Li Bai is good at making friends and writing poems. He has written poems for many friends, such as “Gift to Wang Lun”, “Gift to Meng Haoran”, etc. Little people know that Li Bai also wrote poems for a Japanese friend.
This Japanese friend’s name is Abe Zhongmalu, and his Chinese name is Chaoheng, also known as Chao Heng. He is one of the foreign students sent by Japan to the Tang Dynasty. Befriended Chao Heng, and their deeds became a testimony to the friendship between China and Japan.
Li Bai once wrote a poem in memory of Chao Heng, titled “Crying Chao Qingheng”, the whole poem is:
Japan’s Chao Qing left the imperial capital and set sail around the pot.
The bright moon does not return to Shen Bihai, and the white clouds are full of melancholy.
The whole poem is sincere and touching, but there is a big oolong. What’s going on? This starts with sending envoys to the Tang Dynasty.
The road map of the Tang Dynasty sending envoys to the Tang Dynasty
During the Tang Dynasty, the country was strong and the economy was prosperous , the culture is prosperous, Japan, Silla and other neighboring countries will send Tang envoys to the Tang Dynasty to exchange and study.
Abe Nakamaro, who was born in Nara, Japan, came to the Tang Dynasty in the fifth year of Kaiyuan (717 AD) as an international student with the eighth delegation to the Tang Dynasty. , This year, he was less than 20 years old.
Abe Zhongma Lu was talented and diligent and eager to learn. After arriving in the Tang Dynasty, he entered the Imperial College of the Imperial College and received excellent grades. After his studies, he participated in the imperial examination. Exams, in one fell swoop, become Jinshi.
Abe Zhongmalu (film and television stills)
Tang Dynasty, with ” Thirty old famous classics, fifty young Jinshi”, that is, 50 years old is already very young to be admitted to Jinshi. Foreigners were admitted to the Tang Dynasty Jinshi, which shows that Abe Nakamaro is indeed very good.
According to the custom, after sending Tang envoys to study for a period of time, they can return to China, or return to China with the next Tang envoys, but because of admiration for Chinese culture, Abe Nakama Lu did not Ken left, he changed his name to Chao Heng, also known as Chao Heng, and stayed in the Tang Dynasty.
Abe Zhongma Lu was diligent and eager to learn, and wrote well in poetry. He had contacts with Tang Dynasty poets Wang Wei, Li Bai, Bao Ji, Chu Guangxi, etc.
It was the twelfth year of Tianbao (753 AD), Abe Zhongmalu came to the Tang Dynasty. It has been 37 years Become a man in his sixties.
The longer I come to Tang Dynasty, the more I miss my hometown. Abe Zhongma Lu had resigned many times to return to the country, but Emperor Xuanzong refused.
In 752, the eleventh year of Tianbao, Japan sent Tang envoys to Tang for the eleventh time, seeing the people of his hometown again, arousing his deep yearning for his homeland .
He once again requested to return to China. He felt that he had served the Tang Dynasty for decades and his parents were old. Tang Xuanzong approved him to return to China and appointed him. He was the Japanese envoy of the Tang Dynasty, and a foreigner was the Chinese envoy, which is rare in history.
Learning that Abe Nakamaru was going to return to the country, people from the court and the opposition in Chang’an held a banquet. His “Send Secretary Chao Jian to Return to Japan” and Bao Ji’s “Send the Japanese Ambassador Chao Juqing to Return East” are among the masterpieces.
Chao Heng finally embarked on his journey back home, he set sail from Suzhou by boat.
That night, the bright moon was in the sky, and the bright moonlight filled the river. Abe Zhongmalu looked up at the bright moon and was about to leave the Tang Dynasty. One is called “Poems of Wangxiang”, also known as “Mingzhou Watching the Moon” and “Tang Kingdom Watching the Moon”.
Abe Nakamaro Statue
This poem is recorded in the “Anthology of Ancient and Modern Japanese Songs” “, was compiled by Ji Guanzhi, a writer in the early Heian Dynasty, and others.
