"If you listen to it at the same time, you will be bright, and if you believe it partially, you will be dark", and the classic "Zizhi Tongjian Tang Taizong Zhenguan II": "Shang (Tang Taizong) asked Wei Zhengyi: 'What is the lord of man and what is bright and what is dark?'" "If you listen to it, it is bright, and if you believe it, you will be dark." This means that only by listening to the opinions of many sides can we distinguish between right and wrong; listening to unilateral words, we cannot distinguish between right and wrong.
We extend this sentence to think of it as a criterion for evaluating a person. The most complex thing in the world is the human heart, any person is a "polyhedron", there is a good side, there is also a bad side, if it is "partial" to a certain aspect of someone, it will make a wrong judgment, only to "listen" and fully understand all aspects of him, in order to make a correct and fair judgment on it, in order to restore his original appearance!
Throughout ancient Chinese history, there are not a few historical figures who have been "partially believed", and Emperor Gaozong of the Song Dynasty is a typical representative!
Let's first look at the Zhao Shuo in most people's eyes
Most people remember zhao cuo as the ninth son of Emperor Huizong of Song and the younger brother of Zhao Huan of Song Qinzong, after the "Jing Kang Revolution", Hui and Qin Emperors were captured by the Jin people, and Zhao Shuo ascended the throne in Yingtianfu, establishing the Southern Song Dynasty, becoming the founding emperor of the Southern Song Dynasty and the tenth emperor of the Song Dynasty.
During Zhao Shuo's reign, although he was forced by the situation to use Yue Fei, Han Shizhong and other famous anti-Jin generals, he did not want to really fight with the Jin Dynasty endlessly, all he did was to "seek peace with war", so Qin Ju and other traitors of the lords and factions paid more attention to him, so when Yue Fei's Northern Expedition was about to be completed, Zhao Shuo issued twelve gold medals in a row to force Yue Fei's class to return to the dynasty, and finally joined forces with Qin Ju and others to mutilate Yue Fei in the Wind Wave Pavilion on the charge of "false accusations".
Because of the above "disgraceful" deeds, Zhao Shuo left the impression of being weak and incompetent, afraid of war, and cruel to Zhongliang, and it cannot be said that these impressions were wrong, after all, Zhao Shuo did reuse Qin Ju and did kill Yue Fei, but this was only "a certain aspect" of Zhao Shuo, or his "evil" side, not the "true face" of Zhao Shuo!
So what kind of emperor was Zhao Zhuo in history?
Zhao Shuo was definitely not a weak and incompetent person, on the contrary, he was not afraid of danger, he was wise and courageous, and regarded death as a homecoming, when he was still the King of Kang, the Jin army besieged Kaifeng Province for the first time in the first year of Jing Kang, asking the princes and zaichen of the Song Dynasty to go to negotiate peace, at that time all the princes were greedy and afraid of death, afraid of death, afraid of their heads and tails, afraid of this fatal errand falling on their heads, only Zhao Shuo was not afraid of life and death, stepped forward, and Song Qinzong ordered Zhang Bangchang to go to the Jin camp with Zhao Shuo.
After the two arrived at the Jin camp, they were threatened and intimidated by the Jin people, Zhang Bangchang was greedy and afraid of death, often wept bitterly, kneeling and begging for forgiveness, Zhao Shuo was not moved, and the jin army commander was "hard and rigid", there was no fear on his face, and later the Jin people imprisoned the two, Zhao Shuo read and practiced martial arts as usual every day, and did not have the slightest "consciousness" of being a prisoner of the order, the jin army commander thought that there was absolutely no such a bold prince in the Song imperial family, so he doubted his true identity, and finally forced the fifth prince Zhao Shu to come and exchange Zhao Shuo, and Zhao Shuo escaped, and that winter of that year, The Jin soldiers made a comeback and besieged Kaifeng, and Zhao Zhuo was ordered to send another envoy to the Jin camp, only to be dissuaded by the Hebei guards to stay.
