"Taboo" is a unique culture in ancient China, and sometimes it often causes people a lot of trouble. The so-called taboo, generally for his holiness, simply put, is related to the elders or high-ranking people things and words to be used carefully, for example, the most typical, once the emperor in ancient times took a name, the words in his name can not be mentioned by the people, there is a "civil department" in the three provinces and six ministries system, because Li Shimin committed taboos after he ascended the throne, it was changed to "household department".
This is not the most embarrassing taboo, the famous poet Li He of the Tang Dynasty, because of the taboo, could not be admitted to the imperial examination for a lifetime. Why? Li He's father's name was Li Jinsu, and there was a "Jin" in his name, and "Jin" was homophonous with "Jin" in the Jinshi section, so people at that time reported that he could not take the Jinshike examination, although the teacher Han Yu defended him in every way, and finally Li He had to leave the examination room.
Under normal circumstances, the emperor also knows that the people are easy to make taboos with words, so the names of the imperial family are generally chosen to be more exotic words to take, and Ming Taizu even specially specified a bunch of words that are difficult to recognize for his family's name, one of which is to prevent ordinary people or readers from committing taboos without knowing it and suffering from injustice.
Emperor Huizong of Song, who was born in 1082, originally did not have the opportunity to become emperor, but because Song Zhezong at that time did not have suitable heirs to inherit the throne, Zhao Tuo, as the Duan King, was supported by the empress dowager on the emperor's throne. Zhao Tuo was a man of high literary attainment, and it is said that his father, Shenzong, was very envious when he watched the portrait of Li Yu, the lord of the Southern Tang Dynasty, and soon after Zhao Tuo was born, and the history books record that he "was a hundred times more literate and popular with Li Lord."
However, just as Li Yu's example is, most of the people whose literary attainments in history are too luxurious and beautiful are not good emperors. At that time, many people opposed Zhao Tuo's succession to the throne, but in the end he sat on the emperor's throne. Because of his meticulous study of literature and art, Zhao Tuo had almost no idea about the governance of politics, and at that time, a group of traitorous ministers Cai Jing and Gao Qiu catered to This mentality of Zhao Tuo, and did not talk to Zhao Tuo about governing the country at all, only talking about literature and art eating, drinking, and interesting things.
There is a person named Fan Zhixuan, in order to attract the eyes of Song Huizong, he proposed that "the emperor belongs to the dog, but now the people of the world are very fond of eating dog meat, which is a great disrespect to the emperor, and it will also affect the fate and national fortune of the emperor in feng shui and taboo." Zhao Yao knew so much, and when he heard him say such a thing, he was immediately very panicked, and he was about to order that people in the world be forbidden to eat slaughter dogs.
At this moment, the ministers fried the pot, the world does not know how many people rely on the operation of dog meat restaurants to survive, if the emperor because of his own selfishness to forbid the slaughter of dogs in the world, then these people will definitely lose the dependence of life. If such a consequence were caused, how would people all over the world look at Emperor Huizong of Song and how would they look at the court of the Great Song Dynasty? Therefore, the ministers stopped Zhao Tuo from making this will.
However, hearing that eating dog meat would affect his own fate and national fortunes, Zhao Yao was of course panicked, where would he care about these remarks of the ministers? It will be imposed. However, at this time, a courtier stepped forward, and he retorted to Zhao Tuo: "Your father, Emperor Shenzong, is a rat, is he going to forbid folk cats to catch rats?" When this sentence came down, Song Huizong had nothing to say and had to give up.
This incident also shows the level of governance of Emperor Huizong of Song, which is the so-called "poor night half empty front seat, do not ask the heavens to ask the ghosts and gods." Only by winning the hearts and minds of the people of the world can we ensure the prosperity of our country and ensure that our destiny will not live in vain.