A Study Of The Pure Minister Of The Wei,Jin And Southern And Northern Dynasties

The Wei,Jin and Southern and Northern Dynasties was a period of great changes in the Middle Ages of China,which witnessed unprecedented turmoil in ethics and morality as well as in the political situation.Under such turbulent changes,the traditional ethics " virtue of loyalty " held by scholars and officials also experienced complicated and various social practices."The loyal minister should die as the emperor orders" does not have to be the choice of justice under political changes,and historians of later generations attached the label "No loyal ministers in the Six Dynasties" to this period.However,looking at the scholars who lived in this period,it is undeniable that there are still many "pure ministers" who do not change their loyalty.This study intends to explore the complex orientation of "pure ministers" during the Wei,Jin,Southern and Northern Dynasties from a multidimensional perspective by combining the ideological characteristics and political changes of the period.The term "pure ministers" can have a lot of definitions,and in this study it basically refers to the people who have "loyalty" for their masters under the time of political turmoil,rather than those who follow the turbulent flow and change their loyalty frequently.By taking typical characters as examples and conducting sample studies through parallelism and comparisons,this study investigates the practical background and specific methods of"pure loyalty",and probes into the results and impacts of "pure ministers"from multiple dimensions,including discussions on the special factors and influence in this period to shed some light on studies of this group as well as the ideological and political changes.This study mainly falls into three parts.The first part analyzes the samples of "pure ministers" during the period of the Wei,Jin,Southern and Northern Dynasties,and examines whether or not the ministers participate in the new regime as breakpoints.It is believed that the group of pure ministers can be roughly divided into two categories:one is the group of ministers who die for the old master or give up power,and another category is those who are loyal to the old master,but they also participate in the new regime.Regardless of the modes of practice,these two kinds of people are attributed to the "pure ministers" group in this study since they both have practiced "pure loyalty".The second part focuses on the results and influences that the pure minister group has brought to the Wei,Jin and the Southern and Northern Dynasties from the following three perspectives:individuals and families,monarchs and power,society and consensus.Specifically,the pure ministers themselves and their families obtain prestige and career promotion;the monarch and the government can gather people and select talents in a fast way in the troubled times;the social environment was purged and consensus on "loyalty" becomes increasingly diversified and complicated.In the third part,in addition to the discussion mentioned above,this study discusses another three special factors that characterize the pure ministers in the Wei,Jin,and the Southern and Northern Dynasties,namely the prevention of Interracial and native,the distinction between loyalty and filial piety,and the political situation.Firstly,this period is particularly special in that the northward migration of the Interracial(Yi)and the southern migration of native(Xia)have resulted in more and more aggressive conflicts,which stimulate and induce the choice of loyalty.Secondly,pure ministers are caught in the dilemma of combining traditional moral ethics with "loyalty" and "filial piety".Before Wei Jin,the "loyalty" and "filial piety" were parallel,and personal choice was relatively free.However,due to the actual needs of political development as well as personal and social stability during the Wei,Jin and Southern and Northern Dynasties,the situation of "filial piety"gradually preceded "loyalty" in the later period.Thirdly,the special political environment where forces of all parties compete and winners succeed while losers die during the change of power has affected the development of personal circumstances and the opinion of public officials.This has often led to the situation where loyalty and betrayal are difficult to tell.The reversal of loyalty is not only manifested in the fact that the ruler has promoted unfaithful people and relied on their backs for political needs instead of using pure ministers,but also is reflected in the writing techniques of the Spring and Autumn in the historical books.