Su Shi is not an atheist. He encountered gods, spirits, and ghosts many times in his life, and when he did, he went to reason with them and talk about conditions.
Once, on the way back to Beijing (Kaifeng), after passing through a mountain road, one of the people in the retinue suddenly began to take off his clothes like a middle evil until he was stripped naked. Su Shi quickly asked people to help him put him back on and tie him up again, but the clothes on his body fell off inexplicably. Everyone said that this person must have angered the mountain god.
Su Shi then went to the mountain temple and began to reason with the mountain god.
Su Shi said that this person is like ants and lice in the heavens and the earth, so small, why should the god of Laoshan exert great power on him? Even if he has any slackness or petty theft, he will not be punished by you personally - after all, the place under your jurisdiction is so vast, in your jurisdiction, every day the powerful and nobles openly commit adultery, and I don't see you daring to be angry with them, but now you want to be angry with a small person, this is really not true, right?
After the prayer, Su Shi walked out of the mountain temple, and a mountain wind blew toward him, "shaking the heavens and the earth, and the sand and stones flew."
Su Shi said, Is the mountain god even more angry after listening? But I'm not afraid.
So, the group braved the strong wind to continue to move forward. The wind was getting stronger until the men and horses couldn't walk anymore. The entourage all advised Su Shi to return to the mountain temple to ask for forgiveness, but Su Shi replied, "Misfortune and blessing, heaven also." God's wrath is wrath, and I do not stop. "The mountain god is going to be angry, that's his business, I still have to go forward, see if he can help me!"
Before long, the fierce wind stopped, and the evil retinue was awake. It was as calm as ever, as if nothing had happened.
Su Shi's life is a journey of "God's anger is anger, and I do not stop". It's not that he hasn't experienced darkness, he's just never being swallowed up by it. After his death, the unique personality charm he exuded gained the tolerance and favor of history. It can be said that there is only one such wonderful person in three thousand years, and we have not been able to find a second one so far.
▲Portrait of Su Shi
01
The Su Shi family lived in Meizhou (present-day Meishan, Sichuan). In the spring of 1037 AD, Penglao Mountain in Meizhou did not bloom, the grass and trees withered, and a beautiful mountain suddenly became a barren land. Many years later, the villagers of Meizhou suddenly realized that this year, a heavenly wizard was born in the local area, and the spirit of the mountains and rivers was exclusively in him, and they were all sucked away. This is a folklore about the birth of Su Shi. In history, in addition to the inexhaustible auspicious omens of the birth of the emperor, it is very rare for a literati politician to receive such treatment.
The Su family is a rather solid local cultivator.
Su Shi's grandfather, Su Xu, grew corn rice, which was not shelled after harvest, and built a large warehouse for direct storage. A few years later, there were three or four thousand stones. No one knows what his intentions are. Until one year, when there was a famine in Meizhou, Su Xu opened a warehouse to take millet, first to relieve his family and relatives, and then to help tenants and poor people. Someone asked him, why do you have to use millet to save the wilderness? He said that corn is strong, can withstand long-term storage, and uses it when there is a shortage of grain, and it will not rot.
Su Shi had an uncle named Su Zhuo, who was the key person in the change of fortune in the entire family. At the age of 24, Su Zhuo passed the examination for the jinshi, breaking the situation that the Su family was "not visible for three generations" and becoming the first person in this civilian family to rise to the level of an official eunuch family. Su Shi later wrote a tribute to Su Zhuan that his uncle was a clean and honest official, traveled all over the world, and forgot his home, but now that he is dead, his family is poor. This is the family style of the Su family in Meizhou.
Su Shi's father, Su Xun, was considered a prodigal son when he was young. When the Su Shi brothers were very young, their father had been out in the world for many years and had disappeared. The brothers' reading enlightenment was completed by their mother, Mrs. Cheng.
Lady Cheng was born into a famous family in Qingshen County, Meizhou, and her father Cheng Wen should have been a jinshi and an official in Dali Temple. Mrs. Cheng, who grew up in a prosperous family, lived a rich life, liked to read poetry and books since childhood, and developed a character of knowledgeable and dignified and virtuous.
Mrs. Cheng personally served as a teacher for the Su Shi brothers, teaching them to read. One day, she taught her son to read the history of the Eastern Han Dynasty, and when she read the "Biography of Fan Huan", she was overwhelmed with emotion. Fan Huan was a famous scholar of the Eastern Han Dynasty, who was respected by the people of the time for his learning and morality, and he was implicated when the disaster of the party was committed. When saying goodbye to his mother, Fan Huan said that life and death have their own place, and he hopes that his mother will not be sad. Fan Mu replied that how can a person who wants both moral fame and wealth and longevity have both? I want you to give up your life and realize your ideals.
Reading this, Mrs. Cheng's mother and son were deeply moved by this history. After a long time, 10-year-old Su Shi said to Mrs. Cheng: "If I become Fan Huan, will my mother agree?" After hearing this, Madame Cheng calmly said, "If you can become a loyal and righteous soldier like Fan Huan, can't I become Fan Huan's mother?" Since then, Su Shi has forged ahead, read a lot of books, and has the world in mind.
Later, Su Xun sent his two sons to the state to study. Liu Ju, a professor of state studies, was a local celebrity in Meizhou, who taught the Su Shi brothers the skills of sound rhythm and pairing. Once, Liu Ju gave a poem to the heron in class, reading the last two sentences "The fisherman suddenly startled, the snow flakes slanted in the wind", Su Shi immediately said that the teacher's poem is good, but how about changing the last sentence to "snow flakes falling on the leaves"? After Liu Ju listened, he said with a smug face, I can't be your teacher anymore.
Su Xun participated in the imperial examination three times in his life, and all of them fell behind, so he no longer clinged to his own meritorious name, but pinned his hopes on his two sons. He compiled thousands of books for his two sons as teaching materials, and said to his sons: "Reading is enough to govern the body from the inside and the people from the outside." That is to say, after reading these, it is more than enough to cultivate oneself and rule the country and the world. He also did not teach his sons according to the outline of the imperial examination, but used the articles of Mencius, Han Yu, and Ouyang Xiu as examples for them to learn to write ancient texts.
▲Portrait of Su Xun
Meizhou is located in a corner of the empire, but it has a long history and a collection of humanities. In the year that Su Shi and his brother entered Beijing to participate in the imperial examination, Meizhou passed the examination for 13 jinshi, which attracted the attention of the country. In this small southwestern city that was later called "the city of yuran thousand-year-old poetry book" by Lu You, Su Shi felt the daily historical and cultural influence from an early age.
When he was 7 years old, Su Shi and his friends heard a 90-year-old nun talking about the old things in the Houshu Palace. When the old nun was young, she followed her master to the Houshu Palace to do things, and on a summer night, she saw the Later Shu Emperor Meng Chang and his favorite concubine Lady Huarui taking shelter by the Mahabharata Pool, chanting poems and lyrics. Decades later, the old nun could still recite the words she had heard that night.
