What are the reasons for the failure of the peasant uprising created by ghosts and gods?

In the long river of history, countless heroes ended in fiasco, but this still can't stop their glory. The ancient society is too far away for us now, but it still arouses our infinite reverie and imagination. However, is it really as simple as we think?

That's not the answer. What we learn and what we are exposed to tell us that we are different. In ancient times, some emperors loved their people as sons, and the people in the world lived and worked in peace and contentment. However, some emperors increased taxes and corvees, and the people were miserable and nowhere to be found.

The history of frequent rebellions in ancient times dates back to the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period. Some officials are authoritarian in insurrection, such as Wang Mang's regime established at the end of the Western Han Dynasty, and there are also many consorts like Emperor Wen who conspire and interfere in politics. At the same time, there are also eunuchs who interfere in politics as we know in film and television dramas. Although the regime is not entirely in its own hands, it can be said that one person is above ten thousand people.

It can be traced back to Zhao Gao near Hu Hai, Qin Ershi in the Qin Dynasty. The most prominent example is "referring to a deer as a horse". The most obvious thing is that the Ming dynasty eunuchs dominated the political affairs, and the power of the court was almost entirely in the hands of eunuchs around the emperor. Today we are going to talk about the well-known history of the ancient peasant uprising. The peasant uprisings we know are Chen, Guang and Hong Xiuquan.

But why did they all end in failure? We can know that the ancients believed in the theory of ghosts and gods, which has been circulated among the people since ancient times. But is it really the right way to shape political power with the help of ghosts and gods? That's not the answer. Let us understand why ancient peasant uprisings ended in failure with the help of ghosts and gods.

1. Social reasons: Only relying on the theory of ghosts and gods is not enough to solve social contradictions and free people from suffering. During the uprising, Chen Sheng and Guangwu used cinnabar to carve words on silk, and then hid them in the fish's stomach, so that others could buy fish and find the silk hidden in the fish's stomach, which made people believe that what Chen Sheng and Guangwu did was to comply with God's will and make people willingly obey him.

This is to use ghosts and gods to create momentum and achieve the purpose of centralized political power, but this cannot solve all problems. Whether it is a "one-eyed stone man" or from "the death of heaven" to "worshiping god", this method of stabilizing people's hearts with the help of ghosts and gods is "treating the symptoms rather than the root cause", and it can't fundamentally solve the interests that people really needed at that time. Perhaps the temporary theory of ghosts and gods can appease people and persuade them to follow the peasant leaders. However, with the passage of time, the people's expectations and needs have not been resolved, and then the political power established by the peasant uprising will produce internal contradictions.

In most cases, the reasons for peasant uprisings are as follows:

First, the emperor was cruel, the people were poor and the society was in turmoil. In order to gain the hope of survival, the peasants at the bottom had to embark on the road of rebellion and uprising.

Second, the intensification of contradictions within society. Since the establishment of the ancient feudal regime, the main contradiction in ancient China was the contradiction between the landlord class and the peasant class. If this contradiction cannot be resolved, there will always be irreconcilable interests between the two sides, which will lead to intensification.

Third, ethnic contradictions have always been foreign invasions in China's history, and foreign invasions are the most prone to peasant uprisings, such as the Xiongnu invasion at the time of the demise of the Qin Dynasty and the Liao and Jin Dynasties at the time of the Song Dynasty, all of which are eyeing our territorial regime. In modern times, foreign countries invaded China, and the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Movement appeared. Most peasant uprisings chose the regime with the weakest foundation, because the regime at this time was turbulent and vulnerable to aggression.

No matter the peasant uprising or the establishment of the new regime, they will use the potential of ghosts and gods to stabilize the regime and implement the policy of ignorance. Only in this way can they help stabilize the political power and help the people to be stable and United. The theory of ghosts and gods has a long history, not only from the establishment of dynasty regime, but also from totem worship and divination in ancient times. With the continuous development and progress of society, the theory of ghosts and gods is constantly improving and developing, and the system of ghosts and gods is becoming more and more perfect and complete.

Second, subjective reasons: the subjective judgment of the leaders of peasant uprisings and the theory that the leaders of ancient peasant uprisings were immature and dependent on ghosts and gods mostly came from the peasant class. They lack the experience and theoretical basis of ruling regime. As the saying goes, their cultural level is very low. It is not only an opportunity to really rule the bottom people and overthrow a dynasty, but also a skill to grasp and weigh the current situation.

To rule a dynasty requires not only the will of the people, but also the resistance to overcome and resist temptation. For example, Hong Xiuquan, who rebelled in the late Qing Dynasty, finally established a regime that could resist the Qing Dynasty with Nanjing as its capital. Why was it finally broken? The main reason is that Hong Xiuquan's inner ruling group lacks the psychology of resistance, only covets beauty and money, and is easy to be content with the present without thinking about the long-term future. The disadvantage of peasant uprising is that you can share joys and sorrows, but you can't share joys and sorrows. Once they gain power and wealth, they will lose themselves and begin to disintegrate internally without the ruling class sending troops to suppress them.

Although it is a good way to stabilize the regime by ghosts and gods, it is not a long-term solution. At first, it can calm people's hearts. However, in order to stabilize the political power for a long time, the theory of ghosts and gods cannot take into account all aspects.

Throughout the ages, I have always had both ability and political integrity and achieved great things. This statement also applies to the ruling class that overthrew the regime. Most peasant uprisings only see immediate interests, but fail to see long-term development, which easily leads to political instability, and it is short-term, often short-lived and short-lived. When peasant uprisings occur, they are mostly the end of a dynasty and the beginning of a new dynasty. The root of the failure of the peasant uprising lies in the limitations of the small peasant class. As Yuan Qu once sang, it tells the infinite sorrow of the peasant class: "Xing, the people suffer; When you die, the people suffer. "