In 1372, Zhu Yuanzhang had been emperor for five years, and this year was a year full of setbacks for Zhu Yuanzhang.
Since the remnants of the Northern Yuan dynasty were still a major threat to the newly established Ming Dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang launched the Second Northern Expedition in order to sleep peacefully, with the intention of eliminating the Northern Yuan forces in one fell swoop, known as the Battle of Lingbei.
However, in this battle, Zhu Yuanzhang fought very stubbornly, and even said that he had suffered a major defeat that had never been suffered before.
When dispatching troops, Zhu Yuanzhang arranged for Xu Da to lead the main army of the middle road, and then arranged for Li Wenzhong to lead the Eastern Route Army and Feng Sheng to lead the Western Route Army to cooperate with Xu Da.
The three-way army advanced together, intending to completely eat the Northern Yuan, but the result of the war made Zhu Yuanzhang feel like a needle, Xu Da achieved a major defeat, Li Wenzhong gained and lost equally, only Feng Sheng won the victory, but because he was afraid of the eastward advance of the Eastern Chagatai Khanate, he abandoned Gansu.
As a last resort, Zhu Yuanzhang could only talk about the Northern Expedition and put it aside for the time being.
Perhaps, some small partners will ask, since Zhu Yuanzhang attaches so much importance to this war, why not fight it himself?
This is because at this time, Zhu Yuanzhang has become the emperor and has no reason to continue to charge the battlefield, in addition, Zhu Yuanzhang still has a bunch of government affairs to deal with, and he has no skills at all.
Of course, he could have entrusted government affairs to his courtiers, but he was not at all at ease, preferring to work harder than to decentralize power.
However, in Zhu Yuanzhang's leisure time, he also liked to read, especially the Confucian classics, and he himself admired Confucius.
But one day, when Zhu Yuanzhang was watching "Mencius", he suddenly became angry, and then issued an order: To expel Mencius from the Confucius Temple and not to be entitled.
What is this all about, as a "yasheng" who exerts Confucius's thought to the extreme, where did he get provoked?
Let's take a look.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="15" > Zhu Yuanzhang hated the scribes</h1>
Unlike the emperor who came from a family of magnates, Zhu Yuanzhang was born of a poor child, which led to the fact that he did not have the capital to read and write when he was young.
It can be said that Zhu Yuanzhang's childhood is a nightmare that he does not want to remember, but even if he tries to forget, those past cannot be completely erased.
When Zhu Yuanzhang was young, he let go of cattle, had to eat, and became a monk, and it can be said that in order to survive, he lived without dignity at all.
Later, by chance, Zhu Yuanzhang joined the army and gradually embarked on the road of counterattack in life, but he knew that he was only a warrior, and he might be very good at leading soldiers to fight and charge into battle, but he could not compare with the literati at all.
It is this profound self-awareness that makes Zhu Yuanzhang fall into contradictions, not only does he have a lingering sense of inferiority in his bones, but he also looks down on Confucianism in his bones.
However, after becoming emperor, he felt that if he wanted to consolidate his position, he had to unify the thinking of the literati, and he had to start with culture, so he could only win over these scribes on the one hand and suppress them on the other.
At one point, he was really tired of the scribes' muttering, so in front of them, he gave a poem called "Scolding the Scribe", which read:
Twittering a few crows, squirting feces all over their mouths. Don't be happy today, tomorrow morning a mess.
Let's not say whether it is written well or not, but at least, it is quite rhyming, and although these scribes want to laugh at it, they can only keep their mouths shut in the end.
Therefore, due to the resistance and contempt for the scribes, it is reasonable that Mencius, who is a saint, was hated by Zhu Yuanzhang.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="58" > Zhu Yuanzhang could not accept Mencius's ideas</h1>
Since Zhu Yuanzhang despised the scribes, why did he want to promote Confucius, and at the same time expel Mencius from the Temple of Confucius, the two seem to be contradictory.
In fact, Zhu Yuanzhang's treatment of Confucius and Mencius is not contradictory at all, the most important reason is that Mencius carried out deep processing on the basis of Confucius thought and put forward the idea of "people-oriented".
We all know that Confucius's Confucianism is not suitable for a chaotic world, but it is extremely good to teach the people in peacetime, so during the Han Dynasty, there was a situation of deposing hundreds of families and respecting Confucianism alone.
Zhu Yuanzhang laid the foundation for the world and stabilized the situation, and naturally needed this theory, so he loved the Analects and had great respect for Confucius.
Mencius's position in Confucianism, second only to Confucius, is also highly respected by posterity, but Zhu Yuanzhang does not think so, as we all know, Mencius has a famous saying:
The people are precious, the society is secondary, and the king is light.
This means that the status of the people and the interests of the country are higher than those of the emperor, and the emperor, as the ruler of the country, must serve the people and serve the jiangshan community.
What's more, Mencius also put forward the idea that the relationship between kings and subjects is relative, which fundamentally negates the authority of the Son of Heaven.
Mencius also believed that the people of the world did not need to be loyal to one person, who could protect the people, who could claim the king, but if they mutilated the people, then he was alone, such a person was not worthy of the world, even if he got the world will be overthrown.
The emperor's throne has not been done for a few years, the dragon chair has not yet been burned, he is naturally very disgusted with Mencius's theory, after all, in his thinking, the world is his alone, what the people are precious, this is simply nonsense.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="59" > Zhu Yuanzhang impatiently restored Mencius's tablet</h1>
Mencius's thought was actually completely from the perspective of the people, and even told the emperor what he should do and what he should not do, which made Zhu Yuanzhang, who was extremely powerful and possessive, unable to accept it at all.
In addition, coupled with his innate hatred of intellectuals due to the disadvantages of his own culture, he poured all his anger on Mencius.
After issuing the holy will to expel Mencius from the Confucius Temple, Zhu Yuanzhang thought that a large number of literati would definitely jump out to dissuade them, in order to make them shut up, Zhu Yuanzhang also deliberately added a sentence behind the holy will:
Those who have advised him to speak of disrespect and order Kingo to shoot him.
This means that whoever dares to advise is a great disrespect and will order someone to shoot him directly.
When the ministers received such an order, they did not know how to do it for a while, but they could not accept that the Yasheng they admired was expelled from the Confucius Temple, at which time a minister named Qian Tang jumped out and said that even if he was shot, he would have to persuade Zhu Yuanzhang.
So the next day, he wrote to Zhu Yuanzhang:
The subject died for Meng Ke, and died with Yu Rong.
Since some people took the lead, some readers took the opportunity to tell Zhu Yuanzhang that they looked at the sky at night and found that the stars were dim and the sky was different.
Although Zhu Yuanzhang was an emperor, he was also superstitious about the Mandate of Heaven, and under the influence of Qian Tang's death advice and fear of the calamity of heaven, Zhu Yuanzhang impatiently withdrew his destiny and restored Mencius's tablet.
But in order to make himself happy, Zhu Yuanzhang thought of another way: to delete the book, and he cut off the ideas and remarks in Mencius that he could not accept, and almost deleted a third of them.
Later, after Zhu Di became emperor, under the advice of his courtiers, the original version of Mencius was restored, which made it difficult for the entire "Mencius" to be passed on to this world.
References: History of the Ming Dynasty, Mencius, etc.
(Figure net, invasion and deletion)