Zhu Chao accompanied me to watch short videos

[Read it in one breath, why is it said that Wu Qi killed his wife to seek generals? Historical trivia about the Warring States Period]

Wu Qi was revered as the "Second Sage of Military Strategies" by later generations and was listed among the "Ten Sages of the Temple of Martial Arts". Why did he achieve such high achievements? However, he has been ignored and even reviled by later generations.

The main reason for this comes from the record of Wu Qi's misconduct in "Records of the Grand Historian: Biographies of Sun Tzu and Wu Qi", especially the story of "Wu Qi killing his wife to become a general" which is the most well-known. Although this statement is not credible, it has left Wu Qi with a bad reputation of "corrupt character".

Coupled with the criticism of Wu Qi by the Confucian master Zengzi, in the environment of "abolishing all schools of thought and respecting Confucianism alone", Wu Qi was regarded as a negative example of morality by later Confucianists and has been criticized ever since.

However, Wu Qi's extraordinary talent was often overlooked, so much so that during the Song Dynasty, Wu Qi was removed from the Temple of Martial Arts on the grounds of "moral corruption." So, what is the truth?

The truth about "killing wife to get general"

"Records of the Grand Historian: Biographies of Sun Tzu and Wu Qi" records: Wu Qi married a woman from Qi. When Qi attacked Lu, Lu wanted to appoint Wu Qi as a general, but because Wu Qi's wife was from Qi, Lu was worried that Wu Qi would be unfaithful.

So Wu Qi, in order to gain fame, killed his wife to prove his loyalty, and Lu appointed him as a general to fight against Qi and eventually won. However, there are many doubts about this statement.

In 419 BC, Wu Qi was 22 years old. From 408 BC, when Wu Qi was 33 years old, Qi attacked Lu twice, in 412 BC and 408 BC, but Qi won both wars.

That is to say, after Wu Qi "killed his wife to seek a general", Lu did not win against Qi, which contradicts the record in "Historical Records". Since the war did not happen, or the result of the war does not match the record, the authenticity of Wu Qi's "killing his wife to seek a general" is very questionable.

In Han Feizi, which was earlier than Records of the Grand Historian, it was recorded that Wu Qi "divorced his wife instead of killing her."

"Han Feizi Wai Chu Shuo You Shang" records: Wu Qi's wife wove cloth for Wu Qi, but the size did not meet his requirements. Wu Qi asked her to weave it again, but his wife was disrespectful. Wu Qi was furious and divorced his wife and sent her back to her parents' home.

Han Fei lived earlier than Sima Qian, and only 100 years before Wu Qi died. From the perspective of time, the record in Han Feizi seems to be more in line with the facts. Since Wu Qi only "divorced his wife", the claim of "killing his wife to become a general" is even less credible.

Is Wu Qi’s character really that bad?

First, let's look at the evaluation of Wu Qi by his colleagues in Wei. According to the Records of the Grand Historian, Li Kui, the prime minister of Wei, recommended Wu Qi to Wei Wenhou. When Wei Wenhou asked what kind of person Wu Qi was, Li Kui replied, "Wu Qi is greedy and lustful, but he is better than Sima Rangju in military operations."

Li Kui said that Wu Qi was greedy for money and lustful, but he had first-class military talent, so Wei Wenhou appointed Wu Qi. Here it only said that Wu Qi was greedy for money and lustful, but did not say that Wu Qi was morally corrupt.

In Wei, Wu Qi's performance was even more remarkable. He defeated Qin many times, and as a commander, he cared about his soldiers, ate and lived with them, walked instead of riding in a car, and wore the same clothes as the lowest-ranking soldiers.

There was even a soldier who had an abscess on his leg, and Wu Qi sucked out the pus himself. During his time guarding Hexi in the State of Wei, Wu Qi was honest and dedicated to his work, and was deeply loved by the soldiers.

Let's look at the fate of Wu Qi's colleague due to his moral corruption. Wei Wenhou once sent General Le Yang to attack Zhongshan State. At that time, one of Le Yang's sons was serving as an official in Zhongshan.

The King of Zhongshan State used Le Yang's son as a threat, but Le Yang remained unmoved. So the King of Zhongshan State killed Le Yang's son, cooked him into a pot of broth, and served a bowl of it to Le Yang through an envoy.

Le Yang ate the broth in front of the envoy, looking calm. When Wei Wenhou learned about this, he thought Le Yang was inhumane and therefore rejected him. In history, these two events were also put together, saying that Wu Qi was unkind in "killing his wife to become a general" and Le Yang was too cruel in "eating his son's broth".

But Le Yang ate his son's broth under special circumstances. He did not kill his son. His son was killed by others. Le Yang was already defined as "inhumane" and was abandoned.

