The debating skills of Zhuge Liang in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms.

The Romance of the Three Kingdoms is a masterpiece of Chinese classical novels and belongs to one of Four Great Classical Novels. Many characters with different personalities and unique features have been created in the book. At the same time, there are also many wonderful paragraphs, which are impressive even today. Among these many wonderful things, Zhuge Liang's speech war with Confucianism has brought the language art and debate skills into full play.

"Zhuge Liang's war of words with Confucianism" happened at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty. Cao Cao, who relied on the emperor to make the vassal dominant, was invincible in the north, and only Liu Bei and Sun Quan in the south had some strength, so they were ready to be unified in the south. At this critical moment, Liu Bei sent Zhuge Liang to Sun Wu to unite with Wu against Cao. There are also differences within Sun Wu over whether to resist or surrender.

Against this background, when Zhuge Liang arrived in Sun Wu, he debated with many advisers of Sun Quan on this matter, and finally ended with Zhuge Liang's victory. In the book Romance of the Three Kingdoms, the story appeared in the 43rd time, "Zhuge Liang's verbal warfare is full of Confucianism, and Lu Zi's efforts are overwhelming".

Then, starting from the original text of Romance of the Three Kingdoms, we will analyze, summarize and discuss Zhuge Liang's debating skills when arguing with Confucianism.

(1) Zhang Zhao

The first character who appeared in "Debate with Confucianism" was Zhang Zhao. Personally, I think Zhang Zhao is one of the cleverest, and his words are very argumentative.

at the beginning, he asked, "I've heard for a long time that Mr. What is the fruit of this language? " This sentence seems to be the beginning of the conversation, but in fact it is a diversion. Because this sentence is indeed said by Zhuge Liang, and Zhuge Liang's personality also determines that he will definitely give a positive answer.

Sure enough, with Zhuge Liang's oral confirmation, Zhang Zhao continued to set a trap. "Liu Bei got what you thought was like a duck to water and wanted to sweep Jingxiang." Finally, the question fell on "What is his opinion?" This is not only questioning Zhuge Liang, trying to pull out the black history of Kongming, but also further inducing Kongming to walk into the trap he created.

In the face of Zhang Zhao's stratagem, Zhuge Liang first occupied the "commanding heights of benevolence and righteousness", and then placed Liu Bei and Liu Cong in a comparative position. This was a defensive measure. Of course, it was not passive defense, but active defense. In this way, Zhang Zhao's previous attack was not only invisible, but also prepared for the subsequent counterattack.

Next, Zhang Zhao's words can be described as wonderful, which can be summed up as "Liu Bei had some achievements before he got Zhuge Liang, but he was defeated one after another after he got Zhuge Liang". Finally, he asked, "Is it the same with Guan Zhong and Le Yi?" From the point of view of scholars and counselors, these words are eloquent and quite reasonable. However, militarily speaking, it is obviously not advisable to judge a person's strength only by one or a limited number of battles.

Therefore, although Zhang Zhao seems to have an advantage in his words, he can't hide the fatal defects of these words, which also provides Zhuge Liang with a great opportunity to break through him.

Zhuge Liang first refuted Zhang Zhao's words with the analogy of "treating diseases and taking medicine". Then, in pursuit of victory, it was stated that "the enemy is strong and we are weak" and "the teacher of benevolence and righteousness", and the "commanding heights of benevolence and righteousness" that had been occupied before was pushed to Zhang Zhao with an overwhelming trend, skillfully passing Liu Bei's defeat by a stroke, and at the same time leaving Zhang Zhao speechless. Really awesome!

(2) Yu Fan

Yu Fan's second question, from what he said, "There will be thousands of soldiers stationed in the army, and the dragon will be eager to swallow Jiangxia", is obviously intended to use the method of "long Cao Cao's ambition, destroy his prestige" to narrow down the military capability and political significance of * * * resisting Cao Cao, and even to make a speech test for his possible surrender to Cao Cao later.

Zhu Gekongming's response was to continue to use the title of "Renyi", and then the conversation changed, comparing Liu Bei and Sun Quan, one was weak and the other was big. However, the weak one practiced the independent support of Renyi, and the big one had to surrender despite the natural barrier.

