Touchy, touchy

Although Chu Yuan-chang had been a Buddhist monk and brought other monks into his

court, he also promoted Confucian rituals and scholarship. Among the Chinese of this

time, few people felt that it was important to accept only one religious tradition while

rejecting all others.

The emperor wasn’t as tolerant about other things as he was about religion. For

example, he forbade any reference to his years in the monastery — not because of

religion, but because he was sensitive about his humble origins. (You didn’t dare

mention that he’d grown up a peasant, either.) Once, two Confucian scholars sent Chu

Yuan-chang a letter of congratulations in which they used the word sheng, which

means “birth.” The term was a little too close to the word seng, which means “monk.”

The emperor took it as a pun and had them killed.

Later, Chu got so touchy that he made it a capital crime to question his policies. When

he thought the people of Nanjing didn’t display proper respect to him, he slaughtered

15,000 of them.

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