When the old nun told these old things, she deeply infected the childhood Su Shi. The words memorized by the old nun were imprinted on his mind. 40 years later, he can still remember the first two sentences: "Ice muscle jade bone, cool and sweatless." The water temple wind comes dark incense. At this time, Su Shi was already a literary all-rounder, and concluded that this long-lost Shu Palace word plate should be "Dong Xian Song", so he began with these two sentences and continued to write a complete chapter:
Ice muscle jade bone, cool without sweat. The water temple wind comes dark incense. The embroidery curtain is open, a little bright moon peeps at people, people do not sleep, and the pillow is chaotic.
Get up and take the hands of the plain, the court is silent, and when you see the stars crossing the river, you will see the thin stars. How about the night? The night has changed three times, the golden wave is light, and the jade rope is turned low. But when the west wind came, it was not secretly changed for many years.
—— Su Shi,"Dong Xian Song"
When he was a teenager, Su Shi once went out with his brother to play, passed a small courtyard, and saw two poems written on the wall: "There is rain in the cold night, and the courtyard is quiet like no monk." The brothers pondered for half a day and thought it was interesting, but they didn't know who wrote it. Many years later, Su Shi was demoted to Huangzhou and stayed at the Huangzhou Zenzhi Temple, where the monks were not there, and suddenly it rained in the middle of the night, hitting the bamboo and making a noise. In the face of this situation, Su Shiyou remembered these two poems he had read when he was young, and sighed with emotion:
The Buddha lamp gradually dimmed and the hungry rats came out, and the mountain rain suddenly came to repair the bamboo singing.
Knowing whose old verses it is, I should have known my present situation.
At that time, his hometown of Meizhou could not go back, but he often remembered the events of his childhood. In the darkness, many encounters buried a preset ending in the small town teenager who was idle.
▲Sichuan Meishan Sansu Ancestral Hall Image source/Figure worm creative
02
The imperial examination in the spring of 1057 AD was full of talents and glorious throughout the ages. The 21-year-old Su Shi and his 19-year-old brother Su Rui both ranked first and stood out.
Su Shi's on-the-spot essay "On the Reward of Loyalty and Loyalty to Punishment" almost made him the champion of the imperial examination that year. At that time, the paste name system was implemented, and the chief examiner Ouyang Xiu suspected that this good article was written by his own student Zeng Gong, and in order to avoid suspicion, he demoted the article to a lower rank. When it was unveiled, it was found that it was Su Shi's masterpiece.
However, after the Su Shi brothers were on the list, public opinion was very controversial. Unlike Zeng Gong, who was also on the list, the Su Shi brothers were not famous before, and many readers expressed dissatisfaction and began to protest. At the crucial time, it was still Ouyang Xiu, the lord of the literary league, who came out of the horse.
Ouyang Xiu praised Su Shi on various occasions, saying that houlang was fierce, and the old man should avoid this person (Su Shi) and release his head. He also said that after 30 years, no one will remember him Ouyang Xiu, and the literary world will be Su Shi's world.
When Su Shi went to meet and thank Ouyang Xiu, Ouyang Xiu asked, "You said in your article, when Emperor Yao was an ancient Emperor Yao, Gao Tao was a magistrate, there was a person who committed a crime, Gao Tao proposed to kill him three times, and Emperor Yao pardoned him three times.
Su Shi replied, in the notes of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms and the Biography of Kong Rong.
After Su Shi left, Ouyang Xiu quickly found the "Romance of the Three Kingdoms and Kong Rong biography" to re-read, but did not find this allusion, very depressed. The next time we met, I asked Su Shi again.
Su Shi replied that after Cao Cao destroyed Yuan Shao, he rewarded Yuan Shao's daughter-in-law to his son Cao Pi, and Kong Rong was very dissatisfied with this, saying: "In that year, King Wu was in the middle of the cutting, and gave the favored concubine of the King of Shang to the Duke of Zhou. Cao Cao asked what book the matter came from. Kong Rong said: "There is no basis for it, but it is just a matter of taking it for granted to speculate on the situation in ancient times based on today's events." The students also speculated based on Emperor Yao's benevolence and the strictness of Gao Tao's law enforcement, and they just took it for granted.
Originally an allusion made up by Su Shi, but he explained it so freshly and unconventionally, Ouyang Xiu was very admired after listening to it, and afterwards he praised Su Shi for being good at reading and using books, and his daily articles must be unique in the world.
▲Ouyang Xiu statue Image source/photo network
Three years later, in order to prepare for the examination of the subject system presided over by Song Renzong himself, the Su Shi brothers moved to a station together to review. One night, when it was raining heavily, the two happened to read a poem by the Tang Dynasty poet Wei Yingwu: "I would rather know the stormy night, and sleep in this bed." "They are very emotional with each other, they know that the brothers are inseparable at the moment, but once they embark on a career, they will travel separately and face a long goodbye. That night, the two brothers agreed that in the future, they would return to their hometown of Meishan as soon as possible.
In the years to come, they all remembered the agreement of this stormy night, but in their careers, they could not help themselves, and they could not realize this simple dream.
The brothers' exams were relatively smooth. When Emperor Renzong of Song returned to the palace after presiding over the examination, he could not hide his inner joy and said to Empress Cao quite proudly: "Today I have two prime ministers for my descendants!" ”
The Su Shi brothers thus began to enter the career. Su Shi's first official position was dali judge, preparing to sign a sentence in Fengxiang Province, while Su Rui applied to serve his father in Beijing. In 1061, on a cold winter day, Su Shi set out with his wife Wang Fu and the eldest son in his infancy. Su Rui rode all the way along and did not return until tens of miles away. For the first time in more than 20 years, they parted ways, and both were sad.
Passers-by sang and lived happily, and the servants blamed me for being miserable.
I also know that life should be different, but I am afraid that the years will drift.
The cold lights are relatively memorable, and when the night rain listens to the depression.
Knowing this intention, you must not forget it, and be careful not to love high-ranking officials.
Su Shi looked at the back of his brother's return, remembered their stormy covenant more than a year ago, and wrote poems with a pen, hoping that both of them would not forget their original intentions in pursuit of official positions.
Su Shi's first superior was Song Xuan, the prefect of Fengxiang. Song Xuan was diligent in politics and personally grasped big and small things, which gave Su Shi the earliest demonstration of official ability. When Su Shi entered Beijing to catch the examination, he passed by Fengxiang and wanted to stay at the official residence, who knew that it was dilapidated and could not live at all. Now that he had gone to Fengxiang as an official, he found that the post had been renovated under the leadership of the new prefect Song Xuan. Su Shi was quite inspired by this small matter and wrote a special article saying that he only wanted to do big things and did not care about doing small things, which was a common disease in the world. Only by removing disdain and starting from small things can the world be ruled.
Su Shi learned the pragmatic spirit of being an official from Song Xuan, and since then he has served as the governor of many places, and he can benefit the people.
However, now for Su Shi, who had just entered the official field, he already felt a deep sense of powerlessness. He always carried out his official duties with a compassionate heart for the people, but felt that many things could not be solved within his purview. Faced with the institutional dilemmas of the entire country, he was often ashamed of himself as an official.
