Shanghai Hongkou District Cultural Center Intangible Cultural Heritage Protection Center Lin Luyi
Li Ke, researcher of the Research Center for Non-Genetic Inheritance and Application of East China Normal University, postdoctoral fellow in folklore, and doctor of literature of Fudan University
April 24, 2022 is the seventh China Space Day, with the theme of "Spacelights Dreams". Looking back, "the time of heaven and man" is the long-cherished wish of the Chinese people, facing the starry sky, the reverie of the stars to pass through and stir between the twilight drums and morning bells for thousands of years, and finally more than half a century ago, in the song of "the east is red, the sun rises", a beautiful promise was opened. It is true that space flight not only points to the dream of contemporary Chinese astronauts, but also belongs not only to scientists, astronauts, and national defense science and technology workers, but also to every Chinese. Because it carries the common and grand vision of the Chinese nation since ancient times to imagine galloping through the universe of heaven and earth and walking in the heavens and the sky, and those myths created by the Chinese ancestors, passed down from generation to generation in the land of China, widely circulated, and enduring, are the vivid descriptions and infinite admiration of this vision.
One
Worshiping heaven and earth is the cultural gene that Chinese penetrates deep into the bone marrow, and has also become an important driving force for the occurrence and acceptance of many flying and dreaming myths; and night stargazing, formulating calendars, and guiding Nongsang are the daily needs of ancient Chinese. Myths and astrology, although they belong to two categories in the scope of knowledge today, have their isomorphism in the world of the thought of the ancients.
In ancient times, "flying heaven" is, in a sense, "feathered dengxian", and "heavenly palace" is a dream wonderland that can be envisioned under the endless starry sky, which is the dream destination of ordinary people. The flying dream of "picking stars with your hands" has been done Chinese for thousands of years. Taking the sky as the big, looking back at the flying road of the Chinese nation, those flying myths are the most vivid and romantic interpretation and interpretation of the dream of the stars and the heaven and earth complex of the vast number of people. In ancient times, Pangu's earth-shattering creation myth shaped the most primitive cosmology of the ancestors; Nuwa refined five-colored stones to make up the sky, and all sentient beings began to live in peace. "White rabbit pounding medicine autumn and spring, Chang'e lonely perch with whom to neighbor", Chang'e ran to the Moon Palace, full of people's imagination of the moon, the "close neighbor" of the earth, and even worship. The ascension of the mythical animal dragon and phoenix to heaven symbolizes the secular society's desire for the powerful and the sending of Xiangrui. "Roundabout morning glory, Kyaukgyao River Han Girl", countless magpies use their bodies to build a queqiao bridge across the Tianhe River, completing the annual Tanabata meeting of the cowherd weaver girl on the Tianhe River, and it is a popular legend of immortality...
In addition to the reverie of heaven and earth sung by folk songs, there is also no shortage of mythical heavenly people's praises and heavenly thoughts. Jin Gehong's "Baopuzi" Yun: "Dao Ye, Runaway Rainbow, Soaring Danxiao, The Void of the Hong cliff, created by the will." "This is the belief and pursuit of immortality and flying immortality. Liang Xiaozixian's Book of Southern Qi says: "Xiakou City (xiakou city ( present-day Wuchang , Hubei ) was located in the Yellow Crane, and the ancestral immortal Zi An took the Yellow Crane through this Shangye." "Then it is nothing less than inspiring", "The people of the past have taken the Yellow Crane, and the Yellow Crane Tower is empty here." The Yellow Crane is gone, and the white clouds are long in the air for a thousand years", a well-known and well-known sentence that has been widely praised and popular for thousands of years, also wields the poetic prototype of manned spaceflight. There are also more literati doctors, who look up at the stars, but they are also down-to-earth, and the sadness of the heavens lies in compassion for people, so there is the human nature torture of the Chu Guo Quzi Doctor "Sun Moon An Genus, Liexing An Chen", and there is also Mr. Dongpo's human sigh of "I don't know what year this is in the heavenly palace".
For the royal nobles of the past generations, the elements of the flying sky and the dream myth were often presented in their courts, burial chambers, costumes, utensils and other things. The flying figures in the murals of many ancient aristocratic tombs represent the meaning of the soul feathering ascension of the tomb owner. These images of flying and ascending to the heavens have gradually evolved into unique artistic symbols and cultural symbols of the Chinese nation, and the flying figures in the murals of Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes are typical representatives of their special characteristics.
【The image of the flying (heavenly woman) holding the pipa in cave 257 of Mogao Caves (Northern Wei)】
It is precisely these diverse, passed-down flying, dreaming myths, and mythical flying imaginations that eventually end up as a perceptual and profound collective unconscious that is universally accepted. Consciousness came first, so there were ten thousand households in the Ming Dynasty to test flight, completed the earliest solid rocket lift-off test of mankind, and established a great monument in the human journey of chasing flying dreams.
Two
Nowadays, many myths and legends about flying and dreaming have been included in the representative list of intangible cultural heritage at all levels of the mainland, and have become valuable cultural resources on which contemporary cultural development depends. Listed on the Representative List of National Intangible Cultural Heritage are: Pangu Myth (second batch in 2008), legend of cowherd weaver girl (second batch in 2008), legend of Nuwa (fifth batch in 2021), and so on.
