Zhu Yuanzhang Returns from Modern Times

Chapter 126 See, you're in a hurry again!
Inside the Wuying Hall, Song Ne sat motionless.

He bowed his head slightly, as if he were an old monk in deep meditation.

Song Lian, however, was getting impatient, his heart filled with trepidation.

Waiting for the emperor to say what he would say next.

Even Song Lian couldn't remain calm in the face of the current emperor.

The emperors of today often do not play by the rules.

They do things that are unexpected, but often very unpleasant.

Even a great Confucian scholar like him was not much better than Zhu Yuanzhang.

"What we're talking about is the Hongwu Zheng Yun (a type of ancient Chinese poetry).

Song Lian, who was highly focused, was taken aback by Zhu Yuanzhang's words.

What's wrong with the Hongwu Zheng Yun?
Isn't the Hongwu Zheng Yun (洪武正韵) perfectly fine?

"We feel that the Hongwu Zheng Yun style is still not quite right and needs improvement."

Upon hearing Zhu Yuanzhang's words, Song Lian felt an urge to bang his head on the ground.

The reason is simple: Hongwu Zhengyun started working on it at the beginning of last year.

He led a group of talented scholars, including those from the Hanlin Academy, to jointly formulate the plan.

It took a lot of effort.

During this period, the emperor offered several suggestions, which they all followed.

After so much back and forth, it wasn't until September of this year that it was finally completed.

It was also bestowed the name Hongwu Zhengyun by the emperor.

Song Lian breathed a long sigh of relief, finally free from the torment.

They were also waiting for the emperor to release the Hongwu Zheng Yun at the right time.

To rectify the pronunciation of Mandarin and establish a standard for it.

He felt that nothing would change in this matter.

The Hongwu Zhengyun will become the standard of Mandarin in the Ming Dynasty.

But who would have thought that the emperor would summon him today and bring up the matter of the Hongwu Zheng Yun again.

It is also said that the Hongwu style has many aspects that need improvement.

Judging from the emperor's behavior, things still need to be changed.

For a moment, Song Lian felt an overwhelming sense of unease.

Still want to change it? Still want to change it!
It was revised several times in the seventh year of the Hongwu reign, so how can it be revised again?
He really couldn't figure out how to change it!

Serving the emperor is truly difficult.

"Your Majesty, this... there's something not quite right about it. Please enlighten me."

As he said this, he caught a glimpse of Song Ne sitting there motionless out of the corner of his eye, and his heart skipped a beat.

A not-so-good idea popped into his mind.

Could it be that the emperor will allow Song Ne, this northerner, to participate in the revision of the Hongwu Zheng Yun, so that the northern language can become the official language?

"When we were revising it, we told Mr. Song and others that we should refer to the elegant pronunciation of the Central Plains."

As a result, the revised Hongwu Zhengyun still mainly reflects the accents of Nanjing, Jianghuai, and Jiangnan regions.

This is very different from our original intention and our requirements.

“Your Majesty is right, but… the situation is different now than before.”

Since the Song Dynasty, Mandarin has been predominantly spoken in the south.

The standard rhyme scheme revised during the Song Dynasty was also based on the southern accent.

Nowadays, when it comes to prosperity, wealth, and population size, the South far surpasses the North.

The capital of our Great Ming Dynasty is Yingtian, and Your Majesty and many civil and military officials mostly come from the Jianghuai and Jiangnan regions.

Many of the soldiers were also mainly from the Jianghuai and Jiangnan regions.

Under these circumstances, the Hongwu Zhengyun (a style of poetry) naturally had to focus on the areas of Yingtian (Nanjing) and Jianghuai (the region south of the Yangtze River).

The elegant sounds of the North and Central Plains are used as a supplement.

Official rhyme schemes are meant to provide a standard for how people should speak.

It's certain which language is used more often, and where it's used.

When we were compiling the Hongwu Zhengyun (a system of phonetic transcription for the Hongwu Emperor), we consulted many classical Chinese pronunciations from the Central Plains, as Your Majesty had suggested.

If we continue to make changes, I'm afraid... things might not be so good.

This is vastly different from the situation in our Great Ming Dynasty today.

After saying this, Song Lian quickly added:

"However, if the superior feels it is not good enough, we can continue to revise it, even if it is difficult to revise."

Add more elegant Central Plains accents to it.

In fact, according to Song Lian's own thoughts, the revised Hongwu Zhengyun didn't need to be changed at all.

