石庆 / Shi Qing (Western Han)

Overview

石庆 / Shi Qing enters the wiki as the Western Han yushi dafu appointed chancellor and enfeoffed as Muqiu Hou after 赵周’s death. Hanji 353-2 uses his cautious tenure to show a chancellorship losing practical control over major fiscal, legal, and literary-policy decisions.

Current Profile

The episode presents Shi Qing less through individual policy than through institutional position. 桑弘羊 and other officials secure revenue, 王温舒 and his peers enforce harsh law, and 兒宽 and related officials advance literary learning. These actors rise into consequential work while affairs do not pass through or receive decision from the chancellor.

Shi Qing therefore survives by being “醇谨,” cautious and compliant, rather than by reasserting comprehensive ministerial direction. That is a source-bounded portrait of this tenure, not proof that the chancellor office was permanently empty of authority across the Western Han.

Key Characteristics

• Yushi dafu promoted to chancellor after Zhao Zhou’s death.
• Enfeoffed as Muqiu Hou on appointment.
• Serves while fiscal, legal, and literary-policy officials exercise growing issue-specific influence.
• Presented as cautious and compliant rather than as the decision center for major affairs.
• Illustrates a gap between holding the highest ministerial title and controlling policy flow.

Evidence

Appointment and rank:

• Hanji 353-2 says Shi Qing is promoted from yushi dafu to chancellor and enfeoffed as Muqiu Hou.

Institutional position:

• Hanji 353-2 says major fiscal, harsh-law, and literary officials are successively used while affairs are not decided through the chancellor.

Personal posture:

• Hanji 353-2 characterizes Shi Qing as careful and restrained in office.

Qualifications

This page is bounded to one short episode and does not reconstruct Shi Qing’s family background, earlier offices, complete chancellorship, policy record, or later fate. The institutional interpretation should not be generalized into a claim that every Western Han chancellor lacked authority. The episode’s grouping of Sang Hongyang, Wang Wenshu, Ni Kuan, and their peers describes a distribution of influence, not a complete formal organization chart.

What Changed

• Created a source-bounded profile centered on Shi Qing’s appointment and the episode’s claim of practical chancellor marginalization.

Relationships

• 赵周 - predecessor whose prosecution and death open the office.
• 汉武帝 - ruler under whom policy authority is distributed beyond the chancellor.
• 桑弘羊 - fiscal-policy actor used to illustrate issue-specific influence.
• 王温舒 - harsh-law actor used to illustrate parallel authority.
• 兒宽 - literary-policy actor in the episode’s fragmented court field.
• 宰相中心治理 - contrasting model in which the chancellor is expected to filter and execute state affairs.