During the Song Dynasty, there was a book that achieved a par with the Zizhi Tongjian and was generally regarded as an imperial reading, and this book was the Tang Jian written by Fan Zuyu. It is said that the Northern Song Dynasty theologian Cheng Yi was very fond of reading the Tang Jian, and he commented: "After three generations, there is no such discussion"; Song Gaozong also said: "Reading the Zizhi Tongjian, I know that Sima Guang has the measure of the prime minister; reading the "Tang Jian", I know that Fan Zuyu has the means of Taiwan advice. ”
Fan Zuyu was a disciple of Sima Guang, and their views on history were highly consistent, and they all paid attention to the problems of chaos and ruin in history and the solidarity of the people, and were eager to find something from history that future generations could learn from. When compiling the Zizhi Tongjian, Sima Guang assigned the Tang Ji to Fan Zuyu, who wrote a "long compilation" of various historical materials of the Tang Dynasty; then Sima Guang added, deleted, and subtracted the "long compilation", and finally formed the Tang Ji. The Tang Dynasty consists of eighty-one volumes, exceeding sixty volumes of the Han Dynasty—the Tang Dynasty became the most inked dynasty in the Tongjian, which shows that Sima Guang and Fan Zuyu attach great importance to the experience of this dynasty.
In the process of writing the "long series", Fan Zuyu extracted the essence of the "traces of success and failure", and then commented on it, "folded with righteousness", and "additionally" wrote a book called "Tang Jian".
A work of the same name as the Zizhi Tongjian
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="5" > the Tang Dynasty in the eyes of the Song Dynasty</h1>
In the "Table of Entering the Tang Dynasty", Fan Zuyu told his original intention of writing, he believes that "the Tang Dynasty in this dynasty is like Xia to Shang, Shang to Zhou", so "the prison is not far away, it is easy to see", if the Song Dynasty people want to learn from history, the preferred object is the history of the Tang Dynasty.
In Fan Zuyu's time, the Song people formed a more consistent view of the Tang Dynasty, believing that the mistake of Tang government was that the "three programs were not correct". For example, Cheng Yi said:
"The rule of Han is too Tang, the Outline of Han is correct, and the Tang is full of eyes."
He also said:
"Tang has the world, such as Zhenguan and Kaiyuan, although the number is ping, but there is also the wind of Yidi, the three principles are not correct, there is no father and son and a monarch and a couple."
It is believed that the rule of the Tang Dynasty is still mixed with the Yidi style of the Northern Dynasty, and since Tang Taizong, the Tang Dynasty has had the problem of "three principles being incorrect". As far as father and son were concerned, Tang Taizong forced Tang Gaozu to abdicate, Tang Suzong connived with Li Fuguo to bully Tang Xuanzong, Tang Xianzong and Tang Muzong were suspected of killing their fathers and killing the king; for the emperor, after the Anshi Rebellion, Fanzhen did not obey the orders of the dynasty, and Hebei was like a foreign country. Eunuchs controlled the palace janissaries for a long time and were able to depose the emperor at will, and since Emperor Dezong of Tang, the government was extremely dim; for the couple, Wu Zetian had served the father and son of Emperor Gaozong of Tang, and Yang Guifei had also married Emperor Xuanzong of Tang and King Shou. As a founding prince, Tang Taizong not only killed Li Yuanji, but also occupied his wife Yang Shi, which was no different from the customs of the Xiongnu.
The Tang Jian was originally written for Emperor Shenzong of Song, so Fan Zuyu paid special attention to the issue of "Jungang"; the book was a praise-and-criticism analysis of what the Tang monarchs did, pointing out their superior wisdom and stupidity. Like Cheng Yi, Fan Zuyu also believed that Tang Dynasty politics was mixed with Yidi style.