It's already perfect.

He also wanted to have a proper talk with the emperor.

Let the emperor know what official language is.

How excellent is the standard of Mandarin they painstakingly established!

However, considering that Song Ne, that northerner, was by his side, he ultimately did not say such things.

The advice and explanations given to the emperor were only touched upon briefly.

He was worried that if he said too much about this, the emperor would be disgusted.

Then, in a fit of anger, the emperor simply forbade himself and others from revising the Hongwu Zhengyun.

Instead, they let Song Ne, this northerner, do the job.

When Song Ne came to revise it, he would definitely create a standard rhyme scheme using pure Northern dialect.

They rejected the refined accents of the South.

If that happens, it would be a case of losing more than you gain!

Now, the key to this matter is to first secure the right to revise the Hongwu Zhengyun.

Then, based on the emperor's requirements, we gradually made changes.

Although the emperor has his own requirements, it is the people themselves who revise the rhyme scheme, and the pen is in their own hands.

So when revising, we can still fill it in with whatever we want, according to our own ideas.

Song Lian had considered this very clearly.

Seeing Song Lian's reaction, how could Zhu Yuanzhang not know what Song Lian was thinking?
In his previous life, he had many grievances against the Hongwu Zheng Yun style.

After the Hongwu Zheng Yun was completed in the eighth year of the Hongwu reign.

He quickly had someone revise the Hongwu Zhengyun again.

Furthermore, Song Lian and others were replaced.

Continue to have them revise their work, using the elegant pronunciation of the Central Plains as a reference.

The revision was not completed until the twelfth year of the Hongwu reign.

Even after revising the Hongwu Zhengyun, he was still not satisfied.

Still speaking with a southern accent.

It was very different from what I had in mind.

Therefore, in the twentieth year of Hongwu's reign, he once again ordered people to revise the Hongwu Zhengyun rhyme scheme.

But this time, the reaction in Shilin and the officialdom was very strong.

Many people say that there is no way to fix it anymore.

Even if you get angry and kill some people, it's still not enough.

The matter of revising the Hongwu Zhengyun was thus left unresolved.

Ultimately, having no other choice, he renamed Sun Wuyu's "Yunhui Dingzheng" to "Hongwu Tongyun" and ordered its publication.

It replaced the Hongwu Zheng Yun.

It can be said that even in the end, Hongwu Zhengyun was not able to satisfy himself.

In my past life, I spent a lot of energy on this matter.

Why are so many people who participated in revising the Hongwu Zhengyun unable to produce the Zhengyun they wanted?
Why did I become so resistant to my own demands later on?

Is it because they can't understand human language, don't understand their own requirements, and can't create a Hongwu Zheng Yun that satisfies them?
Naturally not.

Rather, it is because this seemingly simple official rhyme actually reflects the North-South conflict that existed during the Ming Dynasty.

The division between the north and south of the Ming Dynasty was extremely severe.

In his previous life, he used various methods to bridge the gap between the North and the South, effectively unifying them and establishing the Ming Dynasty.

However, more than 20 years later, the division between the North and the South remains extremely severe.

People from the south and the north are often at odds with each other.

Southerners, in particular, hold a dominant and powerful position, and they look down on northerners from the bottom of their hearts.

Under such circumstances, northerners would naturally not treat southerners well.

Southerners call northerners "Northern barbarians," while northerners call southerners "Southern barbarians."

They were at loggerheads, and many things had to be divided into North and South.

The Ming Dynasty was dominated by people from the south, and many of them did not consider the northerners to be part of the country.

This is true in both official circles and among scholars.

The North-South Examination Case that occurred during the later years of the Hongwu reign is a prime example.

Unifying the standard of speech and promoting it so that the whole country speaks the same language has extremely powerful significance.

Why was China able to become China? Why was it able to reunite after each period of division?

Why is it that China has been able to become a unified whole, indestructible and resilient in the face of setbacks?

The shared cultural origins, as well as the standardization of writing, cart axles, and weights and measures during the Qin Dynasty, played a significant role in this.

In particular, the standardization of written language.

With this, even if accents differ from place to place, the written language remains the same.

They were able to communicate normally through written text, understand and implement the imperial decrees.

The unification of accents was something that subsequent dynasties continued to work on.
Official language has always existed.

But ultimately, the promotion efforts were still insufficient.

Not many people can speak Mandarin.

In many places, few ordinary people can speak Mandarin.

