龔鵬程x柯恩｜語文學的全球實踐和對中國古代的解釋

龔鵬程對話海外學者第一百一十二期：在后現代情境中，被技術統治的人類社會，只有強化交談、重建溝通倫理，才能獲得文化新生的力量。這不是誰的理論，而是每個人都應實踐的活動。龔鵬程先生遊走世界，并曾主持過“世界漢學研究中心”。我們會陸續推出“龔鵬程對話海外學者”系列文章，請他對話一些學界有意義的靈魂。范圍不局限于漢學，會涉及多種學科。以期深山長谷之水，四面而出。

馬丁·柯恩教授（Professor Martin Kern）

美國普林斯頓大學亞洲研究教授，美國哲學學會院士。

龔鵬程教授：您好。您可以描述一下中國文學體系的形成和中國詩歌的起源和早期發展嗎？

馬丁·柯恩教授：龔教授，您好。中國文學體系和"詩歌"的起源可以追溯到西周時期，當時還沒有 "詩歌"或 "文學"的獨特概念。青銅器銘文為宗教和政治儀式的特定場合使用了諸如韻律、節奏和節拍等特征。這種強化的、具有美學特征的言語形式——當時在《尚書》的演講、《詩經》的詩歌和《周易》的詩句中也有比較系統的體現——靠著我們通常所說的 "詩 "的語言特征，在形式上與日常言語有所區別。

然而，這種"詩 "并不符合現代的 "詩 "的概念；在中國早期沒有一個單一的 "詩 "字，也沒有關于個別 "詩人 "和他們獨特的、原創的創作形式的成熟概念。相反，中國早期的 "詩 "是由共同的思想和表達方式組成的，也就是說，是由每一個這樣的話語中有限的、重復的詞匯組成。它的主要形式特征延伸到所有早期的非語錄性話語（銘文、演講、頌歌和其他歌曲、占卜規則等）。

因此，雖然不同類型的《詩經》"詩"（"頌"、"雅"和 "風"）彼此不共享相同的詞匯和修辭，但它們都屬于超越《詩經》文本本身的大話語。將這些話語結合在一起的是它們對文化身份的表達、穩定和傳播。韻律、節奏、節拍和其他美學特征以兩種方式發揮作用：它們標志著什么是最重要的，而且它們是表演和記誦的記憶工具。

The origins of the Chinese literary system, and of “poetry,” are found in the Western Zhou dynasty, when no distinct concept of “poetry” or “literature” existed. Bronze inscriptions deployed features such as rhyme, rhythm, and meter for specific occasions of religious and political rituals. This form of intensified and aesthetically marked speech—then also found more systematically in the receivedShangshu speeches, Shijing poetry, and verses in the Zhou Yi—was formally distinguished from everyday speech by its linguistic features we commonly call “poetry.” Yet this “poetry” does not correspond to modern ideas of “poetry”; there is no a single word for “poetry” in early China, and there is no developed idea of individual “poets” and their unique, original forms of composition. Instead, early Chinese “poetry” is composed from shared repertoires of ideas and expressions, that is, from limited, repetitive lexicons within each such discourse. Its principal formal features extend across all early non-quotidian utterances (inscriptions, speeches, hymns and other songs, divination formulas, etc.). Thus, while the different types of Shijiing “poems” (the “Eulogies,” “Court Hymns,” and “Airs of the States”) do not share the same lexicon and diction with one another, they each belong to larger discourses that transcend the text of the Shijing itself. What unites these discourses is their commitment to the expression, stabilization, and transmission of cultural identity. Rhyme, rhythm, meter and other aesthetic features functioned in two ways: they marked what was centrally important, and they served as mnemonic devices for performance and memorization.