In 1063, in the eighth year of Jiayou, in March, Emperor Renzong of Song died, and in order to build the imperial tomb, Fengxiang Province was responsible for providing a large amount of wood. This incident alone took Su Shi more than five months. At that time, there was a great drought, the river water dried up, and the wood could not be transported out at all, and Su Shi was extremely distressed in his heart. He said in the poem that the imperial tomb was approaching, and the people were being persecuted in the prefectures, and no one dared to oppose the emperor's posthumous affairs, but "the people should be ashamed." If an official does not benefit the people, but instead overwhelms the people, he should feel ashamed – he is warning other officials and blaming himself.
He was discouraged by this and felt that it was not interesting to be an official. One day, he climbed the Sifei Pavilion in Baoji County, looked far away, and began to miss his hometown. He asked himself in his heart, "Whoever made the love official go to the country lightly, this body has no old fishing tree." "Who made me stay in my official position and abandon my homeland so easily?" In this life, I can't live as leisurely as a fisherman woodcutter!
After Song Xuan left office, Chen Xiliang was succeeded as the prefect of Fengxiang. Chen Xiliang is a native of Meizhou, and it is reasonable to say that he is not only Su Shi's compatriot and elder, but also his boss, and the two should have a harmonious working experience. In fact, the two are quite incompatible. This made Su Shi suffer a lot.
According to Shi Zai, Chen Xiliang was a fierce, resolute and capable official, who "did not fake people in his life, and from the princes and nobles, they were all strictly afraid." After he arrived at his post, he heard that the servants in Fengxiang Mansion all honored Su Shi as "Su Xianliang", and he was very angry and said: "The government judge is the government judge, what is virtuous and not virtuous." Although the board hit the servants, it was Su Shi who was embarrassed.
Because of Su Shi's talent, the official documents he wrote were almost unchanged when Song Xuan was in office. But Chen Xiliang is different, always unceremoniously deleting and revising, back and forth to express dissatisfaction. This in turn made Su Shi, who was conceited by the article, quite uncomfortable.
After the friction between the two increased, Su Shi was reluctant to appear on the same occasion as Chen Xiliang, so that the official banquet and the meeting of the yamen would be absent. Chen Xiliang, enraged, impeached Su Shi to the imperial court, resulting in Su Shi being fined eight pounds of copper.
At the end of the year, Chen Xiliang built a Lingxutai and asked Su Shi to write an article to commemorate the incident after its completion.
The young and vigorous Su Shi thought that the opportunity to "take revenge" on this "evil boss" had come, so he wrote "The Record of Ling Xuantai" in a flash. "Ling Xu Tai" is completely different from the regular praise articles for commemorating grand events, and the central idea of this article is only one - it is unreliable to want to boast about the world by building a high platform. Su Shi said in the text, don't say that the rise of the high platform and the collapse of the high platform are themselves rapid decay, not to mention that you really have the ability to rely on, and you will not rely on a high platform to leave a name in history.
After Chen Xiliang finished reading such a sarcastic connotation of the builder of the Ling Void Platform, this time he did not change a word, and ordered someone to carve it on the stone.
After many years, Su Shi understood why Chen Xiliang had always had to embarrass him in the past. Chen Xiliang once told people privately that I was afraid that I would suffer a big loss in the future because I was frustrated by Su Shi's vigor. After Su Shi knew this, he would like to thank this predecessor for the rest of his life.
Chen Xiliang's son, Chen Jichang, later became one of Su Shi's best friends. The idiom we are familiar with, "Hedong lion roar", is Su Shi's ridicule of Chen Ji's constant fear of the inside. Su Shi wrote a biography of Chen Xiliang at the request of Chen Jichang, and one of the passages read: "Shi Guan Yu Fengxiang was actually conggong (Chen Xiliang) for two years. Fang is young and vigorous, foolish, repeatedly quarreling with the public, taking the form of words, and has repented. Because he could not feel the deep meaning of Chen Xiliang deliberately making things difficult for himself, Su Shi had already regretted it.
It is precisely because of people like Song Xuan and Chen Xiliang, who encourage from the front and attack from the opposite side, that there is a Su Shi who is gradually mature and detached.
Su Shi served in Fengxiang for more than three years. Emperor Yingzong of Song wanted to summon him to the Hanlin Academy and make him the emperor's secretary, responsible for drafting the emperor's edict or repairing the notes on the living quarters—many prime ministers in history have been promoted from this position.
But Chancellor Han Qi opposed Song Yingzong's decision, saying that Su Shi was still young and lacked experience, and his sudden promotion could not convince the public.
In the end, Su Shi took the Guan Ge examination and became a direct history official with excellent results, specializing in the compilation of national history.
At this time, Su Shi's wife Wang Fu died of illness at the age of 27, leaving behind his son Su Mai, who was less than 7 years old. Wang Fu crossed the door at the age of 16 and lived a happy married life with Su Shi for ten years, but unfortunately, this marriage ended abruptly, and the two lived and died.
Su Shi remembered that Wang Fu had just passed through the door, and when Su Shi was reading, she was just sitting by the side doing needlework, and no one knew that she actually knew how to read. Until one time, Su Shi endorsed the book, carrying a stuck shell on his back, and Wang Fu, who was on the side, quietly prompted a word. This surprised Su Shi, who picked up the book and asked Wang Fu one by one, and she was able to answer it.
After Su Shi became an official, Wang Fu accompanied him to Fengxiang. Every time a guest came to Su Shi, she hid behind the screen to listen to the conversation between the two sides, and after the guest left, she would help her husband judge whether the person was worth making deep friends. She knows that her husband is outspoken and has suffered a lot, so she hopes that she can help her husband to plant less in the face of complex human nature. Su Shi recalled that most of her observations and judgments were confirmed afterwards.
After Wang Fu's death, Su Shi felt lost for a long time and was quite lost. Ten years after Wang Fu's death, he still dreamed of her and woke up grief-stricken. He got out of bed in his clothes and wrote a deeply moving eulogy that has been passed down through the ages:
Ten years of life and death are vague, not thinking, unforgettable. Thousands of miles of lonely graves, nowhere to say desolate. Even if they do not know each other, they are full of dust and sideburns.
At night, the ghost dream suddenly returned home, the small window, is grooming. There are no words for each other, but there are thousands of tears. It is expected that the intestines will be broken every year, the night of the bright moon, and the short Matsuoka.
——Su Shi, "Jiang Chengzi Yi Yi ZhengYue Twenty Night Dream"
The year after Wang Fu's death, in 1066, Su Shi's father Su Xun died of illness. The imperial court sent an official ship to escort Su Xun's coffin back to his hometown in Meishan, and the Su Shi brothers supported the coffin to return to their hometown to guard the system. This is also the last time the brothers return home.
▲Meishan Sansu statue Image source/figure worm creative
03
When Su Shi returned to the imperial capital from his hometown 27 months later, things had changed at the imperial court.
