Wu Said he was grateful for the TV series "Qing Ping Le" because it brought a long reigning emperor in Chinese history, ——— Song Renzong Zhao Zhen, into the public eye and also brought fire to his new book "Song Renzong: The Era of Co-Governance".
Historical research is the most taboo not to be objective, Wu Hook often reminds himself to maintain an emotional distance from the subject of study, but for Song Renzong, he still bet on different feelings. Born in 1010, Song Renzong published a biography of the emperor, who had never had a personal biography, in order to publish a biography in such a meaningful year as 2020, Wu Hook resigned from public office at the beginning of last year to concentrate on writing.
Is Wu Hook's Song Renzong really as beautifying as some people criticize? Why did he not fear the slander of "Song Blowing" and remember the Song Dynasty and write endlessly? In the dialogue with this edition of the reporter, his slow narration shows the rational and gentle love of an ordinary history lover and researcher for Chinese history and traditional culture. His rationality and gentleness are in line with his temperament with the Song Renzong dynasty he loves.
Song Renzong: The Era of Co-Governance, by Wu Hook, Xinmin Shuo/Guangxi Normal University Press
His "mediocrity" does not arouse people's imagination
The real Song Renzong did not have the wisdom and decisiveness of Wang Kai
Shang study: Before the book "Song Renzong: The Era of Co-governance" and the TV series "Qing Ping Le", everyone really paid little attention to Song Renzong, but now when you look at his "resume", there are actually many highlights.
Wu Hook: Su Shi, the great scholar, said, "For more than seventy years of Song Xing, the people did not know the soldiers, and the rich taught them, and the most holy and the most holy and the most beautiful. "Tiansheng and Jingyou are both era names of Song Renzong. During the reign of Song Renzong, a very large number of outstanding figures emerged in China: in the literary circles, six of the eight great masters of the Tang and Song Dynasties selected by the Ming Dynasty were Northern Song dynasty people, all of whom appeared on the historical stage in the Renzong Dynasty; academic circles, the Song Dynasty can be described as a hundred schools of thought, forming many schools, the founders or representatives of these schools, all living in the Renzong Dynasty; the political circles, from the New Deal of the Qing Calendar, the Xifeng Reform Law to the Yuanyou Reformation, Fan Zhongyan, Wang Anshi, Sima Guang, and many other political stars, all of which have dazzling performances in the Renzong era; the scientific community, Three of the four great civilizations of ancient China appeared in the Renzong Dynasty. The brilliance of the Renzong Dynasty is almost no era in history that can be compared.
"Nongsang does not disturb the age of Changdeng" says that Renzong's dynasty is smooth and rainy, and "the border generals cannot be meritorious officials" say that Renzong's dynasty has risen to peace in all directions, and the generals and officials have no chance to make meritorious contributions, which is the Renzong dynasty in literary memory. In fact, there were also serious floods in the era of Emperor Renzong, and wars also broke out in the northwest and Guangnan, but for the difficult Chinese nation, Renzong's 42 years of reign can indeed be regarded as "the people's security and customs, and the world is called rule".
Compared with other dynasties, the people of the Song Dynasty lived a very prosperous life. Wang Dan, the chancellor of the Song Dynasty, said, "The assets of the capital are at most one million (guan), and one hundred thousand upwards, abounding. "Throwing a random stone on the street of Beijing can smash a local tycoon with a hundred thousand yuan in his waist." If the rich man of the Han Dynasty is put into the Song Dynasty, he is only a middle class, and the property of a middle class in the Song Dynasty is 10 times or even 30 times that of the middle class of the Han Dynasty. The Tang Dynasty poets loved to show off their wealth, and a Tang Dynasty poet named Wei Chulao wrote a poem that showed off his wealth, "Ten Red Silk Circles Night Jade." Shen Kuo of the Song Dynasty laughed at the fact that he had never seen the world, "Ten red silk for the tent, the square is less than four or five feet, do not know how to stretch out the feet?" This so-called has not been close to the rich family. Shen Kuo concluded that "the Tang Dynasty wrote rich and noble poems, and remembered the grandeur of their service, which was frightening to the poor eyes." And what we now mean by "poverty limits the imagination" is one meaning.
