Chapter 2 Mr. Cai Shaoqing and the Research on Chinese Secret Society
The study of secret societies is a wonderful flower in the field of Chinese social history research.Mr. Cai Shaoqing has been engaged in the research on the history of Chinese secret society for a long time, and is a well-known expert at home and abroad in the study of Chinese secret society and underworld.
Mr. Cai's research is represented by "Research on the History of the Chinese Modern Society" published by Zhonghua Book Company, which has been highly praised by the academic circle.From 1985 when I started my master’s degree under the tutelage of Mr. Cai, until 1992 when I left Nanjing University to study at the University of Tokyo in Japan, I worked as a graduate student and teaching assistant under Mr. Cai for about 7 years.Among the many graduate students of Mr. Cai, I was the first one to graduate. Although I often received the attention of Mr. Cai, but because of other distractions, I did not get started in the study of secret society history. I started to really engage in this research after arriving in Japan. thing.So far, although I have been immersed in this field for ten years, it is too small to fully evaluate Mr. Cai’s research on secret societies, and it is difficult to bear the responsibility. Slightly presumptuous.
In September 1984, when I just entered the fourth year of university, I decided to apply for a postgraduate entrance examination.Among the many famous scholars in the history department of Nanjing University, I chose to apply for Mr. Cai's postgraduate.When I told this idea to a classmate who was already in graduate school, the classmate told me that Mr. Cai is a well-known expert on party history. Students and scholars who come to study under Mr. Cai from all over the world and all over the country every year There are a lot of them, if you enter Mr. Cai's door, you will definitely gain a lot.However, I chose to apply for Mr. Cai's postgraduate examination not to study the history of the party/secret society, but to study the history of modern enlightenment thought.
The 1980s was the era when the trend of modernism was on the rise in China, and the "cultural craze" almost swept the entire academic world. I know that Mr. Cai and other teachers in the history department once compiled a 5-volume "Yan Fu Collection" on There is also a lot of experience and research on modern Chinese enlightenment thought, so I decided to apply for the graduate student in the history of modern enlightenment thought recruited by Mr. Cai.
At that time, Mr. Cai’s elective course was Party History of the Modern Society. After I decided to apply for a postgraduate entrance examination, I took this course.I remember that Mr. Cai will distribute photocopied papers and historical materials every time in class, which is very different from other elective courses I have taken, and it is refreshing.Many years later, when I was studying at the University of Tokyo in Japan, I learned that foreign university teachers always do this when they teach elective courses to senior undergraduates and graduate students. This has a silent effect on cultivating students to enter the academic field as soon as possible.During class, Mr. Cai often quotes widely, and the blackboard is always filled with beautiful blackboard writing; after class, he greets the students and encourages them to engage in research.Over time, I became a little interested in the study of the history of secret societies.However, I know that the study of the history of secret societies is not a simple subject. If nothing else, it is not easy to find credible historical materials. Stone, nothing, so I did not think to study this topic.On the eve of the registration exam, one day Mr. Cai suddenly told me that he would not recruit postgraduate students in the history of enlightenment thought, and hoped that I would take the postgraduate exam in party history instead, so I applied for Mr. Cai’s postgraduate course in party history.
Man is a product of his times.In the cultural atmosphere of modernism, unless one has a high degree of ideological self-awareness and determination, it is difficult to pay attention to civil society and culture quietly.To be honest, after I was admitted to the master's degree, I not only lacked confidence in the research society's party history/secret society history, but also had prejudices, thinking that researching elite social culture was more valuable.Therefore, when Mr. Cai went to the United States as a visiting scholar from 1986 to 1987, I changed the title of my master’s thesis without authorization, and changed the topic of the Gelaohui research that I had planned to do into a lesson plan research that reflected the conflict between Chinese and Western cultures in modern times.A year later, Mr. Cai returned to China, and I presented my finished master thesis in front of Mr. Cai, waiting for Mr. Cai’s criticism. Unexpectedly, Mr. Cai was very tolerant of my “deviant” behavior. He said that the teaching plan is a very important thing. Question, since you are interested in studying this topic, you might as well go deeper.To do a good job on this topic, it is not enough to read only Chinese materials, but also to read a lot of foreign language materials.In this way, this thesis was slightly revised and became my master's thesis. Mr. Cai also allowed me to defend and graduate early, which was a rare thing at that time.
Mr. Cai emphasized the importance of possession of historical materials and theoretical study.When I was doing my graduation thesis, Mr. Cai appointed me to read an English monograph on the secret societies of Southeast Asian Chinese in detail, and use this book as the center to comment on the research on secret societies abroad.
