Life Configurations: Perceived Patternings in Premodern China John Timothy Wixted

In premodern China, there were received ways of looking at the world that conditioned attitudes towards everything in the universe. They informed understanding of the cosmos, the world, the family, nature, the past, the future, daily life. Since they were usually taken for grantedunexamined and unquestionedtheir effect on the perceptions, attitudes, beliefs, expectations, and norms of most Chinese was all the more powerful. Basic approaches to the universe included viewing it in terms of cyclical, linear, dialectical, and other patternings. A cyclical view of the world is reflected, most notably, in the Yijing (Classic of Change). The Yijing is a book of hexagram patterns, sixty-four in number, that in their permutations account for the universe/world. They form and re-form in diverse configurarions, a graphic symbolization of the process of intercourse between Yin and Yang, whereby all things in the world are produced. (Fung 142) The sixty-four patterns ring changes: all potentialities are already present in them. As an early appended commentary to the work states, With the expansion of the use of the hexagrams, and the application of them to new classes, everything that man can do in the world is there. (Fung 168-169) Change is the only constant; yet the principle behind it, the Do (or Way), is unchanging. All stages of the process are always implicitly present. Some scholars have referred to this cyclical flux as constancy in change or standing movement. The genuine Chinese cosmogony is that of organismic process, meaning that all of the parts of the entire cosmos belong to one organic whole and that they all interact as participants in one spontaneously self-generating life processone of cosmic dynamism. (Mote 19)

An upshot of this is the view that, literally, nothing is new. In China, the idea of a Maker, of the kind so familiar in the West, is alien. There is no Maker. Instead of a universe controlled by spiritual beings, . . . we have a natural operation of forces. (Chan 263) And this underlies attitudes about writing. The word for writing, wn meaning patterning (originally tattoo), embodies the idea that writing is a pattern, one reflecting the patternings in nature, in the world.1 The writer is not a creatornot a demigod, still less ( la Plato) one possessed. Hence, original writing does not exist. And poetry, if one were anachronistically to apply such terminology, is non-fiction. It reflects the world and does not make it. It tells the truth. (And fiction, not surprisingly, is considered suspect.) Calendars are based on cycles. In China, the sexagenary cycle, one of many, was perhaps the most prominent. Sixty days, each with its own binome, followed one after another; and one sixty-day cycle would follow another; so too, the course of the years, counted in sixty-year cycles. On Chinese paintings, up through most of the twentieth century, the year of composition, if noted in the accompanying calligraphy, would be indicated by the appropriate two-character compound. One need only check to see which year falls in a painters adult life (e.g., 1210 or 1270) to determine the date of composition. The sexagenary cycle itself was formed by alternately joining the twelve earthly branches with the ten heavenly stems to produce sixty. The twelve cycle is most familiar to us in the form of the Chinese zodiac (see p. 17 [from Pas, between 130 and 131, fig. 17]), according to which those born in 1930, 1942, 1954, etc., are classified as being aligned with the year of the horse, etc. Cycles are perceived in nature: most obviously, in the seasons. And there are activities that are deemed proper to each season. The second-century work of Cui Shi (ca. 100170) on husbandry describes farm life. Note that the following formulation, like so much in Chinese thought, is descriptive, prescriptive, and idealized, all at the same time:
1

Cf. the term for astronomy: tinwn xu , heavenly-pattern study.

Heavy ground is broken up in the first month; good arable in the second; and light sandy soils in the third; and in some of the fields this work might continue right through to the seventh month. Hay is cut in the fifth and eighth months, and the sixth month is the time for hoeing. For the first eight months of the year there is usually some crop or vegetable to be sown; in addition to cereals there are gourds, beans, or hemp, and the right time depends on seasonal conditions, such as the rains of the third month or the summer solstice of the fifth month. There are a number of herbs to be collected and drugs to be compounded in the fifth month, . . . (as summarized by Loewe, 178; modified) The most common linear view in China is the inverse of the modern one of progress in the West. In premodern China, in philosophical and most other discourse, the world is nearly always perceived to be in decline. It is inferior to the idealized past of remote antiquity, and getting worse. Confucius voiced the formulation twenty-five centuries ago, in effect saying, If only we could get back to Zhou times (1029771 B.C.)! In the Tang dynasty (618907), people looked back to the Han (206 B.C.-A.D. 220). And in the Song (960-1279), to the Tangand all looked back to antiquity. Many modern Chinese view with longing the Han, Tang, or Songfor the different idealized qualities of each. It is telling that movements to change things, to improve things, to overturn thingsall intended to effect a kind of progress, as it werehave invariably been presented as a recuperation of the past, a return to antiguity, a reversion to an older collectivity. And if effected, the new was [not] accorded a priority of whatever sort over the old. The new in the cycle was newer than the old immediately preceding it, but was also older. And precisely because it was still older, its claim to a return to power could be justified. The new thus became renewal, and revolution became restoration. (Bauer 71, slightly modified)

