There is a folk saying that "cutting the grass does not remove the roots, and the spring wind blows and grows again", among the more than four hundred emperors in ancient times, Tang Taizong Li Shimin did the most thorough work in this regard. In the Xuanwumen Rebellion, he not only personally shot his brother Li Jiancheng, but also after executing his younger brother Li Yuanji, in order to cut the grass and remove the roots, he even made up his mind to execute all ten of his nephews.
Li Shimin fought on the battlefield for many years, and then competed with the crown prince Li Jiancheng for the throne, and in this process he has been cutting the grass and removing the roots very thoroughly. However, there are exceptions to everything, there was once a rebel who was beheaded by Li Shimin, but Xu Maogong secretly took care of his wife and children, and Li Shimin did not cut the grass and remove the roots after learning about it, but added him to the rank of knight, and as a result, he planted a curse for the Tang Dynasty, and the rebel general who was beheaded by Li Shimin was the eighteenth good Han Shan Xiongxin of the Sui and Tang Dynasties.
Shan Xiongxin was a fierce general born in Wagangzhai, and in Li Shimin's Qin palace, many generals were born in Wagangzhai. But why did Li Shimin later want to kill Shan Xiongxin? Shan Xiongxin's death proves that sometimes people's choices are really very important, and the slightest carelessness will end up in a doomed end.
Shan Xiongxin and Xu Maogong were friends of life and death, and in the ninth year of Daye, the two defected to Zhai Rang's Wagang Village, belonging to the elder-level figures of Wagang Village. Shan Xiongxin was highly skilled in martial arts, good at using horse mallets, and was a member of the WagangZhai fierce generals, and later after Li Mi sat on the leadership of Wagangzhai, Shan Xiongxin was named the Great General of Zuo Wuhou and Xu Maogong was made the Great General of Right Wuhou. However, a later choice made their fate change completely differently, Xu Maogong became one of the twenty-four heroes of Ling Yange, and Shan Xiongxin became a traitor in the eyes of the world, and even the surrender was not accepted by Li Shimin.
Xu Maogong had a long-term vision, a figure who could be compared with Li Jing, the "god of war of the Tang Dynasty", and when the general trend of Wagangzhai had gone, he already had a premonition that the final victory would definitely belong to the Li Tang royal family. Therefore, after Li Mi was defeated by Wang Shichong, Shan Xiongxin, Qin Qiong, Cheng Yaojin and others all defected to Wang Shichong, while Xu Maogong turned to Li Tang and became a major general in Li Shimin's Qin palace. Wang Shichong was a treacherous man, and Qin Qiong, Cheng Yaojin, and others later managed to sneak into Li Tang's camp, but Shan Xiongxin was unmoved.
In the third year of WuDe, Li Shimin led an army to attack Luoyang, and Shan Xiongxin led his army to fight, almost killing Li Shimin on the battlefield. If it were not for Xu Maogong's words of persuasion, I am afraid that Li Shimin would have already drunk and hated the battlefield, and Shan Xiong believed in the friendship between Gu Quan and Xu Maogong, and finally chose to retire. However, when Wang Shichong was defeated and surrendered to Li Tang, Li Shimin was unwilling to let Shan Xiongxin go no matter what, so many surrendered rebels did not kill, but had to kill Shan Xiongxin.
Xu Maogong once interceded with Li Shimin, hoping to spare Shan Xiongxin's death, but Li Shimin was not at all moved and insisted on killing Shan Xiongxin. In the face of death, Shan Xiongxin seemed calm and self-assured, and instead he advised Xu Maogong: "It doesn't matter, I know that I will definitely die." Xu Maogong could not save his friend, so he had to say that he would take good care of Shan Xiongxin's family and cut the flesh of Mingzhi. Shan Xiongxin ate Xu Maogong's flesh and died in anger.
After Shan Xiongxin's death, Xu Maogong secretly took care of his wife and children until one day Li Shimin, who had become emperor, discovered the matter. Based on what Li Shimin did during the Xuanwumen Rebellion, Xu Maogong originally thought that Li Shimin would be furious and ask him to cut the grass and root out and kill Shan Xiongxin's wife and children. However, what Xu Maogong did not expect was that Li Shimin, instead of pursuing it, promoted Shan Xiongxin's son Shan Daozhen to Sima of LiangZhou. Moreover, Shan Xiongxin's descendants have always been reused, and the two grandsons, one official to the Andong Capital Protectorate, and the other to the Qi Prefecture Assassination History, have to be said to be surprising.
Li Shimin let go of Shan Xiongxin's descendants, probably also to give Xu Maogong a face, after all, it was Xu Maogong who persuaded Shan Xiongxin to save Li Shimin's life. However, I am afraid that Li Shimin did not expect that his momentary softness of heart would actually sow the bane of the Tang Dynasty two hundred years later.
Shan Xiongxin's 11th grandson had four people, namely Shan Xing, Shan Wang, Shan Mao, and Shan Sheng, who joined the Huangchao Rebellion at the end of the Tang Dynasty and were known as the "Four Masters of the Yellow Army" because of their bravery and good fighting. Although the Huangchao Rebellion ultimately failed to overthrow the Tang Dynasty, it accelerated the demise of the Tang Dynasty, and Shan Xing and Shan Wang also played a crucial role in it. If Li Shimin had learned that this situation would have occurred in the first moment of weakness, which indirectly promoted the demise of the Tang Dynasty, he did not know how the underground people would feel.