In the history of Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes, there is one person who can be described as very critical, and he is Wang Yuanzhen. He campaigned for the protection of Dunhuang's cultural relics, but he never received the attention of the government.
Disheartened, he made an important decision: that is, to keep it for himself. He built three floors in the Dunhuang Tibetan Scripture Pavilion and was specifically responsible for protecting Dunhuang cultural relics.
However, due to his lack of knowledge and being lured by foreign scholars, he forced some of the cultural relics of the Tibetan Scripture Cabinet to sell.
As a result, this act of being forced to sell national treasures was criticized by Yu Qiuyu. Yu Qiuyu dutifully accused Wang Yuanzhen of being a historical sinner in "Cultural Journey" and caused repercussions among his readers.
However, experts in later generations believe that Wang Yuanzhen is not only not a historical sinner, but a historical hero, and Yu Qiuyu owes him an apology.
Run for the national treasure
Wang Yuanzhen is a native of Macheng, Hubei Province, and because his family is poor, he has to travel to various places in order to make a living. During the Qing Guangxu period, after Wang Yuanzhen joined the army and retired from the army, he became a Taoist monk, and the world often called him Wang Daoist.
Wang Daoist built the Taoist Temple of taiqing Palace at the Mogao Grottoes in Dunhuang, where he received incense, was charitable, and often treated the surrounding people.
Due to his limited savings, Wang Daoshi hired a scribe to copy the scriptures, and he took these copied Taoist scriptures to sell in order to maintain his basic life and the Taoist temple.
One day, the scribe was sitting in a cave and suddenly felt that there was an echo of an empty hole around him, as if there was a secret room, so he told wang Daoshi about this discovery.
After Wang Daoshi heard about it, he and the scribe chiseled through the wall of the cave, and sure enough, they found that there was a mystery hidden inside. This secret room is full of important cultural relics such as written scrolls and printed copies, which is the beginning and end of the discovery of the Tibetan Scripture Cave.
After discovering the cave, wang Daoist knew the importance of this matter. Although his level of education was not high, and he was a Taoist monk who believed in the Three Qings, he also knew that these cultural relics must be very precious.
Therefore, in the spirit of protecting the national treasures and cultural relics, he worked tirelessly and traveled all over the official government at that time to seek official attention.
He first took two scrolls of scriptures and walked 50 miles on foot to Send Them to Yan Ze, the county commander of Dunhuang County, hoping that he would protect them. Unfortunately, this county commander's position was originally bought with money, not only did he have no level of education, but he did not have any compassion at all, and looking at the yellowed scriptures, he only regarded it as a pile of waste paper.
After a while, Dunhuang County came to a new ZhiXian named Wang Zonghan. This Wang Zhixian was better than the former Zhixian Yan Ze, who was born into the jinshi and knew the importance of these cultural relics.
Therefore, after listening to the report of Wang Daoshi, he sent someone to the Tibetan Scripture Cave to check it out. In the Cave of the Scriptures, this Zhixian did feel that the cultural relics here were very precious, but due to the social unrest in the late Qing Dynasty, it was impossible for him to devote energy and personnel to guarding this place.
After searching for Zhixian without results, Wang Daoshi was still unwilling, and he went to the capital of Gansu alone to find Ye Changzi, the "director of education" at that time. This Ye Daren was an intellectual who had read a lot of poetry and books, and he also had a certain study of scriptures.
Therefore, he implored the envoys at that time to transport all the cultural relics of Dunhuang to the provincial ministry for collection. However, the envoy was in charge of the finances of a province, and he understood that the freight alone was a considerable expense, so he refused to study politics for this reason. He also ordered Wang Zonghan of Zhixian county to urge Wang Daoist to seal it on the spot and not to leak it.
After seeing that many unsuccessful applications for protection had been unsuccessful, Wang Daoshi was deeply disappointed in the corrupt government of the Manchu Qing. Discouraged, he built a three-story pavilion in the Tibetan Scripture Cabinet, which accompanied the scriptures all day long.
The sinners of eternity in "Cultural Journey"
In the 1990s, Chinese mainland had a best-selling book called Cultural Journey. For some time, the book was frequently placed at the bedside or desk of teachers, officials, and scholars.
When he walked to the Mogao Grottoes, he found a Taoist pagoda whose owner was None other than Wang Yuanzhen. Therefore, Yu Qiuyu recalled this past in his article and denounced Wang Yuanzhen as a historical sinner.
He wrote, "The owner of the Taoist Pagoda is actually the Wang Yuan Zhen!" History has recorded that he was a sinner in the Dunhuang Grottoes! ”
In the text, the main reason he considered Wang Yuanzhen to be a historical sinner was that the Taoist priest sold the national treasure to foreign adventurers and religious scholars.
He wrote: "In October 1905, the Russian Bluchev exchanged a small amount of Russian goods for a large number of clerical scrolls; in May 1907, the Hungarian Stein exchanged a stack of silver dollars for 24 large boxes of scrolls, 5 boxes of silk and paintings. ”
So he wrote bitterly: "I hate it! I don't know why a buddhist shrine would be run by a Taoist priest! ”
Yu Qiuyu's style of grief and indignation made his readers who followed him, or who did not know the truth of the matter, naturally think that Wang Yuanzhen was a true and genuine historical sinner.
This is really wronging him.
Who is right and who is wrong
If you explore this question carefully, it is not difficult to solve the doubts. The main reason for Yu Qiuyu's anger was that Wang Daoshi had sold the national treasure cheaply, so that the cultural relics flowed into other countries, and now they had to buy them back from other countries.
Literally, it seems that Yu Qiuyu's anger and accusations are not unreasonable, but if you look at it under the historical background at that time, it is biased.
However, the first thing to be sure of is that Wang Daoshi did sell the national treasure, which cannot be avoided. But the reason behind his trafficking in national treasures is worth mentioning.
It is generally believed that there are three reasons why the Taoist sold the national treasure to Stein and others.
First, in the case of repeated unsuccessful attempts to protect cultural relics by the government, Wang Daoshi has become discouraged and has lost confidence in the government. In the process of repeated travels, he thoroughly recognized that the Manchu Qing government would not and did not want to protect these cultural relics.
As a result, he had to keep it for himself, but his ability was limited and he could not fully take care of all the artifacts. In addition, he himself believed in Taoism, did not have much knowledge, and did not have a sober estimate of the value of cultural relics.
Second, he had a dream of building a three-story pavilion in the cave, and in order to fulfill this dream, he had to empty the scriptures in the cave to facilitate him to build a three-story pavilion.
The last and most important reason is that he is a good person by nature, and does not have so many tricks. When the foreign adventurer Stein came to ask for the scriptures, wang Daoshi was initially reluctant to give it to him.
But Stein said that he had come from Europe thousands of miles because he believed in Buddhism and believed in Tang Xuanzang. He came here from India to complete his lifelong faith in order to obtain scriptures and mountains and suffering.
Wang Daoshi, who had faith in himself, listened to his words and felt a great resonance in his heart. Coupled with his good nature, he did not speculate too much about Stein's authenticity.
Eventually, out of sympathy and affection for Stein's persistent beliefs, Wang Yuanzhen sold the scripture scrolls he had asked for to be sold to Stein. As a result, subsequent foreigners used this as an excuse to obtain scriptures.
All in all, we cannot take the behavior of Wang Daoists literally, but analyze them in the historical context of that time: Wang Yuanzhen was instrumental in protecting Dunhuang's national treasures!
As for Yu Qiuyu's accusations, modern experts have also made it clear: Wang Yuanzhen is a hero of history, not a sinner, and Yu Qiuyu owes him an apology!