Wojiao has a false reputation and makes a small profit, so he is very busy. Everything is decided in advance, who is weak and who is strong.
While I am still young, let me and others go crazy. In a hundred years, the Ping Cult was awakened, with 36,000 events.
Think about how much you can do, worry about the wind and rain, half of it will hinder you. There is no need to talk about short things and long things even to the point of death.
Fortunately, the breeze is bright and the moon is bright, the moss is spreading and the clouds are high. The south of the Yangtze River is good, a thousand bells of fine wine, and a song that fills the courtyard.
Su Shi's poem was written in the fifth year of Yuanfeng (1082), the reign of Emperor Shenzong of the Song Dynasty. Some poem selections are doubtful about this, but from the spiritual context of the poem, it is certain that this poem is indeed written by Su Shi Yinwu. Written after Taiwan Poetry Case was demoted to Huangzhou. This poem by Dongpo "makes it possible for those who are striving for fame and fame to read it and disintegrate it, and for those who are optimistic and indifferent to sing it to entertain people"
(Song Dynasty Huang Sheng's "Exquisite Poems of the Sages of the Tang and Song Dynasties" select"). At first reading, this song "Man Ting Fang" gives people a feeling of "a thousand sails have passed" and a free and easy world. However, after careful reading, you can appreciate Su Shi's complex and subtle melancholy and loneliness wandering between entering the world and being born.
The first part of the poem is straight from the heart, unabashedly expressing the author's disdain for fame and fortune and his cynicism. The opening lines of "Wojiao's false reputation" and "Xiaotou's meager profit" directly point out the topic of discussion in this poem. Wojiao is quoted from "Zhuangzi Zeyang": "Those who have a kingdom on the left corner of the snail are called the Hu clan; those who have a kingdom on the right corner of the snail are called the Man clan. When the war is over, there are tens of thousands of floating corpses. Drive north, and then turn back after five days." Later, this code was used to refer to the battles caused by trivial matters. False fame is like the illusion of fame and fortune. The meager profits from the Snail Controversy are so insignificant. Do people in the world need to be so busy? Just as Bai Juyi sighed in "Drinking Wine": "What's the point of fighting on the horns of snails? Live this life in the light of stone fire. Be happy with the rich and the poor. If you don't open your mouth to smile, you are a fool."
According to Buddhism Thinking, everything is predestined. Life is one moment and another, don't be too showy when you are proud, and don't be depressed when you are frustrated. Life is long, who is weak and who is strong in the end? "In a hundred years, the Puritans were drunk, thirty-six thousand times" shows the true nature of Mr. Dongpo's madness. This sentence is adapted from Li Bai's "Song of Xiangyang": "One hundred years and thirty-six thousand days, three hundred cups must be poured out every day." If a person can live for one hundred years, it will only last for thirty-six thousand days. Even if he is drunk every day, he will still be drunk. Just over 30,000 days. Life is fast and easy to grow old, why not take advantage of the opportunity to be more free and carefree and less sad before getting older?
The second part of the poem seems to change from excitement to calmness. The phrase "sorrowful about wind and rain" is often used, such as Ye Qingchen's "Congratulations to the Holy Dynasty": "One third is spring beauty, two is sadness, and one is wind and rain." Emotions are often expressed in the external environment. This is because the wind and rain in natural phenomena, like the wind and rain in life, can arouse people's sympathy and sympathy. Good times in life are like a sunny day, and bad times are like wind and rain. It can be seen that half of the beautiful spring time is wasted due to sorrow and wind and rain. Xin's poem uses an allusion to Huan Wen's Northern Expedition. When he saw that the willow trees planted in Jincheng many years ago were all around him, he couldn't help but sigh: "The trees are like this, how can people be embarrassed!" The "wind and rain" in Su's poem undoubtedly alludes to the "Wutai Poetry Case" "One thing. During the Northern Song Dynasty, the Central Yushitai was a specialized agency responsible for examining and impeaching local officials. It is said that in the Han Dynasty, there were a large number of cypress trees planted in the Central Censor's Mansion, with thousands of crows perching on the trees, so people called the Censor's Terrace "Wotai". The Yushitai arrested Su Shi on the pretext that Su Shi wrote a poem to ridicule the New Deal. His arrest was completely framed. Time flies so quickly, so why do those people have to talk about short stories and long stories even to the death?