In 1069, the second year of Xi Ning, the young Emperor Shenzong of Song used Wang Anshi to preside over the reform and open the prelude to the New Deal that affected the history of the Northern Song Dynasty. However, from the very beginning of the change, the scholars and doctors in the imperial court did not reach a consensus. This led to the subsequent politics of the imperial court to tearing up, attacking and party strife.
In the 1070 imperial examination, Lü Huiqing was the chief examiner and Su Shi was one of the examiners. At that time, juzi knew that the emperor was keen on changing the law, so they all advocated the greatness of the change in the examination papers. A candidate named Ye Zuqia replied in the examination paper: The ancestors of the Fadu, gou and follow the rules, the emperor should work with Haojie's ministers, "conspire and be new." There is nothing wrong with this statement in itself, but the difference in the position of the examiners leads to a large difference in the evaluation of this statement.
Su Shi believed that Ye Zuqia, a candidate who flattered the king, should be deposed. The chief examiner, Lu Huiqing, directly listed Ye Zuqia's examination paper as the first place.
Su Shi was very angry about this result, and without saying much, he wrote a fold to Song Shenzong, saying that the famous doctors in ancient times all had any ability to cure any disease, and without that skill, they did not dare to mess around, while the current doctor was "unable to detect the pulse and wanted to try Hua Tuo's formula", what is the difference between this and killing people with knives?
After Song Shenzong read it, instead of resenting Su Shi's direct advice, he admired it. He showed Su Shi's fold to Wang Anshi, who said that Su Shi was indeed very talented, but unfortunately the path was not right.
Song Shenzong still decided to summon Su Shi and wanted to meet with him.
In 1071, the fourth year of Xi Ning, the first month, Song Shenzong met the legendary Su Shi. In the face of Song Shenzong's inquiry about the opinion on changing the law, Su Shi bluntly said that the emperor was "too anxious to seek treatment, too wide-ranging in listening, and too sharp in entering people." In fact, he criticized the emperor for being too hasty in changing the law. After a little contemplation, Song Shenzong said that these three sentences must be carefully considered.
After retiring from the dynasty, Su Shi was very excited to tell his colleagues and friends about the meeting. The incident also reached Wang Anshi's ears, and he was worried that Su Shi's scholarly views would affect the emperor's decision-making.
Soon, in view of the low efficiency of the Zhongshu Government Affairs Hall, the imperial court set up a compilation and revision of the Zhongshu Ordinance Office, hoping to reform the administration of officials. Song Shenzong thought of Su Shi and intended to transfer Su Shi to this new department. When the emperor asked Wang Anshi's opinion, Wang Anshi was blunt: "Su Shi and his subjects have always been different from each other, and it is not appropriate to take on this responsibility." ”
Later, Emperor Shenzong of Song wanted to appoint Su Shixiu as a subordinate position, which was the closest to the emperor. Wang Anshi once again resolutely stopped: "Your Majesty has only listened to Su Shi's remarks, and these remarks have no use, I am afraid that it is not appropriate to appoint them rashly." ”
In the end, in this round of personnel appointments, Su Shi was appointed as the judge of Kaifeng Province. Wang Anshi's intention was to trap Su Shi in the complicated administrative affairs of the capital, so that he would not have time to express his opinions on the affairs of the imperial court.
▲Portrait of Wang Anshi
Later generations look back on this change, and it is difficult to judge the choices and actions of all parties with right and wrong. To put it simply, Wang Anshi has an upward vision and advocates that changing the law is responsible for imperial power and national strength. After this change, the Northern Song Dynasty did become stronger, especially the national treasury income has increased significantly, but he can't see the cost behind it. What Su Shi saw was precisely the cost of changing the law.
Contrary to Wang Anshi, Su Shi looked downward and saw that in the specific implementation and landing process of the change, it gradually evolved into the exploitation of the common people. This understanding is related to Su Shi's feelings, origin and region. Su Shi was from Sichuan, which was the most chaotic region in the country in the half century after the founding of the Northern Song Dynasty, and there were many uprisings by Wang Xiaobo, Li Shun, and Wang Jun. The reason is that after the imperial court conquered Sichuan, it adopted a model of deep exploitation, forcing the local low-level people to have no way to live. This period of history is only thirty or forty years away from the era in which Su Shi lived, and he must have felt a lot about it. So when he saw the people at the bottom groaning in pain under the scavenging of Wang Anshi's new law, he instinctively sided with the weak.
Li Yibing said in the "New Biography of Su Dongpo" that Sichuan's special geographical environment makes the Shu people have a kind of ideological root of an independent world and a world--good at rhetoric and reasoning, and do not agree with the existence of so-called authorities in the world. Su Shi entered politics, and every time he stood on the opposing position of the ruling faction, he fought hard and argued about things, which stemmed from this.
Su Shi once said to his friend: "I can't bear things, I have words in my heart, like flies in food, I have to vomit." ”
So the darkness of the political struggle soon pounced on him.
Yushi Xie Jingwen impeached Su Shi, saying that Su Shi had returned to Shu ding on an official ship when his father died of illness five years ago, and took the opportunity to load up goods and sell smuggled salt and porcelain. In response to this false accusation, the imperial court went so far as to dispatch six soldiers and horses to investigate the matter. There was a lot of commotion, but the result was not over. This storm of false accusations, which was not lethal and extremely insulting, seriously damaged Su Shi's reputation, and the people of the world did not ask right from wrong, but only knew that Su Shi was suspected of "smuggling smuggling."
Su Shi could only request to be released and go to Hangzhou to serve as a general judge.
At this point, those who disagreed with the change of the law, including Ouyang Xiu, Sima Guang, Fan Zhen, and so on, retired retirement, retreated to hermitage, and left Beijing. The reformers won a comprehensive personnel victory.
On the way to Hangzhou, Su Shi crossed Chen Prefecture (present-day Zhoukou, Henan) to meet with his brother Su Rui's family and lived for more than two months. Subsequently, Su Rui sent his brother to Yingzhou (颍州, in modern Fuyang, Anhui), where they met with his retired mentor Ouyang Xiu. Ouyang Xiu was over sixty years old, his hair was white, and his steps were faltering. Throughout his life, he experienced the waves of the eunuchs, was attacked and rumored countless times, and many unspeakable slanders were held on his head. In the past two or three years of political turmoil, Su Shi has deeply realized the difficulty of his mentor.
The Su Shi brothers and Ouyang Xiu drank and wrote poems and talked freely all day. This was their last meeting, and the next year, Ouyang Xiu died of illness.
In Hangzhou, the enforcement of the new law still made Su Shi unhappy. In his poems, he satirizes the new law regardless of the life and death of the bottom, and this accumulates "evidence" for his later encounters with the literal prison.
After the implementation of the new law, the government collected taxes and asked for money instead of rice, resulting in a shortage of rice and money. In the name of relieving the peasants, the Green Shoots Law, which was lent by the government, naturally set a "trap" for the lower classes. Although its original intention is not bad, it becomes mandatory in the process of execution. In order to earn more interest, magistrates asked for merit and rewards, and added various blackmail in various names to the prescribed interest. When the profits were added together, in the face of natural and man-made disasters, the peasants were unable to repay the state loans at all, and under the urging of the government, they had to pay double the interest to borrow money from the rich and powerful to repay the official debts, and finally ruined their families.
