Gang organizations and martial arts gangs in wuxia novels

Gangs are secret organizations of the old society. In order to survive, the lower classes of the people secretly organized and worked together in the same boat to help each other. For example, the famous gang Tiandihui of the Qing Dynasty, "worshiping heaven as the father, worshiping the land as the mother", with the purpose of "anti-Qing and restoration", the members were mostly farmers, craftsmen, urban and rural laborers and vagrants. The various factions of the Association have repeatedly launched and participated in armed uprisings. However, after the Xinhai Revolution, such secret groups gradually declined, and were even used and manipulated by bad people, turning into underworld organizations with goons and hooligans as the main body, such as the Green Gang and the Red Gang, which degenerated into an evil force group. Most of the martial arts gangs written in martial arts novels can see the shadow of ancient gang organizations and contemporary underworld groups, and some are simply a mixture of the two.

The establishment and consolidation and development of gangs are inseparable from "interests", "righteousness" and "family law". Interests are an important basis for gang combinations; righteousness is the cohesive force that sustains the gang's disciples; and family law is a powerful measure to control the behavior of the gang, and all three are indispensable. Of course, this "interest" is only the interest within the gang group, and this "righteous spirit" only protects the narrow interests of the gang, and outside the gang, it is not at all moralistic, and even fights to the death because of the struggle for profit. Each gang has its own strict organization and complete family law, which has great restraining power on the gang.

The "KaixiangTang" is a solemn ceremony held by the gang's disciples. Taking the Red Gang (actually the Hong Gang) as an example, anyone who wants to join the Red Gang must register with the leader of the Gang's specialized development organization in advance. After accumulating tens or hundreds of people, the mountain lord (the red gang organization generally calls it so-and-so mountain) sent a leader to be responsible for the work of the incense hall, calling it the "boss". After the boss was ordered, he chose a secluded temple and arranged it. In the middle of the xiangtang, there is a Guan Emperor throne, with the plaque of "Zhongyi Hall" hanging on it, and the three floors of the table for the ancestors in the middle, each written on red or yellow paper. In the middle of the hall, there is another large square platform, one for the right side of the large piece (large knife), the left for a small spray canister (pistol), in the middle of the burning of a furnace of incense, a pair of candles, and a bunch of incense at the mouth of the table. In addition, there are red lights, three on the outer layer, eight on the middle layer, and twenty-one on the inside, which means to split the word "Hong" into "three eight twenty-one". After the arrangement of the incense hall, he ordered the new gang to enter the gang with fish, and invited the more qualified masters on the mountain to participate in the grand event at the same time, which is called "going to the peach". Then he closed the mountain gate and ordered the new disciples to perform the ritual of three kneels and nine prostrations to the ancestral tablet. After the ceremony, a great uncle explained the various gang rules to the gang in detail and read them out according to the rules. Then he held the incense sticking to his left hand, and his right hand held a large piece of offering to the stage, and looked around at the disciples angrily: "In the future, if you do not obey the orders of the mountain lord and cannot strictly abide by the rules of the gang, take this incense as an example." "When speaking, he held aloft a large piece, slashed the incense stick, and slashed it in two. After cutting the incense, all the broken incense is given to the new disciples, and each person hides one as a souvenir, and also guards it. Then he ordered the gang members to form a large circle, listened to the uncle recite a poem into the gang, and ordered the brothers of the same gang to perform a ritual according to the rules. Li Bi conducted a question and answer for membership, and after the question and answer, he sent a "ticket cloth" (suspected to refer to various incisions in the gang) to order each treasure. At this point, the opening of the incense hall is finished.