At the beginning of the Tang Jian, it is recorded that Emperor Taizong Li Shimin wanted to raise an army against the Sui, fearing that his father Gaozu Li Yuan would oppose him, so he secretly offered the Jinyang Palace people with Pei Ning and others to serve Gao Zu, causing Gao Zu to commit the crime of killing his head, in order to force him to agree to the rebellion. Fan Zuyu criticized that "it is a pity that Emperor Taizong has the ambition to save the world, the talent of chaos, but does not know righteousness", he not only does not know the righteousness of the king, but also traps his father in sin, let alone the righteousness of father and son. Of course, Tang Gaozu himself also had problems, he favored Pei Huan, obviously knowing that the other party was a Sui Dynasty palace girl, but did not refuse; and at the beginning of the army, Gao Zu once claimed to be a vassal of the Turks, wanting to help, completely disregarding decency. As the kings of entrepreneurship, Gaozu and Taizong did not consider the influence of later generations, so Fan Zuyu said: "The Lord of the Tang Dynasty has no right way, and the chaos of Rong Diduo's slippery summer is the beginning of Gai Gaozu. Later, whenever the Tang Dynasty was in mourning, it was bound to beg for soldiers from foreign tribes—Tang Suzong relied on Uighurs to quell the Anshi rebellion, and Tang Shuzong reused Shatuo to suppress Huangchao.
To a certain extent, the Tang Jian represents the values of the Song Dynasty, the Song Dynasty had no weak lords, did not kill their fathers and kill the king, did not have imperial civil strife, did not divide the feudal towns, and did not govern eunuchs, which was the result of the Tang Dynasty.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="15" > there is a difference between the Tang Jian and the Zizhi Tongjian</h1>
Fan Zuyu believes that the so-called "chaos and destruction are subtle", so people are not easy to detect, if you want to avoid repeating the mistakes of the past, you must study the modern history, understand the footprints of predecessors in order to "audit the gains and losses, monitor the success or failure." ”
If the Zizhi Tongjian is intended to "look through" the universal laws of the rise and fall of successive dynasties, then the Tang Jian focuses on the direct experience of the modern pre-dynasties, which is the difference in vision between the two - the former is the "Tongjian of the Previous Dynasties", and the latter is only the "Classic of the Previous Dynasties".
Secondly, the Tongjian is more inclined to the "theory of non-unification", and Sima Guang also emphasizes that the book "is not a law of praise and deprecation in the Spring and Autumn Period, but also to dispel chaos and oppose all the righteousness." "Spring and Autumn" has a clear tendency to "honor the king", repeatedly declaring "Wang Zhengyue", and by devaluing the king of Chu and the king of Wu as Chu Zi and Wu Zi, to maintain the Zhou Dynasty that has already existed in name only. The Tongjian removes this layer of ideology and recognizes the monarchs of the Warring States Kings, the Five Hu Sixteen Kingdoms, and the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms, and what kind of nicknames they received when they died, the Tongjian will be truthfully called, and will no longer be praised or depreciated by changing their titles. For example, the Northern Qi emperors, each of whom was obsolete and cruel, the Tongjian still called "Gaozu", "Xianzu", and "Shizu" Yunyun; Shi Jingyao claimed to be subordinate to the Khitan and humiliatingly ceded Youyun Sixteen Prefectures, but the Tongjian did not give him a bad name without authorization, and still called him "Emperor Wuming Dexiao of gaozu shengwen" like the Later Jin history books, in order to show the reality that Shi Jingyao lived in a high position and was buried after death. This shows that the "General Commentary" adheres to an objective historical narrative and does not mix ideological and historical officials' praises and demeans in the history books.
The Tang Jian was deeply influenced by the Spring and Autumn Period. The Song Dynasty people believed that the problem of the Tang Dynasty was that the "Three Programs were not correct", so Empress Wu snatched her son with her mother, and Zhang Hou took her wife to lingfu, resulting in chaos in the government; at that time, the "Jungang" was weak, so the feudal towns were weak, and the eunuchs were in power, so "reviving the Three Programs" was like the "Honorable King" of the Spring and Autumn Period, which became the basic value of the Tang Jian. The Tang Jian revived the Spring and Autumn view of history, which had been discarded by the Tongjian, and reintroduced moral concepts and ideologies into history, the most significant consequence of which was the evaluation of Wu Zhou.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="10" > Why does the Tang Jian deny the existence of Wu Zhou? </h1>
Historically, Wu Zetian took the title of empress dowager in the first year of the reign of Emperor Sisheng (684) and changed the name of the country to "Zhou" as emperor in the first year of the Reign of Heaven (690). It was not until the first year of Shenlong (705) that she abdicated due to a coup d'état and was renamed empress dowager. The Wuzhou regime existed for at least 15 years in history, on par with Wang Mang's new dynasty.
