When I was a child watching Jin Yong's "Deer DingJi", my favorite character was not Wei Xiaobao, not Kangxi, but Chen Jinnan, the chief helmsman of the Heaven and Earth Society, and I don't know what everyone thinks of him, anyway, in my mind, Chen Jinnan is a nearly perfect character.
Chen Jinnan was both literate and martial, loyal and courageous, and could not only put Wei Xiaobao, who loved to play slippery, obedient, but also come out from time to time with his amazing martial arts. In the "Deer Ding Chronicle", he was praised, "If you don't see Chen Jinnan in your life, you will call him a hero in vain!" The only thing that can make people complain is that he was loyal to the Zheng family all his life, and in the end he died at their hands, and some people thought that he was foolish.
But I think that Chen Jinnan's foolish loyalty is not one of his charms? In the chaotic world of the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, it was not difficult to find traitors and traitors, but it was not easy to find a loyal minister, and Chen Jinnan was one of them. How to say it? If you look at the generals who surrendered to the Qing Dynasty, there are more and more such people, although it can also be said that they know the times, but in the end they have less national integrity, and they will not be able to leave any good reputation in future generations.
For example, Wu Sangui, through the hatred of taking his wife, let the Qing army enter the customs, and joined forces with Dolgun to defeat Li Zicheng at Shanhaiguan, and the Qing court remembered his merits and crowned him as the king of the domain, but he was still not satisfied, and he was not willing to submit to the Qing court, so he engaged in a Rebellion of San Francisco. For a person like Wu Sangui, his focus is always on his own interests, and it is the same for him who does it. But Chen Jinnan was not, he was loyal to the Zheng family, thinking about the anti-Qing restoration, he rarely thought about himself, even if he was killed by the second son of the Zheng family, before his death, Yin Yin told Wei Xiaobao not to avenge him. In contrast, the high and low are immediately seen.
Chen Jinnan is the bearer of the Heaven and Earth Society, speaking of the Heaven and Earth Society, there are many stories, some people say that the Heaven and Earth Society is the earliest "underworld", throughout the Qing Dynasty, there is its shadow, it is like a thorn in the heart of the Qing rulers all the time. At the end of the Qing Dynasty, the Heaven and Earth Society had also been active, and Feng Zicai, a veteran general at the end of the Qing Dynasty, was originally born in the Heaven and Earth Society. It can be seen that the Heaven and Earth Society has really caused a lot of trouble for the Qing Dynasty. In this way, Chen Jinnan, as the chief helmsman of the Heaven and Earth Society, could not be underestimated.
Having said all this, Chen Jinnan is a character in a literary work after all, and he cannot be trusted. Out of curiosity, I went to find out and see if there was really a figure like Chen Jinnan in history. Unexpectedly, there really is, Jin Yong's Chen Jinnan, the prototype is the Zheng family's courtiers - Chen Yonghua. Chen Yonghua devoted his life to opposing the Qing Dynasty and restoring the Ming Dynasty, but his contribution was mainly due to giving Zheng Chenggong a lot of political advice, and Zheng Chenggong greatly valued him, but there is little record of his military value. After Zheng Chenggong's death, Chen Yonghua went on to assist Zheng Jing, but was later involved in the succession dispute and was ostracized.
In addition, it is worth mentioning the relationship between Chen Yonghua and the Zheng family. Some say that Chen Yonghua's daughter married Zheng Chenggong's son, and some say that Zheng Jing's son is Chen Yonghua's son-in-law, in short, Chen Yonghua and the Zheng family do have an in-law relationship, but the specifics cannot be examined.
In my opinion, whether it is Jin Yong's Chen Jinnan or Chen Yonghua as a courtier of the Zheng family, what they have in common lies in their loyalty to the country and the nation. It is lamentable that such people often have a dismal end, they are not tolerated by the world, but they will certainly be remembered by future generations.