166 AD
The first party disaster: the storm caused by the murder
In 166 AD, Li Bing, Du Mi, Chen Yu and other scholars were arrested and imprisoned, which is known as the first disaster of the party.
The cause of this is simple, it was a murder. There was a man in Hanoi (present-day northern Henan) named Zhang Cheng, who was good at divination, and he calculated according to the celestial signs that the emperor wanted to grant amnesty to the world (it should be just from the eunuchs), so he instigated his son to kill people, and later the world was amnesty, but Zhang Cheng's son was not released. Because Henan Yin Li Bing was very angry after learning about the case, he was so angry that he exploited the loophole in the law so much that he did not care about the edict of amnesty and executed Zhang Cheng's son.
This Zhang Cheng is not an ordinary person, but a eunuch's nemesis. The eunuch gave him advice and asked his disciples to write to the emperor, falsely accusing Li Ofe of forming a party and slandering the imperial court. This kind of thing was the most taboo of the emperor, and Emperor Huan of Han ordered the search and arrest of the party's soldiers. According to the system of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the edict had to be signed by the three dukes to take effect, and it happened that one of the three dukes, the lieutenant Chen Fan, was the leader of the scholars, so he refused to sign it. The emperor was so angry that he simply bypassed Chen Fan and ordered the eunuchs to lead people to arrest Li Bing and others.
All the scholars felt that Li Bing's execution of the murderer was to uphold justice, and that it was even more out of thin air to form a party for personal gain, and that the people who were arrested at that time were basically prestigious Confucians, so some people voluntarily went to prison, some wanted to show their attitude, and some felt that if they did not go to prison, how could they prove that they were celebrities?
The courtiers began to speak for the scholars, such as Empress Dou's father Dou Wu and Shangshu Huozhi, who interceded with Emperor Huan. Li Bing was also very resourceful, and the eunuch who tried the case asked him to confess to the members of the group, and all the people he said were the children of the eunuchs. The eunuchs did not dare to show the confession to the emperor. In this way, Li Yi finally only dismissed the official and returned to his hometown. Emperor Huan's board was lifted high and fell gently.
In fact, this was not the first time that the gentry bureaucracy had executed eunuchs and fellow party members. Xu Xuan, the nephew of the eunuch Xu Huang, wanted to marry the daughter of Runan Taishou, but was refused, and even snatched the girl away and killed her. Huang Fu, the prime minister of the East China Sea, received the report and directly ordered the killing of Xu Xuan's entire family. Huang Fu was much more retaliated against and was directly sent to hard labor. Even Li Bing struck at eunuchs more than once. Zhang Rang's younger brother broke the law and was caught and executed by Li Bing, and even the emperor's intercession did not agree.
At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, eunuchs and scholars fought with each other in a tug-of-war manner. The first disaster of the party was a counterattack after the eunuch was challenged. Although Li Bing was relieved of his official duties and returned to his hometown, his prestige also reached its peak, and all the scholars praised Li Bing and unanimously believed that the imperial court had been occupied by villains and was completely decayed.
Conclusion: This time, the eunuch weakened the power of the sergeant and caused greater dissatisfaction among the sergeant. A year later, Emperor Huan died, and a clique of foreign relatives and scholars, led by Dou Wu and Chen Fan, began to plan an action to eliminate the eunuchs.
168 AD
Dou Wu and Chen Fan attacked the eunuchs: the soldiers counterattacked
In 168, Empress Dowager Dou ordered the eunuchs Guan Ba and Su Kang to be killed.
Not long ago, these two eunuchs were Empress Dou's confidants. Before Dou became empress, she was the third empress of Emperor Huan of Han, but she was not favored, so she was jealous of Emperor Huan's favorite nobleman, Tian Sheng. In early 168, Emperor Huan died. Before Emperor Xian was buried, Empress Dou killed Tian Sheng, and also killed several other nobles, and only stopped under the persuasion of Guan Ba and Su Kang. Guan and Su stopped Empress Dou's jealousy, but did not block the butcher knife that was slashed at them.
The key player here was Empress Dou's father, Dou Wu. Dou Wu had no pursuit of wealth, and the treasures given by the emperor were all used to support the students and poor peasants. Therefore, Dou Wu's status as a foreign relative did not affect his relationship with the scholars. At that time, there were three most respected people in the world--Liu Shu, Chen Fan and Dou Wu.
