A reader once asked a small story: How to evaluate the "Dongpo resident" Su Shi?
Opening clear meaning: Su Shi, who calls himself a resident of Dongpo, is the most well-known of his many names, and it is also the most widely circulated one.
Su Shi was an outstanding literary scholar of the Song Dynasty and a literary scholar with far-reaching influence in the entire history of Chinese literature, and he was ranked as one of the "Eight Great Masters of the Tang and Song Dynasties" for his outstanding achievements in literature.
Su Shi is versatile and talented, and at the same time, he is also a horticulturist, foodie, sommelier, and winemaker. Su Shi's poetry, lyrics, prose, calligraphy, and painting led the trend of the times, and he achieved the highest achievements in the literature and art of his time. It can be said that Su Shi is an encyclopedic master of literature and art.
In the third year of Song Renzong Jingyou (1036), Su Shi was born in Meishan City, Sichuan Province, and in the second year of Song Renzong Jiayou, when Su Shi was 21 years old, he entered the career path.
Of Su Shi's forty-five years as an eunuch, twenty-four years were spent in the years of derogatory times.
Although Su Shi's career was bumpy, during the period of depreciation, his idea of loyalty to the king and the country, as well as the idea of making a modest contribution to the country, and even the ambition to make meritorious achievements have never stopped, which is also the expression of Su Shi's loyalty to his home country.
Among the ancient Chinese writers, there are very few literary scholars who can establish a cordial and touching relationship with the era in which he lived for a long time, and even fewer literary artists who can establish a cordial and touching relationship with future generations of people who can "meet each other and become confidants".
Li Bai's whimsical and romantic and free-spirited nature certainly makes people fall for it, but it is inevitable that it is difficult for ordinary people to reach because of his lofty ambitions; Du Fu is loyal and sincere, and he feels sad about the world, and people cannot be indifferent, but it is too bitter and tiring to learn.
Su Shi, on the other hand, is a wise man who infuses the fusion of presentness and transcendence, and he always has many readers from generation to generation, always nostalgic and always inspiring.
Therefore, for this master of literature and art, how to accurately evaluate it? Or rather, where is the entry point for evaluation?
Here is a good reference, that is, Su Shi's eunuch career, from Su Shi's entry into the career to his death, in his more than forty years of eunuch career, more than thirty years have been spent in the years of depreciation.
Since the experience of demeaning who occupies most of Su Shi's life history, then to evaluate Su Shi, let's start from his derogatory road.
In the second year of Emperor Xining of the Song Dynasty, Wang Anshi served as the governor of the government and put forward a series of innovative ideas aimed at enriching the country and strengthening the army, and the Xining reform law began.
Because Su Shi's thinking was inconsistent with the mainstream of the change of law, Su Shi believed that the change of law should be carried out smoothly and should not be rushed to achieve success, and his attitude caused dissatisfaction among those who supported the change of law, so in the fourth year of Xining, Su Shi asked for a foreign appointment and came to Hangzhou as a general judge, this year Su Shi was 36 years old.
In the seventh year of Xining, Su Shi transferred to Mizhou. In the tenth year of Xining, Su Shi was appointed as the governor of Xuzhou, when the Yellow River broke, Su Shi personally led the military and civilians to fight floods and rescue dangers, and finally successfully managed the Yellow River breach and guarded the peace of the party.
Two years later, Su Shi went to Huzhou to serve as Zhizhou, and at this time the change of law was in full swing, as soon as Su Shi arrived in Huzhou, he wrote a letter to Song Shenzong "Huzhou Xie Shang Table", but because the text contained "stupid and unwell, it is difficult to accompany the new jin", and "to detect his old age and not to cause trouble or to be able to shepherd small people", which gave some people an opportunity.
Among them, Yushi Liding, Shu Qi, He Zhengchen and others used these texts to personally attack Su Shi, and they also said that Su Shi's words were dissatisfied with the new law.
As a result, a controversy based on the impeachment of Su Shi intensified, and the "Wutai Poetry Case" was formed, at this time, Su Shi had only completed three months in Huzhou, and was arrested by Yushitai, which was the famous "Wutai Poetry Case" in the Northern Song Dynasty.
The "Wutai Poetry Case" became a turning point in Su Shi's life and career, and after many rescues, Su Shi survived. After Su Shi was released from prison, he was demoted to the position of deputy envoy of the Huangzhou Regiment, which was the first time that Su Shi was degraded on his way. Since then, Su Shi has lived a life of upheaval and displacement, and his soul has endured great suffering.
