Summary: <br> A little Christmas morning stocking stuffer: A look at some of the guys that Zhuge Liang keeps getting compared to.<br> <br> * <a href="http://www.3kingdomspodcast.com/2015/12/25/supplemental-episode-005-legendary-advisers/#transcript">Transcript</a><br> <br> <br> <a id="transcript"></a>Transcript<br> <a href="http://www.3kingdomspodcast.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/3KingdomsSupplemental005LegendaryAdvisers.pdf">PDF version</a><br> Welcome to the Romance of the Three Kingdoms Podcast. This is a supplemental episode.<br> In this episode, I want to introduce you to a few of the legendary advisers in Chinese history. I’m going to cover four guys: Jiang (1) Ziya (3,2), Zhang (1) Liang (2), Guan (3) Zhong (4), and Yue (4) Yi (4). Ever since we were introduced to Zhuge Liang in the novel, we have been hearing a lot of comparisons to these guys, so I think it would be helpful to give you some context about who they were.<br> <br> First, let’s talk about Jiang Ziya, the earliest of the four. He lived at the end of the Shang Dynasty, around the 1100s B.C. The Shang was considered the second Chinese dynasty, although it is the first dynasty for which we have solid evidence of its existence. The Shang was said to have lasted something like 700 years, but by the time of JIang Ziya, it was fading fast. According to some versions of his story, Jiang Ziya supposedly served in the court of the last king of the Shang for a while, but left because of the king’s wicked ways. From there, he was said to have traveled near and far to the surrounding kingdoms, but none of their rulers really made much use of him. Before you know it, Jiang Ziya was an old man who had accomplished little and was living in poverty.<br> Meanwhile, one of the vassals of the Shang, King Wen (2) of the kingdom of Zhou, was in the midst of searching for talented men. As the story goes, one day, before the king went out hunting, he took the auspices, and the diviner informed him that on the north bank of the Wei (4) River, he would net a big catch, but that this catch would not be in the form of a dragon, a tiger, or a bear. Instead, he was told, he would find an official who would help him achieve his grand plans.<br> So King Wen (2) went off on his hunt, and on the north bank of the Wei (4) River, he came upon an old man sitting on a grass mat and fishing. King Wen noticed something odd about the old man’s fishing line. At the end of the line was not a hook, but a straight needle, or according to some version of the story, nothing at all. This obviously was not going to snag any fish.<br> Intrigued, the king asked the old man about his strange method of fishing. This old man, who of course, was none other than JIang Ziya, replied, “Those who are ready will come to me on their own volition.” He then added, “The willing will come; the unwilling will go away.”<br> When the king heard this, he couldn’t quite shake the feeling that the old man was maybe not talking so much about fish as he was about the king. So he began to converse with Jiang Ziya and soon recognized that he was talking to a man possessing great political and military knowledge. So the king asked Jiang Ziya to be his teacher. To show his respect, the king asked Jiang Ziya to sit in his chariot, then personally drove the chariot back to his capital, where he made Jiang Ziya his prime minister. <br> King Wen’s faith in Jiang Ziya was not misplaced. After King Wen died, his son, King Wu (3), came the throne and decided to overthrow the Shang Dynasty. Jiang Ziya was his main strategist in the ensuing war and was instrumental in the eventual victory that marked the beginning of the Zhou Dynasty, which would last about 800 years. For his contributions, Jiang Ziya was made the ruler of the vassal kingdom of Qi (2), and he ruled that territory wisely and made it prosper.<br> To this day, Jiang Ziya is something of a revered, half-mythical figure in China,
