朱熹認為：「興者，先言他物以引起所詠之辭。」然「他物」與「所詠之辭」之間，究竟有沒有意義上的關係，歷來學者們有多種不同的，有認為全取義者，有認為全不取義者，有認為兼取義與不取義者，今人似以贊成後者為多。本文透過層層的剖析，從全取義者之不可信、兼取義與不取義者之可懷疑，及由興的特質來駁斥興不取義的論點。進而從興義的源流、興的創過程，以及一些實際作品的考察，來推論興皆取義說是可以成立的。然興本隱微，再加上過境遷等種因素，後人欲求得其所興之義，本非易事，須待吾人努力探求，方能體會《詩》中的真味。蓋興之作用，或氣氛之醞釀，或主體之烘托，或事物之興起，或情意之象徵，不一而足，皆是取義的。

Chu-His (1130-1200A.D.), one of the greatest scholars of Sung Dynasty, thought that “The Metaphor of ’the Book of Odes’ means using another things to enhance the major subject expression. There is an “another subject” associated with the “major subject expression”, is it a meaning in the poem or not, many scholars have had many different opinions? Some scholars used all-inclusive meaning, some of them used exclusive meaning, and some used both all-inclusive and exclusive meaning. Currently people approved more the latter opinion than the former opinion. In this analysis shows many different point of views to reveal that all-inclusive is unbelievable, both all-inclusive and all-exclusive is doubtful, as well as, with the feature of metaphor of the “Book of Odes”, some scholars reject all exclusive view. In addition, in arising image and arising creativeness process, we can observe some poems in the “Book of Odes” and find that all metaphor expression has its own meaning is available accordingly. In spite of metaphor meaning is hidden and concealed, things have changed with the passage of time, people of future generations have desire to get the metaphor image of the writers, which is undecided, all modern people makes efforts to explore and to get the truth. The function of metaphor finds atmosphere exciting, subject emphasizing, things stirring, up, feels expressing, all-expressive, are meaningful.