In the extant English-language scholarship on Vietnam, most scholars argue that there was little presence of Confucianism during the period of the Lý Dynasty (1009-1225) and that it was only towards the end of the Trần Dynasty (1226-1400) that Confucian scholars started to attempt to exert some influence at the court.
However, the story goes that they had little success, and that it was only during the Lê Dynasty (1428-1789), following a period of Ming Dynasty occupation, that Confucian scholars really began to influence affairs at the court.
I don’t agree with this view because 1) I can see plenty of evidence of Confucian ideas/practices in the Lý and Trần dynasty periods, and 2) I can see the way that scholars have misunderstood/distorted the information in the sources to make their arguments.
An example of this concerns the way that a couple of references in the Đại Việt sử ký toàn thư to people referred to as “bạch diện thư sinh” 白面書生 have been presented and discussed. This phrase has been translated as “white-faced students” and “pale scholars” and it appears a couple of times in the Đại Việt sử ký toàn thư during the fourteenth century.
I want to look at one of those instances here, and more specifically, to look at how a couple of historians wrote about it. It dates from 1357, the year Emperor Trần Minh Tông died. This emperor reigned from 1314 to 1329, and then abdicated but continued to influence affairs.
Perhaps the first to write about the bạch diện thư sinh was Esta Serne Ungar in an unpublished 1983 PhD dissertation from Cornell University entitled, “Vietnamese Leadership and Order: Đại Việt Under the Lê Dynasty (1428-1459). Ungar provided what she saw as the context for the appearance of this expression and translated part of the passage where it can be found.
By the mid-1300s prominent Trần scholar-officials began to espouse more Confucian ideas on maintaining order. They urged the Trần throne to adopt more stringent Confucian-style measures to stabilize the population. Two well-known officials, Lê Bá Quát and Phạm Sư Mạnh, disciples of the Confucian teacher Chu Van An, desired the emperor Trần Minh-tôn (d. 1357) to reform the Tran system of government. The Trần ruler took refuge in dynastic pride in the old customs of the royal clan and chided these scholarly Confucian adherents for their inexperience:
The country has its own perfect institutes.
The South [Vietnam] and the North [China] are each different.
If I listen to the plans that [you] white-faced students are seeking to promote,
Then rebellion will result. (22-23)
Later, in 1987, John K. Whitmore, mentioned this passage as well [“From Classical Scholarship to Confucian Belief in Vietnam,” Vietnam Forum 9 (1987): 49-65], and stated the following:
Yet a certain tension was building up in these years between the traditional pattern and the increasing literati concern with administrative and social change. The same ruler, [Trần] Minh-Tông, complained of those he called “pale scholars” who wished to impose the northern ways of China on the Vietnamese south. Declaring that the Chinese goal of a “great peace” (thái-bình in Vietnamese pronunciation) already existed in Vietnam, Minh-Tông, saw no need to put aside the country’s “established rules and regulations.” If such were done, he thought, “immediate chaos” would result. (54)
First, let’s look at the wording here. On one side you have “the old customs of the royal clan” or “the traditional pattern,” and on the other you have “more Confucian ideas on maintaining order,” “more stringent Confucian-style measures,” and the desire “to impose the northern ways of China.”
Hmmm. . . Can you tell who the good guys and the bad guys are here?
I can. . . and that is already a sign that this is biased historical scholarship.
Both of these historians presented a dichotomy, “a certain tension,” in the fourteenth century between Vietnamese emperors/Vietnamese culture and Confucian scholars/Chinese culture. They both argued that Confucian scholars tried to impose new foreign/Chinese ways on Vietnam, and that this was rejected by the Trần monarch who was firmly grounded in Vietnamese ways of doing things, and who dismissed these men as “white-faced” or “pale,” signifying their bookish ways and their detachment from the reality of Vietnam.
Further, both of these scholars saw this passage as demonstrating the initial (but failed) attempts of Vietnamese Confucian scholars to exert some influence at the court.
However, what neither of these scholars (or anyone else that I have seen) did, was to discuss the actual context for this information.
The statements that Ungar and Whitmore referenced were recorded in a comment made by historian Phan Phu Tiên, who was commissioned in 1455 to compile a history of the Trần Dynasty and the Ming occupation period of the early fifteenth century.