In the fourth year of Song Zhezong Shaosheng, the new party that supported the change of law once again dominated the political arena, and Su Shi was belittled under the retaliation of the new party. In April of the following year, Su Shi was demoted from the post of Zhizhou to Yingzhou. In the middle of the way, he was demoted to the deputy envoy of the Ning Yuan Army, and Huizhou was resettled, which was Su Shi's second depreciation on his career.
In the fourth year of Song Zhezong Shaosheng, Su Shi was demoted to Qiongzhou Beichai, Changhua resettlement, in fact, it was equivalent to exile, when Su Shi was 62 years old, this was Su Shi's third depreciation in his career.
In 1100, Su Shi still moved to Lianzhou as a driver in Qiongzhou. After Emperor Huizong of Song ascended the throne, he granted amnesty to the world, and Su Shi died of illness in Changzhou on July 28, 1101, at the age of 66, on his way back to the north.
Time flies and the pace does not stop. On the way back to the north, Su Shi passed through Zhenzhou, and he visited the Famous Jinshan Temple in Zhenzhou with a happy mood, and a portrait of Su Shi was painted on the wall of the Golden Mountain Temple, which was painted by the famous painter Li Gonglin many years ago.
When Su Shi saw his own portrait at the Golden Mountain Temple, he suddenly had a feeling of being in a trance. He recalled his life's experience under his own portrait at the Golden Mountain Temple, and for a time he was full of emotions, so he wrote a poem "Self-titled Portrait of Jinshan":
The heart is like a gray wood, and the body is like a boat that is not tied.
Ask Ru Pingsheng Gongye, Huangzhou Huizhou Danzhou.
In this poem, Su Shi regards the demeaning career as a "merit", which has a hint of self-deprecation. In fact, he also wrote the position of the derogatory career in his life, and the three places of Huangzhou, Huizhou and Danzhou have undoubtedly become the three most important places in Su Shi's life and career, and these three places have left an indelible impression on Su Shi.
When Su Shi was first belittled, his mood was very low, which was both the common sentiment of people and the general psychology of the scholar class. Although Su Shi had feelings of loneliness and loneliness, he did not have any grudges.
On the contrary, Su Shi has an aesthetic poetic realm, which is the embodiment of Su Shi's open-minded and optimistic attitude, and at this time, the open-minded and optimistic mentality has been sublimated into an aesthetic life realm of Su Shi.
For example, The poem written by Su Shi when he first arrived in Huangzhou:
Self-laughing life is busy with mouth, and the old career turns absurd.
The Yangtze River goes around Guo Zhiyu is beautiful, and the good bamboo and mountains feel the fragrance of bamboo shoots.
Eviction may as well be placed outside, and the poet is exemplary as Shui Cao Lang.
Only ashamed of nothing, shang fei official family pressed the wine bag.
What is lost is the glory of the career for a while, but what is gained is the true meaning of life. It is not difficult to see from the poem that Su Shi has calmly faced his own things because of his good arguments about right and wrong, because of his demeaning words, and he likes the delicious fish in Huangzhou and the fresh bamboo shoots on the shore.
In fact, when Su Shi first came to Huangzhou, his life was once in trouble, and his friend Ma Zhengqing in Huangzhou extended a helping hand in time to apply for an old piece of land for Su Shi from the county, which was in the east of Huangzhou City.
So Su Shi led the family to reclaim the wasteland and plant crops in the field, and Su Shi personally cultivated it, so that the diet of the Su Shi family was temporarily guaranteed. Because this piece of land is located in the east of the city and is a slope land, Su Shi named himself "East Slope" after the orientation and characteristics of this land.
After solving the problem of food and accommodation, Su Shi traveled through the landscape of Huangzhou with a relaxed attitude.
During his tour of Huangzhou's ChibiJi, he wrote "Former Chibi Fu" and "Post Chibi Fu". He traveled with friends in Huangzhou to Lanxi, and also wrote the famous "Youlanxi": "Under the mountain Lanya short soaking creek, Songjian sand road is pure without mud, Xiao Xiao twilight rain rules cry, who Dao life is no less, the water in front of the door can still be west, Hugh will sing yellow chicken with white hair." ”
This not only reflects Su Shi's optimistic attitude towards the landscape, but also reflects Su Shi's open-minded optimism and positive attitude towards life with laughter.
