Pei Ji

Biography

The Taiyuan Uprising

Pei Ji served as deputy director of the Jinyang Palace and became close to Li Yuan, the Sui governor of Taiyuan. Li Shimin and Liu Wenjing used this relationship to approach Li Yuan. Pei Ji argued that the empire was in disorder and that an uprising could avoid destruction and achieve a great political result. He then contributed palace personnel, grain, silk, and armor to the new army.

Early Tang chancellor

After Li Yuan entered the capital and established Tang, Pei Ji served as chief secretary in the military and grand chancellor offices. Li Yuan credited him with bringing the new dynasty into being, appointed him Right Vice Director, and granted exceptional court privileges. He helped prepare the Wude Code, ordinances, and administrative arrangements.

Loss of power and death

Pei Ji's field command against Liu Wuzhou ended in defeat, although Li Yuan continued to protect him. Under Taizong he became Sikong but was implicated in the Faya “demonic speech” case and lost his offices. He later concealed a servant's report and ordered a killing, leading to exile. During a local uprising in exile, he led his household retainers against the rebels. Taizong planned to recall him, but Pei Ji died on the journey.

Pei Ji, courtesy name Xuanzhen, was a native of Sangquan in Puzhou, of the Western branch of the Pei of Hedong. Losing his father young, he was raised by his elder brother, became registrar of Bingzhou at fourteen and deputy supervisor of the Jinyang Palace at the end of the Sui, where he became friendly with Li Yuan, then guardian of Taiyuan. When Li Yuan and his son prepared to rise, Pei Ji helped them with the stores he controlled, supplying a myriad bushels of grain and four hundred thousand suits of armor from the palace, and had palace women attend Li Yuan to fix his resolve; he was one of the chief participants in the rising at Jinyang.

After the Tang was founded he became right vice director of the Secretariat and then left vice director, long holding the chancellorship. Emperor Gaozu treated him with great favor, once saying he wished to grow old together with him, a treatment exceptional among the founders. In the Wude years he took part in framing the statutes and regulations and presided over certain ritual matters. His relations with the Prince of Qin, Li Shimin, were however distant, and in the struggle between the heir apparent Li Jiancheng and the prince he leaned to the heir.

After the coup at the Xuanwu gate his position fell rapidly. In 629 he was implicated in the affair of the monk Faya's seditious talk, stripped of office and fief and exiled to Jingzhou; later summoned to court again, he died on the way and was granted posthumous rank. His career reflects the position of the early Tang founders amid changes of sovereign: greatly relied on under Gaozu, he lost ground under Taizong for his former alignment, his fortunes closely bound to the shifts of early Tang politics.

Among the early Tang chancellors Pei Ji and Liu Wenjing were the two central figures who first followed Li Yuan in rebellion, their relations worsening through rivalry over merit until Liu was killed and Pei's position grew firmer. As Li Shimin's power rose his own position became steadily more passive, and his stay or departure around the Xuanwu gate coup is a direct result of the regrouping of power in the early Tang.

Judgments of him differed already in the Tang: records of Gaozu's court stress his services in the founding, while histories of Taizong's reign criticize much of what he did in the Wude years — a difference tied directly to changes in political alignment.

The Tang chancellorship changed substantially between the Wude and Zhenguan years: under Gaozu the heads of the three departments were of comparable weight, while under Taizong the division of Secretariat and Chancellery and the council of state affairs gradually took shape; Pei Ji's rise and fall falls within that transition.

The framing of early Tang institutions was chiefly the work of the chancellors of Gaozu's reign, and Pei Ji took part in settling the statutes, the rites and the official establishment, as may be seen in the old and new histories of the Tang.

Little is recorded of his exile beyond his recall and death on the road, the court granting him posthumous rank.

He held the title Duke of Wei, and the gifts and estates he received under Gaozu were lavish for the time, notices that stand in contrast with his loss of standing under Taizong.

In Tang commemorations of the founders his name appears in the records of both the Wude and Zhenguan years, the rise and fall of his standing being representative of the early Tang founding group.

The post of left vice director he held in the Wude years was head of the Secretariat of State Affairs in the early Tang, its authority covering appointments and the conduct of business — a weight that explains the exceptional favor he enjoyed under Gaozu.

At the rising in Jinyang Pei Ji and Liu Wenjing were the two chief counselors about Li Yuan. Pei used the palace's stores and connections to fix Li Yuan's resolve, while Liu advised much on diplomacy and war; their later fates were wholly different, Liu being killed through his quarrel with Pei and Pei losing ground under Taizong. The episode is recorded in some detail in the old and new histories of the Tang and in the Comprehensive Mirror.

