After defeating the Chu army in the Battle of Yanling and winning the final victory, the Jin army, from the monarch Jin Ligong to the ordinary soldiers, were all elated and jubilantJin Ligong also warmly celebrated the hard-won victory of defeating the old rival Chu army and maintaining the hegemony of the Jin State with the behavior of 'garrisoning the Chu camp and enjoying Chu Su'.
As mentioned in the previous article, while everyone else was celebrating the victory, the Jin Zhong Junzuo and the old minister Shixie still had a great sense of worry, fearing that the situation that they had predicted that 'after the external threat was calmed down, the internal strife in the Jin Dynasty would inevitably begin' would become a reality.
Therefore, immediately after the great victory, Shi Xie met with Jin Ligong and advised the king to always be vigilant and humble, and to reflect on himself at all timesUse 'the Mandate of Heaven cannot always be unchanging' to alert yourself, unite with the doctors and scholars, and unite with the outside world to guard against threats that come at any time!
After Shi Xie came out, he was loyal, diligent, sincere, and dedicated to assisting the two generations of monarchs of the Jin Kingdom, so of course Jin Ligong couldn't help but listen to the words of the old minister, and always made a sign of acceptance on the surface;Therefore, after leading the army to eat the military rations left by the Chu army for three days, Jin Li Gong took the opportunity to announce the withdrawal of troops from Zheng State and return to China for rest and recuperation, so as to restore the excessive national and military strength consumed by this war.
As for Zheng Bo (Zheng Chenggong), the treacherous and repeated villain who jumped off the wall, he will come to clean him up when he is free in the future (Jin Li Gongyu).
After personally leading the army to defeat the Chu army commanded by the King of Chu in Yanling and consolidating the hegemony of the Jin State, the Duke of Jin Li succeeded the former Emperor Wen and Xiang Gong and became the new generation of the Jin State and the well-deserved overlord of the Central Plains princes (the first monarch Jing Gong is actually not bad, but with the hard wound of the defeat in the Battle of Yi, it is not good to be ranked with the Duke of Wen and the Duke of Xiang).
Coupled with the previous defeat of the Qin State in the Battle of Ma Tunnel, the Battle of Jiaogang and the defeat of the Di people, under these military victories, the external threat of the Jin State has been basically eliminated, and the complacent Jin Li Gong believes that there is no more evenly matched opponents abroad, so he turned his attention to the country, preparing to weaken the power of the Zhuqing scholars and doctors who have begun to threaten the power of the office, and concentrate the military and political power of the Jin State in the hands of the office, that is, to implement the plan of 'going to the group of doctors and establishing their own control'.
Since the first monarch dedicated the duke, the practice of the Jin State was that the sons and grandsons of the public office would not stay in the country, but went to other princely states or the kings of Yuyi to go out, so since the Jin Dynasty, the Jin State was almost in a state of 'no duke'. The position of the ruling secretary of the Jin State was basically appointed by the successive Jin marquis to appoint a doctor with a different surname (different clan) or a member of the distant branch of the office. The first 'ruling' military general of the Jin State is the collateral ancestor of the current Qiangqing Yin clan - Xun Xuan (the great-grandfather of the current Shangjun general Xun Rui).
Starting from the Duke of Jin Ling, the military and political power of the Jin State was basically held by the Qingshi family, and the successive Marquis of Jin lost absolute control of the courtIn order to control the power, there have been disputes between monarchs and ministers between several generations of Jin marquis and qingshi, among which Linggong was killed by the Zhao family, and Jing Gong successfully counterattacked the Zhao family with the assistance of other ministers, and once eliminated the Zhao clan.
When the Duke of Jin Li was still the 'prince of the Jin Kingdom', he hated the situation that the country's major affairs were controlled by the secretaries and scholars, and the office did not hold the absolute control of the court, and he was determined to wait for his succession to the throne in the future, and he must try to change the situation of 'no distinction between the monarch and the minister', and implement the "get rid of the doctors and establish their own influences", and collect all the power of the Jin State in the office;And this idea of recovering power accompanied Jin Ligong for the rest of his life.