Su Shi satirized the Qingmiao Fa in a poem:
The cane wrapped rice went to hurry, and the green money changed hands empty-handed.
Win children's voice good, strong for a year and a half in the city.
The peasants borrowed money from the state, but in the end they ended up empty-handed and broke their production. What makes people laugh is that the Procedures for the Green Shoots Law are complicated, and in order to handle these loan procedures, farmers spend more than half of the year in the city, delaying production and labor, and the only "advantage" is that the children learn the accent of the people in the city.
These bankrupt peasants eventually took the risk and started a private salt business, resulting in overcrowding in the prison of the Hangzhou government. Even Chinese New Year's Eve, Su Shi was still busy, naming the prisoners one by one. He knew that these prisoners were forced to be helpless and wanted to release them. But he did not have such courage after all, and could only scold himself in his heart:
Villains camp grain, fallen nets are not ashamed.
I am also in love with Bo Lu and follow the rules.
There is no need to talk about the wise and the foolish, but for the sake of food.
Su Shi, who admitted that he was too provocative, began his filler career during this time. Since then, a great poet who has never been born has been on the road.
Before zhongju, he was busy reading, and he was too young to have the opportunity to attend a banquet, so he did not have the opportunity to contact the genre commonly known as "Yanke". In the first ten years of his career as an official, he was an active Confucian usher, and he had little energy or desire to pay attention to the creation of words. It was not until after he was appointed as a general judge in Hangzhou that he became acquainted with the predecessor Lyricist Zhang Xian.
Zhang Xian was one of the most important lyricists of the early Song Dynasty, and was famous for words and phrases with the word "shadow" such as "clouds breaking the moon to make flowers and shadows", and was known as "Zhang Sanying". Su Shi and Zhang Xian are nearly half a century apart in age, but the two get along quite comfortably. Zhang Xian became the guide for Su Shi to enter the world of words. Folklore still says that Zhang Xian took a concubine when he was 85 years old, and Su Shi wrote "a tree of pear blossoms pressing begonias" for ridicule. When Zhang Xian died at the age of 89, Su Shi wrote "Tribute to Zhang Ziye" to mourn and recall the year-long friendship between the two in Hangzhou.
Su Shi, who entered the world of words, only took four or five years to write the "Water Tune Song Head : When is the Bright Moon", which has been passed down through the ages. It was the Mid-Autumn Festival in 1076, and the 40-year-old Su Shi faced a round of bright moon, remembering his brother Su Rui, and taking advantage of the wine to drink, he waved his pen:
When is the moon? Ask the wine to qingtian. I don't know what year it is in the heavenly palace. I want to go home by the wind, and I am afraid of Qionglou Yuyu, and the high places are cold. Dancing to find out the shadow, how it seems to be in the human world.
Turn zhu ge, low Qi household, no sleep. There should be no hatred, why should it be long to go to the other time? People have sorrows and joys, and the moon has clouds and sunshine, and this matter is difficult to complete. May people be long-lasting, and thousands of miles will be cherished together.
——Su Shi, "Water Tune Song Head"
At that time, Su Shi had been transferred out of Hangzhou and had been serving as Zhizhou in Mizhou (密州, in modern Zhucheng, Shandong) for two years. The year after writing this, he was transferred to Xuzhou and then to Huzhou, until a prison disaster that almost killed his head began to him.
▲ Screenshot of the documentary "Su Dongpo"
04
In 1079, the second year of YuanFeng. Hitting the great robbery, Su Shi almost couldn't carry it.
Some people took his poems and the table given to the imperial court and engaged in literal hell, saying that he ridiculed the government. The imperial court ordered that people be arrested!
At that time, Su Shi was serving as Zhizhou in Huzhou. From the imperial capital Kaifeng to Huzhou, it took a long time, and Li Ding, the backbone of the New Party and the secretary of the Imperial History, was worried about finding a candidate for the arrest task, and after a long time of consideration, he selected Emperor Fufu as the leader of the arrest team.
Emperor Fu took his son and two pawns on a day-to-night journey to Huzhou. At this time, Wang Yi ( 王诜 ) sent a message to Su Shi 's younger brother Su Rui ( 苏辙 ) . Su Rui immediately sent someone to Huzhou, hoping to catch up with Emperor Fu, so that his brother could get the news early and be mentally prepared.
Emperor Fu's son accidentally fell ill on the way and delayed the trip. In this way, Su Shi knew the coming fate in advance.
However, when Emperor Fu and his party appeared at the Huzhou local government office, Su Shi was still quite frightened. According to his later recollections, two soldiers who arrested people arrested him as if they were a local official.
Su Shi expected that he would undoubtedly die, and the first thing he thought of was to say goodbye to his wife, leave a suicide note for his brother Su Rui, and entrust the aftermath. When the boat reached Taihu Lake, he wanted to commit suicide by throwing himself into the water, but he thought that death might affect his brother, so he resisted.
In the days when Su Shi was imprisoned, some people were bound to put it to death, while others interceded for the world's first talent. Even his political opponent, Wang Anshi, who had retired to Jinling, interceded for him: "Is there a saint who kills talented people?" ”
One night, a stranger entered Su Shi's cell and, without saying a word, lay down beside him and slept. When he woke up the next day, the man said to Su Shi, "Congratulations." Su Shi looked confused and didn't know what to mean. The man laughed and said, "Just sleep in peace." After saying that, he got up and left the cell.
Later, Su Shi learned that it was someone sent by the emperor to monitor whether he had a disobedient heart. When people found out that Su Shi was sleeping soundly, they knew that there was no ghost in his heart, so they went back to his life. Song Shenzong was originally reluctant to kill Su Shi, but he could finally say to the ministers, "Su Shi has long known that Su Shi is not ashamed. ”
After more than four months in prison, the imperial court's verdict came down, and Su Shi was demoted to Huangzhou (黄州, in modern Huanggang, Hubei).
On the day of his release from prison, Su Shi wrote a poem again:
Ordinary life text is tired of me, and the reputation of this is not tired.
Stuffed into his day horse, the east of the city does not fight young chickens.
The last sentence uses an allusion to Jia Chang, who was famous for cockfighting in Chang'an City in the Tang Dynasty, and was favored by Tang Xuanzong, who loved cockfighting games at a young age. Su Shi's implication is that the imperial court is now full of flattering people who have voted for the emperor, and I am not in league with these people.
After writing, he knew that he was taboo again, and he had no choice but to throw his pen and laugh: "I am really incurable." ”
Who lived in Huangzhou, Su Shi was nominally the deputy envoy of the regiment, a petty official with no real power, but in fact belonged to the supervision personnel of the imperial court and could not leave at will. Because of the arrival of Su Shi, Huangzhou has become the spiritual coordinates in the history of literature. There, the classic of the Song Dynasty in the history of the liberal school, "Nian Nu Jiao Chibi Huaigu", is waiting for him to write. There, he spent the most painful period of his life and completed his own spiritual purgatory.
