When we think of gods and Buddhas, we are often in awe. During the New Year's holidays, I don't forget to worship the gods and Buddhas and pray for protection.

As a religion that has been introduced to China since the Han Dynasty, Buddhism has grown from scratch and flourished. Du Mu once said in a poem that "there are 480 temples in the Southern Dynasties, and how many buildings are in the smoke and rain", which also shows the prosperity and rapid development of Buddhism in the Southern Dynasties. The teachings of Buddhism, in terms of a certain cause and effect of good and evil, also constrain the norms of human behavior, so as to apply the needs of the ruling class and achieve its barbaric growth.

However, there have been four large-scale extermination campaigns in Chinese history.

And Chai Rong, as the first master of the five generations, led one of them, which we call Chai Rong to destroy the Buddha

As an undeniable first master of the five generations in the records of historians throughout the ages, he can be said to be loved by thousands of historians, and he died early.

His heroic material can be described as a hero, and he humbly listens to it, and uses people without doubt, isn't it the so-called virtuous master! Its north to take the three passes, the soldiers are not bloody, and the historian still ridicules its light social weight, and luck is better than the hasty, but I don't know the strength of its material, compared to the other and I take advantage of the law of the death, the opportunity to gain and not to lose, this is not clear in the decisive person, who can be the best? It's beyond the reach of the Shi family!" "The History of the New Five Dynasties" if Zhou Shizong is benevolent! Love not the body but the people; If Zhou Shizong, it can be said to be clear! Don't waste the benefits of nothing. "Sejong ordered the ministers with a letter, and blamed the countries with justice, Wang Huan was rewarded for not surrendering, Liu Renzhen was praised for his perseverance, and he was saved for his loyalty, and the Shu soldiers were repeatedly executed, Feng Dao was abandoned for his intemperance, and Zhang Mei was neglected for his personal kindness. Jiangnan did not serve, then the pro-offender Yashi, expected to be in the Ke, even if it was served, then love it like a son, push the sincerity of the words, for the foresight. Its grandeur and generosity, how can it be the same as Zhuang Zong! The book says: "There is no bias and no party, and the royal road is swinging." He also said: "The big state is afraid of its strength, and the small state is full of virtue." 'Sejong is near!' "Information Governance Guide"

In the troubled times of five generations, he once vowed that "if it is as Qing said, I should open up the world in ten years, raise the people in ten years, and achieve peace in ten years!"

But he reigned for only six years, and died suddenly at the age of 39. The business was unfinished, so there was a saying that Chai Rong had offended the gods and Buddhas. The campaign to exterminate the Buddha under his edict made him: "Zhou Shizong is the master of the Ying, but the punishment is urgent, the punishment is excessive, and the enjoyment is not eternal." It's all because the criminal law is severe, there are too many killings, and the crimes are too heavy, which leads to this.

But is that really the case? This is a big fallacy. And those who hold the retribution of Chai Rong to destroy the Buddha are not real Buddhist disciples, let alone real believers in Buddhism.

After Buddhism was introduced to China, it borrowed from and fused with traditional Chinese culture to form Chinese Buddhism, a sect of flesh and blood. From our thirteen stick monks to save the King of Qin to the subsequent dynasties, all of them are in line with the mission of the times. The Buddha said: The Buddha is the person who came over, and the person is the Buddha of the future. This is the path that a Buddha should have, and this is the true reincarnation of cause and effect.

But by the end of the Five Dynasties, Buddhism was even more prosperous

Shi Zhenzong, the sage of the wonderful way, helps the world to persuade goodness, and its benefits are very good. Since the previous generation, it has been tired and organized, but in recent years it has declined, and it is quite orderly. A close look at the news of the states, following the illegal acts of the gangsters, there is no prohibition, so that it is especially violated, the monks and nuns are private, the increasing obscenity, the creation of monasteries, gradually to the multiplicity, the disadvantages in the countryside have become even worse. Those who slipped through the net and betrayed the army were shaved to escape punishment; Adultery is a thief, and he holds the abbot and hides evil. It is necessary to distinguish whether it is true or not, and it is advisable to cite the old chapter and use the disadvantages of the reform. History of the Old Five Dynasties

Buddhism, which was supposed to help the world and persuade goodness, has become a place to hide filth and dirt, and people who evade military service and labor; Adulterers abound. The people even destroyed the copper coins to build bronze statues, and under the privileges of tax exemption and land enjoyed by the temples themselves, the temples concentrated a large amount of social wealth, which seriously endangered the development of the country's economy.

If it were you, your emperor, would you not order the destruction of the Buddha?

The pain of the sixteen states of Youyun, the sergeant conquest, which one doesn't need money?

And as a Dao Ming Jun, he is not like the other three Buddha-destroying kings, but destroying the Buddha with scale and proportion.

