There are mainly two kinds of creation myths: the creation myth of heaven and earth (including the formation of the world and everything) and the myth of human origin (including the origin of nations). There are three myths about the creation of heaven and earth: the first is to create the world with God as the main body. This image, title and way of creating heaven and earth are all different. The creative god of Yao nationality is called Miruotuo; Yi people have four creative gods: Bagg, Dianni, Zhige Aru and Jiezhi Jialu. The second category, the giant metaplasia myth, tells that everything in the world is transformed from various parts of the giant's body. For example, the myth of Pangu of Han nationality, the myth of "Shepama and Shemima" of Achang nationality, and the myth of "Nizhi Xiajin, the giant who created everything" of Yi nationality, etc. The third category, the myth of natural evolution, tells the process of natural formation of heaven and earth in imagination, which is neither the creation of the god of land reclamation nor the metaplasia of giants, but completely natural evolution. For example, Buluotuo and his sisters in Zhuang mythology, and the ancestors' love in Naxi creation mythology. These myths are preserved in the epics and ancient songs of ethnic minorities. There are two kinds of myths about the origin of human beings: one is to explain the birth of human beings in the world, to tell the process of creating human beings and to explain the origin of nations; The other is related to the flood myth, which explains the process of rebuilding human beings through the combination of brother and sister after the flood. In the national creation myth, people are born from eggs, gourds, stones and caves or Woods, but it is more common that people are made of clay, such as the myth of Nu Wa.
In the myth of creation, the contents that explain the origin of human beings and nationalities are often combined, and the origins of nationalities and human beings are considered to be simultaneous. The creation process recorded in the Yi epic Meige is that brother and sister get married, give birth to strange gourds, and eight kinds of people appear, indicating the origin of eight nationalities. The myth of creation is worldwide, and it is the ideology of human primitive period, which has important historical value and certain literary value. Myths that explain natural phenomena such as the sun, moon and stars. The myth of the sun, moon and stars first put forward the origin of the sun, moon and stars. China has five myths: fertility theory, limb metaplasia theory, egg birth theory, casting theory and God creation theory. In addition, there is another saying that the sun is a heroic god and a celestial emperor. There are also some myths that explain the origin of some constellations.
The regular movement of the sun and the moon is one aspect of the explanation of natural phenomena in the myth of the sun and the moon. Ancient myths in China described the daily life schedule of the sun and the moon as having work and rest like human beings. The shadow in the middle of the month and the change of full moon and short moon are another aspect of this kind of myth to explain natural phenomena. In Han mythology, the Goddess Chang'e flying to the moon turned into a toad, WU GANG chopped laurel, and Jade Rabbit pounded medicine. There are also many myths among ethnic minorities to explain the shadow in the middle of the month. Regarding the relationship between the sun and the moon, people think of them as husband and wife, brother and sister, sister and menstruation. There is also a magical explanation for the phenomenon of solar eclipse in mythology. For example, the Han people have the saying that Tiangou swallowed it. The myth of shooting at the sun is an indispensable part of the myth of the sun and the moon. The basic content it describes is that there are many suns (or moons) in the sky, and strong light irradiation has caused serious consequences. The hero's archer shot down the redundant sun and moon. This kind of myth reflects the ancient people's desire to control the sun and conquer drought.
The myth of the sun, the moon and the stars reflects the simple understanding of celestial bodies by ancient humans, and some show the desire to control celestial bodies by witchcraft, which has primitive science and certain practical significance. However, due to the infiltration and integration of various original ideas, they finally combined into a myth full of odd-second fantasies, which was taken as the creative theme by literati. A natural myth. It is an explanatory story of primitive people about the origin and characteristics of animals and plants. In the primitive era of fishing, hunting and gathering economy, the level of human productivity is extremely low, and it is still impossible to distinguish between itself and nature. People often think that the animals and plants around them have the same perception, feeling and life history as themselves, especially those that have a direct interest in people's life and production, and then use visual fantasy to explain their sources and characteristics, which has become the myth of the origin of animals and plants.
In China's mythological works, there are few separate myths about the origin of animals and plants, and most of them exist as original myths and local plots in the epic of creation. For example, in the Buyi myth epic "Creation of the Earth", it is said that the forest and rare birds and animals are all changed by Weng's family. According to Kuafu mythology, Taolin was transformed from a cane that Kuafu abandoned after dying of thirst every day. This kind of myth holds that animals and plants are changed by a certain part of God's body or God's instruments.