Before that, his life was basically smooth sailing, and he was expected as a "Taiping Prime Minister". But without these setbacks and hardships, there would be no su shi who is familiar to the world today with detached and open-mindedness.
Su Shi, who had just arrived in Huangzhou, could not accept the sudden fall of life. He almost cut off contact with his friends and slowly adjusted to his state. Living in DinghuiYuan in Huangzhou, he wrote a poem that revealed his lonely and independent mentality:
The lack of moon hanging sparse tong, leaking the first quiet of people. When you see the ghosts alone, the shadows are lonely.
Startled but turned back, there is hatred and no one to save. Picking all the cold branches refuses to perch, and the lonely sandbar is cold.
——Su Shi, "Bu Operator, Huangzhou Dinghui Courtyard Residence"
After settling down, Su Shi said that he was "flattening the boat and walking in the grass, letting go of the mountains and rivers." Guests, many words to be absent, the exchange of books is as sparse as a mountain, do not reply also. It tastes so good, I was never born with it." Willful, evacuated, when thrown away from the normal track of imperial official promotion, Su Shi finally discovered a new world of life.
He became a farmer. Run to the fields, markets, and riversides to chat with various people. If he can't say anything of value, he asks them to tell him a ghost story. People say there are no ghost stories. But he said, "It's okay to make up one." He enjoys this state where no one knows who he is and what he experiences, and "self-satisfaction fades into obscurity."
It was also after Huangzhou that Su Shi became the dashing Su Dongpo in history – although the name "Dongpo" actually originated from the embarrassing reality.
In Huangzhou, The Su Shi family's daily expenses were very frugal, but because there was no income, the money he brought to Huangzhou was only enough for a year at best. A year later, Su Shi's family was in a dilemma. At this time, Ma Mengde, a friend who had followed Su Shi to Huangzhou, discovered a barren slope in the east of Huangzhou City and applied to the government for the land.
Ma Mengde was born in the same month of the same year as Su Shi, and is also a Capricorn. In Su Shi's words, this constellation is "no rich man", so he and Ma Mengde are poor ghosts, but if you must distinguish who is the champion of the poor ghosts, then Ma Mengde must not give in. This poor ghost, who was even more unlucky than Su Shi, helped Su Shi to a wasteland where he could make a living.
Su Shi referred to this nameless highland as "Dongpo" and has since called himself "Dongpo Resident".
He immersed himself in the days of being a farmer. Choosing a day, he set a fire on the eastern slope and burned the weeds on it. With divine help, after the fire, he found a dark well - from then on it was cultivated here, and irrigation was not a problem. He bought a cow, added hoes, sickles and other agricultural tools, and planted wheat in the field. After the harvest, he asked his wife Wang Yanzhi to cook with wheat and millet mixed together. The children found it difficult to swallow, but he ate it deliciously.
Wang Yanzhi is Wang Fu's cousin. After Wang Fu's death, she became Su Shi's step-brother. She knew that Su Shi was good at drinking, but she had a poor amount of alcohol, but she never stopped Su Shi from drinking. If Su Shi was upset, she would say, I'll get you some bars.
Su Shi seemed to be very satisfied with the days of farming, going out early in the morning with farm tools and a wine jug, drinking wine when he was tired, and falling asleep on the ground when he was sleepy. In a letter to a friend, he introduced his "estate": five rooms, more than ten fruit trees and vegetables, and more than a hundred mulberry trees.
At night, he would copy Tao Yuanming's "Return to Xi Ci" over and over again under the lamp. In the words, he believes that his previous life is Tao Yuanming: "In the dream, he woke up drunk, only Yuanming, is the previous life." ”
Once, he and his friends were drinking late at night, drunk and awake, awake and drunk, and it was three o'clock in the morning when he came home. He stood outside the door, knocking on the door unanswered, and only the sound of the child snoring sound. He had to curl up and sit in front of the door, faintly hearing the sound of the river lapping at the shore in the dark night:
Night drink Dongpo woke up drunk, and returned as if three more. The child's sniffles have thundered. Knock on the door should not be, lean on the staff to listen to the sound of the river.
Long hate this body is not me, when to forget the camp. The night wind is still and flat. The boat has since passed away, and Jiang Hai has lived the rest of his life.
—— Su Shi, "Linjiang Immortal"
After the word spread in Huangzhou City, people said that Su Dongpo sang this song, hung his clothes on the riverside, and went away by boat. When Xu Junyou of Huangzhou Zhizhou heard the news, he was very nervous -- he had the responsibility of supervision for Su Shi, so he quickly ran to Su Shi's house. When I got to the door, I heard Su Shi's snoring. That's how you put your mind at ease.
For Su Shi, what he had to consider was how to settle down in Huangzhou. After all, Dongpo is an official land, and it is difficult to guarantee that it will be taken back one day, so Su Shi wants to buy a piece of land himself.
In the spring, he followed his friend to Shahu Lake in the southeast of Huangzhou to see the ground, and halfway to the road, it suddenly rained heavily. Friends in the same industry felt very embarrassed, only he poured out a good word in the rain:
Don't listen to the sound of leaves beating through the forest, why not groan and walk slowly. Bamboo cane mango shoes light victory over horses, who is afraid? A cloud of smoke and rain is a life of peace.
The steep spring wind blows wine awake, slightly cold, but the mountain head obliquely illuminates each other. Looking back at the place where it has always been, returning, there is no wind or rain or sunshine.
——Su Shi, "Fixing the Storm"
When he and his friends visited Chibiji outside Huangzhou again, he was no longer attached to his personal situation. The overlap of history and the cultivation of scenery have forged a heart of openness. He wrote a classic lyric that is known as the "ancient and modern song":
The great river goes east, the waves are exhausted, and the characters of the ages are flowing. To the west of the old fortress, humanity is, three kingdoms Zhou Lang Chibi. Rocks pierced through the air, the waves crashed on the shore, and a thousand piles of snow rolled up. The country is picturesque, and there are many heroes at a time.
In the year of Gongjin, Xiao Qiao was married for the first time and was majestic and heroic. Lupine scarf, between talk and laughter, the tree ashes disappear. The homeland is wandering, amorous should laugh at me, early birth Huafa. Life is like a dream, a statue is still in the moon.
——Su Shi, "Nian Nu Jiao Chibi Huaigu"
Su Shi, after a nirvana, returned. Nothing could crush him anymore.
05
During the four years that Su Shi was demoted to Huangzhou, the emperor never forgot him.
In 1084, in the seventh year of YuanFeng, Su Shi was demoted to Ruzhou. Ruzhou was not too far from the political center of the Northern Song Dynasty, which meant that Su Shi's political situation improved. Su Shi originally wanted to go to the thank you table to explain that he was willing to end up in Huangzhou, but thinking that this was after all a good intention of Song Shenzong, he had to give up.
He still has some reluctance to leave the farmhouse he has managed with his heart, as well as the environment and heart that he has not settled down so hard. Not long ago, he had just asked a friend for a batch of citrus saplings to plant, and he thought that he would never see them grow up again.
Su Shi traveled north from Huangzhou, and on the way to Jinling to meet Wang Anshi, who had lived in seclusion for eight or nine years.