All provinces, prefectures, counties, towns, villages, and squares should have a temple, all the same, and those who have no amount, and stop abolishing it, all the meritorious Buddha statues and monks and nuns, and vacate and place in the temple. In the counties and towns of the world, if there is no temple, only in the abandoned temple, the one with the most meritorious houses is selected, or the monks and nuns of the monastery are left one, and if there are no nuns to live, only one monastery is left. ………… Those who have been punished by lawsuits, as well as those who have abandoned their parents, fugitive slaves and maids, adulterers, evil rebels, outlaws in the mountains and forests, thieves who have not been found, and those who have been convicted and smuggled, are not allowed to shave their heads at home. If there is a monastery that accepts it, he and his master, the three gangs, the governor and the monks and nuns, and the monks living in the neighboring houses, and they will be arrested and forbidden to investigate, and they will be punished. The History of the Old Five Dynasties, Volume 115

In the face of opposition from the government and the opposition, Buddhism is flourishing, and he is even more committed to the end, "and I heard that the Buddha is determined to benefit people, although the leader is still willing to give alms, if I can help the people, it is not a pity." ”

The emperor has said that "sacrificing his life", who dares to say anything, he even destroyed the Buddha statue himself. "The Son of Heaven is a word, how can it be abolished because of a Buddha statue, I will go to explore it in person."

For you to be like this, why worry about Zhou's lack of prosperity? According to this, after the destruction of the Buddha, "there were 2,694 existing monasteries, 3336 abandoned monasteries, and 61,200 monks and nuns."

The destruction of the Buddha can be said to be a great way to provide financial and human support for its conquest of the world. Wise, courageous, agile, and enlightened, but he died in the prime of life, but he was said to be the karma of Buddhism. It's really disrespectful to history and to this Ming Jun.

And his death can be explained by the death of overwork in modern medicine, where does the theory of retribution come from. In the history, its "to pay attention to political affairs, tirelessly", in the attack on the Northern Han Dynasty, take Qin Long, Pinghuai right is more hands-on, the royal drive pro-conquest, attack the 16 states of Youyun. Without spending a single soldier and coercing the power of the Son of Heaven, he recovered Sanguan and Sanzhou.

If it is allowed to work and rest reasonably, so that it can live and recuperate, how can it come to the pain of the Sixteen Prefectures of Youyun of the Iron and Blood Great Song Dynasty ("Sending Blood"), and the shame of Jingkang in the future.

Although the reign of Chai Rong of the Later Zhou Dynasty was short, his rule did bring the Central Plains back to life. Since the end of the Tang Dynasty, the Central Plains has fallen into turmoil, and the warlords and jiedu envoys of all parties have fought against each other, and the power of the country has been continuously weakened. Especially after the Later Jin Dynasty took the Later Tang Dynasty, the Sixteen Prefectures of Youyun were given to the Khitans by Emperor Shi Jingjiao, and the last barrier between the Central Plains and the northern ethnic minorities was lost, making the Central Plains under the iron heel of the Khitan army at any time. In addition, the Northern Han and other northern Han regimes could not continue to improve themselves, but instead paid tribute to the Khitans, which made the Central Plains weaker and weaker. This made the situation in the Central Plains take a sharp turn for the worse, the imperial army was unable to resist the invasion of the Khitans, the people lived in hardship, and the Central Plains was devastated.

Under this extremely unfavorable historical condition, Chai Rong of the Later Zhou Dynasty made great efforts. Externally, he repelled the invasion of the Northern Han, Khitan and Southern Tang tripartite coalition forces, and internally appointed Wang Pu, Fan Zhen and other civil servants to restore the national strength. Then he reformed the malaise of warlord governance, creating a precedent for literati politics, making the Later Zhou Dynasty the most powerful state in the Central Plains. In the course of these reforms, the imperial court will naturally touch the interests of various warlord groups, and may even trigger domestic unrest. However, Chai Rong cleverly took advantage of the advantages of literati politics and balanced the interests of the state and the warlords and nobles through the exchange of various political interests, so that the country could develop and grow in a stable political environment.

Chai Rong was later called "the first emperor of the five dynasties", and his greatest achievement is that this series of reforms was completed in four or five years, and did not cause internal conflicts and turmoil, which shows his extremely high political skill. Not only that, but he has a large number of capable people, including a genius politician like Wang Pu, as well as a large number of upstarts in the court who can fight well, such as Zhao Kuangyin, Gao Huaide, Zhang Yongde, and Li Chongjin, and has also received the support of Fu Yanqing and other warlords of the older generation, and the country's environment has been greatly improved. However, while Chai Rong was praised for governing the country, his attitude towards religion was criticized by later generations. In particular, the series of measures he took to worship the Buddha and destroy the Tao caused dissatisfaction among the Buddhists, and people are still a stain on the talk of people.

