Who was Qin Shi Huang's father? Is it really Lü Buwei?
Who Qin Shi Huang's father was has always been a mystery. This question first appeared in Sima Qian's Records of the Historians, and various reports in the Records of the Historians - The Records of Qin Shi Huang and the Biography of Lü Buwei Lie have caused confusion about the life of Qin Shi Huang. However, based on the available information, I believe that Qin Shi Huang was undoubtedly the son of Zichu.
Causes of events, conflicting testimonies in historical records.
The mystery of Qin Shi Huang's birth comes from Sima Qian's description in the Records of the Historians, and it was his two different accounts of the same event that led to the discovery of this mystery.
Historical Records - Qin Shi Huang Benji" clearly recorded"Qin Shi Huang, the son of King Xiang of Qin Zhuang"。When King Xiang of Qin Zhuang was a hostage in Zhao State, he met Zhao Ji at Lü Buwei's house and fell in love at first sight. In the first month of the forty-eighth year of King Zhaoxiang of Qin (259 BC), he married Zhao Ji and gave birth to Qin Shi Huang.
However, Sima Qian also said in "Historical Records - Biography of Lü Buweilie":"Lü Buwei is good at dancing in Handan, knows that he has a body, and lives with it. Zichu doesn't drink power, doesn't see, doesn't speak, because he wants to live forever. Lü Buwei was furious, thinking that he had to arrest a man for the sake of Zichu's family, so he sacrificed his concubine. Lü Buwei dedicated his concubine to Zichu, and the concubine hid and gave birth to Zizheng. Zi Chu then married Ji. In other words, Lu Buwei didn't want to give Zichu to Zhao Ji, but because he had spent a lot of effort on Zhao Ji, he finally gave Zhao Ji to the other party because of the success of the investment, but Zhao Ji concealed the fact that she was pregnant. After Zhao Ji married Zi Chu, she gave birth to Ying Zheng, and Zi Chu also married Zhao Ji as his wife.
Why are the historical records diametrically opposed? Sima Qian encountered this problem when he was writing the "Historical Records". Due to the difficulty of the material, it is impossible to judge the authenticity of many things, so when he wrote the "Historical Records" and "Table Records", he used the most reliable historical materials to leave the biography to the less reliable historical materials, and sometimes even put contradictory historical materials in one place, leaving obscure sentences for people to think and remember.
Therefore, the writing of the Records of the First Emperor of the Qin Dynasty must be based on the most reliable historical sources, in which Sima Qian confirms that Yingzheng's father was Chu Zhuangxiang, the prince of Qinzhuangxiang. On the other hand, the narrative of Lü Buwei Lie uses anecdotes from folklore, albeit of low reliability and regrettable deletions, thus preserving various ** historical information in the form of anecdotes and using analogous and contradictory writing techniques.
Who was Qin Shi Huang's father?
In fact, there is a lot of circumstantial evidence that can confirm the birth of Qin Shi Huang, but the reason why I think Zi Chu is the father of Qin Shi Huang is mainly based on the following reasons:
1.From his birth to his accession to the throne, Qin Shi Huang's life history has never been in doubt. Historical Records - The Biography of Lü Buwei Lie" records:"Zhao Ji gave birth to Zizheng, and it was a great time"。The ancient pronunciation of period is ji, which means year. In other words, Zichu gave birth to Yingzheng a year after Zihui married Yingzheng. If Zhao Ji was pregnant before marrying Zichu, then she was at least twelve months pregnant, which is of course abnormal. Zichu was the first to return to Qin, where she remarried and had a son. When Yingzheng returned to Qin, Zichu had already given birth to another son. If it is said that Qin Shi Huang's bloodline is problematic and cannot be established as an heir because of his royal bloodline, and Zichu has no doubt about this, this is obviously unreasonable. It can be said that from Yingzheng's birth to his succession, no one has had the slightest doubt or even rumor about his background.
2.Lü Buwei couldn't give a pregnant woman to Zichu. Before meeting Lü Buwei, Zichu had no chance to ascend to the throne until Lü Buwei gave his life to him. First, Lü Buwei successfully applied the business principles of complementarity and win-win to politics. Through a series of investment schemes, Zichu allied with Lady Huayang and won the battle for the throne, eventually winning the power of Qin. Secondly, the historical event of Lü Buwei's persuasion of Mrs. Huayang to establish Zichu as the crown prince seems complicated and dramatic on the surface, but in fact it re-established a political alliance between a certain prince of the Ying family and a certain relative of the Mi family. Third, the issue of Zichu's royal lineage is the core of the whole incident. Lü Buwei believes that the investment value of Zichu lies in his royal lineage. Therefore, for Lü Buwei, protecting the purity and credibility of King Qin's bloodline is the most important issue, he does not dare to make concessions in this matter, he will not make mistakes in this matter, and now it is probably too late to avoid suspicion.
In addition, most of the controversies about the birth of Qin Shi Huang occurred after the Han Dynasty, and I am afraid that there are too many political factors involved.
To sum up, I think that the secret of Qin Shi Huang's birth was made up by later generations, and Qin Shi Huang's father was Chu, the son of King Zhuangxiang.