When people think of Zhu You, the ming dynasty, the first thing that comes to mind is his skillful carpentry skills. This "unprofessional" emperor has always been talked about by people, making fun of him as a negative character. So, in the turbulent late Ming Dynasty, was the emperor who was put on the throne really useless except to do carpentry work?
Why is he "put" on the throne? In 1620, the Wanli Emperor died and was passed down to Emperor Mingguangzong Zhu Changluo. However, Ming Guangzong only reigned for 29 days before he died violently because of the "Red Pill Case". Zhu Youxiao was the eldest son of Zhu Changluo, so he inherited the throne, and at the age of 16, he was hastily pushed to the top of his power.
Zhu Changluo
In the last years of the Ming Dynasty, the Donglin Party and the Eunuch Party fought fiercely, and the imperial power was in jeopardy. The Wanli Emperor favored Zheng Guifei and wanted to pass on Zhu Changxun, the Prince of Fu, who was located in Zheng Guifei's son. In order to save himself and his son, Zhu Changluo wanted Zhu Youxiao to live a life of plainness, away from the whirlpool of power, and not let him go out of the cabinet to study. Zhu Yu was bored every day, so he liked to do carpentry, which is the origin of his hobby.
Some people say that Zhu Youxiao is illiterate, but in fact, this is also a misunderstanding. Although Zhu Youxue had not read books in name, he was taught to read by his internal ministers from an early age, and there were Also Confucian scholars such as "Emperor Master" Sun Chengzong. Therefore, the Emperor of the Apocalypse was not only not illiterate, but also highly educated.
Zhu Youxiao's father, Zhu Changluo, was actually a victim of the party struggle, and Zhu Youxiao knew this very well. He was young and inexperienced, which was one of the reasons why he was put on the throne and reigned for many years. He knew that he did not have any real power, and if he had to get real power immediately, he might end up like his father.
Zhu Yu School
The young Zhu Youxiao understood that when he first ascended to the throne, he had no foundation, but was just a puppet and a pretext, and no one really regarded himself as an emperor. Therefore, he chose to be patient and continued to indulge in his carpentry skills. He chose to support Wei Zhongxian and wanted to use Wei Zhongxian's hand to suppress the Donglin Party in order to balance the korean and Chinese forces.
Zhu Youxiao's practice was very similar to that of the Wanli Emperor. It is also sitting on the mountain and watching the tiger fight, using one side's forces to suppress the other side's forces. However, posterity only remembered that Zhu You proofread Wei Zhongxian's nepotism, but did not know that during the apocalypse years, Zhu You school used Wei Zhongxian to contain the Donglin Party, and could receive 200,000 taels of silver taxes from Jiangsu and Zhejiang every year, which was unimaginable before.
The Emperor of the Apocalypse knew that the Donglin Party was harmful to the imperial court and had no benefit. Some people, even some scholars, believe that the Emperor of the Apocalypse was controlled by Wei Zhongxian, but in fact Wei Zhongxian was a puppet of the Apocalypse. Wei Zhongxian was doing things for Zhu Youxiao, and the imperial power had always been firmly held in the palm of his hand by the Emperor of the Heavenly Revelation.
Wei Zhongxian
On the other hand, the Chongzhen Emperor Zhu Youjian was able to easily solve Wei Zhongxian after he ascended the throne, which also showed that Wei Zhongxian was only a slave after all. However, before his death, Zhu Youxian also told his younger brother Zhu Youjian that Wei Zhongxian was a usable talent. Unfortunately, this younger brother, who was evaluated by himself as comparable to Yao Shun, did not listen to his advice.
In the last years of the Ming Dynasty, internal and external troubles. Internally, the Emperor of The Apocalypse appointed Sun Chengzong, Yuan Keli, Yuan Chonghuan, and others to stabilize the situation in Eastern Liaoning in response to Later Jin's aggressiveness. Externally, Zhu Youxiao twice defeated the invincible Dutch invaders in Penghu. In the Battle of Tuen Mun, Zhu You's proofreading macau did not give way, and even if Portugal occupied Macau, Zhu You's school never agreed to cede it. It was not until the end of the Qing Dynasty that Macau became a Portuguese colony. Not only that, the Emperor of the Apocalypse also bought cannons from Macao and ordered people to learn to manufacture them, and Zhu You was never ambiguous in defending against foreign enemies.
During the Apocalypse period, the Ming Dynasty was militarily able to clamp down on HouJin. However, after the Chongzhen Emperor ascended the throne, this balance was immediately broken due to the mistake of employing people, and Hou Jin lost his containment power and began to slowly encroach on Daming.
Chongzhen Emperor
The apocalyptic explosion during the apocalyptic year is also a suspense case. Afterwards, Zhu Youxue immediately issued a "crime edict" to reflect on himself and help the victims of the disaster. On his deathbed, Zhu Youxiao did not forget to ask his younger brother Zhu Youjian to take good care of his wife, Empress Zhang. All these things can show that Colonel Zhu You was a good emperor with flesh and blood.
Emperor Zhu Youxiao of the Apocalypse was not a blackened emperor, but an emperor who was blackened out of the sky. The Wanli Emperor crawled for ten years to gain real power, and Zhu Youxiao was just waiting for an opportunity for him to gain real power. If he had reigned a little longer and had not died in an inexplicable fall into the water, then perhaps Daming would not have perished so quickly.