This is a series of 294 intensive readings of Chinese history, and 19 consecutive years of "History of the Ming Dynasty", welcome to watch. (Rest for a few days, looking forward to Qingshi)
When mentioning the story of the "Yongle Canon", to understand the reason, this must start from the Yongle era of the Ming Dynasty.
Zhu Di, the King of Yan, seized power by force from his nephew Emperor Jianwen at the Battle of Jingnan and changed his name to Yuan Yongle. In order to stabilize the ruling order and win the support of bureaucrats and doctors, he adopted a two-handed strategy of suppressing and enveloping the old ministers of the former dynasty, such as treating Qi Tai, Huang Zicheng and others, because he pioneered the "cutting of the domain", Zhu Di naturally wanted to put him to death and then hurry; even if a famous minister like Fang Xiaoru, because he was loyal to Emperor Jianwen, he did not want to submit to the Yongle Dynasty, Zhu Di also killed him, and there were many people.
On the other hand, in the treatment of those old ministers who sincerely submitted to the new dynasty, Zhu Di gave him heavy uses, such as Jianyi, who was the right attendant of the official department at the time of Emperor Jianwen, and soon after Zhu Di ascended the throne, he was promoted to the position of official Shangshu; Xia Yuanji, who was promoted by the right attendant of Hubu to Behubu Shangshu; and the talented Xie Jin was more favored by the Yongle Emperor, and the heavy responsibility of compiling the Yongle Canon was entrusted to him.
In July of the first year of Yongle (1403), in order to further enlist more Su xue da Confucians to serve the new regime, and also to whitewash the taiping and prosperous world, Zhu Di decided to edit a large-scale book that surpassed the previous generation to show the prosperity of culture and the stability of the political situation, so he issued an edict, ordering hanlin scholars to xie jin and others, and gathered personnel to classify and search the ancient and modern things that were "scattered in all books", "unify them with rhymes, and compile them into one book", so that the emperor could read them at any time.
This not only helps the imperial court to learn from the experience of the rulers of the past generations of rulers in "Qi government affairs, the same customs" and the experience of the political people, but also drives a large number of bureaucrats and masters to bury their heads in the pile of ancient books, spend their time and eliminate the nostalgia of the Jianwen Dynasty.
In order to achieve his own political goals, Zhu Di specially instructed the editorial official Xie Jin and others that in addition to the collection of books in Wenyuan Pavilion, the manuscripts should also be extensively "purchased and collected from all over the world", from ancient times to the current world, searching and collecting from the side, and all the books that have been written since the beginning of the "classics, histories, sub-books, and collections of hundreds of families, as for astronomy, geography, yin and yang, medical divination, monasticism, and skill", are not tired of being voluminous, and must be exhaustive, so as to achieve "including the vastness of the universe, the similarities and differences between ancient and modern, the huge and fine, and the clear preparation." “
The Yongle Emperor's guiding ideology of greed for more and more perfection and the need to record books reflects that although the early Ming Dynasty advocated Confucianism and attached importance to scriptures, it still paid more attention to the development of social production and paid attention to practical and useful practical knowledge.
After Xie Jin and others accepted the task, they did not fully understand the will of the Yongle Emperor and were eager to achieve success, and in November of the second year of Yongle (1404), they submitted a hastily compiled manuscript and named it "Literature Dacheng". Ming Chengzu saw it, felt that the material was not complete enough, and was not very satisfied, so he ordered the re-repair, and sent Yao Guangxiao and others to cooperate with Xie Jin as a supervisor, and also ordered the Ceremonial Department to select internal and external officials and the sifang Su xue old Confucian and learned people to serve as repairers, and selected the Guozijian and the students who were good at writing in foreign counties to assist in the writing. According to relevant records, there were about 3,000 people involved in the incident at that time, and the chief editorial office was located in Wenyuan Pavilion. Guanglu Temple serves morning and evening meals for staff.
At that time, the editorial method was to refer to the genres of "Yunfu Qunyu" and "Huixi Shiyun". Each word is arranged according to the order of "rhyme mother", which is called "using rhyme to unify words"; and then all kinds of things such as astronomy, geography, dynastic and state classics, opera, poetry, etc. are included in the word, that is, the so-called "use of words to tie things".
For example, astronomical books are listed under the word "tian", books of plain language are included under the word "words", and drama texts are listed under the word "drama". At that time, the important classics of the classics, histories, sub-books, and concentrations were all and compiled with the titles of the books or the titles of the articles, and the contents of the books were recorded word for word under the different words.
This method of editing finally preserved an extremely rich amount of information and became an important source of information for the later work of compiling the book.
