孔穎達撰寫《禮記正義》是以鄭玄的《禮記注》為基礎的，對於這兩者的關係，學界長期遵守清人「疏不駁注」之說。然而僅通過對比鄭玄、孔穎達的《中庸》解經方法後便可發現，雖然他們在釋字詞、釋句意等方面是基本一致的，但有「注」與「疏」、「融今古文」與「統南北之學」等方面的差異。換句說，孔穎達在解經的時候，始終存在「疏不駁注」與「疏必破注」的張力。

Kong Yingda writes the Rectifying Meanings of the Book of Rites on the basis of Zheng Xuan’s Annotation of Rites. Qing dynasty scholars took Kong’s type of commentary as Exegeses (shu 疏) not contrary to commentaries (zhu 注). However, just by comparing Zheng Xuan’s and Kong Ying-ta’s methods of interpreting Zhongyong, we can see that although they are basically the same in the interpretation of words, phrases, and sentences, there are some differences between them in terms of “Commentaries” and “Exegesis”, “integration of New Text Confucianism and Old Text Confucianism” and “unification of North and South studies”. In other words, when interpreting the scriptures, Kong Yingda always had the tensions of “Exegeses (shu 疏) not contrary to commentaries (zhu 注)” and “Exegeses (shu 疏) rectifying commentaries (zhu 注)”.