The Western Mountain Sutra
There are birds, whose shape is like an owl (xiāo), a green feather red beak, a human tongue that can speak, and a parrot.
There is a bird living in the green mountains called the parrot, which is also known as the parrot. It looks like an owl, but has blue feathers, a red mouth, and a human-like tongue in its mouth. It can learn to talk, and the idiom "parrot learns tongue" comes from this.
The ancients thought that parrot learning tongue is like a child learning to talk to its mother, so there are "baby" and "mother" in these two words. It is also believed that parrots can speak human speech because the structure of the bird's tongue resembles the tongue of a child, so it can spit out the pronunciation of words; When blinking, the upper and lower eyelids move as much as when a person blinks, and only this bird has this characteristic.
There is a story in India about "parrots extinguishing fires". A long time ago, there was a parrot living deep in the mountains, and there were many other small animals. One day, there was a fire in the bamboo forest in the mountain, and the birds and beasts were terrified and fled everywhere, and even some small animals were burned alive by the fire.
The parrot saw this tragic situation and was very anxious. Thinking that water could extinguish the fire, it hurried to the mountain stream and soaked its feathers with the water of the stream. Wait for it to fly back, then squeeze out the water from the feathers and sprinkle it on the fire. Although it was only a cup of water, the parrot was not discouraged, and again and again, took water to extinguish the fire.
The Heavenly Emperor asked the parrot, "Such a big fire, with your own strength, how can you extinguish it?" The parrot replied: "So many animals live in bamboo forests, and once the bamboo forests are burned, they are homeless." Besides, if the fire is not extinguished, more animals will be burned to death. Although my strength is small, if I persevere, I will definitely be able to put out the fire. ”
The parrot's behavior eventually touched the Emperor of Heaven, who summoned the god in charge of the rain, and a heavy rain poured out the fire.
Parrots can imitate human speech, and the ancients believed that they had human-like souls, so the ancients regarded them as divine birds that could lead to the underworld. Later, the parrot became a symbol of love and joy and appeared in literary works.