From March 3 to March 28, 2021, the International Center for the Study of Ancient Texts and Cultures (ICSAT) has held the first of our four 2021 Spring Lecture Series On Early Chinese Classics by overseas sinologists: the “Zuo zhuan/Zuo Traditions（《左传》）Reading Group” led by Prof. Yuri Pines, Chair Professor of Asian Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The lecture was hosted by Chinese Director of the ICSAT, Associate Professor Xu Jianwei of the College of Literature, and joined by Wu Yang, Vice Dean of the College of Chinese Studies, Li Ruhui, Zhang Hanmo, Zhang Jing, other teachers and students from the university, as well as the audience online.

Since Liu Xin's attempt to establish Zuo zhuan as an official commentary on the Spring and Autumn Annals, the Zuo Zhuan has been at the center of numerous controversies; once Liu Fenglu, a scholar of the Qing Dynasty, published Examinations of the Zuo zhuan （《春秋左氏考证》）, it gradually pushed the research on the Zuo Zhuan to a climax in the late Qing Dynasty. In the first lecture, Prof. Pines briefly clarified the key issues such as the nature, authorship, date of writing, authenticity and historical reliability of Zuo Zhuan, and introduced the history of research on Zuo Zhuan, especially the contributions of the 21st century Sinology (specifically "English Sinology") to the study of Zuo Zhuan. In particular, the contributions of sinology (specifically "English sinology") to the study of Zuo Zhuan in the twenty-first century are highlighted, with emphasis on the work of two scholars, Wai-Yee Li and David Schaberg, on Zuo Tradition and the English translation of Zuo Tradition (Zuo Tradition / Zuozhuan: Commentary on the "Spring and Autumn"), which they translated and annotated in collaboration with Stephen Durrant. on the "Spring and Autumn Annals").

The second lecture focused on the comparison of the texts of the Spring and Autumn Annals and Zuozhuan, introducing the three types of information usually contained in historical works such as Zuo Tradition - informative, interpretive, and interpretive. Prof. Pines discussed the importance of the "biography without scripture (无经之传)"  in the Zuo Zhuan, as well as a close reading of "Zheng Bo Keduan in the Yanas". The third and fourth lectures focused on the story of Duke Chonger (公子重耳)  and the battle for hegemony between Chu and Jin (楚晋争霸). The information, interpretation, and lessons in it were read in detail. In the fifth Lecture, Prof. Pines went on to explain the coup d’état in the story of Lord Xian of Wei (卫献公), where the role and function of speeches, such as remonstrance as a way of conveying historical lessons, were shown. In lecture 6 to lecture 8, Prof. Pines drew a panorama of Lord Zhao (鲁昭公) years through three different “narrators”: the rebellion of Prince Zhao 王子朝, the Chu narratives of the Lord Zhao period, and the overthrow of Lord Zhao of Lu, and in doing so, explored the structure of materials of the Zuo Zhuan. Prof. Pines also gave a brief summary on the structure, layers and composition of the Zuo zhuan, and proposed for new methodology in studying the Zuo zhuan. The inspiring thoughts will be shared in detail in Prof. Pines’ forthcoming article on the Zuo zhuan.

As the lecture series is also hosted online, the reading materials of each lecture are distributed in advance through the public emailbox and the Wechat groupchat. Audience can join the lectures from Tencent Meeting and broadcasting link. 

The “Zuo zhuan Reading Group ” is the first of ICSAT 2021 Spring Lecture Series on Early Chinese Classics. The second, Prof. Dirk Meyer on the Shu traditions is coming soon. To find out more about Prof. Meyer’s lectures, please click here.