Jin Shengtan (simplified Chinese: 金圣叹; traditional Chinese: 金聖歎; pinyin: Jīn Shèngtàn; Wade–Giles: Chin Shêng-t'an; 1610? – 7 August 1661), original name Jin Renrui (金人瑞), also known as Jin Kui (金喟), was a Chinese editor, writer and critic, who has been called the champion of Vernacular Chinese literature.
The year of Jin's birth is unclear, with some sources reporting 1610 and others 1608. The former estimate is based on the fact that Jin's son was 10 years old in East Asian age reckoning in 1641, and is generally accepted by scholars. He was born Jin Renrui in the town of Suzhou, a place celebrated for its culture and elegance. Jin's family was of the scholar-gentry class, but was constantly plagued by sickness and death, which led in turn to little wealth. Jin's father was apparently a scholar. Jin began schooling relatively late, attending a village school at the age of nine. He displayed great intellectual curiosity, and had somewhat unusual ideas. However, he was a conscientious student. Early in life, he took the style name "Shengtan", a phrase from the Analects meaning "the sage [Confucius] sighed". He passed only the lowest of the imperial examinations, and never held public office.
In his writings, Jin showed a great interest in the ideas of Chan Buddhism. He claimed that this interest began early, when he first read the Lotus Sutra at the age of 11. This inclination toward Buddhist ideas became even more pronounced after the fall of the Ming dynasty in 1644. In that year and the one that followed, Jin became conspicuously more depressed and withdrawn, as well as more receptive to Buddhism. The 20th century scholar Zhang Guoguang attributed this change to the fall of the short-lived Li Zicheng regime. Throughout his life, Jin's interest in Buddhism affected his views, and he considered himself a mere agent of the forces of eternity.
Jin is sometimes said to have been known by the name Zhang Cai (張采), but this appears to be a mistake due to confusion with a contemporary, Zhang Pu.
In 1661, Jin joined a group of literati protesting the appointment of a corrupt official. The protesters first petitioned the government, and then staged a public rally. This was met with swift retaliation from local officials, and Jin was sentenced to death. This incident is sometimes called "Lamenting at the Temple of Confucius" (哭廟案), and led to a stifling of political dissent for years after. Before his death, Jin supposedly joked, "Being beheaded is the most painful thing, but for some reason it's going to happen to me. Fancy that!" In a 1933 essay, noted writer Lu Xun admits that this quote may be apocryphal, but condemns it as "laughing away the cruelty of the human butcher".
He was known for formulating a list of what he called the "Six Works of Genius": the Zhuangzi, the poem Li Sao, Shiji, Du Fu's poems, Romance of the Western Chamber, and the Water Margin. This list contained both highly classical works, like Li Sao and Du Fu's poems, and novels or plays in vernacular Chinese that had their origins in the streets and marketplace. The six works were chosen based on their literary merit, as opposed to their upstanding morals. For these reasons, Jin was considered an eccentric and made many enemies among the conservative Confucian scholars of his day. Jin edited, commented on, and added introductions and interlinear notes to the popular novels the Water Margin and Romance of the Three Kingdoms, and the Yuan dynasty drama, Romance of the Western Chamber.
Jin is often grouped with Mao Zonggang, and Zhang Zhupo as commentator/editors. Mao's commentarial edition of Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Zhang's commentary on The Plum in the Golden Vase featured dufa (讀法; 'way to read') which interpreted the novels using a vocabulary and critical standards which up to then had been limited to poetry and painting. This innovation raised the status of fiction for Chinese readers and made the writing of fiction into a respectable activity for educated people.
Jin believed that only the emperor and wise sages could truly "author" a work. He points out that even Confucius took pains to avoid being named the author of the Spring and Autumn Annals. In Jin's view, the authoring of books by commoners would lead to the undermining of heavenly order and peace. He saw his commentary as the only way to minimize the damage caused by books "authored" by those who were unworthy to do so. In writing his commentaries, Jin firmly believed that the story that was written should be read on its own terms, apart from reality. In his commentary on Romance of the Western Chamber, he wrote, "the meaning lies in the writing, and does not lie in the event". In other words, it is the story that is written that matters, rather than how well that story emulates reality. At the same time, Jin believed that authorial intention is less important than the commentator's reading of a story. In his Romance of the Western Chamber commentary, he writes, "Xixiang Ji is not a work written by an individual named Wang Shifu alone; If I read it carefully, it will also be a work of my own creation, because all the words in Xixiang Ji happen to be the words that I want to say and that I want to write down".
Commentary on the Water Margin
Jin's first major critical activity, completed in 1641, was a commentary on the popular Chinese novel the Water Margin. The commentary begins with three prefaces, in which Jin discusses his reasons for undertaking the commentary, and the achievements of the work's putative author Shi Nai'an. The next section is entitled "How to Read the Fifth Work of Genius". In addition to advice for the reader, this section contains Jin's thoughts on the literary achievements of the novel as a whole. The novel itself comes next, with introductory marks preceding each chapter, and critical comments inserted frequently between passages, sentences, and even words of the text.
Jin's version of the Water Margin is most well known for the drastic alterations that he makes to the text. Earlier versions of the text are 100- or 120-chapter in length. Jin deletes a large portion of the story, from the second half of chapter 71 to the end of the novel. In order to bring the modified text to a conclusion, he composes an episode in which Lu Junyi has a vision of the execution of the band, and amends this to the second half of chapter 71. Jin also combines the Prologue of earlier editions with the first chapter, creating a new, single chapter titled "Induction". This forces the renumbering of all subsequent chapters, so Jin's version of the Water Margin is referred to by scholars as the "70-Chapter Edition". In addition to the large changes described above, Jin also changes the text of the remaining chapters in three general ways. First, he improves the consistency of some sections, such that, for example, chapters whose content do not match their titles receive new names. Secondly, Jin makes the text more compact by removing sections that he feels do not advance the story, and by excising the incidental Shi and Ci verses. Finally, Jin makes subtle changes to the text for pure literary effect. These changes range from emphasizing the emotions of characters to changing story elements to make them more compelling.
Jin's critical commentary frequently oscillates between sympathizing with the individual bandit-heroes and condemning their status as outlaws. On one hand, he criticizes the evil official system that has led many of the 108 heroes to become bandits. He also expresses admiration for several of the men. On the other hand, he calls the band "malignant" and "evil". He especially criticizes Song Jiang, the leader of the group. Jin's removal of the last 30 (or 50) chapters of the novel can be seen as an extension of his condemnation of banditry. In these chapters, the bandits are pardoned by Imperial edict, and are put in service of the country. Jin's version, by contrast, has all of the bandits captured and executed. He follows this ending with eight reasons why outlawry can never be tolerated.