The just-concluded Winter Olympics made people remember the ice pier and snow rong rong dolls, and their design contained the Olympic spirit and Chinese cultural symbols. The generation and development of a symbol has a strong and complex cultural support behind it, and once the culture has formed a symbol after a long period of accumulation, its meaning will have long-term and stability. Only by reading the symbols can we understand the culture carried by the symbols. In the book "China in Symbols", more than 100 symbols that can best represent China are examined.
A pair of mascots of the Winter Olympics, the ice pier and the snow melt, have gained everyone's love. The design of the ice pier contains the fortitude, bravery, sense of the future and sense of the times of the Olympic spirit; xuerongrong seeks the interior of traditional Chinese culture, illuminates the road ahead with the metaphor of "lantern", and responds to the theme of "community of human destiny" with a line of melting warmth, while the ruyi ring, the Great Wall pattern, the Beijing pigeon pattern and the ruyi pattern all over the snow rongrong are typical Chinese traditional ornaments, and each pattern has precipitated a profound cultural significance.
In a way, the ice piers and snow melt are deliberately created symbols that represent a cultural phenomenon and convey a certain meaning, and we collect and love them not only because they are a cute pair of dolls, but also because of the Olympic spirit and the inspiring spiritual memory of the Winter Olympics. From this, we pay attention to some cultural symbols, but in fact, we pay attention to the cultural significance they represent.
On January 18, 2022, Beijing, the mascot of the Winter Olympic Games, the ice pier and snow rongrong, have been "posted" on Metro Line 11, and the train has been newly decorated to welcome the Winter Olympics. Chang Zhitao/Visual China Image
China is a big country of "cultural symbols", and in the history of thousands of years, we are extremely good at using symbols to symbolize and convey those spiritual meanings that are difficult to express or are easy to fall into because of mystery, such as class and power, seeking blessings and seeking good fortune, spiritual beliefs, and warding off evil spirits. In a book published by Zhonghua, "China in Symbols", more than 100 symbols that can best represent China are selected, such as dragon, phoenix, Hongmeng, Zhu Rong, Taijitu, Baguatu, Hetuluo, Sanxingdui "Sun - Divine Bird - Divine Man - Divine Tree", etc., which are divided into four series: Xiangrui, Guardian, Sacred, and Humanistic, and examine the generation and flux of these symbols.
Animals as symbols
The generation and development of a symbol must have a strong and complex cultural support behind it, and once the culture has formed a symbol after a long period of accumulation, its meaning will have long-term and stability. Only by reading the symbols can we understand the culture carried by the symbols.
As mentioned above, the mascots chosen for several international competitions in China have been based on the theme of the creation of pandas, and pandas have increasingly become the animals that can best represent China. The panda is actually not so conspicuous among the animal symbols of ancient China. When choosing symbols, China prefers to choose the "sacred beasts" handed down from ancient times. For example, the dragon and phoenix that Wen Yiduo said were "the symbol of the origin of the nation and the origin of culture", the dragon and phoenix that were derived from the dragon system such as the "Nine Sons of the Dragon", and the beasts that had undergone a combination of creations such as the cat and the unicorn.
Southern Song Dynasty Chen Rong painted a part of the "Nine Dragon Map"
It seems that only those animals full of mystery and recreated can be used as a symbol of auspiciousness, such as the unicorn, which is said to appear only when the Taiping Dynasty or the saint is born. And the real animals, but also often attached to these sacred beasts, for example, in the Ming Dynasty, there were foreign emissaries to sacrifice a sacred beast, when people thought it was a unicorn, the whole country sensation, in fact, giraffes. "Ruiying Qilin Diagram" is that people at that time mistakenly painted giraffes as unicorns.