In ancient China, there was no theocratic state, but Buddhism and Taoism had a great influence on the country. The emperors of all dynasties have a tradition of believing in religion, for example, most of the emperors of the Tang Dynasty believed in Taoism, and Li Shimin, Taizong of the Tang Dynasty, even claimed that the Li Tang royal family was the descendant of Li Er, the Taishang Laojun. However, most of the empresses of the Tang Dynasty believed in Buddhism, and when the female emperor Wu Zetian built the Longmen Grottoes, she asked craftsmen to carve their faces into these Buddhist sculptures. This tradition made the imperial court very preferential treatment of religion, and there were many preferential policies such as the elimination of forced labor and taxes, so that religious disciples had a superior status among the people. The most extreme of this situation was in the Southern Liang Dynasty, when Emperor Xiao Yan of Liang Wu actually forced the imperial court to support Buddhism in the name of becoming a monk, which can be described as extremely absurd.

Because religion occupies a privileged position in the policy of the state, the resources in their possession gradually erode into the foundations of the state. In order to take advantage of the privileged policy of religion, the local tyrants and landlords in many places colluded with the presiding officers of temples and Taoist temples to expand in a disorderly manner, and carried out tricks and plunders against the local people, which aggravated social contradictions such as the gap between the rich and the poor and land annexation, and became a cancer parasitic on the blood of the state. In order to eradicate these tumors, the emperor and the imperial court will find ways to limit the disorderly expansion of religion, the most famous of which is the "Three Martial Arts and One Sect Extermination of Buddha" incident. The leaders of these four "Buddha extermination" events were Tuoba Tao, Taiwu Emperor of the Northern Wei Dynasty, Yuwen Yong, Emperor Wu of the Northern Zhou Dynasty, Li Yan of Tang Wuzong, and Chai Rong of Shizong of the Later Zhou Dynasty.

During the Five Dynasties, the practice of believing in Buddhism was extremely popular, and many people obtained the imperial court's privileged policies in religion by donating money to build private temples and ordaining monks and nuns privately. They even bought a large number of bronze objects and melted money to cast Buddhas to avoid all kinds of taxes that should be paid. In order to change this bad atmosphere, Chai Rong issued a series of policies to exclude Buddhism from the second year of his reign, and controlled a series of non-governmental behaviors such as "privately visiting monks and nuns, increasing obscenity, and establishing monasteries". Except for some key temples with a long history, or government-run religious sites, the others are closed.

Even the preserved government monasteries have certain requirements for the monks in them. These monks are required to have a certain foundation in Buddhism, be able to recite and interpret a certain amount of Buddhist scriptures, and have permission from the family elders. Moreover, Chai Rong cracked down on the illegal casting of bronze Buddhas in his family and temples, and once found, he would be confiscated or sentenced to death. In this way, the trend of melting money to cast Buddha was curbed, and the confiscated bronze Buddha was also cast into a furnace to cast copper coins, which increased the wealth of the country. After this series of rectifications, the number of Buddhist monasteries in the country was drastically reduced in the Later Zhou Dynasty, and finally only more than 2,000 remained. Of course, those cancerous families that relied on Buddhism were also eliminated, and the national strength of the Later Zhou Dynasty was strengthened, and the social environment was also improved

Unlike the harshness of Taoist Buddhism, Chai Rong is very respectful in his treatment of Taoism. He was very interested in Taoist alchemy and the spell of turning stones into gold, and he also sent someone to invite the great master of the Taoist Hidden Immortal Sect, Chen Tuan, to live in the palace. Ancestor Chen Jun did not teach Chai Rong the method of alchemy, but advised him to concentrate on governing the country and not to think about these illusory things. Chai Rong accepted Chen Luan's suggestion and appointed the other party as the counselor. Later, Chen Tuan Ancestor left Bianliang and returned to Zhongnanshan, Chai Rong also rewarded him, and ordered the local officials to pay condolences to Chen Tuan Ancestor during the New Year's Festival. Later, Zhu Xian, the assassin of Chengzhou, went to work, and when he left Bianliang, Chai Rong asked him to bring cloth and tea to Chen Tuan ancestor by the way, in order to express his longing.

Due to his different attitudes towards Buddhism and Taoism, Chai Rong's evaluation of the two religions is diametrically opposed. In the eyes of Buddhist disciples, Chai Rong is the demon of the "Buddha", eager to "eat its flesh and sleep its skin". The Taoist disciples admired Chai Rong very much, and later generations also shaped him into a fairy character. Because Guo Wei, the Taizu of the Later Zhou Dynasty, was very difficult in the early days of his business, Chai Rong was responsible for taking care of logistics affairs, and he also had to earn money by being a merchant to supplement military expenses, so Chai Rong became the God of Wealth Emperor among the Taoist immortals. This kind of atmosphere is quite popular in Taoism in the Central Plains, and Chai Rong has become the protector of porcelain, tea, umbrellas, ores, bricks and tiles and other industries in the hearts of the common people. This sacrificial tradition is still preserved to this day, and it can be seen in the countryside during the Chinese New Year.