Biography of the eunuchs
A eunuch is a eunuch who is a servant of the emperor and his family. Since the Eastern Han Dynasty, eunuchs have all used eunuchs. Originally, eunuchs were only responsible for court chores and were not allowed to participate in court affairs, but because they got along with the emperor day and night, they gained trust and held important positions. In the Eastern Han Dynasty, the eunuchs were extremely powerful, and they formed a situation of autocracy many times, so Fan Ye deliberately set up a joint biography. "The Book of the Later Han Dynasty: The Biography of the Eunuchs" is a total of one volume, recording the deeds of nine eunuchs, and this book selects Cai Lun and Cao Teng as representatives.
"Originator of papermaking" Cai Lun
Cai Lun (c. 61-121), known as Jingzhong, was a native of Guiyang County (now Chenzhou City, Hunan Province) and a great inventor of the Eastern Han Dynasty.
According to research, Cai Lun was born in a family of blacksmiths, and because the imperial court set up iron officials in Guiyang County, the Cai family began to have close contacts with court officials.
Cai Lun was studious when he was young, and he was very interested in smelting, casting, hemp planting, silkworm raising and other affairs. In the later years of Emperor Ming of the Han Dynasty, Cai Lun entered the inner court to work, and since then he has been promoted many times. After Emperor Han He ascended the throne, he served as a regular attendant and served by the emperor's side.
Cai Lun is very talented and learned, does his best to do things, and has repeatedly made direct admonitions, pointing out the gains and losses of Chen's political affairs. He later served as Shang Fangling, in charge of the manufacture of weapons and court utensils. The secret swords and various instruments he was responsible for manufacturing were all precise and became the laws of later generations.
At that time, the words were engraved on the bamboo slips, because the bamboo slips were too thick and heavy, and the emperor needed to use a car to carry them every time he approved them, which was very inconvenient. Although it is also written in light silk, it is expensive, so Cai Lun wanted to find a cheap alternative.
Cai Lun summed up the experience of his predecessors and studied the use of bark, hemp, rags and broken fishing nets to make paper. In 105, Cai Lun created a paper that was both light and economical, and presented it to Emperor He, who was very happy and praised it, and ordered it to be used and promoted both inside and outside the imperial court.
Cai Lun made meritorious service because of this, and was named the Marquis of Longting, with 300 households. People call the paper made by Cai Lun "Cai Hou paper". Cai Lun's improved papermaking technology not only facilitated writing, but also promoted the spread of culture, and was listed as one of the "four great inventions" in ancient China. Cai Lun is also respected as the "originator of papermaking".
During the reign of Emperor An of the Han Dynasty, the imperial court sent someone to proofread the text of the Confucian classics and ordered Cai Lun to supervise the matter.
Cai Lun was once instructed by the Empress Dowager Dou to frame the grandmother of Emperor An of the Han Dynasty, and when the Empress Dowager Dou died, Emperor An ordered a thorough investigation of the matter and let Cai Lun confess his guilt. Cai Lun didn't want to suffer such an insult, so he took poison and died.
Cai Lun improved papermaking and made great contributions to the spread and development of human civilization, and was respected by later generations for thousands of years, and the paper industry worshipped him as a "paper god".
The eunuch Cao Teng, who was posthumously honored as the emperor
Cao Teng (year of birth and death unknown), the name Jixing, was a native of Peiguo Qian (Qiáo) County (now Bozhou City, Anhui Province), and a eunuch in the late Eastern Han Dynasty.
During the reign of Emperor An of the Han Dynasty, Cao Teng entered the palace on an errand. Emperor An's eldest son Liu Bao was made the crown prince, and the Empress Dowager Deng selected virtuous eunuchs to serve the prince to study, and selected Cao Teng.
Cao Teng had a good relationship with the prince, and when he won the favor of the prince, he received a different reward from others. Liu Bao succeeded to the throne as Emperor Shun of Han, and Cao Teng was promoted to the rank of Zhongchang attendant and served by the emperor's side.
