In Western culture, man is a god, God created their ancestors Adam and Eve, after the two had wisdom, Adam and Eve were expelled from the Garden of Eden and fell from the "kingdom of heaven" to the "mortal world". Therefore, a person repents and atones for his sins throughout his life of suffering and suffering, and at the final judgment it is up to God to decide whether he goes to heaven or hell. In short, the "God" of the West is the creator of all the worlds, and man is the lamb he takes care of, and he needs to obey God's arrangement absolutely, otherwise he will go to hell, so the people in the Western man-god relationship are god's vassals and belong to instrumental beings.
Unlike the West, China has long been a secular society, so what is the relationship between Chinese people and God? Judging from the Shang Dynasty, which was a heavy ghost god, it was already very different from the West at that time, and even diametrically opposed.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="13" > the person in Oracle</h1>
The word "ren" in the oracle bone, like the posture of a person bowing down on the side (see figure below), has no essential change from today's "ren" glyph. However, the glyphs do not change much, but the meanings are very different. The "people" of the Shang Dynasty were common names for human sacrifices, with low status, mostly belonging to commoners and slaves, and were at the bottom of society. Simply put, the aristocratic rulers of the Shang Dynasty were not "people", and the objects of rule were "people".
"Spring and Autumn" said: Man is Yi, are ancient derogatory terms, with the development of the times, the conquered Yi in the Spring and Autumn Period after serving and assimilating called "people", unconquered foreign tribes for Yi. Therefore, in the oracle bone, "the word "renyi, the original person is yi, yi is human".
The "big" character in the oracle bone also represents people in glyphs, but it is somewhat different from the "human" glyph (see figure below), standing with its head held high, representing not ordinary people, but the ruling class. The oracle bones contain the word "big", and the "big" in it almost all represents "people"—the ruling class with a certain status. In later generations, people called people with status "adults", which stemmed from this.
Therefore, during the Shang Dynasty, "man" did not represent a biological species, but the lower people or slaves were called "people", the ruling class was either called according to official position or according to title, the supreme ruler was called "Wang" or "I", and the posthumous Shang king was called "Emperor".
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="31" > god in Oracle</h1>
In the oracle bones, "Shen" is used as "god", and the ancient glyph of "Shen" is the image depiction of lightning in the sky, because the ancients' cognitive ability is limited, they often treat various natural phenomena as gods, and "Shen" as "god" shows that the ancients regarded lightning as a miracle.
However, the Shang Dynasty people mixed the rulers of natural phenomena such as wind, rain, thunder, and lightning with the posthumous Shang kings or those who had made great contributions to the Shang Dynasty, and called them "Heavenly Emperors". Among them, the oracle bone used in words such as "by me" generally refers to ancestral gods, such as "Jia Chenbu, contending for chastity: I cut the horse side, the emperor received me and (You) January", praying to the previous kings to bless the success of the horse cutting. Therefore, the "gods" sacrificed in the Shang Dynasty were mainly of two types, namely the masters of natural phenomena and the ancestral gods.
The oracle bone also records a special deity, "Xinhai Bu, to Yi Yin, there is a cow (imperial level sacrifice specifications)", "Jia Shu Bu, its ZhiYi, You, Year", etc., that is, the founding hero Yi Yin enjoyed the same sacrifice specifications as the Shang King, indicating that Yi Yin became a "god". At the same time, this phenomenon also broke the rumor of "Yi Yin usurping the throne" in the Bamboo Book Chronicle, if Yi Yin usurped the throne, the descendants of the Shang King could not be so honored and sacrificed to Yi Yin.
After the Zhou Dynasty, the word "Shen" was borrowed as the ninth of the earth branch, so the word "Show" was added to form the word "God". In the Zhou Dynasty Jin text, the glyph "god" (see picture below) consists of an offering platform or altar and a kneeling person, meaning kneeling to worship the gods.
<h1 class="pgc-h-arrow-right" data-track="44" > the difference between Chinese and Western gods</h1>
Through the above analysis, it is not difficult to see that the gods of China were great figures who once existed - either meritorious or powerful, but now they have died, and the previous kings of the Shang Dynasty have all ascended to heaven after death, and the descendants of the Shang Dynasty have worshipped him as an emperor (god). That is to say, "God" represents a dead person, who will become a god after death, and who has already made up his mind, so the "god" who only leaves the spirit can only manifest, and the "immortal" who still exists in the flesh is the next mortal.
It should be noted that the Chinese gods are more "stubborn", far less lofty than the West: on the one hand, the gods are canonized by mortals, such as Jiang Ziya, Yue Fei, Guan Yu Zhongyi And Yongwu, and the descendants have successively canonized them as martial saints, saying that in the end, whether someone can become a "god" after death, mortals say; on the other hand, the Chinese gods after the ascension of the heavens does not mean that they can be separated from the mortal world and completely override the human world, and the oracle bones such as "by me" and other words show that the Yin people hope that the ancestral gods can bless them, and it will be more utilitarian in the future life Once the gods can not be blessed, will soon be abandoned, from ancient times to the present China has appeared a lot of "gods", but now many have been completely forgotten, in the end The Chinese gods are for the service of the people of the world, usually when there is nothing to do, basically do not put "god" in the heart.
Compared with the Relationship between Man and God in China, the relationship between Man and God in the West is very simple, basically two different species, God is high above, man is humble below, and man must obey God's arrangement, and ultimately serve God. It can be seen that the relationship between man and god in the Shang Dynasty is already very different from that in the West.
During the Shang Dynasty, the difficulty of changing from a person to a god was still very high, but after the Zhou Dynasty, almost everyone could become a god through cultivation, even ordinary ordinary people could also "noble sentiments" and canonize gods, so the gods of China in later generations were not rulers on high, but mainly just the forerunners of a higher realm of life, the meritorious people, the leaders of a certain industry, etc. When needed, they worshiped, usually not paying much attention to their hearts, if worship has no effect, they can also abandon unbelief and ignore god's feelings.
It is worth mentioning that in ancient times, human beings were extremely ignorant, so they shaped various gods to worship, and religion slowly appeared, but unlike other civilizations in the world, China seems to have broken away from the shackles of gods very early and began the process of secularization, advocating "Tianxingjian, gentlemen should be self-reliant", that is, hard work and self-reliance, so when encountering the great flood, Dayu's father was killed after stealing the heavenly emperor's soil to rule the water, and finally could only rely on the hands of mortals to control the water. This national character of not relying on God gives Chinese the courage to face reality head-on in times of disaster, adversity, and crisis, the preparation for self-reliance, and the motivation to make unremitting efforts to improve themselves. A nation's strength for a while does not mean anything, but a nation that has been strong for thousands of years must have its own internal reasons, and its attitude toward God may be one of the important reasons why China has always been strong.