Li Xian was the sixth son of Emperor Gaozong Li Zhi and the second son of him and Wu Zetian. Li Xian was crowned the Prince of Lu at the age of two, and at the age of three he was given the title of Assassin of Qizhou. Li Zhi was very fond of this son, and there is a small story about it, when Emperor Gaozong Li Zhi told Li Ji, who was then a sikong, that he had asked Li Xian to recite the Analects, and when he read the sentence "Xianxian changes color", Li Xian repeatedly read it. He asked Li Xian why, and Li Xian replied that he liked this sentence very much. "Virtuous and discolored" means that people should respect people with virtue and not pay attention to superficial things. Li Xian, who was very young, understood this truth, how could Li Zhi be unhappy in his heart, he could not help his own joy, and often used this story to praise his son.
Li Xian is indeed intelligent and sensitive, and his nature is true. Li Zhi felt that he was a good seedling that could be shaped. At the age of six, Li Xian was made the Prince of Pei and the General of Zuo Wuwei, at the age of twelve he was the Governor of Yangzhou, and at the age of eighteen he was made the Prince of Yong and became the Governor of Liangzhou. In 675, less than two months after the death of Crown Prince Li Hong, Li Xian was made crown prince and became The Successor of Emperor Gaozong of Tang.
In that year, Emperor Gaozong Li Zhi granted amnesty to li xian and let Li Xian handle the daily affairs of the imperial court. Li Xian's performance is really good, he handles affairs in an orderly manner, is sympathetic to the people, diligent and diligent, and administers properly. This made Li Zhi very satisfied, and in 676 (the first year of Yi Feng), under his personal arrangement, he gave a heavy reward to the crown prince Li Xian. After that, Li Xian gathered a group of scholars to annotate Fan Ye's Book of later Han, and when Li Zhi saw the prince's annotated version, he was happy and gave him 30,000 pieces of silk. The courtiers also felt that the new prince was a good material for helming the world.
But man is an animal that will change, and the satisfaction of small desires will stimulate the production of large desires. Full of warm thoughts and lust, at this time, Li Xian is no longer the Li Xian who likes to be "virtuous and discolored".
In May 679 (the fourth year of Yi Feng), two things happened that were very unfavorable to Li Xian.
One thing is that Wei Chengqing, the secretary of the council, wrote to him that the crown prince Li Xian was too, and even more excessively engaged in homosexuality with his own domestic slave Zhao Daosheng and several other men. In order to satisfy his lust, Li Xian often rewarded those who were inconsistent with gold. He also said that Li Xian could not listen to his words, and he insisted on going his own way and doing his own thing, and he did not look like a successor.
When Wu Zetian learned of this, he was very angry.
At this time, there was another thing that also angered Li Zhi and Wu Zetian. The wizard Ming Chongyu, who was deeply liked by the two empresses at that time, was killed, and Tianhou Wu Zetian suspected that it was Li Xian's doing. Ming Chongyu often played some small tricks such as spells and ghosts, and would be very decent, but also very gracefully, plus Wu Zetian was very good at this mouth, and soon became very likable. Ming Chongyu had repeatedly told others in private that the crown prince Li Xian was not a suitable successor, that the English king Li Xian was very similar to Emperor Taizong, that Li Dan, the king of Xiang, was a natural nobleman, and so on. Ming Chongyu was dead, and in Wu Zetian's view, Li Xian was the most suspicious. In addition, it was privately rumored in the palace that Lee Hyun was not born to Empress Wu, but to Lady Han, the sister of Empress Wu. Li Xian also had doubts about his origins.
The relationship between Wu Zetian and his son quickly deteriorated.
We say that rumors don't have wings, but they fly faster than birds. These headless and brainless arguments made Li Xian not know how to be good, and made Li Zhi and Wu Zetian even more angry.
Therefore, Emperor Gaozong Li Zhi ordered a strict investigation of the crown prince Li Xian.
