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Persons in Chinese History - Xiahou Sheng 夏侯勝

Periods of Chinese History
Xiahou Sheng 夏侯勝, courtesy name Xiahou Zhanggong 夏侯長公, also called Xiahou Senior (Da Xiahou 大夏侯), was a Confucian scholar of the mid-Former Han period 前漢 (206 BCE-8 CE). He came from Dongping 東平 (modern Shandong) and was an expert in the new-text (modern character) version of the Shangshu 尚書 "Book of Documents" and the founder of the Senior Xiahou school (Da Xiahou xue 大夏侯學) of the Shujing.
Orphaned as a young boy, he loved studying and learning and was a student of Xiahou Shichang 夏侯始昌 who instructed him in the Shangshu and especially in the chapter Hongfan wuxing zhuan 洪范五行傳. He was also instructed by Master Ouyang 歐陽生 and Jian Qing 簡卿, a disciple of Ni Kuan 兒寬. His philosophical interpretations of the Confucian Classics thus derived from different sources, including the teaching of the Five Agents that believed that political performance was expressed by natural phenomena. During the reign of Emperor Xuan 漢宣帝 (r. 74-49 BCE) he was appointed professor (boshi 博士 "erudite"). He was later promoted to Grand Master for Splendid Happiness (guanglu dafu 光祿大夫), Chamberlain for the Revenues (shaofu 少府) of the Changxin Palace 長信宮 and even Grand Mentor of the Heir Apparent (taizi taifu 太子太傅). By his sincere and modest character he personally lived the ideas of Confucius.
Xiahou Sheng had written the Shangshu Da-Xiao Xiahou zhangju 尚書大小夏侯章句 and Da-Xiao Xiahou jiegu 大小夏侯解故 that are both lost except some fragments collected by the Qing period 清 (1644-1911) scholar Chen Qiaozong 陳喬樅 in the book Shangshu Ouyang-Xiahou yishuo kao 尚書歐陽夏侯遺說考 that is included in the collection Huang-Qing jingjie xubian 皇清經解續編.


Source: Pang Pu 龐樸 (ed. 1997), Zhongguo ruxue 中國儒學 (Shanghai: Dongfang chuban zhongxin), Vol. 2, p. 49.

January 15, 2012 © Ulrich Theobald · Mail
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