In the historical records, Di Renjie's morality is perfect, he is good at fighting with people, whether it is the emperor or his colleagues, he always has to fight with black and white.
However, such a well-fought man could not move like a mountain above the dangerous temple, and Wu Zetian, who occupied the throne of the Li surname, respected him as the elder of the country, while the Li clan, who was in charge of Qiankun, also gave him endless mourning.
How did he do it? A good hand at squeezing colleagues There is a Cheng Huan in China called "spitting on one's own side."
The idiom says that others spit on their faces, not to wipe it off, but to let it dry themselves.
People often use this idiom to describe a person who is insulted but can be extremely tolerant and never resist.
The protagonist of this idiom story is called Lou Shide, who was Wu Zetian's right and left arm with Di Renjie at that time.
Although they are the same country, the abilities of the two people are different. Di Ren was outstanding, but Lou Shide seemed somewhat mediocre.
Although Lou Shide is a humble gentleman and will never have conflicts with anyone, the domineering Di Renjie is not accustomed to him sitting on an equal footing with himself, squeezing Lou Shide and sparing no effort.
Lou Shide was a person who believed in spitting on himself, and no matter how much Di Renjie bullied him, he didn't seem to pay attention to it.
In this way, on the contrary, outsiders could not see it, and they thought that Di Renjie's not even letting go of Lao Lou was a bit too much.
But everyone knew that Di Renjie came from a high and arrogant disposition, so no one dared to mediate this matter.
In the end, even Wu Zetian couldn't see it anymore, so he had to personally come forward to do Di Renjie's work.
Wu Zetian was the supreme leader at that time, and of course he had more material than anyone else.
At the same time, Wu Zetian was also particularly good at doing ideological and political work.
One day, when the dynasty was dispersed, Wu Zetian left Di Renjie behind and chatted a few words. She asked Di Renjie bluntly, "I use you so much, do you know why?"
Di Renjie replied very crisply: "I am a person who never knew how to rely on others, and you actually reused me in the end, I think it must be because of my excellent article and good character." ”
Although such an answer was expected by Wu Zetian, Di Renjie's tone still made her a little unhappy, she took a sip of tea, swallowed another mouthful of spit, and said in a calm tone as much as possible: "Mr. Di, you only know one, you don't know the other." At that time, I didn't know anything about you, why did I think of promoting you, all because someone recommended you in front of me. ”
This time it was Di Renjie's turn to be surprised: "Really? How could I not remember who would recommend me?"
"Give you three chances, guess what?" But I guess you can't guess even if you give you ten chances!"
Di Renjie was a wise man, and when he saw the emperor say this, he replied in passing: "Then please ask the emperor to tell me directly." ”
"Tell you what, you can have today, not because of others, but by Lou Shide, who recommended you in front of me five times!"
Wu Zetian seemed to see Di Renjie's surprise and disbelief, and immediately asked the attendant to take the filing cabinet, smiled and said to Di Renjie, "You go and open it yourself to see what is inside." ”
The filing cabinet opened, and more than a dozen letters of recommendation to the emperor were presented to Di Renjie one by one, and the theme of these recommendation letters was only one, that is, to recommend Di Renjie to an important position.
There is only one author of more than a dozen letters of recommendation, and that is Lou Shide.
This time it was Di Renjie's turn to be self-contained, and it turned out that he could have today, relying on Lou Shide's strong recommendation that year. If he didn't appreciate it, he knew that he still attacked Lou Shide from time to time.
And what made him even more ashamed was that Lou Shide had never been proud of himself and was kind to others, and had actually been silently bearing sneers without any explanation!
Finally, Di Renjie used his aggressiveness to achieve a famous saying that has been passed down through the ages: "The prime minister can hold a boat in his belly."
The capital of a famous detective
Di Renjie's family lineage was not prominent, and his father only made a long history of Kuizhou (夔州, in present-day Fengjie, Chongqing).
