During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, the two most legendary military geniuses, Sun Wu and Sun Bing, were both members of the Sun family. What is unknown is that they are still all Qi people, and they are all the bloodline of the Qi royal family, and finally Sun Bin also serves the Qi state. Guan Zhong was also a very legendary figure in the Spring and Autumn Period, helping the Duke of Qi Huan to "honor the king and establish great feats". So why did the State of Qi not unify the world in the end? The following interesting history Xiaobian will bring you a detailed introduction, let's take a look at it!
First of all, let's talk about the history of the State of Qi, although the State of Qi is a country, it is actually divided into two stages, one is the State of Qi, which was sealed by Jiang Ziya in 1044 BC, and the other is the State of Qi, which tian He established himself as king in 386 BC. This is also a typical representative of Zhuangzi's saying that "those who steal the hook are cursed, and those who steal the country are princes" - Tian He stole the world of the State of Qi surnamed Jiang and was crowned as a prince. In both periods, the State of Qi had the opportunity to unify the world.
One is the Jiang surname Qi Guo period, with the help of Guan Zhong, the Duke of Qi Huan "Nine Princes, One Kuang Tianxia", at that time The Duke of Qi Huan was the first prince to dominate, and the strength of other princes could not be compared with him. At this time, if the Duke of Qi Huan invaded the Zhou Dynasty in the west and replaced it, it was very likely. And Qi Huangong himself actually has this meaning, often making his own interests similar to tianzi, indicating that he has the meaning of trespassing.
But he didn't succeed in the end, because his ambitions were eventually stopped by an important person, Guan Zhong. The hegemony of the Duke of Qi Huan can be said to have been established with the help of Guan Zhong, but Guan Zhong always only helped Qi Huan to dominate and did not approve of his replacement of the Zhou Dynasty. In order to prepare for the establishment of the "Qi Dynasty", Duke Huan of Qi first prepared to seal Zen like the Son of Heaven and declare his merits to heaven:
So Huan Gong called it: "The widow went south to Zhaoling and looked at Xiongshan; Northern Expedition Shanrong, Detachment, Lone Bamboo; Western Expedition to Bactria, wading in quicksand; The horse was suspended and the carriage was ascended to the taihang, and returned to the Bei'er Mountain. Princes shall not disobey the widows. The meeting of the widow's military car is three, the meeting of the car is six, the nine princes are combined, and the world is one. The past three generations have been ordained, so why is it different from this? I want to seal Taishan, Zen Liang Father. ”
Guan Zhong's attitude toward this is that he is resolutely opposed. He found all kinds of reasons to prevent Qi Huangong from replacing Zhou Tianzi, and even did not hesitate to intimidate Qi Huangong with ghostly things, as recorded in the "Records of History":
"Guan Zhonggu advises, and does not listen; It is said that Huan Gong is sealed with a distant treasure monster, and Huan Gong is stopped. ”
Qi Huangong may not have believed guan Zhong's words of a ghost god, but wouldn't his most powerful minister so strongly oppose his great cause of reunification than the obstruction of the ghost god? As for why Guan Zhong opposed the replacement of the Zhou Dynasty by the Duke of Qi Huan, there may be two reasons. On the one hand, it was out of public conscience - the internal contradictions in the State of Qi at that time were actually very serious, on the one hand, the Tian family that later replaced the State of Qi had already entered the court, and on the other hand, Yi Ya, Gongzi Kaifang, Shu Diao and others also occupied the court.
If Qi Huangong really attacked the Zhou Dynasty, which had not exhausted its qi, it was likely that he had not yet reached his destination, and his own family would be in turmoil. Guan Zhong himself, surnamed Ji, is a descendant of King Mu of Zhou, so he is a relative of the Zhou royal family. According to the culture of the time, guan Zhong could not have helped outsiders fight the Zhou royal family—although he was a courtier of the Duke of Qi Huan, he was also a vassal of Zhou Tianzi. For this reason, Confucius once criticized Guan Zhong, whom he respected very much, and said, "Guan Zhong's instrument is Small!"