If Wu Qi really killed his wife in order to seek an official position, wouldn't that be even more inhumane? However, Wu Qi was highly valued by Wei Wenhou in Wei State. From this point, it can also be seen that the story of "killing his wife to seek a general" is not credible.

Is Sima Qian's evaluation of Wu Qi objective?

"Records of the Grand Historian" is a great work, but it also contains many untrue and even contradictory parts.

Sima Qian, the Grand Historian, gave a rather complicated evaluation of Wu Qi. In the previous passage, Sima Qian mentioned that Wu Qi "enlightened the laws and examined the decrees, dismissed unnecessary officials, and removed those who were alienated from the royal family." This means that Wu Qi strictly enforced the laws, streamlined the institutions, cut down on the redundant ones, and hit the interests of the nobles.

The "harsh" was due to the strict laws, and the "ungracious" was due to the abolition of special treatment for the alienated royal family. However, Sima Qian's evaluation of another reformer, Shang Yang, was "ungracious and greedy, harsh and ungracious, and it backfired on him."

From this point we can also see that Sima Qian, as a supporter of Confucianism, obviously had no good feelings towards Legalism.

In the environment of "rejecting all schools of thought and respecting Confucianism alone" at that time, Sima Qian, as a student of Dong Zhongshu, could not help but be influenced. Therefore, when he looked at Wu Qi's problem, he could not avoid this "Confucian bias".

[Read the Farmer Master in one breath - Xu Xing Historical Trivia Farmer]

He was a fighter in the Warring States Period who spoke for the common people, but was labeled as "regional discrimination" by Mencius. He was the agricultural master Xu Xing, whose thoughts and ideas had a far-reaching influence.

In this video, let's walk into the world of Xu Xing. Xu Xing was a native of Chu during the Warring States Period and an important representative of hardworking farmers. In that turbulent and war-torn Warring States Period, Xu Xing was the most skilled agricultural scientist at that time.

His disciples had a heated debate with Mencius, and the scene was extremely intense. In the end, Mencius used regional discrimination against Xu Xing, calling him "a man of the southern barbarians with a 鴂舌", meaning an uneducated southern barbarian.

However, it was Mencius's regional discrimination that made Xu Xing, a master of agriculture who was not well-known before, recorded and known to everyone. The agricultural school represented by Xu Xing respected Shennong as the ancestor and was a school of thought that advocated the development of agriculture. They believed that "food is the first necessity of the people" and that grain has been the foundation of national stability and development since ancient times.

Therefore, although the Nong family is not well-known, its ideas had a profound influence in the feudal society dominated by small peasant economy at that time. As a representative of the Nong family, Xu Xing not only wrote books, but also farmed himself and had a very good harvest, which had a strong influence at that time.

His influence was so great that even Confucian disciples gave up Confucianism and worshipped him as their teacher, becoming loyal followers of the Agricultural School. Among them, Chen Xiang, who switched to the Agricultural School, was a disciple of Chen Liang, a great Confucian scholar who was one of the eight Confucian schools at that time.

You may not be familiar with Chen Liang, but he is said to be Qu Yuan's teacher. Chen Xiang's "betrayal of his master" caused quite a stir at the time and also aroused the dissatisfaction of the Confucian tough guy Mencius.

So, Mencius and Xu Xing's follower Chen Xiang started a famous "agriculture debate" in history. The theme of this debate is simply: should people who do not farm get food?

This debate also allows us to fully understand the thoughts of Xu Xing and the agricultural school. The agricultural school headed by Xu Xing advocates that "the wise man and the people work together to farm and eat", which means that even if you are a wise man or a monarch, you have to work together with the people to eat, and you can only have enough food and clothing by doing it yourself, and then you can govern the country. The core of Xu Xing's agricultural thought is to oppose eating without working and the exploitation of the people by the ruling class.

His ideas have similarities with some of the concepts of our ideology, such as common ownership of social resources, common labor, and common sharing of the fruits of labor. They embodied the ideas of egalitarianism and common contradictions of the poor peasants at that time, and required everyone to support themselves and share the fruits of their labor.

However, Xu Xing's ideas also have limitations. His ideas are too idealistic. In the era of low social productivity at that time, using an ideal social structure similar to the Paris Commune to solve the contradiction of class antagonism was not in line with the law of historical development and also reflected the limitations of small producers.

Mencius's ideas were diametrically opposed to Xu Xing's. Mencius advocated that "those who work with their minds govern others, and those who work with their hands are governed by others", which means that those who work with their minds manage others, and those who work with their hands are managed. Mental workers need to be supported by those who work with their hands, which is fair in itself.