I worked very hard on my graduation thesis and was very unsuccessful, but I benefited a lot from it. First, I developed the habit of reading English monographs and materials, and second, I began to pay attention to the dynamics of international Chinese studies. In the mid-1980s, in the field of modern Chinese history research, there were very few teachers who could read foreign language materials, and even fewer teachers assigned students to read foreign language materials. In this regard, Mr. Cai can be regarded as a model.Although most of my academic works are written in Japanese, I still maintain the habit of reading a lot of English monographs and materials.
In 1992, I left Nanjing University to study in Japan, where I continued to study under Professor Yoshihisa Namiki at the University of Tokyo.A year later, I officially entered the PhD program.I remember that Professor Noki Yoshihisa and I had a conversation around the topic selection of the doctoral thesis.After listening to my research plan on conducting a comparative study of Christian acceptance in China, Japan and South Korea in modern times, Professor Namki said to me gently: You have studied under Professor Cai Shaoqing for a long time, and you have very good knowledge about the history of the Communist Party. Basics, how about choosing a topic in this area? After talking with Professor Namaki, I began to read works on Japanese secret society research, and then I gradually realized the weight of Professor Namiki’s words: If an international student wants to do research in a short time It is not an easy task to produce a high-level paper that is recognized by the mainstream of the academic world. Mr. Namki's tactful persuasion to study the issue of secret societies has a profound meaning, that is, he hopes that I will make use of my strengths and avoid weaknesses, and give full play to what I have learned from Mr. Cai. .
I have been paying attention to China studies in the United States and Japan for a long time, and I have a feeling that American China studies encourage intellectual adventures, are full of vitality, accumulate slowly and develop steadily;Mr. Cai's research on secret societies is well known in European, American and Japanese academic circles.I have read most of the research papers on secret societies in English, French and Japanese, and found that the citation rate of Mr. Cai's papers has always been high.After I went to study in Japan, the impression I got of Mr. Cai from books was verified by my personal experience. In December 1993, the Institute of Humanities at Kanagawa University in Japan invited me to give a report on the history of Chinese secret societies. At that time, I had only been in Japan for more than a year. The reason why the professors of the Institute kindly invited me to give a report is probably because they have preconceived ideas, thinking that a famous teacher produces a good student, and Mr. Cai's students must be masters of secret society research.
When I started my own research project, in order to collect information as much as possible, I interviewed several Japanese and Chinese secret society research experts.Professor Tadao Sakai, who is in his early 90s, is one of them. In the early summer of 1996, when Mr. Cai visited Japan, Professor Sakai, who had difficulty walking, came to visit Mr. Cai. The two of them got together and talked continuously for nearly 5 hours.Every time Professor Sakai calls me, he always asks about Mr. Cai's current situation, and is very concerned about whether Mr. Cai has any new books published. In 1998, when Professor Sakai compiled his previous research into a multi-volume "Works of Sakai Tadao" and published it, he specifically asked me to ask Mr. Cai to write a recommendation for the publication of his book.Professor Tadao Sakai is the first researcher on Chinese secret societies in Japan. His research on gangs and philanthropy has a high status in the international Chinese academic circles. He has been writing continuously. He asked Mr. Cai, who is more than 20 years younger than himself, to write a publication recommendation His resignation can be seen in his evaluation of Mr. Cai's research on secret societies.
All of the above are what I have seen and heard.So, what achievements has Mr. Cai made in the study of secret societies?No one will have any doubts about Mr. Cai's contribution to the study of secret societies.But how to evaluate?But people say different things, and each has its own standards. Even if they are both students of Mr. Cai, their understanding may not be unified.From my personal point of view, Mr. Cai’s contribution to the study of secret societies, generally speaking, opened up a new way of describing secret societies.Among Mr. Cai's many writings on secret societies, the most influential one was his paper "On the Origin of Tiandihui" published in 1962.The theory about the historical origin of the Tiandihui has long been entangled in the Tiandihui’s books and modern political discourse. People generally position the origin of the Tiandihui as “anti-Qing and restoring the Ming Dynasty”, and thus formed the narrative of the Tiandihui’s national revolution. .Before Mr. Cai's paper was published, this view dominated the academic circle for a century and a half.
The first to use the term "secret association" (secret association, secret society) was the Europeans in the early 19th century.The missionary Dr. Milne was the first to conduct research on the Tiandihui among overseas Chinese in Southeast Asia. After Milne's death in 1822, his research results were sorted out by another famous missionary, Dr. Morrison, and published in 1826.This article is of great significance to the description of the Tiandihui in European and American languages: first, it describes the history of the origin of the triad society (Tiandihui)/secret society based on the meeting scriptures; As a comparison, it has an obvious orientarism color.It can be said that Western works after the middle of the 19th century all follow this path of thinking, and the historical narrative of secret societies structured in this way has influenced European and American studies on China after World War II.