Instructive in this regard is the Shipin (Poetry Gradings), a work by the Six Dynasties critic Zhong Rong (469-518). More than any other, it influenced critical views in the arts for the next millenium. The Shipin was the first work to provide critiques of a large number of individual poets (well over 100) and a framework of gradings (upper, middle, and lower) in which to place them. The approach employed, that of characterizing a poet in language that could (and generally did) refer both to (A) the personality/character of the writer and (B) the writings of the authoras well as sometimes (C) the response, i.e., the feeling or impression that the poetry engendered in readersbecame common. The conflation of the two (or three) axes of reference has been common in discussions of literature in Chinese criticism to this day. The terminology used in the Shipin especially lent itself to such dual (or tripartite) reference. This is particularly true when terms such as fng (air) and q (life-breath or vital force) are used. For example, in Zhong Rongs formulation, Liu Zhens (d. 217) noble air (gofng ) surpasses the common run, the expression noble air can refer to Liu Zhen, his work, and/or the feeling the latter is said to inspire in his readers. Dual and occasionally triple reference is suggested by other compounds as well, such as ydng (unrestrained and unencumbered) and yunfng (profound and untrammeled), even in contexts that clearly refer to writing. Although some of the terminology used by Zhong Rong was original, his work developed out of a characterological tradition that had been common since the third centuryone issuing from the need to rank officials. In some respects, the Shipin represents another way of constructing change: one in which there are punctuated (ever smaller) bursts of literary flourishing, on a plane that is ever-declining. For example, there is a major early burst (major, in part, because it is early):

In the Jianan period (196-220), Cao Cao (155-220) and his sons (Cao Zhi , 192-232, and Cao Pi , 187-226) sincerely loved polite letters. These twothe Duke of Pingyuan and his brothergloriously became beams in the house of literature. Liu Zhen and Wang Can (177-217) became their attendant wings. Then there were those clinging to the dragon and phoenix who brought up the rear, numbering in all more than one hundred. An abundance of wonderful writing came to completion in this age. But the words that immediately follow point to the more general vector of deterioration: Thereafter, continuing into Jin times (which began in 265), literature fell into decline. That stage is followed by another positive burstone, tellingly enough, couched in terms of recuperation or restoration. In the Taikang reign-period (280-289), the three Zhangs, the two Lus, the Pan pair, and the single Zuo,2 suddenly rose up and followed in the wake of the Jianan-period sovereigns. The earlier poetic legacy was not yet at an end. There was truly a restoration of belles lettres. Zhong Rong assigns a filiation to lyric poetry (shi ) that, directly or indirectly, goes back to the Shijing (Classic of Song) or Chuci (Lyrics of Chu). As a rule, the more removed a writer is from these fonts of the poetic tradition, the poorer the rank he is likely to be assigned. Zhongs model here is one found in historical biography, the family saga in which, starting from an ancestral family head, generation begets generation, good forebears are followed by descendants who can be recognized by family resemblances (but who often carry the features in a coarsened form). (Robertson 12) So the writing of lyric poetry, which
2

The three Zhangs are Zhang Zai (fl. 285), Zhang Xie (fl. 295), and Zhang Kang (fl. 307). The two Lus are Lu Ji (261-303) and Lu Yun (262-303). The Pan pair are Pan Yue (247300) and Pan Ni (d. 311)). The single Zuo is Zuo Si (d. 306?).

