Biography
Family Background and Early Years
Baiju was born into the Mongol Jalair aristocracy. He was a fifth-generation descendant of Muqali and a grandson of the Yuan Grand Councilor Antong. His father died when Baiju was five, and he was raised by his grandmother, Lady Kereit. She imposed strict discipline and repeatedly reminded him of the achievements of his ancestors and the majesty of the emperor, warning him not to become arrogant because of his rank.
When Baiju was around twenty and serving in the Court of Imperial Sacrifices and Ceremonies, an official came to his residence seeking a signature while Baiju was watching entertainment in the rear garden. Because he came out late, his grandmother sharply rebuked him for neglecting public business. Baiju blamed himself and thereafter became still more self-disciplined. The source attributes much of his character to her instruction.
Entry into Office and Early Career
In 1309, Baiju inherited command of the imperial guard. In 1315 he was appointed to the Court of Imperial Sacrifices and Ceremonies and successively received a series of high ranks and titles. During these years he cultivated Confucian learning and frequently invited Confucian scholars to discuss ancient and contemporary ritual, music, criminal law, government, political order, and disorder.
Before Shidibala became emperor, he once asked which officials in the imperial guard were worthy. Baiju was highly recommended. The crown prince sent a messenger inviting him to converse, but Baiju declined, saying that because he commanded the emperor's guards, private dealings with the Eastern Palace could expose both himself and the crown prince to suspicion. The story was presented as evidence of his caution and understanding of ministerial propriety.
A Senior Minister under Emperor Yingzong
In the third month of 1320, Emperor Yingzong ascended the throne and appointed Baiju to a senior post in the Secretariat. During an audience with princes in Daming Hall, Yingzong ordered him to read ancestral instructions said to have been preserved in a golden casket. Baiju was described as dignified in appearance, composed in bearing, and clear in speech.
In the fifth month, officials including Shiliemen and Yelishiba, wife of Yaoshumu, were implicated in a plot. Yingzong secretly summoned Baiju to discuss the matter. Baiju urged swift action, arguing that people who had long monopolized power and disrupted government would otherwise gather allies and threaten the state. Yingzong accepted the advice and ordered Baiju to lead guards in arresting and executing the conspirators.
That same month Baiju became Left Grand Councilor of the Secretariat. Grand Empress Dowager Dagi supported Right Grand Councilor Temüder, who had built a powerful political faction. Baiju and Yingzong cooperated in resisting it. Temüder was accused in the source of corruption, selling offices, killing ministers, and building a network of partisans. He attempted to have senior officials Wang Yi and Gao Fang executed over damage to grain stores in the capital. Baiju privately argued to the emperor that senior ministers should be judged on their responsibility for government rather than minor accounting matters. Yingzong agreed, and the two officials escaped execution.
Temüder also promoted Zhang Siming to strengthen his own faction. When Baiju's attendants warned him that Zhang and others were plotting against him, Baiju replied that his ancestors had served the state loyally for a century and that he should focus on fulfilling his duty to ruler and people rather than seeking private revenge. The source uses this episode to portray him as placing public affairs above personal grievances.
Sole Grand Councilor and Reform
In the autumn of 1322, after the deaths of Temüder and Grand Empress Dowager Dagi, Baiju was promoted to Right Grand Councilor of the Secretariat and placed in charge of state historiography. Yingzong wished to grant him one of the Three Excellencies, but Baiju declined. The emperor then left the office of Left Grand Councilor vacant, giving Baiju sole leadership of the Secretariat.
Baiju recommended Zhang Gui for renewed service, recalled retired senior officials on generous stipends, and had them discuss policy in the Secretariat. He selected officials without rigid regard for customary seniority and made the appointment of the able and dismissal of the mediocre a daily priority. Concerned that the laws were inconsistent and officials lacked a common standard, he requested a thorough review and codification. This process culminated in the promulgation of the *Da Yuan Tongzhi*.
He also emphasized education, regarding schools as a foundation of political instruction, and asked officials throughout the empire to discuss measures for improvement. When Yingzong asked whether Buddhism could govern the realm, Baiju replied that quietism and transcendence might be suitable for self-cultivation, but abandoning benevolence and righteousness in governing the realm would disorder the fundamental human relationships. When Yingzong asked whether there were still remonstrating ministers like Wei Zheng of the Tang, Baiju answered that water takes the shape of its vessel: a ruler like Emperor Taizong of Tang, who accepted remonstrance, would produce a minister like Wei Zheng. Yingzong praised both replies.
Baiju also sought to restore ritual and music. The source states that construction of the imperial ancestral temple had begun in 1277 (the fourteenth year of the Zhiyuan era) and that forty years had passed while the emperor had still found no opportunity to personally rehearse the sacrificial rites. He urged the emperor to personally perform ancestral sacrifices, invoking the saying that ritual and music flourish only after a century. In the tenth month of 1322, Yingzong personally sacrificed at the imperial ancestral temple, with Baiju acting as Defender-in-chief in attendance. The emperor credited Baiju's advice with the restoration of the ceremony, and the source describes the event as a revival of ritual practices long neglected.
Assassination
Although Temüder had died, his associates remained at court. In the twelfth month of 1322, Temüder's son Balijisi, then head of the Bureau of Buddhist and Tibetan Affairs, was executed in connection with the Liu Kui land case. In the second month of the next year, Liu Kui and Nangjiatai were also executed. Tieshi, Temüder's adopted son, and other allies became increasingly fearful. In the sixth month of 1323, Tieshi and others tried to persuade monks to argue that the state faced calamity and needed Buddhist rituals and a general amnesty. Baiju rebuked them, saying that they sought wealth and wished to shield the guilty. Temüder's remaining faction then intensified its conspiracy.
Tieshi and others formed close ties with Dawlat Shah, an intimate of Prince of Jin Yesun Temur, agreeing to enthrone Yesun Temur if the plot succeeded. On the fifth day of the eighth month of 1323, as Yingzong traveled south from Shangdu and reached Nanpo, about thirty *li* away, Tieshi and fifteen others launched a coup with support from Asud guards under his command. The conspirators included senior military and civil officials as well as several Mongol princes. They first killed Right Grand Councilor Baiju and then murdered Emperor Yingzong in his quarters. Baiju was twenty-six years old according to the source.
Early in the reign of Emperor Taiding, the Secretariat memorialized the throne that Baiju had died while loyally serving the state. He received a long series of posthumous honorifics, was created Prince of Dongping, and received the posthumous name Zhongxian. Early in the Zhizheng era, the honorifics were revised and the posthumous name changed to Wenzhong.