From Zhao Zhao's performance in jinying, it is not difficult for us to see that he is by no means a weak and incompetent person who is greedy for life and afraid of death, so why did he become afraid of his head and tail after he became emperor, and he was full of power and peace?
The reason is very simple, Zhao Zhuo's identity and position have changed, when he was still the King of Kang, he was a bare stick, he could not be afraid of life and death, when he became emperor, he had to consider all aspects of the problem, Yue Fei and other generals single-handedly led the battle, vowing to recover the homeland, but they did not consider the actual situation of the Southern Song Dynasty at all.
At that time, the Southern Song Dynasty was in a quiet corner, the strength could not be compared with the Jin Dynasty, Yue Fei's several Northern Expeditions made the Southern Song Dynasty's military expenditure more and more large, had to levy high taxes on the people, which made the southern Song Dynasty people's resentment, and even broke out of the peasant uprising, if the war continues, the peasant uprising in the Southern Song Dynasty will be out of control, then I am afraid that Yue Fei and others failed to recover their homeland, and the Southern Song regime would be gone.
Therefore, Zhao Shuo had no choice but to "seek peace with war", hoping to maintain a temporary peace, but Yue Fei, Han Shizhong and other generals did not understand Zhao Shuo's good intentions and difficulties, but only blindly asked for money, which made the gap between them and Zhao Shuo bigger and bigger, and finally Qin Ju and other traitors took advantage of the void!
Of course, no matter what, Zhao Shuo killed Yue Fei is an indisputable fact, but the reasons behind this are very complicated, and we cannot arbitrarily characterize Zhao Shuo as a faint and incompetent monarch
In fact, Zhao Zhuo was not incompetent, but on the contrary, he was both literate and martial
According to the "History of Song", Zhao Zhuo was proficient in calligraphy, good at truth, line, cursive, and his brushwork was free and graceful, natural and smooth, and quite a Jin people's charm. Of course, the Song Dynasty emphasized literature and light martial arts, almost every emperor was a great talent, and Zhao Shuo's literary flair was also expected by the world, but what few people know is that Zhao Shuo is not only good at literature but also good at martial arts, he has excellent arm strength, excellent archery, and is good at improving weapons, called "weapon master"!
High martial arts and improved weapons are two different concepts, Yue Fei is superior in martial arts, good at leading troops to fight, but in terms of improving weapons is far inferior to Zhao Shuo, when the Yue family army was first built, the weapons were simple, Zhao Zhuo personally "operated the knife", designed a long gun for the Yue family army, Yue Fei was greatly impressed after the trial, immediately equipped the whole army, and later the Yue family army was able to play a great prestige, so that the Jin people issued a sigh of "shaking the mountain is easy, regretting the difficulty of the Yue family army", absolutely have a credit to Zhao Zhao!
In addition, Zhao Zhuo also improved the Song Dynasty's God Arm Bow, the God Arm Bow is the Song Dynasty army's best weapon, once made the Jin people suffer a lot, but Zhao Zhuo believes that this bow still has room for improvement, after some efforts, Zhao Zhuo successfully improved the God Arm Bow, the improved bow has reduced the requirements for arm strength, the power has become larger, becoming the Song Army's first major killing weapon against the enemy!
brief summary:
According to the basic principles of Marxist philosophy, the evaluation of historical figures should adopt the historical analysis method, put the characters in a specific historical background for all-round analysis, so as to draw a more objective conclusion, if you catch the wind and catch the shadow, the vision is limited to a certain aspect, the conclusion must be one-sided, not objective, just like Song Gaozong Zhao Shuo, if we have a deep understanding of it, we will find that he is not as bad as we imagined!
We must remember that "both listening is bright, and partial belief is dark", evaluating historical figures is so, and it is even more so to deal with people in the world!
References: Zizhi Tongjian Tang Taizong Zhenguan II, History of the Song Dynasty
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