天才的墮落·華彥鈞對命運的報復與自我毀滅The Fall of a Genius · Hua Yanjun’s Revenge Against Fate and His Self-Destruction
China’s Beethoven · Blind Musician AbingThe Fall of a Genius · Hua Yanjun’s Revenge Against Fate and His Self-Destruction
China’s Beethoven · Blind Musician Abing天才的墮落·華彥鈞對命運的報復與自我毀滅
中國的貝多芬·瞎子阿炳

From an early age, Hua Yanjun’s innate gift for music gradually revealed itself—whether inherited by nature or awakened under the loving care and rigorous training of his master, who was also his father, Hua Qinghe.

He did not disappoint his father. He studied with extraordinary diligence and progressed with remarkable speed. By the age of fifteen or sixteen, he had already mastered a wide range of musical instruments. Among the Taoist priests of Leizun Temple, none could rival him; in certain respects, he had even begun to surpass his father.

Hua Yanjun could be said to have inherited everything from him. Although his childhood had been filled with hardship, he grew into a strikingly handsome young man, graceful and distinguished—more captivating even than Hua Qinghe had been in his youth. The pupil had truly surpassed the master; the son, the father.

Hua Yanjun began accompanying his father to perform religious ceremonies. Despite his youth, he had already become one of the principal musicians in their ritual ensembles. With his handsome appearance, confident bearing, and almost magical command of music, he became the center of attention whenever the Taoist priests performed ceremonies in the homes of wealthy families. Young women, in particular, could hardly take their eyes off him.

Hua Qinghe saw all this. He was delighted, and deeply proud—but beneath that pride lay an unspoken anxiety.

He feared that his son might follow the same path he himself had once taken: that one moment of weakness might leave behind a lifetime of trouble and suffering.

At the time, however, Hua Qinghe did not worry too much. As long as he was still alive, he believed he could watch over his son, warn him when necessary, and restrain him before he strayed too far. Pride therefore outweighed fear. He took heartfelt comfort in his son’s intelligence, handsome appearance, and exceptional musical gifts.

But storms can descend from a clear sky, and human fortune can change overnight.

The happy years shared by father and son did not last long. Hua Qinghe contracted a serious illness and became bedridden. Although they sought out every renowned physician in Wuxi, his condition did not improve. In the end, there was nothing more that medicine could do.

His greatest concern was the son he would soon leave behind—a young man of extraordinary talent and promise, yet innocent as clear water and almost entirely without experience of the world.

From an early age, Hua Yanjun’s innate gift for music gradually revealed itself—whether inherited by nature or awakened under the loving care and rigorous training of his master, who was also his father, Hua Qinghe.

He did not disappoint his father. He studied with extraordinary diligence and progressed with remarkable speed. By the age of fifteen or sixteen, he had already mastered a wide range of musical instruments. Among the Taoist priests of Leizun Temple, none could rival him; in certain respects, he had even begun to surpass his father.

Hua Yanjun could be said to have inherited everything from him. Although his childhood had been filled with hardship, he grew into a strikingly handsome young man, graceful and distinguished—more captivating even than Hua Qinghe had been in his youth. The pupil had truly surpassed the master; the son, the father.

Hua Yanjun began accompanying his father to perform religious ceremonies. Despite his youth, he had already become one of the principal musicians in their ritual ensembles. With his handsome appearance, confident bearing, and almost magical command of music, he became the center of attention whenever the Taoist priests performed ceremonies in the homes of wealthy families. Young women, in particular, could hardly take their eyes off him.

Hua Qinghe saw all this. He was delighted, and deeply proud—but beneath that pride lay an unspoken anxiety.

He feared that his son might follow the same path he himself had once taken: that one moment of weakness might leave behind a lifetime of trouble and suffering.

At the time, however, Hua Qinghe did not worry too much. As long as he was still alive, he believed he could watch over his son, warn him when necessary, and restrain him before he strayed too far. Pride therefore outweighed fear. He took heartfelt comfort in his son’s intelligence, handsome appearance, and exceptional musical gifts.

