«——【Preamble】】 ——»
With the continuous deepening of the historical process and the development of Emperor Wu's practice, the contradictions and differences between Liu Che and Dong Zhongshu on political opinions finally intensified. This is naturally the inevitable result of the development of the inherent contradictions within the political views of Dong and Liu, why do they have contradictions?
«——【·Background of the Times·】——»
The foreign war that lasted for more than 30 years from the second year of Yuanguang. It was this protracted war that gave the ambitious Liu Che the crown of "Emperor Wu"; It was also this "typhoon" that blew Dong Zhongshu's utopia of family benevolence and moral rule to the ground.
Since the Qin Dynasty, the invasion of the Xiongnu in the north has posed a serious military threat to the feudal empire that has just established itself in East Asia. Qin Shi Huang built the Great Wall in the north, became a soldier to guard the border, and Han Gaozu squandered his own expedition, but they failed to fundamentally solve this problem.
Before Emperor Wu ascended the throne, Emperor Wen and Emperor Jing turned to a defensive policy of "harmony", and this situation continued until the early years of Emperor Wu. Liu Che adopted Wang Hui's proposition and ambushed 300,000 troops in the area of Mayi, trying to lure the Xiongnu, but due to leaked information, he returned in vain.
Although the two armies were not officially at war, the prelude to the war was already played. "Since the beginning of the conquest of the four provinces, the division has been out for more than 30 years, and the household registration in the world has been halved." The war launched by Emperor Wu against the Xiongnu is a complex historical issue.
This war with all the strength of the country had a very strong impact on the economic and ideological fields of the society at that time, and it was undoubtedly a disaster for Confucianism, which had just risen to the status of "sole respect". Dong Zhongshu's Confucian ideal blueprint of "war is better than no war" has been shelved by Liu Che, who pioneered the frontier.
The first social consequence that accompanied frequent wars was socio-economic chaos. "Hanshu Gongyu Biography" contains: "The death of the ancient people is calculated as money. Emperor Qiwu's conquest of Siyi was re-endowed to the people. When the people give birth to a child when they are three years old, they export money, so the people are in great difficulty, and it is very sad to give birth to a child and kill him. ”
From the first year to the fourth year of Taichu, Liu Che only fought against Dawan only to get sweat and blood, and successively mobilized more than 200,000 soldiers to rejuvenate the army, but only got "dozens of good horses, and more than 3,000 horses below the middle horse." "Labor and money. Heavy forced labor and increasing taxes.
This inevitably leads to another serious social problem, namely, the increasingly acute social contradictions and the emergence of cool officials. At the beginning of the Han Dynasty, in order to revive the social and economic life, the people in power implemented the technique of Huang Lao, and the way of "humility and quietness" and "inaction" was noble.
«——【Cool Officials·】——»
This kind of example of a cool official breaking and a heavy law can be described as a history in the era of Emperor Wu. It is no wonder that Shi Qian's "Historical Records: The Biography of the Officials" of the Han Dynasty had no officials, and among the twenty-one people who were listed in the "Biography of the Cool Officials", there were as many as 18 minions of Emperor Wu alone!
The emergence of a large number of cool officials shows the increasing intensification of social class contradictions at that time, and the reuse of cool officials reflects that Liu Che, as the supreme ruler, was not interested in Dong Zhongshu's Confucian teachings of "virtue is not punished" in his own practice.
Of course, the intensification of such social contradictions cannot be completely attributed to the war, but is mainly the inevitable product of the development of contradictions in the relations of production of the social productive forces. With the recovery and development of the social economy, the greed and corruption of the ruling class have also swelled viciously.
During the time of Emperor Wu, "all the officials and benefits were mixed, and the slaves were numerous, and they went down to the river to cross four million stones and officials, and they came to their own content." "In the past few decades, the use of food alone has skyrocketed by more than ten or dozens of times. Other costs are not to be disclaimed.
This kind of social situation in which "the sick of the adults are not enough for the top, and the people for the small people are inferior" should be the fundamental reason for the intensification of social contradictions. And the continuous war is undoubtedly a catalyst for the increasingly acute social contradictions.
During his reign of fifty-four years, he successively served as 13 ministers, of which four were executed or ordered to commit suicide, four were deposed, and only four were able to die a good death (Tian Qianqiu Zhao Emperor Sihua died, not listed. And the phase is also a non-existent one.
On the other hand, it does reflect his lack of interest in the "scholars of the rites". In the face of such a sharp and aggressive feudalism, Zhong Shu tirelessly advocated the idea of "quiet and inaction", which is exactly where he moved to decay as a living.
«——【Political Discord·】——»
In addition to the fact that Emperor Wu and Dong Zhongshu were incompatible in terms of governance methods, they also had major differences on the fundamental issue of what kind of promising thing to promote. Zhong Shuchui's theory of "divine authority of kings" painted secular power with a sacred color.