Di Renjie's "sandwich life" has been manifested since childhood. Once, when there was a murder case in the family, when the county official came to investigate the case, the family members reported the case to the county official in order to avoid suspicion.
But Di Renjie didn't buy it, and sat alone in the study and read.
The county official felt that the child did not give face, so he went to question him.
Di Renjie replied that the sages did not teach me to talk blindly without observation, so I did not have time to pay attention to you! Make the county officials angry enough!
Di Renjie's stepping stone to enter the official arena was not hard, because his certificate was obtained by Kao Ming. According to the famous history teacher Yuan Tengfei, the Ming Jingke is to fill in the blanks, and when you know what time to learn, you fill in the "learning" and you are finished.
Ming Jing is good at examination, so after being admitted, he cannot become a high official. Jinshike is particularly difficult to test, poetry and music, the country's major policies, whether to hold the Olympic Games, you have to write a paper.
Despite his ordinary family background and Ming Jing origins, Di Renjie did not offend less because of this.
One day, Di Renjie's colleague was going to be sent on a mission to the Western Regions, and he, who was known for his filial piety, thought that the old mother of his colleague's family was sick in bed, so he wanted to go on an envoy for him, but he was opposed by his superiors.
Regardless of his humble position, Di Renjie in turn asked his superiors: "Don't you feel guilty for letting an old mother miss her son thousands of miles away all day?"
In the end, the head did change to someone else, but Di Renjie was also resented for this.
Fortunately, the Tang Dynasty at that time had just shown its vitality, and Di Renjie, who had real talent and hard work, finally became a Dali Cheng during the reign of Emperor Gaozong of Tang after more than a dozen promotions and demotions.
During his tenure, he set an incredible record: a large backlog of cases was adjudicated in a year, but no one was wronged.
Wisdom fight to junchen
As a Beijing official, Di Renjie still had a posture of not being afraid of heaven and earth.
For example, Emperor Gaozong of Tang wanted to visit Fenyang Palace, and the local governor decided to open a new imperial road in order to curry favor with the emperor, but under di Renjie's resolute opposition, the construction plan of the imperial road was forced to be suspended.
For another example, King Benli of Zuo Shilang was pampered, and the ministers of the DPRK were very afraid of him.
However, Di Renjie did not think so, and often seized the opportunity to impeach Wang Benli.
Even if Emperor Gaozong of Tang was deliberately partial, Di Renjie was not impressed. In the end, he really pulled Down Wang Benli, and the imperial court was solemn for a while.
During the reign of Wu Zetian, Di Renjie also encountered the biggest crisis in his life, that time against Wu Chengsi and the famous cool official Lai Junchen.
Wu Chengsi believed that Di Renjie would definitely become the biggest obstacle to his being made an imperial heir in the future.
Therefore, he instructed the cool official Lai Junchen to falsely accuse Di Renjie and others of rebellion, and immediately arrested Di Renjie and imprisoned him.
At that time, there was a clause in the law: "Those who ask questions and rebels may reduce their death." This means that if a person voluntarily admits that he has committed treason, he can mitigate the crime, which is close to what is said today: "confession and leniency, strict resistance."
Lai Junchen forced Di Renjie to admit to "plotting rebellion," and Di Renjie immediately gave him a complete admission: "Rebellion is a fact!" After receiving Di Renjie's confession, Lai Junchen was full of joy and relaxed his vigilance against Di Renjie. Who knows, Di Renjie only used this trick to paralyze Junchen. Later, Di Renjie took advantage of the prison guard's lack of preparation, secretly wrote down the appeal materials, quietly placed them in his cotton clothes, and asked the prison guards to tell their families to take the cotton clothes away. In the end, Di Renjie's son transferred the appeal materials to Wu Zetian's hands.
Therefore, Wu Zetian personally summoned Di Renjie and asked him face to face: "Why did you take the initiative to admit to plotting rebellion in the first place?"
Di Renjie replied calmly, "If I hadn't admitted to plotting rebellion, I guess I would have died under Lai Junchen's whip a long time ago, so how can I see the emperor again?"