Dou Wu's identity and personality determined that he could not tolerate the eunuchs of monopoly. After Emperor Huan's death, Liu Hong, the Marquis of Xieduting, succeeded to the throne and was known as emperor of Hanling. Dou Wu assisted the government as a general and began to plan the elimination of eunuchs. Dou Wu gathered around a group of disgruntled eunuchs, including Chen Fan. Emperor Hanling was only 12 years old at the time, so their primary goal was to win Empress Dowager Dou's support.
There was a solar eclipse in May of that year. Chen Fan told Dou Wu that he could take this opportunity to tell the empress dowager that there was a vision in heaven because the eunuchs had overstepped their authority to interfere in the government, so that the empress dowager would issue an edict to remove all eunuchs and solve the problem at once. So Dou Wu went to the empress dowager and said a set of great truths, persuading the empress dowager to kill all the eunuchs. But the empress dowager said that how could all those who were guilty should be punished, and how could they all be killed? Dou Wu had no choice but to retreat to the second place, saying that he would first kill the guan ba, Who was in charge of palace affairs, Su Kang.
Why did you shoot these two people first? First, after these two people came to power, they encroached on a large number of people's land, and killing them could gain public support. Second, they had already clashed with the scholars. During the reign of Emperor Huan, there was a "Li Du case". Li Yun criticized Emperor Huan for living in luxury and favoring eunuchs, and as a result, he was sent to prison and handed over to Guan Ba, along with Yu Shi and Ting Wei, for interrogation. Du Zhong wrote a letter to defend Li Yun, and said that if li yun's sin had to be cured, then even I would be killed! Emperor Huan was furious and arrested Du Zhong. Chen Fan and other scholars and bureaucrats came out to intercede for Li Du and the two of them, and as a result, they both lost their officials. This incident implicated a number of scholars, and Guan Ba, as the chief judge of the case, naturally became a thorn in the eyes of the scholars.
After successfully eliminating Guan Ba and Su Kang, Dou Wu and others began to persuade Empress Dou to kill another eunuch, Cao Jie. Before Emperor Hanling ascended the throne, it was Cao Jie who took him into Luoyang to protect his safety. Cao Jie had a meritorious service, so the empress dowager had been hesitant to kill him. Without the Empress Dowager nodding, Dou Wu did not dare to act rashly. With such a delay, it was August. Dou Wu and the others again wrote to Empress Dowager Dou, requesting that the eunuch be killed, before the empress dowager could see the letter. The eunuchs took the initiative first, and Cao Jie and others took control of the emperor and empress dowager, seized the seal, and then sent a forbidden army to capture Dou Wu. Dou Wu led his troops to resist, outnumbered, and finally committed suicide. After Chen Fan learned the news, he took dozens of scholars with knives to support, these people were naturally not opponents of the forbidden army, Chen Fan was arrested and executed on the same day.
Conclusion: Dou Wu and Chen Fan's killing of Guan and Su was a victory for foreign relatives and scholars against eunuchs, but after a delay of two months, the eunuchs finally counterattacked. After that, the eunuchs put the empress under house arrest, controlled the emperor, and began to suppress opponents on a large scale, which directly caused the disaster of the second party.
169 AD
The Second Scourge of the Party: The Disaster of the Soldiers
In 169, the eunuch Hou Lan instructed Zhang Jian's fellow villagers to falsely accuse him of forming a party and plotting rebellion, and Emperor Ling ordered the search and arrest of the party members, setting off a second disaster of party revolt. The scale of the second party disaster is far greater than the first. Prior to this, Dou Wu and Chen Fan had failed in their attempt to kill the eunuchs, and the scholars and eunuchs had completely torn their faces, and this time the scourge of the party was the beginning of the eunuchs' comprehensive suppression of the eunuchs.
Zhang Jian had previously impeached Hou Lan for corruption, and the two had already formed a vendetta, so Hou Lan wanted to take revenge on Zhang Jian. However, Zhang Jian was lucky, hiding in Tibet and running to the home of his friend Kong Bao. Just in Kong's absence, his younger brother Kong Rong (the one who let the pear, they were confucius's 20th grandson) took in Zhang Jian. Unexpectedly, this matter was exposed, Zhang Jian ran away again, and the Kong brothers not only did not run, but instead fought to surrender, and finally Kong praised the crime. Zhang Jian fled all the way, and people respected Zhang Jian's character and were willing to take him in, because there were dozens of families who helped Zhang Jian get guilty.