In the fifth year of King Jian of Zhou (581 BC), after the succession of Duke Li of Jin, he successively launched wars with the Di people, Qin and Chu, and in these battles, in the name of unification of military orders, he gradually recovered some of the military power that was held and controlled by the ministers. Although the ministers of the Jin State felt that the monarch was taking back the power in his hands in a planned way and refused to hand over power easily, at that time, the Jin State was full of external threats, and Chu, Qin, and Di were all eyeing the Jin State, and only by eliminating the external threat could the Jin State have the power to expand its interests and continue to command the princes of the world.
Therefore, under the premise of unanimous interests, the monarchs and ministers of the Jin State worked together and devoted themselves to the outside world, and finally did not make a joke of 'internal strife' when the foreign enemy was not settled.
Of course, when the Jin State was using troops abroad, the secretaries also adopted various overt or covert ways to resist the power recovery actions of the Jin Li Gong (such as the Battle of Ma Tunnel, the Jin Li Gong failed to get the full support of the Qing scholars, captured the Qin capital Yongcheng, and completely defeated the Qin State);The monarchs and ministers of the Jin State were waiting for a good opportunity for each other to completely cut off all this (which is also the reason why Shi Xie insisted on leaving the Chu State as the external vigilance of the Jin State;If the threat of Chu is there, the ministers and doctors within the Jin State will be jealous and will not be able to fully confront the monarch, leading to a situation of internal strife in the Jin State).
After the Duke of Jin Li defeated the Chu army led by the King of Chu at Yanling and finally eliminated the last external threat, he was impatient to prepare to implement the established plan of 'going to the group of doctors and regaining control of the court' in the countryBut this plan was unsurprisingly unanimously and resolutely resisted by all the Qing families of the Jin State (even including the Shi family's Shi Xie);The secretaries who had been in charge of the Jin court for decades opposed the return of all the power in their hands to the monarch, at most only a part of the power and interests, but the Duke of Jin Li would not agree with themThe irreconcilable contradictions between the monarchs and ministers of the Jin State gradually revealed themselves within the Jin State just after the end of the Battle of Yanling.
Seeing that the unfortunate situation that he had predicted that "if there is peace outside, there will be internal troubles" is about to happen, Shi Xie, who is in pain, has no choice but to go to the Shi (Fan) temple every day to pray to the ancestors, asking them to bless him to die early
"The king is becoming more and more arrogant and extravagant, and he has unexpectedly defeated all the enemies, this is Haotian's fatal flaw in deliberately increasing him, and the disaster of our Jin Kingdom is about to break out. Xie did not want to see the calamity come with his own eyes, so he could only pray here to the ancestors who had mercy on me and loved me, asking you to let me die quickly, and not let me and the Fan family be involved in this impending calamity;If you can make my wish come true, it will be a blessing for my Fan family!”
Left Biography. Seventeen Years of Chenggong - Jun is arrogant and defeats the enemy, and the sky benefits his illness, and it is difficult to do it. Only the ancestors love me, I wish me a quick death, no difficulty, and the blessing of the Fan family. ’
In June of the twelfth year of King Jian of Zhou (574 BC), that is, the second year after the end of the Battle of Yanling, under the long-term and unremitting sincere prayers, Shixie finally got his wish and died at home safe and sound, finally got a good death, and did not see the bloody internal strife that would occur within the Jin Kingdom in the future.
Just before he died, Shi Xie also cheered up and carefully instructed his son Shi Kuo, who was going to inherit the position of the head of the Shi family (Fan), and ordered him to swear to strictly guard the door and not to participate in any future battles in the court, so as not to bring disaster to the Fan family;In the face of his father's dying request, Shi Kuo agreed one by one.
After Shi Xie's death, there was a vacancy in the position of the Zhongjun Zuo he left behind, and the Duke of Jin Li ordered the head of the Yin family, the general of the Shangjun Army, to succeed him as the Zhongjun Zuo;After that, Shi Kuo also successfully entered the court of the Jin State and served as the new military assistant;Zuo Zhizhi, the former new army, was promoted to the new general.
