"It is not a treasure of gold and jade, but a treasure of faithfulness." In ancient times, many heroes and gentlemen did not hesitate to put their lives and deaths on the line in order to seek loyalty. However, at present, how can we expect everyone to be a righteous gentleman and a hero? Greed for profit and the abandonment of faithfulness Abound, wolf hearts and dogs and lungs wander the world.
Today's protagonist, Kiyomasa Kato, on the one hand, helped Tokugawa Ieyasu defeat the Western Army around the Battle of Sekigahara, putting Ieyasu at the peak of power, which eventually led to the demise of his main family, the Toyotomi clan, and on the other hand, after Tokugawa Ieyasu's ambitions to replace the Toyotomi clan were exposed, he ran to protect the Toyotomi clan. Is he a loyal and honest person, or a wolf's heart and dog lungs? Let's take a look.
Since defecting to Oda Nobunaga, toyotomi Hideyoshi (now known as Kinoshita Hideyoshi, to facilitate unification) has achieved military merit by virtue of his own superiority. Yu Oda's family is becoming more and more prominent. The so-called one man has the Tao, and the chicken and the dog ascend to heaven. Relatives who had previously been close to Toyotomi Hideyoshi came from all over the world to toyotomi Hideyoshi. Among them is Kiyomasa Kato's mother and son.
Toyotomi Hideyoshi was born a commoner and ascended to the heavens one step at a time, and did not have a family of his own. In order to maintain the future rule of the Toyotomi family, Hideyoshi decided that he and his wife Ning Ning would personally cultivate a group of talented young courtiers who were loyal to the Toyotomi clan. Among them, Masanori Fukushima and Kiyomasa Kato are the most famous.
According to estimates, Kato Kiyomasa should have been only eight or nine years old when he joined the Toyotomi clan. Such a young child naturally could not participate in the battle, and Toyotomi Hideyoshi himself was childless, so his wife Ning Ning raised Kato Kiyomasa and others like a son. From this perspective, Hashiba Hideyoshi not only has the grace of knowing kato Kiyomasa and others, but also the grace of nurturing. Later, Kato Kiyomasa and others were also subordinated to the descendants of the Toyotomi family.
Statue of The Qing Dynasty
The first line of Kiyomasa Kato is already difficult to investigate. However, what made Kato Kiyomasa and others famous was the Battle of Mt. Kanagi. In 1583, Toyotomi Hideyoshi and Shibata Katsuya fought each other. A large-scale joint war broke out in the area of Yujiao. Kato Kiyomasa, Fukushima Masanori and other toyotomi katatake generals seven people were praised by the world as "Seven Guns of Mt. Takashi" because they had won a lot of enemy generals in the pursuit battle. This year, Kato Kiyomasa was only in his early twenties. It is a rare achievement.
See Kato Kiyomasa and others who have made many meritorious achievements. Toyotomi Hideyoshi was more serious about Kiyomasa and others. In the subsequent Kyushu Expedition and the Korean Expedition, Kato Kiyomasa was a pioneer in the cause of the Toyotomi family. So far, Kato Kiyomasa has always been a loyal vassal of the Toyotomi clan.
In 1598, Toyotomi Hideyoshi died and was succeeded by his youngest son, Toyotomi Hideyoshi. Tokugawa Ieyasu, on the other hand, deceived Hideyoshi so young that he could hardly do anything about it, and openly went against Toyotomi Hideyoshi's dying wishes. He married other daimyōs (including Kiyomasa Kato and others) to expand their power. Ishida Misei sensed Tokugawa Ieyasu's wolf ambitions. He quickly joined forces with Governor Konishi, Maeda Gene, And Mori Hidebashi to form an anti-Ieyasu alliance in an attempt to suppress Tokugawa Ieyasu's power. However, Tokugawa Ieyasu did not want to show weakness, and successfully took advantage of the contradictions between Kato Kiyomasa, Fukushima Masanori, and others with Ishida Mitsunari, drawing the Toyotomi generals to his side and becoming his own vanguard against Ishida Mitsunari.
