The Classic of Mountains and Seas is an important pre-Qin text that covers various disciplines including literature, religion, history, folklore, astronomy, geography, zoology, botany, and medicine.
Classic of Mountains and Seas
There are many different views on the nature of the Classic of Mountains and Seas. Some representative interpretations include "shamanic text", "geographical gazetteer", "school of forms and names", "collection of myths", and "mythological political geography".
The content of the Classic of Mountains and Seas is indeed diverse and difficult to categorize. However, it undoubtedly represents a collection of a priori consciousness and inspirational experiences of the Huaxia people in the pre-Qin period, recording the basic social activities of the ancient inhabitants of this land, such as agriculture, pastoralism, hunting, sericulture, and worship of deities.
The bizarre and fantastical nature of the Classic of Mountains and Seas allows us to glimpse the true face of primitive ideology.
— Wang Yong, History of Chinese Geography
The "shamanic text" interpretation is an influential view on the nature of the Classic of Mountains and Seas. Lu Xun once referred to it as "an ancient shamanic text" in his Brief History of Chinese Fiction. Yuan Xingpei also proposed in his article "A Preliminary Study of the Classic of Mountains and Seas": "The Mountain Classic details the names of various mountains and rivers, as well as auspicious and strange occurrences, matters of ghosts and spirits, and the production of gold and jade, which are precisely the mythological, geographical, and natural history knowledge of shamans. The Mountain Classic invariably mentions the presiding deities of each mountain, as well as the grains, hair, and animals used in sacrifices, which are the basis for shamans to conduct spirit-summoning rituals, prayers, and curses. The Mountain Classic records the medicinal herbs produced in various mountains and rivers and their effects, which falls within the realm of shamanic medical arts. As for shamanic dances, there are also numerous records in the Mountain Classic."
What is shamanism?
Archaeological evidence shows that as early as 80,000 years ago, Neanderthals had begun to bury their dead, indicating that primitive humans already had a consciousness and belief in the soul. This belief is the origin of primitive shamanism.
Modern research suggests that shamanism arose from primitive people's fear and worship of nature. In primitive societies where nature worship and totem worship prevailed, shamanism was already quite popular. This is reflected in numerous archaeological materials and anthropological survey materials. Shamanic activities had already appeared in oracle bone inscriptions from the pre-Qin period. During the Spring and Autumn period, shamans were present in various states. For primitive people, shamanism was a conventional system of purposeful and meaningful behavior, and it can be said that shamanism constituted the worldview of primitive people.
The Classic of Mountains and Seas describes the worldview of ancient primitive people
Regarding the origins of shamanism, Edward Tylor believed that shamanism originated from "animism", Bronisław Malinowski considered shamanism to be a set of practical means, while Franz Boas believed that shamanism was based on the release of emotions, which could be either vengeful or obsessive.
Whether it's the "animism theory", "practical theory", or "catharsis theory", starting from human subjective feelings is the main thread running through shamanic activities. As an ancient mysterious book, the Classic of Mountains and Seas not only records the images of ancient shamans but also narrates many scenes of shamanic rituals. The human-centered characteristics reflected in it, such as the unity of humans and gods and the focus on humanity, embody the humanistic spiritual essence of ancient shamanic rituals.
The Humanistic Spirit of Shamanic Rituals
Wu (shaman) refers to the shamanic priest. Women can serve the formless and summon spirits through dance. ... Xi refers to those who can reverently serve the spirits. Male shamans are called xi, while female shamans are called wu.
— Explaining Simple and Analyzing Compound Characters
"Wu" (shaman) is the medium connecting humans with heaven, earth, ghosts, and spirits. The methods or means they use to communicate with spirits are called "shamanic arts". Shamanic arts typically involve using specific rituals to utilize and manipulate certain objects of belief to influence human life or certain phenomena in nature, in order to achieve certain goals. Primitive shamanism was a collective ritual activity, manifested in the non-directly productive singing, dancing, ritual, and sacrificial activities of primitive groups.
Shamanism is a set of methods for communication between heaven and humans developed by primitive humans. From needs such as praying for rain, curing diseases, seeking medicine, and praying for good harvests, a set of extremely complex ritual forms and norms developed, which Li Zehou calls "shamanic rituals".
The main activities of ancient shamans recorded in Chinese literature are to summon spirits through dance, to save from disasters, and to dispel diseases.
— Chen Lai, Ancient Religion and Ethics: The Roots of Confucian Thought
A rain prayer scene in the Water God Temple in Hongtong County, Shanxi Province
Shamanic rituals, on the one hand, can communicate between heaven and humans, worship ancestors, and bring blessings to the clan; on the other hand, they are an important guarantee for maintaining order, uniting the clan, and sustaining survival. Shamanic rituals start from the realistic production and life needs of people, interweaving emotions, imagination, and rational knowledge. By communicating between heaven and humans, they express individual or group demands, seeking to achieve practical benefits of pursuing advantages and avoiding disadvantages. It is not a rational logical understanding, but more a reflection of emotional demands and aesthetic sensitivity.
