To talk about the division between imperial power and relative power in the Han Dynasty, let me give you an example:
At that time, the emperor and the prime minister each had a "secretariat", and the organizations on both sides were different in size.
The emperor of the Han Dynasty had six Shang, who were still in charge. The six Shang are Shang Yi, Shang Shi, Shang Guan, Shang Xi, Shang Yu, and Shang Shu. The five Shangdu were only in charge of the emperor's private clothes, food, and daily life. Only Shangshu is in charge of clerical work, this is really the "secretary" in the harem.
At the beginning of the Han Dynasty, the Shangshu had a low status of authority, but it became bigger and bigger. The first Shangshu was only one of the six monks, which was the emperor's secretariat.
Excerpted from the first lecture of Qian Mu's "Political Gains and Losses in China's Past Dynasties" "Han Dynasty and Han Dynasty ** Organization".
In ancient China, there was a distinction between officials and officials for a long time, but today, this distinction is gone, as if everyone is an official, and everyone is a official.
In ancient times, the distinction between officials and officials was clear, and it was simply understood that the official palm had an official seal, and in today's words, it was explained that he had the right to sign and seal.
Because of this, those court dramas in ancient costumes and the like are fighting for two things, one is the jade seal and the other is the tiger talisman. These two things represent precisely the right to sign and seal, that is, the power of officials.
Western society, until today, can have only one power, and that is the right to sign, so the signature of Westerners is very important. But in China, philology is too developed, as early as thousands of years ago, people have had an extremely in-depth study and mastery of writing, and it is easy to forge it.
Therefore, unless the emperor dictates, or covers the jade seal or holds the tiger talisman, even the emperor's personal approval is not credible.
In major matters related to the future and destiny of the country, such as the transfer of troops and the appointment of **, it must be sealed.
Mr. Qian Mu spoke of the emperor's "secretariat", which in the Han Dynasty was the Liushang. Among the six Shangs, except for Shangshu, who deals with ** affairs, that is, exercising public power, the other five Shangs all deal with family affairs, that is, royal affairs, that is, exercising private rights.
There is a common misconception among Chinese that the royal family has no private affairs, and everything is official and state affairs.
The reason why this is a misunderstanding is because this interpretation of royal affairs is partly correct and partly wrong.
Partly correct, it lies in the fact that there is indeed a vague area of separation between public and private at the ** level of the family and the country, because the hereditary nature of imperial power determines that the supreme power always circulates within the family, which also determines the privatization of this part of power.
The reason why there is still a part of the mistake is that the connection between the private power of the imperial power and the public power is only a small liaison office, that is, the Shangshu Office.
The Shangshu Office is a secretariat in the true sense of the word, and its role is only the communication between the imperial power and the political power.
We see from film and television works that the emperor has to go to the court every day, the so-called court, that is, sitting on the dragon chair, listening to the minister's performance, and dealing with it on the spot.
If this is the case, the emperor will be exhausted, and it will be the ministers who will be exhausted.
You can think about the Forbidden City in Beijing, you can ride a horse, you can ride a sedan chair, there are extremely strict rules. The Forbidden City is a home in the concept of the state, a private place for the royal family, and within the Tiananmen Square, it is neither possible to ride a horse nor a sedan chair. Riding a horse and sitting in a sedan chair in the emperor's house is really disrespectful.
If you have to go to court every day, you're afraid that you have to get up at three or four o'clock every day, take a sedan chair for a while, and then walk through Tiananmen Square and enter the main hall.
Every day like this, for a few months, how many ministers can live?
The court meeting is actually a regular meeting, there are large court meetings and small court meetings, not once a day, but several times a month, the rest of the time, if the emperor needs to discuss with the ministers, usually a smaller council, in the Shang study.
The name Shang Shufang or Imperial Study Room came from the Han Dynasty, that is, the emperor's office or secretariat, and the imperial study was the emperor's public office, a place dedicated to dealing with state affairs.
When there was no court meeting or no small-scale discussion, how did the emperor deal with public affairs? At that time, there was no **, Shangshu, which played this ** liaison role.
Shang is the original word of the palm, later, the word Shang was more used in the royal family or ** affairs, and even for official positions, so a hand was added under the word Shang, emphasizing the meaning of mastering with the hand, and became the palm word.
The so-called Shangshu is the person in charge of the affairs of the emperor's book.
For example, librarians, case scribes, letter deliverers, and those who do related chores such as grinding ink and washing pens for the emperor, the most important of which is to contact the ** Shangshu.
* If the prime minister thinks that there is something to be reported to the emperor, a liaison officer will take the relevant recital and send it to the imperial family in charge of liaison, and the book will be presented to the emperor. And the relevant documents approved by the emperor were sent to the prime minister's office by this Shangshu.
Such a person only plays the role of uploading and distributing errands, and his position is naturally not high. Therefore, Mr. Qian Mu said, "The Shangshu at the beginning of the Han Dynasty had a low status of authority, and it only later became bigger and bigger. ”
Later, it became bigger and bigger, and there is a reason that this position directly holds the highest position, but the power is heavy.
From the film and television works, we see that whether it is the emperor or the prime minister, the documents must be sealed by the wax of the person, and in practice, the possibility of the matter being completed by the person is very small, because there are too many documents that need to be sealed with wax, and the emperor or the prime minister can't take care of it at all.
This can only be done through a secretary.
The country's top political, military, and economic secrets are passed around by some ordinary civil servants, which is really too child's play. It is only natural that the position of such people will gradually increase.
It can be seen from the fact that the imperial family set up the six Shang, the imperial power of the Han Dynasty has been strictly restricted, and it is not what we usually understand, the emperor is in power, and he can do whatever he wants.
Since the separation of imperial power and relative power, that is, the formation of ** functions, even the power of the emperor is limited, and the emperor is just a balancer of political power.
To use the current company system as an analogy, the emperor is actually the chairman of the company, and the prime minister is the general manager of the company, and the secretary of the board of directors.