had newly developed over the preceding three centuries, could be legitimized by being anchored in the canonical Classic of Songs and the by-then hallowed Lyrics of Chu. And the enterprises of belles lettres writing and literary criticism, both of which were on shaky theoretical ground until the sixth century (for not being sufficiently didactic), could be better justified. The most common marriage of cyclical and linear development is the vegetal cycle. Things first come into existence, then grow, mature, age, wither, and diepresumably to be carried on in following cycles. One can find the vegetal metaphor in seemingly unexpected places: for example, with the word sincerityan example that opens up the universe. The word for sincerity, chng , is cognate with chng , which means to be complete, not to have anything missing, to have all of the parts in place, and for none of them to be fake; it is the real. As such, integrity would probably be a better translation than sincerity for the first chng. The metaphor of a plant is used in the latter chngs early definition. Something that has blossomed is chng: that is to say, it has completed a process such that there is a beginning and an end, and every natural stage has been gone through. Thus, chng or integrity, sincerity, can be used to refer to a man, to an acorn, or to a star, because, as the Zhongyong (Doctrine of the Mean) says, Sincerity means the completion of the self. . . . It is the beginning and end of things. . . . The organic metaphor for chng is reminiscent of Aristotles use of biological metaphors in his formulations. An important contrast to be kept in mind, however, is that whereas for Aristotle teleology is especially importantthat is to say, the goal is especially importantfor Chinese, every state is intrinsically important; it is not just a means to an end. Thus, for example, filiality is not only important because it leads to loving ones parents, it is also important in its own right.

Operative here is the fact/value fusion so frequently evident in Chinese thought. A descriptive claim, such as the one bound up with chng, that there are processes, becomes an evaluative and normative one: it is good that things go through a process; hence, the normative duty that things become complete. A cyclical view can be united with a linear one. One modern Chinese scholar, for example, has perceived in the Yijing, which is basically cyclical, a kind of development: In certain respects, the perpetual activity of the universe takes the form of cycles, as in the Yin Yang School. But the far more important aspect of the interaction of yn and yng is its progressive direction leading to the development of society, morality, and civilization. In the beginning there is the Great Ultimate (Tij ). It engenders yin and yang, which in their turn give rise to the four forms. These refer to major and minor yin and yang. But the word for form (xing ) also connotes symbols, patterns, and ideas. This means that out of the interaction of the two cosmic forces, all patterns, ideas, systems, and culture are evolved. (Chan 263, modified; italics added) Conversely, a linear view can be united with an implied cyclical one. Zong Tingfu (b. 1825) speaks of poetic development as an organic process. But what is noteworthy in his formulation is that, rooted in the peak growth of a development, is its demise: As the Ming writer He Jingming (1483-1521) in his Letter in Reply to Li Mengyang (1475-1531) wrote, Prose writing was in decline in the Sui dynasty (581-618), and Han Yu (768-824) vigorously revived it; but old-style prose technique began to die out with Han Yu. Poetry became weak under Tao Qian (365-427), and Xie Lingyun (385-

433) vigorously revived it; but the technique of old-style poetry began to die out with Xie Lingyun. Some were startled by He Jingmings words. But Su Shi (1036-1101) as well said, For beauty of calligraphy, there is none equal to Yan Zhenqing (709-785); yet the decline of calligraphic technique started with Yan. For beauty in poetry, none is equal to Han Yu; yet the transformation of poetic style started with Han. These words appear in the Shiren yuxie (Jade Splinters of the Poets [i.e., valuable gleanings about them] by Wei Qingzhi , fl. 1240-1244); they are precisely the idea found in Hes letter. In premodern China, artistic style had ethical as well as aesthetic value; in fact, the ethical had always been primary, accomodation with the aesthetic only being formulated during the Six Dynasties (220-589), when (s)tyles and style models had become more complexly referential, carrying moral, philosophical, and social implications; . . . (Robertson 8, modified) Indeed, an attack on a mans literary work, or on the literary models or styles he favored or emulated, could be tantamount to a personal or political attack. And a moral failing, personal or political, could affect the estimation of an artists work for centuries, down to the present. For example, the calligraphy of Zhao Mengfu (1254-1322), among the greatest over three millenia, is by some considered tainted by his conduct: for Zhao agreed to serve under a new, alien dynasty, one that displaced sovereigns who shared his surname. An organic view similar to the one cited above by Zong Tingfu had earlier been voiced by Yuan Hongdao (1568-1610). It, too, is dialectical in the sense that there is cyclical movement and linear development. But in it, development and decline are couched in terms