Unity of Humans and Gods: Self-affirmation of Ancient Humans
The combination of royal and priestly offices was quite common in ancient Italy and Greece... People are familiar with this combination of religious and royal authority. ... The emperors of China also presided over public sacrifices...
— James Frazer, The Golden Bough
In the Classic of Mountains and Seas, many things in nature are endowed with divinity, appearing as numerous mountain gods, water lords, heavenly emperors, wind gods, sacred mountains, divine trees, and so on. The relationships between humans and ancestors, and between humans and natural objects, are all deified. Di Jun becomes the common ancestor of mortals and natural objects in the lower world. He is not only the ancestor of countries like "Zhongrong", "Siyou", "Heichi", "Sanshen", "Jili", etc., but his wife also "gave birth to ten suns" and "gave birth to twelve moons". Therefore, mortals also have kinship with gods and receive their favor and grace.
Many studies believe that Di Jun is Ku
The family of Yu the Great had a very close relationship with shamanism. Sun Zuoyun believed that Chi You was Gun's father, that is, Yu's grandfather. The Classic of Mountains and Seas records that in the battle between Chi You and the Yellow Emperor, "He asked the wind god and rain master to unleash great winds and rain" (Classic of Mountains and Seas - Great Wilderness North), which was clearly using shamanic methods, indicating Chi You's identity as a shaman.
The Classic of Mountains and Seas - Inner Seas also says: "When the flood waters reached the sky, Gun stole the expanding soil from the emperor to stop the flood, without waiting for the emperor's command." Gun's use of stolen expanding soil to control the flood was also a shamanic activity, indicating that he inherited Chi You's identity and was also a shaman.
The Fayan - Zhongli chapter says: "The Si clan managed water and earth, and the shamanic steps were mostly Yu's", where Yu's steps were actually shamanic dances, which were "steps to summon and command spirits". After Yu the Great ascended to the throne, he also led the work of "attacking clouds and rain" (Classic of Mountains and Seas - Great Wilderness South) and "controlling the flood" (Classic of Mountains and Seas - Great Wilderness North). At that time, he was very likely to have used shamanic methods, "When Yu was controlling the flood, there was a divine dragon using its tail to draw on the ground, guiding where the water should flow and where it should be cut off." Snakes are the most common tools used by shamans, and Yu the Great was very likely to have used snakes (representing dragons) as tools for shamanic practices when controlling the flood.
Yu the Great very likely used shamanic methods to control the flood
Yu's son, Qi, the founder of the Xia Dynasty, was even more of a figure who combined the roles of king and shaman. In his oath during the conquest of the You Qi clan, he clearly positioned himself as the guardian of the religious order, with a strong flavor of a religious leader punishing the You Qi clan for not following religious rules and doctrines. The Classic of Mountains and Seas records the image of Xia Qi as "unity of king and shaman":
In the wilderness of Great Music, Xia Hou Qi danced nine generations here, riding two dragons, with a cloud cover of three layers. In his left hand he held a fan, in his right hand he held a ring, and he wore jade pendants.
— Classic of Mountains and Seas - Western Seas Beyond
The kings of ancient times can be seen as leaders of a group of shamans. Apart from the kings, state ministers, royal teachers, and assistants were mostly from generations of shamans. One of the ruling methods of these people was to monopolize the power of communication and interpretation between the divine and human realms.
Xia Qi was the leader of a group of shamans
From a large number of anthropological survey materials and myths of ethnic minorities, the unity of humans and gods, and the mixture of people and gods, was a common form in primitive early human societies. The Classic of Mountains and Seas tells us that in ancient times, people either communicated with heaven and earth through kings and shaman groups, or through sacred mountains (such as Kunlun Mountain, Jade Mountain, Changliu Mountain, etc.) and divine trees (such as Fuwood, Fusang, etc.) that could reach the heavens. In short, the distance between heaven and earth, between humans and gods, was always very close.
Of course, the lofty status of shamans also reflected the emotional characteristics of primitive early humans' reverence and fear of the gods, and the projection of these emotional characteristics was an affirmation of their own subjectivity.
In reverence, our subjectivity is not invested in God, what we do is not self-denial, but self-affirmation. It seems that in the process of reverence, the more the mandate of heaven and the way of heaven descend, the more our subjectivity is affirmed.
— Mou Zongsan, The Characteristics of Chinese Philosophy
In other words, the reverence for spirits reflected in shamanic rituals has a different ultimate purpose from later religions. Its purpose is not to revere, worship, or entertain the spirits, but to experience and feel the unity of humans and gods in the process of compelling, summoning, and controlling the spirits, and to gain self-affirmation in the experience of the unity of one's own life with the divine.
The Subject Position of Humans in Shamanic Activities
The subjects of magic are mainly human affairs, such as fishing and hunting, gardening, trade, courtship, illness, death, and the like.
— Bronisław Malinowski, Magic, Science, Religion and Myth
The shamanic activities in primitive early human societies mainly served the human affairs of the group directly. Whether it was praying for rain, dispelling disasters, seeking blessings, or curing diseases and seeking immortality, they all had very specific practical purposes and material interests, and were not merely for individual spiritual needs or soul comfort. This is precisely where shamanism differs from religion.