His comment appears after information about the death of Emperor Trần Minh Tông in 1357. I have provided a translation below. I will note here first though that the expression “bạch diện thư sinh” is a reference to someone who is young and inexperienced.
The first part, “bạch diện,” literally means “white face,” and refers to someone who is young and inexperienced. The second part, “thư sinh,” means “student.” To capture the sense of this term and to keep a reference to color, I translate it loosely below as “greenhorn students.”
Here is what Phan Phu Tiên wrote.
潘孚先曰：明宗有仁厚之資，承太平之業，祖宗成憲，無所更改。時有士人上疏，謂民多遊手遊足，年老無籍，賦役不供，差役不及。帝曰：「不如此，則豈足成太平之業。汝欲我責後成何事哉。
朝臣黎伯适、范師孟欲更改制度，帝曰：「國家自有成憲，南北各異。若聽白面書生求售之計，則亂生矣。」
所可惜者，聽陳克終之姦佞，而殺國父上宰，為聰明之累焉。
Phan Thu Tiên nói: Minh Tông có bẩm tính nhân hậu, nối nghiệp thái bình, phép cũ của tổ tông, không thay đổi gì cả. Bấy giờ có kẻ sĩ dâng sớ nói là trong dân gian có nhiều người du thủ du [21b] thực, đến già vẫn không có hộ tịch, thuế má không nộp, sai dịch không theo. Vua nói:
“Không như thế, thì sao thành đời thái bình? [This translation is not correct. It is not a “đời” (age) that is thái bình, but a “nghiệp” 業 (enterprise)] Ngươi muốn ta trách phạt họ thì được việc gì không?”
Triều thần như bọn Lê Bá Quát, Phạm Sư Mạnh muốn thay đổi chế độ. Vua nói: “Nhà nước đã có phép tắc riêng, Nam, Bắc khác nhau, nếu nghe kế của bọn học trò mặt trắng tìm đường thoát thân thì sinh loạn ngay.”
Điều đáng tiếc là nghe lời gian nịnh của Trần Khắc Chung mà giết Quốc phụ thượng tể, đó là điểm kém thông minh vậy.
Phan Phu Tiên stated, Minh Tông had a sincere and charitable disposition. He inherited a [royal] enterprise at peace and did not change any of his ancestors’ established regulations. At that time, there was a scholar who submitted a petition stating that there were many people wandering about unemployed, who reached old age without a registered home, and who did not pay taxes or fulfill corvée labor obligations.
The emperor stated, “If it was not like this, then what would be sufficient to establish a peaceful [royal] enterprise? You want me to reprimand [people], but what would that lead to?”
Court ministers Lê Bá Quát and Phạm Sư Mạnh wanted to change the system. The emperor stated, “The kingdom has its own established regulations. The South and the North are different. If I follow the plan that these greenhorn bookworms have to offer, then there will be chaos.”
What is regrettable is that he listened to the deceitful words of Trần Khắc Chung and killed the State Father and Honorary Prime Minister [i.e., Trần Quốc Chẩn], which became a burden to his wisdom.
Let us look closely at this passage. A scholar pointed out to the emperor that there were many unemployed and landless people in the realm, and the emperor responded by saying “If it was not like this, then what would be sufficient to establish a peaceful [royal] enterprise?” “[Royal] enterprise” (nghiệp 業) here means a “dynasty.”
Ok, let’s think about this. Having unemployed and landless people is necessary for there to be a peaceful dynasty.
Think about that again. Having unemployed and landless people is necessary for there to be a peaceful dynasty.
What is the context here?
The only situation that I can imagine would fit this context is one in which the royal family had allowed other powerful families (or branches of the extended royal family) to accumulate land. This would have created landlessness and unemployment for many, but it would have made those few powerful families wealthy and happy.
This would have been sufficient to keep the dynasty “peaceful” as the people most likely to challenge the dynasty for power would have been satisfied.
That, of course, is not a good situation, and two of the court officials wished to change certain regulations to address that issue.
The emperor, however, disagreed. He felt that the current conditions were necessary to maintain the peace in the land that his father had passed on to him, and he declared that he did not want Northern (“Chinese”) regulations to be put in place in the South (“Vietnam”).
