薛广德 / Xue Guangde (Western Han)

Overview

薛广德 / Xue Guangde enters the wiki through Hanji 475 as a Western Han Yushi Dafu under 汉元帝 whose loyal safety remonstrance succeeds only after 张猛 / 张萌 reframes it more gently. Hanji 476 adds his resignation and honored retirement after the same Yongguang 1 disaster pressure.

Current Profile

The source presents Xue Guangde as a learned official rather than a marginal scold. He is described as a specialist in the Lu tradition of the 《诗经》, a teacher in Chu, a descendant of Xue Jian, and a court entrant supported by 萧望之. Soon after becoming Yushi Dafu, he uses his office to oppose Yuan’s private leisure when famine and disaster have made imperial conduct politically exposed.

His profile is defined by a tension between substantive loyalty and rhetorical overpressure. Xue first stops Yuan from staying at Ganquan to hunt by linking the emperor’s leisure to famine-era public suffering. Later, he blocks the imperial carriage and threatens to die under the wheels if Yuan insists on crossing the river by boat. Hanji 475 does not treat the safety judgment as absurd; it treats the delivery as too coercive. Xue’s warning needs Zhang Meng’s face-saving restatement before Yuan accepts the safer bridge route.

Hanji 476 adds the exit: after severe cold ruins crops and famine displaces the people, Xue resigns together with Yu Dingguo and Shi Gao. Yuan accepts and gives honor gifts, and the episode says Xue later hangs the bestowed carriage at his gate as a family honor.

Key Characteristics

• Western Han learned official associated with Lu poetry, teaching, and Xiao Wangzhi’s recommendation network.
• Newly appointed Yushi Dafu who quickly uses office speech to restrain imperial leisure.
• Links hunting during famine to public suffering and inappropriate ruler example.
• Treats Yuan’s river crossing by boat as an avoidable safety risk.
• Uses dramatic bodily threat and public pressure that make correct advice hard for the ruler to accept.
• Becomes the source’s negative contrast for Zhang Meng’s gentler, more effective framing.
• Resigns after Yongguang 1 disaster pressure and turns the emperor’s retirement gift into family honor.

Evidence

• Background: Hanji 475 says Xue Guangde was learned in Lu poetry, taught in Chu, and entered Yuan’s court through Xiao Wangzhi’s recommendation.
• Ganquan hunting: Hanji 475 says Xue urged Yuan not to hunt while Guandong people suffered famine and displacement.
• River crossing: Hanji 475 says Xue blocked the carriage, removed his cap, knocked his head against the vehicle, and threatened to die under the wheels.
• Communication contrast: Hanji 475 says Yuan accepted the bridge route after Zhang Meng gave the same advice in more acceptable language.

Retirement:

• Hanji 476 says Xue resigns with Yu Dingguo and Shi Gao after severe cold, crop failure, famine, and displacement.
• Hanji 476 says Yuan gives the resigning officials a four-horse carriage and sixty jin of gold, and that Xue displays the carriage at his gate for his descendants.

Qualifications

This profile is source-scoped to Hanji 475 and Hanji 476. It does not settle Xue Guangde’s full biography, the original classical text of his memorials, Yuan’s private emotional reaction, or whether the physical risk of the river crossing was objectively high. The page records the communication reading and the later retirement note: loyal advice can still become counterproductive when it corners the listener, while resignation after disaster can still be converted into honorable family memory.

What Changed

• Added Hanji 476’s disaster-era resignation and honor-gift layer to the Hanji 475 remonstrance profile.

Relationships

• 汉元帝 - ruler whom Xue tries to restrain from hunting and unsafe river travel.
• 张猛 / 张萌 - official who restates Xue’s advice in a more face-saving form.
• 萧望之 - sponsor figure who helps bring Xue into the court, according to the source.
• 于定国 and 史高 - fellow senior officials resigning in the same disaster sequence.
• 韦玄成 - successor appointed Yushi Dafu after Xue’s resignation.
• 留面子式进谏包装 - contrast concept because Xue supplies the loyal-but-coercive version of advice.
• 责任绑定风险回避 - substantive principle behind Xue’s warning against unnecessary physical danger.
• 天象灾异包装式进谏 - adjacent court speech mode because famine and disaster heighten the political meaning of imperial conduct.