In the second half of the 19th century, the Japanese term "secret society" began to appear in Japanese writings, and its meaning is similar to that of "scret society" in Western languages.During the Meiji period, the Japanese Hirayama Shu, Munegata Kotaro and others investigated the Chinese secret society and left more detailed texts. Like the famous Miyazaki Toten, they all participated in Sun Yat-sen’s revolutionary struggle to overthrow the rule of the Qing Dynasty . In 1903, Ping Shanzhou published the article "Gelaohui" under a pseudonym, arguing that the Gelaohui was a "secret meeting" against the system, and its tradition can be traced back to the Han Dynasty. In 1911, Hirayama Zhou published "China's Revolutionary Party and Secret Association" (the Chinese name is the famous "History of China's Secret Society" Commercial Press, 1912 edition), pointing out that the Gelaohui, like the Tiandihui, was an organization that "anti-Qing and Fuming". In 1907, Zongfang Xiaotaro, who once rebelled with Wen Tang Caichang on his own, wrote the article "Secret Associations in China", in addition to introducing various secret associations such as the Gelaohui, Bailianjiao, Lianzhuanghui, Yanxiao, and Anqing Daoyouhui. He also mentioned the Gelaohui, and believed that "its purpose is to fight against the Qing Dynasty and restore the Ming Dynasty, to overthrow the Qing Dynasty, and to restore the Ming Dynasty."The understanding of Hirayama and Zongfang represented the mainstream of Japanese understanding of Chinese secret societies at that time, and had a decisive impact on the descriptions of secret societies such as Tiandihui and Gelaohui in Japanese.
The term "secret society" in Chinese was first seen in the article "New Guangdong" published by Ou Jiajia in Japan in 1901. In the article, brotherhood and folk religious sects with anti-system tendencies were called "secret society" and "secret society". ". In 1905, Sun Yat-sen drafted the "New Chapter Essentials of Zhigongtang" when he was reorganizing the overseas Zhigongtang, which included the words "secret society is flourishing because of it".In nationalist narratives, secret societies are portrayed as bearers of national revolutions.The anti-Qing revolutionaries skillfully integrated modern revolution and secret society in the same political context through regional discourse and Confucian revolutionary discourse. After the Japanese Kwantung Army launched the invasion of Northeast China in 1931, due to the actual needs of anti-Japanese nationalism, the rhetoric about the secret society as a "anti-Qing and Ming Dynasty" folk association once again attracted the attention of the world. The history of secret society nationalism The narrative is brought up again.The writings of historians Xiao Yishan and Luo Ergang affirmed and praised the nationalism of the secret society Tiandihui against alien invasion.Both of them are historians, so what they say naturally has certain textual basis.On the other hand, they are all strongly aware of the fact that China is being invaded by alien Japan, and they hope to encourage people to promote anti-Japanese nationalism by using the Tiandihui to "anti-Qing and restore the Ming Dynasty". tendency. In 1957, Xiao Yishan, while continuing to insist that the Tiandihui originated from "anti-Qing and restoring the Ming Dynasty", even quoted the story of the Tiandihui as a metaphor for the situation of the Kuomintang and the Communist Party in Taiwan and the mainland, trying to use the Tiandihui's "anti-Qing and restoring the Ming" to motivate the Kuomintang to counterattack mainland.
The significance of Mr. Cai’s thesis is that it is the first time to use a large number of original archives, not just the Tiandihuihui’s book to verify the origin of the Tiandihui. The point of view of the organization of "mutual aid in life" presents another point of view that is completely different from the definition of secret societies in the context of Europe, America, Japan, and China.Although there are still many scholars who disagree with Mr. Cai’s point of view, Mr. Cai’s initiative has been echoed and supplemented by Professor Qin Baoqi of Renmin University of China. Professor Qin’s hard work has made this point of view more and more popular. Academic support.From today’s standpoint, looking back at the debate on the origin of the Tiandihui, I personally feel that the significance of Mr. Cai’s article “On the Origin of the Tiandihui” is not to try to answer the question of what the Tiandihui is—the Tiandihui was created by the monk Hong Er in the It was founded in Zhangpu County, Fujian Province in the 26th year of Qianlong, but introduced another Tiandihui narrative method in terms of methodology, that is, to study the discourses surrounding Tiandihui/secret society in specific historical situations, so as to put The historical narrative of Tiandihui/Secret Society is constructed on the historical time and space that can be captured.
