It has been said since ancient times that "an upright official cannot handle household affairs." In today's era of freedom and independence, it may be difficult for us to understand how trivial and helpless the ancient family life was. Take Hai Rui, whom we are talking about today, for example. Although he has proven his ability at work, he is also a mess when it comes to handling family affairs, and has even been criticized by future generations.

01 The First Wife

Hai Rui was a well-known upright official in the Ming Dynasty. In the era of corrupt officials in the late Ming Dynasty, his appearance undoubtedly became a scenery of that era. . But the breeze on his sleeves represents poverty. Although he was a censor in the right rank of the fourth rank, the salary of officials in the Ming Dynasty was generally very low, so his monthly salary was only twenty-four shi, which is equivalent to today's About 2600-3200 yuan.

In addition to supporting the mother, the money must also be used to maintain the expenses of the entire family, and sometimes to help the poor. It can be said that Hai Rui's quality of life is very low and he can't even afford meat. But the strange thing is that even though his family life is already so difficult, he still keeps marrying wives and taking concubines. According to records in "History of the Ming Dynasty", Hai Rui married three wives and took in two concubines throughout his life. People can't help but wonder, is Hai Rui a womanizer?

The answer is of course no. As an upright official, he must be a person who has no flaws and no flaws. Otherwise, it will be easy for others to catch him, and his integrity will collapse. Since he is not lewd, why did he marry so many wives and concubines? Shen Defu, a scholar of the Ming Dynasty, recorded Hai Rui's family situation in great detail in his work "Wanli Yehuobian·Supplement". According to the book, Hai Qingtian had no choice but to take wives and concubines, and was forced by the old lady. In fact, Hai Rui's first wife, Mrs. Xu, was very good. Mrs. Xu was virtuous, hardworking, and took care of the household chores every day, so that her husband could free up time to focus on his career.

However, Haimu disliked Mrs. Xu because after marrying into the Hai family, Mrs. Xu gave birth to two daughters in succession, but she was never able to give birth to a son to continue the family's legacy. What's even more unfortunate is that both of her daughters died one after another after birth. Therefore, Haimu thought that Xu was not good, so she forced her son to divorce his wife. Hai Rui was known as a filial son. Although he loved Mrs. Xu very much, he had to obey her. So he could only obey his mother's orders and divorce Mrs. Xu with tears.

02 The second wife

After Mrs. Xu was divorced, Haimu immediately went to work looking for a wife for her son. Soon after, a woman named Pan was attracted by the sea mother. After the Hai family scraped together a betrothal gift, they married Pan back. But this time the old lady misjudged her. This Mrs. Pan was fierce and fierce. She was not as hard-working and uncomplaining as the previous Mrs. Xu. She always talked back to her mother-in-law, often making her so angry that she could not speak. The old lady wanted to wait until Pan got married before asking her son to divorce her. But Pan went too far and even deliberately refused to sleep with Hai Rui. This touched Hai Mu's bottom line, so she asked her son to divorce Pan.

03 The Third Wife

After this experience, Haimu no longer blindly helped her son find a wife, but inquired in many ways to confirm the woman’s character. Make plans. In this way, a woman named Wang became Hai Rui's third wife. Wang's family lived up to Haimu's expectations and gave birth to three children in a row in a few years, two of which were sons. Haimu, who finally had her grandson in her arms, was beaming with smiles and spent the whole day accompanying her two grandsons.

However, not long after, Hai Rui couldn't stand the emperor Zhu Houcong's superstitious Taoism and his delusional desire to live forever and ignore the affairs of the government. After that, he worked hard and wrote the famous "Public Security Shu" in history. It was also at this time that Hai Rui was imprisoned by the emperor. Strangely, after Hai Rui was imprisoned, not only did his two sons die one after another, but even his daughter did not survive. Although Haimu was very sad at this time, she thought that her son was upright and in his prime. As long as she rescued her son first, she could have a grandson in the future.

04 Two Concubines

However, Haimu didn’t expect that after Hai Rui returned safely, Wang’s stomach stopped moving, which made Haimu very anxious. In desperation, Hai Mu asked Hai Rui to take a concubine. Although Hai Rui was more helpless than Hai Mu, he could only do as he was told. However, he had spent almost all his savings on marrying Pan and Wang, and now he had to take in concubines. He really couldn't afford the money. So he could only shamelessly borrow money from relatives and friends to take in concubines. But for unknown reasons, the concubine Han hanged herself not long after marrying into the Hai family. More than 10 days later, his wife Wang also died suddenly.

This series of funerals has cast a layer of gloom over the entire Hai family. Counting it all together, in the more than 30 years since Hai Rui's first daughter died in infancy to Wang's death, seven people in the Hai family have died. But Haimu still didn't give up. She dragged her old body and continued to run around for the sake of the Hai family. Although she finally found a woman named Qiu as a concubine for Hai Rui, she worked hard for many years and did not see Qiu give birth to a son until the moment she closed her eyes. After his mother passed away, even though Qiu never gave birth to a child, Hai Rui did not marry again. Until Hai Rui's death, this Qiu was always by his side.

05 The ethics of cannibalism

I remember Lu Xun once said a famous saying, "The ethics of cannibalism."

In the story of Hai Rui marrying a wife and taking concubines, we can indeed feel Hai Mu's strictness and coercion in ethics. Especially Hai Mu's repeated forced interference with her son's divorce, which made many people angry. In addition, Hai Rui obeyed his mother's advice without caring about the feelings of others, which has been criticized by future generations. But as everyone knows, if it weren’t for the Sea Mother, there would be no Qingtian Hairui.

Hai’s mother’s surname was Xie. Four years after she gave birth to Hai Rui, her husband Hai Han died. After that, Haimu raised Hai Rui on her own through all kinds of hardships. Due to Hai Mu's tough character, Hai Rui was given a strict education from an early age. In addition, Haimu saved money and food for Hai Rui to study, and taught Hai Rui many principles of life, especially not to be selfish and to please the powerful. This concept can be seen in the "Zhili Policy" written by Hai Rui when he took the provincial examination for the first time.

It was under the correct teachings of Hai Mu that Hai Rui could become famous in the future. Although Haimu seems a bit arbitrary in continuing Hai Rui's incense, Haimu is a woman who lived in the feudal era after all. It is not easy for her to educate such an outstanding son, so don't criticize her too much for her ethics and education. Strictly observed.