There is a mound called Mashan Buyi in the western suburbs of Laiyang County, Dengzhou Prefecture. It is said that it has good feng shui and is a good place to bury people and raise corpses. Nowadays, the largest scholarly family in Denglai area, the ancestral grave of the Laiyang Zuo family, known as the "Nine Floors and Eighteen Mao (27 famous Confucian scholars in two generations), and the four Jinshi in one family", is located on the southeast slope of Mashan Buyi - —It turns out this is a school district grave!
And Zuo Maodi, one of the four Jinshi of the Zuo family, now lives in the school district cemetery in Mashanbuyi. Of course, he is not buried underground. He is not dead yet! Instead, he built a thatched cottage next to the large grave shared by his father, Zuo Zhilong, and his mother, Mrs. Chen.
This is called "keep the tomb in the house", and this is how the so-called "filial piety" is observed. According to China's most standard filial piety, three years after the death of the father, three years after the death of the mother. If the child was born by the younger wife, it would be three years for the aunt's mother, and three years for the biological mother... Theoretically, a maximum of nine years of filial piety can be observed.
Of course, it is impossible for ordinary working people to observe filial piety like this, otherwise they will have to starve to death. Those who observe filial piety in this way are usually scholar-bureaucrats. It doesn't matter if they are scholars or have achieved fame. Anyway, keeping filial piety will not delay the collection of rent, lending money and evading taxes. If you become a Jinshi and become an official, it will be a little delayed. For example, when you are in your forties, you become a Jinshi, and then your father, your aunt, and your biological mother die. After nine years of filial piety, you are already over fifty, and you are about to retire! Those who are in poor health may have their sons to keep their filial piety. The most ridiculous thing is that the mother passed away when the father and son were officials in the same court. In this case, the father of the deceased wife had to continue to be an official, and the son of the deceased mother went home to observe his filial piety and chew on his old age...
However, Zuo Maodi, the filial son of Zuo Maodi, is now observing filial piety for his mother, Chen, but this is not a delay in business. He is observing filial piety and serving as an official at the same time. And no one can say that he is contrary to human ethics, but he can still get a "most filial son" Good reputation.
The so-called loyalty and filial piety are nothing more than this.
"Everyone, I have just received news that Duduo, the gold-touching prince of the Eastern Lu, has led one hundred thousand troops to the gates of Qufu. There is another report saying that the Donglu army burned, killed, looted, dug up tombs, and committed all kinds of evil along the way... ..."
Beside the large tomb where Zuo Zhilong and Chen were buried together, a hall with adobe walls and a thatched roof was built at some time. Zuo Maodi, who was dressed in linen and filial piety, was sitting on it, talking nonsense with dignity and dignity.
If Dodo heard what he said, he would probably scream that he was wronged. They also burned, killed and looted...all the leeks were gone, what else could be looted and killed? As for the excavation of tombs, it's even more ridiculous. There are no imperial tombs along the canal. There are some tombs of wealthy families in the sky. They are all scattered and there may not be treasures in the tombs. How could Duduo disperse all his limited troops to dig graves? This is simply ridiculous!
But Zuo Maodi was such a great Confucian and a filial son, so his words had credibility in Shandong!
In addition, Zuo Maodi is organized!
He is the successor of Donglin in Shandong. He joined the famous literary society Shanzuo Grand Society as early as the Wanli period. There are 91 members of Shanzuo Grand Society, all of whom are famous Confucian scholars in Denglai area. Through layer-by-layer relationships such as clans, teachers, fellow villagers, and in-laws, a network of relationships covering the three prefectures of Deng, Lai, and Qing was formed.
The Confucian scholars gathered in this hall now all come from this network of relationships. And because of the "return to the native land" more than a year ago, the backbone of these local gangsters in Denglai Qingsanfu has become hardened, and everyone has hundreds or even thousands of young men in their hands.
The Laiyang Zuo family was no exception. They also raised a Zuo family army and established a "shanzhai association" based on the Dengzhou association. They also imitated "997" and trained their troops day and night. However, there is no land and money, and at most it is rent-free and interest-free. All Laiyang tenants who choose Zuo Jiajun can enjoy rent-free and interest-free treatment. If they die for the country, their family members will be raised by the Zuo family.
In addition, the principle of loyalty, filial piety, benevolence and righteousness is also sufficient! There are so many scholars in the Zuo family, and they have prestige in Laiyang, so they smear the Tatars every day.
Killing, setting fires, raping and fighting, it's all evil. If they were allowed to take over Shandong, the people would definitely have no way to survive, and even their ancestors buried underground would have to be dug out and fed to the dogs...