龔鵬程教授：中國人傳統上會認為《尚書》在文學體系中的地位，至少不比《詩經》差，可是西方學者比較重視或更多地討論詩。您認為這種差異是如何產生的？

馬丁·柯恩教授：中國兩千年來的《詩經》學術書目至少是《尚書》學術書目的兩倍。在帝制中國之前的資料中，幾乎看不到《尚書》（尤其是公認文本），而《詩經》的詩句卻被到處引用。

在帝制中國時期，《尚書》和《詩經》都是五經的一部分，但只有后者還享有廣大的文學讀者群。即使像朱熹（1130-1200）這樣的經典學者也寫過《詩經》的注釋，但沒有寫過《尚書》的注釋。

盡管如此，西方學者對《尚書》的研究仍然非常有限。對大多數現代漢學家來說，《尚書》的文本是困難的、枯燥的，而且在歷史上是存疑的。似乎很少有人喜歡讀它；更少有人認為其中表達的思想有趣或互相關聯（與戰國政治思想相比）。簡而言之，雖然《詩經》仍能觸動我們的詩情畫意，并成為中國文學史的一部分，但對大多數西方漢學家來說，《尚書》僅僅具有古人的興趣。

這是不幸的，因為《尚書》作為一個與其說是歷史，不如說是政治神話的文本，應該對整個古代世界的文化比較具有重要意義。與《詩經》的部分內容一樣，《尚書》中有關周朝征服的言論仍然是思考中國政治起源和文化身份的核心參考點。僅就這一點而言，該文本就值得從比較的角度進行研究。

然而，與此同時，即使是現代中國的政治學家，在尋找與我們這個時代相關的古代政治思想時，也從未求助于《尚書》。

Chinese bibliographies ofShijing scholarship across two millennia contain at least twice as many titles as those of Shangshu scholarship. In pre-imperial sources the Shangshu (especially the received text) is barely visible, while Shijing poetry is quoted everywhere. In imperial China, both Shangshu and Shijing were part of the Five Classics, but only the latter also enjoyed a broad literary reception. Even a canonical scholar like Zhu Xi (1130–1200) wrote a Shijing commentary but not a Shangshu commentary. That said, Western scholarship on the Shangshu remains woefully limited. To most modern Sinologists, the text is difficult, dull, and historically dubious. Few people seem to enjoy reading it; and fewer still find the ideas expressed there interesting or relevant (compared to, say, Warring States political thought). In short, while the Shijing continues to speak to our poetic sensibilities and is part of Chinese literary history, for most Western Sinologists the Shangshu holds merely antiquarian interest. This is unfortunate, because the Shangshu—as a text less of history than of political mythology—should be of great relevance to cultural comparisons across the ancient world. Together with parts of the Shijing, its speeches related to the Zhou conquest are still a central reference point for reflecting on China’s political origins and cultural identity. For this alone the text is worth studying from comparative perspectives. Yet meanwhile, even modern Chinese political scientists, when searching for ancient political ideas relevant to our time, never turn to the Shangshu.

龔鵬程教授：可以談談您的“語文學的全球實踐和對古代進行比較研究”嗎？

馬丁·柯恩教授：這里有兩個問題：一個是關于全球語文學的實踐，另一個是關于古代的比較研究。

幾千年來，語文學的實踐在不同的文化中并存；有些與周圍的人互動，有些則大多保持獨立。

佛教到來之前的中國語文學是后者的一個例子，而在許多語言文化中，或與其他語言文本密切接觸的文化中，翻譯始終是語文學的一個核心實踐。

然而，"獨立"并不等于 "獨特 "或 "無法比擬"。因此，我目前正在共同編輯一個大型項目《語文學實踐》。該項目涵蓋了大約20種不同的語言學文化，有來自世界各地的數百名學者參與，以確定和描述具體的語文學實踐。

西方也有許多比較語文學研究的中心，特別是比較手稿研究，但在中國還沒有。

另一方面，古代的比較研究本身就是一門在歐洲有數百年歷史的學科，但也是最近變得特別有活力的學科。它的意義不在于對兩種或更多的文化進行比較以確定其相似性和差異性。相反，它提議根據彼此的情況來看待不同的文化，通過觀察其他文化中的重要問題來發現一種文化的新問題。

