Elegy of Tang Dynasty

Chapter 45 Multiple contradictions and struggles in the Tang Dynasty from the Kaiyuan Year to the Tianbao Year
From time to time, I still need to upload some information, otherwise many plots will not understand where the inner connection is.

For example: Why does Zhang Jiuling target Niu Xianke, is it just because he doesn't like it?

Well, since Niu Xianke was a minor official, it was normal for Zhang Jiuling to look down on him.

Then why did Zhang Jiuling despise Zhang Shougui and want to stop him from worshiping the prime minister?
Ordinarily, before Zhang Jiuling resigned as prime minister, Zhang Shougui's qualifications, popularity, and military achievements were already sufficient. Why did Zhang Jiuling want to stop him?

This reason can also explain why he looks down on Niu Xianke.

So when looking at history, you can't just stare at the few words recorded in the history books.You can't be led by the ancients, but by the historian, you have to find the answer from the context of historical facts.

Without further ado, let’s get down to the practical stuff.

Let’s first take a look at the prime ministers of the Tang Dynasty from Kaiyuan to Tianbao. They are divided into “groups” because they are usually replaced together, and their terms are generally 3-4 years (with some exceptions).

The first group: Zhang Shuo (this one will be worshiped as Prime Minister later), Liu Youqiu, Wei Zhigu, Lu Xiangxian, and Guo Yuanzhen.

These people were in the transitional period of the first year of Kaiyuan, and they were in power for no more than one year. Because the political situation was not yet determined at that time, they were not included in the analysis.

The second group: Yao Chong, Lu Huaishen

Yao Chong: Ban Lang was born, a veteran.

Lu Huaishen: Getting a Jinshi degree is almost like soy sauce.

There are no financial officials among them, but there are veterans trained during the Wu Zhou period (Yao Chong)

The third group: Yuan Qianyao, Song Jing, Su Ting

Yuan Qianyao: Jinshi and the first.

Song Jing: Jinshi and the first

Zhang said: Veteran ministers during the Wu Zhou period
There are no financial management officials, but Yuan Qianyao is just a prime minister and basically does nothing.

PS: "A man of merit deserves his talent, but is a brother slave a good man?" This is what Yuan Qianyao said, but it can be inferred that Lao Yuan does not want to recommend Li Linfu, but that he is a subordinate in the central power structure Status, a wisecrack is just to cover up his own powerlessness.

The fourth group: Zhang Jiazhen, Su Ting, Yuan Qianyao, Zhang Shuo

Zhang Jiazhen: Jinshi of Ming Dynasty, veteran of Wuzhou
Su Ting: passed the imperial examination, and Wu Zhou entered officialdom in his early years.

Zhang said: A veteran trained during the Wu and Zhou Dynasties.

There are also no financial officials.

Group [-]: Li Yuanhong, Du Xian

Li Yuanhong: Enyin started his family and was the great-grandson of Ying Guogong Li Can.

Du Siam: He passed the Mingjing examination and has decades of experience in local employment.

The sixth group: Xiao Song, Yu Wenrong (short), Pei Guangting
Xiao Song: He became an official in the shade of the door, and his ancestor was Xiao Kui, Emperor Ming of Liang.

Yuwenrong: He became an official in the shadow of his family, serving the grandson of Yuwenjie in Zhongzhong, and an official of the professional financial management school.

Note that he is the first professional financial management prime minister since the Kaiyuan Dynasty, and he vigorously promoted Li Linfu.

Pei Guangting: The middle family room of the Pei family in Hedong, where he became an official in the shade of the door.

Group Seven: Han Xiu (short), Pei Yaoqing, Zhang Jiuling, Li Linfu
Han Xiu: He was promoted to an official position (the imperial court opened a special subject for selection), and he was a professional admonisher.

Pei Yaoqing: Passed the Tongzi Examination (equivalent to becoming an official in Mengyin). He has strong overall ability and focuses on financial management.