of literary stylestyle being understood as potentially having ethical overtones of the sort just noted. Artistic models (f ) have as their cause some deficiency, and end by producing some kind of excess. Those who reformed the Six Dynasties habit of splendid, artificial arrangements and elaborate, empty displays used a free-handed ornamental beauty (lil ) to overcome it. Without question, elaborated and empty display was the basis for the freehanded beauty; however, the latters excess lay in triviality and over-refinement (chngxin ), and so the various figures of High Tang (713-766) used a wide-ranging and grand (kud ) manner as a remedy. But having achieved the wide-ranging, they went on to produce from it the vague and confused (mng ). Thus it was that those who succeeded to High Tang remedied the excess with actualities (qngsh ). They were true to the facts all right, but also out of this realistic approach they produced the pedestrian (l ). Thus, those who came after the writers of mid-Tang used the strange and eccentric (qp ) as a remedy. When they did so, their poetic settings were necessarily too narrowly limited and idiosyncratic and each one labored to produce something unprecedented so as to outdo the others. As a result, by late Tang (ninth century) the way of poetry was greatly diminished. When Ouyang Xiu (1007-1072), Su Shi, and their peers emerged in Song, they brought about a major transformation of the mannerisms of the late Tang. With respect to things (w ), there was none they failed to include in their verse; in the matter of models or methods, there was none they did not have; as for feelings (qng ), there was none they failed to express; in regard to settings (jng ), they made use of every kind. . . . People
9

at present notice only that the Song poets do not write with Tang methods; they do not realize that Song poets methods have their basis in the Tang. For example, what is bland and neutral (dn ) is not richly flavored (nng ), and yet rich flavor actually depends upon the existence of blandness. (Robertson 19-20, modified) As both of the preceding passages illustrate, the focus is on process, on the flow from one state to another, rather than on isolating or determining blocs of time. And as they and other citations in this paper illustrate: if one is to generalize, the vast majority of Chinese thinkers display the same predilection for concepts by intuition rather than by postulation, for suggestive rather than for explicit language, for similitude rather than syllogism. (Mote 70) In his magisterial history of Chinese science, Joseph Needham, compares early Chinese thought to what he calls the Whiteheadian preference for reticular relationship, or process, whereas Western man has been deeply influenced by the Newtonian preference for particulate, catenary causal explanation; that is, Whitehead describes the cosmic process as a netlike interweaving of events, while Newton conceives of it as a series of discrete events linked in a causal chain. (Mote 27; per Needham 2:289) Let us proceed to discussion of correlative thought in China. From early times, correspondances were perceived between the heavens and the earth, between similar orders or classes of things in the world. And items in correspondance were thought to mutually affect each other. For example, a geographical area on earth would have its correlate in the heavens. A disturbance in the one would affect the other. The concept is not unfamiliar in the West: According to the principle like knows like [of Pythagoras], the soul responds joyfully to the harmonious vibrations that affect and move kindred elements among the circling worlds. (Gilbert and Kuhn 8)

10

Part of the cosmic dynamism we spoke of earlier became more clearly articulated in Han times as Five Phases theory. The defining elements or agents of the Five Phases were Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, and Water. (See the upper left of p. 18, noting the complementary sets of arrows.) As initially formulated, one element would conquer another, in a set cycle. Hence, not unlike the rock, paper, scissors hand-game familiar to us in the West (which, by the way, comes from China), where Paper covers rock; scissors cut paper, and rock breaks scissors, in early Five Phases thought: Wood parts Earth; Earth absorbs (or dams) Water; Water quenches Fire; Fire melts Metal; and Metal chops Wood. (So not surprisingly, a new dynasty would identify itself with the agent that trumped the one identified with the preceding dynasty.) But this view of conquering was matched by a complementary cycle that became more dominant, that of generation. In this configuration, each of the five elements melds into, gives way to, produces the next: Wood feeds Fire; Fire creates Earth (ash); Earth bears Metal; Metal generates/bears Water (by condensation, or by being carried in a metal container); and Water nourishes Wood. An ever greater variety of things came to be classified into fives: five seasons, five directions, five colors, five animals, the pentatonic musical scale, etc. Shao Yong (1011 1077) developed thirty such categories. Hence, per the chart on lower right of p. 18 (from deBary and Bloom 348), Metal was seen to be in correlation with autumn, the West, white, dogs, and the shng musical mode. All were viewed, in some sense or another, as being of the same class. This led to, or went hand in hand with, the devising of series of correlations in China that are probably the most familiar to us, traditional Chinese medicine and geomancy (fngshu practices). In this regard, note the chart on p. 19 (from Unschuld 87). It graphically represents the cycles of mutual generation and of mutual destruction in Chinese medicine. Heat corre11

