Text\Dream walker
Wang Mian was a famous painter, poet, and seal engraver in the late Yuan and early Ming dynasties, and a native of Zhuji, Shaoxing, Zhejiang. Wang Mian came from a peasant family, was very poor, and when he was a child, he herded cattle for people. However, he was very studious, tireless in reading, and reached the level of obsession, often going to the nearby temple at night to read with the lamp of the long light there, and the days went on, and his knowledge gradually deepened.
Because his family was poor, he often lacked firewood for the fire, and when it was time to cook, Wang Guan would go to the temple not far away to cut the wooden statues of the gods into pieces and take them home to burn the fire to cook. However, one of his neighbors was particularly superstitious, and often knelt and worshipped the idols in the temple, very religious. When he saw the crown splitting the statue and burning the fire, he couldn't help but shout, "Sin, sin! Aren't you afraid of God's retribution? ”
The crown did not believe in ghosts and gods, and the shouts of his neighbors had no effect on him. The neighbor had no choice but to carve a statue of a deity and repair it himself after the crown had cut down a statue. He firmly believed that the crown would be punished and punished by God, and that his kindness would be blessed by God. Who knew that in a few years, his expected retribution and punishment had not been fulfilled in the crown, but his wife and children were constantly sick, causing him a headache.
Once, when the shaman came to the temple to burn incense and pray for blessings, the neighbor asked him: "The crown has repeatedly taken the idol to chop wood and burn the fire, but I have not been punished at all, and I always worship God, repair the old, replace the new, why doesn't God bless me, but let my wife and children get sick?" The wizard did not come up with any suitable reason in his haste, so he pretended to be the tone of the temple god and said to him, "You don't need wood to repair the idol, what does he take as firewood and fire?" ”
The people next to them laughed when they heard the wizard's answer. From then on, Wang Tian's neighbors no longer did the stupid thing of repairing the idols, and the temple was later abandoned because there were fewer and fewer people burning incense.
The Miscellaneous Records of Shuyuan is a historical note compiled by Lu Rong in the Ming Dynasty, mostly about the ming dynasty's dynasties and oppositions, which has the value of corroboring with the history and making up for its omissions. The story of this crowned god splitting the statue to make firewood and burning fire is derived from this book. This story tells us: superstition is to put a shackle on your own neck!
2021.10.20.