Due to the reasons of the times and the obstruction of Guan Zhong, the State of Qi lost the first opportunity to unify the world.
When Sun Bing appeared, the State of Qi of the Tian clan had a second chance to unify the world.
Sun Bing is from Sun Wu, and Sun Wu is from Sun Shu. Sun Shu was not originally called Sun Shu, his name was Tian Shu. Tian Shu can also be called Chen Shu — because he was a descendant of Chen Quan (also known as Tian Quan), tian quan was the son of Chen Ligong, and Chen Ligong was a descendant of Emperor Shun. All in all, after Tian Quan fled from the State of Chen to the State of Qi, one descendant replaced Jiang as the King of Qi, and the other branch passed on to the line of The Soldier Saint Sun Wu, and Sun Wu passed on to Sun Zhen. Later, Sun Bing returned to the State of Qi and served the State of Qi.
Logically speaking, Sun Zhi was originally a distant relative of King Qi, and he was also talented, so there was no problem in helping King Qi unify the world. So why did King Qi lose this opportunity again?
In the "Art of War of Sun Yuan", it is specifically recorded that Sun Bin's views on The King of Qiwei after seeing the King of Qiwei are specially recorded, and Sun Bin wrote about the King of Qiwei and the State of Qi in this way:
"What about the question of King Wei and Lord Tian Jichen?" Sun Tzu said: "King Wei asked nine, Tian Ji asked Qi, and several knew the soldiers, but did not reach The Daoye." I heard that the believer Chang, Li Yi. Those who are unprepared are wounded, and those who are poor are killed. Qi III was worried. ””
Why did Sun Bin come to the conclusion that both King Qi Wei and Tian Ji "did not reach the Daoye"? We might as well take a look at what Both King Qi Wei and Tian Ji had asked. With regard to the question of King Qi Wei, we will extract a few and compare them with another heroic prince, Qin Xiaogong, who asked Shang Martin, to see the gap between the two and the reason why Sun Zhen said that King Qi "did not reach The Daoye".
King Qi Wei asked Sun Tzu, "The two armies are equal, the two generals are facing each other, both are firm and solid, do not dare to take the first move, why bother?"
"The enemy is outnumbered, the enemy is strong and I am weak, so why use it?"
What can be seen is that King Qi Wei asked the question of what tactics should be adopted in the specific situation. So let's take a look at what questions are raised between Qin Xiaogong and Shang Martin? When Qin Xiaogong inquired about Shang Martingale, he said this:
"Dai Li does not forget the society, and the way of the king is also; Wrong law and ignorance claim, the subject's line also. Now I want to change the law to govern, and I am more respectful to teach the people, and I am afraid that the world will discuss me. ”
That is to say: "I don't care how to do the change of law, I want you to make my country strong." Now that the courtiers and the people are talking about your new Law, I hope you will tell me what to do. ”
Therefore, Qin Xiaogong directly passed over the specific tactical problem as soon as he came up--this kind of small problem is left to you to discuss the martingale, I am only concerned with the success or failure of the whole thing of changing the law, and I am only concerned with the implementation of this grand strategy.
Therefore, the gap between the two was immediately reflected, and King Qi Wei's dream was to be a "master of micro-exercises", hoping to make various specific tactics clearer than the courtiers; And Qin Xiaogong is a master of strategy, he only cares about the direction of the overall strategy, and does not care about how to do something specifically. The king's energy is limited, and the affairs of the state are unlimited, and if the king cannot delegate power to the ministers and is too concerned with the small things, then the big things must not succeed.
Sure enough, although Sun Zhi and Tian Ji helped King Qi Wei defeat the overlord Wei guo at that time, in the end, King Qi Wei was afraid of Tian Ji and Sun Zhigong. Sun Bing had to return to the hidden mountains and forests early, and Tian Ji was also driven to the Chu kingdom by the King of Qi Wei, so the last chance of the King of Qi to unify the world was gone.
Eventually, the State of Qi was destroyed by the State of Qin in 221 BC.