In addition, some myths believe that animals and plants were created by the creator God. For example, the Yi epic Le Aoteyi tells the story of Otsu who helped the gods create creatures on the earth, planted three trees on the ground, and then there were trees. Put the deer in the forest, and there were animals from then on. There are also some myths that god, man, animals and plants are interactive. Nu Wa is the goddess of creation in China mythology. It is a great goddess image handed down from the matriarchal clan period in primitive society.
The content of the myth of Nu Wa mainly has two aspects. The first is to make people. Legend has it that Nu Wa kneaded the yellow land and created human beings. Later, because I was busy, I dragged the rope into the mud and shook it. The spilled mud became a lot of people (see Ying Shao's "Later Han Dynasty Customs and Justice"). The other is mending the sky. The theory of mending the sky was first seen in Huai Nan Zi Lan Mingxun. Legend has it that in ancient times, the sky fell apart, fires burned us, floods flooded, and evil birds and animals harmed people. Nu Wa smelted five-color stones to fill the sky; Cut off the turtle's foot and put it on the ground, propping up the sky and killing the black dragon who made waves to save the people in the Central Plains. Then the reeds were burned to ashes, which stopped the terrible flood. Nu Wa can also be regarded as the earliest hero of water control in China myths and legends.
In addition, it is also said that Nu Wa once made a sheng spring. This is similar to the Lusheng played by all ethnic groups in southwest China later. Nu Wa is also the goddess of music. There is also a legend that Nu Wa established a marriage system for human beings ("the general meaning of custom"), allowing young men and women to marry each other and reproduce. She is also the goddess of marriage. The myth created by China culture. Fuxi, also called Taihao Fuxi, is said to be the son of Hua Xushi who stepped on Raytheon's footprints in Razer. He can "go up and down" along the building timber growing in the wild in Du Guang as a ladder.
Fuxi has many inventions, mainly saying that he sat on a square altar, listened to music from all directions, and drew eight symbols of divination, namely, Gan, Kun, Zhen, Xun, Kan, Li, Gen and Hui, to represent all kinds of things between heaven and earth. He also imitated spiders to weave webs and make fishing nets. According to this principle, his courtier Ju Mang became a bird catcher. Fuxi also made the harp and created the music of peace and discussion. The dawn of ancient civilization was revealed in the legendary Fuxi era.
Fuxi later became the emperor of the East, and his courtier Ju Mang became his god. There is also a legend that Fuxi and Nuwa are husband and wife. This theory appeared in the Western Han Dynasty. Wang Yanshou of the Eastern Han Dynasty wrote the words "Fuxi Scale, Nu Wa Snake" in Lu Lingguang Dian Fu. There are images of Fuxi, Nu Wa mating with the snake head on the stone statue of Wuliangci in the Eastern Han Dynasty. One side is marked Fuxi, and the other side may be Nuwa. 1, echoing the echo of labor creation, is a vivid record of labor creation and a praise for labor performance and initiative.
Myth, as one of the artistic expressions of the ancients, originated from labor like other arts. Virtuous gods or sacred heroes praised in mythology are almost all related to labor. For example, Pangu, the epoch-making Nuwa, Shennong, who discovered herbs, Hou Ji, who taught people to cultivate crops, Yu, who managed floods, and Hou Yi, who invented bows and arrows, personally cultivated and fished in Lishan and made pottery by the river. Some rely on divine power, such as Nu Wa refining stones to fill the sky; Some use some magic weapons, such as stealing the emperor's land to control water; Some magical powers, magic weapons and skills are both, such as Houyi shooting at the sun to kill pests, having bows and arrows given by the Emperor of Heaven, relying on his own magical powers and skills; Some even turned into foreign objects to engage in some special labor, in order to achieve his expected purpose, such as turning the surplus into bears, cutting mountains and opening roads, or trying to chase the myth of the sun's light and shadow, and the girl who drowned in the East China Sea and became a jingwei bird "always trapped in the East China Sea with western hills and stones." Anyone with a little common sense in real life knows that it is just a beautiful fantasy of myth, but it is reflected from one side.
2, full of care for the people:
The goddess fills the sky, shoots for nine days, controls water by Yu, and fills the sea by Jing Wei, all in order to get rid of and overcome the troubles of natural disasters; The purpose of the Yellow Emperor's war against Chiyou is to destroy the evil forces in the world and prevent them from endangering the normal survival of mankind.