Study: Is the king with such a ruling achievement really ignored for a thousand years?
Wu Hook: This is really not an exaggeration. Song Renzong's sense of existence is so low that folk fabricated stories do not take him as the protagonist. Song Taizu has the legend of "sending a thousand miles to the Beijing Lady", Song Huizong has the interpretation of "private meeting Li Shishi", the Ming Dynasty Zhengde Emperor has the affair of "playing with the dragon and playing with the phoenix", but Song Renzong does not even have a legend that can be enjoyed by the literati in the street, although there is also an unforgettable love between Song Renzong and Zhang Guifei. Even in the widely disseminated "Tanuki Cat for Prince" drama, Song Renzong, as the changed prince, is also a supporting role, just to achieve the good name of the protagonist "Bao Qingtian". There are also stories such as Yang Jiajiang and Hu Jiajian, all of which are set in the Renzong Dynasty, but Song Renzong has never had the opportunity to be the protagonist.
Study: Why is there such a big gap?
Wu Hook: Chinese tour of the Great Wall, you will think of Qin Shi Huang; when you visit the Grand Canal, you will think of the Sui Emperor; and some people love to quote Emperor Wu of Han's "Ming Dynasty offenders of the strong Han, although they are far away"; when it comes to "Zheng He going to the West", it is naturally the credit of Emperor Yongle of Ming Chengzu; when it comes to the prosperous times in Chinese history, it is always about the rule of Wenjing, the rule of Zhenguan, the prosperity of Kaiyuan, and the prosperity of Kangqian.
Because these emperors, can be said to have great talent, can also be said to be strong and arbitrary, people love to talk about them, is to project their own desires in the ancient emperors, to open up the territory, to show off their might, implying a kind of success. I don't think of the Song Dynasty and think of Song Renzong because the "mediocrity" of Song Renzong cannot arouse people's imagination and cannot produce a sense of substitution.
However, Song Renzong is in line with my value judgment, and some people in the Song Dynasty said that he "will not do everything, but will only be an official", but is it not the best for the country and the people to do a good job as an official?
"Ren" is the definitive theory of historians, and it is also the highest evaluation of him by Confucians
The "Night Stop Burning Sheep Diagram" in the early Qing Dynasty painted version of the "Emperor Jian Tushu" tells the story of Song Renzong's hunger and not eating the roasted sheep. Collection of the National Library of France
Study: Whether Song Renzong is really "mediocre" is still to be discussed, but his experience is plain but it is a fact, why did you choose such a master? This is a "birth defect" for the writing of a biography.
Wu Hook: Writing a biography of Song Renzong is something I have been planning for a long time, but it is really difficult to write. Because Zhao Zhen is not a person with a flamboyant personality and ups and downs. He was born and raised within the palace ban, and he could not step out of the palace unless it was necessary for etiquette. But the focus of my writing is not on the twists and turns of the bizarre plot, but on what Zhao Zhen is like as a son of man, a father, and a husband, hoping to write about his character and destiny, his youth and loneliness, his kindness and cowardice, his willfulness and restraint. He had the most honorable status, but he lived the most boring life. Faced with fate, he had no choice.
I would like to talk more about Renzong as the king of a country. In essence, the monarch is a system, and I devote more space to the events that occurred during the Renzong Dynasty and reflected the operation of the system. Renzong may not be the protagonist of these events, but these events constitute the institutional environment that Song Renzong as a monarch must face.
For the scholars of the Song Dynasty, they wanted the monarch to be a symbol of the system, believing that the monarch should not show too obvious personality, should not exude personal love and hatred. But in this case, Renzong as a monarch and Zhao Zhen as an individual, these two roles sometimes clash, and in the face of conflict, Renzong often chooses to restrain his emotions and preferences. The reason why Emperor Renzong was praised by later generations of doctors is an important reason.
Shang Shu: The subtitle of the book, "The Era of Co-Governance", refers to this interactive relationship between Song Renzong and the scholar?
