In ancient Chinese history, some emperors, in order to favor young concubines, often abolished their eldest sons and appointed the sons of these concubines as crown princes. This situation is not uncommon in Chinese history.
Among the many events of abolishing the elders and establishing the young, the Liji Rebellion in the Spring and Autumn Period can be regarded as a model of them. In this rebellion of Liji, it was essentially the father of Duke Wen of Jin who married a young and beautiful wife, and tried to abolish the original heir and set up the son of the new lady as the heir.
Due to his father's decision, Duke Wen of Jin was forced into exile for 19 years, triggering many historical events. It was not until the return of Duke Wen of Jin that this civil strife was finally resolved.
The impact of this dispute was not limited to the Jin Wengong family, but in fact, this dispute not only determined the historical trend of the Jin Kingdom, but also had a profound impact on the history of the entire Spring and Autumn Period.
If we delve into the history of this Liji Rebellion, we will find that the ancients had a high level of wisdom more than 2,000 years ago. As for the specific process of this dispute, we need to start with the grandfather of Jin Wengong.
At the beginning of the Spring and Autumn Period, the Jin state rose to prominence among the nations and gradually became a first-class power, thanks to the Marquis Wen of Jin, a very leading monarch. Under his leadership, the Jin state was able to rise during the alternating period of the Western and Eastern Zhou dynasties.
Unfortunately, Jin Wenhou planted a time bomb on his deathbed. He made his son his heir, but gave his younger brother great prestige and a large fief within the Jin state.
Therefore, after the death of Marquis Wen of Jin, his younger brother began to plot to usurp the throne. At first, there were many people in the Jin country who supported the monarch's lineage, so the younger brother failed to succeed. But then, the younger brother Yimai never gave up, and took the initiative to attack many times in the past 70 years, continuing to weaken the power of the monarch's Yimai.
In the long course of history, the descendants of the younger brother finally succeeded in controlling the Jin Kingdom in the grandson's generation, and finally succeeded in usurping the throne, which is the famous "Quwo Daiyi".
The usurping grandson was known in history as "Jin Wu Gong", that is, the grandfather of the later Jin Wen Gong. It was in this context that Duke Wen of Jin was born, and many of the contradictions and conflicts of the later Liji Rebellion were buried at that time.
The strife within the family, especially the usurpation between the brothers, was chaotic enough. But compared to it, the private life of the Jin Wen family is even more chaotic.
According to historical records, in order to win over the Qi State, Duke Wu of Jin married the daughter of Duke Huan of Qi as a concubine. However, at this time, Duke Wu of Jin was already very old, even a generation older than Duke Qi Huan, and marrying Duke Qi Huan's daughter was like marrying a woman younger than his granddaughter.
Despite the large age gap, they crossed this barrier and began a forbidden love. However, the relationship did not end well, and they had a child, who was also the eldest son of the hero's father.
The hero's father died two years after usurping the throne, and he ascended to the throne as the Duke of Jin Xian. However, his original wife had no son, and the woman with whom he had an affair gave birth to his first son.
Therefore, Jin Xiangong decided to make this son the crown prince.
The original version was disputed: the eldest brother of Duke Wen of Jin was said to have been born to his father and grandfather's concubines. However, some historians believe that this statement is not true.
They point out that, judging from the timeline, Duke Huan of Qi ascended the throne in 685 BC, and if Duke Wu of Jin married Duke Huan of Qi's daughter after Duke Huan ascended the throne to woo him, then Prince Shensheng should have been born after 685 BC.
However, the reality is that Shen Sheng was the oldest of Jin Xiangong's sons, and Jin Wengong was actually the second son. And Jin Wengong was born in 697 BC, which indicates that Shen Sheng's actual date of birth should be before 697 BC.
In this way, the two dates cannot be matched. Therefore, many historians believe that the woman who married Duke Wu of Jin and the woman who married Duke Xian of Jin were simply two people, just because their names were similar and were mistaken for the same person in the history books.
After the death of Duke Wu of Jin, Duke Xian of Jin took over the scepter. At the time of his accession to the throne, he had three children, of which Shen Sheng was the eldest son born of fornication. Later, Jin Xiangong married the two daughters of the fox family in Jin, of which his sister gave birth to his second son, Chong'er, that is, Jin Wengong, and his sister gave birth to Lao Sanyiwu for him.
