Zhang Yan still stayed in Chengde Mansion. There were too many things going on. What he faced was a rebellion. Although he took the initiative to 'fish' to catch it, it was still quite difficult to deal with it because it involved too many things.
In the Jokhang Temple, there are a group of great monks with different expressions and shapes. They are a group of people who are quite difficult to deal with in this rebellion.
Strictly speaking, these people cannot be considered monks, because many of them are not even familiar with scriptures. Instead, they are familiar with finance, real estate, logistics trade, etc.
Those true religious monks, Zhang Gao had already calmed them down.
Under the coordination of Master Cixian and Master Wenyi, the founder of Fayan Sect, Zhang Gao personally came forward and reached an agreement with them.
Buddhist sects across the country will begin to fully restore the system of paying ultimatums starting from today. The number of monks in each region shall not exceed one thousandth of the local tax-paying population.
That is to say, in a county with 6,000 households and 35,000 to 40,000 people, the number of monks with ultimatums cannot exceed 40.
Of course, you can recruit as many monks as you want without ultimatums, but they cannot be ordained, cannot be exempted from service, and need to pay taxes. As long as your temple can afford to support them, you can do whatever you want.
There are also strict regulations regarding the issuance of ultimatums, and assessments must be conducted every three years. Those who fail will have their ultimatums withdrawn directly.
At the same time, the phenomenon of destroying one's body and giving alms shall be strictly restricted and the practice shall be subject to the supervision of the government.
In any temple, if there is even one case of accepting alms that destroy one's body, he will be punished from closing the gate for thirty days to revoking the ultimatum.
Regarding the Buddhist tradition of collecting precious metals to cast Buddha statues, Zhang Gao also gave a specific solution.
That is, the imperial court used rice, grain and cloth to pay in ten years and sold the bronze statues of major Buddhist temples. As for the remaining half, the major temples were naturally willing to donate it.
From then on, only the bronze statues cast in the previous dynasty were of particularly exquisite works of art. From then on, except for the royal gifts, only clay sculptures and wood carvings were allowed to be decorated with gold powder.
Once the conditions are given, whether the major Buddhist temples and sects agree or not is actually irrelevant.
If they agree, Zhang Zhi will give them dignity. If they don't agree, Zhang Zhi will help them with dignity.
Finally, after two or three days of stalemate, after the persuasion of Master Cixian and Master Wenyi, Zhang Gao's several articles of reforming Buddhism were passed.
In fact, within Buddhism, some people are opposed to such bad habits as casting Buddha statues in gold and bronze, destroying the body and giving alms.
As soon as they agreed, Zhang Yan didn't even wait for these people to go back to make arrangements. He immediately gave orders to Feng Dao, the Secretary of Records in Tokyo, and the right servant of Zhongshu, and Pei Yuan, the Minister of Luantai, to act in accordance with this method immediately.
Due to previous battles to eliminate the evil forces belonging to Buddhism, the situation of major Buddhist temples has long been understood.
In just one month, Feng Dao and Pei Yuan closed more than 48,200 illegal Buddhist temples in the six provinces of Henan (Zhili), Hebei, Hedong, Guanzhong, Hubei, and Jiaodong, killing more than 110,000 people.
Monks and nuns return to secular life.
More than 3 million acres of land seized by Buddhist temples were confiscated. A terrifying number of more than 50,000 households were concealed, with a population of more than 300,000. The gold (copper) obtained from melting down the Buddha statues can be used to cast more than 1.7 million copper coins.
Through.
Don't underestimate the 1.7 million copper coins. This is copper that can be used to cast copper coins. It does not mean that it must be cast.
, the imperial court can use these high-quality copper mixed with ordinary copper and other minerals to cast coins, generating more than 3 million yuan in revenue, and it can also play a great role in promoting the market that is extremely short of metal currency transactions.
At this point, this relatively mild extermination of the Buddha, which should perhaps be called the Operation to Change the Buddha, has come to a relatively satisfactory end.
Although Zhang Gao did not take the violent action of Sanwu who even smashed Daxingshan Temple and Baima Temple, he still gave Buddhism a heavy blow at this time.
Buddhism's tax exemption and exemption privileges are retained, but the number of people is strictly limited.
And unlike when Sanwu destroyed Buddhism, the Buddhists destroyed most of the money they collected and refused to let the court get it. When Zhang Zhou converted to Buddhism this time, the Buddhists basically handed over more than 80% of the property.
At the same time, it also avoids the damage of various precious cultural relics to a certain extent.
At the Jokhang Temple, Zhang Yan took the report jointly sent by Feng Dao and Pei Yuan and couldn't help but sucked his mouth. When it comes to making money, it still depends on you!
And this is not all the property of Buddhism, because the temples that paid the above-mentioned property do not include the great monks here.
Compared with these great monks who are engaged in finance, international trade, and real estate, the other monks in the temples, apart from the larger population control, in terms of wealth, they cannot keep up with the hundreds of monks who are now forcibly recruited by Zhang Zhi.
The thing about banknotes is actually a cognitive mistake made by Zhang Zhi.
He always thought that since paper money first appeared in the Sichuan area during the Northern Song Dynasty, the 'bank note' he created, which was before checks and banknotes, was an innovation.
But in fact, this is not the case at all. These Buddhists, at least during the Southern and Northern Dynasties, began to use similar methods to solve the inconveniences caused by large transactions and long-distance trade.
This is also the reason why the Qianzhuanghui can spread so quickly in the Central Plains without Zhang Yan's personal management.