After four years of cooperation, the manuscript was compiled in the sixth year of Yongle (1408). Ming Chengzu personally wrote the preface and titled it "Yongle Canon". The book consists of 22,937 volumes (including 60 volumes of examples and catalogues), bound into 11,095 volumes, totaling 3. More than 700 million words. Its project can be described as vast and extensive, becoming the first comprehensive book in China's history; its extensive collection, rich content and volume, were also among the best in the field of world culture at that time.
After the completion of the Yongle Canon, due to the sheer volume, it could not be printed, and the original manuscript (or original copy) was originally hidden in the Wenyuan Pavilion in Nanjing. In the nineteenth year of Yongle (1421), Ming Chengzu moved the capital to Beijing, and the "Great Canon" moved north and was hidden in the "Wenlou" in the palace. Later, only Emperor Xiaozong Zhu Youfan and Sejong Zhu Houxi once consulted. It is said that Emperor Xiaozong also ordered some of these drugs and forbidden recipes to be copied to the doctors of the imperial medical office, and he also copied some golden secret recipes for use in the Tai Hospital.
In the thirty-sixth year of Jiajing (1557), there was a fire in the palace, and the three major halls and the "WenLou" and "Wulou" were burned, and after the Jiajing Emperor urged the rescue, the "Great Canon" was finally saved from misfortune. Zhu Houxi learned this lesson, worried that the orphan book would be accidentally encountered in the future, and in the forty-first year of Jiajing (1562), he ordered the cabinet minister Xu Jie and the Rebbe Attendant Gao Gong and other organizational personnel to begin to copy a new manuscript, calling it a copy. In the first year of Longqing (1567), the copy was recorded, and the original was treasured in Wenyuan Pavilion and Imperial Shixiao, respectively. In short, in the Ming Dynasty, the "Great Canon" became a secret code in the deep hidden palace, and it was shelved in a high cabinet, and ordinary scholars were not allowed to study it, so it failed to play its due role.
At the time of the Ming Dynasty' death, Wenyuan Pavilion was burned down again, and the original could be destroyed by a fire. During the Qing Yongzheng period, the copy had become an orphan copy and was moved to the Hanlin Academy, and from then on, some scholars and editors had the opportunity to see it. During the Qianlong period, in order to edit the Siku Quanshu, the Qing court compiled more than 500 kinds of books from the "Great Canon". According to records, there are 66 kinds of scriptures, 41 kinds of history departments, 130 kinds of sub-departments, and 175 kinds of collection departments, totaling 4926 volumes. There are many books that have been extinct since the Song and Yuan dynasties, and it is precisely because of this "Canon" that they have been preserved and reprinted.
Since then, some scholars, such as Qian Daxin, have also copied out many books from them, which shows the important value of the Yongle Canon in preserving ancient documents.
However, in the late Qing Dynasty, the Qing court was corrupt and incompetent, and the Yongle Canon was poorly managed, and it was constantly stolen and lost. At that time, in order to steal books, some officials who entered and left the Hanlin Academy carried bags and wrapped their clothes inside when they went to work, put them on when they left work, and then smuggled out the bags hidden in the stolen books.
But he has done such a shameful deed that harms public wealth and private interests! In particular, the Xianfeng Decade (1860) The invasion of Beijing by the Anglo-French coalition forces and the wanton plundering of the Eight-Nation Coalition in Beijing in the year of Guangxu Gengzi (1900) caused the Yongle Canon to suffer unprecedented disasters, or it was burned or robbed, and it was almost lost!
According to Yuan Tongli's "Catalogue of Extant Volumes of the Yongle Canon": After the disaster, very few of the "Great Canons" have been preserved in the hands of the public and private sectors in China, but the number lost in the hands of foreigners in Europe, the United States, and Japan is several times more than that preserved in China.
After the founding of New China, after years of active collection and collation, as of 1959, a total of 215 volumes of the Original Yongle Canon, plus copies, etc., totaling 730 volumes, were photocopied and published by the Zhonghua Book Company in 1960, including many precious ancient documents.
The value of the Yongle Canon lies mainly in its rich content, and the compilation of many ancient cultural classics not only provides a rich research reference for future generations, but also, as mentioned earlier, it can also be compiled from which the testament of the Book of Ano can be recorded, so that the ancient classics can be preserved and passed on.
Secondly, as a kind of book, it is far beyond the previous generation of books in terms of grand scale, rich content, voluminous volume, and innovation of style, and it is also in the forefront of the world culture forest at that time. It reflects the high level of cultural development of China's Ming Dynasty, and is a cultural treasure house that we should cherish and be proud of.
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The content of this article is compiled from the "History of the Ming Dynasty" of the Chinese reading book "Classic Chinese General History" jointly created by China International Broadcasting Publishing House and "Reading History".
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