"Jin Ping Mei" is a novel that fully expresses "human desires". This is a common understanding of most commentators since the present, and it is also an indisputable fact. But there are opinions on this kind of human desire.
Of course, those orthodox feudal literati of the Ming and Qing dynasties completely denyed it by their description of human desire (mainly sexual desire). During the ten-year catastrophe, it was banned for the same reason. Today, it seems not to be a lesson, but since the 1980s, another bias has appeared in the evaluation of this issue, that is, the complete affirmation of the writing and ink expressing human desires in the novel.
The starting point of these theorists is obviously to speak out for the experience of this famous work and has been misunderstood by the world for a long time. However, it is necessary to correct the mistakes, and over-regulation may lead to another extreme and may produce unpredictable side effects.
Because the description of human desire in "Jin Ping Mei" has been a sensitive issue in the research of "Jin Xue" in history and also involves the objective evaluation of this "strange book", the analysis of this issue is particularly necessary and important.
(I) Human desire to describe and analyze
A history of human civilization, in a sense, can be said to be a history of human desires constantly escalating and satisfying through human wisdom and hard work. Continuously changing the status quo and moving towards a higher civilization are inevitable trends in the development of human society.
"If a person has no desire or desire, he will not become a human being.... If a person is indifferent to everything around him, has no desire, and is complacent, he will not become a living creature of society." [1]
Marx divided human needs into two levels: "natural needs" and "needs created by society", thereby affirming human desires.
We do not deny the inherent natural attributes of human beings as living things, but we should pay more attention to the social attributes of human beings, because this is the fundamental sign that distinguishes others from other animals.
In social practice activities, humans will inevitably have various desires and have extremely different goals and urgent needs.
For those ancient Chinese philosophers who have been famous throughout the ages, Confucius and Mencius' ideals are certainly the embodiment of the ideal personality pursuit of Confucianism; Laozi and Zhuang's escape from the world, forgetting both things and self, advocating nature, transcending the realm of life and death, isn't it a manifestation of the desire to pursue absolute freedom?
People have nothing to ask for, and they will inevitably be mediocre and useless; society has no desires, and they will lose their vitality for development and progress. But the crux of the problem is: is this desire itself progressive or decayed? Will it promote the sound development of society? What methods should be adopted and what means should be used to satisfy and achieve? This is the basic foothold for evaluating "human desire".
"The Holy Family" book seal
human being evolved from animals.
"The fact that humans come from animals has determined that humans can never completely get rid of animal nature, so the problem can always be to get rid of more or less, and the difference in the degree of animal nature or human nature." [2]
Humans are the sum of social relations. The fundamental difference between humans and animals lies in their social attributes. Not to mention that Confucianism has always attached great importance to human social attributes, and that is, the Taoist school of thought that it is to "communicate with the spirit of heaven and earth alone" to resist social norms, cannot transcend the world and "be with the secular world" (" Zhuangzi·World ").
legitimate rational norms, whether they are mandatory constraint mechanisms such as laws and systems, or non-mandatory constraint mechanisms such as ethics and morality, are necessary conditions for maintaining social stability and promoting social development.
The natural nature and instinct satisfaction of human beings must consciously or be forced to achieve coordination and unity with reasonable rational norms.
Civilized society is a huge progress than barbaric society. The establishment and improvement of legitimate social constraint mechanisms are also an important yardstick for distinguishing civilization from barbarism, human nature and animal nature. Marx said:
"Eating, drinking, sexual behavior, etc. are certainly also the functions of real people.But if these functions are separated from other human activities and made them the last and only ultimate end, then in this abstraction, they are the functions of animals. ”[3]
The pursuit of enjoyment in material life such as clothing, food, housing, transportation, etc. is certainly a human instinct, but this instinct is only worthy of recognition only when it is satisfied in the practice of transforming the objective world; more importantly, this instinct satisfaction is by no means the only and ultimate purpose of human beings, but to further understand and transform the objective world.
's desire for the opposite sex and sexual satisfaction are the common characteristics of human beings; but for human beings, this satisfaction can only be combined with the social attributes of human beings to prevent human nature from degrading. It is animal nature, which makes people degenerate into animals. The human desires described in "Jin Ping Mei Cihua" - material desires and lust have not risen to the height of human social practice rationality in many cases, but are more of the catharsis of human biological instincts, the mixture of human nature and animal nature, and even the regression of human nature to animal nature, which is a kind of loss of human "nature".
