Chapter 46 Section 10 Zhu Yuanzhang's Utopia Exploration

Every nation has its own Utopia.The Chinese have a particularly long history of pursuing "one family under heaven".From "Book of Rites·Li Yun Pian" to "Book of Great Harmony", the intensity and consistency of collectivism and egalitarianism in the Chinese utopian dream have only been seen in world history. Zhu Yuanzhang, who grew up in a rural life, was particularly persistent in his utopian dream.Under the natural economy, the living conditions of the peasants are self-sufficient and self-sufficient.Yang Wanli, a poet of the Song Dynasty, drew a picture of farming and weaving: "The fields are cultivated during the day and the hemp is harvested at night. The children and grandchildren in the village are in charge of their families. The children and grandchildren are not released for farming and weaving. They also learn to grow melons in the shade of mulberry trees." If the weather is good, the rural life is full of peace and tranquility. serene.But this kind of small-scale production by one family is very fragile. When there are natural disasters and man-made disasters, the farmers with few surpluses often go bankrupt.

Zhu Yuanzhang has a deep understanding of this point.Since the political law in China is that "everything can be done with power", Zhu Yuanzhang now hopes to combine the huge power in his hands with the simplicity, kindness, and sense of mutual assistance of the peasants, so that the peasants can form a warm family. Make friends with each other, watch and help each other, and support each other when you are sick." Everyone lives a life of hard work and more than enough. "In this way, why are the rich and the poor suffering from inequality, why are there endless lawsuits, and why is the world suffering from death. There must be a reason for peace forever."

China's political tradition provides a possible platform for Zhu Yuanzhang to conduct utopian experiments, because planning and designing the lives of the people in the whole country is the right of an autocratic monarch. "Zhou Li" repeatedly said: "Only Wang Jianguo, the defense side is in the right position, the country is governed by the government, and the officials are divided into positions, and the people are the best." Every generation of great politicians, facing the world that they have conquered with their own swords, has a kind of desire. The urge to paint the latest and greatest pictures on it.

They regard themselves as talented artists, devoting their minds to creating magnificent art in this land that he has cut out as blank paper.In Huang Renyu's words, this is to "create an ideal mathematical formula first, and use the perfection and beauty of natural laws to cover the criss-crossed territory and the bustling millions of sentient beings... Where it doesn't work, we have to Discounted, high-sounding on the top, nameless on the bottom" ("Broadening the Horizon of History"). Xie Jin, a talented scholar in the early Ming Dynasty, once provided him with a perfect picture of a rural utopia.In "Ten Strategies for Peace", he proposed based on the records of "Zhou Li" that every two hundred families should be compiled into a "li" and live together. .Every "li" builds a rural club in the middle of the village, and selects young and virtuous old people to sit in the club to manage the affairs of the big family.Schools are set up on both sides of the clubhouse, where children over the age of 8 learn to deal with daily labor, etiquette and propriety, music, archery, royal (driving), books, and mathematics, and children over the age of 15 learn "Poetry", etc. Confucian classics.Adult men all go out to work in the morning to cultivate private or public fields, and in the evening after dinner, they go to school to learn morality and etiquette.There is a women's activity room at the back of the school, where women gather to work as textile and sewing women workers.

This blueprint is too perfect, of course Zhu Yuanzhang will not be so bookish, he absorbs the spirit of understanding Jin blueprint, revises this blueprint, and implements it in real life. In an ideal society, the social life of the people of the whole country should also be uniform under the command of the emperor. During the period of the People’s Commune, the members of the commune followed the unified orders of the captain when they went to work.Every morning, when the half of the railroad track hanging from the old tree at the head of the village is struck, the labor force of the whole village comes out of every household and goes to work in the field under the leadership of the team leader.Few people know that this is not an invention of the People's Commune.Six hundred years ago, in order to urge the people to produce, Zhu Yuanzhang had already come up with an extraordinary idea similar to today's Spring Plowing Production Mobilization Meeting.

Today's order is only for the elders in the villages to persuade the supervisors to set up a drum in each village. Whenever there is a farming season, the drum will be played at five o'clock, and everyone will go to the field after hearing the drum.Those who do not go to the field after asking questions from the elderly are responsible for the decision. They must be strictly supervised.If the old man refuses to supervise and advise, the peasants will be poor and embarrassed, and each will be punished for his crimes. ("Jiaomin Bangwen") is to order all the villages to set up big drums, and when the drums sound in the early morning, the whole village will gather in the fields and plow in time.If there is laziness, the old man will supervise and blame him.If Li Lao indulges and does not persuade and supervise, he will be severely punished.He also stipulated that those who do not respect the time and place of the people are "discussed as the law."

In an ideal society, every group should be full of mutual help spirit.Zhu Yuanzhang issued a proclamation of mutual aid among the villages: The people in the village range from rich to poor.Marriage death or injury, good or bad, etc., no one knows.From now on, every household in this village will give to each other when they encounter such things.And if a certain family's children get married, a certain family is poor, and it is difficult to manage for a while. If there are one household in one mile, each household may pay out one guan.Wouldn't it be a success to support in this way.In the future, a certain marriage will also follow this method, and will pay weekly in turn.Another example is that if a family or parents are killed or injured on the ground, each family may provide a certain amount of banknotes, or a certain amount of rice as a subsidy, the family or the coffin, or the monks and monks to build good fortune, etc., can all be used for financial assistance.If there is such a thing in a certain family in the future, it will also give to each other as in the previous method.Although it is a poor family, some small money and rice can also be taken care of.In this way, it will be easy for everyone to support each other. After a long time, the village will naturally be dear.

The "following the etiquette" that is causing headaches today is very likely to have originated from Zhu Yuanzhang. Based on the memory of the simple rural life, Zhu Yuanzhang also absorbed the beneficial nutrition in traditional culture and established the "rural drinking ceremony" system.This can be said to be Zhu Yuanzhang's creative use of relevant records in "Zhou Li".Every spring and autumn, villages around the country gather every hundred households as a unit, and at the drinking conference, the respected old people in the village lead the villagers to read the oath:

All the people in my same li, each abide by the etiquette and law, rely on the weak, and those who violate it will be ruled together first, and then passed on to the officials; if they are poor and have nothing to support, they will give their families a week.There is a lack of marriage and funeral, so I help each other as much as I can.Those who do not follow the crowd, and those who commit treachery, theft, fraud and all wrongdoing are not allowed to enter. Through such gatherings, oaths can be used to cultivate the collective consciousness and mutual assistance spirit of the people.The purpose of refusing those who have done bad things to join the association is to make them feel ashamed and resentful so that they can reform.

The utopia in Zhu Yuanzhang's thought is not limited to this, he even explored the mutual aid society.In the twenty-eighth year of Hongwu, he adopted the suggestion of Sui Ji, the Dian Shi of Shangyuan County, Yingtian Prefecture, and ordered the villagers to form a community of twenty or forty or fifty families. In the busy farming season, if anyone was sick, the whole society would work together. , to assist in its cultivation.As for the extent to which this system was implemented and the results of the exploration, there is no context in the history books.