Why did Su Shi and Sima Guang strongly oppose Wang Anshi's political reform in order to enrich Qiang Bing?

Although both of them were beaten by Wang Anshi, Sima Guang and Su Shi did so for different reasons: one was to oppose it for the sake of opposition. The other is responsible for the country and the nation, regardless of personal gains and losses. What is the difference? Let's take a look at one of them: Sima Guang.

Although Sima Guang's position in the political history and literary history of the Song Dynasty is extremely lofty, his reasons for opposing Wang Anshi's political reform, himself and his followers in later generations, have justly summed up a large basket. However, in the whole process of Wang Anshi's political reform, Sima Guang's words and deeds were well grasped, that is, much thunder and little rain.

How to thunder? Let's look at a little thing that shocked Song Shenzong: Sima Guang was initially banished to Shaanxi for opposing Wang Anshi's political reform. After arriving in Shaanxi, he continued to curse and told Song Shenzong that I saw with my own eyes that Wang Anshi's "auxiliary service law" was harming Shaanxi people. Song Shenzong's nose will explode if he talks with eyes and nose: The Law on Assisted Service has not been implemented in Shaanxi. Which eye do you see that it harms the people?

Every time Wang Anshi refutes him speechless, "regional blackness" is an inevitable trick of Sima Guang. For example, when Chen Shengzhi, a Fujian-born minister, carried out political reform, Sima Guang fumed: Fujian people are cunning and dangerous, and Chu people are easy to deal with. Not only Chen Shengzhi's hometown is in Fujian, but also in Hubei and Hunan. If Sima Guang is today's TV anchor, with this biting style, the TV station will be smashed!

But for the specific content of Wang Anshi's political reform, Sima Guang has told the facts many times, all of which are good reasons, but after careful scrutiny, they are all ridiculous.

For example, in Wang Anshi's political reform, Sima Guang opposed the "market exchange law" which brought many years of "blood-enriching" effect to the national finance of the Northern Song Dynasty. Even if it greatly improves the treasury finance and reduces the burden on the people, there is nothing wrong with it. He even gave a thunderous reason: it is opportunism for the court to increase fiscal revenue, and even if the country has money, it is shameful. So it must be abolished.

While opposing Wang Anshi's "Exemption Law", Sima Guang even made a joke: After Song Shenzong's death, in order to abolish the "Exemption Law", Sima Guang, who returned to North Korea, frantically hoped to remember the throne and cursed all kinds of faults of the "Exemption Law". However, the content of different memorials is self-deprecating. The last memorial said that the exemption method facilitated the rich to harm the poor, but the next one changed the subject and said that the exemption method made the rich poor. Zhang Dun, Minister of Work-study, pointed to his nose and cursed: Sima Guang, do you have a score?

Equally unreliable is Sima Guang's performance in another key area: national defense!

When Wang Anshi's political reform, he punched for national defense, but in Sima Guang's eyes, it became nonsense. The central idea of his "Begging for Insurance" is speechless: no matter how hard the Song people try, they can't defeat the Qidan Xixia. It is better to submit to humiliation and defeat the enemy without fighting. What about the country? Sima Guang is confident: "Let nature take its course, and the sky will not destroy the Song Dynasty".

Countless blood and tears in history can prove that no matter how powerful a country is, if Sima Guang's military thought of "letting nature take its course" is chosen, it is basically eating until death.

More sadly, in the last few years of Song Shenzong's rule, the soldiers of Dasong fought bloody battles and completely suppressed the old enemy, Queen Xixia. However, in order to prove the greatness of his thought of "letting nature take its course", Sima Guang, who came to power in a high-profile manner after Song Shenzong's death, staged the most humiliating scene of the Northern Song Dynasty before the shame of Jingkang: he devoted himself to "On Westerners Begging for Begging and Refusing Miscellaneous Children" and strongly demanded that the northwest land recovered by Song Jun's blood be ceded to Xixia. Even the Xixia emissary was in the court of the Northern Song Dynasty, watching the Xixia emissary shout five times and drink six times, shouting at the Empress Dowager: The gods know their mistakes!

So humiliated, he just wanted to completely trample down his old rival Wang Anshi and completely abolish the Qiang Bing Wang Anshi's political reform, which called Dasong on the road to prosperity. His inner abacus, his good comrade-in-arms Wen Yanbo has long said: rule the world with literature, not with the people. His "opposition for the sake of opposition" is to destroy the country with high-sounding reasons and to speak for the "literati." Its absurd behavior is just like the anger attack of the great scholar Wang Fu: the demise of the Northern Song Dynasty began with Sima Guang!

Such a "sinner" full of benevolence, righteousness and morality is precisely the person who needs the most vigilance in life, and Su Shi, who also opposes Wang Anshi's political reform, is the person who has the highest evaluation of Sima Guang.

Although like Sima Guang, Su Shi once opposed Wang Anshi's political reform, and even was angered and demoted by Wang Anshi because of his outstanding "mischief". In those years of political reform, he suffered enough. However, in the year when Song Shenzong died suddenly and the old guard came to power in an all-round way, Su Shi, a salted fish turned over, proved his personality much bigger than Sima Guangqiang's: stand up and protect Wang Anshi's political reform!

If Su Shi, who opposed Wang Anshi's political reform in his early years, had the same truth, he witnessed the effectiveness of Wang Anshi's political reform in benefiting the country and the people, especially after the people benefited from it. Su Shi was not as selective and blind as Sima Guang, but corrected his own mistakes. In the years when Sima Guang came to power, Su Shi, who had had enough of the reformists, became a bachelor of Hanlin. After he took office, he wrote to the queen mother: although Wang Anshi has rectified me, his reform is beneficial to the country and the people, and must not be abolished without authorization!

Even when Sima Guang, who was bent on his own way, completely abolished the new law in a simple and rude way, he dug a big hole for the poverty and weakness in the Northern Song Dynasty in the next few years. Under the threat of Sima Guang, the civil and military officials in the Qing Dynasty dared not say much, but Su Shi stood up and tried his best to stop him even if he fell out with Sima Guang. In a word, he even poked Sima Guang in the skin: he just wanted to change the laws of Ning, regardless of gains and losses, regardless of strength! When Sima Guang had the cheek to go it alone, Su Shi was even more sad and angry, shouting a very painful curse in the history of the Song Dynasty: Sima Niu! Sima Niu!

Through the cry of this war, through the figure of Su Shi fighting for his honor and disgrace. This great writer left behind not only amazing poems, but also a commitment to the country and the nation, regardless of personal grievances!