But storms can descend from a clear sky, and human fortune can change overnight.

The happy years shared by father and son did not last long. Hua Qinghe contracted a serious illness and became bedridden. Although they sought out every renowned physician in Wuxi, his condition did not improve. In the end, there was nothing more that medicine could do.

His greatest concern was the son he would soon leave behind—a young man of extraordinary talent and promise, yet innocent as clear water and almost entirely without experience of the world.

Before his death, Hua Qinghe finally revealed the truth about their relationship. They were not merely master and disciple. They were father and son.

He then entrusted Hua Yanjun with his position as the priest in charge of Leizun Temple, together with the responsibility of managing the Taoist sanctuary.

With tears covering his face, Hua Qinghe held his son’s hand and repeatedly urged him to remember his words. He must conduct himself cautiously. He must guard against the enticements of wicked people. Above all, he must preserve Leizun Temple. With the offerings of its worshippers, the income from its land, and the money earned by performing religious ceremonies, he would be able to live without fear of hunger or deprivation for the rest of his life.

The young Hua Yanjun was utterly unprepared. Everything had changed too suddenly.

His master had only just become his father—and the father he had only just recognized was about to leave him forever. The sudden revelation of his identity, followed immediately by the anguish of permanent separation, left him shocked and bewildered. He did not know how to face any of it.

Yet reality had changed before he had time to understand what was happening, and Hua Yanjun was still far too young. As a disciple, he had always lived beneath the protective wings of his master—his father. He had been sheltered, cared for, and guided. Never had he imagined that he would one day have to assume the immense responsibility of managing the temple without his father beside him.

His father left Leizun Temple in his hands. Along with his elevated position and improved living conditions came the enormous burdens of managing the temple, presiding over religious ceremonies, and sustaining the prosperity of its worship and offerings. Everything arrived too quickly. He was overwhelmed. He had no experience in management and was completely unprepared to carry such a responsibility.

After Hua Qinghe’s death, Abing succeeded him as the priest in charge of Leizun Temple and began participating in the management of the temple and its income. At the time, the temple still attracted a substantial number of worshippers and possessed a certain amount of farmland, as well as income from religious ceremonies. Had he quietly preserved the foundation his father had left him, he might have continued to enjoy a secure and comfortable life.

But what actually happened was precisely the opposite.

The sudden rise in his status and the comforts of his new circumstances seemed insignificant beside the confusion and suffering within him. His father’s death did not make him mature overnight. Instead, it released something that had long been suppressed, and his inner world suddenly spun out of control.

The pain in Abing’s heart began to burn like a raging fire.

The world, he now realized, was not as pure or as beautiful as his master—who was also his father—had always taught him to believe. The man who had demanded that he obey Taoist discipline, conduct himself cautiously, and submit to years of rigorous training had himself concealed the most important truth of all.

In Abing’s eyes, his master had preached one thing and practiced another.

Because of his father’s concealment, he had spent more than twenty years bearing the humiliation of being an illegitimate child. He had endured insults, hostile glances, discrimination, and rejection by the society around him. The wounds accumulated over all those years could not be healed by a single deathbed confession: “I am your biological father.”

Moreover, his mother, Wu Afen, had been forced to leave this world because of a relationship that neither conventional morality nor the Taoist temple could tolerate.

Young, innocent, and inexperienced in the ways of society, Abing began to harbor intensely complicated feelings toward his father.

Of course he knew that his father had loved him. Hua Qinghe had raised him, educated him, and trained him with uncompromising discipline. He had passed on everything he knew without reservation and, in the end, had placed Leizun Temple in his son’s hands.

Yet Abing could not understand him, much less forgive him so easily.

If you were my biological father, why did you refuse to acknowledge me for more than twenty years?

If you always taught me to live honestly, why did you use an enormous lie to conceal the truth of my entire existence?

