The Qing Dynasty was a dynasty founded by ethnic minorities, and its ruler was the Jianzhou Jurchen, the predecessor of the Eight Banners of Manchuria. However, after entering the Central Plains, the Qing Dynasty did not respect the Jin Dynasty, which was also a Jurchen clan before, as orthodox, but respected the Southern Song Dynasty in a remote corner as orthodox. The Jin Dynasty destroyed the Liao Dynasty and the Northern Song Dynasty, occupying the traditional Central Plains, and the Southern Song Dynasty also bowed down to the subject, which can theoretically be regarded as orthodox. As a Jurchen family, why did the Qing Dynasty prefer the Southern Song Dynasty?
In fact, in the early Qing Dynasty, it was really orthodox to take the Jin Dynasty as the orthodox. At that time, during the reign of Emperor Taiji and Shunzhi, the Qing Dynasty was still an ethnic minority regime limited to the northeast region, so in order to create ethnic minorities who could also enter the Central Plains, the public opinion that ruled the Han Dynasty respected the Jin Dynasty as orthodox. However, with the development of the times, especially the Kangxi Ping San Fan, the capture of Taiwan, the destruction of Kaldan, and the reunification of the whole country, the rule of the Qing Dynasty became more and more stable. By the time of Qianlong, the legitimacy of the Qing Dynasty was already very stable, so Qianlong needed a new orthodox system to integrate the Qing Dynasty into the Dynasties that unified the whole country, such as the Yuan and Ming Dynasties, rather than the local regimes such as the Jin Dynasty and the Jin Dynasty before and after the Qing Dynasty.
Before Qianlong, the concept of the rulers of the Qing Dynasty was that "the world of the Qing Dynasty was taken from thieves, not from the Ming Dynasty" and "the territory of the Qing Dynasty was far away from the Ming Dynasty". That is to say, when the Qing Dynasty entered the customs, the city of Beijing had long been attacked by the peasant army, and the Chongzhen Emperor zihanna was also li zicheng's work, which had nothing to do with the Qing Dynasty. The Qing Dynasty, because ethnic minorities entered the Central Plains and massacred in the process of unifying the world, needed a strong jurisprudence. In the Kangxi Yongzheng era, the legal principle of the Great Qing Dynasty was that the fall of the Ming Dynasty had nothing to do with me, and the northeast, Mongolia, Xinjiang, and Tibet that the Ming Dynasty could not effectively administer were firmly controlled by the Qing Dynasty, that is, the so-called "I am strong and reasonable." ”
By the Qianlong era, the rule had been stabilized, and this theory could not be done. Because since the Qing Dynasty can obtain the Orthodox Mandate of Heaven of the Central Plains Dynasty by virtue of "unifying the whole country" and "being strong", if a new force rises at this time, stronger than the Qing Dynasty, does it mean that it has obtained a new "Mandate of Heaven"? Dynasties rise and fall, and since ancient times, the Qing Dynasty will always have a time of decline. Therefore, the Qing Dynasty needs a new orthodox theory, even if the Qing Dynasty declines, the people who are not strong are no longer happy, even if the emerging forces know how to unite the people and are incomparably strong, but in the orthodox theory, the orthodox ones still belong to the Great Qing, not the new forces.
So the Qianlong era began to build a new orthodox system. Since the beginning of the Tang Dynasty, and then five generations, the Northern Song Dynasty, the Southern Song Dynasty, the Yuan, the Ming, and the Qing Dynasty have been passed down all the way. Legitimacy cannot be robbed unless one day the former dynasty is completely overthrown by the latter, which is the core idea of the new orthodox system of the Qing Dynasty. Although the Northern Song Dynasty did not have youyun sixteen states, it inherited the orthodoxy of Li Tang to the five dynasties; although the Southern Song Dynasty crossed a corner of the south and only half of the country, it inherited the orthodoxy of the Northern Song Dynasty. No matter how weak the Southern Song Dynasty was, as long as it still existed and did not perish, then it was still orthodox, until the Battle of Yashan was completely destroyed.
In the same way, Daming is the orthodoxy of the Mandate of Heaven, even if the people in the last years of the Ming Dynasty do not have a good life, and the displaced people revolt everywhere, its legitimacy is not something that Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong, thieves and thieves can take away. At this time, the Qing Dynasty made a shining appearance to avenge the Ming Dynasty monarch, which can be described as a very decent thing in the world. Of course, as for the Predecessor of the Qing Dynasty, the Jianzhou Jurchen, including Taizu Nurhaci himself, who had been subservient to the Ming Dynasty for many years, Qianlong still made changes. Qianlong actually did not admit that the Jianzhou Jurchen had once submitted to Daming, which was a bit of an attempt to cover up.
Similarly, after the Qianlong period established the orthodox dynastic system, it also compiled the "Biography of the Second Minister" and the "Biography of the Contrarian". Even those former Ming courtiers who helped the Qing Dynasty win the world's hard work and merit, including Hong Chengzuo, Shang Kexi, Kong Youde, Geng Zhongming, Wu Liuqi and others, all entered the "Biography of the Second Minister", while Wu Sangui, Sun Yanling, Geng Jingzhong, Jiang Ou, Zheng Zhilong and others entered the "Biography of the Contrarian". Therefore, for the sake of the firm legitimacy of its rule, the Qing Dynasty chose to honor the Southern Song Dynasty instead of the Jin Dynasty, which was also a Jurchen family. In fact, the Jurchen clan of the Jin Dynasty and the Jurchen clan of the Qing Dynasty did not belong to the same branch.