General Yang's Honesty

Here is my summarized and translated version of the story contained in the Chinese Text Book of Virtues, Book one, Chapter on Trust and Credibility ( 信 ). Please pardon my translation errors and let me know if you spot any errors.

During the Jin dynasty ( 晋朝 ), there was a general with the surname of Yang, name Hu and given name Shuzi (see note*). He brought his troops to defend the area of Xiangyang. This area borderd the country of Wu ( 吴国 ) and General Yang's troops often clashed with Wu's army which was led by General Lu Kang. Whenever the army from both sides of the border fought, they must first fixed a date for the battle. Moreover, both sides did not make any sneak attack. Whenever the advisors in General Yang's army wanted to propose any scheming attack plans, General Yang would give them a lot of strong wine to drink so that they could not elaborate on their devious plans. Occasionally General Lu Kang would send General Yang some wine to drink. General Yang would drink those wine without any suspicion. When General Lu Kang fell ill, General Yang sent him some medicines and he took the medicines immediately. Others tried to dissuade General Lu Kang from taking the medicines and he said, "How can there be a Yang Shuzi that poison people?"

When the enemy soldiers heard of General Yang's death, they cried for him. Throughout history, there was only General Yang whose trust and credibility had moved the enemies.

* note : In Ancient China, a person's name was made up of three parts, surname ( 姓 ), name ( 名 ) and given name ( 字 ). Before a person reached adulthood, everyone could call him by his name ( 名 ). A man went through a ceremony ( 冠礼 ) at the age of twenty to signify that he had reached adulthood. After that ceremony, it was disrespectful to call him by his name ( 名 ) . His peers, brothers, classmates and friends would then give him a given name ( 字 ). From that time onwards, everyone would call him by his given name ( 字 ) instead of name ( 名 ). Only his parents and teachers could call him by his name ( 名 ).

Original Chinese story available HERE 《德育课本》,初集卷四,《二十四信》, 编号 : dykb1-04, story number 12).