Di Renjie escaped with his wit, but from then on he became a sworn enemy of Wu Chengsi.
Counting from life to death
During Di Renjie's years as chancellor, Wu Zetian's trust in him was beyond the reach of others.
For example, Wu Zetian often referred to Di Renjie as the "Elder of the Nation" and rarely called him by his first name.
For the elderly Di Renjie, Wu Zetian showed a warm side: above the court, Wu Zetian allowed Di Renjie not to bow down; Wu Zetian also warned the officials of the DPRK on many occasions: "If it is not a major matter of the military state, do not bother the duke (referring to Di Renjie)." ”
It was a great deal for Di Renjie. In Wu Zetian's court, Di Renjie's status was so lofty that no one could stand out.
This gave Di Renjie the opportunity to make calm arrangements for his successor after Wu Zetian. Wu Chengsi was Wu Zetian's nephew and had always aspired to become crown prince, while Wu Zetian hesitated.
Di Renjie seized the opportunity to impress Wu Zetian with his affection.
Di Renjie told Wu Zetian that the matter of establishing a prince was of great importance, and there were many factors that should be taken into account, but the first thing to consider was himself.
There is no doubt that people are dying, so we need to choose a successor.
If the successor is well chosen, his own line, principles and policies will be implemented, and his spiritual position can also be enshrined by future generations; If the successor is not well chosen, then everything he did before he was born may be overthrown, and his future spiritual position will be abandoned.
It is also in this sense that the choice of successor should first choose the person who is closest to oneself in blood — only blood is the most reliable.
The most realistic way is that you should make your own son the prince.
If you have your son, you will be the emperor's mother in the future, and it is only natural that you deserve to enjoy the Taimiao Temple; And if you set up the descendants of the Wu clan as the crown prince, then in the future you can only be the aunt of the future emperor, and the nephew let the aunt enjoy the Taimiao Temple, which seems to be a bit hanging!
Obviously, Di Renjie's words were very lethal to Wu Chengsi, and eventually impressed Wu Zetian.
She decided to make her son crown prince, and Wu Chengsi eventually lost the possibility of inheriting the throne of Wu Zetian.
This institutionally guaranteed that Di Renjie would not be liquidated by Wu Chengsi, and as a by-product, the Li Tang Dynasty also completed the restoration.
In order to ensure that Wu Chengsi would not resurrect after his death, Di Renjie also carefully selected his own successor before his death, and this person was Zhang Kamzhi.
One day, Wu Zetian asked Di Renjie for a candidate for prime minister, and Di Renjie said without hesitation: "The governor of Jingzhou, Shi Zhang Kamzhi, is a rare candidate, and although this person is older, he is a real talent for prime minister." This man has never been discovered in his life, and if you use him as prime minister, he will certainly bow down to the country. ”
As a result, Wu Zetian promoted Zhang Kamzhi's official position from Changshi to Sima (司馬).
After a while, Wu Zetian asked Di Renjie to recommend the prime minister, and Di Renjie smiled and said, "I have recommended Zhang Kamzhi before, and I have never seen you use this person until now." ”
Wu Zetian said, "How useless?" I have already promoted him to Sima (司馬). ”
Di Renjie said unhurriedly, "What I recommended to you was the candidate for the prime minister, but you asked him to be Sima And of course there was no appointment." ”
Later, Zhang Kamzhi was indeed appointed as the prime minister.
The Book of Tang records that in the first year of Jiushi (700), Di Renjie died.
A grieving Wu Zetian uttered a eulogy that has been passed down through the ages: "Chaotang Kongye!"
When Wu Zetian was seriously ill, the chancellor Zhang Kamzhi did not live up to Di Renjie's expectations, decisively started an incident, and it took only half an hour to complete the coup d'état to return the regime to Li Tang.
Soon, Li Shi regained control of Qiankun, and Di Renjie was forced to be made Sikong first, and then forced to be made the Duke of Liang.