Although there was a heated debate between Wang Anshi, a representative of the reform faction during the Xining period, and Su Shi, who opposed radical reforms, there was no conflict between the two due to different political opinions. By the Yuanfeng period, the focus of the struggle was obviously no longer on the reform issue, but purely on officialdom and personnel disputes. Since Su Shi passed the Jinshi examination in the second year of Jiayou's reign, his poetry reputation has spread far and wide. Ouyang Xiu, the prime minister of the current dynasty, once predicted that "he will be the only one in the literary world in the future." Song Shenzong also liked Su Shi's articles very much, which made some of his close officials jealous. A group of literati who were offended by Su Shi during the reform movement, such as Li Ding and others, had long been looking for opportunities to attack Su Shi. They took Su Shi's poems that alluded to the government out of context and analyzed them indiscriminately. This is how a "literary hell" began.
The "Wutai Poetry Case" became a turning point in Su Shi's life. He was so worried and angry in prison that he almost committed suicide. However, Shenzong was interested in his talent and his articles, and had no intention of killing him, so he exiled Su Shi to Huangzhou (today's Huanggang, Hubei Province) as deputy history officer of the regiment and was not allowed to sign official documents. From then on, Su Shi lamented that "it's scary to talk arrogantly when drunk" ("Residence in Dinghuiyuan, Occasionally Out on a Moonlit Night").
After the storm, there will be a bright moon and a clear breeze. Under the bright moon, drink to your heart's content, and a thousand minutes of fine wine will not make you intoxicating. Even though Su Shi's desire to actively join the world and participate in politics was shattered, he still revealed his pursuit of a certain realm of life due to his drunken madness and his upright nature. Many critics of Ming Dynasty think that this poem has a strong persuasive effect (Ming Dynasty Shen Jifei's "Yu Zheng Collection of Thatched Cottage Poems"). They believe that "everything is decided in advance", and it is better to persuade people to enjoy themselves in time. However, when reading it now, it is Su Shi who is in front of it. After being sidelined by the officialdom and having no intention of hiding his careless and informal character, he became helpless in actively using the world.
Su Shi’s lyrics have evolved from the heroic spirit of his early days of “drawing the eagle’s bow like a full moon, looking northwest, and shooting at the wolf” (“Jiangchengzi·Hunting in Mizhou”) to this song, “The snail horn is in vain, the fly head is in vain.” A small profit means a lot of work", from the tenderness of "Ten years of life and death, without thinking, unforgettable" ("Dreams on the Night of the Twentieth Day of the First Month of Yimao" by Jiang Chengzi), to this song "Let's take advantage of it" His broad-mindedness fully reflects the richness of his thoughts and spiritual world.
Throughout his life, Su Shi "learned well and became an official". However, he experienced ups and downs in officialdom and was demoted three times. As he himself said, "Ask you about your life achievements, Huangzhou, Huizhou and Danzhou" ("Self-titled Portrait of Jinshan"). Most of his life was spent in exile. After the "Wutai Poetry Case" was demoted to Huangzhou, Zen Buddhism became the ideological support for Su Shi's survival. In Huangzhou, he studied Buddhism. "Living leisurely means reading a book, but Buddhist scriptures can keep you busy" (one of two poems on political affairs with Zhang Zihou). In the Northern Song Dynasty where Su Shi lived, Renzong, Yingzong, Shenzong and Huizong all paid attention to Buddhism. The Song Dynasty was a mature period for the development of Buddhism. At that time, the most prosperous Buddhist world was Zen. The teachings of Zen were similar to the traditional Chinese Lao-Zhuang philosophy on the attitude towards nature. It emphasized the integration of nature and oneself, and drew inspiration from nature to get rid of the troubles of the world and gain spiritual liberation. After experiencing the "Wutai Poetry Case", Su Shi almost escaped death. After that, he began to think about the meaning of life and turned to Buddhism to seek peace of mind. Buddhism says that "everything is predestined." He gradually learned to accept his fate, and he was able to take it calmly no matter where he was demoted. Su Shi was unfortunate in his officialdom, but his misfortune made Dongpo the leader in the literary world.
