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What has been the ideal politics of the Chinese people for thousands of years?
That is the "good government of the wise": when a saint or the most important is also a gentleman, a country will govern and prosper.
Is this really the case?" Did "The Wise Man And the Government" ever exist in the real life of the Chinese? What about the true face of the wise men?
For the Chinese people, the Eight Sages are a well-known sage and a good person.
There is no Eight Sages King in the world, and Xiao Feng Dao is everywhere
The shape of the Eight Sages King comes from the Ming Dynasty vernacular novel "Yang Jiajian", also known as "Northern Song Zhi Biography". According to this book, the Eight Sages were born in this way:
He was the fourth son of Zhao Kuangyin, the founding emperor of the Song Dynasty. Before his death, Zhao Kuangyin made his fourth son the King of the Eight Sages and gave him a golden sword, which could "fight the emperor and the traitor", and the main reason why he did this was that he wanted his son to supervise the "brother and brother" and succeed his younger brother Zhao Guangyi (Song Taizong).
Subsequently, this Eight Sages King became the messenger of justice, the embodiment of fairness. He has a wide range of powers, "the upper temple does not participate in the king, and the lower temple does not resign the king." He was righteous and awe-inspiring, he was righteous and outspoken, he was supreme, he was a shock to the emperor and the traitors, and he could always appear at key moments to help the Yang family.
However, without too much research, judging by historical common sense alone, I believe that the Eight Sages in "Yang Jiajian" are unmistakable, and he cannot exist in the real dynasty.
My reason is not only because the stories of the Eight Sages come from commentaries and folk lyrics, which are not recorded in the main history, but also the most crucial thing is that in ancient China, what kind of power could surpass the imperial power. If it were not for the puppet, what emperor would tolerate such a prince who often climbed on his head to exercise justice, and how long could he endure?
According to historical legend, the Song Taizu Zhao Kuangyin "candle shadow axe sound" before his death, there is a saying that he was hacked to death by his younger brother Zhao Guangyi, if this theory is true, then how can Zhao Kuangyin appoint his son to supervise the murderer before he was killed? Wild history circulates that Zhao Guangyi cut off his brother and forced his nephew to die, and this story line is more in line with the logic of power struggle and court struggle.
The above is analyzed from the perspective of imperial power, and then from the perspective of personal desires. We might as well assume that there is really such a wise man who even the emperor dares to fight, so who will restrain him? Without restraint, wouldn't he be more whimsical and lawless than the emperor? Taking a step back, if this supreme overseer existed, then even if the emperor did not straighten him out, he would fall on his own. Because a realistic person cannot have no selfish thoughts, it is impossible not to eat incense in the world, especially in the case of unsupervised self-power, it is impossible to never make mistakes.
"Yang JiaJun" describes the most splendid bridge section of the Eight Sages King, which is to pretend to be a ghost with the Qing official Kou Zhun, "wisely judge Pan Renmei", and rehabilitate Yang Laolinggong and his son Zhaoxue. Why didn't the Eight Sages King spare no effort to help the Yang family generals? In the book, in addition to "justice", there is also a delicate layer of kinship. Yang Liuhao's wife, Lord Cheshire, is a brother and sister of the Eight Sages, and helping the Yang family is helping her brother-in-law. This seems to be more like a person. The author of "Yang JiaJian" wrote the big book "Wisdom Trial Pan Renmei", which was originally intended to say that the Eight Sages Wang Xiande, for the sake of belated justice. But in fact, they did not pay attention, exposing the private thoughts of the sages. Such a whimsical sage is a disaster for a traitor like Pan Renmei, but for the law of the song dynasty, isn't it also the same thing that is at the mercy of the people?!
Obviously, the image of the Eight Sages King is derived from the story of the Yang family general.
Through further examination of the relevant historical materials, I learned the deeper background of the introduction of the story, which is intriguing:
The vernacular novel "Yang Jia Jiang" was written in the Ming Dynasty, and the prototype of the Yang Family Story appeared as early as the Southern Song Dynasty, to be precise, in the era of the second emperor rule of the Southern Song Dynasty. We know that the first emperor of the Southern Song Dynasty was Emperor Gaozong of Song, and although this Zhao Shuo lived a very high life (at the age of eighty), he fell ill in his early years because he was frightened by the pursuit of Jin Bing and lost his fertility, so he adopted a son in the imperial family and designated this adopted son to succeed him, and this adopted son was Zhao Xuan of Song Xiaozong, after Zhao Defang, the fourth son of Song Taizu. That is to say, the blood of the Emperor of the Song Dynasty thus returned from the Taizong lineage back to the Taizu lineage.
At that time, the situation was that the small court of the Southern Song Dynasty, Gou An Jiangnan, was constantly bullied by the Jin Dynasty from the south, most of the Southern Song Dynasty halls were stubborn, and a few famous anti-Jin generals had a bad fate, such as the national hero Yue Fei was also killed for no reason, and after Song Xiaozong came to power, there were signs of exerting great efforts. He rehabilitated Yue Fei against Zhaoxue, and the political bureau of the Southern Song Dynasty took a turn for the better. This greatly increased the people's hopes for Wang Shibeiding Zhongyuan, they remembered Yue Fei, and at the same time, they also remembered the Yang family's loyal martyrs who heroically resisted foreign enemies in those years, so the story of the Yang family generals continued to take shape in the folk. The Yang family in the story has been framed by traitors many times, and urgently needs a protective god to cover them. The current emperor Xiaozong Zhao Xuan was exactly after Zhao Defang, the fourth son of Taizu in that year, so the people gave the chair of the Eight Sages King to Zhao Defang, the ancestor of the emperor of the dynasty, as the embodiment of justice that could restrain the monarchy and ask for the people's lives.
I see! Looking up at the Eight Sages in "Yang Jia Jiang", he is not so much a historical figure as an ideal embodiment. No matter what the reality is, anyway, folk artists have caught the audience's desire for the psychology of the wise man to rule the world. Therefore, in their stage commentaries, they will jump out of the legendary sages from time to time to meet everyone's yearning for an ideal life. The Eight Sages are such a fictional figure.
Regrettably, this perfect Eight Sages King can only satisfy the folk fantasy. The simple Chinese people have placed their hopes in governing society entirely on individual sages. The traditional Chinese concept of sage culture puts forward comprehensive requirements for those who join the army of "loyalty, filial piety, benevolence, righteousness, courtesy, wisdom and faith". These demands position the sage as a perfect and perfect person, which is not only harsh, but also unrealistic. Therefore, sages such as the Eight Sages, like gods and horses, can only gallop in literary and artistic works.
Well, today's sharing ends here, and we'll see you next time