There is no need to say anything more about this intuitive and strong contrast, because Yu Fan's argument has become a "false proposition" at the political level.

(3) Bu Zhi

Bu Zhi will speak next. He shifted the topic from the defeat of the allied forces against Cao and Liu Bei to Su Qin and Zhang Yi, with the intention of accusing and despising Zhuge Liang from the angle of lobbyists, and even making personal attacks.

Zhuge Liang in this paragraph did not analyze it carefully from other aspects, but refuted it from the front, emphasizing that Su Qin and Zhang Yi are not just "lobbyists", but people with great wisdom and great strategy.

Later, he asked, "Su Qin and Zhang Yi are very powerful, many times better than those who bully the weak and fear the hard. So, do those who always persuade the Lord to surrender still laugh at Su Qin and Zhang Yi?"

In this rhetorical question, Su Qin and Zhang Yi, as famous lobbyists in history, are the representatives of Zhuge Liang, while "the bully is afraid of the hard" refers to these counsellors in front of us, who judge each other by their words.

(4) Xue Zong

The fourth appearance was Xue Zong. Xue Zong shifted the topic of debate again and turned it into "Cao Cao" and "Han". From a modern point of view, although Xue Zong's argument is suspected of deliberately exaggerating Cao Cao, it also has some truth: Cao Cao is powerful, but Sun Wu is weak, and once he goes to war, he is more likely to be defeated.

However, his remarks made a major mistake, that is, "the Han Dynasty will end" and "Cao Cao people all return to their hearts".

We should know that even Cao Cao was only "holding the emperor to make the princes" at that time, and did not dare to call himself "the emperor". While Xue Zong's words fall on the objective angle of "those who know the times are heroes", they obviously stand on the opposite side of "loyalty to the monarch and patriotism". When he said these words, he may not know his mistake, but when he said these words, he was already in no way back.

Sure enough, Zhuge Liang called him "no father, no king", and Zhuge Liang's words were standard "words of loyalty", which were rooted in the theory of unshakable feudal society, so it was impossible to refute them, and Xue Zong was naturally defeated.

(5) Achievements

The fifth question is about achievements. As soon as he appeared on the stage, he began to compare Cao Cao and Liu Bei: Cao Cao was a relative country, but Liu Bei was a "weaver", and his achievements intended to compare the two and draw the conclusion that Cao Cao won by far.

This contrast not only belittles the significance of joining forces with Liu Bei to fight against Cao Cao, but also deliberately ignores Cao Cao's anti-"loyalty" action of "relying on the emperor to make the princes". Such praise and demotion unconsciously guarantee the legitimacy of Cao Cao's unification of the world.

Zhuge Liang's countermeasures are drawn from the arguments of his achievements. First of all, after Cao Cao was a prime minister, he should be a Han minister, but the Han minister rebelled because of "infidelity". Since "infidelity", even if his status is high, it will not help, so he is still a "cao thief".

Secondly, for Liu Bei, Zhuge Liang put forward the fact that "Liu Yuzhou is an emperor, and today's emperor is given a title according to the score". As a result, the blood status of Cao Cao and Liu Bei suddenly reversed, and there is nothing to say about their achievements.

(6) Yan Geng

The advantages of Zhuge Liang have been obvious since the whole debate came to Yan Geng. Yan Gang said that Zhuge Liang's words "argue irrationally, they are not orthodox", which is an excuse for himself and a helplessness that gradually tends to fail. After Yan Gang decisively ended all the above topics, and put the point of confrontation on the "classic".

In Yan Gang's eyes, "classic" is the speech and theoretical basis of Confucian scholars, so he deliberately led the topic here, trying to humiliate Zhuge Liang in an attempt to make a fatal fight.

However, he was wrong. Zhuge Liang he faced was not an ordinary person. Zhuge Liang spoke of "corrupt Confucianism" and listed the ancient sages: Yi Yin, Ziya, Zhang Liang, Chen Ping, Deng Yu and Geng Yan to prove his point. Doing so not only protects oneself, but also mocks Yan Gang's "pedantic" essence.

(7) Cheng Deshu

As the last person in this debate, Cheng Deshu obviously has no offensive power, so he has to use "you may not have real talent and learning" to cover up the dangerous situation that this debate has changed from Zhang Zhaoshi's initiative to being very passive now.