Especially in the south, in some relatively isolated areas.

The accents they used to speak were incredibly diverse.

Even though some places are hundreds of miles apart, the languages ​​they commonly use can be quite different.

This is undoubtedly detrimental to the dissemination and implementation of policies, as well as to ethnic integration.

I have devoted a great deal of effort to the study of Hongwu Zhengyun.

The goal was to create an official language that suited the situation of the Ming Dynasty and reduced the barriers between the North and the South.

This will help to integrate the North and South and strengthen the fusion between them.

After all, when people speak the same language, they naturally feel a sense of identification and closeness.

According to his own ideas, this Mandarin contains many elements of the elegant northern pronunciation, while also being compatible with southern languages.

However, the final result was that many officials and scholars in the south were extremely opposed to it.

Even though he repeatedly made his requests regarding the revision of the Hongwu Zhengyun.

These people will also use their own methods to make various excuses.

To deceive oneself.

Even if you kill someone later, it will still be the same.

They set a target of 10 points, and it would be good if they could complete even one point.

It's not that they don't understand how things should be done, but rather that they deliberately don't add too much to it, Nakahara Yaon.

Ultimately, they still lack a sense of national responsibility and are driven by self-interest.

They held themselves in high esteem and looked down on the people of the North.

They believed that the north had long been ruled by barbarians, many of whom wore barbarian clothing, spoke barbarian languages, and behaved in a savage and uncivilized manner.

They were naturally different from these elegant literati of Jiangnan.
Having experienced these things in his previous life, Zhu Yuanzhang could not possibly repeat the same mistakes.

So he shook his head at Song Lian and said: Mr. Song, you shouldn't do this.

Mr. Song is getting old and his energy is limited.

We couldn't bear to see Mr. Song working so hard.

Zhu Yuanzhang knew all too well what the outcome would be if he sent Song Lian and others to repair it.

If that's the case, why should he waste his time arguing with these people?

Why make yourself angry for no reason and waste a lot of precious time promoting Hongwu Zhengyun?
If you don't want to do it, if you don't have a big picture in mind, and if you're unwilling to unify the North and South, then don't do it.

Even without Master Song and his ilk, I can still get things done!

what's the situation?
Song Lian's heart skipped a beat, and he was completely stunned.

His worst fears came true.

As expected, the emperor intended to exclude them and let Song Ne, this northern bumpkin, take the lead in revising the Hongwu Zheng Yun!
This is something he absolutely does not want to see.

If that were to happen, then the Hongwu Zheng Yun would truly be ruined!

"Your Majesty, although I am getting on in years, I am still in good health and have never had any serious illnesses."

Moreover, this Hongwu style is of fundamental importance. How could I, your humble servant, dare not offer my humble service?

A little fatigue is nothing compared to such an important matter.

Song Lian was getting anxious; he was really getting anxious!

This time, the emperor summoned him to discuss this matter. If he did not stop it, he would inevitably be criticized and resented by countless scholars in the future.

He himself was also unable to overcome this hurdle in his own heart.

Therefore, we must find a way to stop this from happening.

We must never allow the northern accent to dominate the standard pronunciation.

Song Ne, that northern bumpkin, is not worthy of compiling the Hongwu Zhengyun!
Song Ne remained unmoved, as if she hadn't heard a thing.

This made Song Lian even more anxious.

The bad feeling was getting worse.

I'm afraid... the Emperor and Song Ne have already reached an agreement on this matter.

Song Ne, that northern bumpkin, actually did something like this without making a sound!

"Mr. Song, please don't worry. We understand and agree with your sincere desire to serve the country and its people."

However, there's no need for Mr. Song to trouble himself with this matter.

Mr. Song is indeed quite old.

"Your Majesty, I am not afraid of being tired or suffering."

When Hongwu Zhengyunchen and others made revisions, there were indeed many aspects that were not considered.

The use of Northern dialects has not been sufficiently adopted.

Your Majesty, we will revise this again, strictly following Your Majesty's instructions and incorporating as much of the refined language of the Central Plains as possible. Your Majesty…

Song Lian's voice sounded hurried as he made his statement.

They were determined to seize control of the revision of the Hongwu Zhengyun.

Song Lian has already made many concessions for this.

“Mr. Song, look, you’re in a hurry again.”

Zhu Yuanzhang looked at Song Lian and said with a smile.

Upon hearing this, Song Lian's words, which he hadn't finished saying, stuck in his throat.

