Judy is the most outstanding son of Zhu Yuanzhang. He is ambitious. At first, he chose his father's eldest brother Zhu Biao as the prince. After Zhu Biao's death, Zhu Yuanzhang made Zhu Yunwen, a cowardly and incompetent grandson, a prince, which aroused Judy's strong dissatisfaction. He slandered Zhu Yunwen several times in front of Zhu Yuanzhang, which is by no means a person who can trust the world. Although Zhu Yuanzhang knew in his heart that his martial arts talent and his fourth son Judy were much higher than his grandson Zhu Yunwen. However, in order to maintain their established imperial eldest son inheritance system. He will firmly support Zhu Yunwen as his successor. On one occasion, in order to show his great-grandson's talent, Zhu Yuanzhang ordered him to recite poems in front of his ministers. Zhu Yuanzhang's last sentence was "The wind blows a thousand lines in a ponytail". Zhu Yunwen thought for a long time and finally said, "Rain blows wool." Although the correct sentence looks fair, its meaning is mediocre and meaningless. Zhu Yuanzhang was greatly unhappy. At this time, Judy, the prince of Yan, casually said, "Rizhao Longlin has ten thousand points of gold." Everyone present was stunned by the domineering attitude of a king, and Zhu Yuanzhang even praised him. But it also increased his concern about the future status of the emperor's grandson.
In the thirty-first year of Hongwu (AD 1398), Zhu Yuanzhang, who was 7 1 year old, died. According to the arrangement before his death, he left a testamentary edict, and his grandson Zhu Yun, 2 1 year-old, succeeded to the throne, with the title of Wen Jian, that is, Ming Huidi in history. Legend has it that before he died, Zhu Yuanzhang didn't trust Zhu Yunwen, so he gave his personal eunuch a secret box, saying that if the emperor's grandson is safe all his life, don't open the box. If there is any emergency, just open the box and it will tell you what to do. This is a folk legend, I don't know whether it is true or not, but it is these bizarre stories that add more mystery to Wen Jian's whereabouts.
During Zhu Yuanzhang's reign, in order to consolidate that the Ming Dynasty was always in the hands of Zhu Descendants, he successively enfeoffed his descendants as princes and sent them to key places in the country. These enfeoffed vassal kings are armed to the teeth and control the whole political party. When Zhu Yuanzhang was alive, he was honest and dared not do anything out of line. However, after Zhu Yuanzhang's death, they didn't care about the cowardly and incompetent Jianwen Emperor Zhu Yunwen. They are all overbearing and do not obey the jurisdiction of the central government. In order to solve the threat of local governors to the central imperial power, Wen Jian adopted the suggestions of Qi Tai, Fang Xiaoru and others, and strictly implemented the policy of reducing vassals. He first sent troops to Kaifeng, put Zhu Su, the king of Zhou, under house arrest, and then abandoned him as a civilian; Then, he sent troops to Hunan and Hubei to get rid of Zhu Bian, king of Fujian, and Bai Zhu, king of Hunan. Since then, Zhu Bo, Qi Wang, Zhu Gui and others have been imprisoned. Wen Jian severely reduced the number of vassals, and local vassals were deprived of their titles, or were deprived of their civilian status or banned from being prisoners. There was a lot of noise and complaints. This measure seriously damaged the vital interests of local princes, and almost all princes were dissatisfied with it, especially the heavily armed and coveted prince Judy.
Judy, the prince of Yan, rebelled and seized the throne long ago, but he didn't have a good excuse. This time, Emperor Wen Jian cut off the governors, which made all the governors complain. This is a golden opportunity for Yan. In July of the first year of Wen Jian (1399), Judy, the prince of Yan, launched the "Battle of Jingnan" under the pretext of Jun Qing. Although nominally to help Wen Jian get rid of traitors around him, in fact he betrayed. After the Prince ascended the throne, Wen Jian immediately panicked and quickly recruited troops from all over the country to enter Beijing. However, since Wen Jian cut the vassal, local governors have been offended by him, so local governors have turned to the account of the Prince and betrayed Wen Jian. Wen Jian had many men of letters, but not many generals who could lead troops to fight. Intimate Ji Tai, Fang Xiaoru and others are also scholars and pedants. Although they are knowledgeable, they are useless. In this way, the prince's army soon arrived in Nanjing without much effort. Seeing the tide ebbing, Emperor Wen Jian ordered the palace to be burned down. Judy, the prince of Yan, couldn't find his emperor after he broke into the palace, so he ordered people to look for him carefully. The eunuch in the palace said that his emperor jumped into the fire in despair and set himself on fire, and found a body from the fire and identified him as his emperor. Judy hypocritically said that he only wanted to get rid of the traitor and didn't want to kill the emperor. Then, he was buried with the emperor's ceremony. However, there is no record of Wen Jian's tomb in official documents, and later Emperor Chongzhen himself said that Wen Jian had no tomb.
So, is the charred body in the ruins his? Is he dead? If not, where did he escape to? Judy herself has doubts about this series of questions, and later historians and folklore have different opinions, which are extremely bizarre.