In the late 1970s, after the end of the "Cultural Revolution" and the Chinese academic circles began to "put order out of chaos", Mr. Cai ushered in his own academic spring.Mr. Cai has successively published a large number of treatises on secret societies, and built his research system on secret societies on the basis of inheritance and innovation.This system started from the first monograph on the history of the Chinese Communist Party, "Research on the History of the Modern Chinese Communist Party", and was supplemented by "Chinese Secret Society" (Zhejiang People's Publishing House, 1989 edition), which had a great impact on the study of secret societies. force.
In the book "Research on the History of the Chinese Modern Society", Mr. Cai gave an overall overview of the secret society and its historical evolution in modern China for the first time.He believes that the so-called secret society "is a kind of secret group that engages in special religious, social or political activities, has secret purposes and rituals, and competes against the government."Regarding the various associations with many names, Mr. Cai adopted the idea of dividing the Chinese secret society into two systems, that is, the party system with the Tiandihui and the Gelaohui as the main body, and the sect system with the White Lotus Sect as the main body. difference between the two systems. The book "Research on the History of Chinese Modern Congregational Parties" specifically divides congregational parties into urban and rural types, and discusses their functions, properties, and historical roles in detail.According to the role played by the secret society in the evolution of Chinese society and politics since modern times, Mr. Cai divides the secret society into seven periods—grasping the trajectory of the secret society within the existing research framework of modern general history.
(1) The first period (1761-1795) was the initial period of Tiandihui.In this part, it examines the early activities of the early Tiandihui, studies in detail the Lin Shuangwen Uprising in Taiwan from 1786 to 1788, and points out that the Qing Dynasty mobilized more than 100,000 troops from seven provinces to suppress the uprising.
The Lin Uprising was not only a large-scale uprising launched by the Hui Party of the Qing Dynasty in its history, but also an important factor that contributed to the transition of the Qing Dynasty from prosperity to decline.
(2) The second period (1796-1840) was the period when Tiandihui was widely spread.The organizational form of the Tiandihui has spread from Fujian and Taiwan to several southern provinces and Southeast Asia, and dozens of names have emerged, forming a complete alliance ceremony, mission system, organizational structure, and secret codes.Although large-scale party uprisings are rare, party uprisings of hundreds of people continue to occur.
(3) The third period (1840-1874) was a period in which congregations rose up one after another.
The textual research on the origin and development of the Gelaohui, the research on the relationship between the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom and the Tiandihui, and the research on the relationship between the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom and Zhaijiao reflect the activities and political features of the Hui Party during this period.While revealing the political role of the congregational party, Mr. Cai also pointed out that with the changes in regional politics and society during this period, there was a phenomenon of mutual integration and infiltration of the congregational party and religious sects.
(4) The fourth period (1874-1894) was the period when the Gelaohui in the Yangtze River Basin opposed "foreign religions".Regarding the relationship between the Gelaohui and the teaching plan during this period, Mr. Cai investigated the Yangtze River teaching case in 1891 and the anti-religious activities of Yu Dongchen in Sichuan. Awakening of consciousness.
(5) The fifth period (1894-1911) was the period when the Hui Party and the Revolutionary Party were in contact, and the Hui Party participated in the anti-Qing uprising.The book analyzed the relationship between the revolutionaries and the Congress Party through the two cases of Tang Caichang’s self-reliant army uprising and the Revolution of 1911, and pointed out that the relationship between the two was extremely fragile. After meeting the requirements of the party, the relationship between the two can only go to rupture.
(6) The sixth period (1912-1921) was a period of breakdown in the relationship between the Communist Party and the bourgeois revolutionaries.A notable event during this period was the repression of the Confederates by revolutionary regimes everywhere.At the same time, the movement of the party also showed a trend of diversification, some showed the backwardness of the proletarians, and some showed the appearance of conservative and restoration in politics.
(7) The seventh period (1921-1949) was a period in which the Chinese Communist Party adopted tactics of mobilization and suppression against secret societies in accordance with changes in revolutionary missions.For the first time, Mr. Cai systematically explored the complex relationship between the two, which is of great help in revealing the origin of the Chinese revolution.
Finally, there is another important research in this book, that is, the research on the secret society in the Chinese society in Southeast Asia. This is also the first research on this topic by Chinese scholars.What needs to be added is that in recent years, Mr. Cai has paid close attention to the secret social networks of overseas Chinese societies. His research has expanded from Southeast Asia to Australia. His recent paper published in "Jianghai Academic Journal" is a brand new start.
