Since ancient times, if you want to describe a doctor who is skilled in medicine, people will always say that he is "Hua Tuo's rebirth", describing his medical skills as smart as Hua Tuo, and being able to cure the disease.
It can be seen that in the field of traditional Chinese medicine, Hua Tuo, a famous doctor at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, has a high status and great reputation.
Influenced by the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, many people believe that Hua Tuo is not only a master of medical skills, but also a noble medical ethic, a famous doctor who is always concerned about the suffering of the people of the world, unwilling to submit to the powerful, and unwilling to see Cao Cao alone.
Therefore, he rejected Cao Cao's high-ranking official Houlu, left Cao Cao on the pretext that his wife was seriously ill, and was finally killed by Cao Cao.
It is an indisputable fact that Hua Tuo died at the hands of Cao Cao. But is the responsibility for Hua Tuo's death really all in Cao Cao? Does Hua Tuo have no responsibility at all?
If we open up the truth of history and analyze it carefully, we will feel that I am afraid that Hua Tuo's death is not all the responsibility of Cao Cao alone. Behind Hua Tuo's murder, there are also extremely complex political reasons.
Hua Tuo, a famous doctor who wanted to become an official
According to the well-known "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", it is said that Cao Cao suffered from headache and died of pain, and the tai doctors were helpless about it.
So Hua Xin recommended Hua Tuo to Cao Cao. After Cao Cao invited Hua Tuo, Hua Tuo believed that Cao Cao's headache was rooted in his head, and if he wanted to cure it, he could only completely cure it after taking the "Hemp Boiling Scatter" he invented, and then cutting cao Cao's head with a sharp axe for surgery.
Cao Cao had always been suspicious, and after hearing Hua Tuo's treatment plan, he thought that Hua Tuo was going to take the opportunity to kill himself, so he put Hua Tuo in prison. Later, Hua Tuo was killed in prison, and the medical book "Qingbao Book" that he spent his life writing was also lost.
The story of Cao Cao's killing of Hua Tuo was included in the "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" in the chapter "Curing the Wind and Disease, The Divine Doctor Died, and Passed on the Death of the Widow and the Number of Adulterous Males". We know that the Romance of the Three Kingdoms itself is not a history book, but a novel, so some of the above statements are still quite different from the historical truth.
Therefore, to find out the true cause of Qinghua Tuo's death, we must not only believe in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, but first find out what kind of person Hua Tuo really is.
According to the Chronicle of the Three Kingdoms, The Book of Wei and the Biography of Fang Ji, Hua Tuo was a native of Pei Guo (沛国谯) (present-day Bozhou, Anhui) at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty. Through extensive visits and self-study, he is proficient in internal, external, gynecological, pediatric, acupuncture and other disciplines, especially good surgery.
Hua Tuo was not a natural divine doctor, and when he was young, he was also a reader of the "Classics of Mathematics". Like most readers at that time, his greatest desire was to rely on reading to become an official and learn medical skills, which was just a "hobby" of his.
In feudal society, "learning and excellence" is the truth that all readers believe in. During the Eastern Han Dynasty, Hua Tuo lived, relying on reading to become an official was a common social phenomenon. Although there was no imperial examination at that time, if you wanted to become a high official, you still had to be proficient in a subset of the history of the classics.
Therefore, at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, there were more than 30,000 students in luoyang Guozi Prison. In contrast, although doctors also have some social status, they are still far inferior to those who study and become officials.
Therefore, for Hua Tuo, his first choice is the same as ordinary people, that is, to rely on reading to realize his dream of becoming an official.
Hua Tuo was not without the opportunity to become an official. Once, Chen Wanggui, the minister of peiguo, heard of Hua Tuo's name and recommended Hua Tuo as "Yilang", but Hua Tuo refused.
This does not mean that Hua Tuo is indifferent to fame and fortune, but because Hua Tuo is a very proud and conceited person, he does not look up to the petty official recommended by Chen Wanggui, "Yilang", but wants to sell at a price and look for better opportunities.
But opportunities don't come at every moment. After losing this opportunity, along with the decay of the government at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the Han Ling Emperor and his ten permanent attendants openly betrayed the official Andejue, and there were only two ways to become an official:
One is that he was born into a family of officials and eunuchs, and relied on the shade of his family to embark on the road of becoming an official; the second is that his family was particularly rich and spent a lot of money to buy an official pawn. Cao Cao's father, Cao Teng, spent eight million to buy a "Tai Wei" and entered the ranks of the "Three Dukes".
