(This article is an excerpt from chapter 7 of "Guan Yu: History and Imagination by All Who Entered God", authorized by the publishing house)
Author | (Netherlands) Tian Hai
The image of "Guan Fuzi"
In the mid-17th century, the scholar community began to give Guan Gong a new title, Guan Fuzi. Obviously, this title is based on the word Confucius in the colloquial language. The word "Confucius" has been widely used in colloquial language since at least the 12th century, and is more widely known than Confucius's original title. The title "GuanFuzi" first appeared in a collection of Buddhist treatises published in 1657, along with a new image of Guan Gong in the same era. This image has an unusual red face, three long black whiskers, dressed in green robes, and a book on the knee, representing Guan Gong's reading of "Spring and Autumn", and this image has since become popular, second only to the traditional seated or standing statue of holding a crescent knife in one hand and stroking the long hair with the other. However, the new title of "Guan Fuzi" seems to have only circulated among the scholarly community, and most people still continued to use the titles in local customs, especially Guan Gong, Guan Di or Guan Sheng Emperor. Literati and educated groups continued to grow during the Qing Dynasty, and the rapid popularity of this term is obviously related to this.
Of course, the analogy of Confucius in the title will not make Guan Gong really transform into a god of the same kind. Because Confucius will not become the protagonist of the ceremony of helping the beggars, nor will he really provide divine help or blessing to the worshippers. Although worshippers can pray to two gods for the same reason, Guan Gong is obviously more practical and popular for worshippers. The local chronicle of Changshu in Jiangnan records that in the late Ming Dynasty, Guan Gong had a variety of identities, both as a "priest of the field" and as a "temple guard" for Buddhists, as well as a Taoist god against Xuan You. It is difficult to determine where Guan Gong's new image as a scribe came from, but this image is likely to have helped him spread further among the masses. This also shows that the scholar community does not want to regard Guan Gong as a god only for the worship of foolish commoners. In the next two sections, we first discuss the role of the Guandi Temple inside the Zhengyang Gate in Beijing in promoting this figure of the scholar. I will show that the large-scale popularity of the image of Guan Gongwen is directly related to the cultural atmosphere of the late Ming Dynasty, although the prototype of this image has existed for hundreds of years.
Guan Yu: History and Imagination by All Mortals, by Tian Hai (The Netherlands), Translators: Wang Jian, Yin Wei, Yan Aiping, Qu Xiaoyu, Edition: Nova Press, March 2022
Guandi Temple at Zhengyang Gate
For the scholars who lived in the late Ming and Qing dynasties, the Guandi Temple next to the Zhengyang Gate in Beijing, although not magnificent, is the most famous among the many temples that worship The Guandi. The city gate still stands alone at the end of Tiananmen Square today, but in its time, it was undoubtedly the most important city gate in Beijing. Whether they were serving in the inner city or being ordered to come to the Forbidden City from other places to meet the emperor, all the officials had to pass through this city gate, and even the emperor himself had to pass through here from the Temple of Heaven at the southern end of the outer city. In the nine urns of the imperial city (commonly referred to as "Moon City" in the literature), there are small Guandi Temples on the gate towers of the seven towers, and there are two Temples of Zhenwu Emperor in the Urn City, which are dedicated to another important god of exorcism. Therefore, the deity in this Guandi temple was first and foremost the god of su wei in the imperial city, almost exactly the same as his role in the Ming dynasty army.
In his notes written around 1615-1617, Cai Xianchen of the late Ming Dynasty mentioned that this Guandi Temple originated from Guan Gong's several assistance to the imperial family in the early Ming Dynasty. Whether it is true or not, this statement itself undoubtedly gives a widely accepted explanation for the prominence of the temple. According to Cai Xianchen, the Zhu Ming Dynasty had already received the protection of Guan Gong as early as the beginning of dingding, before the end of the conquest. Although the historical records of the early Ming Dynasty do not mention this matter, in the era of Cai Xianchen, it was common knowledge that Guan Gong protected the dynasty Dingding Jiangshan. Moreover, Cai Xianchen also mentions the incident of the "capital city of Yubo" in 1550, which should refer to the successful invasion of Beijing by Li Da Khan in this year. When the army suppressed the territory, people "dreamed that the emperor would fight the heavenly soldiers and annihilate them all." The next day, the "Hu Yu" retreated, and the capital was able to break the siege. Cai Xianchen said that, including this incident, Guan Gong's series of miracles made the emperor feel deeply proud of his divine might, and the emperor gave Guan Emperor a new title. The emperor in the story is the Wanli Emperor as we know it today.
A fragment of Taoyuan Jieyi in Romance of the Three Kingdoms.
But the reason why this small Guandi Temple by the Zhengyang Gate eventually became one of the key centers of the entire Guan Yu worship network may be because its location is too important. Elites passed under this gate every day, and were often congested in the small urn city. It is not difficult to imagine that they thus became Guan Yu's followers, and thus became the most important group among the various believers in the temple. The spirit sign of the Guandi Temple of Zhengyang Gate is also very famous. We can imagine that the moment when people enter through the Zhengyang Gate and prepare to enter the inner city is often also the moment when they face a major turning point in their lives, which may be a high school for the imperial examination, or it may be a famous sun mountain, it may be a new official taking office, or it may soon be able to see the face of heaven. Therefore, they were more eager to be inspired by the gods. Although the urn had been demolished in the early 20th century, the Guandi Temple, along with the adjacent Temple of Guanyin, was preserved until the 1960s, when the political frenzy of that era completely engulfed it.