This is a kind of imagery of several major characters created by novels such as Ximen Qing , Pan Jinlian , Li Ping'er, Pang Chunmei, etc. can be proved.
Ximen Qing in the novel is a "bastard" full of animal nature and the great achievements of all sins[4]. What he pursued throughout his life was "vulgar greed, rough lust, and humble material desires".
He "was originally a rich man in Qinghe County, and opened a raw medicine shop in front of the county gate." He was not doing his job since he was a child. After making a few bad money, he "took to take charge of some official affairs in the county, took money with others, and transferred to officials, so everyone in the county was afraid of him"[6]. At this time, he was completely a gangster.
He used all means to seize wealth: he cheated and married the wealthy business widow who "had a penny of good money in his hand", and got thousands of taels of silver; he seduced one of the ten brothers, Li Ping'er, the wife of Hua Zixu, took advantage of Hua Zixu's lawsuit, not only embezzled 3,000 taels of silver, as well as valuable property, but also pirated Hua Zixu to death, and even his wife Li Ping'er took advantage of his life;
In-law Chen Hong was in trouble in the court, and his son-in-law Chen Jing brought his furniture to his father-in-law's house to avoid disaster, so this property was naturally named "Ximen".
Dai Dunbang painted · Hua Zixu
In addition to these few extra money, another way he pursued his desire for money was to bribe the officials, corruption and abuse the law, and seize ill-gotten wealth:
In the case of Miao Qing killing the master, Miao Qing gave him 1,000 taels of silver through Wang Liu'er, and he made the murderer get away with the crime; he also used the despicable means of hiring prostitutes to accompany him to make the salt inspector Cai Yiquan, the salt inspector, hiring the Huai Yan 30,000 yuan he had obtained a month earlier than other merchants, which made him make a fortune.
In addition, he also relies on his power in his business, speculation, tax evasion, low-priced and expensive sales, and loans for usury. In short, his sudden wealth was based on dirty deals and the blood, tears and bones of the weak.
In the officialdom, Ximen Qing colluded with a group of ruthless and honest bureaucrats, using his power for personal gain and doing everything he could. It reflects the filth of the feudal officialdom and the defeat of corrupt politics in him.
In terms of sexual life, he has completely become a male animal full of animality. In order to possess Pan Jinlian, he bribed the government and killed people; in order to marry Li Ping'er, he took advantage of the situation to rob Hua Zixu to death; in order to trait Song Huilian, he set up a trap and sent Lai Wang'er to the death.
One wife and five concubines could not satisfy his lust. He raped maids and maids such as Chunmei, Xiuchun, Yingchun, and Lanxiang, playing with wives and family wives such as Wang Liuer, Ye Wuer, Ruyier, Huiyuan, and other friends; Li Guijie, Zheng Aiyue, and Wu Yiner who occupied the brothel; he raped Mrs. Lin in the Xuanfu, and ruined the child servants.
Not only does he have a strong possessive desire for women, but he often seeks his own physiological pleasure in the destruction and ravage of women and gets psychological satisfaction in the painful moans of women.
There is no equality of love between men and women, and it has nothing to do with the communication between the soul and the integration of emotions.
Some commentators believe that Ximen Qing still has some true feelings for Li Ping'er, the main basis is that after Li Ping'er's death, Ximen Qing was in pain and cried out for what he lost. Li Ping'er herself still "what did she do in vain"[7], and also organized funerals for her major events, leaving her true face, commemoration and accompanying her spirits.
However, through the entire description of the novel, we will know that there is another reason for this artificial style. Although Li Ping'er's death was due to Pan Jinlian's plot, Li Ping'er's illness was due to Ximen Qing's forced sexual abuse and torture during her period (Chapter 50).
The truth about Ximen Qing pretending and crying loudly is Dai'an, the close servant who is known as the worm in Ximen Qing's stomach, said in a word: "Why does my father feel pain in his heart? It doesn't care about people, it feels like money." [8] This is the truth.
What is even more ironic is that Li Ping'er's body was not cold. Ximen Qing used the excuse of accompanying the spirit to pull the wet nurse Ruyi'er into the quilt in front of the spirit, and was full of lust, causing the lewd voice to "listen to several rooms" in "night quiet", and said to Ruyi'er: "I hug you, just like sleeping with him (referring to Li Ping'er)." [9]
We can't see Ximen Qing's human nature at all. He is simply a wild beast in the estrus.
