During the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, there was also a eunuch with a good reputation. He assisted Li Cunxun in expanding the territory and became a perfect person, and was evaluated by posterity as a "Zhuge Liang-style figure", and he was Li Cunxun's chancellor Zhang Chengye.
Zhang Chengye, a native of Jiaocheng, Shanxi, entered the palace from an early age and was adopted as an adopted son by Zhang Tai, an internal attendant. Throughout his magnificent life, Xun Yu at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, he had a similar temperament and destiny.
He was a famous sage in Chinese history for daring to directly advise people and do things impartially, and was called Wei Zheng. He was the first hero of the founding of the Later Tang Dynasty; at the same time, he was also famous in history because of his loyalty to the Tang Dynasty and his opposition to the usurpation of the Later Tang Dynasty.
Zhang Chengye entered the palace during the reign of Emperor Tang. Emperor Zhaozong traveled back and forth between the imperial court and the localities, supervising the army in Hedong, enforcing the law strictly, and Li Ke, the king of Jin, used it very heavily. Li Keyong was a Shatuo person, and was given the royal "Li" surname because his ancestors had made great contributions to the imperial court. During this period, Zhang Chengye and Li Keyong established a "strategic partnership" relationship, and the relationship between the two was very close.
At this time, the great warlord Zhu Wen of the late Tang Dynasty, with the cooperation of the chancellor Cui Yin, killed the eunuchs in Chang'an who had long been harming the Tang Dynasty's dictatorship and defeating the government, and in order to cut the grass and remove the roots, Zhu Wen also used Tang Zhaozong's edict to order the eunuchs in various places to kill the eunuchs in various places. After receiving the edict, Li Keyong immediately hid Zhang Chengye in the temple, and then killed a death row prisoner to impersonate Zhang Chengye. After Zhu Wen destroyed the Tang, Zhang Chengye single-mindedly assisted Li Keyong and was determined to avenge the Tang Dynasty.
Li Ke used his critical illness to explain the aftermath, and Zhang Chengye, together with his younger brother Li Kening, the general Li Cunzhang, and Wu Jue, served as ministers to assist his son Li Cunxun, and he told Zhang Chengye and others: "I have entrusted Yazi (Li Cunxun's nickname) to you. "
After Li Keyong's death, Zhang Chengye was ordered to assist Li Cunxun with all his heart. At this time, Li Ke used his brother Li Kening to disobey the young lord and began to plot to usurp the throne, at this time Li Cunxun was in crisis, Zhang Chengye stepped forward and designed to eliminate Li Kening and ensure the stability of Li Cunxun's throne.
After solving the internal crisis, he also helped Li Cunxun eliminate external troubles, and after defeating Zhu Wen and laying the image of Li Cunxun's young hero in one fell swoop, zhu Wen, who was hurt by the pain, exclaimed: "When a son is born like Li Yazi, it is not used to die!" To my son, guinea pig ears! "
For these great achievements of Zhang Chengye, Li Cunxun was grateful and wanted to give him an official and a knighthood, but Zhang Chengye insisted on resigning, and he always regarded himself as a supervisor of the Tang Dynasty until his death. This made Li Cunxun more and more respected, and he was honored as "Seventh Brother".
Later, Li Cunxun led the army to fight on the front line, and Zhang Chengye learned from Xiao He of the Han Dynasty, collected grain and grass in the rear of Taiyuan, and presided over military and political affairs on his behalf.
After Li Cunxun got Wei Bo, he moved his base camp to Hebei and engaged in a decade-long struggle with the Liang army on both sides of the Yellow River. During this period, Li Cunxun entrusted all military and political affairs in Taiyuan to Zhang Chengye. Zhang Chengye was diligent and earnest, bowed down to the best of his ability, recruited troops to buy horses to support the front, recruited displaced people to produce and farm, and collected grain and grass to enrich the military, all large and small affairs were through the hands of Zhang Chengye, and he managed the rear area of Hedong in an orderly manner, so that Li Cunxun not only had no worries and concentrated on dealing with the rear liang, but also received a steady stream of troops and grain and grass support. In the end, the reason why Li Cunxun was able to surprise the army to destroy Hou Liang, Zhang Chengye played an extremely important role. Therefore, the history books say that "Cheng is a hegemon, and the loyalty of the undertaking is also."