Love, gratitude, resentment, grief over his father’s death, and the collapse of his identity became entangled within him. He could not understand his father. He could not understand himself. Nor did he know what identity he was supposed to live by from that moment onward.

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Unable to forgive his father, he also developed a powerful aversion to the rules and disciplines of the temple. In his eyes, morality, propriety, reputation, and respectability were merely tools people used to restrain others. It was to preserve the honor of Leizun Temple that his father had hidden his identity for more than twenty years—and that his mother had paid with her life.

We cannot, of course, prove that every act of indulgence that followed was a carefully considered act of revenge. A more likely explanation is that grief over his father’s death, rage after the revelation of his parentage, a rebelliousness born of years of humiliation, and the sudden removal of strict restraint combined to destroy the order that had once governed his life.

The enticements of malicious people, the lure of money, and the corrupt environment around him were all external forces pushing him toward the abyss. But what truly caused him to lose control may have been the pain he could not release—and the growing impulse toward self-destruction.

He seemed to have little interest in the status and comfortable life that had come so easily into his hands. Instead, he deliberately turned in the opposite direction. He wanted to defy everything he had once been taught and trample the temple’s rules beneath his feet. To him, all those rules were hypocritical—nothing more than instruments of deception and confinement.

In the past, his master had controlled him, demanding that he practice relentlessly and observe every rule. Now his master was gone. Abing had become the priest in charge of Leizun Temple. He possessed a measure of authority and could control part of the temple’s income.

Very well, then. Now he, Abing, had power. He had money.

At last, he could live entirely according to his own desires. No one could restrain him anymore. No one could force him to behave like an obedient, rule-bound Taoist priest.

He began neglecting his duties at religious ceremonies and showed little concern for whether Leizun Temple continued to prosper. He discarded his Taoist robes, dressed himself in fashionable silk garments, and spent his days among local thugs, gang members, and disreputable figures in Wuxi.

He squandered the money donated by worshippers, the income from the temple’s farmland, and the fees earned from performing religious ceremonies in the brothels and gambling houses around Chong’an Temple in Wuxi.

Even that was not enough. He later became addicted to opium.

In the opium dens, he lay upon the smoking couch, inhaling and exhaling clouds of smoke. The fleeting pleasure produced by the drug offered him a false sense of release—as though, for a little while, he could forget the humiliations of the past, the death of his father, and the unbearable truth of his identity that had been revealed so suddenly.

Some ill-intentioned people in the area saw that he was young, had money at his disposal, and possessed little experience of society. They deliberately befriended and enticed him. Some even set traps to cheat him at gambling.

Perhaps Abing was not entirely unaware of their malicious intentions. Perhaps he understood that the trap had been prepared specifically for him. Yet he still plunged into it as though possessed, throwing large amounts of the temple’s income onto the gambling tables. The more he lost, the more he gambled; the more he gambled, the more he lost.

We do not know exactly what happened. But judging from his background and his later conduct, perhaps, in certain moments of frenzied self-indulgence, a cry like this arose from somewhere deep within him:

“Isn’t money what you value? Don’t you care about reputation and appearances? Then I will squander all of it. I will destroy everything!”

He appeared to be taking revenge upon his father, the temple, conventional morality, and the society that had once despised and humiliated him. But he failed to realize that when he used indulgence to rebel against discipline, and extravagance to avenge his father’s concealment, the person being destroyed, step by step, was himself.

Abing’s reckless self-exile continued for more than ten years.

At first, perhaps he was driven mainly by rebellion. He wanted to escape the restraints his father had left behind and retaliate against the injustice he had suffered. But as the years passed, gambling, prostitution, and opium exerted their own seductions and addictions, gradually taking control of his life.

At first, he may have chosen that life.
Later, that life chose for him.

The foundation his father had left behind was consumed little by little. The temple’s income steadily declined, and his body began to exact its terrible revenge. Although he was still relatively young, his health had already deteriorated dramatically.

