How did Guan Yu become a national idol?

One's success can't depend on one's own efforts.

The Three Kingdoms period in China's history is an era of talented people. Due to the influence of novels and folk stories, many characters in the Three Kingdoms have distinctive and labeled images, which can be remembered by the public.

This is obvious in the game. No matter what kind of game, as long as it is the theme of the Three Kingdoms, you can basically judge the strength of SSR by seeing the names of Cao Cao, Lu Bu and Zhao Yun, and the corresponding Pan Feng Liu Chan is basically the life of the bench dog food.

Among these characters, Mr Guan is a very special one. In the nearly 2,000-year history of the Three Kingdoms, there are hardly many people with high level and excellent moral character. In detail, the deeds of Guan Yu, a senior official of Han Shu Group, may not be so outstanding, but he was able to make great strides all the way, praised by some kings, deified by Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism, and became a national idol, which can be said to be a magical legend of god-making in ancient China culture.

This process of creating gods is very complicated, but the context is still relatively clear, which can be briefly described. The earliest must be the spread of related stories after the Three Kingdoms. Mr. Lu Xun believes that the story of the Three Kingdoms itself has the property of being easy to spread. He said this in "A Brief History of China's Novels":

"Gai was a hero at that time, brave and wise, magnificent and moving, but the story was not simple in Chu, complicated in other countries, and especially suitable for telling."

There are too many stars in the Three Kingdoms, and the popularity competition is fierce. Considering the poor information dissemination conditions at that time, it was not easy for Guan Yu to earn impression points in most parts of the country first. In addition to his brave and loyal story, there is one thing that cannot be ignored: his mass base.

We know that a person's fate depends on self-struggle, but we should also consider the journey of history. As the entrepreneurial backbone of Liu Bei Group, Guan Yu, a native of Shanxi, spent most of his life following the strategic shift of his boss, crossing China obliquely from north to south to inspect the golden corn belt, and finally staying in Jingzhou Branch. By the way, the middle is also seconded by Cao Cao.

The general route of Liu Bei's migration (the red box is the general scope of the story of the Three Kingdoms)

This rich life experience is very rare in the Three Kingdoms. At that time, the folk influence of most celebrities in the Three Kingdoms was mainly in the "home country", which may be known only after the landlord class left the site, such as Xun, a famous scholar in Yingchuan. I'm sorry about Zhang Liao and Zhou Yu, because Hefei and Battle of Red Cliffs are special and have great influence, but their coverage is hard to compare with Guan Yu's "playing all over the country".

Low-key pre-paving

In the Wei, Jin and Southern and Northern Dynasties (from the end of the 3rd century to the end of the 6th century) next to the Three Kingdoms, Guan Yu was just a short-lived historical figure with a thin image. People know so many people and things at most. What do they look like? I don't know. I heard that the beard is quite long. Naturally, there was no reason to worship him, so the praise for Guan Yu at that time was mainly in the army.

At that time, China was once again divided and turbulent, but it did not have the background of "everyone obeyed Han" at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty. The Han nationality is weak, the Hu nationality is strong, and the literati are eulogizing the fearless chivalrous spirit. This tragic wave of the times promoted the spread of the story of military commanders in the Three Kingdoms period, and Guan Yu was not far away. Our understanding of this historical span may be similar to our feelings about the troubled times of the Republic of China now.

At that time, the image of Guan Yu did not have the charm of solo flight. In most literatures, he appeared in the form of "closed" combination, and was occasionally called "Feiyu" combination. The two brothers didn't care which was more important. Praise is also mainly the brave side of "Ten Thousand Enemies" and "Cutting Yan Liang", as well as the fearless spirit embodied in "Scraping Bone to Treat Poison", which is used to brainwash soldiers.

More interestingly, when a loyalty story like Guan Yu's resignation from Cao Guihan appeared in some historical materials (such as the Book of Jin), his words revealed an understandable and deserved attitude, and there was no special praise. In the eyes of people at that time, this was a very normal choice.

After another two or three hundred years, it reached the Sui, Tang and Five Dynasties. China's feudal society entered its heyday. Under the unified social concept and the humanistic spirit of great integration, people pay more attention to the construction of people's livelihood rather than fighting and killing. As a historical figure, Guan Yu's heroic deeds have been far away from people at that time and gradually submerged in the tide of history. His bravery is rarely mentioned, but people like gossip, such as the scandal between Guan Yu and Qin's wife Du Fu? It's a bit like modern people watching the secret history of the Qing palace.

It is worth mentioning that Guan Yu's religious image began to form gradually during this period. As early as when Buddhism flourished in the Northern and Southern Dynasties, there were already some hearsay stories about the characters of the Three Kingdoms. For example, Fu Ruizhi in The Book of Songs records that when Guan Yu was in Xiangyang, two people presented the imperial seal, and then Liu Bei became emperor in Chengdu. In the Sui Dynasty, monks were wise? Zen master built a Dojo at the foot of Yuquan Mountain in Jingzhou and set up a statue dedicated to Guan Yu, which is widely regarded as the earliest recorded Guan Gong shrine.