Emperor Shun died, and his son Emperor Han Chong succeeded to the throne, and he died in less than half a year. Then, Emperor Han Zhen ascended the throne, and more than a year later, he was poisoned by the general Liang Ji. At this time, there was a great disagreement within the imperial court about who would succeed to the throne, with a faction led by Taiwei Li Gu supporting Liu Lian, the great-grandson of Emperor Zhang of Han, and Liu Zhi, the great-grandson of Emperor Zhang of Han, represented by Liang Ji.
While the two factions were arguing, Cao Teng personally visited Liang Ji and expressed his support for Liu Zhi as emperor. In the end, Liu Zhi succeeded to the throne as Emperor Huan of the Han Dynasty, and Cao Teng was named the Marquis of Fei Ting for his meritorious service.
Cao Teng served four emperors in his life, acted in the palace for more than 30 years, and never made a mistake. The people he recommended were all wise men in the sea, and they were successively reused by the imperial court.
Once, the Taishou of Shu County (in the area of present-day Chengdu, Sichuan Province) wanted to pay a bribe to Cao Teng, but the assassin Shi of Yizhou (in the area of present-day Sichuan Province and Chongqing City) discovered his letter to Cao Teng, and the assassin Shi immediately impeached Cao Teng and demanded that the imperial court deal with Cao Teng.
Emperor Huan thought that the letter was written to Cao Teng by someone else, but Cao Teng did not know about it and did not blame him. Cao Teng did not resent the history of Yizhou's assassination, but often praised him as a capable and good official in front of the emperor, and people praised Cao Teng's conduct.
After Cao Teng's death, his adopted son Cao Song succeeded him to the title, and Cao Song's son was none other than Cao Cao, Emperor Wu of Wei. Cao Cao's son Cao Pi forced Emperor Xian of Han to establish the Wei State, and Emperor Ming of Wei posthumously honored Cao Teng as Emperor Gao, and Cao Teng became the only eunuch in mainland history to be posthumously honored as emperor.
Biography of Confucianism
The Book of the Later Han Dynasty and the Biography of Confucianism consists of two volumes, recording the deeds of more than 40 Confucian scholars, and this book selects He Xiu and Xu Shen as representatives.
He Xiu, the leader of today's literature and scriptures
He Xiu (129-182), known as Shao Gong, was a native of Fan County, Rencheng County (now Jining City, Shandong Province), a scholar of literature and classics in the Eastern Han Dynasty and a master of Confucianism.
He Xiu was simple and not good at words, but he was very thoughtful and studied the Six Classics of Confucianism very deeply, and no one in Confucianism at that time could surpass him.
He Xiu was once recruited as Langzhong, but he was unwilling, so he resigned due to illness. Later, Taiwei Chen Fan summoned him as a subordinate official, and He Xiu was able to participate in political affairs. Chen Fan lost power, he was implicated and banned from being an official.
Although the modern literature and scriptures of the Han Dynasty were in the exclusive position of official learning, because Dong Zhongshu added the five elements of yin and yang and the induction of heaven and man, it became more and more superstitious; in order to show their knowledge, Confucian scholars often interpreted hundreds of thousands of words, or even millions of words, and became cumbersome.
In the Eastern Han Dynasty, ancient scriptures rose strongly, and masters such as Xu Shen, Jia Kui (kuí), Zheng Zhong, Ma Rong, and Zheng Xuan appeared successively, and their influence in society became more and more great.
As a master of modern literature and classics, He Xiu felt this cruel reality, and with his extensive knowledge, he meditated behind closed doors at home, persevered for more than ten years, and wrote the book "Spring and Autumn Ram Interpretation (gǔ)".
"The Interpretation of the Spring and Autumn Ram" is meticulous and systematic, inheriting the style of Dong Zhongshu's "The Legend of the Spring and Autumn Ram", and has become a masterpiece of today's literature and classics. Later, it became a must-read for all generations of imperial examination scholars, and had a great impact on the traditional culture of the mainland.
