Pictured - Guo Ju buried carved bricks
Guo Ju, a well-known filial piety, is famous for "burying children and serving mothers".
His deeds are included in the "Chronicle of Shunde Province" and "Chronicle of Neiqiu County", and are also recorded in books such as "Search for God" and "Taiping Imperial Records".
The "Chronicle of Shunde Province" and the "Chronicle of Neiqiu County" record:
Guo Ju, a Han Dynasty man with a character Wenju, whose ancestral home was Lin County, Henan, had a poor family, because of a famine in his hometown, begged all the way, and fled to Jinti Town, Neiqiu County, Hebei Province, to make a living by doing short-term work for others, and his life was very difficult, and there was an old mother, a wife and a son under the age of three.
The old lady loves the next generation, and every time she eats, she is reluctant to eat, saving it for her little grandson.
Guo Ju said to his wife: "Poor can not provide, take the mother's food." The Son may be regained, the Mother shall not be regained, but the Son shall be buried together. ”
Our family was so poor that they ate the last meal without eating, so that the son snatched food from the old mother's mouth. The son can be regenerated, the mother will not have any more, let's bury the child!
The wife had no choice, so she went to the wilderness with Guo Ju and "dug up more than three feet of ground" and planned to bury her son alive.
Digging and digging, I accidentally found a pot full of gold under a stone.
Pictured - Liu Song Tomb Color Guo Ju Buried
With money, Guo Ju's son was saved, and the family began to have no worries about food and clothing.
In order to thank the heavens for their favor, Guo Ju deliberately built a temple in the place where the gold was dug up, known as the "Ciren Temple".
Later generations built a "Guo Ju Pagoda" near the temple, and the villagers of more than two dozen surrounding villages were greatly moved and named villages after Guo Ju's filial piety stories, such as Daliu Village, Huangpu Village, Wuwen Xiao village and so on.
Similar records are recorded in the Western Han Dynasty scholar Liu Xiang's Taiping Imperial Records and the Jin Dynasty scholar Gan Bao's Records of Searching for Gods.
The difference is that Liu Xiang said that Guo Ju was "very rich", and after his father's death, he separated from his two younger brothers and received more than 20 million yuan, and his mother was raised by him.
The neighbor's family has a murderous house, no one dares to live, Guo Ju lives in the murderous house. After his wife gave birth to a son, Guo Ju believed that feeding the child affected the mother of the elderly, so he "ordered his wife to hold the child and want to bury it." ”
A piece of gold (tong cauldron, i.e., pot) was dug up under the ground of the home, and on it was also an iron coupon that read: "Bestow filial piety Guo Ju." ”
Guo Ju planned to return the gold to the owner of the house, but the owner of the house did not dare to accept it.
Later, the government learned of this and awarded the gold to Guo Ju, who had this money, and his son retrieved a life, and Guo Ju has since "become famous in the world".
The "Chronicle of Shunde Province" and the "Chronicle of Neiqiu County" were written relatively late, around the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty.
Liu Xiang and Guo Ju lived in the same era, so the taiping imperial records are more credible.
Guo Ju's deeds of "burying children and serving mothers" were included in the book "Twenty-Four Filial Pieties", which was praised by many people, of course, there was no lack of opposition.
The Ming Dynasty great Confucian Fang Xiaoru pointed out sharply in the "Collection of Sunzhi Zhai": "The giant trap is close to injustice, and the sin is great." And the so-called filial piety, then the heavenly reason is almost worse than the obscurity... Then the evil of killing a son cannot be escaped, and if he commits the great sin of having no future, he will be filial piety? ”
He believes that Guo Ju's behavior is a criminal act that destroys nature.
Lin Jun, a historian and chief of the Punishment Department during the Chenghua period of the Ming Dynasty, commented on this matter in the "Seeing Su Collection", saying: "Those who have no lack of kindness in the world and can be filial piety ... Buried in Yay! ”
Lin Jun believes that kindness and filial piety are one, and there are loopholes in Guo Ju'er's logic, and at the same time, he points out that the Book of Dan is not enough to believe, and it belongs to the good deeds in order to beautify Guo Ju.
Li Guangdi, a famous minister of the Qing Dynasty, was also one of many opponents, and he pointed out in his book "Quotations of Rongcun Village": "Guo Ju's son must have no choice but to listen to him starving. Burying it is a harmful principle. This is all the disadvantage of the good name of the Han and Jin people. ”
Lu Xun's comments in "Twenty-Four Filial Pieties" and "Afterword": Not only do I dare not think of being filial piety anymore, but I am afraid that my father will be filial piety...
Lin Jun of the Ming Dynasty could not see this matter, and also wrote a "Guo Ju Debate", scolding Guo Ju bitterly at length:
You Guo Ju buried your son, if grandma asks where your grandson is, do you big filial piety tell the truth? If you tell the truth, grandma died of anger as soon as she heard it, and you Guo Ju was killing your mother. Are you filial or not?