From the struggle of mythical heroes, we can clearly see the tenacious will to struggle and high-spirited spirit that flashed in China's mythology. In order to realize the ideal, this fearless spirit of dare to struggle, dare to sacrifice, strive for self-improvement and sacrifice oneself for others is shown in myths and legends, which conforms to the traditional style of the Chinese nation, that is, the spirit of actively fighting against fate. In China's mythology, gods or heroes with great military exploits first created a rare living condition for all people in the world with their brave spirit and heroic behavior. Secondly, their struggle is indomitable, lasting and invincible. Although the gods and heroes in western mythology are brave and strong, they are often influenced by an unknown abstract fate.
Typical examples are China's Yu water control myth and Greek Prometheus myth. The plots of these two myths are partly similar, but the spiritual support and fate connotation they strive for are quite different. Prometheus was tied to the cliff of Olympus and endured the pecking of the condor day and night, but he believed that "whoever learned to recognize the unshakable power of fate" and "must endure the pain given by the goddess of fate", and he relied on fate to endure the pain. In the end, it was fate that turned him against Zeus and won.
In the myth of China, Gun fought bravely in front of the flood, snatched the land from the Emperor of Heaven, and even dismissed Zhu Rong, the Vulcan sent by the Yellow Emperor. His body did not rot for three years, and his abdomen was cut open with a knife, which gave birth to the crystallization of his soul and hard work-Yulai inherited his unfinished great cause of water control. Guns do not depend on fate, but on the spirit of active struggle.
A typical myth: "Giant Aos (big Aos or tortoise) crosses the mountain". To the east of the Bohai Sea, there are five mountains. These five mountains are carried by the giant Aos below. The giant Aos doesn't care about crossing the mountain, but dances happily, making the gods on the mountain uneasy. The giant Australian head can climb the mountain, which shows its size. The giant of Longboguo "grabs six Australian heads at a time" and runs at high speed on his back. Its strength and scale are unimaginable.
However, due to the limitation of living environment and productivity level at that time, the early myths were nothing more than common things at that time, such as the sun, moon and stars, mountains and valleys, birds and animals, water plants and trees, etc., and the gods they created could not be separated from the appearance of people. For example, primitive people's struggle with drought was fantasized as a story of shooting for ten days in myth, and their attempt to conquer the ocean was imagined as a feat of Jingwei's reclamation. Therefore, the early myth can't be as magnificent, complicated and colorful as the later myth, but it has many furry original traces, but if it is stripped of its original wilderness, its true colors will naturally be distorted. Where the wings of myth soar, it is always the first sound of scientific creation and invention (myth is sometimes scientific prediction or fantasy science)
A long time ago, people dreamed of flying in the air, so there was a story of "flying carpet". People dreamed of speeding up their walk, so there was a story of "fast boots". Of course, these two examples are both foreign myths, and the myth of China is not inferior to that of other countries in this respect. Take the concept of flying as an example. There are countries with feathers and countries with heads. "Lu Ban carves wood as a crane, flying 700 Li at a time" (Dissertation), "Strange people can travel far away and become flying cars" (foreign history). Today's planes, trains and ships have realized that ancient people are in the sky. Liezi Shangwen also records the myth that Yanshi offered robots to Zhou Muwang. This robot can not only sing and dance, but also flirt with the concubines around Mu Wang, which leads Mu Wang to suspect that this robot is disguised as a real person and order to kill his head. Let's not consider whether this record is true and reliable for the time being. From the description in the book, it is comparable to a modern robot.
From the artistic point of view, myth has a strong positive romantic spirit: bizarre plot, strange fantasy, bold exaggeration and rich imagination.
"Huainanzi Astronomical Training": * * * workers were angry, and their heads could not touch the surrounding mountains, so they broke Tianzhu Di Wei, causing the sky to collapse and the earth to sink into a corner, and the sun, the moon and the stars were displaced.
Historical Records Yin Benji, the giant butterfly Swallowing Eggs, was the ancestor of Shang clan.
"Historical Records of Zhou Benji" Jiang Yuan stepped on the footsteps of giants, but he was "pregnant like a baby" and gave birth to Hou Ji and Hou Ji, which made the people feel comfortable and hungry.