Prophecies related to the Guandi Temple of Zhengyang Gate were first seen in the works of Li Chen (1531-1609). Of course, although the result of this prophecy mentioned by Li Yan was sensational, it was not necessarily the kind that Guan Yu's believers were happy to see:
At noon, Yu was outside the Zhengyang Gate of the Jingshi, and the temple of the King of Guan was called Linghe. There is a king with the surname of a man who holds a money and begs for a sign, and he kills his mother, that is, he is dizzy, and he shouts in the clouds: The king binds me, the king binds me, I want er.
This strange incident was reported to the Shangguan by the inspector, and the person surnamed Wang was soon imprisoned, but it is not known how the sinner was ultimately punished.
The outstanding scholar of the late Ming Dynasty, Jiao Zhu (1541-1620), not only wrote inscriptions for the Guandi Temple of Zhengyang Gate, but also presided over the compilation of the biographies of the gods in the temple. In 1603 he wrote the preface to this collection of biographies entitled "The Ancestral Records of the Former Han General Guan Gong". The prologue describes the place worship of the Guandi Temple at zhengyang gate as follows:
Since Emperor Wen laid the foundation of Yuzi, the character spokes, and the hub of the four squares. Whoever has a plan will pray. Yu Ji then engaged. ⋯⋯ The four parties take the Jingshi as the Tatsuji, and the Jingshi takes Hou as the guide, can the gods of things not be ashamed? Yu Shao knew that xiang xiang was tired in his dreams.
In this passage, Jiao Zhu explains on the one hand how these ordinary believers who shuttle through the Zhengyang Gate every day pray for divine revelation, and on the other hand, he also writes about his personal dream experience. Perhaps because of his dream experience, Jiao Zhu later participated in the editing of another biography of the gods.
Nearly two hundred years later, Ji Yun also described the grand situation of the Guandi Temple at Zhengyang Gate, which was not much different from what Jiao Zhu described. Ji Yun was a Beijing official for a long time, and had served as the chief editor of the Siku Quanshu, so he often went to the Forbidden City:
The shrine rate has been signed, and Mo Ling is in the Guan Emperor. The signature of Emperor Guan, Mo Ling is in the ancestral hall on the side of the Zhengyang Gate. Cover one year old, from New Year's Day to Chinese New Year's Eve; in the middle of the day, from the dawn to dusk, the shaker is constantly bright. If you don't give a tube, put a few tubes. It is not only immaculate to check, but also not to be thought of, although it is a thousand hands and a thousand eyes, it cannot be responded to everywhere. However, the signs obtained are all tested like face words...
Ji Yun also recounted some rather everyday examples, in which Emperor Guan's signature verses were very obscure, but they always foreshadowed the wishes of the disciples who were about to take the township examination. There is no doubt that only at the end of the expedition will people realize the true meaning of these verses. This perception may not be the same as what they thought and felt when they first saw these verses, but it will become the final interpretation of the signature.
Therefore, the Zhengyang gate Guandi Temple embodies the most straightforward relationship between the scholar and the worship of the Guandi. Although it may not be the birthplace of the new Guandi faith, because of this relationship, the Zhengyangmen Guandi Temple has become an ideal place to spread these ideas. Whether it was visiting the temple directly or exchanging various stories about the temple with peers, the details of the new faith were constantly instilled in the scholars, and from here they were taken to all parts of the dynasty. One example illustrates this ability to spread very well. In 1614, the imperial court crowned Guan Gong as "Three Realms Voldemort Emperor ShenweiYuan Zhen Tianzun Guan Shengdi Jun", this title was announced in the Zhengyang Gate Guandi Temple, and after a few years, this title spread throughout the country. The literati from the late Ming Dynasty to the Qing Dynasty were closely related to this temple, and various spiritual rumors from this temple frequently entered the literati's essay collections, and the profound influence of the temple and the gods on the literati and inkers could be seen between the lines.
Familiar with "Spring and Autumn"
Guan Yu's sacred relics of the gods have a crucial development direction: his ability to study the Confucian classic "Spring and Autumn" is obviously increasing, and he is eventually regarded by the public as a master of interpreting "Spring and Autumn". The biography of Guan Yu in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms only records that he wrote a letter to Zhuge Liang. Of course, whether the letter was written in person or ghostwritten by someone, its content has long been scattered. Judging from the biographical materials available today, Guan Yu and his brother-in-law communicated entirely in spoken language. Pei Song's notes on the Romance of the Three Kingdoms quote extensively from the commentaries on the Biography of Jiang Biao, which was written in the late third or early fourth century and is now scattered. It is mentioned in the "Biography of Jiang Biao" that "yuhao zuo clan biography, irony is slightly catchy", this sentence has a great influence on the construction of Guan Yu's image for many centuries in later generations. Although this text does not explain the level of Guan Yu's history in history, it is regarded by later generations of literati as evidence of Guan Yu's proficiency in literature.
