宋若宪诗
Poem by Song Ruoxian
Index
奉和御制麟德殿宴百官
Harmoniously Giving an Imperial Meritorious Virtue Banquet for One Hundred Officials
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端拱承休命 时清荷圣皇 四聪闻受谏 五服远朝王 |
To rule without governing is in opposition to fate. A time of settling is a burden to the emperor. The four sages, hearing admonition, would accept it. They are distant ancestors of our emperor. |
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景媚莺初啭 春残日更长 命筵多济济 盛乐复锵锵 |
Songbirds that flatter their surroundings are the first to sing. Spring may not be over but the days are getting long. To life's feast, multitudes come. Those achieving happiness are the high and lofty. |
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酆镐谁将敌 横汾未可方 愿齐山岳寿 祉福永无疆 |
Zhou Kingdom's brightness, who can withstand it? The River Fen's violence cannot be stemmed. By accepting equal height, mountain peaks endure And, without limit, are fortunate forever. |
-- 宋若宪
废话
Song Ruoxian is one of the five daughters of the Confucian scholar, Song Tingfen. She was in the imperial court in Emperor Dezong's reign (779-805).
A word about the titles of these imperial poems. The first two characters begin all three that I have done so far: 奉和. These are "to give" and "harmony." So the rubric must be something like "Harmoniously Giving ...." Imperial banquets -- we have two -- are marked by 御制and could mean the emperor is in attendance. Then we always have 麟德殿宴 or [unicorn, symbol of merit][virtue][hall][banquet]. Perhaps we have a title of "Meritorious Virtue" applied to "Banquet." Or we might have "Unicorn Virtue" as the name of a hall and in that hall a banquet. Finally, the banquet itself is imperially ordered 应制 or not. This one isn't.
The other two banquets were for one hundred peers (僚). This one is for officials (官) with less status perhaps. Nobles versus bureaucrats. The emperor might be here if the Imperial marker is any indication of this. It was for the last one. This banquet appears to be an instruction of policy banquet to me. There were a lot of rebellions during these times and the emperors won some, lost some, and ended some in a draw. This sounds like we have a draw, with mountains accepting equal height. The "four sages" (四聪) appear to be four somebodies in the Three Kingdoms period who were, I suppose, in a similar circumstance to the current predicament -- whatever that was.
So the point of the poem, and of the banquet, seems to be telling the bureaucracy that the last war is a draw. Everyone needs to accept this, knock off the gossip, and get back to work.