There are many translations of this “Poem of Wangxiang”. Yinniang selected one translation as follows:
Looking up at the sky, galloping towards Nara; on the top of Mikasa Mountain, the moon is full of thoughts.
Abe Nakamaro misses his hometown Nara in this poem.
Abe Nakamaro, who sailed back to his country, did not have a smooth journey. The ship he was on encountered a storm near Ryukyu and lost contact with other ships. At that time , Everyone thought that Abe Nakamaro had died.
The Japanese envoy to Tang Dynasty arrived at the port of Tang Dynasty (Volume 4 of “Eastern Expedition Biography”)
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Abe Nakama Lu and Li Bai made good friends. It is said that he gave Li Bai a Japanese fur coat, and Li Bai was very moved.
When Li Bai learned the news of his “death”, he wrote the poem “Crying Chao Qingheng” to express his sadness and sorrow for the death of his friend. Sorrow.
Fortunately, Abe Nakamaro was not killed. After losing contact with other ships, Abe Nakamaro and his companions were blown to Vietnam by the storm coast.
In June of AD 755 (the 14th year of Tianbao), Abe Nakamaro went back to Chang’an after going through hardships and dangers. Friends see Abe Nakamaro escape from dangerComing back, more than pleasant surprise.
Since then, Abe Nakamaro stayed in Datang and never returned to China. In his life, he experienced three emperors in the Tang Dynasty, and his official position was the governor of Annan. At the age of seventy-two, he died in Chang’an.
Abe Nakamaro (film and television stills)
Through the millennium, we Let’s read Li Bai’s “Crying Chao Qingheng” again. From the words between the lines, you can feel Li Bai’s sincere feelings for Abe Nakama Lu.
Japan’s Chao Qing left the imperial capital and set sail around the pot.
The bright moon does not return to Shen Bihai, and the white clouds are full of melancholy.
Li Bai took “crying” as the theme, unabashedly venting his grief over the loss of his friend.
The title of the poem calls Chao Heng “Qing”, which was an honorific in ancient times, implying Li Bai’s admiration for Chao Heng.
The first two lines of the poem are straight to the point, saying that Chao Heng left Chang’an, sailed away, and floated across the immortal island of Penglai.
In the last two lines of the poem, Li Bai compares Chao Heng to the bright moon, saying that a friend who has never returned is like the bright moon sank into the blue sea, The white clouds above also shrouded the green hills with sadness.
“Ming Moon Shen Bi Hai”, comparing friends to the bright moon, yes The praise of Chao Heng’s personality has a profound meaning, and the artistic realm is beautiful and graceful.
Baiyun was also worried about the passing of a friend, which shows that the sad mood lingers in Li Bai’s heart for a long time.
Fortunately, Abe Nakamaru did not die, he came back, Li Bai’s poems undoubtedly made an oolong, we can’t know, when Abe When Zhongma Lu returned to Chang’an, what did he think when he read the mourning poems written by Li Bai for him?
But Yin Niang thought that he must be very moved. In this land far away from the motherland, there are still many people who sincerely care about him, miss him, and leave him. Hometown is like returning home.
Abe Nakamaru Monument in Xingqing Park, Xi’an
Nowadays, The friendship between Li Bai and Abe Nakamaru has become a testimony to the friendship between China and Japan.
In 1978, Xi’an City and Nara Prefecture agreed to build a monument in each of the two cities for future generations to pay their respects and remembrance.
The monument in Xi’an is located in the ruins of Xingqing Palace in Tang Dynasty. The relief sculpture of the ship dispatched to the Tang Dynasty is flanked by Li Bai’s poem “Crying Chao Qingheng” and Abe Zhongmalu’s “Wangxiang” poem. Its cultural connotation is self-evident.
Abe Nara Sakurai, the hometown of Nakamaro, is engraved with “Poems of Hope”
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Time has flown by, only these two immortal poems still tell the story of that year.