The word "omitted" used in this passage should be interpreted as "strategy" and "military strategy" rather than other interpretations. But it was not unusual in its time to be able to recite or read the Zuo Zhuan as a reference for formulating military strategies, because compared to abstract military works, such as Sun Tzu's Art of War, zuo chuan contained a series of vivid examples of combat. This way of reading does not come from the Confucian method of interpreting the Spring and Autumn, which emphasizes "praise and disparagement", although the latter is the main direction of Confucian study of the Spring and Autumn. However, there is no mention of "Spring and Autumn" in this text, and as Hidetaka Otsuka said, the image of Guan Yu in the Western Jin Dynasty author's writing may have been inspired by the biography of Liu Yuan in the same period. Finally, this account also does not mention anything related to the act of "reading the Spring and Autumn", but emphasizes Guan Yu's ability to memorize. This may indicate that Guan Yu has studied some of the contents of "Spring and Autumn" and can recount some of its important stories, but he does not rely on deep writing skills, but on oral memorization.
In the early century of Guan Gong's cult, Guan Yu's ability to combine real and imaginary writing did not have any impact on the construction of the image of his gods, because few of these gods were able to read and hyphenate, and most of the gods in the embryonic period were more often labeled as people who did not understand the ink. Whether it is Guan Yu's original Yuquan Mountain miracle or the Xiezhou Yanchi miracle, these stories focus on Guan Yu's martial arts. From the Song, Jin, and Yuan dynasties to the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, the story of Guan Yu's xiansheng was centered on this point. In the fifth chapter, we tell the story of what happened in Jingzhou Province in 1125, when Guan Gong, an illiterate jailer, suddenly gained the ability to read and write. Although the jailer's calligraphy became outstanding, the specific texts he wrote had nothing to do with the Confucian classics. In this story, the calligraphy ability is only evidence that Guan Gong exerted divine power on the jailer, because the jailer himself is an illiterate, and there is no doubt that his writing ability can only come from the gods. In fact, the passage written by the jailer is very simple and common, there is no subtlety in the construction of words and sentences, there is no subtle meaning between the lines, and the literary level is extremely limited. These texts are only the level of text within the confines of the prison archives that the jailer has been exposed to for many years, and have nothing to do with the real classics.
However, in a temple stele in 1204, the author has clearly described the historical image of Guan Yu as a person who can read the "Spring and Autumn Zuo Clan Biography". The Popular Literature of the Three Kingdoms is the earliest source of this image. The book was compiled circa 1294 and finally collected in 1321-1323. The book describes Guan Yu as "happy to see the Spring and Autumn Left Biography", and the "happy to see" here is the general way of writing "reading" in popular novels. This statement did not have a greater role in the "Biography of the Good Zuo Clan" mentioned in the original "Biography of Jiang Biao". A story that was very popular in the late 16th century has a more explicit description of Guan Yu's "reading Spring and Autumn". The story mentions that when Guan Yu accompanied the two righteous sisters-in-law, he read the "Left Transmission" at night so as not to disturb the mind. However, neither the early 16th-century version of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms nor the later quotations to this story indicate that Guan Yu read the Zuo Zhuan at night, which shows that this is not a fixed element in Guan Yu's story tradition. I only clearly found this element in the comments of Mao Lun (1605-1700) and Mao Zonggang (1632-1709) on the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, but in the era of Mao's father and son, "Guan Yu's night reading of "Spring and Autumn" had become an inherent understanding of Guan Yu. Mao's comments mentioned many times that Guan Yu already knew this classic through reading "Spring and Autumn". It can be seen that although "reading the Spring and Autumn Period" has long been included in the connotation of the image of the gods, the real systematic absorption of this element by the worship of Guan Gong and its inclusion in the literary narrative was a matter of the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, and the driving force behind it was that the scholars at that time longed for a more elegant and scholarly image of Guan Yu. When the Mao father and son combined this image with the novel in the form of literary criticism, it also became guan Yu's standard image to readers, and has continued to this day.
The above examples show us how "Guan Yu Tong Chunqiu" is constantly integrated into the Guan Yu religious tradition. These examples, although discovered relatively late, illustrate the influence of the written tradition on religious worship. Of course, the specific occurrence time and social effects of this effect need to be further studied. The basic plot of "Guan Yu Tong Chunqiu" has a long history, and the commentary of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms claims that Guan Yu is interested in zuo zhuan, which is the source of the plot. However, this content appeared for the first time in temple tablets of dubious origin and in popular literature, but it did not predate the Yuan Dynasty. If we talk about the actual influence of the concept of "Guan Yu Tong Chunqiu" on Guan Yu's worship activities, it will not be earlier than the late Ming Dynasty, and it will not be until the early Qing Dynasty that it officially appears in Guan Yu's sacred relics.
Author | Tian Hai
Edit | Miyako
Proofreading | Zhao Lin