The title  is an abbreviation of  the famous expression of the Book of Documents (Shang shu): Xing qi wu xing 刑期無刑 , "To punish with a view to punishing no more". The book may be outlined a Japanese adaptation of Shenxing xian 慎刑憲 the ninth part in the monumental Daxueyanyi bu by the Ming Censor Qiu Jun (see Shenxing xian), but with a content significantly modified, to include elements of other books representative of the Shenxing 慎刑 doctrine, which instructed Chinese magistrates that punishments should be used only with great "precaution" or "scruple" (shen 慎). These books are notably Xiangxing yaolan by Wu Na, Ping Yuanlu by Zhao Yizhai,  Xiyuan jilu by Song Ci (qqq.vvv.), and for the general plan, the compiler says he took inspiration not only from the "Shenxing xian" of Qiu Jun's magnus opus mentioned earlier, but also from the penal parts in Wenxian tongkao 文獻通考, by Ma Duanlin 馬端臨.  Indeed, the Japanese Records follow the same progression as its Chinese models, from a general purpose on punishments, to exposing the legal system, describing penal instruments, detailing procedures in trials, sentencing, reviewing sentences, redressing injustices, amnisties and pardons, technicalities on prisons, and finishing with warnings about excessive punishments. The content has been somewhat simplified, nonetheless, since, for instance, the hexagrams of the Book of Changes (Yijing 易經) that constituted cornerstones of the doctrine, hence their apparition at the head of most chapters in the Chinese original, have been mostly shunned in the Japanese version. The Chinese text is duly bordered by the diacritic signs allowing to read it according to the Japanese syntax. A superior margin, absent from the Chinese original, receives some incidental information. Interestingly, the book was reprinted twice in the Meiji period, a first time in 1877, a second time in 1884, both by Mutsu Minemitsu  (陸奥 宗光 1844-1897 cf. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutsu_Munemitsu), on behalf of the Chamber of Elders (元老院 Genrōin). The first edition was very likely prompted by the publication of the Ming code (大明律), in its Japanese version of 1871, which was the first attempt at codification for the whole Japan by the new imperial State. The reprints include the author's preface informing us about the resources of this "record", and a biographical sketch by Saitō Chikudō (斉藤 竹堂 1815-1852), a scholar who, like Ashi himself, served the Lord of Sendai; the 1884 starts with a preface to the reedition by Mizumoto Shigemi (水本成美) relating how the Chamber of Elders was persuaded to take over the reprint (JB, as of 07-07-2015).