The Jade Emperor and the Queen Mother Niangniang, as the two highest-ranking immortals in the heavenly court, in the eyes of everyone, are basically the emperor and empress in the heavens, so aren't the emperor and the empress still two sons?
If we want to understand this problem, then we must first understand the origin of the Queen Mother's mother.
Image of The West King's Mother Wall
There are too many names of the Queen Mother's Niangniang, the most common are: Queen Mother, Golden Mother, Amu, Xi Mu, Yaochi Golden Mother, Golden Mother Yuanjun, West Queen Mother, Xiling Virgin, Taihua Xizhen Wanqi Grandmother Yuanjun, Nine Spirits Taimiao Guishan Golden Mother, Tailing Jiuguang Guitai Golden Mother, etc., the Taoist honorific title is "Shangsheng White Jade Guitai Nine Spirits Taizhen Wuji Mother, Yaochi Great Saint West King Golden Mother, Supreme Qing Ling Yuanjun, Ruling The Great Heavenly Immortals".
The First Appearance of the Queen Mother is in the Classic of Mountains and Seas, which records the ancient encyclopedia: "There is someone, Dai Sheng, tiger teeth, leopard tail, cave, named West Queen Mother", "Leopard tail, tiger tooth, good whistle, fluffy hair Dai Sheng".
The image of the Queen Mother of the West here is not fairy at all, let alone a fairy like a beautiful heavenly immortal. You see, she's hooded, tiger-like teeth, a leopard-like tail, a long whistle, and she's a half-orc, and you don't even know if she's male or female. At this time, she was mainly in charge of plague torture, but she was actually an ancient fierce god.
The image of the Queen Mother of The Ancient West
Every time I talk about the origin of the immortals, I will say a word, because the history of our country is too long, and the immortal system is very complicated, so many immortals are constantly evolving. Even in the Classic of Mountains and Seas, the Queen Mother of the West has several possible meanings, she may be a god, she may be a tribe, and even a place name, a country name. However, here, the status of the Queen Mother of the West as a god in charge of plague torture is still relatively recognized.
In the myths of ancient times, the Queen Mother of the West gradually became a real goddess. After being a god, he was reduced to a mortal, and later went to Kunlun Mountain to find the Queen Mother of the West and asked for two packs of elixirs. It can be seen from this that the Queen Mother of the West has become a great god in charge of the Immortal Elixir at this time.
In the subsequent Battles of the Yellow Emperor and Xuan You, the Queen Mother of the West also sent the Nine Heavenly Xuan Daughters as emissaries to help the Yellow Emperor create the "Cow War Drum", granted the Yellow Emperor the Heavenly Book of War, broke the Formation of Xuan You, and finally helped the Yellow Emperor win the war. Even the later Shun, who also received help from the treasures and maps given by the Queen Mother of the West, eventually made the country stronger.
In the Western Zhou Dynasty, the most famous thing was that King Mu of Zhou toured the world to meet the Queen Mother of the West. At this time, although the Queen Mother of the West was suspected of being a human being (most likely the monarch of a country), she was still more enjoyable as a god. After all, when she met with King Mu of Zhou, she herself also said, "Jia's life will not move, I am only the daughter of the emperor", "I am the daughter of the Heavenly Emperor, and there is an order not to let me leave". And King Mu of Zhou, as a king who can meet with the gods and immortals, has also left an important position in history and legend that others cannot match.
King Mu of Zhou met with the Queen Mother of the West
After that, there was the story of "Emperor Wu of Han feasting on the Queen Mother of the West", although Emperor Liu Che of han Wu was a generation of emperors, he could not avoid the yearning for immortality. One day, the blue bird arrived first as an emissary, and the Queen Mother Niangniang then personally went down to meet Liu Che. However, the Queen Mother did not promise to give Emperor Wu of Han the elixir of immortality, but only gave him some teachings, and left four immortal peaches (there are also five). Obviously, these few immortal peaches were not elixirs, and Emperor Wu of Han was still dying in the end. Looking closely at this story, it is obvious that there are many elements invented by later generations.
