Historical Records Confucius Family said: "There are more than 3,000 ancient poems. When it comes to Confucius, it is necessary to focus on it and take something that can be applied to etiquette, law and benevolence. " ...
Sima Qian said that the Book of Songs has more than 3,000 volumes. Later, when I arrived at Confucius, Confucius removed some of them, leaving only those that were in line with etiquette and could be used for enlightenment. ......
"Deleting poems" refers to the Spring and Autumn Period, when there were many poems. According to Sima Qian, there are more than 3,000 poems. Later, Confucius took one of the ten poems and compiled it into a collection of poems, leaving 305 poems.
The theory of deleting poems originated from Sima Qian, and was later supported by Ban Gu and Zheng Xuan. It was not until Confucius in the Tang Dynasty compiled Justice of Mao Poetry, that is, Zheng Xuan's poems, that he began to put forward different views. But Kong Ying Da only said that Confucius wouldn't delete so many poems, but he didn't publicly deny Confucius's "deleting poems" ~