Mid-Autumn Festival in the symbol

Author: Zhao Yuntao

Man is the "animal of symbols" and "all forms of culture are symbolic forms". Zhao Yuntao, Doctor of Classical Philology of Beijing Normal University and Director of the Department of Literature of the University of International Business and Economics, wrote a new book entitled "China in Symbols", which selects more than 100 symbols that can represent China from the documents handed down from generations, archaeological excavations and folk beliefs, up to the dragons, phoenixes, cats, taiji diagrams, and bagua diagrams in traditional myths and stories, down to the children's favorite gourds, Sun Wukong, and Nezha, and carefully examines the generation process, development flow, current influence, meaning and application of each symbol, and makes a detailed examination of "cultural China" Tell the story in a cute and touching way, highlighting the charm of the Chinese cultural community. The author has a natural history, access to ancient and modern times, through reading the symbols of China, discovering cultural values in high-tech, current affairs, archaeology and other hot spots, turning daily life into an interesting humanistic journey.

The ancient Mid-Autumn Festival can be played all night? When did the custom of eating mooncakes begin? Who is the Lord of the First Moon Palace? The Mid-Autumn Festival is approaching, let us look for answers from "China in Symbols".

The first Lord of the Moon Palace

August 15Thir Mid-Autumn Festival is one of the traditional festivals in China. It is said to originate from the ancient worship of the moon. The Book of Rites says: "The Son of Heaven is in the spring and the moon is in autumn." The morning of the sun, the sunset of the moon. "The night of the moon" is the night sacrifice to the moon. August 15 was designated as a festival in the Tang Dynasty. The Book of Tang and the Book of Taizong says: "August 15, Mid-Autumn Festival." ”

In the Tang Dynasty, the moon festival became a moon appreciation, and the connotation of "reunion" was added. In the Song Dynasty, the Mid-Autumn Festival was extremely prosperous and became a major festival, and people could play all night on this day. Tokyo Dream Record says: "Before the Mid-Autumn Festival, all the shops sell new sake... Your family knots adorn the terrace, and the folk compete to occupy the restaurant to play the moon. The silk is boiling, near the residents of the inner courtyard, and the sound of the shenghuan is heard in the middle of the night, like a cloud outside. Children in Luli, playing all night. Night Market Khotan, as for the well-known. ”

In the last year of the Yuan Dynasty, the custom of eating mooncakes appeared again. The Ming Dynasty's "West Lake Tour Zhiyu" records: "August 15 is the Mid-Autumn Festival, and the folk leave mooncakes to take the meaning of reunion." "The mooncake is modeled after the shape of the full moon, and it is also for the purpose of praying for reunion. At the end of the Ming Dynasty, the custom of sacrificing rabbits and grandfathers appeared in some areas in the north. The Ming Dynasty Ji Kun's "Leftover Manuscript of The Flower King Pavilion" said: "During the Mid-Autumn Festival in Beijing, most of them are in the shape of mud rabbits, and the crown is sitting like a human, and the children worship them." ”

To this day, when the moon is full during the Mid-Autumn Festival, people still look up to the Moon Palace and trace chang'e, jade rabbit, golden toad, laurel tree and Wu Gang. However, these imaginary gods or spirits on the moon did not appear at the same time in the same mythological system, but gradually "put together" by people with the development of the times, constantly superimposed.

In ancient times, people believed that all things have spirits, there are mountain gods on the mountains, water gods in the abyss, and there are natural "moon spirits" on the moon. The moon has a full circle, and the ancients believed that the "moon essence" can be resurrected from the dead. "Chu Ci Tianwen" said: "Luminous He De, death is fertile again?" Julius Wei He, and Gu Suo in the abdomen? "Gu Jing" is not a rabbit, Wen Yiduo cited more than a dozen pieces of evidence in "Tianwen Shi Tian", proving that "Gu Jing" is actually a toad, and the toad is the "moon spirit", which is the earliest "palace master" who landed on the moon in people's fantasies.

So, we often say that there is a white rabbit in the moon, when does the rabbit appear on the moon? Liu of the Han Dynasty said to the Five Classics of Tongyi: "What about rabbits and toads in the moon? "It's thought that there are two kinds of elves in the moon, rabbits and toads. From the Paintings of the Western Han Dynasty, we find that there is indeed a rabbit on the moon, but this rabbit is running without tricking medicine. Legend has it that the rabbit that pounded medicine originally belonged to the myth of the Queen Mother of the West, probably because the legend about Chang'e often said that she swallowed the immortal medicine, and the moon was seen as being able to "come back from the dead", and these associations eventually made the rabbit on the moon have its own job - to pound medicine.

