The Everlasting Empire (39 page)

1. Thus Liu Zehua, the leading scholar of Chinese political culture, summarized his lifetime of research in a book titled
China’s Monarchism
(
Zhongguo de Wangquanzhuyi
); see also note 3 below.

2. For aspects of the emperor’s ritual and symbolic supremacy, see, e.g., Wechsler,
Offerings
; Rawski,
The Late Emperors
; McDermott,
State and Court Ritual
. For the emperor’s “presence” at lower social levels, see, e.g., Faure, “The Emperor in the Village.”

3. There is as yet no comprehensive discussion in English of China’s emperorship; yet there are many insightful studies of individual monarchs, especially from the late imperial period. The most notable of these, in my eyes, is Huang,
1587
; see also Ebrey and Bickford,
Emperor Huizong
; Dardess,
Confucianism and Autocracy
; Farmer,
Zhu Yuanzhang
; Schneewind,
Long Live the Emperor
. In China, by contrast, the nature of emperorship is comprehensively treated in manifold monographs and articles, of which I am most indebted to Liu Zehua’s
Zhongguo de Wangquanzhuyi
; see also Zhang Fentian,
Zhongguo diwang guannian
; Zhou Liangxiao,
Huangdi
; Wang Yi,
Zhongguo huangquan zhidu
.

4. For Montesquieu, see his
The Spirits of the Laws
, bk. 2, chap. 1 (cited from Richter,
The Political Theory of Montesquieu
). For the assault on monarchism in early Chinese republican thought, see Liang Qichao, “Zhongguo zhuanzhi.”

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5. For the Shang political system, see Keightley, “The Shang.”

6. See Zhang Rongming,
Yin Zhou
; cf. Bilsky,
The State Religion
.

7.
Chunqiu Zuo zhuan
, Xiang 26: 1112. For more on the weakness of rulers in the Springs- and- Autumns period, see Pines,
Foundations
, 136–163.

8. See Lewis, “Warring States,” 597. For the importance of the Jin successor states in fostering political reforms, see ibid., 598–600.

9. See, e.g., Lewis, “Warring States.”

10. For a detailed discussion, see Pines,
Envisioning Eternal Empire
, 25–53.

11.
Lüshi chunqiu
, “Zhi yi” 17.8: 1132. See also
Guanzi
, “Qi chen qi zhu” XVII.52: 998–999;
Xunzi
, “Wang ba” VII.11: 223–224;
Han Feizi
, “Er bing” II.7:39–43.

12. For views of rulership during the imperial millennia, see Liu Zehua,
Zhongguo zhengzhi sixiang shi
, vols. 2–3 (specifically for Deng Mu and Huang Zongxi, see 3: 412–416 and 600–618). For Huang Zongxi, see also de Bary,
Waiting for the Dawn
; cf. Jiang Yonglin, “Denouncing.”

13. See Pines, “To Rebel Is Justified?”

14. For attempts to establish an alternative to the dynastic principle of rule and their fasco, see Pines,
Envisioning Eternal Empire
, 54–81.

15. Puett,
To Become a God
.

16. See
Mengzi
, “Gongsun Chou xia” 4.13: 109.

17.
Xunzi
, “Zheng lun” XII.18: 331.

18. See, e.g.,
Xunzi
, “Fu guo” VI.10: 182–183; “Zheng ming” XVI.22: 431; and the detailed discussion in Pines,
Envisioning Eternal Empire
, 86–90.

19.
Xunzi
, “Wang ba” VII.11: 223–224.

20. See discussion in Pines,
Envisioning Eternal Empire
, 90–96.

21. De Bary,
Waiting for the Dawn
, 100–103. Interestingly, similar views were expressed even by an early modern critic of monarchical abuses, Liang Qichao (“Zhongguo zhuanzhi,” 1662–1667).

22. For Han Feizi’s complex views of rulership, see Pines,
Envisioning Eternal Empire
, 97–102, and idem, “Submerged by Absolute Power.”

23. See details in Pines, “The Messianic Emperor.”

24. Citations are from the First Emperor’s stele inscriptions (Kern,
The Stele Inscriptions
, 33, 22, 36, 28, 33, and 42); see more in Pines, “The Messianic Emperor.”

25. An anecdote describes the emperor examining daily the documents he dealt with, and not going to rest until a certain weight was reached (
Shiji
6: 258).

26. This change in the monarch’s self- presentation emerged in the early Han dynasty, in the immediate aftermath of the fall of Qin (Pines, “The Messianic Emperor”).