That day, Wang Anshi rode a donkey to the dock to meet Su Shi. Su Shi didn't even wear a hat, so he went ashore and said to Wang Anshi, "Shi dares to see the Great Chancellor in wild clothes today!" Wang Anshi laughed, "Li Yi is set up for my generation!" This sentence is from the "New Language of the World", which was said by Ruan Yuan, one of the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Forest. After being deposed and completely leaving the political arena, Wang Anshi's thinking became quite open. At this time, Su Shi did not forget to intimidate Wang Anshi: "Shi also knows that he can't use Shi under xianggongmen." "Meaning, they're not politically all the way.
Although there are differences in political opinions, it does not prevent the two superstars of the same era from maintaining a personal friendship. During their time in Jinling, the two put aside the dispute over the change of law, met and traveled together in the landscape, and composed poems and sang many times.
Riding a donkey into the wilderness, I want to see my husband when he is not sick.
Persuade me to try three acres of house, from the public has been ten years late.
At this time, Su Shi also planned to "buy tian Jinling" and return to The Hidden Bell Mountain with Wang Anshi. Although he did not succeed later, at this time, Su Shi's state of mind was real. He realized that he should be like Wang Anshi and withdraw as soon as possible.
Therefore, Su Shi was not in a hurry to go to Ruzhou. He gave Song Shenzong a table, explaining that because "the resources are exhausted, going to Ru (Prefecture) is still far away, more than twenty mouths, do not know where to go, hunger and cold worries, near the dawn", requesting not to go to Ruzhou for the time being, first to live in Changzhou. It was later approved.
Not long after, Emperor Shenzong of Song died, Emperor Zhezong of Song took the throne, and Empress Gao, in the name of Emperor Zhezong's youth, came to the court to listen to the government. Sima Guang, who had retired to Luoyang for 17 years and wrote books, regained his role as a minister, and the new party forces were completely suppressed. The situation in the DPRK has suddenly changed.
Su Shi was soon summoned back to the court, and was promoted to Hanlin Bachelor, Zhi Zhi Zhen, and Zhi Li Bu Tribute.
In this political change called "Yuan You's change", the powerful Sima Guang insisted on abolishing the new law during his illness, and even in the last few days, the Shang Dynasty was very busy with it. Su Shi's personality of not spitting out unhappiness in the face of things was once again revealed, and he suggested that the imperial court weigh the pros and cons and retain the beneficial parts of the change. He personally supported the retention of the exemption law and the repeal of the BIBS law. Sima Guang did not heed the advice.
Wang Anshi was originally silent about the changes in the DPRK, until the exemption law was abolished by Sima Guang, and then he cried out in tears: "Even the exemption law must be abolished?" Emperor Xian and I studied it for two whole years before implementing it, and every aspect was well considered. In 1086, in the first year of the Yuan Dynasty, Wang Anshi and Sima Guang died of illness one after another, and the internal friction and strife caused by the change of law were far from ending.
The three-party dispute between the Luo Party, the Shuo Party, and the Shu Party slowly arose in the imperial court. The politics of the Northern Song Dynasty had always been prejudiced against the Shu people. Su Shi's reputation was already very prosperous when he was alive, but he never had the opportunity to really exercise authority. Whenever he was listed as a candidate for Zaifu, the imperial court officials would stop him with the idea of "Shu people too prosperous". Although Su Shi was regarded as the leader of the "Shu Party", Empress Gao knew The Su Shi and Su Rui brothers very well, saying, "I know that your two brothers are isolated in the DPRK. ”
▲The Great Song Dynasty Party Struggle Is Not Stopped Image Source/TV Series Screenshot
After returning to the imperial capital of Beijing for four years, Su Shi, who was unable to withstand political disputes, repeatedly asked for retirement, and finally in 1089 was allowed to transfer to Hangzhou Zhizhou and left the land of right and wrong.
Although Su Shi was famous for his literary personalities, he was a practical official who could not stand the lengthy and meaningless political disputes in the imperial court. Being a parent official and doing practical things for the people is his most comfortable place. Since entering politics, he has been a leader in Many places such as Mizhou, Xuzhou, Huzhou, and Hangzhou, and has left a fairly good reputation everywhere he goes to, innovating and eliminating disadvantages, facilitating the people by law, building water conservancy, and responding to disasters.
The notes of the Song dynasty record that during his tenure as an official in Hangzhou, Su Shi often worked on the edge of the West Lake, came from Yongjinmen in the morning by boat, ate at pu'an Temple at noon, and made a decision based on the case at Lengquan Pavilion, and when dealing with official documents, he "fell like wind and rain", and in the evening he returned by horse.
He cared for the people, worked diligently for the people, and had a deep sense of compassion and empathy for the people. Such a magistrate, even without the blessing of those classic poems, will certainly remain in the annals of history.
After becoming the Governor of Hangzhou, the local drought failed and the plague broke out, and the History of song recorded that "hunger and epidemic were fought at the same time". Su Shi wrote to the imperial court, requesting a reduction in "one of the three (cents) of rice supplied on this road", and organized relief for the victims. In the face of the epidemic, he came up with a prescription called "Saint Sanzi". It was the secret recipe he got from the old man of Shuzhong, Chaogu. This secret recipe is extremely effective for emergency relief, and the secret of Chaogu is not revealed, and even his own son refuses to teach it. Later, he really couldn't resist Su Shi's entanglement, and took Su Shi to the river, asking him to swear a poisonous oath to the river and never pass it on to others. Then, he gave the secret recipe to Su Shi. But in the face of the life and death of the people, Su Shi could not care about his oath, he made this secret recipe public, and set up a cauldron in the street, boiling decoction, and saving countless people.
In this epidemic, Su Shi also allocated 2,000 taels of money from public funds, and took the lead in donating fifty taels of gold to set up the "Anle Fang" as a public medical institution for the relief of the poor and sick. Anle Fang later became the prototype of the Northern Song Dynasty Anji Fang.
Shi Zai, Su Shi did a lot of practical things in Hangzhou, hangzhou people are grateful for his kindness, and every family hangs his portrait, "food must be blessed."
After Su Shi's death, an old monk in Hangzhou recalled that when he was young, he was ordained in the ShouxingYuan and often saw Su Shi go up the mountain barefoot in the summer. Su Shi would borrow him a recliner, move it under the bamboo forest, take off his robe, and take a nap in the afternoon sun with his bare back. Suddenly, he found that Su Shi had seven black moles on his back, arranged like the seven stars of the Big Dipper. The old monk said that this showed that Su Shi was a god who came to the human world as a guest.
The "immortals" come to do things, and they also come from the past.
After Empress Gao's death, Song Zhezong took the throne and the New Party regained power. In 1094, in the first year of Shaosheng, the 58-year-old Su Shi was demoted to Huizhou.
In Huizhou, Su Shi continued his studies in the direction of a gourmet. When he was in Huangzhou, he created the pork practice because he was poor, and became the founder of the "Dongpo Meat" that was passed down in later generations. Today, he has become the so-called "father of the sheep scorpion".
