Emperor Wen of Han (203 BC – 6 July 157 BC), the third emperor of the Western Han Dynasty, the fourth son of Liu Bang, was the half-brother of Emperor Hui of Han, Liu Ying, and his mother was Bo Ji.
After Emperor Wen of Han ascended the throne, he exerted great efforts to govern, build water conservancy, strictly practice frugality and simplicity, abolish corporal punishment, realize the prosperity of the country, and the well-off of the people, and open the beginning of the "rule of Wenjing".
Emperor Wen of Han was cautious about the excessive power of the princely states and the invasion of the Central Plains by the Xiongnu. In dealing with the princes, adopt the attitude of subjugating people with virtue and quelling chaos with force. In dealing with the Xiongnu, we adopted the method of peace and pro-war to create a political situation of stability, unity, and recuperation.
Emperor Wen of Han once personally tasted medicine for his mother, Empress Bo, and was an emperor with great filial piety, and was the protagonist of "Tasting The Soup Medicine" in "Twenty-Four Filial Pieties".
However, why did Emperor Wen of Han, who was committed to filial piety and was so virtuous, force his uncle Bo Zhao to commit suicide? This also begins with his path to the throne:
In the eleventh year of Emperor Han gao (196 BC), Liu Heng was made king. After Liu Bang's death, Lü Hou came to the throne, Emperor Hui of Han died young, and Zhu Lü held great power in the dynasty.
After Lü Hou's death, after his death, Chen Ping, Zhou Bo, and others eliminated Zhu Lü. Although Liu Heng, who was the acting king at that time, did not make much effort in eradicating Zhulu.
However, he was the eldest of Liu Bang's living sons at that time, and at the same time, his mother Lady Bo had a gentle personality, and Lady Bo only had one younger brother, Bo Zhao, and there would be no situation of dictatorship like Lü Yan in the future, and the monopoly of foreign relatives. After the consideration of Chen Ping, Zhou Bo and other old ministers, it was finally decided to appoint Liu Heng as emperor.
Being elected emperor was certainly a good thing for Liu Heng, but at this time, the situation in Jingshi was still unclear, and Liu Heng was not sure whether Zhou Bo and Chen Pingren were really loyal to the Han Dynasty.
When Liu Heng saw the emissary, he was not very happy at first, but it aroused suspicion, and his subordinates also had different opinions: Zhongling Zhang Wu and others on behalf of Guolang thought that it was deceitful, and proposed to resign on the grounds that he was ill and could not go there, in order to observe the changes in the situation; while Lieutenant Song Changli dismissed the public opinion, believing that Liu's country and mountains were stable and did not need to be worried.
Liu Heng decided to use divination to determine ji ji. As a result, a "great horizontal" divination result was obtained, and this result showed that the cracked lines of the great horizontal were very legitimate, and the Bu Gua people immediately became the king of heaven and carried forward the great cause of the family, just like Xia Qi continued Xia Yu. The GuaShi explained to him that the Heavenly King was the Son of Heaven, one level higher than the average king.
Therefore, although Liu Heng coveted the throne at this time, he still did not dare to venture to the capital to ascend the throne as emperor, for fear that if he went to the capital at this time to ascend the throne, he would become a puppet, or even give his life in vain.
Therefore, he asked his uncle Bo Zhao to go to the capital to find out the situation, and if Zhou Bo and Chen Pingren really supported him, he would set off for Beijing, and if they had the slightest hesitation, they would definitely not enter the capital.
In this way, Bo Zhao, who was carrying a heavy responsibility, risked his life to go to the capital to find out the situation for Liu Heng. After Bo Zhao entered Beijing, he quickly went to Zhou Bo's mansion to ask Zhou Bo the reason for the incident and discover his true intentions.
Later, through exchanges, Bo Zhao learned that Zhou Bo and Chen Pingren really supported Liu Heng as emperor, so Bo Zhao returned to Daidi and said to Liu Heng: "No problem, don't doubt it", at this time, Liu Heng was relieved to go to Chang'an to become emperor.
