2022 marks the 620th anniversary of the martyrdom of Fang Xiaoru, a famous politician, thinker and educator of the Ming Dynasty. Fang Xiaoru was born in Ninghai and martyred in Nanjing, and his youngest son was rescued by many righteous soldiers and went to Shanghai Fengxian to live in seclusion, which has multiplied for more than 20 generations.
"Zhongde Inheritance Hidden Sage"
On the north bank of the Zhoujiagang River in Fengxian, Shanghai, there is a "Fang Family Ancestral Hall". It also has a more formal name, called "Founder Xue Ancestral Hall". Fang Zhengxue, also known as Fang Xiaoru, whose ideas involve politics, economics, law, science, literature, history, education and many other aspects, is called "the ancestor of the ming" by Huang Zongxi, and even comparable to Zhu Zi, "Gai Qianzai one person".
Fang Xiaoru's hometown is in Ninghai, but his ancestral shrine is located in Fengxian, Shanghai, which is related to a shocking tragedy - Fang Xiaoru was sentenced to death and condemned to the Ten Tribes for refusing to draft an edict for Zhu Di.
After Fang Xiaoru was killed, Wei Ze, who was then a lieutenant in Ninghai County, decided to emulate the righteous act of "Cheng Bao saving orphans" and risked his life to protect Fang Xiaoru's bloodline. Wei Ze was once the Shangshu of the Punishment Department, and because of his selflessness and impartial law enforcement, he offended the magnates and was demoted to the rank of lieutenant of Ninghai County. Before the Fang family's secret order to cut off the door had arrived, Wei Ze took the night to rescue Fang Zhongxian, Fang Xiaoru's youngest son, from hiding.
At that time, Taizhou Xiucai Yu Xuekui also wanted to save Fang Xiaoru's orphans and pretended to be crazy to come to Ninghai, twice intercepting Wei Ze singing in the street. Wei Ze understood his intentions, so he handed Over Fang Zhongxian and the entrustment letter he had written in advance to the other party. Disguised as a fisherman, Yu Xuekui fled by sea with Fang Zhongxian, and after several months of travel, arrived in Qingcun, Songjiang Province (present-day Fengxian district, Shanghai), and asked Fang Xiaoru's protégé Yu Yun to take Fang Zhongxian in.
Yu Yun promised to leave Fang Zhongxian in his own home, and later changed his name to Yu Dezong to cover his eyes and ears, and married his adopted daughter to him as a wife, and externally called him a son-in-law. Since then, Fang Xiaoru's descendants have lived in seclusion in Shanghai.
After Emperor Mingshen Zhu Yijun ascended the throne, he ordered the ministers of The Emperor Jianwen to be resubmitted to those who had their descendants, and later exonerated the ministers. In the 36th year of the Wanli Calendar, Yang Tingjun, the Imperial Historian of Nanjing, allowed his descendants to revert to the surname Of Fang after identifying Yu Dezong as Fang Xiao's concubine and breeding to more than 200 people.
In the second year of the Apocalypse, Fang Xiaoru's 10th grandson Fang Zhongyi entered Beijing to take the Gongsheng examination, and wrote to Emperor Mingxi Zhu You, requesting that Fang Xiaoru's reputation be officially restored. The emperor therefore decreed: "Fang Xiaoru is loyal to the festival, and there is a will, and he is allowed to be one with Lian Zining." ”
After Fang Zhongxian changed his name to Yu Dezong, he "was modest and prudent, and taught for a living." In his later years, he changed his name to Yi Chun to show that he did not forget his biological father." Yu Yun also wrote the name of the hall for Yu Dezong, "Youcheng Hall", which means that "after the right path is more helpful, the revival of the middle way will be successful".
Starting from Yu Dezong, Fang Xiaoru's ideas of actively joining the WTO and studying the truth, such as "taking the materials of the world as the heart" and "always taking the Ming Dynasty's way and taking the Taiping as their own responsibility", also took root in Shanghai and constantly infiltrated the cultural bones of this fertile land of Jiangnan.
Among Fang Xiaoru's descendants in Shanghai, there were also people with lofty ideals: Fang Zhongyi defended the city and died when Zhang Xianzhong invaded Sichuan; Fang Xiuying, the eldest daughter of the 22nd Sun Fang Lianzuo, became an underground liaison officer of the CCP and contributed to the revolutionary cause without hesitation.
"Chiaki Masahiro's 1st Intention"
Academically, Fang Xiaoru attaches great importance to the study and discussion of history. He believes that when historians write history, they must not only write straight books, but also make moral judgments on history, that is, to transcend the right and wrong that have become facts for a while, to transcend specific individual eras, to judge history with relatively constant moral standards of justice, to make solemn moral judgments on history, to pinpoint evil, to praise good deeds, to enable those who come after them to follow, and to guide history to develop in the direction of goodness.
If the writer of history succumbs to the established historical facts and takes the results of history as the value of moral judgment, it will inevitably form a theoretical bias of "existence is reasonable" and "the winner is the prince and the loser is the thief", and historiography will inevitably lose its proper position of upholding justice, but will only drift with the wind, only knowing how to smear powder.
Fang Xiaoru spent his life mainly in lectures and writings. During Zhu Yuanzhang's reign, although he summoned Fang Xiaoru three times, he did not reuse him. It was only on the repeated recommendation of Qunchen that a professor of Hanzhong Fuxue was granted the post.
However, when Zhu Yuanzhang was lonely, he actually "summoned filial piety first." Therefore, after the Jianwen Emperor Zhu Yunjiao ascended the throne, he summoned Fang Xiaoru to enter the capital immediately. As a result, Fang Xiaoru became a heavy courtier around Emperor Jianwen, like a "generation of imperial masters". Emperor Jianwen not only summoned him to explain when he had doubts about reading, but also ordered Fang Xiaoru to reply to all major state events.
Fang Xiaoru also actively tried to influence and transform society with his knowledge and political ideals. He believes that the most basic duty of the monarch is to support the people, and the fundamental law of governing the country is "equality". He promoted the well field system, hid the wealth of the people, reused talents, carefully selected officials who governed the country and the people, and advocated benevolence and righteousness as the basis and supplemented by the rule of law.
Fang Xiaoru's righteous spirit has always inspired future generations, and his family style of "self-denial and retribution, words and deeds" has also been recognized by future generations. His influence spread throughout Jiangnan, adding a deep and strong background to Shanghai culture and Jiangnan culture.