"Teacher!" Zhang Boren, a high-density scholar, was the scholar who "got the wrong test paper" in Denglianke. Now he is Zuo Maodi's favorite student, so naturally he was the first to jump out and agree with the teacher.
"The Tatars came to Yanzhou to destroy my famous religion and destroy my homeland! Anyone who is educated and literate should come forward. If you have money, you should contribute if you have the strength! Students suggest that in Laiyang, Qixia, Zhaoyuan, and Yexian Fifteen prefectures and counties, including Pingdu, Changyi, Gaomi, Jiaozhou, Weixian, Anqiu, Zhucheng, Yishui, Rizhao, Wendeng, and Huangxian, have organized regiment training. Each prefecture and county will produce an association and should have company soldiers and auxiliary troops. For 2,000 people, we need to prepare enough spears, swords, rifles, javelins, assault cannons, and three-eyed muskets. All spearmen must be equipped with cloth-covered iron armor and helmets..."
Zuo Maodi, the minister of regiment training in Shandong, is now directly in charge of these 15 "autonomous prefectures and counties." All of these 15 prefectures and counties are led by local gentry to organize regiment training. However, these group trainings are uneven, and some places do them very well. The group trainings in Laiyang, Gaomi, and Jiaozhou must be very good. They were able to pull out a team of 2,000 people according to Zhang Boren's request, but it was worse in other places.
"I'm afraid one association is not enough!" Zuo Maodi's cousin Zuo Maoji said, "Now is not the time to be reluctant to give up money and food. Think about the time in the 16th year of Chongzhen. More than thirty people died in our Zuo family alone. Ordinary people... We hadn’t signed the "Chasing the Hulu" at that time!"
In the 15th year of Chongzhen's reign, the Qing army invaded Laiyang County. The Zuo family of Laiyang performed very heroically in this disaster, resisting and organizing forces to defend the county. From November of the 15th year of Chongzhen's reign, we persisted until February of the following year before the city was broken.
The Zuo family lost thirty-seven people in this battle, so it can be said that they are a loyal family!
Of course, Laiyang Zuo should also be more loyal. Because their family is the largest landowner in Denglai Prefecture, owning 120,000 acres of land, and their estates are spread all over Denglai... basically they don't pay taxes! In addition, the Zuo family also does many businesses that do not pay taxes.
Although Laiyang County is the territory of the Ming Dynasty, the benefits that Emperor Chongzhen gets from Laiyang every year are only a fraction of the Zuo family, maybe not yet!
So this Laiyang's nominal surname is Zhu, but actually his surname is Zuo.
If your Zuo family doesn't fight hard, who will you ask?
However, I thought that although the Ming Dynasty could not collect taxes, it was still very wary of local powerful people and generally did not allow them to hold large-scale team training.
Fortunately, Zhu Cihong has loosened the grip of Shandong people since last year... If you have money, give money, if you have strength, give strength, no matter whether he is a local tyrant, evil gentry or a warlord, please arm yourself!
In addition, don’t forget to sign your name on "Chasing the Hulu"... Now that Zuo Maoji reminded them, everyone became nervous.
"Yes, we all signed it, and we asked the thief Sun Zhixian to copy it and take it back to Beijing!"
"Donglu also made Sun Thief the governor of Shandong. He must have brought a list to kill us!"
"It's so hateful, it won't give us a way to survive!"
"Not only are we not given a way to survive, but our dead ancestors are not even able to survive..."
"Fight them!"
"Yes, let's fight!"
Seeing that everyone was willing to sacrifice their wealth to protect the country (actually to protect the family, they were all small lords), Zuo Maodi also felt very pleased, nodded and said: "Then one state and county will practice two associations. , a total of 4,000 people, limited to three months to complete training.
In addition, all states and counties must pay a sum of money and food to the Tuanlian Yamen, which will be used to relieve refugees and recruit new Tuanlian troops among the refugees..."
Zuo Mao's face was upright for the first time, his eyes were gloomy, and he slowly scanned the main room, "Don't be reluctant to give up money and food... The Tatars are here to save their lives this time! Let's spend some money and food to save our lives and save the land. We can also turn the fifteen prefectures and counties of Dengzhou, Laizhou, and Qingzhou into our own territory. Are we afraid that we won’t be able to get them back in the future?
Moreover, I am recruiting refugees to serve as soldiers for the benefit of everyone... Even if a state or county has 4,000 regiments, they may not be able to keep the city from falling, so it is necessary to train an elite army that can travel to rescue various cities. What do you think? "