After Liu Heng ascended the throne, Bo Zhao was crowned "Marquis of Xuan" because of his merits as a dragon.
Overnight, Bo Zhao became the most prominent imperial relative in the world, his nephew is the current emperor, his sister is the current empress, and there is probably no more noble foreign relative in this world than him!
Under such a prominent identity, Bo Zhao began to gradually lose himself and become a flying and arrogant lawless person, which also laid the groundwork for his later tragedies.
Bo Zhao's own ability to control was already weak, and Emperor Wen of Han should have given him power instead of handing over power to him, but Emperor Wen did not do so, not only did he not restrict Bo Zhao, but instead gave him heavy powers, and chose to ignore his misdeeds.
Bo Zhao began to become more and more arrogant and misbehaving, and then he lost his life in vain.
In 170 BC, in order to strengthen the strength of the Western Han Dynasty, Emperor Wen of Han began to implement new policies, such as prohibiting the princes from collecting taxes without authorization, being harsh on the people, and abiding by the laws of the state, and in order to ensure the smooth implementation of the new policy, he sent supervision officials to inspect various places, at which time the supervision official Zhong Yu was sent to Taiyuan.
Taiyuan was Bo Zhao's fiefdom, and although Bo Zhao was not in Taiyuan at this time (serving as a cheri general in the Beijing Division), his nephew Bo Gui was in Taiyuan. Bo Gui, who wielded the power of Bo Zhao and Bo Ji, did a lot of bad things in Taiyuan, causing the people to complain and complain, and the people did not have a good life.
And the chancellor Zhong Yu was originally a jealous and hateful minister, and he was naturally annoyed when he saw that the people of Taiyuan were so miserable by Bo Gui. In a fit of rage, he ordered him to be executed on the grounds that he was a nobleman and a corrupt person.
Originally, the blood of the Bo family was already thin, and at this time, his nephew was killed again, and Bo Zhao was furious, how could he let Go of Zhong Yu?
Therefore, in order to retaliate, Bo Zhao led his troops to capture Zhong Yu, who had returned to Beijing, and took him to his own palace.
Initially, Bo Zhao did not want to kill Zhong Yu because of the emperor's face, but only forced Zhong Yu to confess his sins to the emperor, and then dressed Bo Gui with ma dai filial piety!
But Phi Ma Dai Filial Piety was something that his son had done to Lao Tzu, so how could Zhong Yu agree to such a humiliating condition? Moreover, in Zhong Yu's view, Bo Gui should have died, and it was even more impossible for him to wear a ma dai filial piety for such a damned person.
Therefore, for Bo Zhao's request, Zhong Yu categorically refused, and when he refused, he also humiliated Bo Zhao. Bo Zhao was originally angry with Zhong Yu because of Bo Gui's death, and this Zhong Yu still ignored him so much, how could he bear it?
As a result, Bo Zhao became angry and took the knife and cut Zhong Yu. This is good, Bo Zhao can be regarded as poking a big honeycomb!
Bo Zhao's killing of imperial court officials was simply lawless, and Emperor Wen of Han decided to execute Bo Zhao, but was blocked by the ministers and empresses.
The ministers persuaded not to execute Bo Zhao because he was Empress Bo's brother, and Empress Bo certainly did not want to execute Bo Zhao. Empress Bo counted Bo Zhao's exploits and blamed Emperor Wen of Han for mercilessly killing her uncle.
Zhong Yu was well known in the court, and the courtiers all admired his integrity, so when the courtiers heard the news, they were naturally angry, so they asked Emperor Wen one after another to ask for Bo Zhaoming's canonical punishment to set an example.
Emperor Wen of Han faced Empress Bo's efforts to protect Bo Zhao, and he was also in a dilemma. Because to kill is not filial piety to the mother, not to kill is to lose faith in the world.
After all, Bo Zhao was Empress Bo's only younger brother and Emperor Wen's only uncle, and under Empress Bo's repeated efforts, Emperor Wen was selfish and wanted to save his life.
However, at this moment, news suddenly came that Zhong Yu's wife learned that the empress dowager had pardoned Bo Zhao, and he committed suicide in grief and despair, leaving only a young child.
