Author: Ten Years of Chopping Wood by Zhan Nianchai
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-06-01
Features: Our ancestors were very wise in creating characters and words. They called bandits "Green Forest Scholars" and "Heroic Grassland Figures," and the act of becoming a bandit "joining the grasslands." This naming might not only be because bandits often hid in deep mountains, but perhaps also because their way of life and principles of conduct were closer to the common origins of humanity—the numerous animals in the vast wilderness. Disputes between common people and petty officials, petty officials and lower-ranking officials, lower-ranking officials and high-ranking officials, and high-ranking officials and the emperor were not decided by reason or law, but by the violent resources each party controlled. The entire Great Song Dynasty seemed to be composed of countless Liao Mountains, adhering to the principle of "when it's time to act, act." What was used in these actions was not law or reason, but money, power, or fists and axes. People despised male theft and female prostitution, yet implicitly acknowledged that these were also trades, merely special ones—one was a life-and-death trade, the other a flesh-and-blood business. Their common characteristic is that they both sell what is fundamentally and ultimately human resources—life and body! In other words, they gamble with life and flesh for money. In the face of money and power, justice is so pale. Not all Liao Mountain people were like Li Kui, who had nothing but violence as their language. They once thought of reasonable procedures and just outcomes, but the Great Ning never fulfilled their most basic aspirations.