In a previous article, we discussed how the author of Romance of the Three Kingdoms was unfair in his evaluation of the Yellow Turban Uprising. Writing from the standpoint of the landlord class, his perspective on the peasant uprising was inevitably biased.
As the saying goes, “The magistrates are free to burn down houses, while the common people are forbidden even to light lamps.” The political corruption of the late Eastern Han Dynasty was a major cause of the peasant uprising. Today, we examine the extent of official corruption through the perspectives of two famous figures in the Three Kingdoms: Lu Zhi and Liu Bei.
In the first and second chapters of Romance of the Three Kingdoms, “Zuo Feng Extorts Bribes and Frames Lu Zhi” and “Du You Extorts Bribes from Liu Bei” are two highly similar plotlines. Both revolve around eunuchs, acting as imperial envoys, extorting bribes from officials, reflecting the chaotic governance of the late Eastern Han Dynasty characterized by eunuch monopolization of power and corrupt officialdom.
Zuo Feng Extorts Bribes and Frames Lu Zhi
At the end of the first chapter of Romance of the Three Kingdoms, the plot of “Huangmen Zuo Feng extorting bribes and falsely accusing Lu Zhi” may seem like an “episodic” official scandal, but it actually serves as a microcosm through which the author exposes the dark side of the late Eastern Han Dynasty’s corrupt court and eunuch monopolization of power, explaining the root cause of why the Yellow Scarves Uprising swept across the nation.
Since the reign of Emperor He of the Eastern Han Dynasty, eunuch interference in politics had become a persistent issue, especially during the reigns of Emperors Huan and Ling. The eunuch group (such as the “Ten Regular Attendants”) controlled the court and monopolized power, even appointing and dismissing officials. Zuo Feng, as a “Huangmen” (a eunuch official responsible for conveying imperial decrees and supervising external officials), though not high-ranking, held special power due to his central position and backing from the eunuch group.
Lu Zhi, a renowned general and Confucian scholar of the late Eastern Han Dynasty (Lu Zhi was the teacher of Liu Bei and Gongsun Zan, excelling in both civil and military affairs), was leading troops to battle the main force of the Yellow Turban Army (Zhang Jiao’s faction) at the time and had made significant contributions to suppressing the peasant rebellion.
In the story, Zuo Feng, under the emperor’s decree, came to supervise army provisions and inspect the general’s achievements, but in reality, this was a means for the eunuch group to control external court generals. Even worse, upon arriving at the front line, Zuo Feng did not first inquire about the military situation but directly demanded bribes from Lu Zhi. These people perverted “military supervision” into a “tool for extortion,” prioritizing personal gain over the broader situation and national interests.
As a military general, Lu Zhi, despite his capabilities, was dismissed and charged due to his unwillingness to bribe. His injustice was not only a personal tragedy but also a symbol of the Eastern Han court’s abandonment of the worthy and dominance of the treacherous.
In this plot, Luo Guanzhan, through the chain reaction of “Zuo Feng extorting bribes,” “Lu Zhi being wronged,” and “Dong Zhuo losing the battle,” profoundly criticizes the historical law of “chaos originating from the top.” The root of the chaos in the late Han Dynasty was not the rebellion from the grassroot due to the people’s misery but the upper class collapsed, like the court corruption and eunuch monopolization of power as mentioned above.
This is the truth behind the Chinese sayings “Those in high positions set examples which those below will follow” and “If the upper beam is crooked, the lower beams will be crooked.”
Du You Extorts Bribes from Liu Bei
As a student of Lu Zhi, Liu Bei had a similar experience. In the second chapter of Romance of the Three Kingdoms, the plot of “Du You extorting bribes from Liu Bei” is another classic scene exposing the corruption of officialdom in the late Han Dynasty, following “Zuo Feng extorting bribes and framing Lu Zhi.”
Unlike Zuo Feng’s damage to the military system at the central level, Du You, as a local supervisory official, extorted bribes from Liu Bei, who had just been appointed as the County Lieutenant of Anxi, and framed him. This not only demonstrated the infiltration of eunuch monopolization of power into local officialdom but also, through the different responses of Liu Bei and Zhang Fei, completed Liu Bei’s heroic awakening from seeking survival within the system to finding another path in the chaotic world.
In the late Eastern Han Dynasty, the central eunuch group, to consolidate power, placed cronies into the local supervisory system, completely perverting supervisory power into a tool for extortion. Liu Bei, as a grassroots official who rose from the bottom with no background or resources, became the optimal target for oppression under this ecosystem.
Du You’s escalation from “extorting bribes” to “framing charges” shattered Liu Bei’s illusion of systematic justice. Zhang Fei’s force intervention forced Liu Bei to actively resign and flee from office. This laid a key foundation for the subsequent independence and development of the Liu Bei group outside the court system.
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