We can't tell anyone else.

"Yes, yes, I was a little too hasty."

He apologized, and his attitude was surprisingly good.

“We’re not saying we won’t let Mr. Song revise it. In fact, we’ve already revised the Hongwu Zhengyun.”

It's been revised?!
Upon hearing Zhu Yuanzhang's words, Song Lian became even more astonished.

Revising the Hongwu Zhengyun is no small undertaking.

The workload is huge, and we need to consider all aspects.

It has only been two months since we finished repairing the Hongwu Zhengyun.

The Emperor has already revised the Hongwu Zheng Yun (a rhyme scheme)?!
Before this, how come I hadn't heard a thing?

With such a huge workload, it's impossible for them to just wait around without hearing a thing.

Now what's going on?

His gaze fell upon Song Ne, who had already opened her eyes, and a sense of foreboding rose within him.

This must have been done by that northern barbarian, Song Ne!

That northerner! Such a cunning fellow!

On the surface, they remained quiet, seemingly busy with matters concerning the Imperial Academy.

Who would have thought that such a thing could be done so quietly?

They completely cut off our supply lines!
Moreover, judging from the way it's done, the official language it uses is very much in line with the emperor's wishes.

How could Song Lian not be angry?
How could one feel good about that?
We and the others have been busy with this matter, but in the end, Song Ne, a northerner, has taken all the credit.

Even though he was a great Confucian scholar, he still couldn't accept it and was deeply troubled.

Song Ne, this Northern barbarian, is absolutely scheming!
They've been doing this in secret for a long time.

Otherwise, how could he have produced a new version of the Hongwu Zhengyun so soon after we and the others did?

Furthermore, it even got the emperor to personally intervene and take sides.

They claimed that the Hongwu Zheng Yun they had compiled was not good enough and that they should adopt the one compiled by Song Ne?

This is incredibly embarrassing!

We've suffered a huge loss!

Song Lian stared at Song Ne with angry eyes.

Seeing that Song Ne acted as if she hadn't seen him at all, looking completely calm and collected, Song Lian felt even more uncomfortable.

If it weren't for the fact that they were still in front of the emperor at this moment, and the emperor was present.

He will definitely stand up and have a good talk with Song Ne, that northern barbarian, and practice his martial arts.

Having lived through the chaos of the late Yuan Dynasty, Song Lian was not just a writer.

It can be said that the Ming Dynasty as a whole still possesses a particularly strong martial spirit.

“Mr. Song, don’t glare at Chief Minister Song. This matter has nothing to do with Chief Minister Song.”

Seeing Song Lian's anxious expression, Zhu Yuanzhang couldn't help but think of retreating to the back to secretly watch the two old men fight.

The idea was to let them fight it out before I came out.

However, he ultimately suppressed this idea.

It wasn't that they were afraid of a bad influence, but rather that Song Ne was older than Song Lian.

If a real fight breaks out, Song Ne will most likely suffer a loss.

Zhu Yuanzhang actually quite wanted to see Song Lian get a beating from Song Ne.

Upon hearing the emperor's words, Song Lian's expression froze, and he swallowed his anger and withdrew his gaze.

He didn't believe a word the emperor said.

How could it not be related to Song Ne?

"This new Hongwu Zhengyun is something we created ourselves."

Zhu Yuanzhang looked at Song Lian and spoke calmly.

WTF? !
Upon hearing this, Song Lian was stunned, his face filled with disbelief.

No... what did I hear?

The emperor actually claimed that he was the one who wrote the Hongwu Zheng Yun rhyme.

How is this possible!

Are you kidding me?
Is the emperor trying to fool a fool?
Undeniably, although the current emperor comes from a humble background, he is quite talented.

They are also willing to put in the effort and endure hardship.

In all aspects, including studies, they are not lagging behind others.

Now, in terms of scholarship, he is no longer the cowherd he once was.

Many people who have read a few books and become self-righteous are no match for the emperor in this regard.

But that depends on the situation.

For example, the task of standardizing rhymes was not something an emperor could handle.

This thing looks simple, but it's actually incredibly complex.

There are many aspects to consider.

Without putting in hard work and dedicated research, it's not so easy to develop this.

It seems the emperor is indeed determined to adopt the northern dialect as the primary language.

For this reason, they didn't hesitate to tell such a despicable lie to protect Song Ne.

They insisted that Song Ne had done it himself.

"Mr. Song, come and take a look at this."

