Imperial Master of the Ming Dynasty

Chapter 21 The ability to grow food

Looking at Jiang Xinghuo's eyes, Zhu Gaoxu scratched his beard and replied: "A dynasty, one family and one surname governs the world. They control the people and fool them."

"That's right, and that's not right either." Jiang Xinghuo smiled.

Hearing this, Zhu Di next door turned and asked: "Master, what do the history books say about the dynasty?"

Dao Yan's knowledge is mixed and comprehensive, and he tells the reasons for the allusions like a humanoid library.

"Literally speaking, dynasty means the emperor's view of the dynasty. "Zhou Li·Di Guan·Shi Shi" records: Si Dynasty is located on the left side of Humen. Zheng Xuan, a great scholar of the Eastern Han Dynasty, noted: The king inspected the dynasty outside the bedroom door on the road. I will look at the court, and if there is a good way that can be done, I will send an edict to the king now."

Dao Yan looked at the wall and said, "Of course, that's not what Jiang Xinghuo wants to say."

Zhu Di nodded, it was true.

Based on his current understanding of Jiang Xinghuo, what a great talent like Jiang Xinghuo wants to talk about must not only be literal, but must be some more subtle and profound mysteries.

Jiang Xinghuo spoke slowly: "The so-called dynasty, the earliest record in history books is the Xia Dynasty. After Dayu controlled the floods, he passed the throne to his son Qi. From then on for thousands of years, most of the time, the power of the dynasty was passed down from father to son, that is, The so-called 'family world'."

After telling this paragraph, Jiang Xinghuo asked a question: "Then, why before Xia, there were no dynasties, only tribal leaders from ancient times?"

After thinking for a short time, Zhu Gaoxu obviously did not immediately come up with an answer to this question that he had never thought about before.

Jiang Xinghuo didn't expect him to give any answer at all when he asked the question. It was just a habit left over from his previous job as a teacher.

"In ancient times, the population of China was not that large. The tribes were relatively independent and had their own fields without interfering with each other. With the development of agricultural planting technology, the population began to increase dramatically. Pay attention to this. I will also talk about agriculture in the future. Every advancement in planting technology will have a direct impact on social form."

"Let's go on to say that after the population increased dramatically, each tribe began to open up more fields in order to support the growing population. As the fields were opened up, tribes began to come into contact with the tribes' territories, and finally joined forces driven by interests. It became a tribal alliance with different positions, which led to the 'Battle of Zhuolu' between the Yellow Emperor and Chi You."

Hearing this, Daoyan couldn't help but feel a little lost.

Was the Battle of Zhuolu actually caused by the advancement of planting technology?

Dao Yan's sitting posture began to change from casual to relaxed, and unconsciously became a little straighter.

Zhu Di couldn't help but smile when he saw the change in Dao Yan's sitting posture.

Zhu Di thought of the first time he listened to Jiang Xinghuo's lecture. It seemed that he had gone from sitting casually with disdain to being attracted by the words to sitting upright.

Jiang Xinghuo seems to have a magical power.

On this side of the wall, Zhu Gaoxu couldn't help but interrupt and said: "Mr. Jiang, I seem to understand that it is inevitable to move from a tribal alliance to a dynasty."

"Yes, you are very smart."

After Jiang Xinghuo nodded slightly and praised the students, he continued: "After the Battle of Zhuolu, as time went by, the original tribal alliance could not adapt to the development of manufacturing power and began to organize into a more complex social structure. As a result, the dynasty emerged ”

"Then I would like to ask Mr. Jiang, since the tribal alliance formed a dynasty, why was the first dynasty established by Yu, who had great achievements in controlling floods, and not by Huang Di, who won the Battle of Zhuolu?"

"Actually, the reason is very simple. It is the development of the 'manufacturing power' I just mentioned."

Afraid that the other party would not understand, Jiang Xinghuo further explained: "You can temporarily understand 'manufacturing power' as 'the ability to grow food' because during the period before and after the establishment of the Xia Dynasty, the level of manufacturing power at that time reached , a level that can support a large number of rentier classes who are not engaged in production.”