Although Jin Xiangong has some problems with his private life, his ability is undoubtedly very strong. Under his rule, the Jin state began to develop rapidly, and while Jin Xiangong rectified the country, he also actively expanded abroad.
And the idiom "false way" was born in the process of his expansion.
After Jin Xiangong ascended the throne, he made a controversial decision: to completely eliminate his family. This is mainly because the root cause of the seventy years of civil strife in the Jin Dynasty was the struggle for power between the members of the clan.
Jin Xiangong believed that only by completely eliminating other clan members could such things be prevented from happening again. As a result, in just a few years after his accession to the throne, he continued to find various excuses and carried out a large-scale purge of his own family.
After his purge, the talents of the Jin State clan withered in an instant, and only a few people remained. At the same time, Jin Xiangong did not relax the pace of external expansion. Five years after his accession to the throne, he managed to defeat Lirong around the Jin Kingdom.
Lirong is a branch of the Gurong ethnic group that lives in the Lintong region of Shaanxi. Under the fierce offensive of the Jin state, Li Rong was forced to surrender and gave a pair of sister flowers as a gift to the Jin Xiangong.
In ancient times, it was not new for nomadic tribes to submit to feudal states after defeat, and to give their daughters as tribute. However, when this pair of exotic sisters entered the Jin Kingdom, it caused a huge sensation.
The sisters entered Jin Xiangong's harem and soon became pregnant one after another. The elder sister gave birth to a fourth son for Jin Xiangong, and the younger sister gave birth to a fifth son for him. The arrival of these two women made the originally lively harem of the Jin Kingdom even more lively.
According to historical records, the time of death of the eldest Shen Sheng and his mother, as well as Jin Wengong and his mother, is not recorded in detail. What is certain is that when these three brothers grow up**, their mother may have died or is no longer favored.
However, the mother of the fourth and fifth children, the sisters from Lirong, are in the prime of their youth and are deeply loved. Therefore, the mother of the fourth child began to plan how to get her son to win the inheritance.
This copy describes a difficult problem, a pair of sisters from Lirong, their son is a concubine, and in order for their son to ascend to the throne, they must first get rid of the three brothers in front of them, but this is an almost impossible task, because all three brothers have strong political power and many supporters.
This dilemma seems unsolvable, but in the end, the sisters found the key - that is, rebellion. Although the three brothers have many supporters in China, if they can be labeled as rebels, the supporters behind them will be afraid and dare not stand up directly.
So the Li Ji sisters set up an exquisite game.
The two sisters worked hard to compete for favor in the Jin Palace, won the favor and trust of Jin Xiangong, and were also fighting for the throne of their wife. Once the elder sister becomes the wife of Jin Xiangong, then the elder sister's son will become the son-in-law, which is more conducive to their power struggle.
As the favorite concubines of Jin Xiangong, they skillfully won over the ministers of the court, especially the most trusted ministers of Jin Xiangong. In this way, almost all the people around Jin Xiangong who can speak are surrounded by them.
The two sisters skillfully incited these favored ministers to support them in the court. Under the pretext that the Jin Kingdom needed to expand, they transferred the three princes, including the crown prince Shensheng, to the border city to guard it.
In this way, only the Li Ji sisters and their people were left in the capital of the Jin Kingdom.
Li Ji is unparalleled in wisdom and wants to trap the prince for the crime of rebellion. She cleverly arranged for the prince to sacrifice to his mother and return to his father as a gift. However, Li Ji was in Beijing, Jin Xiangong went hunting, and the time difference allowed her to receive and poison the sacrificial meat of Xiangong, and the conspiracy emerged.
Li Ji skillfully took advantage of the opportunity of Jin Xiangong's return and let him witness the fact that the meat was poisonous. If the crown prince can meet Jin Xiangong in time, he may still have the opportunity to defend himself and clear his grievances.
It's a pity that the crown prince was not with Jin Xiangong at that time, if he was taken away by others and brought to Jin Xiangong, it must be Li Ji's people, and they can also charge Prince Shensheng with rebellion.
As a result, the crown prince Shensheng was identified as attempting to poison his father.
After being convicted, Prince Shensheng was faced with two choices: either revolt immediately or kill himself. However, due to various reasons, Prince Shensheng was forced to choose the latter.