sponds to fire and so does the heart. Hence evil influences of heat can enter the organism only through the heart. Similarly, both wind and the liver correspond to the phase of wood; hence wind will always harm the liver first. Humidity and the kidneys are associated with the phase of water; hence humidity will always harm the kidneys first. Cold and the lung are associated with the phase of metal; hence cold will always harm the lung first. And, finally, the evil influences associated with unrestrained eating and drinking, weariness, and exhaustion, as well as the spleen correspond to the phase of soil. Hence such influences will always harm the spleen first. (Unschuld 87, slightly modified) It is true that other systems of thought were operative in Chinese medicine as well. Nevertheless, [a]lthough the paradigm of cause-andeffect relationships between non-corresponding phenomena was well represented in China too as a basis for an explanation of the onset of events, or of change, the holistic and inductive type of thinking associated with the notion of systematic correspondence of all phenomena certainly played the major role as far as Chinese medicotheoretical literature is concerned. (Unschuld 54, italics added) Other numerological series of classifications developed into systems. The most common number other than five was nine. But other numbers were also used as the base. Yang Xiong (53 B.C.-18 A.D.) built his system on three and its multiples, Shao Yong based his on four, and Sima Guang (10191086) opted for ten. (Henderson 57, slightly modified) But to get some further idea of the range of classification involved, let us look at the number nine. Many geographical terms are referred to in early classical texts in terms of nine: the nine rivers, the nine marshes, the nine mountains, the nine branches of the Yellow River, the nine fields of the heavens, and the nine provinces of the realm. And a canonical Han medical text speaks of the nine orifices, nine viscera, and nine divisions of the human body. (Henderson 62)
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We see three graphic representations of nine on pp. 20-22 (from Henderson 67, 79, and 83): (A) the nine domains of Zhou in the first (where, the further removed from the center a region is, the more barbaric it is); (B) the nine chambers of the Luminous Hall in the second (correlated with eight trigrams from the Yijing); and (C) the so-called River Diagram (Ht ) in the third (imprinted here on the side of a horse), representing nine (at least four times), eight, and other numerical combinations cosmically significant. Of course, systems of classification are not unique to China. Galen (A.D. 129-199?) grounded his physiology on correspondences, matching the four elements with the four humors, and the three main faculties of the soul (rational, spiritual, and appetitive) with the three major organs of the body (brain, heart, and liver). (Henderson 55) Renaissance systems of correspondance were common, based especially on the numbers three, seven, and nine. And medieval Islamic thinkers developed systems of correspondence, especially numerological ones. For example, Islamic medical cosmologists correlated the seven cervical and twelve dorsal vertebrae of the human body with the seven planets and twelve zodiacal signs of the heavens, as well as with the seven days of the week and twelve months of the year, thus meshing the measures of the human body with those of astronomical space and calendrical time. They also paired the twenty-eight discs thought to be in the vertebrae with the twenty-eight letters of the Arabic alphabet and the twenty-eight stations of the moon. (Henderson 55-56) But the point here is to emphasize (1) how pervasive correlative thought was in China, (2) how consistent its main features were over time (notwithstanding some variation), (3) how much this thinking continues until modern times (especially in geomancy, medicine, and prognostication), and (4) how powerful the thinking is for being mostly taken for granted the perceived patternings that permeate a culture may be identified and elaborated by literate thinkers, but are not necessarily dependent on them.

