Nowadays, our understanding of pre-Qin history is more through Confucianism, and the way is very single, and we can't see the "words of a hundred schools of thought". After the unification of Qin Dynasty, the policy of burying Confucian culture was implemented, and Emperor Wu of Han adopted the suggestion of Confucian scholar Dong Zhongshu to "oust a hundred schools of thought and respect Confucianism alone". In addition to mainstream theories, works and classics have been destroyed or lost, which has caused great losses in China's cultural history.
With the establishment of Confucian orthodoxy, history books compiled with its guiding ideology have become the main channel for future generations to understand history. In fact, some records in these history books may be far from the real history due to subjective factors. The story we are going to tell today is a typical proof.
It dates back to 28 1 year, which was the second year of Taikang in the Western Jin Dynasty. One day, a grave robber named fǒu biāo sneaked into an ancient tomb in Ji 'an County, but he didn't find the gold and silver jewelry he wanted in the tomb, but found a lot of broken bamboo slips. In the dim light, although the grave robbers vaguely found some small characters on the bamboo slips, they were disappointed because they could not understand and were not interested. Soon, the robbery of the ancient tomb was discovered by the local people, who spontaneously went to the government to expose it. When the tomb was opened, almost everyone present was shocked. I saw bamboo slips scattered all over the grave, and the local government pulled more than 10 vehicles. Subsequently, this incident also attracted the attention of the social intelligentsia, and even the emperor appointed bureaucrats such as the Chinese Book Supervisor and the Chinese Book Order Officer to be responsible for the translation of bamboo slips.
After the serious work of officials, the story of bamboo slips was finally uncovered. It comes from the tomb of Wei Xiangwang. Bamboo slips recorded the important history of the pre-Qin and Three Dynasties in detail, especially the historical facts that the three ethnic groups in the Eastern Zhou Dynasty were divided into Jin and Wei Dynasties.
The appraisal work was completed, and the final translation was named Annals of Bamboo Books. The appearance of a lost and wonderful book, Annals of Bamboo Records, immediately aroused great repercussions in the intellectual circles, because many historical facts of the pre-Qin period obtained by the Spring and Autumn Annals and Historical Records were subverted, including the biggest usurper case in Shang Dynasty.
Yi Yin, an important official in Shang Dynasty, is a model of loyalty and patriotism in the Confucian classics Mencius and Zuo Zhuan. After Shang Tang's death, he tried his best to assist the new monarch, Tai Jia, to revitalize the bureaucracy and develop the national economy. Tai Jia is an out-and-out mediocre gentleman, who has no intention of political affairs and loses his virtue to the people. So for the sake of his country, Yi Yin had to abolish Tai Jia's position and let him stay at the wake in Tongcheng, Tang Ling. Three years later, Tai Jia suddenly woke up and Yi Yin was greatly moved. He welcomed Tai Jia back to North Korea and wrote Tai Jia Xun to show his approval. Since then, the Shang Dynasty has flourished under the rule of * * *.
However, there is another version of this history in the annals of bamboo books. According to the book, Yi Yin, a veteran of the Four Dynasties, gained increasing prestige after his predecessor's death, which caused great dissatisfaction among the new monarch, Tai Jia. However, because Tai Jia was youthful and had less political influence than Yi Yin, he was easily captured by Yi Yin and imprisoned in Tongcheng, and then Yi Yin succeeded him as king. Seven years later, Tai Jia was able to make a comeback and kill Yi Yin. That is to say, according to this version, Yi Yin is a black-bellied power minister who committed the crime of seeking power and usurping the throne, which is in sharp contrast with his perfect image in the official history book.
It is difficult to tell clearly what happened in history from different standpoints. Later, there was no lack of pretentious imitation of Yi Yin to depose the monarch. If the chronicles of bamboo books are true, Yi Yin has set a precedent for abolishing the king's independence, which is the biggest usurpation case in history. Therefore, this wonderful book, which was obtained by robbing tombs, allows us to understand the history of pre-Qin from another angle. Perhaps we have really been "blinded" by traditional cognition for many years, so what is called history is really worth savoring.