In the Tang Dynasty, Guan Yu successfully became the object of official worship, which matched the Wu Temple, which was called Wu Temple for short. This sacrificial system is mainly aimed at celebrities in history. There are more than 70 people on both sides. Guan Yu was lucky enough to be chosen, although his position was not ideal: Zhou Yu and Zhang Liao were around, opposite Monroe, and Zhang Fei, diagonally opposite, was one taller than himself. To put it bluntly, he is a supporting role.

But for Mr. Zhong at that time, it was very important to formally take this step. We know that the Wu Temple and the Confucian Temple correspond to each other and belong to the Confucian sacrificial activities. The special historical environment of the future Song Dynasty needs the deified image of Guan Yu as an important spiritual support.

Get on the stage in the national disaster

In the early Song Dynasty, Mao adjusted the list of members of the temple and changed it to more than 20 people. Guan Yu was one of the deported people, and later Song Huizong released him back. Generally speaking, the Northern Song Dynasty continued the religious treatment of Guan Yu since the Tang Dynasty, and added some Taoist legends of "helping Shi Tian to fight Chiyou". In this way, Guan Yu has a sense of existence in Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism.

It is worth noting that Guan Yu's Confucian characteristics of loyalty and righteousness were especially valued by scholars in the Northern Song Dynasty. It should be said that the literati in the Northern Song Dynasty had some ideals. They want to pull back the Five Dynasties rebellion and revive Confucianism. Scholars in the Eastern Jin Dynasty believed that the righteousness and loyalty of "God's truth" became a typical excellent characteristic under this background, and Guan Yu was also given the aura of Confucianism.

If the world continues like this, Guan Yu's influence should only develop slowly and tepidly. But in 1 127, a great event happened in the history of China: the change of Jingkang. Kaifeng was solved, and Song Huizong, Song Qinzong and his son, as well as more than 3,000 royal families and courtiers, were captured by the Jin people in the north.

The change of Jingkang led to the end of the Northern Song Dynasty, and the Southern Song Dynasty was in the southeast, which deeply hurt the hearts of Han people. Facing the pain of reality, people need distant images to pin their confidence. This shows the particularity of Guan Yu. His loyalty spirit is compatible with the high national integrity of the Southern Song Dynasty, and his military courage is the spiritual need to defend the enemy from going north. The orthodox grievances of the Southern Song Dynasty were dormant in the south of the Yangtze River, and the "orthodoxy" of the Western Shu was in the Han Dynasty, and there was some bitterness in history. Coupled with the wider awareness of the people, all this makes Guan Yu worship find the cultural soil on which to live.

Scholars in the Southern Song Dynasty spared no effort to render the positive image of Guan Yu in the inscriptions, and the Emperor of the Southern Song Dynasty also gave Guan Yu the title. With the support and advocacy of the emperor, Guan Yu's temples have mushroomed all over the country, incense is very strong, and various legends of showing saints are also emerging one after another.

The unified background of the Yuan Dynasty created conditions for Guan Yu worship in the south to flow to the north. In addition, under the loose cultural policy of the Yuan Dynasty, the rapid development of popular literature also promoted the spread of the story of the Three Kingdoms and Guan Yu. All kinds of novels and dramas make the characters in the Three Kingdoms more plump and intuitive, and Guan Yu's brave and loyal characteristics are constantly strengthened in this process. It was not until the publication of The Romance of the Three Kingdoms by Luo Guanzhong in the Ming Dynasty that Guan Yu's typical image of bravery and loyalty was basically determined, and it has been influenced to this day.

There may not be many people who admire Guan Yu at present. However, the loyalty and morality he symbolizes, especially the military courage, is still deeply rooted in the hearts of the people and has outstanding image characteristics. In the ACG field, the theme of the Three Kingdoms is a frequent theme, so Guan Yu's picture image also appears many times. There are glorious traditional painting styles, Chen Uen's ink-splashing handwriting, lovely Q-version modeling and exquisite comic style:

"Guan Yu" The picture above comes from Zilong's game "National the legend of heroes".

National the legend of heroes, as a highly anticipated masterpiece of the national fantasy three kingdoms mobile game in 20 17, is closely related to the super popular national monster list of Tencent Animation. There will also be deep cooperation in the implantation of Soul Street and The Three Kingdoms of the Mouth. Both games will add stories and characters from the legend of heroes for All in their chapters.

The game is based on the Three Kingdoms period at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, and it fictionalizes the legendary adventures of the protagonist and his party in troubled times. The game adopts the cartoon technique of wind+top seiyuu dubbing+full animation plot, and specially invites famous studios to write original plots for the game. On the basis of RPG card, the game also adds the innovation of fighting arms, manual micro-operation and strategic enemy control!