They just don't have the ability to expand banknotes to Guanzhong, Hexi, and Longyou. They are not fools who don't know the operating mechanism of banknotes.
The reason why Zhang Yan wanted to summon them was actually because he could no longer play anymore after taking back the bank meeting.
In the past two years or so after excluding major temples, the deposit and loan data of bank associations have dropped by more than 60%.
The reason is also very simple. In this era, regardless of whether Zhang Yan is trying hard to create the image of a saintly king or a wise master, noble officials from the imperial court, to merchants and even ordinary people have a natural distrust of imperial power.
After Zhang Zhi used the Hexi Chamber of Commerce to take over the Qianzhuang Association, most people's thoughts were: Who knows if the emperor was looking for a reason to collect money?
After I deposit the money, who knows when it will be requisitioned by the emperor.
If I go to a bank to borrow money, will the emperor significantly increase the interest rate after the money is loaned out?
Many people have never borrowed money from a bank, and they directly doubt whether the emperor is going to come home again and again.
But if a temple were to take on this task, there would be no such worries. First of all, Buddhist temples naturally have a somewhat religious feel to them.
Regardless of whether they are saving money or borrowing money, they will not feel that Buddhist temples have the courage to swallow their money.
And compared to the few office locations of Qianzhuanghui, these Buddhist temples that can serve as Qianzhuang are often large temples in big cities.
Not only does it occupy a large area, but it is also located in a prime location in the city. The temple also has various statues, paintings, gold and silver utensils, precious Buddhist scriptures, etc. worth tens of thousands of gold as pledges.
The saying "a monk can run away but not the temple", or something similar, did not appear in the Ming and Qing Dynasties at all. In fact, it was originally used to describe how safe it is to save money and lend money in Buddhist temples.
Moreover, Zhang Yan also understood one thing after experiencing the major corruption incident at the Hexi Chamber of Commerce.
Even if corruption is a big problem in state-owned enterprises in later generations, in this era, it is even more difficult to solve it. Even if we want to control it within a certain level, it is unrealistic.
So instead of raising a large group of corrupt people, it would be better to really release the power of the bank association to these monks.
To put it bluntly, even if these monks swallowed the money that I, Saint Zhang, and the imperial court deserved, it would be much more convenient to kill them than to kill people in an organization like the Hexi Chamber of Commerce.
As a result, these great monks from major temples who were invited with great fear were pleasantly surprised to find that the emperor had returned the Qianzhuanghui to them.
Although the emperor gave a death order that they must deposit a large amount of gold and silver as a guarantee in the Ouchi treasury opened by the emperor, they calculated it and found that it was still a good deal.
At the end of the conversation, Zhang Yan sang the Prajna Paramita Heart Sutra together with the monks and ate a vegetarian meal prepared by the royal chef.
Zhang Yan was also very satisfied with the great monks' knowledge and interest, and he also knew the reason why they were so knowledgeable.
That is, Zhang Gao killed the bandits and scarred monks they had taken in. The monks that the major temples relied on most were completely defeated by force. They only deserved to eat the small rations Zhang Gao asked them to eat.
On the first day of the fifth lunar month in the fourth year of the Shaoming Dynasty, Zhang Yan finally settled all the affairs of this great rebellion.
The relocation of tens of thousands of people from Wuning Town in Xuzhou is already on the way. A large number of bandits, bandits, bullies and rangers who had their faces burned and were taken in by Buddhism were all sent to Andong Province to prepare as vanguards to attack Wang's Korea.
In Hexi, each family of the Laogui Rebel Army contributed more than 500,000 guan of goods. Most of them were ordered by Zhang Gao to move to Chang'an, Luoyang, and Kaifeng for resettlement. These roadblocks on the Silk Road were finally moved.
open.
The Hexi Chamber of Commerce has completely disappeared, and its functions have been merged into the Jinyi Guards, Zhangtai, Household Department, Transfer Envoy and other government departments.
Mi Guozhi, who was in Beiting, was transferred back to the Central Plains. After Kang Jinshan donated most of his family property, he went back to become a rich man.
Under Zhang Yan's arrangement, Zhang Liecheng went to Guilin Prefecture in the southernmost part of Hunan Province, where he assisted Zhang Yanjun (Ma Shacai) in dredging and repairing the Ling Canal, collecting intelligence on the Southern Han Dynasty, and preparing for the upcoming attack on the Southern Han Dynasty.
This is not a good job. It is very dangerous and difficult, and there is also the danger of being acclimatized. Only after he has made great achievements and returns, will Zhang Gao forgive him again.
As for the ignorant Cao Wanjin, he was beheaded by Zhang Zhang and his family property was confiscated. He received a total of about 2.2 million yuan. This was unprecedented corruption since the founding of Zhang Zhou.
The money he made from the Hexi Chamber of Commerce was second only to Zhang Zhang, and exceeded nearly 30% of the profits of the Hexi Chamber of Commerce in the past twelve years.
However, in view of Cao Wanjin's involvement in various aspects, and part of the confiscated property was Cao Wanjin's legitimate income, Zhang Yan went after him and a group of his confidants, and did not do much to implicate Cao Wanjin's family, as long as they were innocent.
In short, this fishing law enforcement ended with Zhang Yan's victory.
He eliminated a large number of domestic opposition groups, decadent factions and old rebel factions that were difficult to drive. Internal and external enemies were almost completely eliminated, and the atmosphere in the army and court was purified.
The process of unifying the world can now be fully launched.