About 4,600 years ago, the war between the Huangdi tribe, the Yandi tribe and the Chiyou tribe in Zhuolu created the Chinese nation that integrates the Qiang, Yi, Miao, Li clan tribes and other clan tribe groups with the Yanhuang tribe as the core. After Huangdi, the leader of the Chinese tribal alliance was inherited in the form of abdication: Huangdi abdicated in the Ying surname Shaohao ; Shaohao abdicated in the Huangdi grandson Zhuanxu ; the throne after Zhuanxu was inherited by Zhuanxu son Emperor Ku ; the throne of Emperor Ku was located in the son Emperor Zhi ; Emperor Zhi was located in the half-bdicated in the surname Yi Qi; Yao Abdicated in the surname Yao; Shun Abdicated in the surname Si Yu .
During this period, the leader of the tribal alliance was not necessarily passed down between fathers and sons of the same surname. This system of inheritance of chief status is called abdication. This period is called the "Public World" era. According to legend, during the reign of Yao, he lived in thatched huts and ate brown rice like his tribes. He wore thick hut clothes in summer and only added one piece of deer-skin to keep warm in winter. He would never change his clothes and shoes until they were torn. Yao's spirit of thrift and sharing weal and woe with the people makes the people support him very much. Yao has to start considering the issue of his heirs when he gets older.
At that time, someone recommended Yao's son Danzhu to succeed, but Yao thought his son was too rough and could not convince the public, so he convened a tribal alliance council to let everyone discuss the issue of heir selection. At the beginning, everyone recommended Gun from the Xia tribe. In order to verify whether Gun had the ability to be the leader, Yao asked him to control the flood. Although Gun tried every means to try to block the flood, he still found nothing in the end. Yao exiled Gun, who was unable to do things, and then asked everyone to discuss the heir again. This time everyone recommended Shun, and Yao then conducted a three-year inspection on Shun.
Shun is regarded as the originator of Chinese moral culture. "Records of the Grand Historian" records this: "The virtues of the world all start from Yu Shun ." Although Shun is the descendant of Zhuanxu , their family has become the fifth generation of common people . Shun's mother died when he was very young. Shun's father 小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小小� Since remarried, the blind man has always favored the birth of his wife and the image of his wife. Shun is often excluded by his father, stepmother and younger brother Xiang at home. However, Shun is filial to his parents and is very friendly to his younger brother.
According to legend, Shun was famous for his filial piety at the age of 20. When Yao asked everyone to elect his heir, Shun was recommended. Yao married his two daughters to Shun to examine his character and ability. Shun not only allowed the two girls to live in harmony with the whole family, but also showed outstanding talents and noble personality power in all aspects. As long as Shun works, the trend of courtesy has emerged. No matter where he went, there were people following him, so "in one year he lived in a gathering (climbing is a village), in a town he became a town in the second year, and in a third year he became a capital (four counties were capitals)." After learning about these situations, Yao gave Shun a robe (small robe), piano, cattle and sheep, and warehouse.
Shun received these rewards and aroused the jealousy of Wusou, Wusou's backwife and Xiang. They gathered together to discuss killing Shun and occupying the property. Wusou asked Shun to repair the roof of the warehouse, but set fire to the warehouse below. Shun survived the disaster by jumping from the room with two hats as wings. Later, Wusou asked Shun to dig a well, but after the well was dug very deep, Wusou and Xiang filled the soil on it. They wanted to use this trick to bury Shun alive in the well. Shun dug a passage next to the wellbore and ran out. After this incident, Shun was as filial to his parents and friends as always, and was more sincere and cautious than before.
After Yao finished his investigation of Shun, he officially passed the position of leader to Shun. During Shun's reign, he allowed 8 yuan to manage land, 8 Kai to regulate education, civil affairs, mountains, forests, rivers, Boyi to manage sacrifices, and Gao Yao to punish him, thus improving the social management system.During the reign of Yao and Shun, they joined forces with friendly countries to fight against barbarians from all directions, formulated calendars internally, promoted farming, and rectified officials. What bothers them was that the Central Plains was flooded and the people were displaced. Yao once asked Gun to take charge of the flood. Gun tried every means to try to block the flood but was always futile. After Gun's failure, Gun's son Yu took over the responsibility of flood control for his father.
Yu changed his father's method of blocking floods and instead took advantage of the situation to guide the river channel. According to legend, Yu passed by his house three times during the flood control period and did not enter: When he first passed by the house, he heard his wife's moans during childbirth and the baby's crying, but he did not enter because he was afraid of delaying the flood control period. The second time he passed by the house, his son waved to him in his wife's arms, but Yu just waved his hand and greeted him and walked over. When he passed by the house for the third time, his son, who was over 10 years old, ran over and pulled him home hard. He stroked his son's head affectionately and told him: "The water has not been cured, and he has no time to go home."
