Appreciating "Water Margin" from the View of Loyalty and Righteousness

Class of 2017, School of History and Culture, International Politics, Cui Zhitao

Water Margin is one of the four great classical novels, the main plot is the story of Song Jiang and others who revolted in Liangshanbo at the end of the Northern Song Dynasty. It is China's first novel that describes the peasants' revolts in detail, which is the first novel that transforms the historical facts into literature and praises the spirit of the struggle against the imperial government and puts forward the simple ideals of the peasants. The author of Water Margin is Shi Nai'an, but there is also the view that it was co-authored by Shi Nai'an and Luo Guanzhong, with the former having a wider and more popular audience. There are also seventy versions of the book, one hundred versions of the book, one hundred and fifteen versions of the book, one hundred and twenty versions of the book, the mainstream version is seventy versions of the book and one hundred and twenty versions of the book, that is, the simple version of the book and the whole book of the difference.

The seventy books are generally considered to be the changes made by Jin Shengqian, which mainly recounts the content of Song Jiang and others who were forced by the government to "go to Liangshan" at the end of the Song Dynasty, with the themes of "righteousness" and "small loyalty". The theme of the story is "Great Righteousness" and "Little Faithfulness". "Great Righteousness" is the righteousness of the rivers and lakes and brotherhood, while "Little Faithfulness" is the difference between "loyalty to the king and the country" and "faithfulness". Loyalty", Liangshan's "loyalty" is more for an organization, a "big family" loyalty. The 120-volume version of the book is called "The Complete Water Margin", which contains all the chapters of the 100-volume version. Compared with the seventy books, the last fifty books of the 120 books gradually focus on "loyalty to the king and the country", "building a career", and "returning to one's hometown", which is quite different from the main theme of the first seventy books, and the main theme of the first seventy books is quite different from the main theme of the first seventy books. The main theme of the first seventy times of the occurrence of a large difference, and the historical record of Shi Naian himself is limited, so academics believe that the "Water Margin" is not a one-man sole work is also its reasons.

From the Water Margin, a novel that depicts the emergence, development, and eventual demise of the heroes of the Green Forest, the most important thing to emphasize is the traditional Chinese moral concept of loyalty and righteousness that runs through the book.

In traditional Chinese morality, there is a distinction between loyalty in a narrow sense and loyalty in a broad sense. In the narrow sense, "loyalty" refers to loyalty to the monarch, the only thing the monarch looks up to, and is about the ethics of the ruler and the minister; in the broad sense, "loyalty" refers to loyalty and sincerity. In Water Margin, both meanings of "loyalty" are well represented. The former "loyalty" to the ruler is mainly expressed in the last fifty chapters in which Song Jiang and the others support the recruitment of peace and look forward to serving the country. The latter's "loyalty" runs through the entire novel, centering on Song Gongming, the timely rain, who honors Song Jiang in the early part of the novel for the sake of gathering righteousness, and agrees to the recruitment of peace in the later part of the novel for the sake of respecting Song Jiang. Song Jiang's "loyalty" is to the monarch, i.e., to the Emperor of Song. "Song Jiang's reason for becoming a bandit is that it is not the Emperor but the treacherous officials who are responsible for Song Jiang's failure to be loyal to the imperial court. Until he was given poisoned wine by the emperor and died, he still believed that it was "the son of heaven listened to slander" and "the traitorous ministers misled the country". Confucian traditional concepts of "king, minister, father, son, son", although Song Jiang is a minor official origin, but also y influenced by Confucian culture, so in this point is justifiable. The other heroes and heroes of the "loyalty" is reflected in the Jianghu righteousness under the guidance of the "heart".

Song Jiang is a righteous man who saves the day and is known as "timely rain", "Huboyi", "filial piety and righteousness", and is known as "Heisanlang", and he relies on his prestige in the Liangshan Mountain. In the Song Dynasty, where Confucianism had the strongest influence, Song Jiang's adherence to the moral concepts of loyalty and righteousness won him the loyalty of the great and the good, who followed him in life and in death. This is the kind of value that Chinese people need today, not for people to "rise up", but to learn to respect and value role models.