At this time, the new ranking of the eight kings of the Jin Dynasty was - Luan Shu, the general of the Chinese army and the ruling doctor, Zuo Yan of the Chinese army, Xun Yan (Zhongxing Yan), Zuo Han Ju of the upper army, Xun Gang, Xun Gang, Zuo Li, the new army general Xun Zhi, and the new army Zuo Shilu.
In the new Jin State Four Army and Eight Secretaries, the Yin family still occupies three seats (the Chinese Army Zuo Hao, the Lower Army Zuo Yin, and the New Army General Xu Zhi). The previous Yin clan had served as the ruler of the Jin State for four generations (郤芮, 郤縠, 郤阙, 郤克), and there were eight people in the four generations who entered the ranks of the secretaries (郤芮, 郤縠, 郤渠, 郤秦, 郤阙, 郤銨, 郤錡, 郤zhi, 郤犨).
The Yin family has been operating in the Jin Kingdom for a hundred years, with deep roots and many party henchmen, and its wealth and power are incomparable, almost reaching the level of "rich half of the office, half of the family".Even the great sect of the Zhao family, represented by Zhao Dun back then, could not be compared with the Hao family. After the Zhao clan was wiped out, among the current Qing clan of the Jin Kingdom, the Qing clan with the largest territory and the strongest strength belonged to the Yin clan.
After Shixie's position as Zhongjun Zuo was taken over by the Shangjun general Yin Jian in the order of the court, the power of the Yin clan was higher, and the Zhongjun Zuo of Xun was only one step away from the ruling of the Jin State (Luan Shu's Zhongjun General);If all is normal, in a few years, he will succeed Luan Shu, the current ruler of the Jin State, who has either retired or died (or even been attacked and seized power by the Duke of Jin), becoming the fifth ruler of the Jin State in the history of the Yin family.
The prosperity and strength of the Yin family was not only feared and vigilant by Jin Ligong himself, but also Luan Shu, a Chinese military general who wanted to stabilize the family's power and provoke infighting among the monarch and other ministers' families, also maintained serious concern and extreme vigilance;In the Battle of Yanling, the then new army Zuo Hezhi did not listen to the order of the marshal of the Chinese army (that is, Luan Shu himself) to 'wait for reinforcements and attack slowly', but attacked alone and defeated the Chu army in person, although it increased the influence of the Hao clan in the Jin State, but at the same time, it also made Luan Shu, as the marshal of the Chinese army, embarrassed and even hated the Yin clan, whose power had soared.
Therefore, after leading the army back from Yanling, the extremely vigilant Luan Shu wanted to take measures to take revenge on the Yin family, and even designed to get rid of the Xu family, who was chasing closely behind the Luan family and was about to surpass or even replace his family's status.
Luan and He, in fact, are the Qing family from the branch of the Jin State Office, and the Qing family of the Jin State is currently in the same vein as the monarch, mainly Luan, He, and Han (in addition, there are also Qi family, Yang tongue and other lower-status doctors, which are also other branches of the Jin Office);It stands to reason that the Luan clan and the Hao clan, who both belong to the other branches of the public office, should not initiate internal strife, but Luan Shu is selfish and wants to cause trouble to the east, so that the Duke of Jin Li and the Xin clan will kill each other because of the struggle for power, so as to benefit themselves.
And the Xun family didn't know how to restrain himself, not only offended other ministers, but also made the monarch start to be suspicious and wary of his own family;In the end, the infighting in the Jin Kingdom still hurt the national temple;The hidden danger that the Jin office was finally replaced by a different surname was undoubtedly revealed when Luan Shu began to design to eliminate the Hao family.
Originally, after the return of Jin Ligong from Yanling, the first goal of "collecting power and determining the government" was to take charge of the power of the Jin ** government and the ruling doctor of the Chinese army - Luan Shu, and the power of the Luan family would be taken back step by step by Jin Ligong;If Luan Shu was interested, Jin Ligong would not do anything to him, but just take back all the power in his hands, and then let him quit the court and go home to retire.