In this way, the eldest brother was eliminated first. After the death of the eldest brother, the second and third brothers also understood the mystery. When this happened, the second brother Chong'er, who later became Duke Wen of Jin, was already forty-two years old and was no longer an ignorant child.
Therefore, after learning that the eldest brother committed suicide, the first reaction of the second and third brothers was to flee the Jin Kingdom as soon as possible.
From Li Ji's eyes, we can see that she is determined to win and wants to seize the crown prince. With the death of the crown prince, the two brothers became her main threat, so she decided to take action against them.
Although the crown prince had committed suicide, their strength was not enough to match that of Li Ji, so at the beginning, they tried to tell Jin Xian about their grievances. However, when they arrived in the capital, they heard the news that Li Ji was going to kill them.
In desperation, they had no choice but to flee back to their stations and defend themselves with troops. However, this behavior once again aroused the anger of Jin Xiangong, and he decided to personally lead an army to conquer his two sons.
Originally, against Li Ji, they still had a glimmer of life, but now in the face of Jin Xiangong, they have nothing to do. So, the two chose to flee, hoping to escape to other countries to survive.
The eldest committed suicide, the second and third left together, and only the fourth child born to Li Ji was left in the Jin Kingdom, and he was made the crown prince again by Jin Xiangong. However, due to the killings before Jin Xiangong, the entire Jin State Office has been almost completely wiped out, and no one will speak justice for the crown prince.
Therefore, the inheritance of the fourth child seems to have become a matter of course.
Li Ji's dream was successful, and her son was canonized as the prince of the Jin Kingdom. With the establishment of the crown prince's status, Li Ji's influence in the Jin Kingdom increased day by day. Five years later, the elderly Jin Xiangong passed away, and the crown prince Xi Qi ascended the throne naturally.
However, the chaos in the Jin Kingdom did not end. The reason is that the Jin State in the Spring and Autumn Period was different from later generations: first, in addition to the monarch's family, the minister's family also had real power; Second, the internal and external situation of the Jin State was affected by other countries.
Therefore, the death of Jin Xiangong did not end this chaotic situation, but opened a new turmoil. Although Li Ji successfully won the inheritance for her son, the problem was that when Jin Xiangong died, the fourth child was not yet twenty years old, and the fifth child, the son born to Li Ji's sister, was only a few years old at this time.
During this period, the experience and ability of the fourth child appeared to be insufficient. However, Jin Xiangong was already prepared before he died. He knew that with the current situation of the fourth, he would not be able to stabilize his position.
Therefore, before he died, he found his most trusted person, Xun Xi, to entrust him, and asked Xun Xi to help assist his son.
Xun Xi is the best of the old ministers of the Jin Kingdom, his ability and qualifications are very outstanding, and he is loyal. If you have to find a similar character, then Zhuge Liang in the Three Kingdoms period may be able to be compared with it.
Despite Xun Xi's strong abilities, Jin Xiangong's concern about his usurpation did not abate, but instead regarded him as a choice for orphans. However, in addition to Xun Xi, there is another powerful minister within the Jin Kingdom, and he is Rick.
In the era of Jin Xiangong, Xun Xi and Rick were both literary and martial, and they were the indispensable right-hand men of Jin Xiangong. These two ministers may not be Jin Xiangong's henchmen, but they are undoubtedly Jin Xiangong's right-hand men.
Xun Xi planned the strategy of the Jin State to attack the Kingdom of Yu with false paths, and Rick led the troops to carry it out and attack the Kingdom of Yu. Compared with Xun Xi's desire for stable development of the country, Rick is more concerned about supporting Prince Shensheng.
After Shen Sheng's suicide, Rick was dissatisfied, but did not dare to act under Shen Sheng's hat of rebellion. After the death of Jin Xiangong, Rick conspired with the courtiers who supported the crown prince, and finally found an assassin at the funeral to openly assassinate the fourth child.
It is unbelievable that a minister should openly find someone to assassinate the new monarch of the Jin Kingdom. However, under the special circumstances of the time, this kind of thing actually happened.
Although most people suspected that Rick was responsible, there was no actual evidence that he had sent the Assassins, so no one could help him. Li Ji worked hard for many years and finally put her son on the throne, but she didn't expect him to be assassinated, so she resolutely refused to give up.
