I Was Striking The Tyrants Jie and Zhou, Not My King

During the Spring and Autumn Period (772 to 481 B.C.) in China, there was a royal court musician named Shi Jing from the Wei Kingdom, who was very good at playing the Chinese zither. Xu Shen, a Chinese scholar from the Later Han Dynasty, wrote a story about Shi Jing in the Chapter of “A King’s Virtues” in his treatise Garden of Explanations (or Shuo Yuan in Chinese Pinyin.)

One day, while Shi Jing was playing the Chinese zither for Marquess Wen of the Wei State, the King was very happy and started dancing and singing with the music. Gradually he got lost in exhilaration, and shouted, “Everyone must obey me! Whoever dares to go against me will be punished!” Upon hearing this, Shi Jing stopped playing the music and threw the zither at the King. The zither hit the King’s crown and broke the jade tassels on the crown into pieces. The King was very angry and ordered Shi Jing executed right away. Shi Jing said, “Please let me say something before I die.” The King granted his wish.

Shi Jing said, “In the past, when the sage kings, Yao and Shun (the first two emperors of China who reigned over 4,000 years ago) ran the country, they worried that their people might follow all of their orders blindly. When the fatuous tyrants, Jie and Zhou, ran the country, they did everything they could to make people obey their orders blindly. I was striking Jie and Zhou with the zither, not my King!”

The king became very ashamed of himself and ordered the guards to release Shi Jing immediately. He also had the zither hung above the gate of the capital city, and left the broken jade tassels on the crown to constantly remind himself to be open to all admonitions. Although what he accomplished as a king couldn’t begin to compare with those of the legendary Emperors Yao and Shun, he went down the history as a very good and wise king.

In ancient China, an insignificant musician even had the courage to strike a king in public, and advised the king to examine his behavior. More impressively, the king had the wisdom and the breadth of mind to correct his behavior. Is there anyone in today’s China that has the courage to speak out and to demand that Jiang Zemin’s regime stop the persecution against Falun Gong?

Today, Falun Gong practitioners around the world have filed and will continue to file lawsuits against Jiang Zemin in order to bring him to justice. While Falun Gong practitioners’ symbolic trials against Jiang Zemin are taking place all over the world, many courts in the world will soon start legal trials against the dictator. It’s like a powerful hurricane rapidly sweeping across the world.