In short, Ximen Qing's greed for money is no essential difference from the clever and the feudal ruling class; his destruction and playfulness of women is no different from the debauchery of the feudal bureaucratic class.
In him, it not only reflects the bad nature of the feudal class, but also reflects the viciousness of the profiteering businessmen, and is also mixed with the rogue characteristics of gangsters and gangsters.
Greed, lust, material desire, and power desire constitute the entire content of his life; seeking the satisfaction of carnal sensuality and the pleasure of material life by any means is the ultimate goal of his life.
Ximen Qing's licentious life reflects the corruption of the feudal apocalypse, and is a typical portrayal of the "end of the century" with spiritual emptiness, depravity, no ideals, and dying.
"Jin Ping Mei" illustration
Pan Jinlian is one of the women with the author's most intriguing.
She is a person with a deformed personality of lewd, selfish, jealous and vicious extreme egoism created by this deformed era of late Ming society.
Her life journey was completed in a hurry through the torture and pursuit of sexual desire, wealth desire, and desire to make a name for others.
She calculated everything for the satisfaction of desire and was finally buried in the ocean of selfish desires; she was a person worthy of cursing, and another unfortunate burial object.
Pan Jinlian was smart and beautiful since childhood, but unfortunately had a tragic fate. At the age of nine, she was sold to Wangzhao Xuanfu to learn to play and sing, and became a female slave to relieve her. Later, she lost to Zhang Dahu at the price of thirty taels of silver. In order to continue to possess her, Zhang Dahu in the whole family actually rewarded her to Wu Dalang , who is cowardly, wretched, and nicknamed "three inches of ditches, bark of valley".
Wu Zhi 's ugly and vulgar appearance makes her sexually hungry for a long time; the livelihood shoulder pole that cannot be starved but cannot bear to sell cooked cakes is far from meeting her material desires and pleasure requirements; especially Wu Dalang's cowardice and incompetence, which has led to a group of prodigal children often throwing bricks and tiles at the door of their homes. Not to mention the situation, even living a peaceful life has become a luxury.
If her unfortunate experience reflects the sins of society and is worthy of people's sympathy, then to satisfy her lust, she cruelly killed her husband with the same fate as her, which means the disappearance of human nature in her.
Especially after she became Ximen Qing's fifth concubine, her extreme egoism, which was sold several times and was transformed into a bureaucratic landlord's house, expanded rapidly and became the master of all her behavior.
In order to exclusively occupy the bed, Pan Jinlian tried her best.She was servile to Ximen Qing, provoked the relationship between Wu Yueniang and Ximen Qing, rejected and framed the same unfortunate Sun Xue'e, instigated Sun Xue'e to fight with Song Huilian, instigated Ximen Qing to deport Lai Wanger;
When lust is not satisfied, she often tortured Qiuju cruelly and found psychological balance amid the cry of the maid; later she became obscene, stole the boy, and was treacherous, and treacherous Wang Chao.
In order to satisfy material desires, she was willing to let Ximen Qing gossip for Li Ping'er when she was adulterous. In order to catch Ximen Qing to strengthen her favor and satisfy her vanity, she even deliberately let Ximen Qing rape her maid Chunmei, let Ximen Qing cut off her hair and please the prostitute Li Guijie, and would rather let Ximen Qing and Song Huilian "get along" with her biological mother again and again; she ridicule and even curse her; train her ferocious cats to kill Li Ping'er and her son; she lost her personality, and actually used the method of drinking urinary semen to cater and satisfy Ximen Qing's stubborn heart.
In short, Pan Jinlian is a typical example of completely losing her etiquette, righteousness, integrity, and shame, building her desire satisfaction on the pain of others, and transforming from a weak person who has been insulted and damaged into a typical example of depravity, cruelty, lewdness, selfishness, meanness, and jealousy.
We can evaluate this image and see from her the sins caused by the deformed society and how that society leads a soul to the path of depravity. But affirming the objective significance of this image does not mean recognition and acquiescent to what it does!
cartoon version of characters · Pan Jinlian
Some people believe that Li Ping'er in "Jin Ping Mei" is a successful artistic image created by the author. His creative intention is to tell people:
People have the nature of pursuing 'lust', and this desire to pursue 'lust' is very strong. Only when it feels satisfied can people feel refreshed and happy. Otherwise, The mind feels very depressed and painful.