Su Shi's main political career was during the Xining Reform and Yuanyou years, which was a period of constant party strife within the imperial court. Su Shi's thoughts originally belonged to Confucianism, and he had actively participated in the world. However, as Bo Yang said, the political history of the Song Dynasty was a "sauce jar culture." Only by working together can everyone avoid the scourge of frame-up and exclusion. Su Shi disdained this. He sympathized with the sufferings of the people and wanted to reform the bad government, so he was constantly demoted. His concubine Chaoyun once said that he was "full of inappropriateness". The "Wutai Poetry Case" caused the spiritual home that Su Shi built in his early days, which was mainly about worldliness, to collapse for a time, and he had to find a new spiritual habitat. After being demoted to Huangzhou, Su Shi made a more in-depth exploration of the thoughts of Buddha and Laozi and Zhuang Zen.
Su Shi seems to have been looking for a balance between joining the world and being born out of it. When he was in his 20s (the sixth year of Jiayou's reign of Emperor Renzong of the Song Dynasty, 1061) when he was serving as the judge of Fengxiang, he sent his younger brother Su Che (Ziyou) a famous Qilu poem: "What's the point of knowing everywhere in life? It should be like a flying dragon stepping on snow and mud." . Occasionally, there are fingers and claws left on the mud, and Hong Fei's complex things..." ("Hezi Nostalgia from Mianchi") The "Fei Hong" here is a symbol of Su Shi's own soul. Although he is in an official career, his true soul is like this. Wandering in the ethereal space like a bird. From these lines of poetry, we can see that Su Shi expressed his deep understanding of life in his early days. When Qingcha Shenxing annotated these lines of Su Shi's poems, he quoted the words of Zen Master Tianyi Yihuai: "The geese fly across the sky, and their shadows sink into the cold water. The geese leave no trace, and the water leaves no shadow." Su Shi had just stepped onto the foot of the river. In his official career, when he first took up the post of Fengxiang, he had a worldly spirit, but at the same time he also had a strong interest in Zen Buddhism, which promotes transcendental philosophy. During his tenure in Fengxiang, he also learned Buddhism from Wang Danian. He said in "Wang Danian's Lament": "If you give me a Buddhist book, it will be written by you." But Su Shi's purpose is not to be worldly, but to live in a worldly spirit. Do the business of joining the world and seek purity and peace of mind and body in the ever-changing life course and the turbulent political life. Only by integrating birth and entry into the world can we maintain the integrity of our personality, have a basis for advancement and retreat, and maintain a sense of detachment in a real life full of injustice and troubles.
Mr. Li Zehou said in "The Course of Beauty": "Su Shi had a dual mentality of advancement and retreat in the middle and late Song Dynasty, which was reflected in his works as a lament for the emptiness of life. Although Su Shi followed Confucianism and went to Buddhism and Laoism, "On the one hand, Su Shi was loyal to the emperor and patriotic, studied well and served as an official, and adhered to Confucianism; on the other hand, he was deeply influenced by Buddhism, especially Zen, and pursued spiritual liberation. However, it is worth noting that the main image left by Su Dongpo to future generations is not his active side of the world, but his worldly side.
In fact, Su Shi never truly retired in his life, nor did he truly "return to the fields" like Tao Yuanming. However, the sense of emptiness in life that he expressed through his poems was better than any of his predecessors. "Retirement", "returning to the fields" and "escaping from the world", verbally or in fact, are deeper and heavier. Although Su Shi pursues spiritual tranquility, integrates the thoughts of Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism, and does not care about honor or disgrace, he still adheres to the Confucian belief that "if you are powerful, you can benefit the world, and if you are poor, you can only benefit yourself." Joining the world and leaving the world have become ideological contradictions throughout his life.
The phrase "Ding Feng Bo" seems to be the spiritual home that Su Shi finally found after getting rid of the troubles of joining the world and being born: "
Don't listen to the sound of beating leaves in the forest, why not scream and scream? Xu Xing. Bamboo shoes are lighter than horses. Who is afraid of a misty rain? There is neither wind or rain nor sunshine."
Whether it is the wind and rain that "beat the leaves through the forest" or the light that shines "slantingly on the mountain top", there is no need to worry about the outer appearance of life, and the inner feeling of "there is no need to worry." The peaceful state of mind is the true state of mind.
From the drunken madness of "Man Ting Fang" after being demoted to Huangzhou to the sober calmness of this song "Ding Feng Bo", after experiencing the ups and downs of life and the choice of life and death, he seemed to have shifted from the Confucian world to the Buddhist one. Feelings of transcendence. It can be said that at this point, Su Shi seems to have found a spiritual home directed by his heart.
(Author’s unit: School of Liberal Arts, North China University of Technology)