Approximately 1050 BCE the ruler of an independent province on the
frontier of ancient China named Ji Fa defeated the reigning Emperor Di
Xin's vast forces to found China's 3rd dynasty, the Zhou. The rise of
the Zhou with their military, scientific, cultural, and economic
superiority and their triumph over the Shang dynasty is the subject of
this novel.
For the most part, Ji Fa's conquest was made possible
by three extraordinary men: (1) Ji Chang- Ji Fa's father, primary
author of the world's oldest book, founder of the world's first public
school system and citizen's college, the Thomas Jefferson of his age;
(2) Ji Dan (Zhougong)- Ji Fa's younger brother, a political and
administrative genius, significant contributor to the oldest book, the
Ben Franklin of his age; (3) Lu Shang (Taigong)- an immigrant to Zhou,
China's greatest military leader, the Robert E. Lee of his age. These
three men are still today considered among China's most revered heroes,
as they were by the great sage himself, Confucius, five centuries later.
Indeed, much of what has become Chinese culture as now known
originated, not with Confucius, but with Ji Chang and Ji Dan, whom
Confucius admired greatly.
The I Ching (The Book of Changes) was
written by Ji Chang during a seven year captivity by the last Shang
emperor, an atrocity that contributed crucially to the downfall of the
Shang. After the Zhou conquest, Ji Dan added significantly to the book
even during a post-conquest period of terrific instability and authored
several other ancient volumes that have had vast influence on Chinese
society and thought. Except for an appendix added by Confucius and other
miscellaneous latter day scribbling, The Book of Changes has come to us
through the ages just as the two leaders wrote it.
The story of
their conquest concerns itself with conflicts of values: morality versus
practicality, independence versus social propriety, self-restraint
versus the exercise of power, and so on. This period is prior to
Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism, even Judaism (perhaps even Hinduism).
Viewing the world from 3,000 years ago as China emerged from the stone
age, some of our most respected modern attitudes become suspect. Through
their eyes nature and primitivism were a lifelong threat, virtue and
social propriety were a practical necessity, and ritual and sacrifice
was vital to cultural progress. Indeed, as modern China increasingly
considers itself in “exceptionalist” terms, the Zhou concept of
“tianxia” (all under heaven) is being proffered by Chinese thinkers as
an alternative to the current, prevailing “nation state” model of
civilization [Banyan: “Nothing New Under Heaven.” The Economist, Vol.
399, No. 8738 (6-18-2011), p.50].
The drama of the story arises
from the contrast between Ji Chang, one of China's finest men, and the
corrupt and decadent Shang Emperor, Di Xin, one of China's worst (whose
depravity, incidentally, pales in comparison to well known latter day
despots). This contrast is extended to the men around the two leaders
and ultimately to their cultures as a whole as the characters are swept
into the maelstrom of civil war.
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