This person's name was Fan Congwen, and he was a direct descendant of Fan Zhongyan. It was because of this status that he was exempted from the death penalty by Zhu Yuanzhang and given the grace of being spared from death 5 times.
So why was Zhu Yuanzhang, a descendant of Fan Zhongyan, exempted from the death penalty just because he was a descendant of Fan Zhongyan? We have to start with the founding of the Ming Dynasty.
Since the founding of the Ming Dynasty was a country established after defeating the Yuan Dynasty, many people say that the most righteous person who has won the country in the past is the Ming Dynasty. After the establishment of the Ming Dynasty, due to the perverse behavior of the Yuan Dynasty, the list left for the Ming Dynasty was a very big mess - all kinds of rules and regulations and the traditional customs of the Han people were destroyed, and the population was also lost very badly.
After the founding of the People's Republic of China, Zhu Yuanzhang began to lightly serve thinly. At the same time, many policies were promulgated to restore the previous rules and regulations, and at the same time, because Zhu Yuanzhang witnessed the harm to the people caused by corrupt officials in the Yuan Dynasty in his childhood, his blows against corrupt officials and corrupt officials were very serious. Under such circumstances, Zhu Yuanzhang formulated a very strict anti-corruption plan for corrupt officials and corrupt officials. Once the so-called corrupt officials break the law, they will be immediately brought to justice.
Zhu Yuanzhang used harsh punishments, for example, if he embezzled 50 taels, he would be skinned, in which case corruption should be much better, but in fact it was the opposite. Because Zhu Yuanzhang's salary to the officials himself is too low, but in fact, this can not completely blame Zhu Yuanzhang.
Because in Zhu Yuanzhang's view, bureaucrats do not need labor, so their salaries are already very high, and because the Central Plains have been destroyed by the Yuan Dynasty into such a way, there is great financial pressure to restore in a short period of time, so it is also understandable to limit the salaries of officials. However, officials became corrupt as a result, and although Zhu Yuanzhang formulated such severe punishment measures, they still could not escape their succession.
In this case, Zhu Yuanzhang would like to put up a sign, what brand? That is the typical, the so-called thousands of gold to buy horse bones. Since physical destruction cannot hurt them. If you can't make them change, then try to use the power of the spirit to make them change. That is, I want to make them restrain a little through the power of example.
Zhu Yuanzhang first proved to them by giving counterexamples that his son-in-law, the donkey, had committed the crime of embezzlement, and he did not hesitate to peel the horse. This typical counterexample did not work well, and officials continued to be skinned while committing deadly corruption.
So Zhu Yuanzhang planned to find a positive model to show everyone, but It was difficult for Zhu Yuanzhang to find such a positive model. Because most officials are not suitable for this kind of thing. Or that he still looks like a clean official these days, and after a while it is found that he has also committed corruption, and if such a thing happens, then such an example will play a very bad role...
So Zhu Yuanzhang hit the idea on the ancients. As we all know, Fan Zhongyan is an official who has been flowing through the ages, and his worries about the world before his life and the happiness of the world after the world have become famous sayings and aphorisms to this day. Zhu Yuanzhang had been thinking about this problem for a long time, and Fan Zhongyan's ideological quality was exactly the quality he needed, and what he needed was a high-quality official like Fan Zhongyan.
During this period, he discovered that one of the imperial historians was a direct descendant of Fan Zhongyan. So Zhu Yuanzhang had a plan. First let this direct descendant of Fan Zhongyan suffer a little, this imperial history duty is responsible for advising the king, the danger factor itself is very high, it is very convenient for Zhu Yuanzhang to operate. Therefore, Zhu Yuanzhang planted a crime in the process of persuading the king, and put him in a big prison to execute him.
Officials like them before execution were to show the emperor their family situation. At this time, Zhu Yuanzhang pretended to find out that he was a direct descendant of Fan Zhongyan. So he performed some acting skills and staged a scene of buying horse bones for thousands of dollars to the ministers. Prove to everyone that as long as he is a clean official, as long as he is a clean official like Fan Zhongyun, who worries about the world before the world and is happy after the world, he can benefit his descendants.
Zhu Yuanzhang's move today seems to be contrary to the spirit of the rule of law, but we cannot completely deny this practice of his because of this, because his practice could indeed play a positive role at that time.