Chinese creation myth
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Chinese creation myths explain the legendary beginnings of the universe, earth, and life.
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[edit] Mythology
The principal creation myth in Chinese mythology describes Pangu 盤古 separating the world egg-like Hundun 混沌 "primordial chaos" into Heaven and Earth. However, none of the ancient Chinese classics mentions the Pangu myth, which was first recorded in the (3rd century CE) Sanwu Liji 三五歴記 "Record of Cycles in Threes and Fives", written by Three Kingdoms period Daoist author Xu Zheng. Derk Bodde paraphrases.
Heaven and Earth were once inextricably commingled (hun-tun) like a chicken's egg, within which was engendered P'an-ku (a name perhaps meaning "Coiled-up Antiquity"). After 18,000 years, this inchoate mass split apart, what was bright and light forming Heaven, and what was dark and heavy forming Earth. Thereafter, during another 18,000 years, Heaven daily increased ten feet in height, Earth daily increased then feet in thickness, and P'an-ku, between the two, daily increased ten feet in size. This is how Heaven and Earth came to be separated by their present distance of 90,000 li (roughly 30,000 English miles). (1961:382-3)
Most scholars believe the Pangu myth "to be of non-Chinese origin" (Bodde 1961:383) and link it to the ancestral mythologies of the Miao people and Yao people. Based upon this comparatively late and likely foreign entry into the Chinese written record, some authors (e.g., Major 1978) suggest that ancient China had the only major civilization without a creation myth.
Without naming Pangu, earlier Chinese texts recorded fragments of creation stories. The Zhuangzi and Huainanzi cosmogonically mention Hundun. The Shujing and Guoyu describe the separation of Heaven and Earth during the legendary era of Zhuanxu. The Huainanzi and Chuci say that Nüwa created the first humans from yellow clay and repaired the fallen pillars of Heaven (cf. Axis mundi).
[edit] Cosmogony
The (ca. 4th century BCE) Daodejing suggests a less mythical Chinese cosmogony.
The Way gave birth to unity, Unity gave birth to duality, Duality gave birth to trinity, Trinity gave birth to the myriad creatures. The myriad creatures bear yin on their back and embrace yang in their bosoms. They neutralize these vapors and thereby achieve harmony. (tr. Mair 1990:9)
Later Daoists interpreted this sequence to mean the Dao "Way", formless Wuji "Without Ultimate", unitary Taiji "Great Ultimate", and binary yin and yang or Heaven and Earth.
The (ca. 4th-3rd centuries BCE) Taiyi Shengshui "Great One gave birth to water", a Daoist text recently excavated in the Guodian Chu Slips, offers an alternate creation myth, but analysis remains uncertain.
The (ca. 120 CE) Lingxian 靈憲, by the polymath Zhang Heng, thoroughly accounts for the creation of Heaven and Earth.
Before the Great Plainness (or Great Basis, Taisu 太素) came to be, there was dark limpidity and mysterious quiescence, dim and dark. No image of it can be formed. Its midst was void; its exterior was non-existence. Things remained thus for long ages; this is called obscurity (mingxing 溟涬). It was the root of the Dao. … When the stem of the Dao had been grown, creatures came into being and shapes were formed. At this stage, the original qi split and divided, hard and soft first divided, pure and turbid took up different positions. Heaven formed on the outside, and Earth became fixed within. Heaven took it body from the Yang, so it was round and in motion; Earth took its body from the Yin, so it was flat and quiescent. Through motion there was action and giving forth; through quiescence there was conjoining and transformation. Through binding together there was fertilization, and in time all the kinds of things were brought to growth. This is called the Great Origin (Taiyuan 太元). It was the fruition of the Dao. (tr. Cullen 2008:47)
The Neo-Confucianist philosopher Zhou Dunyi provided a multifaceted cosmology in his Taiji tushuo 太極圖說 "Diagram Explaining the Supreme Ultimate", which integrated the Yijing with Daoism and Chinese Buddhism.
[edit] References
- Bodde, Derk. 1961. "Myths of Ancient China", in Mythologies of the Ancient World, ed. by Samuel Noah Kramer, pp. 367-408. Anchor.
- Cullen, Christopher. 2008. "Cosmogony: Overview", in The Encyclopedia of Taoism, ed. by Fabrizio Pregadio, pp. 47-8. Routledge.
- Mair, Victor H. 1990. Tao Te Ching: The Classic Book of Integrity and the Way, by Lao Tzu; an entirely new translation based on the recently discovered Ma-wang-tui manuscripts. Bantam Books.
- Major, John S. 1978. "Myth, Cosmogony, and the Origins of Chinese Science," Journal of Chinese Philosophy 5:1-20.
- Werner, E.T.C. 1922. Cosmogony – P'an Ku and the Creation Myth, in Myths and Legends of China, pp. 76-92. Harrap.
[edit] External links
- Chinese story of creation, Thinkquest Mythology Project
- In a Calabash, A Chinese Myth of Origins, Stephen Field
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