not taken lessons directly from the master himself. This community was large in number; all aspired to put into practice Wangs well-known theory of extending intuitive knowledge and maintained active personal contact and academic exchanges with each other. They have common traits in their intellectual and behavioral activities， along with some local characteristics.

First， as an intellectual community， they achieved wide coverage in Quzhou. Disciples and admirers of Wang Yangming could be found in each town， with a total number of over forty. Among them， twenty-seven were from Jiangshan. It shows how influential Wang Yangming and his teachings were in this area. According to the existing literature， there were fourteen of Wangs direct disciples such as Zhou Ren 周任 （1469–1526）， Zhou Ji 周积 （1483–1564）， Zheng Liu 郑骝 （1488–1543）， and Xu Pei 徐霈 （1500–1586）. This number ranked in the top three of Zhejiang， just smaller than that of Ningbo and equivalent to that of Shaoxing. There were twenty-seven recorded second generations of Wangs disciples in Quzhou， and the actual number might far exceed this. These disciples and admirers contributed greatly to the dissemination of Wang Yangmings teachings in the Jiangnan area.

Second， the Quzhou community was based on Wang Yangmings thought and was renowned for its abundant intellectual history. They took Wangs doctrines as their academic criteria and at the same time tried to diversify their scholarship. In doing so， they broke the conventional school differentiation as laid down by Huang Zongxi， and therein achieved a commendable scholarly hybridity. Amidst the Quzhou Yangming community， some had exposed themselves to other schools before joining the Yangming school; whilst others continued their studies in other places thereafter. These factors all contributed to the intellectual diversity of the Quzhou Yangming community. Take some well-known scholars for example. Luan Hui 欒惠 （d. 1539） had studied under Wang Yangming before he took Zhan Ganquan 湛甘泉 （1466–1560） as his teacher. Luan finally grasped the essence of both Wang and Zhans theories of the mind. Zheng Liu was another of Wangs disciples and received instruction from other scholars of the Jiangxi Yangming school—Zou Dongkuo 邹东廓 （1491–1562）， Xue Zhongli 薛中离 （d. 1545）， and Nie Shuangjiang 聂双江 （1487–1563） for instance. Those second generation disciples usually followed Wang Yangmings notable pupils such as Wang Ji 王畿 （1498–1583） and Qian Dehong 钱德洪 （1496–1574） as their masters， who were from different schools of Yangming. Zhu Xia 朱夏 （fl. 1567） was tutored by Xu Pei and at the same time he was much praised by Wang Longxi 王龙溪 （1498–1583） of the Zhejiang school and Li Jianluo 李见罗 （fl. 1562） of the Jiangxi Zhixiu school. Such study across related schools was very conducive to the exchange and dissemination of the ideas of the Quzhou Yangming community.