Wu Hook: Under the guidance of the founding policy of the Song Dynasty, song Renzong, with his profound understanding of the role of the emperor and his gentle and tolerant personality, gradually built a relatively benign dynasty operation mechanism with his subordinate zaifu ministers. The monarch was responsible for appointing the principal ministers of the government, who would take charge of the affairs of the empire and establish an independent system of advisors to closely supervise the government personnel. Under this mechanism, the emperor did not monopolize power, but ruled the world together with the scholars. They quelled the rebellion, carried out reforms, and launched many measures such as selecting talents, improving people's livelihood, and improving the legal system. Therefore, in the middle and late period of Emperor Renzong's reign, the politics, economy, culture, science and technology of the Song Dynasty have made great progress, and the entire era has shown a vigorous spiritual outlook, so it has been named "The Rule of Jiayou", and the way of governance during this period is also considered by later generations to be a model for governing the country. On the surface, whether as an individual or an emperor, Song Renzong was always constrained by the chancellor at every turn. However, it was precisely because of his lack of freedom in everything, and it was the reasoning of The Minister of Zaifu that brought about the unprecedented prosperity of this era.
This set of more advanced political systems in the Middle Ages was not inherited by Song Renzong from his ancestors, but was created by him, and from this point of view, Song Renzong's merits were no less than those of Taizu and Taizong, who founded the country.
Shang shu: Zhao Zhen was the first monarch in Chinese history with the temple name "Renzong", and "Ren" is a very high evaluation.
Wu Hook: The character "Ren" is the historian's conclusive theory of Zhao Zhen, and it is also the confucian highest evaluation of a monarch.
Ren first of all, Song Renzong had a generous temperament and did not do anything luxurious. There are a few stories that illustrate a thing or two.
Once, in the late spring, Renzong was walking in the imperial garden for a while, and the people around him found that Renzong frequently looked back, but did not say anything. When he returned to the palace, he hurriedly said to the palace maid, "I am thirsty, so help me bring water to drink." The palace maid asked strangely, why didn't you drink water outside and endure your thirst for so long? Renzong replied while drinking, "I looked back many times, but I didn't see the attendant on duty who was in charge of the tea, and it was inconvenient to ask, because if I wanted to ask, the attendant would inevitably be punished." ”
The history books also record such a story: Emperor Renzong told his close ministers one day that he could not sleep last night, and he was hungry in his stomach and wanted to eat mutton. The courtier asked, then why not let people intrude? Renzong said that he was worried that the dining room would become the norm, because I would have to burn sheep at night and night because of this time, so how many sheep would be killed?
Emperor Renzong's benevolence also showed political tolerance and listening to opinions. In history, many dynasties have engaged in a "reign of terror" at the beginning of their founding to deter their subjects. Zhu Yuanzhang established the Ming Dynasty and the Qing army entered the customs, and both of them were "literal prisons", except for Zhao song who established the state, and Song Taizu made an oath at the Zongmiao Temple, warning his descendants not to kill those who wrote and said things. Under the constraint of this oath, the civilian subjects of the Song Dynasty dared to discuss state affairs, and even spoke out in a bad way, not fearing that they would be beheaded. In the more than three hundred years of the Two Song Dynasties, with one or two exceptions, there were indeed very few scholars and doctors who were humiliated and killed by the imperial court because they wrote letters and made arguments, and tens of thousands of people were punished by the "prison of words" during the Ming and Qing dynasties.
Therefore, the young and vigorous Su Rui dared to criticize Renzong for being lustful in the policy of the imperial examination, and after Renzong read the papers, he did not know whether he was angry or not, and in any case, not only did he not arrest Su Rui and punish him, but also granted him an official position. During Bao Zheng's tenure as an inspector of imperial history and advisory, he often did not give the emperor any face at all, and sometimes when he was anxious to speak, he sprayed spit stars on Zhao Zhen's face, and Zhao Zhen wiped his face with his sleeve while accepting his suggestions. Once, a man in Sichuan wrote a poem to the prefect of Chengdu, "Burn the broken sword gate to the boardwalk, and Xichuan is not a clean kun." It was an anti-poem advocating independence, and the prefect immediately tied it up and escorted him to Beijing. After Emperor Renzong found out, he believed that this was lao Juzi's "ascension to the throne" in order to become an official, and he did not punish him.
