Preface to the Genealogy of the He Family from Qingyuan (Text)

Preface to the Genealogy of the He Family from Qingyuan

        Gratitude and righteousness are what people have naturally. They hardly depend on a genealogy. However, after a person is born, he gives birth to children, and then grandchildren. The affection between father and son is deep, but at the level of grandsons it is not as deep, and this  is even more so in the case of one’s brothers’ sons and grandsons. They may even regard each other as strangers--so insignificant [to each other] that they have no feeling of joy and sorrow [for each other]. Some even hate each other! Tracing back to the origin, they all come from a common root. However, in the end, they cannot get along with each other. Is it not because they have forgotten their ancestors that they do violence to the branches? The reason for this is that the branches divide further and further, and therefore [the descendants] forget their origin, and are further estranged from each other. Since those who are close are estranged by division, those who are estranged can also become close by unification. This is the reason for the compilation of the genealogy.

       Our purpose in compiling the genealogy is to teach benevolence and love and to strengthen [an awareness of having a common] origin. If we study [the genealogy] from the perspective of benevolence and love, their meanings are complete [in it]: when we open and read a genealogy, [the records of] who was born to whom are full of the familial affection between father and son; [the records of] who and who were brothers are full of the righteousness between brothers; [when the genealogy records] who married which woman, the way of husband and wife is illuminated; [when it records] who was the first and who was the second in seniority, the order of seniority is clarified; [when it records] who served at which court, and whether he maintained his integrity ordied for righteousness, helped promote vitrtue and effected government policy, assisted Xun and Hua,[1] was upright and diligent and extended his love [to the populace], had his name recorded [in history] and had extraordinary achievements, is not the principle of the relationship between ruler and minister brightly illuminated? The genealogy completely embodies the principles of human relations. It is not only for the purpose of uniting the distant so that they become close and of arousing love in the heart.

       As for our He lineage: after [the descendants of our first ancestor] Tang Shu  proliferated and changed the surname to He, theyspread across the land. ThoseYingchuan [in modern Henan Province] and Jinling [modern Nanjing in Jiangsu Province] cannot be fully recorded. For those who moved to Kuocang [in modern southern Zhejiang Province]there are the Genealogy of Qingyuan, Genealogy of Yuxue, and Genealogy of the Vice Minister of Ministry of War. Although their names are different, they are the same in fact. Later, those who moved to Wuyi lived in various places but gradually forgot their origin. But the Genealogy of Qingyuan and Genealogy of Yuxue of Kuocang are extant andthe imperial edicts and decrees f bestowing titles are extant. This was the same idea [to maintain connections to the ancestor’s] as Weizi’s leaving with the sacrificial vessels.[2]  Through them we first learned that the Gentleman Badi [He Guo], our first ancestor in Wuyi, was the grandnephew of the Gentleman Zhengxian [He Zhizhong, 1044-1117]. Zhengxian was posthumously given the title of Commandery Prince of Qingyuan , and the honor was also extended to his ancestors for three generations—his great grandfather, He Weize, washonored as Duke of Wei. of the excess of [He Zhizhong’s] beneficial grace also flowed to the branches—therefore the Gentleman Badi also claimed to be from Qingyuan Commandery. The Gentleman fled to Wuyi to escape social upheavals and then settled here. He had five great boys. After three generations, there was a person listed as Qing 3^rd [i.e. third in the Qing generation] who became the first ancestor of the Market Back Lane branch; a person listed as Qing 1^st became the first ancestor of the branch of the Principal Graduate Quarter [in Wuyi city]; a person listed as Qing 4^th became the first ancestor of the branch in Guodong; as those listed as Qing 113^th, Qing 63^rd, and Qing 45^th became the first ancestors of the branch in He Village. As for the great number of worthies who served in the government, [their deeds can be found] in the records of government service through the successive dynasties.

       After the Gentleman Badi the lineage divided into various branches, and from it we learn the many different branches [of the lineage]. However, if we trace back to the root and pursue the source, we learn that the root is one. When one reads the genealogy, the affection for the relatives wells up in his heart. We who are listed in the same genealogy are in contact during the course of the year, celebrating happy events and grieving  for misfortune. When we cannot bear to see others impoverished benevolence can be aroused; when we cannot bear to see others in trouble righteousness can be aroused; when we cannot bear to see others enmity for each other cordiality can be aroused. Let us unite the thousands of people [in our lineage] and maintain the custom of benevolence and kindness together! Do not boast of our ancestors for fame; do not bring the lineage together for extravagant expenditures. There are many examples in the world of those who once forced the populace into submission and bullied them and who acted tyrannically in villages, but in the end destroyed their lineages and families. Alas! Should we not be fearful? Thus I also mention this to warn our descendants.

In the tenth month of the fifth year of the Longqing reign period, the xinwei year (1571),

Respectfully written by

Qiren, descendant of the thirteenth generation, a Tribute Student