But Luan Shu has been in office for decades, from the lower army to the middle general, his thoughtful, cunning and cunning, of course he understands who Jin Ligong's plan to take over power is aimed at;Therefore, Luan Shu tried his best to distract the Luan family from the Duke of Jin Li on the one hand, and on the other hand, he tried to lead the troubles to the other Qingshi families. And Luan Shu's target is naturally the Hao family, which is the most powerful and powerful among the Qings.
This is Luan Shu tried his best to use the hands of Jin Li Gong to eradicate the Yin family, which had festivals and contradictions with the Luan family, and at the same time achieve the ultimate goal of making Jin Li Gong lose the hearts of the people in the country because of killing the minister in vain, and finally kill himself, so as to protect the Luan family.
After that, in order to transfer the first goal of Jin Ligong's "seizure of power" and hit potential political enemies (in fact, it is already obvious), the scheming Luan Shu went through a series of careful planning, and carefully arranged one ring after another of deep traps, so that the self-aggrandizing Jin Ligong unknowingly successfully transferred the first object of the power attack to the head of the Yin family;The specific process is as follows
In order to blame the Yin family and maintain the safety of the Luan family, Luan Shu first privately found the prince of the Chu prince who was captured by the Jin army in the Battle of Yanling, and instigated him to frame and slander the Yin family when he was summoned by the Duke of Jin Li on the condition of "releasing him to return to China".And in order to return to China as soon as possible, when Gongzi Qi met with Duke Jin Li, he said in accordance with Luan Shu's instructions:
"At the beginning of the battle of Yanling, our widow (referring to the king of Chu) was lured by the initiative of your country's new army general (that is, Yin Zhi, who was still a new army at that time), and the two countries fought. At that time, I also heard that the reason why the new army general was in such a hurry to attack our army was to take the opportunity to cause chaos on the battlefield, so that your National Front would have an unexpected event (implying that the Duke of Jin Li might be killed or captured because of this);Afterwards, they (referring to the Yin family) went to Luoyi to welcome Gongsun Zhou (the great-great-grandson of Duke Wen of Jin and the nephew of Duke Li of Jin) to return to China and inherit the throne, so as to make a meritorious contribution to the establishment. ”
No matter how rigid and arrogant Jin Ligong is, he still has a certain amount of achievements and a strong monarch who has won a great victory in the Quartet War, not those mediocre and incompetent people, and his basic quality of governing and employing people is not bad at all, so he will naturally not directly attack the country's ministers just by relying on the words of Gongzi Zhi, a captive.
But at that time on the battlefield of Yanling, Jin Li Gong did see that Yin Zhi had deep contact with the envoy of the King of Chu Gong, accepted the battlefield gifts, and saluted the car of the King of Chu Gong, and later Yin Zhi gave up the pursuit of Zheng Cheng's car that was fleeingThese things had to make Jin Ligong suspicious of the true intentions of Yin Zhi (the Yin family) to do this, and wanted to find out the reason.
In order to clear up his doubts, Jin Li Gong summoned the ruling Luan Shu to come and ask him about his views and suggestions on this matter;This is exactly the result that Luan Shu was looking forward to.
Luan Shu, who came to the palace, naturally pretended not to know anything, and after Jin Ligong finished relaying Gongzi's words, Luan Shu replied "shockedly".
"What the king said is very likely to be true!At that time, the battle situation was so critical, and the new army general (Xun Zhi) still looked like he was not afraid of death, and took the initiative to attack the Chu army;During the battle, he got out of the car several times, took off his helmet to salute Chu Jun opposite, accepted the gift from Chu Jun, and gossiped with the envoy of Chu for a long time on the battlefield, which is very strange. Later, the new army general deliberately let Zheng Bo go, but did not capture him directly, and for unknown reasons.
At the beginning, when we were preparing to attack Zheng, we sent invitations to the three kingdoms of Qi, Lu, and Wei in advance, and also sent envoys to invite them to send troops togetherBut the three ** teams didn't come until after the end of the war, and they didn't play a role;I later heard that it was the new army general who deliberately instructed the envoys to the Three Kingdoms (pointing out that the then new army general of the Three Kingdoms, the uncle of Hao Zhi;At this time, he had been promoted to the rank of subordinate military leaderAt that time, Luan Shu's son Luan Wei was also the envoy of the envoy, Luan Shu deliberately said this, it was to put aside the responsibility of his own family and lead the spearhead to the Xu family), to delay the dispatch of troops from the Three Kingdoms, so that the monarch you alone led the army to fight against the Chu and Zheng coalition forces, so you were in a dangerous situation.