During the Huangzhou period, he gradually came out of the shadow of depreciation, and the loss and pain in his heart achieved transcendence. During this period, he also drew spiritual strength from traditional philosophical thought, Su Shi used Zhuangzi's philosophical thought and Buddhist thought to cultivate his personality during the period of derogation, and he was deeply influenced by Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism throughout his life, absorbing and integrating the essence of the three schools of thought.
In this way, he can not only meditate and cultivate in the years of vicissitudes, so as to achieve the transcendence of reality, but also enhance the spiritual realm and achieve the purpose of health maintenance.
In Huizhou, Su Shi said, "Three hundred litchi in a day, and I will not hesitate to be a Lingnanian"; in Danzhou, Hainan, Su Shi said, "I am a native of Hainan, parasitizing Western ShuZhou." Suddenly cross the sea, such as a long trip. ”
At this time, Su Shi, after experiencing the precipitation of time and the baptism of years, he became more open-minded and optimistic, and his positive and upward state of life was gradually reflected, which was closely related to the continuous improvement of his thinking, and he pursued a realm that was not burdened by the world, and longed for a life that was both worldly and free.
For example, after Su Shi arrived in Danzhou, the living conditions were quite harsh, and he thought that he could not return to his hometown in his lifetime: "And the ghost gate and the east, the floating miasma sea moved south." There is no end to life, and there is a residual responsibility for death. ”
After Su Shi arrived in Hainan, the situation was even more difficult than imagined, and even books could not be seen, and Su Shi could not adapt to the climate of Hainan at first: "There is no meat here, no medicine for illness, no room to live in, no friends out, no charcoal in winter, and no cold spring in summer." ”
With the passage of time, Su Shi slowly adapted to the conditions here, he was self-sufficient in Hainan, personally engaged in production and labor, he rented a small piece of land from others, and grew vegetables himself.
If su Shi still had some worries in his heart before coming to Hainan, this worry has long been swept away.
This is not only because Su Shi has become accustomed to life here, he no longer cares about the material living conditions of suffering, and can accept them very calmly, but also because his open-minded and optimistic, positive and upward ideological personality and peace of mind have played an important role, which is the embodiment of the improvement of Su Shi's ideological realm.
Similarly, when Su Shi first degraded to Huangzhou, there were still certain ups and downs in his heart: the emotion of anger and indignation was also reflected in his literary works, but this mentality gradually disappeared with Su Shi's extremely strong self-regulation, and his thoughts gradually achieved self-transcendence.
During the period of Huizhou and Danzhou, Su Shi's thinking was more mature and stable than in Huangzhou, more calm and calm, Su Shi could calmly face life and work, open-minded and optimistic, positive and upward mentality became a strong driving force for him to overcome difficulties and face life.
In the long-term demeaning life, Su Shi learned to look at the problem from a higher level, which greatly alleviated the various pressures he was bearing, and his mind was broader and his vision was broader: he no longer cared about the gains and losses of honor and humiliation, the good or bad of the situation, and at this time Su Shi already had transcendent feelings.
Su Shi once said that "the upper can accompany the Jade Emperor, the lower can accompany the Beggars of the Beitianyuan", in Su Shi's heart, everyone is equal, there is no distinction between high and low, the Jade Emperor is good, the Beggars of the Beitianyuan are the same in his heart, he can accompany them to chat and play with them, which is actually the embodiment of Su Shi's broad mind of benevolence and tolerance.
In the years when Su Shi was degraded, he was not depressed because of the ups and downs of his career, on the contrary, in the years of depreciation, he always maintained an optimistic and open-minded attitude.
In every place where he worked, he actively devoted himself to his work and made outstanding contributions to the local economy, culture and education.
It is also in the years of depreciation that Su Shi maintained an optimistic and open-minded attitude, and his literary creation showed a state of blowout, thus climbing another peak of literature.
Su Shi's calm, open-minded, positive, upward and optimistic mentality allowed him to walk out of the lows and even shadows of depreciation.
In every place, he can well integrate with local colleagues and people, find a sense of belonging, find a spiritual home, and thus obtain spiritual self-sufficiency.
Different places, different customs and customs have broadened Su Shi's horizons, made him experience vicissitudes and troubles, and also sublimated Su Shi's life realm. I have a deeper understanding and understanding of life.
Huangzhou, Huizhou and Danzhou were the low tide periods in Su Shi's life and career, but they achieved the highest realm of his thoughts and mentality, and he also composed the chapter of life and the peak of literature and art here.