Meishan Su family, Su Yun is the most virtuous

Chapter 138 Su Yun's Ambition

Seeing that Ah Hui handled the situation well, Su Yun didn't say much and went back to Imperial College the next day.

Su Yun brought the Guliang Zhuan and Gongyang Zhuan that he had brought from Zhang Dun, as well as the annotations to the three annotations, "Annotations to the Zuo Zhuan of the Spring and Autumn Annals" (also called "The Correct Meaning of the Spring and Autumn Annals"), "Annotations to the Gongyang Zhuan of the Spring and Autumn Annals", and "Annotations to the Guliang Zhuan of the Spring and Autumn Annals".

During this period, he plans to finish reading all three commentaries on the Spring and Autumn Annals. After the New Year, he will start taking monthly, quarterly and annual examinations.

Although he had no intention of following the path of being granted an official position at the Imperial College, taking these exams was considered a preparation for the imperial examinations.

After all, he had never taken part in this kind of exam before. If he rashly took the imperial examination, it would be a miracle if he could pass.

His foundation is weaker than that of most students. After all, they all learned it as children, while he is a latecomer. If he wants to pass the exam, he still has to work hard.

There were seventy-six holidays in the Song Dynasty each year, including three traditional festivals: New Year's Day (Spring Festival), Cold Food Festival, and Winter Solstice, each with a seven-day holiday.

There are also seven-day holidays for Tianqing Festival and Lantern Festival.

There are seven days of holiday during the Spring Festival, so before the seventh day, Su Yun had some free time to study. Except for going to Zhang Dun's house for dinner every day, he spent the rest of his time studying in the Imperial College.

Of course, what others call studying hard, he calls reading, because once you immerse yourself in it, it is really interesting.

After Su Yun's training in reading the Book of Han and the Records of the Three Kingdoms, his knowledge of history was already very solid. Reading the Spring and Autumn Annals was not difficult for him, not to mention that there were annotations for it.

Since entering the Imperial College and immersing himself in studies, Su Yun felt extremely fulfilled. He no longer had the light-headed feeling he had before. He felt that his roots had slowly taken root.

Su Yun already has a new goal. He wants to seriously compile a history book and also write a work on the meaning of the classics.

Both of these things require a lot of time and energy. With these two things under control, his mental illness will not be in danger of recurring.

Of course, this is the main purpose. He still feels that the secondary purpose is that although later generations criticized Confucianism, especially in some special periods, including when the country's economy was backward, the criticism was particularly fierce.

But Su Yun read the Thirteen Confucian Classics, including the Book of Changes, Book of History, Book of Songs, Book of Zhou Rites, Book of Rites, Zuo Zhuan, Gongyang Zhuan, Guliang Zhuan, Book of Filial Piety, Analects of Confucius, Mencius, and Erya. Although Su Yun had problems with each of them, overall they were not major.

It can be said that these thirteen classics constitute the underlying spiritual structure of the Chinese people. Although some people criticize Confucianism very sharply, if we analyze this person carefully, we will find that he is still deeply influenced by Confucianism.

Even though he has returned from studying abroad and looks like a traitor, if you put him together with foreigners, you can still clearly feel that he is a Chinese.

The problem is not with the classics; the problem lies with the people who annotated them.

I have very serious problems with the commentaries on the Five Classics. For example, Dong Zhongshu's Chunqiu Fanlu, Zhu Xi's Jizhuanzhangju of the Four Books, and the Three Commentaries on the Spring and Autumn Annals, etc., are said to be commentaries on the official classics, but they contain too much personal opinion.

Su Yun did not deny the achievements of these people, but he did not agree with some of them, which were even erroneous to some extent and would have a great impact.

It would have been fine if Su Yun didn't understand the meaning of the scriptures well before, but now that he has come in by chance, why not try to correct it?
Su Yun is not a passive person, but there is no need to bang your head against the wall when you know that some things cannot be done. For example, he thinks that even if God comes, there is no way to save the Song Dynasty. The Song Dynasty was not founded on the right principles. In order to keep the carriage with a defective chassis running, the Zhao family piled too many things on it. Once you want to save the carriage through reform, you will find that if you want to remove any of the things, the carriage will fall apart immediately.

Therefore, unless this carriage was completely dismantled and a solid chassis was rebuilt, the Song Dynasty could not be saved.

If you know it is impossible to do something, then just don't do it. Wouldn't it be better to live a more carefree life?
But his goal now is different. When it comes to compiling history books, everyone can express their own opinions and compile them however they want. At most, everyone may spit at each other, but once it is compiled, no one can stop you.

Correcting the meaning of the classics may be much more controversial than compiling history books, and may also be more risky, but this period is the best time.

Confucianism was formally formed in the Spring and Autumn Period, experienced a low point in the Qin Dynasty, and began to be systematized in the Han Dynasty.

By the time of the Sui and Tang dynasties, Confucianism began to become rigid. Fortunately, Han Yu revived Confucianism. After the chaotic Five Dynasties, people in the Song Dynasty began to feel that Confucianism was gradually entering a rigid stage again.

Therefore, the recent decades have seen a new upsurge in Confucianism.

There are already signs of this now. Wang Anshi's new learning, Zhou Dunyi, Zhang Zai, Shao Yong, the two Cheng brothers' Neo-Confucianism, Su Shi and his brothers' Shu School, and so on, and the emergence of Zhu Xi, the master of Neo-Confucianism, made Neo-Confucianism a Confucianism that has influenced future generations for thousands of years.

Many people in later generations hated Neo-Confucianism and believed it to be a cultural dregs, but in Su Yun's opinion, Neo-Confucianism was not that bad.

Zhu Xi was the master of Neo-Confucianism. He inherited the teachings of the two Cheng brothers, absorbed the ideas of Zhou Dunyi's Tai Chi theory and Zhang Zai's Qi theory, and pushed Neo-Confucianism to its peak.

The reason why the Southern Song Dynasty promoted Neo-Confucianism actually had a lot to do with the political and cultural environment at that time.

After the Song Dynasty lost half of its territory, the aristocratic families, landlords and wealthy businessmen fled to the south of the Yangtze River. They were frightened by the Jin people and did not want to fight anymore. They just wanted to live a peaceful life.

The rich and powerful are addicted to pleasure all day long, with three wives and four concubines, delicacies from land and sea, and luxurious houses and beautiful gardens.

The people are getting richer and having a good life, so who would want to go to war again?

However, by confining themselves to a corner and indulging in pleasure, and by the rise of liberalism and individualism, not only would they be unable to recover their former territory, but they might not even be able to keep half of the southern half.

The Eastern Jin Dynasty's migration to the south, the Northern and Southern Dynasties, etc. were all painful lessons.

Therefore, Neo-Confucianism was naturally promoted.

This is a product of the times, and there is nothing wrong with it being used to cope with the times. However, once this set of things entered a unified dynasty, it was bound to imprison people's thoughts and hinder social progress.

Therefore, Su Yun had an ambition, which was to incorporate advanced theories such as materialism and dialectical thinking from later generations into Confucianism at a time when everything could still be changed, so as to make Confucianism more open and dynamic.

Well, it may not be able to unify the world like Neo-Confucianism, but adding a handful of sand into Confucianism may be helpful in some matters.

(End of this chapter)