《Ruiying Qilin Diagram》
For example, the lion, a kind of animal introduced to China from the Western Regions, records that the Book of the Later Han Dynasty records that the Resting Kingdom "sent envoys to sacrifice lions", which caused a sensation in the capital. Since then, more and more countries have worshipped lions to China, and until the Yuan Dynasty, it is recorded that lions were entered China as tributes. After the lion entered China, it gradually merged into Chinese myths and legends and became a divine object. However, as a symbol of auspicious rui, such as a stone lion with strong symbolic significance, it will integrate the characteristics of dragons, tigers, unicorns, gluttonies and other animals, and distinguish them from ordinary lions according to the characteristics of Chinese "divine beast" culture.
In "The Map of all Nations Coming to the Dynasty", it is possible to recreate the "Rui Beast" based on some animals.
And even native, common animals, in order to highlight their mystery and preciousness, will increase or decrease the number of organs, or replace certain parts to highlight the difference. For example, the "four spirits", such as the three-legged golden toad, the status of the toad in the Han Dynasty is very high, in the Han Dynasty tombs of the whole set of "ascension immortal" procedures, the West Queen Mother often set up Danding in front of the medicine, and jade rabbit pounding medicine, toad medicine, symbolizing the production and mastery of immortal medicine.
"Misalignment" and "Misalignment" in the Evolution of Symbols
A certain animal as a symbol, its shape and meaning, will be constantly changing, take the golden toad as an example, in the Han Dynasty, it is a symbol of longevity, to the Tang Dynasty, people called the golden toad golden toad, considered to be a symbol of wealth. When these auspicious symbols are given meaning, there is often no logic, and Zhao Yuntao, author of "China in Symbols", believes that the process of formation or evolution of many symbols can be summarized in two words - "wrong" and "misplaced".
Zhao Yuntao said that one manifestation of "false accusations" is gradually "accumulating non-success". For example, "Zhang Guo Lao" in the Eight Immortals, there is a sentence "Mr. Zhang Guo Lao" in the literature passed down from generation to generation, there is no punctuation in ancient times, there is no amorphous sentence in broken sentences, and later it is gradually passed on falsely, "Zhang Guo, Old Mr." Became "Zhang Guo Lao, Sir"; the aforementioned golden toad, in the Ming and Qing dynasties, people attached it to the character of the Eastern Han Dynasty: "Liu Hai Toad", because there is a "toad" in its name, people made up the story of "Liu Hai Play Golden Toad" The name of "Liu Hai Toad" also became "Liu Hai"; Zhong Kui, the ancient book said, The dialect of Qidi often refers to the large wooden stick, that is, "chuí", as "final aoi", which can be used to drive away ghosts, and later there is a god called "Zhong Kui" to exorcise ghosts.
Some "false accusations" are consciously generated by people, such as animals and plants as auspicious elements, and the formation of auspicious meanings is mostly based on associative thinking and deliberately forming a "false false" effect. "Deer" is consonant "Lu", so people draw a deer, which means that they can get Fulu, and bats have been adjusted because of the harmonic "Fu"; and the more typical "Four Great Kongs" have also been adjusted because of the harmonic sound of the treasure in their hands, "Wind and Rain".
Ming Anon. Liu HaiJin Toad Figure
Qing Yongzheng Pastel gourd pattern bowl
Zhao Yuntao believes that the "dislocation" in the formation and evolution of symbols is a more advanced "mismatch". "Misalignment" refers to the gradual change of some symbols in the process of sanctification, secularization, localization, etc.
In China's belief system, a considerable number of Buddhist immortals will undergo a "localization" transformation in China. The Avalokiteshvara bodhisattvas of ancient India were male, and spread to China, and before the Tang Dynasty, they were mostly male, generally with a mustache. After Wu Zetian came to power, the status of women increased, and Guanyin Bodhisattva also became a female minister. After the Yuan, the female phase Guanyin became the mainstream. The early Maitreya Buddha was not a big belly, and the shape of the big belly is said to be based on a cloth bag monk named Qi Qi in the Five Dynasties period, and people liked this image, so it was gradually fixed, so that there was a big belly Maitreya Buddha.