As James Frazer stated in The Golden Bough: "(Shamanism) treats spirits in essentially the same way as it treats inanimate objects, that is, by compelling or suppressing these spirits, rather than pleasing or flattering them as religion does." Therefore, the main characteristic that distinguishes shamanism from religion is the direct establishment of human subjectivity.
The shamanic activities recorded in the Classic of Mountains and Seas are mostly about human affairs:
Praying for rain: "The responding dragon dwells in the South Pole. It killed Chi You and Kua Fu, and could not ascend again, so it often causes droughts below. When there is a drought, making the shape of the responding dragon will bring heavy rain." (Classic of Mountains and Seas - Great Wilderness East)
Curing diseases: "Another eighty li to the west is Mount Fuyu. Its south side has much copper, and its north side has much iron. On top of it there is a tree called Wenjing, its fruit is like a date and can cure deafness. There are many Tiao grasses on it, shaped like mallow with red flowers and yellow fruit, like a baby's tongue. Eating it prevents confusion." (Classic of Mountains and Seas - Western Mountains)
Longevity: "The country of Xuanyuan is at the end of this extreme mountain, where those who are not long-lived live for eight hundred years." (Classic of Mountains and Seas - Western Seas Beyond)
Immortality medicine: "To the east of Kaiming, there are the shamans Peng, Di, Yang, Lü, Fan, and Xiang, who hold the corpse of Xuan Yu between them, all wielding the medicine of immortality to ward it off. Xuan Yu has a snake's body and a human face, and was killed by Er Fu Chen." (Classic of Mountains and Seas - Western Inner Seas)
Warding off evil: "The Yellow Emperor then took the jade glory of Mount Jiao and cast it on the south side of Mount Zhong. The jade of Jinyu is good, hard and fine-grained, with a turbid luster and light. It produces five colors, harmonizing softness and hardness. Gods and spirits of heaven and earth eat and enjoy it; gentlemen wear it to ward off misfortune." (Classic of Mountains and Seas - Western Mountains)
Although these descriptions are very exaggerated, they allow us to glimpse the worldview of ancient primitive people. Their demands were very specific and closely related to production and life, such as praying for rain, curing diseases, as well as seeking longevity and even immortality. These wishes for good fortune and avoidance of calamity were realized through "shamanic rituals". Here, it was not passive requests or prayers, but filled with proactive spirit from psychological consciousness to physical actions. For example, performing shamanic dances to induce rain from heaven, dispel disasters, and bestow blessings was a way to influence, compel, and even control the gods and nature through shamanic activities.
Shamanic rituals in ancientCertainly. Here's the translation of the remaining content:
Shamanic rituals in ancient rock paintings
In "shamanic rituals", human proactivity is extremely prominent, pursuing the unity of body and mind. "Shamanic rituals" are a very complex set of behaviors, appearances, gestures, and languages, including a series of intricate actions and high-level skills. They emphasize the process of activity rather than objective objects. This is because "divine spirits" only appear in the process of shamanic activities; they are not objects that exist independently of human shamanic activities, nor are they worshipped statically and independently somewhere like idols. In a sense, human shamanic activities became the prerequisite for the appearance of "divine spirits", and "divine spirits" were constructed in the process of shamanic activities. It is precisely because there are no absolute, extremely feared and worshipped idols as in religion that people can more actively choose and decide their own survival reality and living conditions.
Conclusion: On the Later Influence of Shamanic Rituals
In The Golden Bough, Frazer categorizes magic into two types based on different classification methods - from the perspective of the purpose of performing magic, magic performed for personal interests is called "individual magic", while magic performed for the interests of the entire tribe is called "public magic". When the welfare of the tribe is believed to depend on the performance of these magical rituals, the shaman rises to a more influential and prestigious position, and can easily acquire the status and authority of a leader or king. This has been used by many scholars as excellent material to argue for the unity of shaman and king in early societies.
Malinowski mentions in his book A Scientific Theory of Culture that "magic is a concrete and practical psychological tool" that "gives people confidence, maintains a balanced attitude and mental unity." Shamanic rituals prevalent in primitive early human societies existed to realize the material and spiritual interests of individuals or tribes. Shamanic rituals seemed to revere the heavenly gods, but in reality, they were doing human affairs through communication between heaven and humans.
Confucian thought, which emphasizes the restoration of "Zhou rituals", has always placed particular emphasis on human secular life and practical utility. It takes the cultivation and shaping of human emotions as its core, which is not unrelated to the process of rationalization that shamanic rituals underwent in the early Zhou Dynasty. The rationalization of shamanic rituals produced a way of thinking and belief system that fused emotion and reason, pursuing practical benefits and personality shaping. Confucian thought, which integrates politics, religion, and ethics, is not a complete negation and overthrow of shamanic rituals, but rather inherits the core of shamanic rituals and can be seen as a product of the rationalization of primitive shamanic rituals.