Confucianism advocates "thinking of righteousness in the face of profit", "it is not righteous to take what is not one's own", "to give up one's life for righteousness", and so on. The connotation of "righteousness" is complex, "Water Margin" in the "righteousness" is more of a "righteousness of the jianghu", "robbing the rich to help the poor In "Water Margin", "righteousness" is more a kind of "Jianghu righteousness", "robbing the rich to help the poor", "big scale to share gold and silver, big bowl to eat wine and meat", a kind of spiritual direction to maintain and stabilize the relationship between organizations, to strengthen the connection with each other in the turbulence, and to become the spiritual power to act. For example, Lu Zhishen easily dealt with the trouble of the punks attacking the temple through the incident of "pulling down the willow", and formed a brotherhood with them; or Lu Zhishen, in order to protect Lin Chong from being victimized halfway, staged the drama of "making trouble in the wild boar forest"; or "Song Gongming released Chao Tianwang, Zhu Gong released Song Gongming, Jin Mao Hu released Song Jiang, and Liang Shan Po robbed the court. "Each of these events is characterized by the word "righteousness". This is not only a kind of green forest and reckless spirit of help, but also the traditional Chinese culture attaches great importance to the morality. In modern times, it can be interpreted as the spirit of solidarity of "do not abandon, do not give up", which is also what we need to learn. Looking at the whole country, it can also rise to the economic development concept of "not abandoning anyone on the way to wealth".

Looking at the "Water Margin" "loyalty and righteousness" of the view, there is no doubt that the Liangshan "loyalty and righteousness" is with two sides. To be sure, Liangshan, as a gathering of green forests and reckless people, had a limited cultural level. But in this case, they showed the most simple moral concepts of downtrodden bureaucrats, small landowners, peasants, and jobless hobos. Taoism emphasizes "The Way is Simple", and Confucianism emphasizes "The Way is Public". Liangshan Gathering transformed the two noble moral cultures into the most simple "humane and righteous reasoning" between human beings, between human beings and the society, and between human beings and the country. The "Water Margin" is to be recognized on this point. And the Water Margin puts forward the discontent of the peasants with the corrupt state, and accordingly puts forward the idea of peasants' doctrine in favor of the development of the agricultural society, which provides a reference for the leaders of the later regimes.

On the other hand, the "loyalty" and "righteousness" in Water Margin are imperfect and flawed. First of all, Song Jiang's "loyalty" is obviously in favor of the court. Under the limitation of historical conditions and the influence of traditional Confucian education, Song Jiang could not see the corruption and decline of the imperial court, and emphasized that the traitorous ministers had misled the country while ignoring the incompetence of Emperor Huizong himself, which is typical of "foolish loyalty", and this is manifested most vividly in the positive acceptance of the recruitment of peace and the active "conquest of Fang La". This is a typical example of "foolish loyalty". In the Liangshan development to the peak of the Liangshan people pushed into the quagmire of the dynasty.

The Liangshan people also have a "stupid loyalty" to Song Jiang. On the issue of recruitment, Liangshan internal existence of clear opposition, resistance, their personal ability is by no means below Song Jiang, but chose to obey, Li Kui is even until the death of all said, "life serves the brother, death is only a brother under a brat," sad and lamentable. This kind of unconditional support for the leader, obedience to the emperor's logic is still from the "limited cultural level". Liangshan people really received a formal education in the people are very limited, and most of them can not get out of the "Taoist" fence. They also know the danger of recruiting, but still submit to the authority of the absolute leader. Mozi said, "If you know but do not fight, you cannot be called loyal. In "righteousness", "Water Margin" is more "righteousness" between men, for women's "righteousness" is more "righteousness" of women. The "righteousness" of women is more the "righteousness" of women, and the "righteousness" of women is more the "righteousness" of women, and the "righteousness" of women is more the "righteousness" of women. "Acting on behalf of heaven" is the signboard of Liangshan, but in the actual action is mostly "indiscriminate killing of innocents", resulting in a bad social impact. In terms of profit sharing, equalization is not realistic. "Robbing the rich to help the poor" is "Water Margin" "righteousness" slogan, but in the robbery of the birth order, Wu Wu said: "to take this set of wealth, ill-gotten gains, we figure a world of pleasure", where there is "help the poor", but the actual action is mostly "indiscriminate killing of the innocent", resulting in a bad social impact. Where is the concept of "helping the poor"? And the robbery of the program led to the "green-faced beast" Yang Zhi was forced to flee, and what is the "righteousness of the jianghu"? In addition, the rich is not everyone for the rich, the rich should be robbed? "Robbing the rich to help the poor" is not so much righteousness as it is the peasants' "violent protest" against social inequality. The Liangshan uprising began with "righteousness" and ended with "loyalty", which confused the choice between loyalty and righteousness, resulting in the final tragedy.

"Water Margin" embodies the "loyalty and righteousness" values are worth every generation to analyze, in modern society, loyal to the country, loyal to the people, loyal to their own ideals; give up their lives for righteousness, etiquette and righteousness. "Benevolence, the essence of righteousness", benevolent people love people, which is also the most basic, the most simple, the most feasible way to achieve modern "loyalty and righteousness".