Zhang Jiuling: Jinshi, representative of Ci ministers, partial admonishment ministers.

Li Linfu: He entered the officialdom with a strong background and strong comprehensive ability.

Group [-]: Li Linfu, Niu Xianke
Niu Xianke: He was born as a grassroots official, with rich experience at the grassroots level, and a school of official administration.

The ninth group: Li Linfu, Li Shizhi
Li Shizhi: If you enter an official position, you will become a prime minister.

Group Ten: Li Linfu, Chen Xilie
Chen Xilie: Entering the official position in the shadow of the door, making soy sauce
Group Ten: Chen Xilie, Yang Guozhong
Yang Guozhong: Li Longji thought he was good at managing money because the petty official had a superior position (nepotism).

The above is a preliminary summary, but it can actually be subdivided.

The following is my personal analysis:
Before Yuwen became the prime minister in the 14th year of Kaiyuan, Datang's financial problems had not yet broken out.Therefore, among the people who entered the prime minister's position, there were Ci ministers who were Jinshi and others, there were also practical people who were gradually rising in the local area, and there were also veterans who were trained during the Wu Zhou period.

In fact, the power structure is one master and one time. Most of them have prime ministers who play soy sauce. Li Longji is more involved in politics, and the power of prime ministers is relatively loose.

Since the 14th year of Kaiyuan, the financial problems of the Tang Dynasty have become an issue that the prime ministers have to consider.Pei Yaoqing, Li Linfu, Niu Xianke and even Yang Guozhong, their financial management ability is one of the main factors in worshiping the prime minister.

Therefore, officials like Zhang Jiuling and financial management officials like Li Linfu have completely different meanings of existence and what they want to do, and even contradict each other at all.

This is the first contradiction in the center of the Tang Dynasty: the contradiction between the bureaucrats of the traditional Confucian school of poetry and the bureaucrats of the financial management school that emerged as a result of the situation, and this contradiction is often irreconcilable.

Confucian bureaucrats (take Zhang Jiuling as an example) believe that: the people are more important than the emperor, the small government reduces fiscal expenditures, reduces the scale of officials, reduces the central government’s interference in local affairs, reduces the cost of the legal system, and focuses on the rule of virtue.

Yes, the legal system requires costs, and the costs are not low.In the case of ancient powerful people who basically did not abide by the law, the role of rule of virtue may not be smaller than that of the rule of law.This is the objective limitation of the feudal era.

And there is nothing to say about the thinking of the officials of the financial management school, just one sentence: find a way to increase the central finance!

To increase finance, we must take it from the people, increase taxes, and open new institutions. Big government is inevitable.

At this time, a major problem that Li Longji encountered was: If the status quo of Datang is to be maintained, it is necessary to reuse financial management officials like Li Linfu.If you want to reform the various malpractices of the Tang Dynasty, you must reuse Confucian school officials like Zhang Jiuling.

However, what is regrettable is that if we look back and analyze from now on, even if Zhang Jiuling is in power for 20 more years and kills Anlu Mountain in advance, he will not be able to change the substantial disintegration of the grassroots society of the Tang Dynasty:
The foundations of the Fubing and Land Equalization system no longer exist, the government reform that treats the symptoms but not the root cause cannot be continued, there is no unique solution to the sharp contradiction of land annexation (such as the method of fighting poison with poison as in the Northern Song Dynasty cannot be implemented), and the economic crisis caused by the growing capital , Ecological imbalance.

If Zhang Jiuling continues to be in office for 20 years, there is a high probability that his reputation will be ruined.This principle is just like if Li Linfu died of illness after being prime minister for four years, he would be famous in history.

Li Longji can also see this point. The reform of the Tang Dynasty is hopeless, just hang on.If you close your eyes, it will be dark, and if you leave Chang'an, the world will be peaceful.

It is inevitable that Zhang Jiuling and others will fall out of favor.There is no hope for what they can do; what Li Longji urgently needs, they can't do.