His loss of standing under Taizong is bound up with the general reshuffling of the Wude old guard. After taking the throne Taizong advanced Fang Xuanling, Du Ruhui and others while the existing chancellors retired or were posted away; Pei's exile came through a case, but its setting was this wholesale change of personnel.

Works such as the Essentials of Government of the Zhenguan Era discuss Taizong's handling of the old ministers, comment on Pei Ji's case turning on two points: not bearing old grudges, and deciding by law.

Early Tang grants to its founders included hereditary fields and actual fief revenue, and the scale of Pei Ji's grant was of the highest order for the time; these economic benefits did not track the rise and fall of his political standing, a feature of early Tang policy toward the founders.

His career is told fairly continuously in the Tang annals of the Comprehensive Mirror, to be read alongside the old and new histories of the Tang.

The rise and fall of early Tang chancellors was often tied to changes in the succession, and Pei Ji's career is the clearest instance.

His son Pei Lüshi still held office under Taizong, and the family continued long in the Tang, one branch of the Pei of Hedong in that dynasty.

The early Tang founding group gradually merged into the regular bureaucracy after Taizong, and the experience of Pei Ji's house is an early instance of that process.

His part in framing the institutions of the early Tang gives him a place in the dynasty's official account, though his own end was not a happy one.

Sacrifices and posthumous grants to him in the Tang followed the customary treatment of founding ministers.

Early Tang chancellors often held other posts concurrently, and Pei Ji at times oversaw the war and personnel ministries, his authority wider than that of later chancellors.

His tomb and burial place are briefly recorded, the family graves lying in the Hedong region.

Among the chancellors of the early Tang his seniority and the honors he received were unusual.

His business in the Wude years also covered decisions on local administration and the setting up of militia offices; with the dynasty newly founded and institutions largely settled by the chancellors, his range of participation was wide. Fragments of this work appear in his biography and the Comprehensive Mirror, material for understanding the framing of early Tang institutions.

The evaluation of early Tang founders was rewritten through later political change, and the record of Pei Ji is itself a product of that process: the favor of Gaozu's reign and the depreciation of Taizong's form the two emphases of later accounts.

The group that rose at Taiyuan centered on Li Yuan's affines and old subordinates, and Pei Ji's post as deputy supervisor of the Jinyang Palace gave him control of its stores and personnel, a circumstance of real use in the rising and the capital on which his long tenure as chancellor rested.

The exceptional ceremonies he enjoyed under Gaozu included such privileges as not hastening at court and entering with sword and shoes, honors granted to few ministers in the early Tang.

His brother Pei Xuanzhen lived with him in Hedong, the family's choices at the turn from Sui to Tang being related to its circumstances.

Posthumous grants to early Tang founders were often tied to their descendants' careers, and Pei Ji's son still held court office after him, showing the court's recognition of his part in the founding.

The trust he enjoyed under Gaozu also showed in the weight of his opinions: on matters of the clan, enfeoffments and local appointments the emperor generally consulted him, as his biography repeatedly reflects.

The exact year of his exile and the details of the case differ slightly between his biography in the Old Tang History and the Comprehensive Mirror, requiring comparison.

After Taizong's reign he fades from the official record, and the later history of his family can only be inferred from scattered notices.

Major Activities

Taiyuan Uprising

His advice and material support were decisive in moving Li Yuan from hesitation to armed action and in sustaining the first Tang army.

Early Tang institutions

He participated in the preparation of the Wude Code, ordinances, and early court administration.

Military experience

His defeat against Liu Wuzhou showed that his political influence and logistical ability did not make him an outstanding field commander.

Personal Relations

• Rulers: Gaozu Li Yuan and Taizong Li Shimin.
• Fellow Taiyuan founders: Liu Wenjing and Li Shimin.
• Family: son Pei Lüshi; a daughter married Prince Li Yuanjing.
• Political conflict: Liu Wenjing, whom Pei Ji helped prosecute after a palace dispute.

Representative Works

• The Complete Tang Prose includes a "Memorial Urging Accession" attributed to Pei Ji. The surviving sources state only that the piece was included in the general collection and do not allow its exact occasion or textual transmission to be confirmed, so it is listed only as a recorded transmitted work without expanding its content.

Historical Assessment

Li Yuan praised Pei Ji's founding contribution, while the Old Book of Tang and New Book of Tang criticize his dependence on personal favor and his role in Liu Wenjing's death. Modern scholarship sees Pei Ji as a skilled court intermediary and organizer whose status declined when the political center moved from Gaozu's household to Taizong's government.