Zhang Jian saved his life. Most of the other famous scholars who had offended the eunuchs were not so lucky, and there were six or seven hundred people implicated. Li Bing, Du Mi, and others who survived the first party disaster were all killed this time, and their families were exiled. Some people advised Li Bing to flee quickly, but Li Bing said: It is not afraid to do things without difficulty, and crimes are not evaded, this is the duty of a courtier, I am already sixty years old, death is also my life, where else can I escape?
Li Bing's integrity is worth admiring, but I am afraid that he can also see clearly, now the strength of the two sides is seriously unequal, and he is more fierce than ji.
After the first party disaster, a number of scholars had been dismissed, and eunuchs gradually controlled the appointment of officials from the central to the local level. Moreover, at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the inspection and lifting system almost failed, and there was a folk song "Ju Xiu Cai, I don't know the book" that is, the selected Xiu Cai did not even know the words. It is becoming increasingly difficult for truly talented scholars to become officials. For example, the son of Uncle Shi Liao, the chief of the Situ Dynasty, was particularly mediocre and could not be an official. He found Guanghan Taishou, who was the same year as himself, and successfully recommended his son to be a showman. Eunuchs used the probation system to install cronies even more. Once Hou Lan wanted to arrange for several people to raise filial piety, but Hedong Taishou Shi Bi rejected him. Hou Lan was very angry and falsely accused Shi Bi, almost letting him die in prison. Li Bing himself was a filial piety and honesty to become an official. Many people admire his talent and character and want to learn from him, so that they can get a good reputation and become an official. Among them, there was a man named Fan Ling, who usually had bad character, so Li Bing did not accept him. Fan Ling was finally bribed by the eunuchs, and he actually became a lieutenant, bigger than Li Bingguan.
There are fewer and fewer opportunities for scholars to really meddle in government affairs. Therefore, the popular "Qing discussion" began, that is, a group of people gathered together to evaluate the policies of the imperial court and the character of officials. Those who can be praised by them have prestige, and those who are criticized by them are scolded by everyone. Scholars evaluated Li Bing, Chen Fan, and Wang Chang as "the model of the world, Li Yuanli, who is not afraid of the strong Chen Zhongju, and the world's junxiu Wang Shumao", these three people enjoyed high prestige, and There were thousands of students of Li Ping. Officials at that time were particularly afraid of the criticism of the scholars, and every time a scholar came to visit, he immediately went to the door to greet him, sometimes so anxious that he did not even wear his shoes. The scholars relied on the Qing Dynasty to influence public opinion, restrain the behavior of the eunuchs and maintain their political influence.
However, after Dou Wu and Chen Fan were killed, there were basically no real power figures on the side of the scholars, and there were soldiers and rich people on the eunuch side, and there was also the support of the emperor. The influence of the "Qing Deliberation" made the eunuchs hate the scholars even more, so this time the disaster of the party, the scholars suffered heavy losses.
After the end of this great hunt, the eunuchs did not stop attacking the party. In 171, the Han Ling Emperor announced a general amnesty, except for the party members. In 172, when Empress Dou died, someone wrote at the palace gate that "the world is in chaos, Cao Jie and Wang Fu killed the empress, and the secretaries of state are all corpses, and there are no loyalists", so that Cao Jie once again began to arrest the party, and more than a thousand people were planted. In 176, Yongchang Taishou Cao Luan wrote a letter to intercede for the party. A few eunuchs looked at it, and after so many years, there were still people interceding for the soldiers, and it seemed that the Yu Dang had not yet been cleaned up. Therefore, he ordered all states and counties to investigate the family lineage of the Party members, and all relatives within five servings were dismissed from their posts and were not allowed to become officials.
After tossing and turning so many times, capable and dignified soldiers died and fled. The entire imperial power fell completely into the hands of eunuchs, who coaxed Emperor Ling to be happy while selling officials to amass wealth and annexing land. This kind of unbridled exploitation will definitely lead to a strong backlash. In 184, the Yellow Turban Rebellion broke out. The Han Ling Emperor was afraid of the collusion between the party and the anti-thieves, so he remembered to lift the party, but unfortunately it was too late, and the Eastern Han Dynasty was getting closer and closer to extinction.
Conclusion: After the second disaster of the party, the eunuchs completely controlled the government and suppressed the scholars, and the Eastern Han court became more corrupt.
The second scourge of the party: eunuchs, foreign relatives, and scholars fought the pinnacle of power