27. The predominantly negative image of Qin through much of imperial history (Pines, “The First Emperor”) encouraged many critics of dynastic rule, such as Deng Mu and Huang Zongxi (see note 12 above), to identify it as the progenitor of all abuses perpetrated by the imperial system. Yet even admirers of this system, such as Wang Fuzhi (
Du Tongjian
1: 1–3), credited the Qin with its establishment.

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28. Montesquieu,
The Spirits of the Laws
, bk. 2, chap. 1, cited from Richter,
The Political Theory of Montesquieu
, 178.

29. Huang,
1587
, 46.

30.
Zizhi tongjian
1: 2–3. For Sima Guang’s political views, see Bol, “Government, Society and State.”

31. These cases of the emperors’ “unorthodox” self- divinization could derive from their personal predilections (e.g., Chao Shin- yi, “Huizong”), or from political expediency (Crossley,
A Translucent Mirror
, 223–280), or from the combination of the two (Janousch, “The Emperor as Bodhisattva”).

32. McDermott, “Emperor, Élites and Commoners.”

33. For massive loyalist suicides, see, e.g., Davis,
Wind against the Mountain
; Wakeman,
The Great Enterprise
. Such instances of extreme zeal were rare in Chinese established religions, and were associated either with sectarians (see chapter 5) or with segments of the Buddhist establishment (Benn,
Burning for the Buddha
).

34. Patricia Ebrey notes that “the relative rarity of reverencing likenesses of rulers makes China stand out among the early civilizations of Eurasia” (“Portrait Sculptures,” 46n13). While imperial portraits were produced, their circulation generally remained limited to members of the upper elite; in the Ming dynasty “it was made illegal to make or possess an image of a ruler or former rulers, apparently out of fear that it would be used for anti- dynastic ends” (46n13); cf. Ching, “Visual Images.”

35. For the “ten abominations,” see Jiang Yonglin,
The Great Ming Code
, 18– 19; for an example of the sacred power of an edict sealed by the emperor, see, e.g., Holmgren, “Politics of the Inner Court,” 300.

36.
A Dream of Red Mansions
18: 255.

37. For the example of the Eastern Jin dynasty (318–420), see Holcombe, “The Exemplar State”; cf. the trajectory of the Tang dynasty in the aftermath of An Lushan’s rebellion, discussed in chapter 1. For “loyal criticism” and its perils, see Zhang Xiangming, “A Preliminary Study of the Punishment of Political Speech.”

38. See Goodrich,
The Literary Inquisition
; Guy,
The Emperor’s Four Treasuries
, 157–200; Kutcher, “The Death of the Xiaoxian Empress”; Elman,
Cultural History
, 211–212; Wu Fusheng,
Written at Imperial Command
, 14.

39. The earliest attempts to reshape the popular pantheon are traceable to the First Emperor of Qin, and they were repeated by many other rulers, albeit with limited success. See Bujard, “State and Local Cults,” for the early imperial period, and Taylor, “Official and Popular Religion,” for the later one.

40. See, e.g., Weinstein,
Buddhism under the Tang
; Brook, “At the Margin”; Martynov, “Gosudarstvo i religii.” For Liang Emperor Wu’s example, see Janousch, “The Emperor as Bodhisattva.”

41. See Weinstein,
Buddhism under the Tang
, 114–136, for a detailed account of this event.

42. For the Byzantine case, see Gregory,
A History of Byzantium
, 198–241.

43. For Huan Xuan’s initiative and the resultant exchange, see Zürcher,
The Buddhist Conquest of China
, 231–259; cf. Komissarova, “Monakh.”

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44.
Mao shi zhengyi
, “Bei shan” 13: 463 (Mao 205); cf. Waley,
The Book of Songs
, 189.

45. For private ownership of land as recognized de facto, even if not de jure, see Philip Huang,
Civil Justice
.

46. See the detailed discussion of Northern Wei reforms in Wang Zhongluo,
Wei Jin
, 522–557; for certain aspects of these reforms, see Chase, “The Edict of 495 Reconsidered.”

47. For Huang Zongxi and Gu Yanwu, see Liu Zehua,
Zhongguo zhengzhi sixiang shi
, 3: 600–630, and note 12 above; for Liang Qichao, see his “Zhongguo zhuanzhi”; for a classical exposition of the “descent into despotism” thesis, see Mote, “The Growth of Chinese Despotism.” For negative comments, see, e.g., Endicott- West, “Imperial Governance”; Bol,
Neo- Confucianism
, 115–152. For Chinese scholars who adopt this thesis, see, e.g., Wang Yi,
Zhongguo huangquan zhidu
; Zhou Liangxiao,
Huangdi
.

