Why did Yuan Shu oppose his brother Yuan Shao's appointment of Liu Yu as emperor?

The crusade against Dong Zhuo in 190 AD did not yield any results. As soon as 191 AD entered, the Guandong princes headed by Yuan Shao and Han Fu planned to establish Liu Yu, the shepherd of Youzhou, as emperor. However, this matter was opposed by two people. One was Cao Cao, whom we introduced before.

Cao Cao was not the only one who did not admit that Yuan Shao supported Liu Yu. Yuan Shao and Han Fu wrote to Yuan Shu, the rear general who had troops in Luyang, saying that they were preparing to establish another emperor. The letter read: "The current emperor Liu Xie is not the son of Emperor Ling of the Han Dynasty. We plan to follow the example of Zhou Bo and Zhou Bo. At that time, Guan Ying killed the young master, set a precedent for the king, and supported the great commander Liu Yu as the emperor."

In the letter written by Yuan Shao and Han Fu to Yuan Shu, there are two more pieces of information. . The first one is to slander Liu Xie that he is not the biological son of Emperor Ling of the Han Dynasty. It seems that not only in our era, spreading rumors has been a common method in political struggles since ancient times. The second article quoted the old story of Zhou Bo and others who killed Empress Lu's family and then killed the deposed emperor to install Emperor Wen of Han Dynasty to explain what they wanted to do.

After receiving Yuan Shao's letter, Yuan Shu quickly refused in the name of the justice of the monarch and his ministers. When Yuan Shao saw that his brother refused so simply, he quickly wrote another letter to persuade: "Although there is an emperor in name in the west, he does not have royal blood. The ministers and ministers all flatter Dong Zhuo, which is not credible at all. Nowadays, there is an emperor in name. As long as we send troops to guard the dangerous points, we can trap them in the pass. Now we only need to support the wise master, and the good days of peace are just around the corner. Brother, why are you hesitating? Our whole family was killed. We should be like Wu Zixu. How can you still avenge your father and brother and continue to surrender to them?"

In this letter written by Yuan Shao to Yuan Shu, Yuan Shao not only continued to slander Emperor Xian of Han that he was not the biological son of Emperor Ling of Han, but also analyzed The current situation is very good for their Yuan brothers. He further used the deep pain of being exterminated and the blood connection to draw closer to Yuan Shu, and persuaded Yuan Shu to agree to the idea of ??establishing another emperor.

After receiving such a letter from Yuan Shao, which is both a temptation of interests and a sign of family ties, let’s see how Yuan Shu replies to Yuan Shao. Yuan Shu's reply was as follows: "Liu Xie is smart and intelligent, and has the same potential as King Zhou Cheng (son of King Wu of Zhou). The traitor Dong Zhuo used violence to suppress all officials when the country was in crisis. This was just one of the things that happened to the Han family. It's just a small embarrassment, how can you accuse the current emperor of not having royal blood? You also said that our whole family was killed, how can we submit to him? But our whole family was killed by Dong Zhuo, what does it have to do with the emperor? This is definitely not the emperor's intention? I, Yuan Shu, only have a sincere heart and am determined to eliminate Dong Zhuo. I don't know anything else." Yuan Shu's reply to Yuan Shao sounded a bit ruthless. In the letter, Yuan Shu first exposed Yuan Shao's lies and praised Emperor Liu Xie Yitong. Then he gave Dong Zhuo all the responsibility for the death of the Yuan family, and finally rejected Yuan Shao's proposal with the most righteous words.

Faced with Yuan Shao's proposal to establish a new emperor, the Later Han Dynasty said that Yuan Shu did not want to establish an adult emperor, but wanted to be the emperor himself. Maybe Fan Ye's statement is right, especially since Yuan Shu later proclaimed himself emperor. But back to the relationship between the Yuan brothers, and looking at Yuan Shu's rejection of Yuan Shao, it's not that difficult.

We have introduced before that Yuan Shao and Yuan Shu are half-brothers, and both are sons of Yuan Feng. However, Yuan Shao was adopted to Yuan Cheng, who had no son. But one thing is that Yuan Shao's biological mother was probably a maid, and Yuan Shu was a direct descendant. This level of hierarchical relationship implicit within the Yuan family made it difficult for Yuan Shu to submit willingly to Yuan Shao. This can be explained by the fact that Yuan Shu, who escaped from the capital later than Yuan Shao, did not go to Yuan Shao, but came to Luyang alone.

Although Yuan Shao's side has a large army and many princes, Yuan Shu has also accumulated real strength, including the joining of powerful generals like Sun Jian. When I, Yuan Shu, and you, Yuan Shao, were under He Jin's account, I could listen to you in everything. After all, you are closer to He Jin, who holds the core power, than I am. But now that I have a strong family background, how can I easily obey the orders of a man from a humble background like you? Besides, what you said is not right. In this way, the Yuan brothers completely fell out over the issue of establishing a prince.