Okay, let’s go back to what we mentioned at the beginning: Why did Zhang Jiuling prevent Niu Xianke from ascending to the throne? Is it just because the other party lacked ability?

I don't think so, at least not quite.

From the perspective of future generations, Yan Tingzhi's ability will never surpass Niu Xianke, and his merits will be even less.I spent a long time looking for historical materials to find out what achievements Yan Tingzhi had.

So why did Zhang Jiuling recommend Yan Tingzhi as prime minister?
First, both of them were born in imperial examinations; second, both of them were Ci ministers, and their articles were well written.In other words, they were comrades in the trenches and naturally became friends.

Zhang Jiuling said that Niu Xianke "does not know books", not that the other party can't read books, but that Niu Xianke can't write poems and articles, and his literary quality is very low.In comparison, Yan Tingzhi's literary accomplishment is several orders of magnitude higher, right?

Therefore, it is Zhang Jiuling's ideal to form the pattern of civil officials governing the country during the Renzong period of the Northern Song Dynasty. It cannot be said that there is a problem with his ideas, because hundreds of years later, this pattern was really realized in the Northern Song Dynasty.

Zhang Jiuling has grasped the historical trend of disintegrating power politics downwards, lowering the upper limit of aristocratic rights, and lowering the lower limit of the threshold for participating in politics.

But it cannot be said that his ideas are without problems, because this central political structure has had a very serious, negative, and long-lasting impact.

Niu Xianke is not allowed to be prime minister because he is not a person who comes from the "rules of the game" and this gap cannot be opened.The "rules of the game" in Zhang Jiuling's mind were the imperial examinations.

For the same reason, he objected to Zhang Shougui becoming prime minister from Jiedu envoy, because Zhang Shougui was a side general becoming prime minister (this was a tradition in the early Tang Dynasty).

Zhang Jiuling hopes to create a central group of traditional literati circles composed of people who came from the imperial examination. This is his ideal.

So even if Niu Xianke was replaced by Xiao Fang's brain, Zhang Jiuling would still object.Of course, if Niu Xianke passed the imperial examination and continued to work in Hexi to reach Jiedushi, he could also be accepted by Zhang Jiuling and others.

Li Longji believed that Zhang Jiuling was "a party member" and he really didn't accuse him unjustly.The ambition of the party formed by Zhang Jiuling (he may not realize it himself) is so great that it almost spans hundreds of years of evolution of the civilian political landscape.

Looking at this point, Li Longji did not kill him purely because he was short-sighted and not wise. Of course, this was also Zhang Jiuling's luck.

This is the second contradiction in the Central Committee of the Tang Dynasty: the clear factional contradiction between officials who came from the imperial examination and "miscellaneous" officials such as Men Yin who became officials (including low-level officials and border generals who became prime ministers).

Suppose, if An Lushan came to Chang'an to become prime minister, would he rebel?The answer is definitely not, although there will definitely be people in the Youzhou Group who will take over and rebel.

Zhang Jiuling suppressed the generals and became prime minister. In fact, the feudal town would rebel sooner or later.

Moreover, this kind of contradiction did not disappear because of the occurrence of the Anshi Rebellion, but was instead reflected in the "Niu Li Party Struggle" in the later Tang Xianzong period. Things like chicken feathers in a place are the continuation of this struggle.

So the title of my book is "Elegy of the Prosperous Tang Dynasty", because the old pattern of the prosperous Tang Dynasty is really hopeless, and it is full of contradictions from the inside to the outside.

I want to write this book as a benchmark for historical literature during the period from the end of the Kaiyuan period to the Anshi Rebellion. The excavation of the historical context is very in-depth.Under this premise, try to ensure the fluency and refreshment of the plot.

Then even if I come back to read this book ten years later, I still feel that it has merits. When I read it for the second and third time, I will not feel that it is insulting to my intelligence and made up, and it will not turn into a book that makes me vomit just because of the passage of time. Spicy chicken.

This is the direction of my efforts.

(End of this chapter)