Yu finally completed the great cause of water control after 13 years of hard work. In the process of controlling the flood, Yu divided the world into Ji, Yan, Qing, Xu, Yang, Jing, Yu, Liang and Yong according to the situation of mountains and rivers to manage it. Water control is a task that requires extremely high manpower, material resources and financial resources. Therefore, Yu formed a scheduling mechanism for various resources in the process of flood control. Because Yu freed the people from the rampant flood, the people supported this water control hero from the bottom of their hearts. The flood control allowed Yu to gain the hearts of the people, gain the right to dispatch various resources, and be familiar with the mountains and rivers of the world.
Yu was able to become the new leader of the Chinese Tribal Alliance after Shun abdicated. When Yu gets older, he will elect a new leader as usual. Everyone recommended Boyi , who was successful in assisting Dayu to control floods, but after Yu's death, Yu's son Qi directly took the throne. Xia Dynasty As the first hereditary dynasty in Chinese history, it was born. From then on, the hereditary system of the throne replaced the abdication system, and the "public world" became the "family world". The throne will be passed down from then on in Xia Qi's family for generations, and people from other tribes will no longer have the chance to be with the throne.
This will of course cause opposition from other tribes who feel that their interests are damaged, but everyone still has to claim their own weight. During the reign of Yu, the Xia tribe had accumulated a large amount of private property. The Xia tribe used these properties to hire warriors to form a powerful armed force. Everyone mostly verbally opposed the attack on the Xia Qi's throne and then let it go after it was invalid. But there was a tribe called Youhu clan who insisted on using force to oppose Xia Qi's destruction of the abdication system. Youhu clan didn't join the Huaxia Tribal Alliance for a long time: when Dayu was reigned, he had conquered the Youhu clan.
After the defeat in the war, Youhu family had to join the Huaxia Tribal Alliance as a vassal. It is precisely because the Youhu family joined the Huaxia Tribal Alliance during the Dayu period that many old members of the Tribal Alliance still regard it as barbarians. Qi used this to shape himself into Chinese orthodox - he claimed that he inherited his father's will and continued to conquer the Youhu clan. Through this kind of political propaganda, Qi indeed won the support of many tribes, so he was able to defeat the Youhu clan in a place called Gan. After the Youhu clan was wiped out, he returned to Yangdi, the capital, and summoned the leaders of various tribes to hold a alliance meeting.
The so-called alliance is to gather everyone to worship the ancestors of heaven and earth, and at the same time, the convener will also hold a banquet to entertain guests who come to the meeting. This may be the first time in Chinese history that has been written into official history. Xia Qi made the leaders of various tribes recognize their status as the common ruler of the world at this dinner called " Juntai Enjoyment". The core essence of the "public world" era before this was to realize the alternation of power of the wise and capable people through abdication. In " Book of Rites ", "The way of the great way is the public. Selecting the wise and capable, and pursuing faith and harmony" refers to this state. At this time, who is the boss is elected by everyone.
Everyone recommends whoever thinks is virtuous, and everyone thinks is virtuous and dismisses whoever thinks is not virtuous. This seems fair and reasonable, but social affairs become complicated with the development of productivity. It is becoming increasingly difficult for people to reach broad consensus on the evaluation criteria of "savvy". The primitive clan tribes' demands for survival far exceed their demands for development: whoever can lead the tribe to grab more territory and get more food is the unscrupulous wise man. For example, Dayu's behavior of controlling floods and leading troops to attack Sanmiao was regarded as a virtuous act by his clan members. But when the survival problem is basically solved, a variety of demands arise.
When I can have enough food today, I think I can eat fish and meat tomorrow; when I can wear clothes today, I think I can design more novel styles... Different people have different demands for their lives. People with different demands naturally have different judgments on the virtuous and the unvirtuous. Since there is no set of objective standards that can be accurately quantified between virtuous and unvirtuous, anyone will feel that their family looks the most virtuous. The abdication system was originally designed to achieve the goal of appointing people to be based on merit, but with the development of the times, it gradually became a nepotism. This is because human nature determines that normal people will be more willing to push their families to the top.
Human nature determines that the abdication system held by "public world" makes the rulers lack the driving force to transform the world. Mencius once said: "Those who have constant property have perseverance, and those who have no permanent property have no perseverance." Some people strive for political achievements in order to gain power, but after getting what they want, they will strive for peace of mind. After all, reform and development are all about risk. Under the premise of abdication system, the tribal leader must ultimately hand over his power and status to people of other surnames no matter what political achievements he has. I worked diligently and I still don’t know who I worked hard for and who I was busy for. But what if the ruler's power and status can be passed on to his son? In the end, human selfish desires overcome the expectation of fairness.