In addition, He Xiu also wrote annotations to the Book of Filial Piety and the Analects, and wrote "The Ram Keeps It", comparing the doctrine of the "Ram" to Mo Zhai (dí) guarding the city, which is unbreakable, and wrote "Zuo's Anointing" and "Gu Liang's Waste Disease", criticizing "Zuo's Biography" and "Gu Liang's Biography". Later, Zheng Xuan wrote "Hair and Ink", "Needle Anointment" and "Waste Disease" respectively, refuting He Xiu.
Scholars in the capital called Zheng Xuan "Jingshen" and He Xiu "Xuehai", and respected them very much.
After the party ban was lifted, He Xiu came out to be an official again, and died in 182 at the age of fifty-four.
"Word Saint" Xu Shen
Xu Shen (c. 58-c. 147), also known as Shuzhong, was a native of Ling County, Zhao (shào) of Runan County (in present-day Luohe City, Henan Province), and was a famous scholar and philologist in the Eastern Han Dynasty.
Xu Shen had a simple and honest personality, and when he was young, he studied the scriptures extensively, and the scholar Ma Rong spoke highly of him, and people at that time praised Xu Shen, saying that no one could compare with him in his study of the Five Classics. Xu Shen was elected as filial piety, once served as a doctor of the Five Classics, and was in charge of the school book in the Dongguan of the National Library.
At that time, after hundreds of years of development, Confucian scriptures had spawned many schools, and the interpretation of the Five Classics was very confusing, with mixed reviews, so he wrote "The Five Classics and Different Meanings", which described the similarities and differences between the content of modern and ancient scriptures.
After Qin Shi Huang unified the world, he implemented the system of "writing with the same text" and ordered the unification of the written language, and successively issued the "Cangjie Chapter" by Prime Minister Li Si, the "Yuán Calendar Chapter" issued by Zhao Gao of the CRRC Prefecture, and the "Erudite Chapter" issued by Hu Wu (wú) Jing of Taishi Ling, which became an earlier character book; the Han Dynasty also issued the "Fan Jiang Chapter" and "Urgent Chapter" and other character books, continuing to popularize the written language. However, these books do not have many words, and the fonts have been in flux, which has been confusing for a long time.
Since the Eastern Han Dynasty, scholars of modern literature and classics have often taken the Confucian classics as a dogma, believing that every word and sentence has the subtle meaning of the sage, and arbitrarily using words to attach and extend, while scholars of ancient literature and classics believe that words have original meanings, and only by objectively understanding the original meaning can they better interpret the classics.
As a scholar of ancient scriptures, Xu Shen was determined to refute the claim that modern scriptures had tampered with the meaning of scriptures, and decided to create a character book.
In 100 years, when he was studying in the Eastern Pavilion, he had already completed the "Shuowen Jie Zi", and took advantage of the opportunity to read the royal classics, and continued to spend more than 20 years revising and perfecting it, and finalized it in 121 and presented it to the imperial court.
The book consists of 15 volumes, divided into 540 radicals, containing 9,353 characters, plus more than 1,000 variant characters, for a total of 10,516 characters. "Shuowen Jie Zi" classifies and summarizes Chinese characters through radicals and radicals, and opens the method of arranging Chinese characters according to radicals, which has been used to this day. It preserves a large number of ancient characters and ancient meanings, which is of great significance in exegesis, and also preserves a large number of ancient sound materials, which provides an important basis for the study of ancient sounds in later generations.
Shuowen Jie Zi is the earliest reference book in mainland China to systematically analyze the glyphs of Chinese characters and investigate the origin of characters, and it is also the first dictionary in the world, which has a far-reaching impact on later generations.
In 147, Xu Shen died of illness. In order to commemorate Xu Shen's outstanding contributions to philology, people respectfully call him "the saint of words", call his "Shuowen Jie Zi" "Xu Shu", and call his doctrine "Xu Xue".
This article is excerpted from "Twenty-four Histories Read Immediately, Language and History Are Progressing" - the fourth volume of the Book of the Later Han Dynasty, which is officially authorized to be published, welcome to continue to pay attention.