After the gang joins the club, they must strictly abide by the family law in the gang. If the gang violated the gang rules or offended the old man, they would be severely punished, and the heavier ones would be executed by Ling Chi. The Green Gang has ten family laws, which include punishment methods for those who violate the rules of the gang, those who disobey their parents, those who do not obey the teacher's training, those who do not respect the elders, those who encroach on the property of the gang, those who beat the old and young in the gang, those who do not do the right thing, and those who commit adultery and adultery. On the surface, these family laws are to punish evil and promote good, but in fact they are tools for the "leaders" in the gang to bully and abuse the gang. Their "incense hall" is a private "public court", and the "family law" is a lynching, and the old men can use it at will. In the past, the Jiangsu Red Gang organization Chunbaoshan had such an incident: a small leader led more than twenty gangs to the seashore to smuggle and sell salt, and was rounded up by anti-smuggling boats halfway through, and more than ten people escaped from the battle. Because both the salt and silver of the boat were lost, they did not dare to return to the mountain to report, and they fell on the Yangtze River steamship to steal for a living. Later, they were discovered by the spies in the gang, all of them were arrested and returned to the gang, and they were beheaded on the charges of "escaping from the battle" and "engulfing the head of the water", and after death, the body was divided into several pieces, wrapped in a bundle of reed mats, and thrown into the river. And immediately announced to the whole gang to warn the other gangs.

Similar to the above-mentioned descriptions of the "Kaixiangtang" and "Family Law" of the Qing Gang and the Red Gang, it can be seen in many martial arts novels. The martial arts gangs in wuxia novels also have strict organizational forms and "incisions" of communication, and all have certain laws and regulations, each occupying a certain territory. The Book of the Dragon Slayer in yitian describes the scene of the gang meeting in this way: "Only to hear someone on the Ship of the Heavenly Eagle Sect shouting: 'There is a serious business, and irrelevant guests should avoid it.'" Yin Susu cried, "The sun and the moon shine, the heavenly eagle spreads its wings, the holy flame is raging, and it benefits the world." This is the master of the general rudder, which altar is burning incense and raising fire? She was talking about the incision of the SkyHawk Sect. The man on the boat immediately said respectfully, "Lord Li Of the Heavenly City Hall, leading the Qinglong Altar Master and the Divine Snake Altar Seal Altar Lord here." Is it the Arrival of the Lord of Tianwei Hall Yin Tang? ’...... The Heavenly Eagle Sect Leader, Baimei Eagle King Yin Tianzheng, was divided into three inner halls and five outer altars, which were divided into various sects. The inner three halls are the three halls of Tianwei, Ziwei and Tianshi, and the outer five altars are the five altars of Green Dragon, White Tiger, Xuanwu, Suzaku and Divine Snake. The Huashan Sect in "Smiling Proud of the Rivers and Lakes" has seven precepts: "The first precept deceives the teacher and destroys the ancestors, and does not respect the elders." The second precept is bullying and harming the innocent. The three precepts are adulterous and lustful, flirting with women. The four precepts are jealous and cannibalistic. The Five Precepts are to see profit and forget righteousness, and to steal property. The Six Commandments are arrogant and arrogant, and offend their fellow believers. The Seven Precepts are promiscuous to bandits and collude with demons. "The seven precepts of the Huashan Sect are quite similar to the ten family laws of the Qing Gang. These precepts were only used to restrain the disciples, and Yue Buqun, as the leader of the Huashan Sect, like the leader of the Green Gang, did not need to be obeyed. Not only did he steal his disciple's "Sword Spectrum to Ward Off Evil Spirits" by "seeing profit and forgetting righteousness," but he also killed the two hengshan sect masters too secretly than "offending his fellow travelers" and "injuring innocents without permission.", which was really a real traitor.

The big gangs in martial arts novels often have a difference between the general rudder and the rudder. Each gang and faction has its own territory, often dominating one side, running rampant in several provinces, and becoming the hegemon of the region. The leaders of the gang must absolutely obey the leaders of the gang, and are not allowed to have a half-point difference pool, and the leaders have the power of life and death, and can punish any "rebellious" gang at any time. The gang has its laws, courts, interrogation rooms and execution grounds, and each martial arts gang is like an independent kingdom that cannot be inserted into the needle and the water cannot be spilled. Xiang Qingtian in "Smiling Proud of the Rivers and Lakes", because he refused to honor dongfang undefeated as the leader of the demon sect, he was hunted down and killed by the undefeated people of the east. Mei Zhuang Siyou, who was responsible for imprisoning the former head of the Teaching Director Of our line, was questioned by the four elders of the Demon Sect for being rescued by Xiang Tianshi and rescued ren Yixing. Ren Yi acted to effectively control the Demon Sect, and ordered his subordinates to take the "Three Corpse Brain Divine Dan" containing severe poison and timing attacks. All this shows that the control and punishment of the gang leaders by the gang leaders is extremely severe.