With the news coming, the group of ministers was completely fried, and they all strongly said that Emperor Wen must execute Bo Zhao, otherwise Heaven would be intolerable.
At this time, the chancellor Zhang Cang was even more clothed in ma Dai filial piety, holding Zhong Yu's young son to the temple to file for injustice, and the veteran general Zhou Xing also resigned his official position to fight, and finally Emperor Wen finally made up his mind to execute Bo Zhao.
So Emperor Wen of Han asked Zhang Cang and Zhou Xing to go to Bo Zhao's house to set up a banquet to persuade Bo Zhao to commit suicide. But Bo Zhao not only did not comply, but also scolded Emperor Wen of Han. When Empress Bo knew of this, she directly announced the pardon of Bo Zhao, and then she went to personally rebuke Emperor Wen of Han.
Emperor Wen of Han xuan Bo Zhao entered the palace, but when Bo Zhao entered the palace, he saw that Emperor Wen of Han had already set up a spiritual seat for him and was worshipping. Bo Zhao knew at this time that Emperor Wen of Han had made up his mind to kill him, and eventually Bo Zhao had no choice but to commit suicide.
For Emperor Wen of Han to kill his uncle, there are different evaluation views.
One is that Emperor Wen of Han was right in this move, after all, Bo Zhao had a reason to kill, and according to the law, he had to kill, and the fault was that Emperor Wen of Han did not find Bo Zhao's weakness and give him back the right, so there was such a tragedy.
There is also a saying that Empress Bo only had this one brother, and Emperor Wen of Han insisted on killing Bo Zhao, which was somewhat inhumane. After all, Emperor Wen of Han was an emperor, and he could pardon a person as the Ninth Five-Year Emperor, of course, what he brought was to provoke criticism and lose faith in the world. However, in ancient times, some emperors were only a one-sentence decision to kill.
But then again, Emperor Wen of Han not only ruled the world with filial piety, but also a rare sage. For those tyrannical kings, it is okay to be partial and not to kill. But unfortunately, Emperor Wen of Han was not a tyrannical monarch.
Although the imperial power is heavy, he cannot lose faith in the world, and for the monarch, no matter how small the family affairs are, they are also big things.
Bo Zhao's death is the result of Liu Heng's connivance, the main reason is still his own death, as the saying goes, "if you don't die, you won't die", you have to say that all this is fate.
In the seventh year of the Later Yuan Dynasty (157 BC), Liu Heng died in Weiyang Palace, with the temple name Taizong and Emperor Xiaowen, and was buried in Baling.
Xiao Bian believes that Emperor Wen of Han's righteousness is awe-inspiring, as the ruler of a country, but also as a virtuous monarch, it is a mission to put such an uncle to death! The following is a brief description of the achievements of various generations of historical celebrities on the life of this Ming Jun!
1. Sima Qian:
Han was the first to rise, the heir was unknown, the king was honored, and the world returned to the heart; corporal punishment was removed, GuanLiang was opened, Guang'en Boshi was given, and he was called Taizong.
2. Confucius said: "The world will be benevolent" and "The good man who has ruled the country for a hundred years can also be victorious and killed." Sincerely speaking! Han Xing, to Xiaowen forty years, Virtue to Shengye. The township of Liao Liao corrected the service of sealing Zen, and the humility was not achieved in the present. Whoops, isn't that kind!
3. Cao Zhi: Filial piety is on the throne, and the love object is examined. Proud Wu Fuyue, Xiongnu and pro. Forgive sins and honor the people. To the point of punishment, all nations are pure.
4. Li Shimin: Emperor Wen of the Former Han Dynasty will raise the terrace and cherish the property of the Ten Houses. Shuo De did not catch the Han Emperor, and the expense was too much, and it was said that it was the way of the people's parents!
5. Zeng Guofan: The world is only sincere, and the humility of Emperor Wen of Han is out of sincerity! ...... Geqide is the only wise lord seen three generations later, and his heart is ashamed that he does not call himself an emperor.