Unfortunately, Hua Tuo does not have the above two articles. He was neither a famous person, nor did he have any family wealth, so after losing that opportunity, he never had the opportunity to become an official again, so he had to retreat to the second place and embark on the road of practicing medicine.
Later, even after becoming a famous doctor, Hua Tuo often expressed regret, regretting that he was young and crazy and did not seize the opportunity to become an official.
Chen Shou described in detail these ideological activities of Hua Tuo in the Fang Ji Biography of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms: "(Hua Tuo) was originally a scholar, saw his profession as a doctor, and often repented of himself. ”
One sentence broke Hua Tuo's mentality after practicing medicine. In the process of practicing medicine, Hua Tuo has come into contact with many high-ranking officials and magnates, and after seeing the living conditions of these people, Hua Tuo deeply feels that compared with them, his so-called "famous doctor" is simply not worth mentioning.
As his fame grew, more and more powerful people invited Hua Tuo to see a doctor, and Hua Tuo's sense of loss became stronger and stronger. Over time, Hua Tuo was not calm, and his personality became particularly obedient and became more and more extreme.
Fan Ye unceremoniously pointed out the flaws in Hua Tuo's personality in the "Later Han Shu Fang Shu Lie Biography", saying that he was "evil for human nature, and it is rare to be happy".
While regretting and remorseful, Hua Tuo was also waiting for the opportunity to become an official at all times. But he waited, waited, and never waited for a particularly good opportunity. During this period, he practiced medicine everywhere, and his medical skills became more and more skilled.
Sensational "scraping bone healing"
Objectively speaking, Hua Tuo is a medical genius. In the process of practicing medicine, he relied on his own ingenuity to invent the world's earliest anesthetic "Hemp Boiling Scatter". Relying on this anesthetic, Hua Tuo performed the world's earliest surgical operation.
The Later Han Shu Fang Shu Lie Biography records that Hua Tuo performed the operation on people as follows: "First he was boiled and scattered with wine, and he was drunk and unconscious, because he broke his abdomen and back, and he cut and accumulated." If it is in the stomach and intestines, it is cut off, the disease is removed, and then sutured, the ointment is applied, and the wound is healed in four or five days, and it is calmed in January. Wounds are not painful, and people do not humiliate themselves. ”
After waiting for many years, the opportunity to become an official did not wait, but Hua Tuo waited for an opportunity to make him famous in the world.
According to the Chronicle of the Three Kingdoms, Shu Shu, and Guan Yu' biography, "Yu tasted the middle of the flowing arrow, ran through his left arm, and although the wound healed, every time it rained, the bone often ached." The doctor said: "The arrow is poisonous, poisonous to the bone, when the broken arm is wounded, the bone is scraped to remove the poison, and then the disease is removed from the ear." Yu Ben stretched out his arm and ordered the doctor to split it. Shi Yushi asked the generals to eat oppositely, the blood in their arms flowed away, and they were on the plate, while Yu Cut and introduced the wine, smiling freely. ”
When Guan Yu and Cao Jun fought, their right arm was swollen after being hit by the enemy's poisonous arrow, and they could not continue to command the battle. His men then went around looking for a famous doctor for Guan Yu and invited Hua Tuo over.
After Examining Guan Yu, Hua Tuo said, "If you want to cure your hand, you must cut open the flesh with a knife, scrape off the poison from the bone, and sew it up again." But this surgery is very painful, and I am afraid you will not be able to eat it. ”
Guan Yu laughed and held out his right arm and said, "You do it now, I'll drink my wine!" So Hua Tuo used a sharp knife to cut Guan Yu's flesh open and operated on Guan Yu. The knife scraped back and forth on Guan Yu's bones, making a sound of knowing, but Guan Yu did not change his face and continued to drink.
After the operation, Hua Tuo said, "I have shown people a lifetime of illness, and I have never seen a person like the general." Prince True God also! Guan Yu laughed and said, "Sir's medical skills are really clever, and my arm doesn't hurt at all now." Sir is such a divine doctor! Since then, Hua Tuo's fame has spread throughout the land of Shenzhou.
In the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, it is not said that the doctor who operated on Guan Yu was Hua Tuo, but most people believe that there was no second except For Hua Tuo, who had this kind of medical technique at that time.