Southern Song Dynasty Liang Kai 《布袋僧圖》
And with the vast territory of China and the frequent changes of dynasties, the choice of gods and immortals is also very arbitrary, such as the king of Yan Luo, who is familiar with the rule of the underworld, before him, the original god in charge of the ghost god was taishan god, and the "Naturalist" records that the god of Taishan is called "Tiansun", the grandson of the Heavenly Emperor, he is responsible for summoning people's souls, knowing the length of human life. During the Wei and Jin Dynasties, a new destination and administrator was born in the ghost world, which was the Taoist creation of The Capital and emperor of the Capital. It was not until the Tang Dynasty that the Buddhist belief in the king of Yama began to gain the upper hand.
The King of Yan Luo came with the eastern transmission of Indian Buddhism, which shows that the symbol of faith that we originally thought to have very Chinese characteristics is itself the result of cultural integration, such as the folk imagination of the "Difu", which is a fusion of The Chinese "Yellow Spring" and the "Hell" of Buddhism, and the widely accepted and loved "Sun Wukong", which is based on Hu Shi's research, is the Indian god monkey Hanuman in the Indian epic "Ramayana".
In addition to the misalignment caused by thinking and aesthetic patterns and cultural integration, people's behavior will also lead to the occurrence of "dislocation" in symbol systems. For example, tomb sweeping in the Tang Dynasty was a custom of the Cold Food Festival, but the Cold Food Festival was forbidden to fire, and the Tang and Song Dynasties also popularized the need to burn paper money for tomb sweeping. Therefore, in order to avoid conflict, the custom of tomb sweeping gradually became the symbol of the Qingming Festival.
Interpret the symbol of "daily use but do not know" in "Journey to the West"
In the writing of "China in Symbols", the author starts from the classical Chinese novel, talks about the application of symbols in the novel, and arouses the reader's interest in those symbols that are "used daily but do not know".
A very prominent text is Journey to the West. The seemingly illogical stories of gods and demons in "Journey to the West" actually have a very solid foundation of folk beliefs. For example, at the end of "Journey to the West", why are the scriptures that the Tang monks first retrieve are blank, and the scriptures they finally get are also shelved? Zhao Yuntao believes: "In the Journey to the West, when the Tang monks arrived at the West Heavenly Spirit Mountain, it was Jia Ye and Ah Yi (the prototype was Ananda) who led the Tang monks to get the scriptures. The first time the Tang monks took the scriptures, they were blank, which actually showed the purpose of Zen Buddhism to "not establish a script" and pass on the mantle. And "the story of the Tang monks taking the scriptures is well known to everyone, and in history, Tang Xuanzang went to India to take the scriptures, mainly taking the classics of the Weizhi Sect." But the classics he retrieved were quickly shelved and later lost. One of the most important reasons is that the water and soil are not satisfied, and it is difficult for the general public to accept or approach the Wisdom Sect, because many of the terms in the Wisdom Sect classics are not understood by ordinary people, and the practice is about hierarchy, the steps are very complicated, and it is more inclined to professionals. ”
Stills from Journey to the West
Many of the monsters in Journey to the West are the mounts of heavenly gods, and the only goblins that appear twice in Journey to the West are manjushri's lion spirits, once in Wuji Country and once in Lion Hump Ridge. In "Journey to the West", there is a monster that even Sun Wukong is afraid of him, that is, the Nine Spirit Yuansheng, also known as the Nine-Headed Lion, is Taiyi's mount to save the suffering Tianzun. The Nine Spirit Yuan Saints have great mana power, and can capture Sun Wukong and Sand Monk with their heads, causing Sun Wukong to hear the sound and flee. There is also the birthday star's mount, the White Deer Netherworld, who became the elder brother-in-law of the king of the bhikkhu kingdom.