In 1599, toshiya Maeda, the toyotomi clan's last attempt to suppress Ieyasu's power, died. Kiyomasa Kato and the others immediately planned to kill Ishida Sansei. Although Ishida Sansei sensed danger, he escaped by chance. He was expelled from the Center for Rights. Since then, the power of the Toyotomi family has fallen into the hands of Ieyasu. However, out of loyalty to the Toyotomi family, Ishida Did not give up the idea of expelling Ieyasu.
Statue of Tokugawa Ieyasu
In 1600, on the occasion of Tokugawa Ieyasu's eastern crusade against the Uesugi clan, Ishida Misei quickly called on Mori Keigen, Ukita Hideyasu, Governor Konishi, and others to attack Tokugawa Ieyasu. The Battle of Sekigahara thus broke out. However, what makes Ishida Mitsunari hard to imagine is that it was the toyotomi family who eventually served as the vanguard of the Tokugawa clan. Among them, Kato Kiyomasa was able to successfully prevent some of the Kyushu daimyo's army from joining the Western Army. In this war that decided to replace the Tokugawa clan with the Toyotomi clan as the hegemon of the world, Tokugawa Ieyasu's meritorious genealogy was filled with the names of Toyotomi clan courtiers such as Kato Kiyomasa.
Why did Kiyomasa Kato and others choose to side with Tokugawa Ieyasu during the Battle of Sekigahara? Although there are many complex reasons for this, there are some clues in a certain miscellaneous account recorded in the Maori Biography.
According to the Biography of Maori, Kiyoshi Kato sent envoys to communicate with the general of the Western Army, Maori Huiyuan, in the early stages of the Battle of Sekigahara, and expressed that he would be willing to join the Western Army if he could get Yamato Ichigoku. However, Maori Huiyuan did not explicitly agree to Kato Kiyomasa's request, but only hoped that Kato Kiyomasa would quickly enter the war, and his interests would be discussed separately after the war. Without a definitive reply, Kiyomasa Kato eventually chose to join Tokugawa Ieyasu.
Samurai fighting
Of course, the authenticity of this story is not verifiable. But it does show an important reason why Kato Kiyomasa joined Tokugawa Ieyasu - interests. Kato Kiyomasa joined the Eastern Army and prevented the Kyushu Western Army from supporting Sekigahara. After the war, Kato Kiyomasa was rewarded with the original domain of Governor Konishi. The territory was expanded from 250,000 stones in the original fat half to 520,000 stones in the fat country. More than doubled.
And let's assume that if Kato Kiyomasa joined the Western Army, what benefits would he get? First of all, although the Western Army supported Maori Huiyuan as the general general, the actual leader was Ishida Sansei. If the Western Army wins, Ishida Sansei is afraid that he will return to power of the Toyotomi clan. Kato Kiyomasa, who has a political acumen, is also well aware of this. And Ishida Sansei and Kato Kiyomasa and others originally hated each other, if Ishida Sansei ascended to the throne, how could Kato Kiyomasa and others, who had originally tried to kill Ishida Sansei, retreat completely?
On the other hand, Ishida Mitsunari only received the impeachment letter of Sanbong, and the Toyotomi clan himself chose neutrality. For Kiyomasa Kato and others, Ishida Sansei's crusade against Tokugawa Ieyasu was not very strong in name. At the same time, the general of the Western Army will be Maori Huiyuan, and the leader will be Ishida Sansei. The Toyotomi clan was not involved, and in the end, the Battle of Sekigahara was a war between Akimoto Mori, Misei Ishida, and Tokugawa Ieyasu. Naturally, Kiyomasa Kato and others had no reason to join the Western Army. For them, they will naturally choose to join the Eastern Army, which is more beneficial to them. Moreover, Kiyomasa Kato and Tokugawa Ieyasu himself have also climbed the family.