As the fourth emperor of the Northern Song Dynasty, in the middle of the Northern Song Dynasty, there was both the rich foundation laid by the ancestors of previous generations and the pressure of reform that was difficult to return; there were tigers in the Western Xia and Liao, and there were friends and parties in the inner world and the masses of courtiers competing, but in this situation, Renzong did not adopt an iron fist policy, but instead followed the flow of advice and controlled the northern Song Dynasty for more than forty years with extremely unique political wisdom.
Using "civilization" to measure the dynasties, the achievements of the Song Dynasty are actually the highest
Yuan Dynasty Qian Xuanlin Su Hanchen's "Song Taizu Keju Diagram", shanghai museum collection
Shang shu: Over the years, from "Song: The Dawn Of Modern Times", "Fengya Song: Visible Great Song Civilization", "Zhi Song: A History of the Great Song Written to My Daughter" to today's "Song Renzong: The Era of Co-Governance", your writing has been swirling around in the Song Dynasty, so that some people say that you are a "Song fan", and some people say that you are "Song Chui", what do you think of it yourself?
Wu Hook: I can accept the "Song Fan" theory, because this has not wronged me, but I do not accept "Song Blowing".
What I really want to say, I am not a fan of the Song Dynasty, but civilization, I have said before, I am a "civilization fan", I am not a "powder" Song dynasty, but the degree of civilization achieved by the "powder" Song.
What fascinates me most about the Song Dynasty is civilization. The martial arts of the Song Dynasty were obviously not as good as those of the Han and Tang Dynasties, but the civilization reached the peak of all dynasties. Mr. Chen Yinke said, "The culture of the Chinese nation has evolved over thousands of years, and was created in the world of Zhao and Song Dynasties, and then gradually declined, and will eventually be revived." "In the civilization of the Song Dynasty, it has shown rich modernity and profoundly influenced the development of European civilization. The so-called "stagnation theory of Chinese history" and "impact-response theory" that are widely circulated now are nothing more than prejudices based on "Western-centrism." I sincerely hope that readers can abandon the prejudices of the Song Dynasty and forget the "knowledge of TV dramas", and rediscover the Song Dynasty and reinterpret the tradition.
Shangdian: What do you see as the achievements of Song civilization?
Wu Hook: It is not to open up the territory, not to kill the enemy on the battlefield, not to show off the army, not to come to the dynasty, but the civilization achievements in my heart refer to being more politically enlightened, the society being more relaxed, the economy being more prosperous, and the people being richer. If you use these indicators to measure the dynasties and generations in Chinese history, you will find that the Song Dynasty, which has always been degraded, is actually an era with the highest achievements in civilization, and there is no one.
First of all, the social system of the Song Dynasty was more relaxed and open than other dynasties, and there was no distinction between nobles and lowly in law, so that the commoners dared to dream of becoming the prime minister, so that the scholars and doctors had the ambition to take the world as their own responsibility, and the great responsibility of heaven was none other than me. This was almost impossible in other dynasties, especially the Qing Dynasty, which enslaved officials.
The Song Dynasty also allowed free movement, and there was no need to bring a pass or introduction letter to go out.
Secondly, the Song Dynasty was a period of extreme economic prosperity, the world's first paper money was produced in the Song Dynasty; Song money was a hard currency that swept Southeast Asia; the "interleaved shops" that appeared in the big cities of the Song Dynasty were the earliest places similar to securities trading centers.
The most prosperous time of the "Maritime Silk Road" was the Song and Yuan Dynasties, with the world's leading shipbuilding technology, compass technology and rich navigation experience, the Song Dynasty and the Western and Nanyang countries have launched commercial transactions. At that time, the coastline of the entire Song Dynasty, north to Jiaozhou Bay, through Hangzhou Bay and the Golden Triangle of Fuzhou, Zhangzhou and Quanzhou, south to Guangzhou Bay, and then to the Qiongzhou Strait, were open to the outside world, and developed commerce and trade with the Western And Nanyang countries, unlike "Zheng He going to the Western Ocean", it was just an exotic move of the Zhu Ming Dynasty, and had nothing to do with civil commerce.
