In "Water Margin", Xiao Rang is known as the scholar with the earth's literary star. This title sounds not simple. At that time, Wu Yong commented on Xiao Rang, saying that he knew the four popular calligraphy styles in the world and his calligraphy skills were quite high. In Song Jiang's eyes, what kind of literati was Xiao Rang? In fact, the literati in "Water Margin" are all different. Xiao Rang is the more idealistic type, so Song Jiang thinks he is too naive. But Xiao Rang was self-aware, so it was not easy for him to finally find a job in Cai Taishi's house and die a good death.
Xiao Rang’s story can be summed up in one word: false.
Meng Chao's "The Book of Heroes of Liangshan" quoted a saying: "The two close-ups of Xiao Rang in "Water Margin" are both fake. The rescue of Song Jiang was a forged letter to earn Li Ying They are pretending to be fake magistrates, and they are all pretending to be scholars. "This concept is actually quite correct.
Xiao Rang is an old acquaintance of Wu Yong, but he is not a figure in the world. Wu Yong wanted to copy Cai Jing's letters, so he deceived Xiao Rang and Jin Dajian into going up the mountain. With the momentum at that time, the forgery of letters was bound to happen, and Xiao Rang and Jin Dajian would be implicated. If we rescued them, the cost would be too high. If we didn't rescue them, it would seem that Liangshan had no friendship at all.
What's more, once the incident occurs, Xiao Rang, Jin Dajian and Dai Zong are likely to be dealt with together. At that time, Xiao Rang, Jin Dajian and Dai Zong, who were the victims, got together, which would allow Wu Yong to borrow The purpose of this case to deepen the relationship between Song Jiang and Dai Zong failed - it was full of complications, which was not beautiful.
In addition to the two above-mentioned contributions, Xiao Rang's contributions in Liangshan are not needed in daily work. The work arranged by Song Jiang for him was to "write letters and dispatch troops and dispatch generals." "Writing words and dispatching troops and dispatching generals" was of course his right, but "dispatch troops and generals" was just a matter of uploading and issuing orders. It should be Liangshan's pen. However, the official documents written by Liangshan to attack the surrounding areas may not actually rely on Xiao Rang's writing style.
In later derivative literature, Xiao Rang's actions mostly revolve around the word "fake" or "cheating". For example, in the chapter 120 about the conquest of Wang Qing, it is written that Xiao Rang There is an "empty city strategy":
At that time, Wang Qing's troops surrounded Wanzhou. Lin Chong and Hua Rong have led 20,000 troops out of the city to meet the enemy. Lu Fang and Guo Sheng have allocated another 20,000 troops out of the north gate to meet the enemy. Only two generals, Xuan Zan and Hao Siwen, remain behind. Their military strength is only 10,000, and half of them are old, weak and sick. disabled. Wang Qing's 30,000-strong army came to the city, and the isolated city of Wanzhou was in danger.
Xiao Rang immediately decided to empty the city and had fun with three officials in the city. When Wang Qing's army was hesitant, they suddenly heard a burst of artillery fire, and the flags on the Wanzhou city tower were waving. The enemy troops were frightened. Xuan Zan and Hao Siwen came out from Xiece and "beheaded more than ten thousand people." Chen Guan, Hou Meng, and Luo Jian "were all overjoyed and praised Xiao Rang for his wonderful strategy and the generals as heroes." Unexpectedly, after Song Jiang returned to the army, he heard what Ma Ling, the general from Hebei, said. Song Jiang was shocked and said: "What if the thieves find out? After all, it is the knowledge of a scholar."
The so-called "scholar's knowledge" is, in the final analysis, the knowledge of a scholar. According to the general rough view, ancient times were divided into civil servants and military generals, and modern subjects were divided into liberal arts and science. In ancient times, anyone who wrote was a "literati"; today, anyone who does not do natural experiments is a "liberal arts".
But this obviously simplifies both literati and humanities. In fact, the "literati" in ancient times includes at least three types of people: scholars, scholars and politicians. Scholars generally have a bottom line and are sincere, at least in academic terms; scholars probably have some integrity and grace, but if they can't develop this, then they can only "cheat".
As for the way of being a person and doing things, a scholar only has the temperament and flexibility but lacks the talent, decisiveness and courage of a politician. He acts according to his own temperament and even emotions; when a politician is just starting out, he only acts based on his own temperament. The main focus is fraud, of course, it is not just about power, but also requires the ability to turn clouds and rains, and you also know how to use hidden dragons, so that you can really do great things.
Song Jiang criticized Xiao Rang as "a scholar with a vision after all", which meant that he was idealistic, temperamental, and pinned his victory on luck, without any precautionary consequences. Of course, this kind of vision is unacceptable to politicians. Pick.
In fact, because of this, politicians have always looked down on literati. Although the Northern Song Dynasty valued literature over martial arts, the emphasis was always on politicians, not scholars and poets.
So Liu Yong wrote in "Crane Soaring to the Sky": "Youth is all about the same salary. I can bear the fame and sing in a low voice." This caused Song Renzong's dissatisfaction, and he saw Liu Yong participating in the science and technology department. After taking the exam, he said: "Let's go and sing in a low voice, why do we need to be famous." Liu Yong could only "write lyrics according to orders".