However, there is no conclusive evidence for these things, and it cannot be proved that the new army general (Xun Shi) really wanted to kill the monarch and welcome Gongsun Zhou back to China;Since Gongzi said to you that the new army will put you in a dangerous situation in order to support Gongsun Zhou to succeed to the throne, then you might as well take advantage of this opportunity to offer victory to the Son of Heaven (Spring and Autumn etiquette, after the princes have won the war, they must send an envoy to the king of Luoyi to pay tribute to the Son of Heaven, and offer the booty and prisoners obtained to show respect for the royal family), and the new army will be the messenger of the Jiejie, and send him to Luoyi to meet the Son of Heaven;You can secretly send someone to observe whether he had private contact with Gongsun Zhou when he was in Luoyi, and whether he had secretly talked about supporting the establishment, and then plan to follow. ”
Duke Li of Jin didn't notice anything wrong, and was very satisfied with Luan Shu's suggestion, so he ordered Xu Zhi to serve as the 'envoy of Xianjie', and with the booty and prisoners obtained in the battle of Yanling, he went to Luoyi to win the victory to Zhou Tianzi.
As for the delay in the dispatch of troops by the Three Kingdoms of Qiluwei, it was not the focus of Luan Shu's plan to attack the Yin clan, but only a cover;Luan Shu's real intention was to divert the attention of Duke Jin Li, so that he would pay attention to whether he would meet and talk privately with Gongsun Zhou, who was in the royal capital, after he arrived in Luoyi, and even make further collusions.
Luan Shu was afraid that if he arrived in Luoyi but did not go to see Gongsun Zhou, then his plan would be frustrated, so he secretly let his henchmen rush to Luoyi in advance as an envoy of the Jin State, visited Gongsun Zhou first, and advised him:
"The new army general is Zhizhi, who has made many military exploits and been loyal to the state since he joined the army, and will definitely have a bright future in the future and reach a higher level;This time, he came to the king's capital as a 'messenger' to play a victory to the Son of Heaven, which was a harbinger for the monarch to reuse him;Gongsun, you are a talented person in the public office, and you serve the Son of Heaven in the royal capital, and you have also made great contributions to the Jin Kingdom;You must meet the new generals this time, get acquainted with each other, and if you want to return to the Jin Kingdom in the future, it will be of great benefit to you to make friends with the new army!”
Gongsun Zhou was not yet fourteen years old at this time, he was young and naïve, and he didn't know that this was all the calculations and traps of the old fox in Luan Shu, so he didn't think much about it, so he agreed to come down, and after Yin Zhi came to Luoyi, he took the initiative to send out an invitation and invite Yin Zhi to come to meet and talk.
And Xun Zhi didn't care about this, and after completing the "victory" ceremony to Zhou Tianzi according to the etiquette, he went to meet Gongsun Zhou in person in accordance with the etiquette of courtiers to meet the children of the public office;The two talked for a long time in Gongsun Zhou's private house, and they were respectful and respectful to each other, and the atmosphere of the meeting was very harmonious.
List of high-quality authors But what Xun Zhi and Gongsun Zhou didn't expect was that all of this was seen by the people who were secretly sent by Jin Li Gong to spy on them;Afterwards, the monitor made a detailed report to Jin Ligong (and added fuel and vinegar). And when Jin Ligong heard that Yin Zhi had really gone to meet Gongsun Zhou after going to Luoyi, and after talking to each other in detail for a long time, he was immediately furious, and believed that Yin Zhi and Gongsun Zhou had a deep collusion, and indeed had the intention of abolishing the establishment;From then on, Jin Ligong began to kill the Yin Zhi, and even wanted to attack the Yin family.
The next thing is the beginning of the Hao family's catastrophe.