48. Ray Huang’s
1587
is a classical exposition of the weakness of the throne vis- à- vis powerful bureaucracy.

49. Rawski,
The Last Emperors
, 212–213.

50. Farmer,
Zhu Yuanzhang
, 105; for Huang Zongxi, see de Bary,
Waiting for the Dawn
, 100–103.

51. The Sui Emperor Wen (r. 581–604), initiated a series of administrative reforms amid which the position of a “prime minister” had been abolished, and his functions divided among a group of chief ministers (Xiong,
Emperor Yang
, 109–110). This system continued into the early Tang, when there was no single chief minister but rather a group of ad hoc appointees to chief ministerial positions; only gradually did the position of these ministers strengthen and domineering chief ministers evolve in the court (see Twitchett, “Hsüan- tsung,” 349–350; Dalby, “Court Politics,” 590–591). For the early Song concentration of executive powers in the emperor’s hands and the absence of the prime minister office, see Lau and Huang, “Founding and Consolidation,” 239–240.

52. Cited from Spence,
Emperor of China
, 146–147. For the complaint of Kangxi’s son, the Yongzheng Emperor, that in order to make a proper appointment he “often goes without sleep all night,” see Zelin, “The Yung- cheng Reign,” 195.

53. Robinson, “The Ming Court and the Legacy of the Yuan Mongols,” 400; for the classical study of the disempowerment of the emperors in the late Ming dynasty, see Huang,
1587
.

54.
The August Ming Ancestral Instruction
, cited from Farmer,
Zhu Yuanzhang
, 117.

55. For training of the heir apparent, see, e.g., Twitchett, “The T’ang Imperial Family”; cf. Huang,
1587
.

56. For Taizong’s career, see Eisenberg,
Kingship
, 167–194.

57. See
Xunzi
, “Zheng lun” XII.18: 333. For the contraction of the emperors’ ritual space from the beginning to the end of the Han dynasty, see Lewis,
The Construction of Space
, 169–186, and Puett, “Combining the Ghosts”; for later trends, see Chang,
A Court on Horseback
, 34–113, 423–438.

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58. For the gradual deterioration of the ministers’ status vis- à- vis the throne, see Du Jiaji, “Zhongguo gudai junchen”; for its harshest manifestation— public fogging of court officials— which proliferated beginning in the Jin (1115– 1234) and Yuan (1271–1368) dynasties, see Endicott- West, “Imperial Governance.”

59. See Fletcher, “Turco-Mongolian Monarchic Tradition”; Biran,
Chinggis Khan
. In my discussion here I do not distinguish between pure nomadic regimes (e.g., the Mongols) and the seminomadic ones (e.g., the Manchus), because both shared the same fundamental traits of a tribal and military- oriented political culture. For different assessments of the importance of these differences, see Barfield,
The Perilous Frontier
; cf. Franke and Twitchett, “Introduction,” especially pp. 21–30.

60. It is not my intention here to deal with the much- debated issue of cultural aspects of the “Sinicization” of China’s conquerors; generally, I share misgivings about this term as expressed, e.g., in Elliott,
The Manchu Way
, 20–35. What really matters for me is the process of the conqueror’s political adaptation to the norms of a sedentary (in this case, Chinese) world— particularly modification of the form of rulership.

61. For the
qurlitai
in Mongol political culture and its gradual fading away under Khubilai, see Endicott- West, “Imperial Governance.”

62. For Khubilai Khan, see Rossabi,
Khubilai
; for subsequent Mongol history, see Dardess,
Conquerors and Confucians
. David Robinson (
Empire’s Twilight
, 18–21) questions the widespread denigration of Toghon Temür as a weakling but fails to produce compelling evidence to overturn the negative verdict. For the Qianlong Emperor’s indignation with regard to Toghon Temür’s loss of nomadic prowess, see Chang,
A Court on Horseback
, 108–111.

63. See Dardess,
Confucianism and Autocracy
, 186.

64. For the power of pre- 1800 Qing emperors, see, e.g., Rawski,
The Last Emperors
(especially pp. 206–207); Chang,
A Court on Horseback
; Spence, “The Kang- hsi Reign.” For the Yongzheng reign, see Zelin, “The Yung- cheng Reign,” and idem,
The Magistrate’s Tael
; Bartlett,
Monarchs and Ministers
; Spence,
Treason by the Book
. For the Qing territorial expansion see chapter 1, note 65.