I originally wanted to write an information film about the official system of the Tang Dynasty, but I found that there were too many slots, too many topics, and too deep thinking to provoke, which would deviate from the theme of the book.

Therefore, I still excerpt the parts related to the content of the book and publish a separate chapter. These contents are basically beyond the psychological expectations of readers, and I still need to say a few more nonsense.

The first thing to talk about is the involution and polarization of officialdom.

The so-called involution means that there are too many people who are officials, and the "official position" (I will explain this word slowly later in quotation marks) is not enough.

In the middle and late Tang Dynasty society (including Kaiyuan Tianbao), the entire officialdom has been institutionalized, which has triggered a series of chain reactions. For example, in some novels (I won't say which one specifically), I like to quote Feng Yan's "Eight Jun Said", that is, eight steps to be promoted to become prime minister, and there are two official positions to choose from at each step, to show that this is the dream of a scholar in the Tang Dynasty to become an official.

Bajun said that he couldn't say wrong, but he didn't get to the point, and combined with the context, he was completely wrong.

The scholars of the Tang Dynasty can be understood as those who were awarded official positions after the middle rank, and they can also refer to those who aspire to become officials. Therefore, Zhang Jiuling is a scholar, and the frustrated scholar who failed the imperial examination is also a scholar. So, is the ideal of scholars really the "eight-step promotion method" to the prime minister?

In fact, no, their dreams are just "clear" and "want".

Qing, the concept is very complex, and in a nutshell, it means not doing things, or doing less. The bitter official position of the assassin is definitely not "clear", so there is absolutely no official in the eight-step promotion method.

After explaining the clear, let's explain the "want", the so-called "want", simply put, is important. Some officials are very idle, but they are not important at all, such as the administrator of the library and other official positions.

After explaining this, let's explain what is called "scholar", simply put, it means that reading is for the sake of officials and their families. Since birth, there has only been one way for them to become an official, either to become an official, or on the way to the imperial examination, or to "raise hope" at home after being dismissed, and be in a state of leisure.

In short, it is impossible for them to participate in social labor, to farm, to engage in business, and to marry the children of non-officials.

After understanding these concepts, the involution of the Kaiyuan and Tianbao periods is easy to understand.

An average of 27 jinshi a year seems to be a few, but there are even fewer suitable official positions. This is not counting, the middle jinshi will be elected after three years, and these three years are the preparatory period for these jinshi to go through the back door!

If you also count the people who have entered the Ming Dynasty, those vacant official positions are far from enough.

Although there are many official positions in Datang, but! Not all of these scholars will be in office! This point is very important, and the historical novels of the Tang Dynasty that ignore this point are basically talking to themselves and having fun.

The scholars monopolized the official position of the Qing nobles, and if the emperor did not promote them, they would not allow people from a similar background to hold such official positions, let alone Niu Xianke who did not have a background and did not take the imperial examination.

In the same way, these people will not hold non-noble official positions, such as the trick officer, which is a large number of officials, such as the medical officer in the Tai Hospital, or a large number of grassroots clerks in the state and county.

They have official positions and official positions, not grassroots officials, but there are no official historical records, and many official positions are determined by archaeological excavations in later generations.

Then a terrible conclusion can be deduced from here: the history of the Tang Dynasty written by the Song people is actually only the history of the Tang Dynasty scholars, and the history of the Tang Dynasty in the eyes of the Song Dynasty scholars. The types of Qing and noble official positions in the Tang Dynasty only account for 20%-25% (100+/400+) of the total number of civil official positions in the Tang Dynasty that have been discovered.

Officials in the Tang Dynasty generally had a four-year term, and they were generally transferred after the expiration of the term, first to go to office, and then to wait for the election of officials (such as what happened to Lao Zheng after returning to Chang'an). It is easy to leave a job, but it is even more difficult to be granted an official position. Many readers have the impression that those who are officials should continue to be officials until they die.

But this was not the case in the Tang Dynasty.

People like Zhang Jiuling, Bai Juyi, and Li Deyu have passed more than 20 official positions, and they basically belong to people who have been in office, and they belong to the leaders among successful officials. But what about ordinary officials?

It's just 3-5 terms, maybe the officialdom career is only 12-20 years, and many people who have lived to be fifty or sixty years old have less than ten years of officialdom! He spent most of his life in seclusion.

Either they are in office, or they are forced to live in seclusion at home, this is the state of life of officials. Some people who are officials themselves, but are not considered officials in the eyes of the scholars who revised the history of the Song Dynasty, such as the trick officials, etc., because the history books do not record them, so there are few records about these people, and the historical materials are fragmented.

But one thing is for sure, after the Anshi Rebellion, because the festival envoy needed a large number of practical officials to maintain the scene, a large part of these people were reused. The demand for talents is very large, and the salaries offered are also very high, providing a large number of jobs for all kinds of trick officials who are not recorded in detail in the history books.

To sum up: in the middle and late Tang Dynasty, the bureaucratic class dominated by scholars was seriously solidified, the upward channel at the bottom was blocked, and the internal competition among scholars was fierce.

The second thing to say is: after the Tang Dynasty, the establishment of officials by "things" gradually became the norm, the system of three provinces and six ministries was in vain, and the efficiency of the government's government affairs was extremely low, so it had to adopt the "patching" model to maintain the operation.

This article is also inseparable from the gradual blurring of the scholar class. People with real talent and real learning often come through "special channels", and what they do is often because of "special channels". The three provinces and six ministries that maintained the operation of the imperial court, many unimportant departments and official positions, gradually became undone.

For example, the household department is responsible for collecting taxes, but it can only collect those taxes that were set when the Tang Dynasty was founded. And the extra color servants and miscellaneous servants and the like, there is no way to do it at all. After the Anshi Rebellion, the position of Tobe Shirou became a fictitious position, and there are countless similar examples.

Therefore, whatever the emperor or the central center needs to do, he will set up whatever position.

If it is necessary to manage the transportation of taxes, then set up a "transshipment envoy".

If you need to collect a salt tax, then set up a "salt and iron envoy".

Even Li Longji sent people to the people to search for beauties, and set up a "flower and bird envoy"!

These positions, which are constantly set up because of the need for firms, have greatly impacted the structure of the three provinces and six ministries. Since the end of the Anshi Rebellion, the Tang Dynasty has been operating inefficiently for 30 years, and officials often go to work every few days, and they are so idle that they have to fade out.

The reason is that many official positions in the three provinces and six ministries have been vacated by new positions in charge of exclusive matters.

The evolution of this process is one-way and irreversible, and Li Longji's special financial officials to manage their finances are a passive response to these fictitious changes, which is also the call of the times, and does not depend on personal will.

After reading the above, I think readers should also understand what I want to express.

The general trend of history is mighty; Those who follow me prosper, and those who oppose me perish.

Where is there absolute right and wrong, and where is there absolutely good people?

Zhang Jiuling must be a good person? Li Linfu must be a bad person?

These questions need to take into account the position of the questioner and what he wants to know in order to have a proper answer.

A lot of people are asking, and I don't mind saying that in the process of researching historical materials, I have found more and more that the model of the Tang Dynasty is not sustainable. Datang is hopeless, if you like to watch the plot of saving Datang, maybe it's better to change to a book that you don't read without a brain, my one, I can't save it.

I can't change the materialist view of history in this book just because I want to see the plot of saving the Tang Dynasty.

Regarding the content of the Tang Dynasty official system, let's add it later.