Over the centuries, scholars in China had come up with various policies to try to alleviate the problem of landlessness (like the equal field system), and my guess is that this is what Lê Bá Quát and Phạm Sư Mạnh suggested.
As such, while I guess that at one level you could say that the emperor’s response about the differences between the South and the North was indeed meant to prevent the import of “foreign” ideas.
However, Ungar and Whitmore presented this statement as confirming a significant cultural difference at this time between the ways of the Chinese-influenced white/pale faced students/scholars and the Vietnamese monarch.
In reality what we see here is an emperor protecting a corrupt and exploitative system of government from reforms that would have benefited common people, and would have brought wealth from taxes to the central court, but which ran the risk of alienating the corrupt powerful elite.
But, yes, whatever plan Lê Bá Quát and Phạm Sư Mạnh suggested was probably one that had a precedent in China. However, was this really one of the first times that a scholar-official had proposed such ideas at the court?
Is it really the case that for centuries before this point Vietnamese courts had followed some non-Confucian “Vietnamese” way of doing things?
There are different ways that we can answer this question, but here is one.
In 1314, the year Trần Minh Tông came to power, an exam was held to test National University students (Thái học sinh 太學生). The National University (Thái học 太學生) was a school for the sons of the royal family and top officials.
It was not the only school, and it was not the only pathway to government service. One could take the civil service exam and be selected for government service as well. In fact, those who passed the civil service exam tended to garner more prestige. However, having sons study in the National University was a way for the elite to maintain their privileged status.
So, was the examination of National University Students in 1314 the first time that this exam had ever been held? No, the Đại Việt sử ký toàn thư mentions such exams in the years 1232, 1239, 1247 (48 students selected), 1256 (43 students selected), 1266 (47 students selected), 1275 (27 students selected), 1304 (44 students selected), 1314 (the first year of Trần Minh Tông’s reign), 1345, 1347, etc.
Were these the only times that this exam was ever held? Again, no, there is no reason to think that. There is a note appended to the information about the 1347 exam which indicates that “formerly,” meaning the “official,” “theoretical” functioning of this exam (in China) was for it to be held once every seven years and for 30 students to be selected each time.
So, in terms of the quantity of students selected, we can see that the Trần exceeded that number a few times. My guess would be that the exam was also held with more regularity than the Đại Việt sử ký toàn thư records.
And how were people like the National University students or the men who passed the civil service exam perceived? Let’s look at what the Đại Việt sử ký toàn thư records about an exam that was held in 1304, ten years before Trần Minh Tông ascended the throne.
三月，試天下士人。賜狀元莫挺之太學生火勇首，充内書家。榜眼裴慕祗候簿書帽衫，充内令書家。探花郎張放校書權冕 [權冕 doesn’t make sense, but 軒冕 would]，充二資，黃甲阮忠彦，太學生凡四十四名。引三魁出龍門鳳城，遊街衢三日，其餘留學三百三十人。(忠彦年十六，時號神童。)
其試法先以《醫國篇》、《穆太 {天} 子傳》暗寫汰冗；次則經疑、經義并詩題 (即古詩五言長篇)。用王度寬猛詩律，用才難射雉賦題，用帝德好生洽于民心八韻體，三長制詔表，四塲對策。(挺之至靈人，慕青威人，放清化人。)
Tháng 3, thi kẻ sĩ trong nước. Ban cho trạng nguyên. Mạc Đĩnh Chi chức Thái học sinh hỏa dũng thủ, sung làm nội thư gia; bảng nhãn Bùi Mộ chức chi hậu bạ thư mạo sam, sung làm nội lệnh thư gia; thám hoa lang Trương Phóng chức Hiệu thư quyền miện, sung làm nhị tư [In this passage it says “充 (sung) nhị tư,” but in other places it says “爵 (tước) nhị tư”]; Nguyễn Trung Ngạn đỗ hoàng giáp; tất cả 44 người đỗ thái học sinh. Dẫn 3 người đỗ đầu ra cửa Long Môn của Phượng Thành đi du ngoạn đường phố 3 ngày. Còn 330 người khác thì ở lại học tập. Trung Ngạn mới 16 tuổi, đương thời gọi là thần đồng.