Around 1928, when Abing was approximately thirty-four or thirty-five, he contracted syphilis—according to the more widely accepted account—as a result of his long years frequenting brothels.

In an age before penicillin and other effective antibiotics, syphilis could cause severe and irreversible damage to vision if it affected the eyes or nervous system. Abing’s eyes gradually deteriorated, beginning with inflammation and persistent watering. Eventually, he became completely blind, and everything before him sank into absolute darkness.

By the time Abing had lost his sight, little remained of the temple’s income or farmland. He could no longer participate in religious ceremonies as he once had, nor was he capable of managing Leizun Temple.

He lost his position as the priest in charge. He also lost the means to support himself through the temple. In the end, dressed in worn and tattered clothing and feeling his way forward with a bamboo cane, he took to the streets of Wuxi and survived by performing music for a living.

At this point, Abing had completed the most devastating act of self-mutilation in his life.

Through opium, prostitution, gambling, and endless dissipation, he had squandered the foundation his father had left him and shattered the stable life he might otherwise have enjoyed.

He appeared to have taken revenge upon his father for the pain caused by years of deliberate concealment. He appeared to have taken revenge upon the Taoist disciplines he had been expected to obey, upon the respectability of the temple, and upon the society that had once despised him.

Yet the people and rules he hated may not have been truly harmed at all.

The only person who was truly wounded—and who consequently lost everything—was Abing himself.

The outside world had once wounded him. Then he took the knife from its hands and continued cutting into himself.

When he became blind and destitute and walked onto the streets of Wuxi with a bamboo cane to earn his living through music, his heart must have been filled with fear, humiliation, regret, and despair.

And yet, beyond all this suffering, we may also imagine that he experienced an intensely contradictory sense of release—one that perhaps even he could not explain.

He was free.

He no longer had to be the illegitimate disciple whose identity could never be brought into the light. He no longer had to be the Taoist priest compelled to obey strict religious discipline. Nor did he have to remain the priest in charge of Leizun Temple, constantly preserving his status, reputation, and respectability, forcing himself to live as his master—who was also his father—had lived.

Now, he was simply himself.

He was Blind Abing: a blind man cast onto the streets and surviving through music; a man who had lost his position, his money, and his sight; a soul who possessed nothing, yet was finally bound by no identity at all.

This was certainly not freedom as ordinary people understand it. It was a desolate and brutal kind of “freedom,” purchased only after a man had paid the most terrible price imaginable.

As for what Abing truly thought at the time, it is now almost impossible for us to know. We have no diaries or personal accounts left by him. We cannot treat later psychological interpretations as established historical fact.

We can only look at his origins, his suffering, and the course of his life, and attempt to understand why a brilliant young Taoist priest with seemingly limitless promise—a man who had become the head of a still-prosperous temple—gradually descended into self-exile and destruction.

But one point can perhaps be stated with some confidence: Abing’s fall cannot simply be blamed entirely upon society, nor can all responsibility be placed upon the wicked people who enticed him.

Society’s discrimination, his father’s concealment, and the temptations surrounding him planted pain and anger in his heart. But the rebelliousness formed through years of suppression transformed that pain into dissipation and self-destruction.

External forces pushed him toward the abyss. Internal forces kept him from turning back—and may even have driven him deliberately deeper into it.

This is the cruelest aspect of the tragedy of Abing’s life.

And yet, seen from another perspective, this searing descent from heaven into hell also became another form of ordeal—a tempering imposed upon him by fate.

He lost his father.
He lost the temple.
He lost his wealth.
He lost his sight.

He lost everything and, in the end, was cast onto the streets to survive by performing music.

All these sufferings—burdens that an ordinary person could scarcely endure—eventually settled into the deepest layers of his life and music. They became the heartbreaking sorrow of The Moon Reflected on the Second Spring: a sorrow that no professor from any formal conservatory could ever imitate, a sorrow that reaches directly into the human soul.

His body descended into darkness.

But his music began its journey toward eternity.

(To be continued)