All of this is the normal desire of a natural and material person, which forms a sharp contrast with the decaying society that is about to decline. ”[10]
Not to mention whether the author’s intention to shape this image is realistic, just what Li Ping'er does seems to be inconsistent with that decaying society.
Li Ping'er married four times in her life. At first she was the concubine of Liang Zhongshu, and her works were just a few words; at the second she was Hua Zixu's wife, but at this time she was actually controlled by the eunuch Hua on the one hand, and on the other hand, she formed an affair with the eunuch to deal with Hua Zixu. As she said to Ximen Qing, she often "swears to the head of a swearing head, and she said it to her father-in-law that she would not be considered a human being if she wanted to hit a white stick." "I would not be involved in him (referring to Hua Zixu) at any time" (Chapter 17), which shows that her personality is vicious.
Later, she and Ximen Qing became a rape, comparing him to "the medicine of a doctor slave". It was obvious that Ximen Qing had fulfilled her long-term suppressed sexual desire in terms of physiology.
If Li Ping'er, in the bookkeeper of Liang Zhong, was very jealous of his wife, and was not able to meet normal physiological needs, she still deserves sympathy for her husband to take the lawsuit, then she took the blame when her husband was abandoned by Ximen Qing and was unbearable and lingering in her sick bed. When she took the initiative to marry Jiang Zhushan, she was unforgivable to repay Jiang Eng's revenge just because Jiang Zhushan could not satisfy her sexual desire.
Li Ping'er exchanged with Ximen Qing's material desires with her own lust, and finally died under the attack of Ximen Qing's sexual destruction and the attack of the golden lotus open gun and hidden arrows.
Her tragedy began with lust and ended with lust. The work creates this image, revealing the unreasonable marriage system and the unfortunate status of women at that time, but as far as Li Ping'er's own actions are concerned, they have absolutely not risen to an anti-feudal height.
Dai Dunbang painted by Li Pinger
As we all know, the era when "Jin Ping Mei" was born was an era where people wanted to flow.From the palace ban gardens to the market, material desires and lust are flooded, and the world is in ruins and degenerates.
The emperor's stupidity is rare in history. "When Chenghua , the alchemist Li Ziseng Jixiao had already been very expensive for offering the art of the room. He went to Jiajing and Tao Zhongwen for red lead and was lucky to Shizong . He was promoted to the special promotion of Guanglu Dafu, the young master of the country, and the young master of the Ministry of Rites Gong Chengbo.
So the declining trend gradually became the scholars. The chief censor Shengduanming governor Gu Kexue started his career as a Jinshi, and all used the 'Autumn Stone Form' to reach the throne." [11]
Shenzong 0,000 Emperor Li was criticized by his ministers for "alcohol, sex, wealth and energy" and was not cured by medicine and stones. The debauchery of the princes is even more than that. In official history, there are records of their ugly deeds of "carrying prostitutes, and having sex with naked men and women. Those who are offending from the left and right will be killed immediately after being slapped with an axe, or being burned with a gun" [12].
Even political reformers who are quite successful in Zhang Juzheng are suspected of losing their lives for lust [13]. The feudal talents even said that "two families had a banquet, men and women sat in a mixed manner, and the words of the silence of tassels and candles were spread to the capital"[14].
extends to the public society, which is a comparison of habits and results in the upward and downward. This dirty atmosphere is obviously a turbid current in the feudal apocalypse, and it is also the result of the poisoning of the feudal rulers' declining lifestyle.
The simple and endless greedy pursuit of wealth and lust in the protagonists described in "Jin Ping Mei" is a manifestation of the vulgar life interests of the citizens and the corrupt feudal society.
People should be the master of themselves and the admirer of a happy life. Everyone has the right to pursue wealth and obtain physical pleasure, there is no doubt about this book. But the crux of the problem lies in what kind of pursuit methods and acquisition methods are adopted.
In "Jin Ping Hui", a person's grabbing wealth is often accompanied by the blood, tears and life of others; and his pursuit and satisfaction of "lust" is even more pathological, such as incest sexual intercourse, master and servant sex, seeking favor with sex, lust, taking aphrodisiacs to make lust, and taking aphrodisiacs to make lustful devices, and most of them are dirty behaviors that are incompatible with normal sex.
Often at this time, the normal human nature of the character is lost, the true feelings are destroyed, there is no psychological and emotional compatibility between the two sexes, a higher level of spiritual experience, the sublimation of the emotions from flesh to spirit, only the attraction of animal-like flesh, and the satisfaction of vulgar sensory.