Về phép thi: Trươc hết thi ám tả thiên Y quốc và truyện Mục Thiên tử để loại bớt. Thứ đến kinh nghi, kinh nghĩa, đề thơ (tức thể cổ thi ngũ ngôn trường thiên) hỏi về “vương độ khoan mãnh,” theo luật “tài nan xạ trĩ,” về phú thì dùng thể 8 vần “đế đức hiếu sinh, hiệp vụ dân tâm.” Kỳ thứ ba thi chế, chiếu, biểu. Kỳ thứ tư thi đối sách. (Đĩnh Chi người Chí Linh [6/19b], Mộ người Thanh Oai, Phóng người Thanh Hóa).
In the third lunar month, a palace exam was held for presented scholars [tiến sĩ 進士]. The [position of] principal graduate was granted to Mạc Đĩnh Chi, Courageous Squad Leader of the National University Students, who was appointed as a palace scribe; second graduate was granted to Bùi Mộ, Hooded-Robe Attendant of Official Documents, who was appointed a royal scribe; third graduate was granted to Trương Phóng, the Noble-Capped Copyeditor, who was given a second-grade rank. Golden tier was granted to Nguyễn Trung Ngạn, and there were forty-four National University students [who passed].
The top three scholars were led out of the Phoenix Citadel’s Dragon Gate and paraded through the streets for three days. 310 others stayed to continue their studies. (Trung Ngạn was sixteen at the time and was called a child prodigy [literally, “divine child” (thần đồng 神童)].)
As for the examination method, it started with dictation of the “Medical Kingdom chapter” (sic.) and the “Biography of King Mu, Son of Heaven” to eliminate the superfluous. Next came questions on the classics, explanations of the classics, and poetic composition (that is, ancient style five-character and long-form poems). The regulated verse was on “the royal temperament of leniency and strictness.” The rhapsody was on “the difficulty of obtaining talented men, and shooting pheasants.” The eight-rhyme regulated rhapsody was on “the emperor’s life-loving virtue seeps into the minds of the people.”
The third session was on drafting decrees, edicts and petitions and the fourth session was on answering policy questions. (Đĩnh was from Chí Linh, Mộ from Thanh Oai, and Phóng from Thanh Hóa.)
There is a lot that can be said about this passage. First, we can see the close connection between this exam and the palace. The top three candidates were given posts, but they already held minor positions (that’s what the titles after their names refer to).
Second, getting paraded around the streets for three days is a sign that these men were appreciated.
Third, the fact that there were over 300 men who continued their studies in the capital is a sign that there was a vibrant community of scholars there.
Fourth, we have the content of the exams. They started with a dictation exam to weed out those who were not prepared. One of the texts that was employed was a work from the Warring States period called the “Biography of King Mu, Son of Heaven” (Mu Tianzi zhuan 穆天子傳).
The other title has long baffled scholars, the “Medical Kingdom chapter” (Y quốc thiên/Yiguo pian 醫國篇), as no such text appears to have ever existed.
My guess would be that the man who carved the woodblock print made a mistake, or was working with a text that had a mistaken character, and that this was perhaps originally a reference to another document from the Warring States period, the “On Enriching the State” chapter (Fuguo pian 富國篇) in the Xunzi 荀子.
The 富 and 醫 are both squarish characters with many strokes. . . And we can see that the title next to it, 穆天子傳, was mistakenly written as 穆太子傳. . . Yea, I think we have a case that someone was not paying attention. . .
Moving on, the information about the themes of the poetic writings is really interesting because it shows a focus on the emperor, and in particular, we can see that it highlights ideals about how an emperor and his officials should behave.
For instance, in the regulated verse, the exam candidates were supposed to write about how the “royal temperament” was one of “leniency and strictness.” In their regulated rhapsody, they were to show how “the emperor’s life-loving virtue seeps into the minds of the people,” an idea that comes from the “Counsels of the Great Yu” (Da Yu mo 大禹謨) chapter in the Venerated Documents (Shangshu 尚書).
Finally, in their rhapsody, they were to talk about “the difficulty of obtaining talented men, and shooting pheasants.” This looks odd, but I think I can guess the logic here.
