The Study On Official Retirement In The Tang Dynasty

"Zhishi" (致仕),which is also called "Xiuzhi" (休致),"Zhizheng"(致政) or"Zhishi" (致事), is a political behavior of Chinese ancient officials to return the position and salary to the imperial court.The system of retirement is an important part of the official management system of ancient China.It originated from the Han Dynasty. After the Southern and Northern Dynasties and the Sui Dynasty,it reached the stage of perfection in the Tang Dynasty. Studying of the official retirement system and practice in the Tang Dynasty contributes to looking insight into the politics of Tang dynasty from one side,understanding the rules of its operation and evolution,exploring the state of mind, life and mental state of the people in the Tang Dynasty.So it has important academic significance.The main contents are as follows.The introduction part defines related concepts of the retirement,briefly reviewing the retirement system before the Tang Dynasty,summarizing previous research achievements,and introduces the ideas and methods of the research.The text of the thesis includes five chapters.The first chapter, by combing the series of imperial edicts,regulations and specific phenomena related to the official retirement,has a macroscopic investigation of the establishment and evolution of the retirement system.The change of the retirement system was closely related to the national strength and the political situation of the Tang Dynasty.In the early Tang Dynasty,the national strength was strong while the political situation was stable.As a result,the retirement system had great development,and the official retirement treatment and so on was improved.In the late Tang Dynasty,due to the decline of national power and the turbulence of political situation, the retirement system reversed,even damaged. In summary, the retirement system is a good reference to observe the changes and trends of the political situation in the Tang Dynasty.The second chapter is the research of the content of retirement system in the Tang Dynasty.The thorough analysis to the details of retirement system in the Tang Dynasty is carried on from four aspects of the retirement conditions,programs,management organizations and treatment.There are three parts of retirement conditions:age,health and official rank.The main retirement programs are three steps:officials’ application,the emperor’s reply,and officials’ appreciation for the Emperor. Retiring management organizations are Tongshisheren (能事舍人) of Zhongshusheng(中书省),and local authorities.Retirement treatment includes four aspects:political treatment,economic treatment, living treatment, and the treatment of life after death.The retirement system in Tang Dynasty has clear condition and procedure,thoughtful management and higher treatments.It epitomizes the advantages of retirement system in former dynasty while has its own development and innovation,and promotes the ancient retirement system to a new stage.The third chapter examines the various factors of the official retirement motivation in the Tang Dynasty.The official retirement reasons are different,and they can be divided into unilateral factors and multiple factors.Unilateral factors are mainly three aspects:individual physiological factors, personal subjective factors as well as external factors.Most of the official retirement in Tang Dynasty is caused by one factor,and the reason is relatively single.The individual physiological factors are in the dominant position during the unilateral factors.The fourth chapter analyzes the officials’ opinions of retirement in Tang Dynasty, including three relatively macroscopic aspects:the praise for active retirement,the approval for the behavior of "remaining in office in a good health over seventy years",and the criticism for the behavior of "having no intention of retiring over seventy years ".People’s attitudes towards retirement are diversified.It’s the coexistence of approval and praise with criticism and negation.The acceptance and tolerance of the behavior of "remaining in office in a good health over seventy years" is a manifestation of the flourishing age in the Tang Dynasty.The fifth chapter is the research of reappointment of retired officials and officials without retirement.The reason for reappointment of retired officials including the needs of imperial court,the rulers and official themselves.In general,retired officials will be reappointed due to the needs of the imperial court or emperor within 2 years.Most of them have the experience of retired and reappointment once among retired officials.There are three different situations of official rank when officials are reappointed:reduce,remain unchanged,and improve. The behavior of "not retire" can be mainly divided into "unable to retire" and "unwilling to retiring".The proportion of not retired and retired officials is about 3:2.The retirement system implementation is still unsatisfactory.As a consequence,there is still much room for improvement and promotion.The conclusion part sums up the characteristics and disadvantages of retirement in the Tang Dynasty,and analyzes the influence of it to which in the Song Dynasty. The characteristics of retirement in the Tang Dynasty are that the system is more standardized and perfect than before,with flexibility and less hierarchy.The problems of retirement are as follows.The perfect system is less than satisfactory while being implementing,and the law system, the imperial power,the public opinion of imperial court and other external factors can not fundamentally reverse the situation.The retirement in the Tang Dynasty has an impact on which in the Song Dynasty in aspects of the retiring age,retirement treatment,the way of retirement,the public opinion of imperial court and the reappointment of retired officials.The characteristic of this paper is that,discussing the content of retirement system in the Tang Dynasty comprehensively on the one hand,while making a concrete study on the opinions of retirement,officials without retirement,and reappointment of retired officials on the other hand.The paper also explores the hidden political information through the system itself,observing the political background of the Tang Dynasty,promoting the development of the in-depth study on the political history of the Tang Dynasty.