Can 之 refer to an object not previously mentioned?

Question

When I got this question, I immediately answered „yes“, based on a passage in Mencius. But, apparently, people online confidently dismiss my interpretation, hence I find it incumbent upon myself to inquire with you, before I lead astray junior students.😿

On a specific passage

孟子对曰：“王好战，请以战喻。填然鼓之，兵刃既接，弃甲曳兵而走。⋯“，

Which Legge translates as follows:

Mencius replied, 'Your majesty is fond of war - let me take an illustration from war. The soldiers move forward to the sound of the drums; and after their weapons have been crossed, on one side they throw away their coats of mail, trail their arms behind them, and run…’

Legge also comments specifically on the 之 in the above quote, explaining:

之 refers to 戰士, or soldiers.

Similarly, Harold Shadick included this passage in his »A First Course in Literary Chinese« as Text number 10. The commentary on Text 10 says of this 之：

The implied antecedent of 之 is “the soldiers of two armies drawn up for battle.”

What Western Grammar Books Say on the General Question

Shadick, in his aforementioned book, Section Grammar 4.2, says quite absolutely:

The object substitute 之 ⋯ can substitute for any object of any transitive verb or coverb … The criterion by which an expression is identified as an object is that it can be substituted by 之.

So, clearly, based on the books from which I was taught, the answer is yes.

But I am acutely aware of having studied in the West. I cannot exclude the possibility that this line of reasoning originated from Legge, whence most Western commentators simply absorbed it. Therefore, I was quite shaken by the following.

Different or Unclear Interpretations of 之 in the specific passage

The question of the function of this 之 has vexed a baidu user here. Only one answer was given, that one highly upvoted. And it states that 之 cannot be a 代詞 (pronoun/substitute), but must occur for reasons of sound.

The same is reiterated here.

There is also this commentary, which understands 之 as 代詞, but then states

这里指代击鼓的事由

It is not clear to me, what 事由 means here.

Answer 1

Neither Baidu nor 《孟子：插图珍藏本》 is academically reliable. For questions of this kind you should consult 故训汇纂 or 辞源. However, I didn't find commentary on this particular sentence in 故训汇纂, so the following is my conjecture.

If we look at how 鼓之 is used in pre-Qin texts we may find:

《左传 庄公十年》：十年春，齐师伐我。公将战，曹刿请见。……公与之乘，战于长勺。公将鼓之。

《左传 襄公二十三年》：齐侯还自晋，不入，遂袭莒。……莒子亲鼓之，从而伐之，获杞梁。

If 之 were a filler syllable, then two things cannot be explained: 1) In the first example, 公将战 is used instead of 公将战之; 2) In the second example, 莒子亲鼓之 is used instead of 莒子亲鼓. These examples show that 之 cannot merely be a filler syllable, so explaining it as a pronoun is more plausible.

辞海第三版 p. 4730 says, 鼓 means "to beat the drum", but also specialized to mean "to encourage the army to attack by beating the drum," hence it is plausible that 之 refers to the army.

Answer 2

Can 之 refer to an object not previously mentioned?

yes

請以戰喻・填然鼓之

let me take an illustration from war. The soldiers move forward to the sound of the drums

legge’s translation missed “填然”, the context & presumptions.

in ancient war, when the army is too large to be commanded verbally, they relied on drum (鼓) & bell-shaped gong (鉦), that,

the sound of drum is the command to march forward “聞鼓而進”

the sound of gong is the command to stop “聞金而止”

so, “請以戰喻・填然鼓之”, should be read as:

let me use “war” as metaphor “請以戰喻”; [that, in a war, the soldiers arrayed] suffusedly & magnificently “填然”, [then, beating the] drum “鼓” [to command] [them] “之” [to march forward]

that, the quoted legge’s & shadick’s interpretations are correct; the “之” referred to unmentioned, presumed “soldiers”

the second half of your question, may i say:

being chinese does not imply that one comprehend texts in proto-chinese, classical chinese, and literary chinese automatically; one need to learn.

judging from past questions you asked, i think that you’re more knowledgeable than, . . . 90% of them 😼

be confident 😸

info added in lieu of comment, edited

孟子對曰・王好戰・請以戰喻・填然鼓之・兵刃既接・棄甲曳兵而走

mencius replied “孟子對曰”, your highness [referred to 梁惠王] like war “王好戰”, let me use “war” as metaphor “請以戰喻”.