Because he was a despised criminal official, Su Shi was not qualified to compete with the local magnates for good lamb in Huizhou. He privately instructed the sheep killer to leave him the bones of the sheep that no one wanted, and there was also a little lamb between these bones. After taking it home, he first cooked the lamb backbone thoroughly, then poured wine on the bone, lit a little salt, baked it on the fire, waited for the flesh to be slightly charred, and then ate it. He spends his days picking minced meat between the bones of his lamb, claiming to be as delicious as eating seafood.
He teased the other party in a letter to his brother Su Rui, brother, you live a good life, eat good lamb, and you can't touch the bones of the sheep when you sink your teeth, how can you understand this delicious taste? At the end of the letter, he added that this way of eating was good, but every time he stripped the flesh from his bones, several dogs around him were very unhappy.
In Huizhou, Su Shi also fell in love with Lingnan Jiaguo, Lychee. He joked with his son that he should not let his political enemies know that there are lychees in Lingnan, otherwise they will all run to him and grab food.
In 1097, the fourth year of Shaosheng, Su Shi was relegated to the extremely desolate Danzhou of Hainan Island.
The eldest son, Su Mai, came to bid farewell, and Su Shi explained the aftermath clearly, as if he were never saying goodbye. He decided to make a coffin for himself after going to Hainan. When I arrived in Hainan, I learned that the locals did not use coffins at all, they chiseled mortars on long logs, people used to store rice alive, and people put corpses when they died.
Once, as he was singing on a ridge, an old woman approached him and said, "Sir must have been rich before, but it was all a dream." After he listened, he was horrified.
He often stood by the sea, watching the sea and the sky, and knew that he would not be able to leave the isolated island alive. However, he later thought about it, aren't all the people in this world surrounded by the sea? And like an ant, he fell into a small puddle, thinking that he had fallen into the sea, so he panicked and climbed up a blade of grass, not knowing where he would drift. However, before long, the sun was shining, the puddles dried up, and the little ants survived, and when they saw the same kind, they cried and said, "I almost never see you again." "This ant is ridiculous, but how can it not be so sad for a person in heaven and earth?"
Su Shi, who had lived through the isolated island, still received the last shred of fate - in 1100, with the death of Song Zhezong, the situation changed again, and Su Shi was allowed to return to the north and leave Hainan alive.
In the first month of the following year, on the way back to the north, Su Shi's family was resting in a small shop on Dayuling, and an old man asked the servant who followed: "Who is the official?" ”
"Su Shangshu."
"Is it Su Zizhan?"
"Yes."
The old man stepped forward to Su Shi and said, "I heard that someone tried every means to frame you, and now that the north has returned, it is really a good person blessed by God." ”
Su Shi smiled and thanked him, and then inscribed the wall of the poem:
The crane bone frost has grayed its heart, and the green pine hugs hands and plants it.
Ask Weng Dayu Lingtou to live, have seen the southward migration several times.
Li Yibing said in the "New Biography of Su Dongpo" that the greatest happiness for Su Shi's return from the robbery was that he had a straight and lonely loyalty in his life, and now he is white in the world. All the clouds of slander and suspicion have been blown away, and the lonely moon in the sky should also be seen by all. "The floating clouds have changed, and the lonely moon has a clear heart."
Cross the South Ridge and enter the Yangtze River via the Ganjiang River. Su Shi thought of waiting for his sons to arrive in Qi, so he moved to Xuchang, Henan, to live with his younger brother Su Rui and realize the agreement they had made when they were young to sleep in the night rain. However, the political situation in the north suddenly changed dramatically, and the New Party Zengbu began to monopolize power. Xuchang was close to the imperial capital, and Su Shi was worried that there would be another right and wrong, so he had no choice but to write to the trustee to tell Su Rui: "I have quite a knowledge of northern affairs, and there are people who must not go to Yingchang to live nearby... I would hate for the old brothers to get together, this day, I am like heaven! I don't know if Tianguo will not get together in the end? ”
When the ship arrived at Yizhen (present-day Yizheng, Jiangsu), Su Shi met with Mi Fu. Mi Fu gave Su Shi the two calligraphies he had treasured and asked him to write the Trek. But just two days later, Su Shi was miasma and lashed out. After a few days, the condition did not alleviate at all, at this time Su Shi had a vague sense of foreboding, he told his brother in the letter, after I died, bury me under the Song Mountain, please come and write an epitaph for me. When Su Rui received this letter, he cried bitterly.
▲Portrait of Su Rui
Arriving in Changzhou, Su Shi stopped his journey. He had been ill for more than 50 days and was on his deathbed.
He said to his three sons, "I am born without evil, and I will not fall when I die." "I haven't done anything wrong in my life, and I won't go to hell."
He also said, When I die, do not cry, let me calm down.
The eldest son, Su Mai, asked about the aftermath, but Su Shi did not respond and passed away. This day is July 28 of the first year of the Northern Song Dynasty, august 24, 1101 AD. The Notes of the Song Dynasty record that after Su Shi's death, the grass and trees of Penglaoshan, his hometown of Meishan, resumed flourishing. The Spirit of Heaven and Earth returned to Heaven and Earth.
Before finally falling ill, Su Shi had just written a four-line poem for himself as a summary of his life:
The heart is like a gray wood, and the body is like a boat that is not tied.
Ask Ru Pingsheng Gongye, Huangzhou Huizhou Danzhou.
Su Shi is not an atheist, but he has slowly cultivated thoroughly and fearlessly at every stage of his life. Huangzhou, Huizhou, and Danzhou are his three derogatory experiences, dark stages in the eyes of his political enemies and ordinary people, but Su Shi does not think so. It is not that he will live a good life through these dark times; but that he will live with these dark times, and this is his life.
Life is everywhere like, it should be like Flying Flying On Slush.
Occasionally left finger claws on the mud, Hongfei that recounted things.
Although Su Shi has been dead for more than 900 years, this Feihong has not disappeared as he feared: he and it still live in a long historical time and space.
bibliography:
[Song] Su Xun: Notes on jiayou collection, notes on Zeng Zaozhuang and other notes, Shanghai Ancient Books Publishing House, 1993
[Song] Su Shi: Collected Writings of Su Shi, Notes from Kong Fanli, Zhonghua Bookstore, 2004
[Song] Su Rui: "Luan ChengJi", Zeng Zaozhuang and other schools, Shanghai Ancient Books Publishing House, 1987
[Song] Li Tao: "Continued Zizhi TongjianChang", Zhonghua Bookstore, 2004
[Yuan] Detachment: History of the Song Dynasty, Zhonghua Bookstore, 1977
Qian Mu: Outline of National History, The Commercial Press, 2010
Wang Shuizhao and Zhu Gang: A Commentary on Su Shi, Nanjing University Press, 2004
Lin Yutang: The Biography of Su Dongpo, Hundred Flowers Literary and Art Publishing House, 2008
Li Yibing: A New Biography of Su Dongpo, Sichuan People's Publishing House, 2020
Yang Guangzhao and Zhang Xiaomin: Su Dongpo, Documentary, 2017