Jia Yi

Jia Yi
Jia Yi
Tâi-lô	Ká sing
Old Chinese
Baxter–Sagart (2014)	*C.qˤ<r>aʔ sreŋ

Jia Yi (

Western Han dynasty, best known as one of the earliest known writers of fu rhapsody and for his essay "Disquisition Finding Fault with Qin" (Guò Qín Lùn 過秦論), which criticises the Qin dynasty and describes Jia's opinions on the reasons for its collapse. In particular, he is famous for his two fu, On the Owl (鵩鳥賦) and his Lament for Qu Yuan (吊屈原賦). He is also the author of the treatise Xinshu (新書), containing political and educational insights.^[1]

Life

Jia Yi's biography is contained in Volume 84 of the

Chinese Classics.^[3] His precociousness caught the attention of "Venerable Wu" (Wu gong 吳公), the local governor and a prominent Legalist scholar who had been a student of the Qin dynasty official Li Si.^[3] Wu brought Jia onto his staff, and when he became Commandant of Justice in 179 BCE he recommended Jia to Emperor Wen of Han as a scholar of the Classics.^[3] Emperor Wen made Jia a "professor" (bóshì 博士), and within one year had promoted him to Grand Master of the Palace (tàizhōng dàfū 太中大夫), a relatively high-ranking position at the imperial court.^[3]

Upon assuming his new position, Jia began submitting proposals for institutional reforms—including a proposal to require vassal lords to actually reside in their fiefs and not at the capital. He advised Wen to teach his heir to use

Hunan Province) to serve as Grand Tutor to its young king Wu Chan (吳產; r. 178 – 157 BCE).^[6]^[4]^[7]^[6]

Emperor Wen ended Jia's exile around 172 BCE by summoning him back to the imperial capital at

Daoist mysticism. The emperor appointed him to the position of Grand Tutor (tàifù 太傅) to Liu Yi, Emperor Wen's youngest and favorite son, who was said to have been a good student and to have enjoyed reading.^[6] Liu Yi died in 169 BCE due to injuries he suffered in a fall from a horse. Jia blamed himself for the accident and died, grief-stricken, about one year later.^[6]

Works

Jia known for his famous essay "

Qin Dynasty (221–206 BC), he was classified by other scholars in the Han Dynasty as a Confucian scholar (rujia).^[4] Jia Yi was known for his interest in ghosts, spirits, and other aspects of the afterlife;^[9] and, he wrote his Lament to Qu Yuan as a sacrificial offering to Qu Yuan,^[10] who had a century-or-so earlier drowned himself after being politically exiled. Jia Yi's actions inspired future exiled poets to a minor literary genre of similarly writing and then tossing their newly composed verses into the Xiang River, or other waters, as they traversed them on the way to their decreed places of exile.^[11]

As a figure favored by Wu gong, Jia Yi would for a time be classed as a Legalist himself. Although he does resemblances, as a figure who wrote the Disquisition Finding Fault with Qin, Jia Yi was probably not a proponent of

Huang-Lao. Between Shang Yang and Shen Buhai, he was likely much more infleunced by Shen Buhai.^[12]

References

Citations

^ Svarverud, Rune. Methods of the Way: Early Chinese Ethical Thought. Leiden: Brill, 1998.
^ Sima and Watson (1993), 443-452.
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f ^g Knechtges (2010), p. 417.
^ ^a ^b ^c Loewe (1986), 148.
^ Creel 1970, What Is Taoism?, 87, 103, 106-107, 115
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d Knechtges (2010), p. 418.
^ Di Cosmo (2002), 201–202.
^ Cutter (1986), p. 254.
^ Murck (2000), p. 46.
^ Hawkes (1985), p. 52.
^ Murck (2000), p. 16.
^
Hsiao 1979, pp. 474.
- Creel 1974 p108. What is Taoism