Form

Critical Text

Yinqueshan Text--A

¦D

Yinqueshan Text--B

¦D

Shiyijia zhu Text

§Î

Translation

Form

Annotations

This is the only Sunzi chapter for which two versions survive in the Yinqueshan materials. Strikingly, they are virtually identical--the few differences are mainly allographic. To say this another way, the differences between these Yinqueshan manuscripts and the received texts are consistent, suggesting that the Yinqueshan materials are not careless derivatives from or merely provincial misprisions of classical writings. We refer to these two versions as Yinqueshan--A and Yinqueshan--B.

The title of the chapter in both A and B versions is xing ¦D, "punishment," a common Han dynasty loan word for xing §Î, "form," and one used for it throughout the Yinqueshan text.

In this and later chapters "form" is used to refer to a full range of concrete and abstract manifestations--from military formations to shaping conditions in the field to the commanderÕs formlessness (chapter 6). For further elaborations, see The Art of War, Commentary section, pp. 146-50 and 163-64.