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One could add (5): how interrelated correlative thought is with other kinds of thought. As illustrated by alchemy, a given alchemical text might be read as a description of laboratory operations, of cosmological processes, of sexual or yogic disciplines, of spiritual cultivation or religious redemption. . . . The alchemists world of meaning, unlike that of the modern chemist, united every aspect of experienceempirical, sensual, symbolic, estheticin a single whole. (Henderson 48) These modes of thought had all manner of concrete application. For example, when [in the nineteenth century] it was proposed to construct a telegraph between Canton and Hongkong, the ground of the opposition against it was as follows: Canton is the City of Rams or Sheep, the mouth of the river is known as the Tigers Mouth; the district opposite Hongkong is the Nine Dragons (Kowloon ). What more unfortunate combination could be founda telegraph line to lead the Sheep right into the Tigers Mouth and amongst the Nine Dragons! (Ball 269, slightly modified) Geomancy can take into account multiple systems of correspondance. The geomancers compass, which incorporates as many as thirty-eight circles of symbol sets, including the trigrams and hexagrams of the Change, the ten heavenly stems and the twelve earthly branches, the five phases, yin and yang, the twenty-eight lunar lodges, the twenty-four solar periods, and the four seasons and directions, is a good emblem of the cosmological comprehensiveness of geomancy in traditional China. (Henderson 49, underlining added) Interestingly, when confronted with proof that patterns in the cosmos did not follow the earlier prescribed view, many Qing (1644-1911) scholars regarded such anomalies not so much as departures from a predictable order as themselves constitutive of the fundamental order, or disorder, of the cosmos. (Henderson 249) This points to the weakness of correlative thinking, especially once it became ossified. The tendency to always see a uniformly functioning organism in the cosmos, in society, and

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in history, and the associated, pernicious compulsion to incessantly weave a network of correspondences which not only failed to result in new insights but actually prevented them, also turned conceptions of an ideal state into frozen clichs. . . . [The scientific basis] was the duality of Yin and Yang, the trinity of heaven, earth and man, the fivefold nature of earth, wood, metal, fire and water, and similar rigid models. (Bauer 120-121) It is an open question how prevalent the above perceived patternings in premodern China are today (160 years after the beginning of modern China, as conventionally dated). It is an open question: which patternings, to what extent, and among which classes of people, are operative. And further, to what degree the patternings are unconsciously present, when there is no awareness of them or when they are consciously denied.

March 22, 2012

Works Cited Ball, J. Dyer, Things Chinese ([1903] 5th ed., rev. by E. Chalmers Werner, 1925; rpt. Singapore: Graham Brash, 1989). [J.D.B., 1847-1919; E.C.W., 1864-1954] Bauer, Wolfgang China and the Search for Happiness: Recurring Themes in Four Thousand Years of Chinese Cultural History, Michael Shaw tr. (New York: The Seabury Press, 1976). [Trans. of China und die Hoffnung auf Glck (Mnchen: Carl Hanser Verlag, 1971)] [W.B., 1930-1997] Chan, Wing-tsit, comp. and tr., A Source Book in Chinese Philosophy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963). [= Chen Rongjie , 1901-1994] de Bary, Wm. Theodore, and Irene Bloom, comp., Sources of Chinese Tradition, Vol. 1: From Earliest Times to 1600 (2nd ed., New York: Columbia University Press, 1999). [W.T.deB., 1919-; I.B., d. 2010] Fung Yu-lan, A Short History of Chinese Philosophy, Derk Bodde ed. (1948; New York: The Macmillan Company, 1960). [= Feng Youlan , 1895-1990; D.B., 1909-2003] Gilbert, Katharine Everett, and Helmut Kuhn, A History of Esthetics (1939; 2nd ed., 1953; rpt. New York: Dover Publications Inc., 1972). [K.E.G., 1886-1952; H.K., b. 1899] Henderson, John B., The Development and Decline of Chinese Cosmology (New York: Columbia University Press, 1984). [J.B.H., 1948-]
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Loewe, Michael, Everyday Life in Early Imperial China (New York: G.P. Putnams Sons, 1968; New York: Harper & Row, Perennial Library, 1970). [M.L., 1922-] Mote, Frederick W., Intellectual Foudations of China (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1971). [F.W.M., 1922-2005] Needham, Joseph, Science and Civilisation in China, vol. 2: History of Scientific Thought (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1956). [J.N., 1900-1995] Pas, Julian F., Religious Motifs in Chinese New Year's Greeting Cards, Journal of Chinese Religions 20 (Fall 1992), pp. 117-134. [J.F.P., 1929-2000] Robertson, Maureen, Periodization in the Arts and Patterns of Change in Traditional Chinese Literary History, in Theories of the Arts in China, Susan Bush and Christian Murck ed. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1983), pp. 3-26. [M.R., ca. 1945-] Unschuld, Paul U., Medicine in China: A History of Ideas (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985). [P.U.U., 1943-] Wixted, John Timothy: for bibliography, see www.JohnTimothyWixted.com [J.T.W., 1942-]

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The Imperial Order and Han Syntheses