How did this rabbit "go" to the moon? Wen Yiduo pointed out in the "Tianwen Shi Tian": "The sound of the toad and the rabbit is easy to mix, and the toad becomes a toad rabbit, so one is analyzed into two things, and the two are set up toad and rabbit. There is actually only one toad, and "rabbit" is entirely due to a misunderstanding of pronunciation. After the legend of the rabbit on the moon, and because the descendants liked the rabbit and did not like the toad, the image of the "jade rabbit" gradually overwhelmed the toad and became the companion of Chang'e in the moon palace.

When will Chang'e "run to the moon"

Chang'e may have evolved from Changxi in the Classic of Mountains and Seas. The Classic of Mountains and Seas and the Great Wilderness of the West says: "Emperor Jun's wife Chang Xi, born on the tenth day of the second month, this begins to bathe." Chang Xi is the mother of the moon, and the ancient sound of "Xi" is similar to "E". The legend of Chang'e Running Moon probably existed in the pre-Qin period, and in the Han Dynasty, there is a relatively complete record. The Huainan Zi Lan Meditation Sayings says: "Yi asked for the medicine of immortality in the Queen Mother of the West, and The Concubine stole to run to the moon, and there was no way to continue it." "Concubine is Chang'e, and when Yi was away, she stole the elixir of immortality and fled to the Moon Palace, which was the first time that Chang'e and Houyi were linked. Why was Chang'e able to get Houyi's Immortal Pill? In the Eastern Han Dynasty, Gao Lu further explained in the commentary of the Huainan Zi: "Concubine, Yi wife. "In the Huainan Zi, the Houyi with the immortal medicine is the Houyi who shot the sun in myths and legends, and there is no early record of his wife. It was not until the Eastern Han Dynasty that Gao Lu said that Chang'e was the wife of Houyi who shot the sun, which was "mistaken", but since then people have also determined that Chang'e and Houyi are a pair.

At the end of the Ming Dynasty, the "Biography of Youxia Zhi", which was edited by Zhong Yu and identified by Feng Menglong, once again had a "wrong" interpretation, and the historical Houyi and Chang'e were regarded as husband and wife. It is said that the king of the Xia Dynasty, Taikang, took a fancy to Houyi's wife, Chang'e, and wanted to exchange a city with Houyi, and Houyi actually agreed, and Chang'e was disappointed when she learned the news, and secretly ate the immortal medicine and flew up to the Moon Palace. This confuses the houyi who originally had a wife in history with the houyi in myths and legends, and also found a new reason for Chang'e to run the moon, that is, Chang'e was forced to be helpless and ate the immortal medicine Benyue. As early as the Tang Dynasty, Li Shangyin wrote in a poem: "Chang'e should repent of stealing the elixir, the blue sea, the blue sky, the night heart." "Chang'e may regret that she took the elixir, because of her own selfishness, she had to guard the Guanghan Palace alone." Probably because there was no legend at the time that she was forced to be helpless.

In addition to the "You Xia Zhi Biography", later folklore said that Hou Yi was not at home, his apprentice Peng Meng wanted to rob the immortal medicine, Chang'e had no choice but to swallow the medicine and ascend to the moon, and so on. The reason for Chang'e's moon run has different understandings and interpretations for posterity. As for the results of Chang'e's moon run, it has also taken on different faces in different historical periods.

Toad and Chang'e were originally unrelated stories, only because they were on the moon, so in the Han Dynasty, people associated the story of Chang'e with the toads on the moon, so that on the one hand, they could explain the origin of the toads on the moon, and on the other hand, they could explain the ending of the story of Chang'e and Houyi. In the Han Dynasty, it was believed that Chang'e became a toad after running to the moon. Volume 1 of the "Beginner's Book" quotes the ancient book "Huainanzi", under the sentence "Shu'e steals to run the moon", there are still twelve characters of "supporting the body in the moon, for the toad, and for the moon spirit", which means that Chang'e arrived at the moon palace, and the final ending was to become a toad. Probably later, people felt that the story of beautiful women becoming toads was too destructive and beautiful, so they gradually separated the story of Chang'e, so there were two creatures on the moon, Chang'e and toads. Later, with the development of Taoism, Chang'e's image as a moon palace immortal won, and the story of Chang'e becoming a toad gradually disappeared.