One view is that Wen Jian did not die, but escaped from Nanjing and became a monk in a temple in Guizhou. It is said that after Judy, the prince of Yan, besieged the city, Emperor Wen Jian called it invalid every day and told the land not to respond. In order to prevent being captured and humiliated, Wen Jian decided to commit suicide. At this moment, suddenly a eunuch came running. He told the emperor Wen Jian that Mao gave him a secret box before he died, and told him that if the emperor was in danger, he could open it. Hearing the news, Wen Jian quickly ordered the old eunuch to get the secret box and open it. There are three cassocks, three knives, a razor and three knife names, which are written respectively: Ying Xian, Ying Neng and Wen Ying. Wen Ying refers to Wen Jian's close friends Julian, Yingxian and Yingneng. There is also a letter in the box, which reads: "Wen Ying went out from the gate of hell, and the others went into the ditch from the Watergate. At dusk, I will be in the optimistic west room of God. " When Emperor Wen Jian saw it, he knew that it was the secret box that Emperor Mao had predicted he would have today, and told himself to shave his hair to save his life. According to the instructions of the secret box, Wen Jian shaved his hair and became a monk. He escaped from the palace from the gate of hell and began to live as a wandering monk.
After Wen Jian made up and fled, the empress Ma Shi, in order to cover him, ordered eunuchs to set fire to the city, and then jumped into the fire. Burned himself to death The next day, after Judy broke into the palace, he searched for the whereabouts of Emperor Wen Jian. Under pressure, eunuchs and ladies-in-waiting panicked, thinking that Emperor Wen Jian had set himself on fire and died, and decided that the queen's body belonged to Emperor Wen Jian. At this point, the body found in the fire has been burned beyond recognition and is difficult to identify. In this way, Judy believed it and didn't pursue it again.
Some people even found Wen Jian's seclusion after becoming a monk-Gao Feng Temple in Pingba County, Anshun, Guizhou. According to Pingba County Records, there is a hiding hole in the underground of Gaofengshan Temple Zhaitang, and the words "Xiufeng Zhao Jian wrote the Prajna Gate" are engraved on the stone tablet at the bottom of the cave. In addition, another stone tablet in the temple is engraved with the story of Xiufeng, the founder of the mountain, who took in the emperor Wen Jian. Accordingly, later generations speculated that this was the residence of Wen Jian after he became a monk.
Legend has it that Emperor Wenjian abdicated to Gao Feng Temple in Guizhou. Some people think that he did not go to Guizhou after fleeing, but lived in seclusion in an ancient temple on Dongshan Mountain in Lanxi City. Dongshan, also known as Huang Huishan, is a branch of Jin Huashan. According to legend, the monks in the temple once lived in seclusion here by Emperor Wen Jian, and claimed that there were still places and historical sites where he lived in seclusion. In the main hall of the temple, there is a statue of Emperor Wen Jian in cassock, and two monks, Yang Yingneng and Ye Xixian, are on the left and right respectively. The escape route of Emperor Wen Jian is painted on the back wall of the temple. In addition, there are several poems written by Emperor Wen Jian after he became a monk in the temple: "A hundred officials don't know where to go, and birds will go to court in the morning and evening"; "the heart of the dust disappears without a dutiful son, and it does not invade human flesh." The meaning in the poem is full of helplessness and sadness of fleeing hastily and returning to the outside world, which adds further evidence for his seclusion here.
In addition, there is a popular saying that after he escaped from Nanjing, his Wendi moved to Quanzhou and went abroad. Later, after Ming succeeded to the throne, Zheng He was sent to the Western Seas in search of Emperor Wen who was far away from home. Legend has it that after Wen Jian escaped from Beijing through a secret passage, he saw that the road to the north was mostly blocked by the army of the Prince of Yan, so he had to make up and go south to the Luohan Temple in Wuchang. After reading the official records of Emperor Wen Jian, the abbot of Luohan Temple, Monk Daxuan, quickly introduced Wen Jian into the temple to hide. After a while, Wen Jian and others found that this place was easily discovered by the minions of the prince. Under the guidance of monk Daxuan, they took a boat to Kaiyuan Temple in Quanzhou and then fled overseas. According to the records of Kaiyuan Temple in Quanzhou, Monk Nianhai, the abbot of Kaiyuan Temple in Quanzhou at that time, was a disciple of monk Daxuan, the abbot of Luohan Temple. After Wen Jian came to Kaiyuan Temple in Quanzhou, he hid in the temple and sent people to look for opportunities to escape overseas. Finally, one day, they boarded an Arab merchant's cargo ship and accompanied them to Sumatra, Indonesia, and began to live in seclusion. It is said that every year on May 16 of the lunar calendar, on the day when Wen Jian ascended the throne, the local China people still held a grand ceremony to worship the "emperor".
There have been different views and arguments about Wen Jian's life and death and whereabouts since ancient times. For this, every statement can only be said by one family, because no statement says that it has very conclusive evidence and that historical facts are like this. Perhaps Wen Jian's life and death, like other historical mysteries, is an unsolved case that can never be solved.