When it comes to these two regimes, although the Tongjian does not list the New Era and the Wuzhou Ji separately, it still attributes what happened in those years under "Wang Mang" and "Empress Zetianshun" and adopts their era names. Wang Mangguo was overthrown and died without a title, so the Tongjian directly called him by his name; after Wu Zetian abdicated, he lived for several months, and when he died, he was posthumously honored by the Tang Dynasty as "Empress Zetian Dasheng", which shows that the Tongjian did not deny the existence of the new dynasty and Wuzhou by removing the imperial title and degrading the title. The reason why Wang Mang and Wu Zetian are not called emperors is just the consistent way of writing in the book--for example, the Southern Qi XiaoBao Scroll and the Southern Chen Chen Shubao are not called emperors in the Tongjian, because after their fall, they were named "Marquis of Dongxia" and "Duke of the Great Wall" respectively, so the Tongjian followed their final titles to describe it - this shows that in the Tongjian, there is no removal of the era number and change of the name in order to send praise and depreciation.
The Tang Jian is different, Fan Zuyu believes that Wu Zhou is a puppet regime, does not recognize it, and removes Wu Zetian's name and era name together—everything that happened during that time is attributed to Tang Zhongzong's name; it is believed that after the death of Tang Gaozong, history entered the era of Tang Zhongzong.
In the Tang Jian, Fan Zuyu explained this writing method, and he criticized the "Records of History" and the "Old Book of Tang" for listing the "Lü Hou Benji" and "Zetian Empress Benji" separately, believing that such writing violated the principles of "Spring and Autumn". In the Spring and Autumn Period, even though Lu Zhaogong was expelled from the country by the Three Huans and deposed, the Spring and Autumn Chronicle still links the historical facts to the year of the Duke of Zhao, and for the next eight years it records the exile of the Duke of Zhaohou until his death. Following this example, Tang Jian regarded Tang Zhongzong as the deposed Duke of Luzhao, and after Wu Zetian deposed Emperor Zhongzong as the King of Luling in 684, Tang Jian still nominally retained his status as emperor, and tied the events of the Wuzhou period to Tang Zhongzong's name, writing "Emperor in Fangzhou" at the beginning of each year to imitate the "Gongzai Qianhou" of the Spring and Autumn Period.
From an objective point of view, Wu Zhou is a real regime that has existed in history, and this is not subject to the will of the individual. Whether Wu Zetian deposed Emperor Zhongzong of Tang was reasonable and legitimate was a topic of debate among the scholars, but historians did not have to participate in it, he only needed to truthfully record the situation at that time. Although the Tongjian does not establish the Wu zhou ji, it does not comment on the Wu Zhou regime, does not dwarf the regime, and does not deny its existence. The Tongjian still follows the name of Wu Zhou, calling Luoyang "Shendu" and the era name "Heavenly Grant", and records that during the Shenlong coup, it was written "Fuguo Number Yue Tang". "Acknowledge the fact that Wu Zhou ever existed.
Fan Zuyu believed that It was natural for Emperor Zhongzong of Tang to inherit the throne of Emperor Gaozong of Tang, "In the Spring and Autumn Period, the king of Wu Chu is not called a king, so he saves the Zhou Room; the world under the heavens, Tang Zhi Tianxia, wu clan is also in the middle? "In the Spring and Autumn Period, the titles of the princes were all sealed by the Son of Heaven, and Wu Chuzhijun did not have the power to claim the title of king, so the Spring and Autumn Period demeaned him as a viscount; in the Tang Dynasty, the position of the emperor was passed from father to son, and Wu Zetian did not depose Emperor Zhongzong of Tang, so the Tang Jian did not recognize Wu Zhou. In this regard, Fan Zuyu also said: "In the year of the restoration of the heirs, the number of the Deposed Wu Clan was thought to be the ring of the mother's queen's troubles. Stealing the righteousness of "Spring and Autumn" is not resigned to the gentleman, although he is guilty. ”
Compared with the Tongjian, the Tang Jian has turned backwards here, defending the so-called "great right and wrong" values without acknowledging historical facts. We must know that any value and any ideology are historical and relativistic, and the Song Dynasty people believed that the "Three Principles" were a heavenly principle that was not easy to make in eternity, but we already regarded them as feudal scum; how can we know that the values we firmly believe in will certainly be able to stand in the future? Therefore, what is really difficult in history is facts, truths, and historical facts, not historical views, values, or historical commentaries.