The urbanization of the Song Dynasty far exceeded that of other dynasties in history. The proportion of urban population in the Song Dynasty reached 20%, which was unprecedented, and even the Jiaqing prosperity of the Qing Dynasty was only 7% in later generations, and only 10% in the Republic of China. At that time, the world's largest city was also in the Song Dynasty, and the population of Kaifeng at the end of the Northern Song Dynasty was 1.5 million, far exceeding the 100,000 population of London at that time.
The economy is prosperous, the people are rich, the Song people are very good at enjoying life, raising pets, planting flowers and grasses, indulging in landscapes, tasting tea in the tea house, going to the washe to watch the performance, cold drinks in the summer, bathing every day, using toothbrushes and tooth powder to clean teeth, and Europeans at that time almost did not bathe.
Third, as a manifestation of civilian society, the fields of education, culture and art in the Song Dynasty also appeared obviously popular. Before the Song Dynasty, the nobility had unique educational resources, while the schools of the Song Dynasty were open to the whole people, including the children of "industrial and commercial miscellaneous" who could enter the state and county schools. According to scholars' statistics on the DengkeLu of the Fourth Year of Nan Youbao (1256), among the 601 Song Dynasty scholars, 417 were from civilian origins and 184 were children of official eunuchs. Literature, music, and fine arts were also the elegant activities of the upper class before the Song Dynasty, and after entering the Song Dynasty, literary and musical forms that belonged entirely to the commoners (citizens) were produced, such as scripts and burlesques. In the Tang Dynasty before the Song Dynasty, the untouchables were like cattle, the private property of the lord's family, which could be involved in the market for sale.
This modernization change, which occurred in the 11th to 13th centuries, was formed based on the accumulation and evolution of Chinese civilization itself, based on the inherent development momentum of Chinese history, and the West was still in the long Middle Ages.
Shangxue: But historical shame like the Jingkang Revolution is also real.
Wu Hook: The shame of Jing Kang is indeed the national shame of the Song Dynasty, but when we look at Chinese history, if we only pay attention to the fortunes of the dynasty from a single perspective, it is easy to affect the vision because of our positions and emotions.
Shang study: But why didn't Song, the "dawn of the modern day," continue?
Wu Hook: After the fall of the Song Dynasty, the Yuan Dynasty unified China and brought some backward influences in the political and social spheres. This is because the Yuan Dynasty was essentially a reversal for the Song Dynasty. This reversal not only worked in the Yuan Dynasty, but also as a historical cause, which was inherited by the later Ming Dynasty. The political system of the Ming Dynasty basically inherited the Yuan Dynasty, and this system of the Yuan Dynasty was a patchwork of Mongolian and Jin systems.
Zhu Yuanzhang established the Ming Dynasty, lacked creative wisdom, and almost completely inherited the Yuan Dynasty's family property system (sub-feudal system), family vassal system, court staff system, sea prohibition, curfew system, rough governance technology and other institutional legacies, while the modern performance preserved in the Yuan system was abandoned by Zhu Yuanzhang, such as the policy of mercantilism, the pattern of opening up to the outside world and the rule of leniency. Zhu Yuanzhang was determined to transform China into a closed and quiet giant countryside, where the people stayed on the land, working at sunrise and resting at sunset, and were not allowed to leave the land without permission, and this quiet order did not welcome mobile merchants and noisy commerce, and people were basically self-sufficient, even if there was sporadic trade, they also adopted barter. An extremely strict system of sea prohibitions has also been introduced.
The control of political, social and economic aspects in the Zhu Yuanzhang era made it necessary for subsequent Ming emperors to constantly break through the "Hongwu system" set by Zhu Yuanzhang before they could return to the modernization track of "Tang and Song reforms". In the late Ming Dynasty, with the implementation of the "One Whip Law", the "Hongwu System" was dissolved, industry and commerce finally got out of difficulties, and the so-called "bud of capitalism in the Late Ming Dynasty" appeared. Unfortunately, it was not far from the collapse of the Chamber of Light.