Cao Cao's illness was unexpected
After the news of Hua Tuo's "scraping bones to cure poison" for Guan Yu reached Cao Cao, it happened that Cao Cao was suffering from a headache. So Cao Cao summoned Hua Tuo and told him that he had a stubborn disease of "head wind", "every hair, the heart is confused", and he is miserable.
After Hua Tuo examined Cao Cao, he took out the silver needle and gave Cao Cao a few stitches, which delayed Cao Cao's pain. But Hua Tuo told Cao Cao that the disease was particularly difficult to treat and that there was no way to cure it without surgery.
Cao Cao did not immediately believe Hua Tuo's words. Cao Cao, who was suspicious by nature, believed that Hua Tuo was exaggerating, but wanted to use the opportunity to cure himself and blackmail Cao Cao into doing it for him.
Cao Cao once said to Xun You, "Tuo can heal this." The villain wants to raise my illness to self-respect. This means that Hua Tuo can cure this disease, but he refuses to do his best to cure it, but only wants to raise his own value.
Cao Cao understood Hua Tuo's implications, but was Cao Cao's character willing to be threatened? Therefore, he also pretended to be confused and did not meet Hua Tuo's requirements.
Although Hua Tuo's medical skills are superior, when it comes to playing with the heart eye, the ten Hua Tuo are not Cao Cao's opponents!
After Hua Tuo stayed for a few days, he saw that Cao Cao did not move, so he tentatively asked Cao Cao for leave, saying that he wanted to go home to get the prescription, and took the opportunity to leave Cao Cao.
Later, Cao Cao recruited Hua Tuo several times, and Hua Tuo ignored Cao Cao on the pretext that his wife was ill and so on. Cao Cao wrote many letters urging and asking local officials to come to the door to ask for it, but Hua Tuo was "able to be anorexic", believing that Cao Cao had asked for his own, and refused to go back to see Cao Cao without sealing his official position.
This angered Cao Cao. Cao Cao sent someone to investigate whether Hua Tuo's wife was really sick, and if she was, she would be fine; if she was not sick, she would arrest Hua Tuo and bring her to Xu Du.
In this way, Hua Tuo was arrested and taken to Xu Du's prison. Although there were also people who interceded for him, Cao Cao did not listen to him, and said to the intercessors: Afraid of what, dead Zhang butcher, will not be able to eat pork? (Don't worry, when the world has no such rats?) Then without hesitation, Hua Tuo was executed.
It is said that Hua Tuo also regretted it before his death. He took out a medical book he had written and gave it to the prison guard, saying to the jailer, "This book can save countless people, so you have to put it away!" But the jailers were all afraid of being implicated, and none of them dared to take it. Hua Tuo could only sigh a long time, and a torch burned the medical book to ashes, and then the neck was killed.
Cao Cao killed Hua Tuo, was he a momentary act?
As a politician, Cao Cao rarely killed indiscriminately. According to the Han law, Hua Tuo committed two crimes: one was the crime of "great disrespect" and the other was the crime of "not following the conscription".
And what really killed Hua Tuo was this "sin of not being conscripted." The punishment for the crime of "great disrespect" in the "Han Law" is actually not particularly heavy, not to mention that Cao Cao is not an emperor, so Hua Tuo's "great disrespect" is far from reaching the level of "beheading".
However, in the Han Law, the highest sentencing standard for "not conscripting" is the death penalty. Especially in the Three Kingdoms period at the end of the Han Dynasty, both the central government and the separatist regime implemented this article very strictly.
Therefore, Cao Cao used this crime to punish Hua Tuo's crime, and Hua Tuo had nowhere to defend, even if he helped him intercede, he could not find a legal loophole.
The political reasons behind Hua Tuo's death
Mr. Wang Liqun, the keynote speaker of CCTV's "Hundred Lectures Forum" and a famous professor at Henan University, put forward a new view on Hua Tuo's death: In the last years of the Eastern Han Dynasty, not only Cao Cao, but also all bureaucrats did not regard "doctors" as "people."
So Hua Tuo offended and angered Cao Cao, and Cao Cao killed him without the slightest hesitation.
Mr. Wang Liqun's view has also been endorsed by many historians. No matter how skilled Hua Tuo's medical skills were, his identity was always a common man.
In feudal society, the rulers would not treat such a "shuren" as a "person", including Cao Cao, and only regarded Hua Tuo as a "rat generation" with only a skill, and killing him had no political impact at all.
Mr. Wang Liqun also believed that Cao Cao was in a chaotic world at the end of the Han Dynasty, and if he wanted to pacify the world, he must establish his absolute authority and demand that his subordinates absolutely obey him.