The wulin gangs in wuxia novels are often related to families, divisions, regions, guilds, and sects. For example, the Chen Family Taiji in Henan, the Tang Family Secret Weapon in Sichuan, and the Duan Family in Dali are related to the family; for example, the Shaolin and Wudang Schools are related to Shi Feng Dharma and Zhang Sanfeng. Novelists like to divide the school by mountains, and every famous mountain can become a martial arts sect, in addition to Tai, Hua, Heng, Song, Heng Wuyue, Emei, Kunlun, Zhongnan, Wutai, Huangshan, Tianshan, Changbai Mountain, etc., are also divided into their own factions. The wulin faction formed by the power of the guilds was best written by the Cai Gang, and in Jin Yong's novel, the Cai Gang has a green jade bamboo staff as a relic of the gang leader. In addition to the beggar gang, there are many large and small gangs in various categories, such as the Green Bamboo Gang, the Iron Fan Gang, and the Black Tiger Gang on land, and the Golden Dragon Gang, the Sea Sand Gang, and the Giant Whale Gang on the water. Often, the leader of a certain gang is the leader of a certain gang. The sect is also one of the wulin sects, and the Ming Sect Leader in the Book of the Slaughtering Dragon in the Heavenly Dragon is the Wulin Alliance Leader; the Yunnan Five Poison Sect Leader who is good at making poison in the "Green Blood Sword" is also a wulin sect master.

The gang struggle in the Wulin faction has two situations, both inside and outside. Within this gang, it is to fight for the position of gang leader or leader; outside this gang, it is a bloody battle to win the title of supreme martial arts alliance leader. In order to win these high positions (along with the martial arts secrets that ensure these high positions), many so-called chivalrous characters use both conspiracy and killing. Zuo Lengchan, the leader of the Songshan Sect, and Yue Buqun, the leader of the Huashan Sect, in "Smiling Proud of the Rivers and Lakes", are extremely treacherous, and Yue Buqun is particularly sinister. The Five Peaks originally formed their own sects, and later Zuo Lengchan proposed to merge into the Five Peaks Sword Sect, and both Zuo and Yue competed to become the leaders of the Five Peaks Sword Sect. Zuo Leng Zen's forces are strong, so he is arrogant and overbearing, thinking that he is a sure winner. Yue Buqun's strength was not enough, so he hid it deeply, giving people the illusion of a "gentleman's sword", but in fact he was a hypocrite. It can be seen from zuo lengchan's faction's killing of The Hengshan sect's Liu Zhengfeng family and his attack on the Hengshan sect's Dingjing Shitai and others; it can be seen that he was extremely vicious and vicious; from Yue Buqun's conspiracy to kill the Hengshan sect's Dingxian and Dingyi's two divisions, as well as his despicable deeds of not only taking away the "Sword Spectrum of Warding Off Evil" and using it to blame people, we can see that he was extremely sinister and vicious. What Zuo and Yue did was no different from that of the rogue leaders of the underworld organizations.

Of course, there are also many people in the martial arts gang who are really chivalrous. They care about the security of the country, resist foreign invasions, hoe the strong, help the weak, uphold justice, do not kill innocents indiscriminately, and are heroes and heroes with more chivalry and less banditry. For example, the hero of the Red Flower Congregation, the Yellow River Disaster Relief, the Gang of Servants assisting Guo Jing in guarding Xiangyang, Zhang Danfeng running to the south of the desert to save the Sheji, Xiao Feng heroically sacrificing his life to relieve ethnic contradictions, and Hu Fei's desperate pursuit of bullies to avenge the poor peasants, and so on, all of which embody the heroic nature of Jianghu Haojie. Their heroic behavior is diametrically opposed to the despicable behavior of Zuo Lengchan and Yue Buqun. From the point of view of serving the country and the people, it is not impossible to regard these jianghu heroes as heroes and benevolent people in history. But these are not the focus of this article, so I will leave them alone here.