The Authority Of Emperor Guangwu Of Han Dynasty And The Construction Of Its Legitimacy

In mid and late Western Han Dynasty,social contradictions became increasingly sharp and natural disasters frequently happened,and the imperial power was facing the crisis of legitimacy.The Confucianism of "changing a name to gain support from the heaven" spread throughout the society and called for reform.However,the failure of Wang Mang,s replacing the Han Dynasty and establishing a new made Confucian scholars disillusioned.People inside and outside the hall of fame began to miss the authority of Han Dynasty.The concept of great unity,which already existed in the pre-Qin period,became more common among the people during the political chaos of the Han Dynasty.The people looked forward to the arrival of a holy king to carry out rule govern.The era called for a person to solve problems,and this individual appeared and met the expectations of the people by constantly creating miracles.In the turbulent period of the Han Dynasty,this person.Liu Xiu,came into being,and became a charismatic monarch through his own charm and the legal construction of personal authority.It is generally believed that the builders of a new regime have a certain charisma,and Liu Xiu,unlike most of the founding monarch,was specialized in his own traditional authority.The royal status of Liu gave Liu Xiu the traditional authority and helped him fight for the authority of Han.By manufacturing and controlling the social opinion,deifying himself by being committed to myth and prophecy,Liu Xiu successfully made use of the residual shadow of the authority of the "Han Family" and transformed it into his personal authority.War is a revolutionary means to overthrow the old tradition and establish a new order.Under the state of war,the extraordinary ability and personal charm of military leaders will be fully released,and charismatic authority can be quickly and powerfully constructed.Before the Battle of Kunyang,faced with the absolute superiority of the army sent by Wang Mang,soldiers in the insurrectionary army were so scared that they had no idea what to do.At such a critical moment,Liu Xiu,who had never been known before,came out to talk about the strengths and weaknesses of themselves as well as the enemy and managed to work out strategies.Liu Xiu’s calm state of mind and charm of speech impressed everyone,showing his personal charisma and initially establishing his personal authority.It was in such details and events that the leader’s change in the followers’ thoughts and psychological influence were slowly infiltrated.The declaration of Liu Xiu as Emperor of Hebei meant the establishment of his charismatic authority.After he began to reign,Liu Xiu gradually eliminated the regional powers and carried out the unification of the regime.In the twelfth year of Jianwu(36th year),he wiped out Gongsun Shu,unite the country and reached the peak of his charismatic authority in the whole country.Liu Xiu’s personal charm was the foundation of the construction of his authority legitimacy,his own charm attracted the sincere obedience of his subordinates,and his subordinates’ sincere follow to Liu Xiu also pushed the construction of charismatic authority in reverse.Meanwhile,Liu Xiu was well versed in the personal deification means such as the myth of destiny and divination,and made full use of them in the construction of his own authority.The source of legal authority initially came from force,but after that the maintenance and consolidation of authority can not only rely on force."Using the left hand to hold sword and the right hand to preach a sermon," the construction of the traditional authority of the emperor should be based on the ethical and moral order rooted in the etiquette,and the recognition of the subjects and the people should be obtained through education.Thus,a series of etiquette construction led by the emperor himself further enhanced and consolidated Liu Xiu’s authority.After the unified empire was on the right track,it was confronted with the problem of inheriting the supreme authority.The charismatic characteristics of the founding monarch could not be effectively passed on to his successor.Therefore,Liu Xiu carried out the construction of traditional authority with the help of his own charismatic authority,hoping to pass it on to later generations.The particularity of charismatic authority was that it was the abnormal and irregular form of the traditional one.The charismatic personality was very difficult to pass to the other.The death of Liu Xiu meant the vanishment of his charismatic authority and the loss of social environment in which the specialized political mechanism established.The succession of the emperor Ming named Liu Zhuang meant that the charismatic authority became a traditional one,and at the same time,the regime of the Eastern Han Dynasty gradually entered the normal operation stage after the construction of traditional authority in the early stage,the successor Liu Zhuang returned to the normal rule of the traditional authority of the empire through inheritance.