349

Xin (or New) dynasty in 9 C.E. At this point the scholars Liu Xiang and Liu Xin, who were influential in laying an ideological foundation for Wang Mang's rule, proposed that the "generation" cycle of the Five Phases should replace the "conquest" cycle as the cosmological foundation for the imperial succession. The essentially Confucian idea of a "generation" cycle was based on the idea that the moral intention of Heaven was to prefer birth and nurturing and to dislike punishment and conquest. According to this "generation" cycle, wood produces fire, fire produces earth, earth produces metal, and metal produces water, yielding the series: wood fire earth metal water. It is fairly obvious how the mode or element of wood should be assigned to the season of spring, associated with the color green and the direction east. In like manner fire is assigned to summer, its color red and direction south; metal to autumn, its color white and direction west; and water to winter, its color black and direction north. However, since there are Five Phases, proceeding, according to the "generation" cycle, in the order in which they produce or "beget" each other, but only four seasons, earth, with the color yellow, was commonly assigned to the transitions between seasons, aiding the other elements in their governance. In another version, deriving from the Huainanzi, a fifth season, the "middle of summer" (jixia), was devised to fill out the correspondences. The correspondences derived by analogy according to this system are innumerable. One influential version deriving from the Record of Rites (Liji) and the Huainanzi, illustrates how all facets of the divine and natural worlds could be classified according to these Five Phases. These correspondences are shown here in diagram form.

THE RECONSTRUCTION OF CHINESE

HISTORY

Important also is the application of this theory to history and the succession of dynasties. As each season is ruled by a phase or agent, so, it was believed, each dynasty ruled by virtue of a phase that it honored by adopting the color of that phase in its vestments and flags, and by similar ritual observances. The First Emperor of the Qin, for instance, believing that his dynasty ruled by the virtue or power of water, adopted black as his official color and even changed the name of the Yellow River to "Water of Power" (Deshui). Because the Qin had claimed to rule by the power of water, it was urged by some scholars early in the Han that the Han dynasty should adopt earth, with the color yellow, as its phase, to signify that the Han had conquered the Qin, since, according to the "conquest" theory, earth conquers water. According to tradition, Heaven had sent appropriate signs and omens to past dynasties, such as earthworms (earth), knife blades (metal), red birds (fire), etc., to indicate

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wu_Xing 2012/03/12

THE MEDICINE OF SYSTEMATIC CORRESPONDENCE

Hit by Wind

87

Harmed By Heat

Hit By Humidity

Sequence of Mutual Generation

Sequence of Mutual Destruction

Harmed By (Unrestrained) Drinking, Eating, Weariness, Exhaustion Figure 1

Harmed By Cold

Geometrical Cosmography in Early China

67

Fit

Figure 4. A diagram of the "nine domains of the Chou," all of which are centered on the "area of the royal capital" which occupies the center square. According to this arrangement, the degree of barbarism increases with the square of the distance from the center. SOURCE: Hu Wei, Yii-kung chui-chih (Taipei: Kuang-hsiieh reprint, 1975)6.136.

Geometrical Cosmography in Early China

79

Figure 7. This diagram, a "chart of the nine chambers of the Luminous Hall," depicts a simplified nonary version of the Ming-t'ang. Each of the outer chambers is correlated with one of the eight trigrams and with a number. The numbers when read through the figure in any direction, vertically, horizontally, or diagonally, add up to fifteen. SOURCE: Hu Wei, 1-t'u ming-pien (Taipei: Kuang-wen reprint, 1971) 2.106.

na

Geometrical Cosmography in Early China

S3

was structurally the same types the Han origiwelve inner pilve outer pillars of symbolizing

ymbolic legitimperors to adMing-t?ang cosperial Altar of a (1736-1795), mbers five and Ch'ing scholars cosmological ued to endorse sors. While it g's belief that be sympathetin a structure olitical uses of e of cosmologn cosmology's

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from creative Han texts was ures discussed o-t'u or "Yeltype of physthat postclasurce of nonary

Figure 8. The forms of the Ho-t'u and Lo-shu, the former imprinted on the side of a horse wading in the Yellow River and the latter on the shell of a tortoise emerging from the Lo River. SOURCE: Lai Ch'ii-t'ang, Chou-l ts'ai-t'u, p. la, in Lai's I-ching t'u-chieh (Taipei: Kuang-t'ien reprint, 1975).