When Zhang Chengye ruled the rear, he treated all people equally. Because Taiyuan was a gathering place for clans and ministers, plus empresses, concubines and others, it was inevitable that some unreasonable demands were often made to Zhang Chengye. Zhang Chengye was selfless in his face and refused to do anything, he himself was honest and honest, and in order to revive the great cause of the Tang Dynasty, he did not hesitate to offend these princes and ministers. Those who dare to test the law by example, no matter what their status is, will be severely punished according to law and will not be tolerated. Over time, Taiyuan's politics became clear, and Li Cunxun had a solid and united rear, which was the basis for his final victory in the Liang-Jin confrontation. At that time, Hou Liang was in charge of traitors and contradictions, and even affected the removal of the commander of the army, compared with Hedong, the defeat of Hou Liang was inevitable.
As Li Cunxun's money bag, Zhang Chengye is simply like a scrooge, and the money that should not be spent is that Li Cunxun wants to get some money from his hand and spend it randomly, which is impossible.
Once, in order to get some pocket money from him, Li Cunxun invited Zhang Chengye to drink, and during the banquet, he let his son Li Jiquan dance to help him, and after the dance, he came to ask for rewards, who knew that Zhang Chengye pretended to be confused, but just gave his horse and jade belt to Li Jiyuan.
At this moment, Li Cunxun was furious, saying that my sons were too poor to spend money, so you gave him some, and your horse was not worth much.
After knowing that after such a clear selection, Zhang Chengye's answer was even more desperate, saying that the money I was in charge of was used by the three armies, and that it should be used to suppress Zhu Liang's rebellious thieves, and that the public money could not be used for private use.
Listening to his answer, Li Cunxun was so angry that he wanted to reward him with two swords.
Later, Li Cunxun wanted to claim the throne in Wei Bo because of the persuasion of the audience generals. Zhang Chengye originally assisted Li Cunxun in order to finally destroy Hou Liang and revive the Tang Dynasty, seeing that Li Cunxun also wanted to be called emperor, not caring about his physical illness, let people carry him to WeiZhou to persuade Li Cunxun, he said to Li Cunxun: "The bloody war between the father and son of the great king for more than thirty years, is to avenge the country and revive the Tang Dynasty, now liang thieves are not destroyed and the people's wealth is about to run out, if you call the emperor again, the financial resources will be exhausted, this is the first reason why the minister thinks that he cannot be called emperor; when the minister was in the palace before, it was common when the state succession ceremony was to be held. Always ready to take up to a year to complete.
If the king had to be called emperor, he could not violate the system, and Li Le was not ready now, which was the second reason why the minister thought it was impossible. Whoever does things according to his ability, he must not listen to the persuasion of others. Zhang Chengye's words were actually a strategy to postpone Li Cunxun's claim to the throne, but it was a pity that Li Cunxun did not listen.
But in the face of this alluring power, Zhang Chengye was hit by a wall for the first time. Li Cunxun did not agree to Zhang Chengye's advice, and said: "I am helpless when my subordinates persecute me like this." "
Zhang Chengye knew that it was difficult to dissuade him, so he looked up to the sky and cried: "The princes fought in blood, originally to restore the Tang Dynasty, but now the king has taken the throne himself and deceived the old slave." "
Zhang Chengye fell ill when he returned to Taiyuan and died at home the following year. When Li Cunxun's birth mother, Lady Cao, heard about it, she immediately rushed to Zhang Chengye's home to hang filial piety, dressed in filial piety clothes, and performed the ritual of her son and nephew.
Perhaps in his heart, he was loyal to the Tang Dynasty all his life, assisting Li Ke to use his father and son to avenge Zhu Wen, who destroyed the Tang Dynasty, and then re-support the Tang Dynasty. When Li Cunxun wanted to become emperor, his dream was completely shattered, and he had to be martyred.
In the end, Li Cunxun declared himself emperor in 923 and established the Later Tang. He remembered Zhang Chengye's outstanding merits in the past, and posthumously awarded him the title of General Zuo Wuwei and the title of "Zhenxian".
Zhang Chengye was not an official of Later Tang before his death, but after his death, he served as a heavy minister of Later Tang, but this was not something he could influence.