The Year of the Tiger is a monster that was pranked by netizens - Ai Ye Hua Pi Leopard Essence, zhan yin wu shan as the king, known as the "King of Nanshan", it is one of the few simple and innocent monsters that have no heavenly background among the demon beasts that do evil.
Leopard spirit in Journey to the West
In "Journey to the West", they are also arranged according to the rank of the gods and the functions of the gods, such as the small god who is often called the land god because of the low rank- the land god, the land public belief originates from the worship of the "social god" in the ancient period, before the Qin and Han Dynasties, the status of the god of the society was extremely high, but about the beginning of the Southern and Northern Dynasties, the status of the land god became more and more humble. During the Ming and Qing dynasties, people often believed that the land gong was the guardian deity of the countryside or suburbs, the most basic earth immortal, and because it was most closely related to people's lives, the land temple was also the most common.
In "Journey to the West", there are many appearances of the land gong, such as the land of the special area guardian god, like the land of the peach orchard and the land of the Flame Mountain. In Che Chi Guo, Sun Wukong and Tiger Force Immortal beheaded each other, and when Sun Wukong's head fell on the ground, Tiger Force Immortal secretly called out the land and said to him: "Pull the head of the person, wait until I win the monk, play the king, and you build the small ancestral hall into a big temple, and the clay statue is changed into a golden body." As a result, the land really listened to him, which also shows the humble status of the land.
Sun Wukong and the land mountain gods in "Journey to the West"
Sun Wukong will encounter the gods and immortals in the sky every time he moves the rescue troops, such as the four heavenly kings, when Sun Wukong moves the rescue soldiers to the heavens, he always goes to the door of the South Heavenly Gate and the East Heavenly Gate first, and will meet the Heavenly King who is guarding the gate today, and the author of "China in the Symbol" believes that the best relationship with Sun Wukong is the King of Growth. "What may be implied in this is the concept of 'no fight, no acquaintance' in the Chinese tradition." The first time Sun Wukong went to the heavenly court, he encountered the King of Growth and had a dispute. ...... After that, the relationship between the two people became better, and Sun Wukong's 'sleepy bug' was won by playing a game with the Growth King. ”
The heavenly immortal system is more complicated, Taishang Laojun's Qingniu Essence stole the "King Kong" under the Fan Zhanshan as the king, captured the Tang monk, and also used the "King Kong" to sweep away Sun Wukong's golden hoop stick, Sun Wukong went to the heavenly court to file a complaint, let the investigation of which "fierce star" Si Fan netherworld, briefly introduced the immortal system represented by the heavenly star dou: first checked the god king officials on the gate of the four heavenly gates; the second check was the big and small group truth in the three micro walls; and then checked the thunder official Tao, Zhang, Xin, Deng, Gou, Bi, Pang, and Liu; and finally checked for thirty-three days, every day He also checked the twenty-eight lodges, the east seven lodges, the horns, the kang, the krypton, the house, the ginseng, the tail, and the ji; the west seven residences, the fighting, the bull, the female, the virtual, the danger, the room, and the wall; the south seven residences, the north seven residences, the su anning; and also checked the sun, the yin, the water, the fire, the wood, the gold, and the earth seven governments; Luo, Ji Du, and Bo Siyu. The sky is full of stars, and there is no thinking of the netherworld.
Zhao Yuntao, "China in Symbols", Zhonghua Bookstore
"China in Symbols" provides a new way of reading about the totem of Chinese mythical beasts and the symbol of Xiangrui, he introduced the German philosophers Ernst Cassirer, Roland Barthes and other Western philosophers on symbols and rhetorical terms, with the word "symbol", more scattered in China, time beliefs and totems are taken together, and compiled into a book; while examining the source of each symbol, he also starts from novels such as "Journey to the West", "Fengshen Yanyi", "Dream of the Red Chamber" and so on, and adds interest to the narrative with "mutual proof of literature and history".