This was naturally a matter of maintaining the centralized system at that time. But that's not all. In this proposition, there is also a series of wine in the series of "Qu Jun and look up to the sky". As the "Son of Heaven", nature is extremely sacred and terrifying.
As a monarch who is "for", he must also respect the mandate of heaven, act according to the will of "heaven", and govern the country and the country, which is also the right way of heaven and earth. While deifying the kingship on earth and making the lords have "poetry", Huang Zhongshu carefully regulated the kingship that was once absolutized by history.
He brought out the idols of the other side of the world, "Heaven" and "Heavenly Pass", in an attempt to restrain the "holy relics" of the world on this shore, so that the feudal monarch was "afraid" in his actions. Lan Zhongshu is always the supremacy of the rules in your system - "Heaven".
In fact, it is just an idealized Confucian concept of governance and morality. The thought of the family is reflected in real life through the refraction of "heaven", "heavenly way" and "way", which is sacred and majestic. Shu's "Qu Jun and" heart proposition.
The essence of the unification of the "Spring and Autumn Period" that he repeatedly advocated was to unify the heavens and the earth into the Confucian kingdom. This kind of respectful expression of Qu Jun's face stretching out to the sky naturally has to touch the nail in Liu Che's place.
In the limit of Emperor Wu, it is not a baton of magic. This naturally also reflects his heroic side as a feudal monarch with achievements. Dong Zhongshu's final loss of power was Liu Che's categorical rejection of his theory of disaster induction.
In the sixth year of the founding of the Yuan Dynasty, the high temple of Liaodong and the hall of Changling Gaoyuan were successively hit by fire. Dong Zhongshu took this opportunity to give full play to his theory of catastrophe and change, and the theory of heaven and man induction, and wrote a good chapter to ask Emperor Wu to punish the princes and princes of the emperor "far and wrong", except for "close ministers in the middle of the country and those who are noble and unrighteous" to follow the will of heaven.
At the end of the chapter and above, Emperor Wu was stolen by the master's father. Liu Che was furious and called for a discussion of the crime. His disciple Chang Bushu didn't know what his teacher had written, and thought that he was a fool, "so he went down to Zhongshu and deserved to die, and he was pardoned." Zhong Shu didn't dare to return to the disaster. ”
The beauty of this matter is not only that the disciples sin their teachers, but that the wonderful thing is that Emperor Wu transformed the Confucian scholars who danced and wrote and were full of "benevolent government" and "rule by virtue" into a group of swordsmen and executioners who used the "Spring and Autumn Period" as the legal code to break the prison.
Although he was spared death, the pillar of his entire ideological system, the theory of heaven and man induction, "did not dare to repeat it", which undoubtedly deprived him of the right to speak. Since the baton of "heaven", which has great authority over the human world, has lost its effect,
Then, the laws of "The Great Sutra of Heaven", "Quing the King and Extending the Heavens", "Doing Heaven Like a Father", "Following the Way of Heaven" and so on suddenly lose their effectiveness. Once the cornerstone of "disaster induction" is removed, the entire theory that Dong Zhongshu has bred from this will immediately face a desperate situation.
When Dong Zhongshu complained about his illness, although he occasionally dealt with the inquiries of Zhang Tang and others, most of them were locked up with domestic ducks or wild ducks for ancestral sacrifices: "The ancestral temple or the temple is used as a house, and it is not a house, can it be used?"
This "Confucian Sect" of the Han Dynasty was already insignificant in the life of that time. , and "Confucianism does not play a leading role in Liu Che's life activities. "The king's domineering miscellaneous use of "Tao" is the mainstay, which is more in line with historical facts.
The reason for this situation is that in addition to the decisive role of the social situation at that time, Liu Che's own ideological quality is also one of the factors that cannot be ignored. As an ambitious and joyful feudal, Liu Che did not have the conditions to implement Confucian benevolence and moral governance.
«——【·Conclusion·】——»
As the supreme master of the world, it is still not enough to exhaust the world, and Liu Che then made a big dream of being a fairy, and the pursuit of "but old" is almost fanatical. For those scammers who are unscrupulous, Liu Che is also regarded as a distinguished guest.
In order to obtain alchemy and "the old party", he invited the charlatan Luan Da into the palace to "worship the great general of Wuli", and he was only a scholar and noble. After listening to the nonsense of Sun Qing, the prince of Qi, about the Yellow Emperor's "immortal ascending to the sky", this dignified monarch sighed with regret.
Liu Che's superstitious style of life is also far from the Confucian tradition of silence, power, chaos, and gods. Yes, Dong Zhongshu's ideological system is also full of mysticism, but he does not advocate birthism, nor does he believe in ghosts and gods.
Information sources:
Hanshu Five Elements Chronicles