第五伦 / Fifth Lun (Eastern Han)

Overview

第五伦 / Fifth Lun now has a paired Hanji 755-756 profile. Hanji 755 places him as sikong and a no-restitution minister in the debate over whether Southern Xiongnu should return Northern Xiongnu captives and livestock. Hanji 756 then turns him into a fuller Eastern Han integrity figure: a forthright official whom Emperor Zhang restores to discussion, later permits to retire, and whose self-examination over a refused horse gift becomes the page’s strongest character evidence.

Current Profile

The first current layer is court policy disagreement. After Southern Xiongnu seizes Northern Xiongnu people and livestock, Meng Yun warns that restitution is needed for Han credibility. Fifth Lun and Zheng Hong oppose the return, while Huan Yu and Yuan An support it.

Hanji 756 shows the dispute’s escalation and resolution. Fifth Lun joins Zheng Hong and Wei Biao in submitting seals and ribbons, but Zhangdi treats heated disagreement as normal in major affairs and orders the ministers back into deliberation.

Fifth Lun’s more durable profile is clean and direct public service. The source says he serves with full devotion, states his views sharply, avoids ambiguous fence-sitting, and remains plain and honest in office. When age and illness make continued service difficult, he asks to retire from the sikong post; Zhangdi grants removal and gives him a lifetime two-thousand-shi stipend.

The episode’s strongest character evidence is inward. Asked whether he has private motives, Fifth Lun says someone once offered him a fine horse. He refused the gift and did not recommend the donor, but he still noticed himself remembering the donor when later recommending talent. For the source, the point is not corruption but self-scrutiny: Fifth Lun treats even a faint internal pull as evidence that private interest has to be watched.

Key Characteristics

• Senior minister who initially opposes restitution in the Xiongnu captive-and-livestock dispute.
• Court participant whose resignation gesture is refused because Zhangdi wants continued deliberation.
• Forthright official whose opinions are direct rather than evasive.
• Clean officeholder whose integrity is framed through plainness and public devotion.
• Self-scrutinizing figure who notices private motive even when he rejects the gift and does not act on it.
• Retired high official whose departure marks a shift in Zhangdi-era court staffing.

Evidence

• Initial policy stance: Hanji 755 says Fifth Lun joins Zheng Hong in opposing the return of captives and livestock seized by Southern Xiongnu.
• Court dispute and restored participation: Hanji 756 says Fifth Lun joins Zheng Hong and Wei Biao in submitting seals and ribbons after the dispute escalates, and Zhangdi tells the ministers to return to discussion.
• Public conduct: Hanji 756 describes Fifth Lun as devoted, forthright, plain, honest, and clean.
• Retirement: Hanji 756 says he asks to retire because of age and illness, and Zhangdi grants removal with a lifetime stipend.
• Self-scrutiny: Hanji 756 says Fifth Lun refuses a fine-horse gift but still counts the remembered donor as evidence that he cannot claim to be free of private motive.

Qualifications

This page is bounded to Hanji 755 and Hanji 756 and normalizes the transcript’s 第五轮 wording to 第五伦 / Fifth Lun. Hanji 755 provides a policy stance but not much biography. Hanji 756 provides the integrity and self-scrutiny material. The source’s “慎独” framing is treated as the host’s ethical synthesis from the horse-gift anecdote, not as a complete doctrine of moral psychology.

What Changed

• Added Hanji 755 as Fifth Lun’s initial no-restitution stance in the Xiongnu policy debate.
• Preserved Hanji 756 as the main integrity, retirement, and self-scrutiny layer.

Relationships

• 汉章帝 - ruler who hears Fifth Lun’s policy stance, restores him to court discussion, and later grants retirement.
• 郑洪 - paired senior minister on the no-restitution side of the dispute.
• 桓虞 - pro-restitution counterpart in the same debate.
• 袁安 - pro-restitution counterpart before Yuan’s later anti-Dou profile.
• 南匈奴 - frontier party whose seized gains Fifth Lun initially does not want returned.
• 北匈奴 - frontier party whose captives and livestock trigger the dispute.
• 退让留余地式治理 - episode frame that explains why Zhangdi prevents disagreement from becoming rupture.
• 三不沾式清廉自守 - adjacent integrity pattern; Fifth Lun adds a private-motive scrutiny variant rather than the later three-refusals formula.
• 良知高于党派 - related ethical frame because Fifth Lun’s public stance and private self-check resist convenience.