In "Journey to the West", Chang'e also appeared, is the image of a beautiful woman, and the most famous story related to it is probably the eight precepts of the pig flirting with Chang'e. In addition, when collecting the jade rabbit, Chang'e also appeared. "When the walker looked back, it turned out to be taiyin Xingjun, and then he took the concubine fairy and descended the rainbow cloud to Yu's face." Taiyin Xingjun is a "moon god" created later by Taoism, and the folk often merge her with Chang'e. When Taiyin Xingjun received the jade rabbit and came to the king, Sun Wukong introduced: "Your Majesty Tianzhu, please look at your empress concubine, this treasure building is the Moon Palace Taiyin Xingjun, the fairy sisters on both sides are Chang'e in the moon, but this jade rabbit is a false princess of your family, and the truth is now." "Around the Taiyin Xingjun are many Chang'e, that is to say, there are many fairies in the Moon Palace who are called Chang'e, and Chang'e, who was flirted with by the Eight Precepts of the Pig, may be just one of the Chang'e fairies in the Moon Palace. Taiyin Xingjun also introduced that this princess was originally the "Su'e" (Chang'e's nickname) in the Moon Palace, only because she beat the Jade Rabbit in the Moon Palace, and si fan the Netherworld, she was reincarnated as a princess, and the Jade Rabbit replaced her in the Nether Realm in order to avenge her, and she also wanted to marry Tang Monk. It can be seen that in "Journey to the West", there are many gods and immortals on the Moon Palace, and in fact, these can be regarded as the "doubles" of the traditional Chang'e.

The auspicious element of the Mid-Autumn Festival

In early myths and legends, the Moon Palace was very deserted, only Chang'e and the jade rabbit, the toad, Chang'e is very lonely, not even a neighbor, so Li Bai's poem "Asking the Wine to the Moon" said: "The white rabbit pounds medicine in autumn and spring, and who is Chang'e lonely with?" "In the late Tang Dynasty, there was only one more person in the Moon Palace, that is, Wu Gang. Duan Chengshi's "Youyang Miscellaneous Tricks and Heavenly Charms" records that there was a man named Wu Gang in Xihe who was punished to cut down laurel trees on the moon because of his studies. This laurel tree is very magical, an axe cut down, instantly can be compounded, so Wu Gang can only keep cutting, and the tree will follow the cutting. In "Journey to the West", the sand monk once boasted of his weapons, saying: "The scepter was originally a great reputation, and it was originally a Thoreau sect in the month." Wu Gang cut down the next branch, and Lu Ban made gongfu cover. In other words, the sand monk's Zen staff was a laurel branch that Wu Gang had cut down.

There is Chang'e and Wu Gang on the Moon Palace, so are the two of them husband and wife? Xin abandoned the disease: "Who is the flying mirror without roots, and who is Chang'e who does not marry?" "Did Chang'e ever marry anyone?" At the latest in the Western Han Dynasty, there is the complete story of Chang'e flying in the sky, when she was "mistaken" for Houyi's wife, and in the Tang Dynasty, there was a story of Wu Gangxuexian. Wu Gang's story is much later, so at least before the Tang Dynasty, there will be no rumors that they are husband and wife.

Later, there were some folk legends that regarded Wu Gang and Chang'e as husband and wife, but this statement should have appeared in modern times. Probably because they are on the same moon, a man and a woman, the image of Chang'e is often holding a guizhi, and Wu Gang is a gui, so for various purposes, such as the yearning for the consummation of love and family reunion, I always hope that Chang'e and Wu Gang can have a little "gossip".

In short, as a traditional festival, the Mid-Autumn Festival adds a lot to traditional Chinese culture, which is itself a symbol of "reunion" and the sustenance of acacia. The symbols formed by many myths and legends on the Moon Palace have also formed various auspicious elements, such as Chang'e is a symbol of beauty, Guizhi is a symbol of "gui", and so on. In ancient paintings, furniture, paper-cutting and other works of art, there are common patterns such as Chang'e Benyue, Wu Gangfa Gui, Toad Palace Folding Gui, Jade Rabbit Pounding Medicine, etc., which are the embodiment of the aesthetics and good wishes of the ancients. (Zhao Yuntao)

Source: Liberation Daily