The humanistic spirit that has lasted for thousands of years is the value pursuit left by ancestors to future generations, which is related to the essence of human beings and maintains the vision of mankind. When modern civilized society continues to "alienate" the original intention of human beings, these myths and legends that inherit and express the images of flying, ascending, spaceflight or dreams also make human beings human beings. They express the long-term yearning for the sun, moon and stars, the deep interest in exploring the sky, and the deep concern for the relationship between heaven and man. Therefore, they not only reflect the strong self-confidence of the Chinese ancestors in their own creative ability, but also highlight the interplay of scientific spirit and humanistic feelings, and reflect the free and romantic, vigorous and magnificent imagination and aesthetic power of the ancestors. The ideal is constantly approaching and inexhaustible, and the humanistic spirit of Feitian and Dream has nurtured generations of Chinese descendants, and eventually become a contemporary Chinese of all walks of life, including astronauts, and an inexhaustible force and spiritual background to stimulate cultural self-confidence and sense of innovation.
[At the online launching ceremony of "China Space Day" on April 24, 2022, the United Nations Mars-themed stamps were officially released, including China's "Zhurong" Mars rover, "Zhurong" landing platform, and "Tianwen-1" pre-selected landing area geomorphology]
It is precisely for this reason that many Chinese spacecraft are named and eye-catching chinese mythological and cultural images related to or close to the flying sky, dreaming, ascending to the sky, and spaceflight. On November 20, 1999, the "Boat of Heavenly River" - "Shenzhou" was born, and the whole land of Shenzhou was full of excitement. At 18:05 on October 24, 2007, the Moon Fairy "Chang'e" entered the "Guanghan Palace". At 1:30 a.m. on December 2, 2013, Chang'e-3 returned to the moon with the "Jade Rabbit" in charge of medicine in the Moon Palace. On April 24, 2021, the fire god "Zhu Rong", the fire god of the Three Emperors and Five Emperors era, ignited a new fire in continental interstellar exploration. In 2021, the successful completion of the "Tianwen Series" China's planetary exploration mission is the most beautiful reply to Dr. Qu Zi's call for "on the occasion of nine days, place the genus". In addition, the quantum experimental satellite "Mozi", the global low-orbit satellite system "Hongyan", the solar monitoring satellite program "Kwafu Plan", the Mars exploration satellite "Fireworks", the dark matter particle detection satellite "Wukong"... Chinese astronauts used a series of mythical and romantic terms, illuminated by the light of humanity and the spirit of pursuing dreams, to set up a "heavenly ladder" to communicate between heaven and earth, so that astronauts could incarnate as "gods of heaven", romantically wander in the vast "Tiangong" universe, poetically inhabit the "Tiangong Pavilion" space station carved with jade fences, and use science and technology leading the world to turn the mythical dreams of ancestors into reality.
Three
Science and technology rejuvenate the country, cultural power. The spirit of spaceflight originates from cultural traditions, and then feeds back Chinese civilization, and has become an important part of national spiritual culture. What the Chinese nation preached was never to dominate the universe and to override the heavens and the earth, but to unite heaven and man and to be harmonious and real creatures. Nowadays, the living inheritance of intangible cultural heritage, including many Chinese flying sky and dream myths, has been more closely integrated with the development of the aerospace industry and the pursuit of aerospace dreams. Not only is the intangible cultural heritage and the humanistic spirit behind it infiltrated the aerospace dream, the take-off and realization of the aerospace dream, but also gave the intangible cultural heritage great artistic inspiration and space for display. In 2004, Yao Jianping's "Su Embroidery" masterpiece "I Love China", which is very poetic in the national intangible cultural heritage project, traveled through space on a satellite and achieved the first flying embroidery artwork in art history, which is to use scientific and technological strength and humanistic spirit to show the world the Chinese style and show the self-confidence of a big country. Coincidentally, Su embroidery master Chen Yinghua used traditional embroidery to present and interpret the astrological world and astronomical wonders, and the non-hereditary inheritors of the Miao ethnic group after 95 in Guizhou Qiandongnan used silver jewelry and batik to create a dream space, paying tribute to the astronauts of the space station who "picked the stars", and realizing the cross-border integration and innovative development of science and art...
"When is the bright moon, ask the wine to the blue sky", thousands of years of China's "space dream", is the common ambition of exploring, explaining, communicating, and caring for the relationship between heaven and man, and is the poetry and distant place of the dream of the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation. Surveying the sky, chasing the stars and the moon, the ends of the earth, and the stars and firmaments, now it is no longer "dare not speak loudly, afraid of frightening the people in the sky." After more than half a century of unremitting efforts, Chinese astronauts have finally opened a new space era belonging to the Chinese nation, and the fusion of modern science and technology and traditional culture has become a unique perpetual motion machine for China's aerospace. Mars probe chooses the opportunity to start, Chang'e 5 lunar exploration, the launch of the core module of the space station, the return, the launch of the Long March 8 rocket, the full coverage of the Beidou satellite... All of them are full of the profound cultivation of national culture and the deep expectation of aerospace dreams. Qu Ziyun: "At the beginning of the ancient world, who preached it?" The upper and lower are not formed, why should they be examined? The "soul torture" launched by the great Chinese philosophers more than two thousand years ago on all things in heaven and earth reverberates in the contemporary era: walking in the universe and asking the sky, our journey is the sea of stars!