Dao Yan murmured to himself: "Manufacturing power is temporarily understood as 'the ability to grow food'?"

From the bottom of my heart, I thought that Daoyan, who prided himself on being knowledgeable about Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism, would not bow to anyone in terms of intelligence and talent.

Even if the other party is a contemporary genius, a literary master, or a great Confucian, he will not be taken seriously by Dao Yan.

This is Daoyan's pride, and it has never been broken for decades.

However, Jiang Xinghuo's simple words today made Daoyan have a little doubt about himself.

If Jiang Xinghuo's previous plans on things like cutting down the vassal clan only made Dao Yan think that he was slightly inferior in a specific plan, but in other aspects, he was completely crushed.

So the current sentence "Manufacturing power is the ability to grow food" made Daoyan truly, for the first time, regard Jiang Xinghuo as a resourceful person who could be compared with himself.

There is no other reason. Only a wise man who has reached the level of Dao Yan can realize how subtle this sentence is!

Small words mean great things!

On the other side of the wall, Jiang Xinghuo's lecture continued: "The rentier class, that is, the nobility, the army, wizards, etc., these people are the first time that society has separated large-scale people who are not directly engaged in food production and collection. Classes are also classes that inevitably arise as a result of the division of labor in society. Some people are responsible for ruling, some are responsible for protecting, and some are responsible for belief. This is how the original dynasty was formed."

"Of course, the dynasty did not start with the inheritance system of brother to brother and son to father after death. Before the establishment of the Xia Dynasty, the ancestors also tried the abdication system."

"As for why the inheritance system replaced the abdication system, it is easier to understand why the family world of the later dynasties was formed from inheritance. Who, sitting in the position of emperor, would be willing to think that his son would not inherit the throne and go home to farm? ?”

"Or in other words, who sees his father becoming the emperor and is willing to go home and farm instead of becoming the emperor himself?"

As soon as these words came out, Zhu Di and Dao Yan, who were separated by a wall, fell silent.

Dao Yan, who came to the secret room for the first time to eavesdrop, found this one-way and transparent interaction very interesting. He smiled and asked: "Is your Majesty willing?"

Zhu Di shook his head and laughed, saying only: "Of course I don't want to."

Zhu Di was not willing to pass the throne to anyone who had no blood relationship, not to mention passing it to his brother or nephew.

I had worked so hard to fight against Emperor Jianwen's millions of Southern troops in the same capital in the north, and narrowly escaped death before ascending to the throne. Why should he pass it on to "outsiders"?

Dao Yan clapped his hands and laughed, but remained silent. He was thinking of the just-concluded battle for the throne.

So many people died and so much blood was shed, doesn’t it boil down to just four words?

——Striving to be the emperor.

As for Zhu Gaoxu's psychology outside the wall, it is even simpler.

I helped the old man bring down this world with one knife and one shot. I should inherit the throne. Why not let me inherit?

Anyone who does not allow me to inherit the throne is my enemy. Zhu Gaoxu has only one way to deal with his enemies: hack him to death.

"Definitely no one is willing." Zhu Gaoxu replied directly.

"So the dynasty of inheritance was born."

"That's what I'm telling you about, 'What is a dynasty?'"

Jiang Xinghuo opened the folding fan given to him by Zhu Gaoxu with a "pop" and leaned against the tree trunk to fan himself.

"The 'nature of dynasty' discussed next can truly answer the questions raised before."

Hearing this, several people inside and outside the wall all became serious in unison.

Zhu Gaoxu rubbed his rough hands in excitement and waited for Jiang Xinghuo's explanation.

Zhu Gaojiu's excitement was justified, because ever since he said that the excerpt was written by himself and was fully adopted by his father at the Mid-Autumn Festival Banquet, his third brother Zhu Gaosui was severely shocked and looked at his His eyes were full of adoration.

This kind of shock is like being the last one in the class and suddenly discovering that the second last person who was playing around with him suddenly came out on top in this exam.

Therefore, Zhu Gaoxu was looking forward to learning something new and shocking his ignorant third brother.

Tap the screen to use advanced tools Tip: You can use left and right keyboard keys to browse between chapters.

You'll Also Like