By this time, the Queen Mother Niangniang had gradually become an all-powerful god, in addition to mastering the immortal medicine, she also began to assume the role of "sending a child niangniang", and it was very likely that the fairy peach here was a peach, and the queen mother Niangniang was getting closer and closer to the final immortal image.
The above are the mainstream fairy deeds about the Queen Mother Niangniang, but these are not synchronized with history, and a large part of them are sorted out or passed down by later people, especially the continuous creation of gods in Taoism later, and then evolved later, and the Queen Mother Niangniang has gradually become the supreme god of the world.
After the two Jin Dynasties, the image of the Queen Mother of the West became more complete, and at the same time, another key figure also appeared. This big man is also the mystery figure to be revealed today- the Prince of the East.
Mural statue of the Eastern Prince
"First of all, with the true qi of Donghua, mugong was born on the blue sea, and the ruins of the spirits, with the qi of yang and harmony, rational in the east, also known as wang gongyan." And with the qi of Xihua to miao, the golden mother was born in The Divine Continent Yichuan, surnamed Miao, born and flew, with the spirit of the Lord's yin spirit, rational in the West, also known as the Queen Mother."
This is a passage in the Tang Dynasty's "Yongcheng Jixian Record", everyone is not interested or not to read, mainly to take it out for everyone to understand. By this time, the origin of the Eastern Prince and the Western Queen Mother was very clear.
The Prince of the East and the Queen Mother of the West
Of these two, one is born of the Qi of Donghua Zhizhen, because the East belongs to wood, so it is also called Mu Gong; the other is the Qi incarnation of Xihua Zhimiao, because the West is golden, so it is also called Golden Mother. The Eastern Prince lived on Penglai Immortal Island and was in charge of the Immortal Books of the Ten Male Immortals inside and outside the Three Realms of the World; the Queen Mother of the West lived in kunlun Mountain and was in charge of the Immortal Books of the Ten Immortals inside and outside the Three Realms of the World, so it is said that the immortals under the heavens are under the jurisdiction of these two great gods, and the power of these two is appropriately large.
East to west, gold to wood, yin to yang, so these two gods can be said to be a door-to-door pair, quite a match. In fact, in the origin of the East Queen Mother and the West Queen Mother, it is directly pointed out that their relationship is that they are the original and genuine couple. There is even a saying that they are brothers and sisters like Fuxi and Nuwa, and directly raised heaven and earth.
West Queen Mother film and television image
Therefore, speaking of this, I will tell you the answer to today's question, in fact, the queen mother is the wife of the Eastern Prince, which is also the earliest origin, and it is also recognized by people in all dynasties, and there are many myths and stories of their children later.
So why did some people later think that the Jade Emperor and the Queen Mother had become husband and wife? This is mainly in the Ming and Qing dynasties, Taoists are constantly creating gods, many legendary novels are also constantly enriched, the queen mother's appearance rate is high, and slowly everyone really maps the emperors and empresses in the world to the heavenly court, and of course think that the heavenly court cannot only have the emperor without the empress? As a result, the Queen Mother Niangniang was regarded by many people as the legitimate empress of the Jade Emperor.
Film and television image of the Jade Emperor and the Queen Mother
Although the Jade Emperor had a very high status in the Divine Realm, he appeared too late, and he became the highest-ranking immortal in the Three Realms later, in fact, he and the Queen Mother Niangniang were independent beings. The Queen Mother Niangniang, Ju Kunlun, Shou YaoChi, the Immortals of the Three Realms, and the Peach Orchard full of immortal fruits, are actually not generally strong. Moreover, if the Queen Mother was really counted as the Empress of the Jade Emperor, then how could the Eastern Prince be embarrassed?
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