Mencius emphasized that this clear hierarchical relationship between rulers and the ruled, which is determined by nature, is a necessity of social division of labor, a common truth in the world, and absolutely cannot be changed. This is the so-called concept of class.

From the perspective of social development, Mencius's proposition is relatively reasonable in a specific social environment. However, the reality of "not worrying about scarcity but inequality" is more worthy of our consideration, especially in today's era when everyone is eager to pursue social equality.

Mencius's idea that "those who work with their minds rule others, and those who work with their hands are ruled by others" has been reflected in later generations for thousands of years and has become the ideal paradigm of Chinese feudal politics. Mencius's proposition actually represents the interests of the feudal ruling class, so he severely criticized the Agricultural School headed by Xu Xing and even made personal attacks.

Because Xu Xing's ideas were too idealistic, and Mencius was eloquent, Mencius won the debate. Mencius exposed the limitations of Xu Xing's ideas and, starting from the rationality of social division of labor in a specific historical stage, emphasized that the original intention of social division of labor was correct, but it was used by the rulers as a theoretical basis for the division of social classes.

"The market and the merchants should be unified" is another important proposition put forward by Xu Xing. It is also an ideological theory based on the perspective of the grassroots people. It means that the price of goods should be unified and there should be no mutual deception.

For example, Xu Xing believed that the price of watermelons of the same size should be fixed at a reasonable price across the country. In this way, there would be no more fraud, and even children would not be deceived when buying things in the market.

This price theory reflected the dissatisfaction of the poor farmers at that time with the merchants' use of the market to exploit them at high interest rates, and their desire for price adjustments.

This proposition is more radical than Yang Zhu's "for me" view. Yang Zhu is a representative of small landowners who only want to protect their property, while Xu Xing represents the interests of poor farmers who have nothing or little and live only by working with their hands.

Xu Xing advocated "promoting agriculture and suppressing commerce", but this did not deny the value of the existence of industrial and commercial activities. Instead, it required that the scope of industrial and commercial activities be narrowed and controlled from the perspective of national will so that they would not become obstacles to agricultural activities.

In an era of low productivity, a strong military is the fundamental guarantee for national stability.

In the pre-Qin period, the most important thing for the army was sufficient food and a stable source of soldiers, both of which needed to be provided by developing agriculture. Therefore, emphasizing agriculture was reasonable in the feudal economic era.

The ideas of the agricultural school also influenced later generations. The political demands of the agricultural school, such as the emphasis on agriculture and agricultural production technology, have been implemented by later monarchs. However, the ideas of "military and civilian farming together" and "equal sharing of harvests" advocated by Xu Xing were gradually diluted by rulers in the course of history.

Although the idea of ​​"sharing the harvest equally" was rejected by the rulers, later monarchs often held major ceremonies during the spring plowing season. During the ceremony, the emperor would personally hold the plow and plow the fields to show his attention to agricultural production and to encourage people to engage in farming and sericulture.

This may also be a euphemism for the farmers' idea of ​​"military and civilians farming together" in later generations, and it is also the result of mutual compromise between the rulers and the farmers.

[Read all the historical knowledge of Lü Buwei and the Hundred Schools of Thought in one go]

He is a famous merchant model in Chinese history, and also a politician and thinker who was granted the title of nobility and appointed as prime minister. His works are rich in content and have been passed down to later generations. In this video, let's talk about Lü Buwei as a eclectic scholar.

Lü Buwei, whose surname was Jiang and whose clan name was Lü, was a descendant of the famous Jiang Ziya. His life experience was legendary. He was once a wealthy businessman who could rival a country, and if he were alive today, he would be at least a billionaire.

He served as the prime minister of the Qin State. In that era, he could be said to have great power over the world. He single-handedly changed the historical course of the Qin State and made significant contributions to the unification of the world by the Qin State.

More importantly, he was also an important representative of the Miscellaneous School and a great thinker. He made the Miscellaneous School one of the top nine schools of thought. Today, let's change the perspective to understand Lü Buwei of the Miscellaneous School.

Lü Buwei was a famous general of the Qin State in the late Warring States Period. He spent all his family wealth to help Yiren, who was a hostage in Zhao State, ascend the throne of Qin State, and made great contributions. So after Yiren succeeded to the throne as King Zhuangxiang of Qin, Lü Buwei was appointed as the prime minister of Qin State.

During the Warring States Period, the vassal states had a trend of recruiting retainers and writing books. The reason was that writing books could not only make one famous, but also be passed down to future generations and recorded in history forever.

During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, merchants had a low status, which made Lü Buwei, who was born a merchant, particularly dissatisfied. Therefore, Lü Buwei recruited a large number of literati and scholars, gave them generous treatment, and had as many as 3000 retainers.