On the contrary, Zhuge Liang has completely mastered the leading role in the debate.

Therefore, in the face of Cheng Deshu's question, Zhuge Liang did not answer directly, but put forward the concepts of "the gentleman's Confucianism" and "the villain's Confucianism" with ease. Taking Yang Xiong who surrendered to Wang Mang as an example, he profoundly revealed the essence of Confucianism, drew a clear distinction between the good and the bad of Confucianism, and even cut off the back road for Sun Wu's advisers to surrender to Cao Cao. Looking back and forth, the debate returned to the original theme.

(a) the excavation of the black history

the excavation of the black history is very common in the debate of "Zhuge Liang's argument against Confucianism". Generally speaking, although black history belongs to the past, it has no direct impact on the present. But in fact, the poor record in the past will definitely become a powerful means in the debate.

For example, Zhang Zhao talked about Zhuge Liang's dark history, Yu Fan talked about Liu Bei's defeat, Lu Ji said that Liu Bei had "woven seats and sold goods", and Zhuge Liang said that Lu Ji had "stolen oranges", and so on. Both Sun Wu's advisers and Zhuge Liang regarded it as a weapon. Similarly, in the current debate, digging up the black history is not of direct significance to solving practical problems, but it can make people win.

Just like last year's presidential election debate in the United States, the debate between Trump and Hillary is no longer a "beautiful plan" for the future, but a dig and "smear" of "opponents", which is meaningless to the country and very immoral to the individual, but it is effective. Why not?

(2) Occupy the commanding heights of benevolence, righteousness and loyalty

Whether in feudal society or in the debate of modern society, if one party can occupy the commanding heights of morality or morality, then he will have obvious advantages.

what is the commanding height of morality and morality?

refers to some truth or social rules that most people admit. For example, Zhuge Liang's words of "loyalty to the monarch and patriotism", "helping the Han dynasty" and "the ruler loves the people and the people" are all based on social and feudal theories, not personal fabrications.

In the face of such arguments, even if you don't agree with the other side's arguments, you can't clearly oppose them, because the "commanding heights of ethics" can't be denied.

Just as you can't object to "people should do more good deeds" and "people should respect the old and love the young", there are some things that you can't object to, and when these things become the arguments of the debater, he will have a sharp weapon.

(3) Inducing the other party into one's own trap

This debate method mainly appears in Zhang Zhao's debate. Although his debate failed in the end, this skill still needs us to study hard. It is a classic and wonderful debating technique to induce the other party to walk into the trap step by step along their own design.

For example, in the chapter "Mencius is called Qi Xuanwang" in Liang Hui Wang Xia, Mencius gradually induced the other party into the trap he set by himself through the three levels of "supporting his wife", "judging the teacher" and "four realms", and finally "Wang Gu talked about him from left to right", thus achieving the victory of the debate.

(4) Analogical argument and comparative argument

Analogical argument in this story is mainly reflected in Zhuge Liang's rebuttal of Zhang Zhao with "medicine for treating diseases". Analogy argument can clearly explain one's own point of view, and can also emphasize and increase one's own argument effect. In some cases, it can even achieve the purpose of shifting or deviating from the topic in the argument, changing the opponent's target and protecting one's own side at special times.

Comparative argumentation mainly has the effect of contrast and exaggeration. For example, in the above-mentioned achievements, Liu Bei, who weaves mats and sells clothes, was compared with Cao Cao, who was after the prime minister, with a view to raising Cao Cao and belittling Liu Bei. However, Zhuge Liang was killed instead, and it was really the same to compare Liu Bei, a royal emperor, with Cao Cao, a Chinese thief.

There are similarities and differences between these two debating skills, which are the basic means of debating skills and are also very common in modern debates.

It is difficult to describe the debating skills in the paragraph "Zhuge Liang fights with Confucianism", because language can only be called language in different combinations of words, and debate can only be called debate when all kinds of debating skills are combined.

The skills of the debate complement and blend with each other, and the debate shows its splendor. Perhaps because of this, this "one stroke of the gods" in The Romance of the Three Kingdoms will span history, and even now it can make people feel admired, and it will always exist in the brilliance of classical literature and last forever.