Samurai on horseback
Therefore, driven by interests, whether or not to be able to perceive Tokugawa Ieyasu's ambitions for the world, it is easy to be selectively ignored by Kato Kiyomasa, who is close to Ieyasu. The originally shrewd and capable Kato Kiyomasa and others also volunteered to become the vanguard of the Tokugawa clan's struggle for the world, and eventually assisted Tokugawa Ieyasu in defeating Ishida Sansei, personally clearing the way for Tokugawa Ieyasu to steal the foundation of Toyotomi Hideyoshi's blue wisps. (However, Kiyomasa Kato at the time of the Battle of Sekigahara was not aware of this.)
Of course, Kato Kiyomasa and others who joined the Eastern Army were not traitors to the Toyotomi clan, because in the Battle of Sekigahara, the Toyotomi clan remained neutral. For Kato Kiyomasa, it was just a matter of choosing the party that was more beneficial to him. Later, Kato Kiyomasa also showed loyalty to the Toyotomi clan. In 1611, Tokugawa Ieyasu asked Toyotomi Hideyoshi to leave Osaka for Kyoto to pay homage. Kato Kiyomasa, worried about Toyotomi Hideyoshi's safety, offered to accompany Toyotomi Hideyoshi to Kyoto to protect Toyotomi Hideyoshi. Escorted by Kiyomasa Kato, Toyotomi Hideyoshi returned safely to Osaka.
(However, from the perspective of Ieyasu's personality, he is careful in everything he does.) It seems unlikely that he would kill Toyotomi Hideyoshi without any reason in front of the world's daimyo and give a lie to the people of the world. ）
Samurai helmet
In fact, many people often wonder whether Kato Kiyomasa would have joined toyotomi in the Battle of Osaka if he had lived. History does not give an answer to this question, so the hereafter can only be the wise and the wise, and I personally think - no.
For samurai, it is not difficult to let go of their own personal interests, as Miyamoto Musashi said, "The way of the bush, that is, the way to die resolutely." "But for the samurai family, it is difficult to give up their own family interests." Unlike Kato Kiyomasa, Sanada Yukimura and others were originally clans that were defeated after the Battle of Sekigahara, and their identities had long been transformed into ronin, and for them, there was nothing to lose except their own lives. Joining the Battle of Osaka may give you a chance to turn around.
Kato Kiyomasa, on the other hand, is the head of the Higo nation and has his own prosperous family, and if he joins toyotomi, his own family will inevitably perish because of himself. Burdened with the fate of the family, Kato Kiyomasa's every step of his choice must be carefully considered, and naturally he will not risk joining the toyotomi side of toyotomi, who has almost no chance of winning.
Osaka Castle
This, of course, is not a presumptuous assertion, but corroborated by Masanori Fukushima and others. During the Battle of Osaka, Yodo-kun personally wrote to invite Masanori Fukushima and other daimyo who had been favored by Toyotomi Hideyoshi to join Osaka to help the Toyotomi clan, but most of the daimyo chose to turn a blind eye and remain indifferent, while Masanori Fukushima only acquiesced to the Toyotomi clan's expropriation of his own grain in Osaka, and did not provide more help to the Toyotomi clan. For them, they may be grateful for the kindness of the Toyotomi family, but this kindness is not enough for them to give up their family interests!
Judging only from the fact that Kato Kiyomasa and Fukushima Masanori and others joined the Eastern Army in the Battle of Sekigahara, it is naturally impossible to accuse the two of being traitors to the Toyotomi clan. But Kato Kiyomasa's actions really helped Tokugawa Ieyasu eliminate his political enemies, putting Tokugawa Ieyasu at the pinnacle of power. And later destroyed the Toyotomi clan. Whether they have a heart or not, it is also an indisputable fact that Kato Kiyomasa and others eventually became the gravediggers of the main family, toyotomi.
Note: The article represents only personal views and is intended to stimulate interest in history