These descriptions naturally did not rise to the artistic realm with an aesthetic level, but became a vulgar exhibition of sexual organs, sexual postures, sexual tools, and sexual processes.
This kind of pursuit of "wealth desire" and "lust" is itself a denial of human self and a blasphemy of human happiness.
It not only runs contrary to the proposition of personality liberation based on personality self-reliance, but also means the decline of humans to animals, the social value of humans and the loss of the essence of human beings.
So, what is the meaning of human desire to describe itself in "Jin Ping Mei"? We say that this description appeared in the dark era of Neo-Confucianism cruelly imprisoning people's normal desires in the middle of the 16th century. All human desires and even human rights to survive were curbed.
, but "Jin Ping Mei" did the opposite, exaggerating the world's greed for wealth and lust. Although the pursuit of life did not be included in the healthy and normal track in the writing, it did not rise to the realm of poetry, but went to the extreme of rendering the natural attributes of man.
, this full display of human instinct is actually a deformed resistance and objective reaction to the alienated world, and even objectively contains the meaning of philosophical criticism of "preserving principles and excluding desires".
At the same time, from the group image created by the author and a series of typical plot events, we can see the social style and the appearance of all living beings at the end of the 16th century. Although these images themselves are ugly, this does not exclude the affirmative value and aesthetic significance they contain.
What is more worthy of attention is that through the naked rendering of human desires, the work reveals this truth:
feudal society kills people's normal desires, and the accumulation of capital and the rampant of money also alienates society; Cheng Zhu Neo-Confucianism Although Cheng Zhu Neo-Confucianism , the prevalence of materialism is also destroying the value of human beings itself; Neo-Confucianism that imprisons human desires is worth criticizing, and money that alienates human nature should also be cursed! ( to be continued )
"Selected Works of Zhang Jinde Jin Ping Mei"
comment:
① Marx's "Sacred Family", "Complete Works of Marx and Engels" Volume 2, Beijing: People's Publishing House 1965 edition, page 170.
②Engels " Anti-Durin Theory ", "Selected Works of Marx and Engels", Volume 3, Beijing: People's Publishing House, 1972 edition, page 140
③ "844 Economic Philosophy Manuscript ", "Complete Works of Marx and Engels", Volume 42, Beijing: People's Publishing House, 1979 edition, page 94.
④Zhang Zhupo "Reading Jin Ping Plum" 32, "Zhang Zhupo's criticism of the first strange book Jin Ping Plum", Jinan: Qilu Book Club 1987 edition, page 35.
⑤ Engels "Family, Private ownership and the Origin of the State", "Selected Works of Marx and Engels", Volume 4, Beijing: People's Publishing House, 1972 edition, page 94.
⑥ Lanling Xiaoxiaosheng's second chapter of "Jin Ping Mei Cihua", Beijing: People's Literature Press 2000 edition, page 25.
⑦ Lanling Xiaoxiaosheng's "Jin Ping Mei Cihua" Chapter 62, Beijing: People's Literature Publishing House, 2000 edition, page 793.
⑧Lanling Xiaoxiaosheng's "Jin Ping Mei Cihua" Chapter 64, Beijing: People's Literature Publishing House, 2000 edition, page 812.
⑨Lanling Xiaoxiaosheng's "Jin Ping Mei Cihua" Chapter 67, Beijing: People's Literature Publishing House, 2000 edition, page 859.
⑩Zhang Bing's "Description of "Human Desire" in Jin Ping Mei's Ci Words and Its Value", " Research on Ming and Qing Novels " No. 2, 1991.
1 Lu Xun's "History of Chinese Novels " Chapter 19 "The Novels of the Human Love in Ming (Part 1)", Shanghai: Shanghai Ancient Books Publishing House 1998 edition, page 128. 12 Zhang Tingyu et al. " Ming History " Volume 16 "Kings One", Beijing: Zhonghua Book Company 1974 edition, page 3575.
3 Wang Shizhen "Biography of the First Auxiliary since Jiajing·Biography of Zhang Gongju", " Siku Quanshu " "History Department" and "Biography" of the Qing Wenyuan Pavilion. 14 Qian Qianyi " Biography of the Poems of the Dynasty " Ding's "Tu Yibu Long", Shanghai: Shanghai Ancient Books Publishing House, 1959 edition, page 445.
Author’s unit: Henan University
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