Zhu Yuanzhang picked up a booklet from the imperial desk.

Upon seeing this, Song Lian stood up, stepped forward, and accepted the gift with both hands.

The booklet prominently displays the four characters "Hongwu Zhengyun".

He was momentarily stunned.

The reason is simply that this booklet is too thin.

No more than forty.

The Hongwu Zhengyun they had previously compiled consisted of sixteen volumes, with a total of seventy-six rhymes.

How come when it came to the emperor, all that was left was a booklet?

Can such a booklet really cover everything about rhythm?

With these questions in mind, he opened the Hongwu Zhengyun book to read it.

Upon seeing it, I couldn't help but be stunned for a moment.

Because what he found was completely different from what he had imagined.

It could even be said that it completely exceeded his expectations.
The opening line is: simple vowels.

a[阿]o[噢]e[鹅]i[衣]u[乌]ü[迂]
Compound vowels

ai[哀]ei[嘿]ui[危]ao[奥]ou[欧]iu[悠]ie[耶]üe[约]er[儿]
……

what?
What are all these scribbles?

Song Lian was stunned.

As I looked further, the more I looked, the more outrageous it seemed.

Because these scribbled symbols are all labeled with Chinese characters.

He could pronounce these things.

They also understood the emperor's meaning.

However, this method of using foreign languages ​​to annotate Chinese characters with phonetic symbols is not very effective!

Isn't this going against the natural order of the Heavenly Spirits?

It was far different from the method he was familiar with, which used Chinese characters to annotate the pronunciation of Chinese characters.

Shocked, they also began to believe the emperor's words.

This wasn't done by Song Ne, it was done by the emperor himself.

Because these scribbles were not something Song Ne possessed at all.

Song Ne would never use such scribbled characters to annotate the pronunciation of Chinese characters.

"Your Majesty, this... I'm afraid this is somewhat inappropriate."

Zhu Yuanzhang asked, "What's wrong with it?"

"How can we use such foreign scripts to annotate the pronunciation of Chinese characters?"

Zhu Yuanzhang said, "Stones from other mountains can be used to polish jade."

Ease of use is the most important factor.

What foreign tribes or barbarian lands?
What I take and use is mine.

Mr. Song doesn't think that using this method to annotate the pronunciation of Chinese characters would be much simpler?
If you memorize these few pinyin letters, you can annotate the pinyin of all Chinese characters.

Furthermore, there is a unified standard, unlike the previous phonetic notation system, which often used two Chinese characters to annotate the pronunciation of one Chinese character.

The more phonetic symbols are used, the more complicated it becomes.

Sages advocated education for all, meaning that knowledge is acquired so that it can be shared with everyone.

Naturally, the easier it is to spread, the better.

With this phonetic notation system, wouldn't the spread of knowledge be greatly accelerated in the future?
Doesn't this conform to the way of the sages?

At this point, Zhu Yuanzhang began to play the role of a sage.

Dealing with a very orthodox Confucian like Song Lian, persuading him on this matter is not so easy.

Bringing up the image of a sage, and the politically correct act of spreading the knowledge of that sage, should be quite effective.

"Your Majesty, this...this is certainly good."

However… this barbarian script is still somewhat problematic, needlessly disrupting our Chinese script.”

"I don't think there's anything wrong with it."

Learning requires an inclusive and eclectic approach.

Mr. Song might as well broaden his horizons and open his mind a little more.

Besides, we weren't the ones who started this trend of inclusiveness.

Didn't those wise men of the past do this long ago?
During the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods, the Hundred Schools of Thought contended, wasn't it all about you absorbing my ideas and me absorbing yours?

Later, Dong Zhongshu dismissed all other schools of thought and exclusively promoted Confucianism.

How could it not have absorbed the teachings of Huang-Lao Legalism?
As for Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism, they eventually became intertwined, each influencing the other.
Now, why can't we also absorb some of the best aspects to help Chinese culture flourish?

“However, Your Majesty…” Song Lian wanted to continue arguing.

"Mr. Song!"

Zhu Yuanzhang's expression turned somewhat serious as he interrupted Song Lian.

"After reading all that Mr. Song has said, the most fundamental issue is not that foreign languages ​​are disrupting the orthodox Chinese writing system."

"Are you complaining that our Hongwu Zhengyun (a system of phonetic transcriptions from the Hongwu era) only reflects the refined pronunciation of the Central Plains?"

(End of this chapter)