從根本上說，對古代的比較研究試圖使熟悉的東西變得不熟悉。如果不了解其他文化，就無法完全理解"自己的 "古代文化。

There are two questions here: one on global practices of philology, the other on the comparative study of antiquity. Practices of philology have existed side by side for thousands of years in different cultures; some have interacted with those around them, others have remained mostly separate. Chinese philology before the arrival of Buddhism is an example of the latter, while in many multilingual cultures, or cultures in close contact with texts in other languages, translation was always a core practice of philology. Yet “separate” does not equal “unique” or “incomparable.” Thus, I am currently co-editing a large project,Philological Practices: A Comparative Historical Lexicon, that covers some twenty different philological cultures and involves hundreds of scholars from around the world to identify and describe specific philological practices on their own terms. There also exist many centers for comparative philological study—especially comparative manuscript studies—in the West, though none yet in China. The comparative study of antiquity, on the other hand, is itself a discipline with a centuries-long history in Europe, but also one that recently has become particularly dynamic. Its relevance lies not in the comparison of two or more cultures to identify their similarities and differences. Instead, it proposes to view different cultures in light of one another, to discover new questions about one culture by looking at the important questions in other cultures. Fundamentally, the comparative study of antiquity seeks to defamiliarize the familiar. One cannot fully understand “one’s own” ancient culture without also understanding others.

龔鵬程教授：近年，對中國古代詩歌之口傳與書寫問題，已成為一個新的熱點或爭論。對于夏含夷（Edward L.Shaughnessy）、張萬民等人的意見，您有最新的回應嗎？

馬丁·柯恩教授：這種關于《詩經》的所謂辯論是適得其反的。我對駁斥關于"書寫和口述 "的簡單化誤解和錯誤的對立并不感興趣。

自2002年以來，我多次撰文分析早期手稿中的文字變體，描述了絕大多數情況下，這些變體是基于聲音的相似性，而不是視覺外觀。

我的結論是，大多數早期文學或哲學手稿，不僅是關于《詩經》的手稿，都是根據記憶或背誦寫成的。我認為，這種單獨的寫作行為——有很多——通常是相互獨立的，沒有一個書面文本控制著《詩經》詩歌的實際傳播時間。

相反，即使是"同一首 "詩，在不同的朗誦場合也會有不同的即興發揮，然后被寫下來。因此，這些詩在聲音上基本穩定，但在字形上卻不穩定，因此，對其文字的解釋仍有不同的可能性。

這正是《毛詩》和后來的注釋經常將某些字形解釋為"借來的字形（假藉） "的原因，這些字形不應該從表面上看，而應該作為聲音相似的字形的不規則替代品來閱讀。

長話短說，我對《詩經》詩歌的"口頭或書面性質 "不感興趣；我關注的是寫作和口頭表演中詩歌傳播的交錯過程。從證據來看，包括被掠奪的安徽大學手稿，我認為情況很清楚。也許有些學者誤解了有關的論點。

This so-called debate about theShijing is counterproductive. I am not interested in refuting simplistic misunderstandings and false antagonisms about “writing and orality.” Since 2002 I have repeatedly written on the analysis of textual variants in early manuscripts, describing how overwhelmingly, these variants are based on similarity in sound, not in visual appearance. I concluded that most early literary or philosophical manuscripts, not only those regarding the Shijing, were written from memory or recitation. I suggested that such individual acts of writing—of which there were many—were usually independent from one another and that no single written text controlled the actual transmission of a Shijing poem over time. Instead, even “the same” poem could be improvised differently on different occasions of recitation and then be written down as such. As a result, the poems were largely stable in their sounds but not in their graphs, and hence still open to different interpretations of their words. This is precisely the reason why the Mao Shi and later commentaries frequently interpret certain graphs as “loan graphs” that should be read not at face value but as irregular substitutes for graphs of similar sound. Long story short, I am not interested at all in the “oral or written nature” of Shijing poetry; I am concerned with the intersecting processes of poetic transmission in both writing and oral performance. Looking at the evidence, including the looted Anhui University manuscript, I think the case is clear. Perhaps some scholars misunderstand the argument in question.

龔鵬程，1956年生于臺北，臺灣師范大學博士，當代著名學者和思想家。著作已出版一百五十多本。

辦有大學、出版社、雜志社、書院等，并規劃城市建設、主題園區等多處。講學于世界各地。并在北京、上海、杭州、臺北、巴黎、日本、澳門等地舉辦過書法展。現為中國孔子博物館名譽館長、臺灣國立東華大學終身榮譽教授、美國龔鵬程基金會主席。