[that, in a war, the soldiers arrayed] suffusedly & magnificently “填然”, [then, beating the] drum “鼓” [to command] [them] “之” [to march forward], [till their] weapons “兵刃” already encountered “既接“ [resistance], [the marching forward side] abandoned [their] armours and weapons “棄甲曳兵”, and escaped “而走“

two points:

• in the metaphor, no need to connect any side of the war to 梁惠王‘s army
• the abandoning weapons side is the marching forward side, that the implicit subject do not change (填然、鼓、棄、曳、走)

have fun :)

Answer 3

"孟子对曰：“王好战，请5以战喻。填然鼓之(6)，兵刃既接，弃甲曳兵而走。

• 孟子答道：“王喜欢战争，就请让我用战争来作比喻吧。战鼓咚咚一响，双方刀枪一碰，就扔掉盔甲拖着兵器逃跑。

（6）填然鼓之：填然，即“填填地（响）”“咚咚地（响）”；鼓，击鼓；之，这里指击鼓的事由。(My intepretation: 击鼓的事由 - 為一己的好戰私欲而輕啓戰事. 又: 击鼓為古代發動戰爭/攻击的指示.)

5000言

Answer 4

This modern text from the link provided by joehua in his comment.

填：拟声词，模拟鼓声。
tian: onomatopoeia, imitation of drum sound

鼓之：敲起鼓来，发动进攻。
drum : strike the drum, start the attack. Ancient people struck the drum (as a sign) to go on the offensive, the sound of the gong meant retreat.

古人击鼓进攻，鸣锣退兵。鼓，动词。之，没有实在意义的衬字。
Ancient people struck the drum (as a sign) to go on the offensive, the sound of the gong meant retreat.

鼓，动词。 Drum, (here as) verb.

之，没有实在意义的衬字。
zhi, (here) a filler word with no real meaning. (Can't agree with this.)

兵刃既接：两军的兵器已经接触，指战斗已开始。兵，兵器、武器。既，已经。接，接触，交锋。
兵刃既接: both armies' weapons already in contact, meaning the battle is already begun. The soldiers, (with their) arms, (their) weapons extended, already touching (the enemy), swords are crossed.

弃甲曳兵：抛弃铠甲，拖着兵器。曳，yè，拖着。
弃甲曳兵: abandon armour, dragging weapons. 曳，yè, dragging

孟子回答说：
Mencius replied saying:
“大王喜欢打仗，
Your Majesty likes going to war,
让我用战争做比喻吧。
allow me to use war as an analogy.
咚咚地敲响战鼓，
(at the) pounding sound of the battle drum,
两军开始交战，
both armies begin to fight,
战败的扔掉盔甲拖着武器逃跑。
the losing side casts aside their helmets and armour, (and) dragging their weapons behind (them) flees.

I think that we need to remember, there was no punctuation of the kind we know in ancient Chinese. The text, neatly written on bamboo strips, is then:

孟子对曰王好战请以战喻填然鼓之兵刃既接弃甲曳兵而走

Then perhaps 之 served the function of a separator, separating 鼓 from 兵. Even in the old text shown, a comma separates 之 and 兵刃 之: 指示人或事物，相当于“这个”“那个” [this;that]

Why would 之 point at something unmentioned? The drum sounds, the armies go into battle.

Without 之 we have: 填然鼓兵刃既接: maybe: the sounding drums and the bladed weapons touched