Stories are more readable than papers, and they are the interpretation of the system in the human body
The Forbidden City South Kaoru Hall old collection of Song Renzong seated statue
Shang shu: The second part of your "Speaking Song Series", "Fengya Song: Visible Great Song Civilization", was selected as a "Good Book of China" on April 23, 2018, and the award speech at that time was as follows: "The book has a unique perspective, the above 100 exquisite and realistic Song paintings are clues, combined with relevant literature, showing the daily life of the Song people, depicting a unique and vivid 'Fengya Song' civilization landscape, and is a history of the social life of the Song Dynasty that is appreciated by both elegant and customary." This "Song Renzong: The Era of Co-governance" takes Renzong as the main line and writes about the Renzong Dynasty. Or "reading" paintings or saying things, both of which will make your book deeply loved by readers.
Wu Hook: I wasn't very good at writing at the beginning. When I wrote the first book of the "Song Dynasty Series", "Song: The Dawn of Modern Times", I always thought of depicting the modernization of Song Dynasty China in a panoramic way, and the result was some dragonfly, and the effect was not the most ideal.
When I wrote "Fengya Song: Visible Civilization of the Great Song Dynasty", I paid attention to the theme and focused on the elegant life of the Song people, which was well received by readers.
The paintings, costumes, and furniture of the Song Dynasty are very elegant, which is recognized by everyone, but what I admire most is not this elegance, but the degree of civilization of the politics and justice of the Song Dynasty is very high, not only leading Europe at that time, but also at the peak of the Qin to the Qing. For example, many people think that there were no professional judges in ancient China, which was not true at least in the Song Dynasty. In the Song Dynasty, the central and local governments had full-time and professional judges, and the full-time work was reflected in their basic work being judicial work, and the professional embodiment was that judicial workers had to be trained and pass judicial examinations. As far as I know, the judicial examination was only available in the Song Dynasty. Therefore, in order to solve the institutional reasons behind the "Elegant Song", I wrote a third book, "Knowing the Song: A History of the Great Song Written to My Daughter", which mainly talks about the legal and political system of the Song Dynasty.
But it's easy to get bored with the legal and political system, so I thought of using storytelling, which is obviously more readable than a thesis. History is originally composed of stories (Stories), and the historical narrative with stories is vivid, there is no historical narrative of stories, only a bunch of data, concepts and terms, a face that refuses to be thousands of miles away. I certainly don't want my book to look like this.
Choosing to cut from the story to the history of the system, there is also a consideration, that is, I think that the system that appears in the story is the living system and the system that is enforced. I have also written articles about the political and judicial systems of the Song Dynasty before, and some people have questioned: The paper is very well written, how is it implemented? Well, I'll tell the story, and the story is the process by which the system is enforced.
As I said earlier, Song Renzong was in the institutional environment at that time, and the story of his life in the world was the interpretation of the system on him.
Compared with those who study the history of the Song Dynasty, I do not have an advantage in the excavation of historical materials, nor do I dare to say how new views and ideas I have put forward, but my books, from "Zhi Song" to "Song Renzong", are all telling the story of the Song Dynasty, and presenting the operation of the Song Dynasty system through the interpretation of stories. Many people are prejudiced against history, believing that ancient Chinese society was dark, and Confucianism was an accomplice to autocracy, and such a view of history is one-sided. I would like to offer you another perspective on history. Those netizens who criticize me as "Song Chui", I would like to say that while they criticize me for not being objective, they are also making mistakes of not being objective. The Song Dynasty itself is a complex, three-dimensional existence, my book shows only some aspects of the Song Dynasty, and it is unrealistic to read only one person's book and fully understand the Song Dynasty. Why don't you let go of stereotypes and prejudices and try to understand history and traditions from more perspectives, including the Song Dynasty?
Study room: Looking at your Weibo, I found that you are also chasing the TV series "Qing Ping Le", you are quite appreciative of the props and costumes in the play, although each episode can always pick a point to stab out.
Wu Hook: It's a pleasure for me to pick thorns, but this drama can be regarded as a conscience drama, and the basic historical facts are correct. However, the real Song Renzong is much more mediocre compared with Wang Kai's version of Song Renzong in "Qing Ping Le". Mediocrity is both his character and the system. I think that his mediocrity is often the blessing of the people, he is a model of ancient monarchs, and during the period of national peace, the emperor can be as good as Song Renzong.
Column Editor-in-Chief: Gu Xuewen Text Editor: Gu Xuewen