When his authority is challenged, he generally does not show mercy to the challenger, and unless he adopts a "tolerant" attitude in the case of special political needs, he must maintain his authority.
At that time, Cao Cao had already pacified the north, and "blackmailed the Son of Heaven to order the princes", and was the de facto ruler of the Han Dynasty at that time. Although Cao Cao did not claim the title of emperor, in his heart, he was the emperor, his subordinates were his courtiers, and his orders must be unconditionally obeyed by others, otherwise they would definitely be severely punished.
Hua Tuo disobeyed Cao Cao's orders, negating Cao Cao's political authority, which Cao Cao could not tolerate. In order to maintain his authority and realize his ambition to unify China, Cao Cao had to kill Hua Tuo. From this point of view, Cao Cao was right.
Cao Cao is a man with contradictory dual personalities. Sometimes he is murderous, sometimes he is compassionate, he is tolerant and benevolent, and he will repay with his eyes. He could avenge his father by slaughtering tens of thousands of innocent people in Xuzhou, or he could kill Lü Bohao's entire family, who was kind to him, in order to protect himself.
But at the same time, he was able to tolerate Chen Lin, who wrote insults and insulted him, and was extremely sympathetic to the people. This seemingly contradictory personality illustrates a problem: Cao Cao's guidelines for doing things are only two words, that is, "practical".
Cao Cao's "practicality" is very simple: if it is useful to me, it will stay, and if it is useless, it will be cursed. Cao Cao believed that Hua Tuo was unwilling to treat himself and wanted to use his illness to threaten himself, so "I will not kill this son, and I will not cut off this original ear for me in the end." "Since Hua Tuo is useless, there is no need to stay!"
Can Hua Tuo really open Cao Cao's skull safely?
Let's make another assumption: if Cao Cao really agreed to Hua Tuo splitting his own head, what would happen?
Even today, craniotomy is still a very high-risk surgery, and a little carelessness will leave a variety of sequelae such as long-term coma, hemiplegia, aphasia, epilepsy and so on. Therefore, in addition to the implementation of craniotomy for special diseases such as Parkinson's disease and epilepsy, general hospitals do not recommend this operation.
Two thousand years ago, if Hua Tuo really performed craniotomy on Cao Cao, how he would solve the infection during the operation was a big problem.
Under the medical conditions at that time, the instruments used by Hua Tuo could not be sterile at all, and under the conditions of bacteria, head surgery was carried out, and Cao Cao would definitely have intracranial infection after the operation. At that time, there was no effective broad-spectrum antibiotic, and this infection was enough to kill Cao Cao.
In addition to the infection, hua Tuo faced many other risks in doing craniotomy, and any unknown risk was enough to kill Cao Cao. Therefore, Cao Cao can still live for several years without opening his skull, and if he really opens his skull, I am afraid that he will not even be able to get off the operating table.
Wouldn't Cao Cao, who has read a lot of books, not know about this? Therefore, Cao Cao thought that Hua Tuo wanted to assassinate himself, and from the point of view of reason, it also made sense.
For thousands of years, Hua Tuo's death has been labeled as "not attached to power" and "not subjugated by might", which is also untenable.
In any era, doctors are aimed at treating diseases and saving people, and in the eyes of doctors, there should be only patients, and there is no difference between poor and rich, official and people.
Therefore, we cannot say that Hua Tuo's failure to treat Cao Cao's illness is of high moral character, nor can we say that his treatment of Cao Cao is of despicable character.
Of course, in the matter of killing Hua Tuo, should Cao Cao be more calm?
In fact, after Cao Cao killed Hua Tuo, he also regretted it, especially when his beloved son Cao Chong was seriously ill and other doctors were helpless, Cao Cao regretted it = killed Hua Tuo: "I regret killing Hua Tuo, so that this child will die!" "But at this time, it is too late to regret it."
Through the analysis of historical materials such as the Romance of the Three Kingdoms and the Book of the Later Han Dynasty, we can conclude that Hua Tuo was a great famous doctor at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, and his shortcomings did not affect his important position in the history of ancient Chinese medicine.
But as the Book of the Later Han Dynasty says, "Hua Tuo's evil and reserved skills will eventually lead to death." How could these flaws in his character not be one of the important reasons for his murder?
Resources:
Wang Liqun: The Moral and Legal Issues of Cao Cao's Killing of Hua Tuo
Wu Jianying: "Cao Cao Killed Hua Tuo for another Reason"