Zhongshu waiter Xue Yuanchao and others were responsible for investigation and punishment. Soon hundreds of soap armor were found from Li Xian's residence, not to mention, the key is that Li Xian's homosexual friend Zhao Daosheng could not withstand intimidation, and confessed that it was the crown prince Li Xian who instructed him to kill Ming Chongyu. Having both conspired against the soap armor and killed his favorite wizard, Wu Zetian believed that the prince was pregnant with a ghost fetus, and Heaven could not tolerate it. Good fellow, both the tools of rebellion and the elimination of dissidents, does this person dare to reuse it? After arguing with Emperor Gaozong and Li Zhi, Li Xian was removed from the position of crown prince and imprisoned in Chang'an.
Li Xian died in 684, and the cause of Li Xian's death has long been debated.
On this issue, the three books of the Old Book of Tang, the New Book of Tang, and the Zizhi Tongjian record the same thing in that they all say that after Wu Zetian came to the dynasty in 684, he sent Qiu Shenxun to Bazhou, Sichuan, to supervise Li Xian, perhaps Qiu Shenji forced Li Xian to commit suicide, or It may be that Li Xian committed suicide out of anger. But the details of the three books vary. The Old Book of Tang says that in order to prevent Li Xian from having a branch or rebellion, Qiu Shenxun closed Li Xian's claustrophobia and forced him to end his life. The Zizhi Tongjian says that Qiu Shenxun came to Bazhou with Wu Zetian's instructions to nominally supervise Li Xian and prevent accidents, but in fact Wu Zetian asked Qiu Shenxun to find a way to force Li Xian to commit suicide. The New Book of Tang, on the other hand, is inconsistent about the cause of Li Xian's death, admitting in the passage about Li Xian as a "forced suicide", while in the Benji of Wu Zetian, it is stated that "Li Xian, a man who killed Li Xian, was in Bazhou." ”
After that, Wu Zetian's bad reputation for killing Li Xian was carried on Wu Zetian.
It is often said that "tiger poison does not eat children". As the mother of man, did Wu Zetian have a reason not to love his son? In dealing with political opponents, Wu Zetian insisted that "the stone must be removed, and the scourge must be eradicated", and did she treat her son, who was very weak, so vicious? Why did she kill her own son?
Some people say that Wu Zetian wants to clear the way. In the later period of Emperor Gaozong's reign, Wu Zetian's position was no longer able to be shaken. At the time of the Second Saint Advent Dynasty, she already had supreme power, and Li Xian posed no threat to her, and she would not get rid of her own flesh and blood because of this.
Others believe that Lee Hyun was not the son of Wu Zetian, but was born to his sister Lady Korea. In December 654 (the fifth year of Yonghui), Li Xian was born on the way for Li Zhi to pay homage to his father Li Shimin Zhaoling, when Wu Zetian's sister Lady Helan had not yet entered the palace, and there was basically no possibility of having anything to do with Li Zhi. For the son he gave birth to, Wu Zetian has always been concerned about his education and study, after Li Hong's illness and death, Wu Zetian supported Li Zhi to make him a prince, there is no mystery of his life, and there is no situation where Wu Zetian wants to kill his sister's son.
As for Li Xian's rebellion, Wu Zetian may have such worries, but Li Xian was already powerless to return to heaven after the Ming Chongyu incident, becoming a sick tiger and hardly having any strength to confront his mother. Wu Zetian knew this better than anyone.
And wu Zetian's claim that he killed his son Li Xian appears in the New Book of Tang, and it is not difficult for us to understand. Ouyang Xiu was very disgusted with the figure of women ascending to the position of emperor, he was undoubtedly a great literary scholar, shining on the track of literature and art, but he was not necessarily a competent historian, and he resented Wu Zetian to the point of wanting to kill her. Biased and self-righteous, in his pen, Gaozong was a bastard emperor, and Wu Zetian became the culprit in killing Li Hong and Li Xian.