Why is the Confucius ideal "Bathing In Yi" frequently doubted by later generations? Knowing "climate change", we must settle the dispute

The picture shows the statue of Confucius in Rizhao City, Shandong Province. (ICphoto/Photo)

In the famous Analects of the Analects, "Attendant Chapter", Confucius highly praised and agreed with Zeng Hao's ideal, the so-called "late spring, spring clothes are completed, five or six crowns, six or seven children, bathing in Yi, wind like dancing, and returning from chanting". Let people feel the beauty of time and the abundance of life. It is mentioned here that when traveling in the late spring, it is necessary to go to the Yishui Water to take a bath, which has always been questioned by some scholars, believing that it is impossible from the perspective of climate and temperature.

Represented by ancient scholars such as Wang Chong and Wang Fuzhi, they believe that it is still very cold in February and is completely unsuitable for bathing in the river. Wang Chong suspected in "On Heng Mingyan", "Speaking of the house, thinking that the bather, bathing in the water also, the air dry body also." April of the week, the year of February also, still cold, and have a bath and dry body? "It's still very cold in February, how can you bathe in the water in the north and air dry the cold water on your body, this is impossible."

Wang Fuzhi also has similar doubts in the "Four Books of Barnyard", he believes that "at the beginning of the late spring, it is cold and eating wind and rain, the northern freeze is first released, and An can play naked in the water? Or it is said that there are hot springs in Yi, and the clothes are before the bath, and the body is swab at the time of the bath, the wind and cold are fierce, and it is not unbearable for people. Based on his climatic experience of living in the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, Wang Fuzhi believed that even the late spring in the north at that time was very cold. In response to the claim that "bathing in a hot spring" is bathing in a hot spring, he believes that this is also impossible in extreme cold weather.

The modern scholar Yu Shengwu also believes in the Analects of the New Evidence that Zhou Zheng's late spring is the January of Xia Zheng, not the time suitable for bathing. Therefore, the word "bath" here should be pronounced as "along", which means to walk along the Yishui, rather than bathing in the Yishui.

But if we start from the knowledge of paleoclimatology, we can find that these skeptical opinions are actually not valid. Because paleoclimatology studies have shown that the climate of Shandong during the time of Confucius's life was warm and humid, with large bamboo forests growing, and the environment was similar to that of the modern Yangtze River Basin. At that time, it was not "winter to Taipei to see the rain", but "winter to Luguo to see the rain". In terms of the modern Yangtze River basin climate that I am familiar with, the twilight spring season is normally more than 20 degrees, and it is completely possible to bathe in the water. Therefore, in the suburbs of Luguo in the late spring at that time, it was entirely possible to participate in the sacrifice activities after bathing outdoors.

In the article "Preliminary Research on Climate Change in China in the Past Five Thousand Years", Mr. Zhu Kezhen used a large number of data to restore the basic clues of climate change in China for thousands of years, and the research results showed that the climate was warmer in the Spring and Autumn Period, and the "Zuo Zhuan" recorded that the Lu kingdom spent the winter, and even in the winter in 698, 590, 545 BC, etc., and subtropical plants such as bamboo and plum trees were frequently found in the "Zuo Zhuan" and the "Book of Poetry".

American scholar Brett Schinsky also studied this in the article "Climate Change and Chinese History", concluding that the climate in southern Shandong during the Spring and Autumn Period was similar to the climate of today's Shanghai, with an average annual temperature of 15.3 °C, which is 3 °C higher than the modern local temperature ([American] Brett Schinsky: "Climate Change and Chinese History").

In other words, the climate of the Lu state in the era of Confucius was the closest to that of the modern Yangtze River Basin and jiangnan region, warm and humid, and less ice and snow in winter.

Wang Chong and Wang Fuzhi, who are deeply skeptical of the climatic conditions of "Yuhuyi", live in an era that is precisely the famous cold period in Chinese history. Paleoclimatology studies have shown that the Eastern Han Dynasty in which Wang Chong lived was a "Xiaoice little Ice Age", "the weather on the mainland has a tendency to be cold", there were several severe colds, when the capital Luoyang in late spring was still frozen to death, he should have a deep impression of this, so he believes that the late spring and autumn of Confucius's life era, late spring can also freeze people to death, so I do not believe that the late spring climate of Confucius's era can "bathe in Yi".

The late Ming and early Qing dynasties in which Wang Fuzhi lived were also known as the "Ming and Qing Xiaoice Period", which was also unusually cold, the climate was much lower than the modern temperature, and the icing period of the Tianjin Canal in the middle of the seventeenth century was much longer than today. And Yu Shengwu may also speculate on the pre-Qin climate based on his familiar life experience in modern liaoning.

Therefore, because of the inability to understand the climatic environment of Confucius's time, and then doubting the content of the Analects, these are all questions worth pondering for modern people. We cannot speculate about ancient times based on the familiar environment and climate of our own time. This line of thinking, just as modern people see that the Sahara is a desert, they assume that the Sahara must have been a desert seven thousand years ago. In the late Spring and Autumn period of Confucius's life, the climate in northern China was warm and humid, closer to the modern Yangtze River Basin and subtropical regions, and we need to understand the history and even ideological content of that time, and we need to bring it into the climate and environmental conditions of that time.

(The author is a historian and university teacher)

(This article is only the author's personal opinion and does not represent the position of this newspaper)

Li Jingheng