The concept of “the difficulty of obtaining talented men” (tài nan 才難) was that it was always difficult for an emperor to find truly talented men to serve in his court. On the surface, “shooting pheasants” (xạ trĩ 射雉) does not seem to be related to this, but in fact, I can see a connection.
There is a famous story in the ancient text, the Zuo Commentary (Zuozhuan 左傳), about a man who had a wife who did not speak or laugh for three years. The man then shot a pheasant and his wife began to laugh and speak.
Yea, I know, she seems a bit dark and deranged, but that’s not the point of the story. . .
The man then said to his wife that talent cannot be restricted to oneself. If he had kept his talent (of shooting pheasants) to himself, then his wife would never have been able to talk and laugh.
Taken together, I can see where these references were leading. The exam candidates were supposed to compose a poetic rhapsody on 1) how it is difficult for emperors to obtain capable officials, and 2) how capable men should not withhold their talent, but instead, must use it to serve the emperor.
It should be perfectly clear by now that when Trần Minh Tông rejected the proposal of Lê Bá Quát and Phạm Sư Mạnh it was not because it was some alien form of knowledge. As the above discussion should make blazingly clear, the Trần Dynasty was deeply invested in Confucian knowledge and the Confucian worldview.
That the ideas of Lê Bá Quát and Phạm Sư Mạnh came from the Confucian tradition was not the problem. The problem was that their ideas pointed to the corrupt foundation of the dynasty.
Further, that Trần Ming Tông referred to those two men as “bạch diện thư sinh” was not an indication that he saw Confucian scholars as somehow irrelevant or disconnected from Vietnamese reality. No, the sons of the royal family and the elite were all in the National University studying the Confucian classics. . . That was not the problem.
What he dismissed them for was being “greenhorn students” who were presenting him with some idealistic approach to governing the empire. That idealistic approach, meanwhile, was probably not all that different from whatever idealistic picture of the emperor that they had painted in the poetry that they composed to pass the civil service exam.
However, the context was different. Addressing corruption had real-life consequences. Trần Minh Tông understood that, and that is why he said to the scholar who first raised this issue, “You want me to reprimand [people], but what would that lead to?”
While one can find birth dates for Lê Bá Quát and Phạm Sư Mạnh on the Internet, there is no such information in the Đại Việt sử ký toàn thư.
Trần Minh Tông ascended the throne in 1314, reigned until 1329, and then abdicated. There is a passage in the Đại Việt sử ký toàn thư for 1323 which states that Lê Quát, Phạm Sư Mạnh, and several other scholars joined the court one after the other. That statement appears to refer to the period of Trần Minh Tông’s rule rather than the single year of 1323.
The above passage also makes reference to an event that occurred in 1328. It’s a complex story, but in that year, Trần Minh Tông believed the false information of one of his officials, Trần Khắc Chung, and had an uncle put to death.
Phan Phu Tiên said of this event that it “became a burden to his wisdom,” indicating that Trần Minh Tông’s refusal to deal with the issue that Lê Bá Quát and Phạm Sư Mạnh raised was because he had become intellectually debilitated by that traumatic event.
Again, this is not a simple story of Confucian scholars making an initial and weak appearance in Vietnamese history.
Trần Ming Tông, Lê Bá Quát and Phạm Sư Mạnh were all in the same cultural world. That’s not where the divide was.
The divide was between the corruption that was leading to landlessness and unemployment and the idealism of Lê Bá Quát and Phạm Sư Mạnh, both of whom were young and naïve.
Trần Minh Tông was caught in the middle.
He did not “[take] refuge in dynastic pride in the old customs of the royal clan,” as Ungar stated. And it is not the case that he “saw no need to put aside the country’s ‘established rules and regulations,’” as Whitmore claimed.
From his comments, we can see that he understood the problem. However, attempting to fix the problem was simply not an option.
This Post Has 2 Comments
“Bach diên” means young , not having yet facial hair
Bàch diên thu sinh = inexperienced
scholars, lacking deep understanding
Ah, “not yet having facial hair” would make sense. I never understood why “white face” would mean someone who is young, but this is a good explanation. Thank you!!