Towards Canons of Philological Method for Analyzing Classical Chinese Texts

Abstract

By Classical Chinese (CC) I mean the language of the texts such as the Tzuoo Juann, the Mencius, the Shyuntzyy and others that we believe to have been written in Northern and Central China during the period 500 - 200 B.C.In this article I am going to take up the banner of the late George Kennedy and, at the risk of appearing somewhat peevish, try to make the case that CC textual analysis needs to be done with much greater rigor than it generally is. Kennedy said in 1953,“Sinologists need to recognize that languages are not private cathedrals of mystery adapted for special revelations and pontifical decrees. The materials of language are as wide open as the rocks and the trees, and people have been looking at them for a long time with varying reactions. From the animistic recognition of each tree or rock as the special abode of a particular spirit we have moved to a classification of the features common to all trees, and to a scientific statement of the features that make a tree different from a rock. There has been a progressive increase in our perceptiveness towards these things, and constant improvement in our methods of analysis and description.” (George A. Kennedy, “Another note on yen,” HJAS 16, 1-2[1953], p. 236)