The development and even prosperity of wine ceremony culture in the Zhou Dynasty has deep historical roots.
First of all, the wine ceremony culture of the Zhou Dynasty is based on the cognition of xia shang because of the wine famine. The first ruler to notice the contradictory nature of wine was Dayu, who is said to have alienated Yidi after tasting the fine wine made by his subordinate Yidi, because Dayu believed that the instability of the wine itself might affect political rule, and predicted that "there will be those who will perish their country with wine in the future." ”
Sure enough, the fall of Xia Jie and Shang Yi was related to alcoholism and misconduct. Specific to the Zhou Dynasty, through the comparison of the political climate of the Shang Dynasty, the Zhou Gong found that the attitude of the kings and officials in the early Shang Dynasty to the liquor was more rigorous and restrained, so the social order in the early Yin Shang Period was relatively stable and the politics were more enlightened. The decline and eventual demise of Yin Shang's power was closely related to the excessive drinking and barren government of the upper nobility in the late Shang Dynasty. The article "Wine Curse" also has a clear understanding of the two sides of wine, and thus formed a unique concept of "drinking to mislead the country" in ancient Chinese politics, and the wine ceremony of the Zhou Dynasty was formed in the political tone of the early Zhou Dynasty.
Xu Shen defines wine from the perspective of wine and human nature in the "Explanation of Words", with a unique insight, "Wine, it is also, so it is the good and evil of human nature." It can be seen that wine is a double-edged sword, although the wine itself has the functions of medicine, feasting and drinking, but at the same time alcoholism is easy to produce alcohol disasters, and drinking too much is like drowning in water.
The official who supervised the liquor activities in the Zhou Dynasty was called "Pingshi", and pingcao did not sink into the water because it had no roots, which was used to symbolize the salvation of those who were addicted to wine.
In order to minimize the negativity caused by wine, the Zhou Dynasty eventually used etiquette as the main means of managing liquor. The "Book of Rites and Music" believes that the original intention of brewing wine was to "feast on the virtuous", not to create misfortune, but alcoholics are often prone to trouble after drinking, so the rulers formulated the wine ceremony to achieve the purpose of "having courtesy, wine and food can be combined", and play the function of "etiquette, so adultery". Because of the normative role of wine etiquette, the Zhou Dynasty nobles had strict etiquette standards for every aspect of drinking, which largely offset the negative impact of wine on the rulers and politics.
It should be clear that the Zhou Dynasty's strictly stipulated alcohol restriction policy for drinking purposes is not equivalent to prohibition of alcohol, and alcohol still plays an important role in the social life of the Zhou Dynasty, combining the Zhou ritual as a drinking activity, but giving wine a social function and cultural significance that does not exist in the Xia and Shang Dynasties, and becoming a cultural element of the Zhou people.
In short, while maximizing the function of wine, it also avoids its negative impact on politics and society.