Sima Guang also looked down on literati. Li Bai was not included in the "Zi Zhi Tong Jian". Gu Yanwu commented: "This book is based on Zizhi, so why bother to record literati?" As for scholars from the Song Dynasty, like Zhang Shi Similarly, few people were shown a positive image, and those who were famous, such as Er Cheng, Wang Anshi and Zhu Xi, were vilified at that time.
Although the politicians at that time also valued literature, they valued the bookishness of literati, not the bookishness or the bookishness of scholars. In the era of the author of "Water Margin", literati were not taken seriously in the martial arts Yuan Dynasty, so much so that there were angry remarks at that time about "eight prostitutes, nine scholars and ten beggars". In the Ming Dynasty, there was a saying that "literati have no practice", and it seemed to be a conclusion that literati were useless.
But in every perfect political power, the role of literati is indispensable. Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty raised Dongfang Shuo, Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang Dynasty raised Li Bai well, and Emperor Qianlong also "advocated good breeding" for Ji Xiaolan.
Only the politicians of the Song Dynasty were proficient in literature. The brothers Su Shi and Su Che, who were known as the "talented prime ministers" at that time, were also among the "Eight Great Masters of the Tang and Song Dynasties". Fan Zhongyan, Ouyang Xiu, Wang Anshi and others who knew political affairs, that is, the deputy prime minister level, were all masters of writing, so Song Renzong did not need Youli Liu Yong and others at all.
Naturally, the ancient emperors’ courtesy to the literati was not just to whitewash the peace. The literati had at least the following three functions:
First, the literati had propaganda significance. Yuan Shao was quarreling with Cao Cao, so he took the chief secretary Chen Lin with him in the army and asked him to write a statement against Cao Cao. Wu Zetian saw the "Pleading for Xu Jingye" written by King Luo Bin, and sighed: "This person was not appointed because of the prime minister's dereliction of duty." They all valued the propaganda function of literati.
Because politics is not just about conquering the world, but also about winning the hearts and minds of the people. Among the people, intellectuals are particularly important. On the one hand, intellectuals may contain talents who will govern the world in the future. Necessary propaganda is the key to getting these people to join the new regime. On the other hand, scholars are the leaders of the four peoples. Since ancient times, the imperial power did not extend to the counties. Intellectuals with a good reputation are the traditional so-called squires, who play a leadership role at the grassroots level. Attracting the support of these people is equivalent to attracting the small people.
Second, literati can deify rulers. Li Zhuowu believes that the stone tablets in Liangshanbo were carved by Wu Yong under the instruction of Xiao Rang and Jin Dajian, and Yu Wanchun's "Dang Kou Zhi" almost confirms this fact.
In "Dang Kou Zhi", Xiao Rang and Jin Dajian confessed after being captured: "This tie has been engraved since Lu Junyi arrived in Shanbo. At that time, Zhang Qing and Dong Ping were still there. Before arriving, I originally wanted to select a few of my subordinates' leaders to complete the number of one hundred and eight people. Later, I arrived with Zhang Qing and others, but it turned out that the fifteenth and sixteenth lines in the Tiangang number were not engraved, so Zhang was sent there. Qing Dynasty, Dong Ping was engraven.
Therefore, Dong Ping is among the Five Tiger Generals, but his ranking is fifteen. He left with Guan Sheng, Lin Chong, Qin Ming, and Hu Yanzhuo. Also."
This is actually a "deception" imposed on Xiao Rang by derivative literature, but Xiao Rang in the 100-chapter version of "Water Margin" only hopes to deceive one or two people, one hundred and twenty chapters. In this book's "Water Margin", Xiao Rang only hopes to deceive an army, but in "Dang Kou Zhi", Xiao Rang hopes to deceive the entire Liangshanbo army. If you win the country, you have to deceive the world.
When rulers of all dynasties wrote their dynasty history books, they would write that they had a "dragon in their arms" when they were born, and there were "fires soaring into the sky" nearby. It would be aggravating if ordinary people believed in them. His destiny and authority. Those who know it is false will never dare to refute it. It is not that they believe in such nonsense, but that they believe in the power in the hands of those who tell lies.
Therefore, the superstition of ignorant people and the enslavement of sober people are actually the same thing. They are just one worshiping gods and the other worshiping humans. Those who worship gods feel that everything is inexplicable, while those who worship humans are inexplicable to everything. Don't dare to explain.
Therefore, rulers love literati because they love to obey their own mouth. With this mouth, social problems can be misinterpreted at will. If the misinterpretation fails, the literati can be used to divert attention. If the focus cannot be diverted, violence will occur, and confrontation will occur. Either the regime will be overthrown, or the resisters will die. Therefore, we can see that the role played by literati in the past was to buffer social conflicts, and the way of buffering was to create public opinion.
This is probably the trick of literati. Although it is of great benefit to political power, it is worthless in the face of violence. Xiao Rang was to Liangshan what a scholar was to violence, and was naturally incompatible with him; Xiao Rang was to Song Jiang and Wu Yong what a scholar was to power, and of course he was just a "scholar with insight."
Therefore, a truly knowledgeable scholar must be able to evaluate his own abilities and properly participate in politics. Otherwise, if he thinks he is smart and dares to challenge the supreme ruler, at least in terms of political life, he will definitely be dead.
Xiao Rang left Liangshan and came to Cai Jing’s sect and only became a doorkeeper, because the Song Dynasty had become superstitious about power, and the control of public opinion was in the hands of the prime ministers and grand masters of the dynasty. , Xiao Rang's talent is of course "useless".