As the first monograph on the history of the society written by Chinese scholars, "Research on the History of the Party in Modern China" laid an important cornerstone in the study of the history of secret societies. Since then, most of the works on secret societies published have followed Mr. Cai's Secret society research system.Thanks to these studies, the secret society is no longer just a history of peddlers and lower Liba people. In the words of the late Mr. Chen Xulu, the party organization is the third civil society in Chinese society besides the clan organization in the village and the guild organization in the town. organize.
"Research on the History of the Chinese Modern Society" mainly studies the history of the secret society, and does not do special research on the issue of secret religion.If you don't write about secret religions, you can't build an overall picture of China's secret society if you only write about the party.In view of this, Mr. Cai completed another book "Chinese Secret Society", which introduced the whole picture of the entire Chinese secret society in a more comprehensive and simple way. So far, the academic circle has another complete monograph on secret societies.Through these two monographs, Mr. Cai built his own research system on secret societies.This research system has been further expanded and reflected in the "Chinese Secret Society Series" edited by him and published by Jiangsu People's Publishing House.
Mr. Cai's research on secret societies contributed to the recognition of the importance of secret societies in the entire Chinese academic circle, and also contributed to the development of international Chinese studies.Mr. Cai's view that the Tiandihui originated from the "mutual assistance in life" of the people was echoed in the enthusiasm for research on popular culture that emerged in the American Sinology in the second half of the 1980s.In D. Ownby's collection of essays on Tiandihui, triads, and corporations in South China and Southeast Asia, scholars generally tend to oppose simply viewing such associations as anti-system civil organizations.Wang Dawei believes that different surname worship, associations, secret associations, and companies are cultural phenomena, and their complicated rituals and political postures are a manifestation of a non-elite society.This understanding can be said to indicate that Western writings have abandoned the previous narrative of secret societies, and thus has an extremely important meaning of discourse transformation.Regrettably, because the author positions secret associations as the existence of non-elite society, he ignores the role of secret associations as a knot in the interpersonal network of Chinese society.In my series of Japanese treatises, in the spirit of studying the discourses surrounding the secret society in specific historical situations, I further put forward my superficial views on the secret society.
For a long time, the study of secret societies has been a "heresy" in Chinese studies. The ignorance and prejudice of Chinese scholars about their own history have led to the underdevelopment of this discipline.On the contrary, in Europe, America and Japan, many scholars faced difficulties and rushed to study the issue of secret societies. The reasons for this are as follows: First, in their opinion, the phenomenon of secret societies in China is an extremely rare phenomenon in the history of Europe, America and Japan. Why did China Will there be so many secret societies? They try to solve the mystery of Chinese social structure by studying secret societies.Second, based on the discussion of the reasons for the victory of the Chinese communist revolution after the war, scholars tried to find the social basis of the Chinese revolution from the "rebellion-revolution" relationship chain of the secret society. Since the 1960s, this issue has been It has always been a question that puzzled Western scholars such as Schram.Therefore, when the study of secret societies was still a "Cinderella" in Chinese academic circles, Mr. Cai's research received extensive attention from overseas academic circles.
Significantly, at the end of the 1990s, Mr. Cai became the focus of the domestic media. An article "Anti-crime must first fight corruption" made Mr. Cai's research out of the ivory tower, and Mr. Cai became a A public figure is an expert on China's contemporary underworld issues that people are concerned about.Based on the media reports on Mr. Cai published on the Internet that I browse from time to time, I feel that the domestic media's understanding of Mr. Cai's research is very biased.The previous article has touched on the origin of the discourse of secret societies. I think Mr. Cai’s research on the origin of the Tiandihui is actually to distinguish the secret society as a historical phenomenon from the secret society as a historical narrative.The folk associations known as secret societies have different forms and properties. The reason why they exist widely in Chinese society is determined by the diversity of Chinese society. The secret societies in historical narratives, no matter they appear in normal In the context of heresy (orthodoxy and heresy) or science and superstition, modernity and tradition, revolution and counter-revolution, it can be said that both are products of ideology.When we use the term "secret society", we should distinguish "underworld" from "secret society". Although secret societies were banned by the old government in past Chinese history, they were not necessarily criminal organizations. Today's China is a criminal organization.Mr. Cai is not only an expert on secret society issues, but also an expert on underworld issues. The two are related, but they are not completely the same thing. History and reality are not a linear relationship without twists and turns.Some media confuse the two, which not only damages Mr. Cai's status in the study of Chinese secret societies, but also discredits many Chinese civil secret society organizations, and further discredits Chinese history.As a late student who studies the history of Chinese secret societies, I am deeply afraid of the one-sided media hype.
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