So, Li Ji put her sister's son, the fifth child, on the throne. However, just over a month later, Rick found another opportunity to publicly assassinate the fifth child in the court!
A mess out of control! The Jin Xiangong family was almost exterminated, the eldest was killed, old.
Second, the third child is in exile, old.
Fourth, the fifth child was assassinated again. No one in the huge Jin Kingdom can succeed to the throne, so they can only consider accepting the old man who is in exile.
Second, the third. But who to pick up? At this time, the Qin forces intervened, making the internal strife in Jin even more chaotic.
The state of Qin did not intervene in this matter out of good intentions, but for its own interests. At that time, the Qin state had already occupied the Guanzhong region and had ambitions for further eastward expansion.
However, if the eastward expansion continued, the Qin state would have to face the powerful Jin state. Previously, the Qin State had fought against the Jin State, but found it difficult for the Jin State to defeat. As a result, the Qin changed their strategy, hoping to establish friendly relations with the Jin through marriage, gain the support of the Jin state, and seek a new route of expansion.
Therefore, before this civil strife, Qin Mugong, the monarch of Qin, took the initiative to propose a marriage to the Jin State, married the daughter of Jin Xiangong, and became the son-in-law of Jin Xiangong.
Within the Jin family, when several sons were vying for inheritance, Qin Mugong seized the opportunity and intervened in their inheritance issues. The third child first contacted Qin Mugong and promised that if Qin Mugong supported him, he would give Qin State a passage.
Therefore, Qin Mugong supported Lao San and helped him inherit the Jin Kingdom. However, the third child broke his promise and refused to give Qin State access. This led to the breakdown of the relationship between Qin Mugong and Lao San, and a war broke out between the two sides.
In the end, although Qin Mugong won the war, he was helpless against the Jin state. And the third child was in the Jin Kingdom, in order to consolidate his position, he began to deal with Rick again, causing a bloody storm.
In the rebellion of the Jin kingdom of Liji, there was no real victor. This unrest led to the killing of the crown prince Shensheng, and the two princes were in exile for many years, Xun Xi committed suicide after the assassination of the two princes, and although Rick supported the prince to ascend to the throne, he was eventually removed by fear.
Li Ji is essentially fighting for her son's inheritance rights and avenging her own tribe. In the end, the third child died, his son ascended the throne, Qin Mugong helped his son Chong'er return to China to seize power, Chong'er ascended the throne of the monarch, and the Liji Rebellion was able to end.
Once, Jin Xiangong conquered the tribe of the Li Ji sisters and brought them to the Jin Kingdom. Before they came to the Jin Kingdom, they may have loved someone deeply, but because of the impermanence of the world, they were forced to become the spoils of Jin Xiangong.
There is no record of Li Ji's final fate in the official history, but according to the "Biography of the Daughters", Rick launched a mutiny after assassinating the fifth child of Jin Xiangong, took control of the court, and whipped Li Ji on the street.
It is regrettable that the manner in which the wife of the monarch of the Jin Kingdom died was so humiliating. Perhaps, this incident was too tragic and there was no real victor, which led to the extreme resistance of Jin Wengong to his family after returning to power after returning to power.
In his opinion, relatives and clans have no practical role other than fighting for power and profit.
Since the reign of Duke Wen of Jin, the Jin state has established an unwritten rule: except for the princes who were canonized as crown princes, the rest of the princes must leave the Jin kingdom and live in other countries when they reach adulthood, in order to prevent the recurrence of events similar to the Liji Rebellion.
However, this tradition led to the Jin government gradually becoming a minority in the country, while the scholar family gradually grew to the dominant position in the Jin state. This rebellion had a direct impact on the historical development of the Jin kingdom and served as a warning to later generations of rulers.
Whenever the emperor wanted to abolish the eldest son and appoint the youngest, the ministers would cite the lessons of the Reihime Rebellion to admonish the emperor.
While primogeniture may result in a mediocre successor, it was still the most stable option under the ancient system. In contrast, if there is a competition between sons or the abolition of the elder and the younger, it may cause a major chaos such as the Reihime Rebellion, which will cause serious damage to the country.
This is the real Lihime Rebellion in history.