In fact, this kind of judgment only applies to the completely linguistized phonetic alphabet, not to Chinese, especially to Chinese before vernacular Chinese. On the one hand, Chinese characters are not symbols of language, but a very independent symbol system relative to language. Moreover, the earlier the writing, the stronger its independence from the language, and the farther it is from the language. Until the most primitive writing stage, that is, the simple "writing" stage, it has nothing to do with language at all.
Different from any writing in human civilization, China writing includes two stages and two systems, namely, writing stage and writing stage, writing system and writing system. We will discuss this point in detail later.
Now, we generally call Chinese characters before modern vernacular Chinese as classical Chinese. The difference between classical Chinese and vernacular Chinese is that the former does not correspond to the language and is not synchronized, while the latter corresponds to the language and is completely synchronized. Since the New Culture Movement, people in China suddenly feel that their own characters are not as good as their own, because they are out of sync with the language, while all the characters in western "developed" countries are completely in sync with the language.
Because the characters in Europe and America are symbolic and linguistic, Europeans and Americans take it for granted that the characters of human civilization should be like that. Once China people accepted the European and American ideas, took the language as the standard of writing, and then applied it to Chinese characters, the "backwardness" of Chinese characters suddenly appeared.
Judging from the history of China characters, the earlier the history, the higher the degree of unsynchronization between characters and language. The five classics are divided into classics and biographies. The most obvious difference between the two is the synchronization with the language. The synchronicity of classics is relatively low, as are Shangshu, Yijing, Chunqiu and Shijing, and the synchronicity of biographies has obviously jumped to a higher level. So classics are hard to understand and biographies are easy to read.
The synchronicity between Oracle Bone Inscriptions and the language is low, but the inscriptions on bronze in the Western Zhou Dynasty are slightly better. In essence, the text styles of Shangshu, Yijing and Chunqiu are highly close to those of the Western Zhou Dynasty. This means that the classics of these three books should have been written in the Western Zhou Dynasty. Although the Spring and Autumn Annals are written since the Spring and Autumn Period, the format and style of historical records should have been fixed in the Western Zhou Dynasty. As a history of Lu, it just got a good inheritance.
Biography appeared in the Spring and Autumn Period, and the iconic and even groundbreaking figure was Confucius. Biography is not an interpretation of classics, but it is classics, not written, not passed down from mouth to mouth. Before the Biography, the main body of the Five Classics actually included two parts, one was a literal part and the other was a non-literal part. Biography only makes the unwritten parts.
This is particularly evident in Zhouyi and Chunqiu Zuozhuan. Without Zhu An, the texts of these two books would be almost meaningless and incomprehensible. Zuo Zhuan directly supplemented a large number of historical facts that were not recorded in the classics.
As the Book of Changes is the first of the group classics and has the longest history, it existed long before the appearance of the writing (Oracle Bone Inscriptions). Therefore, the characteristics of its step-by-step and phased writing are more obvious.
Before Oracle Bone Inscriptions, in fact, before the inscriptions on bronze in the Western Zhou Dynasty, the things symbolized in the Book of Changes were just divinatory symbols, that is, gossip symbols, without words. As will be explained in detail later, the gossip symbol is actually not only a "text", but also the source of "text". In other words, the Book of Changes before the Western Zhou Dynasty was written without words and had no literariness at all. Its main content is word of mouth, and gossip symbols can only play the role of classification, prompt and mnemonic. Therefore, I will never be a book.
No matter in terms of writing or content, the first literariization of the Book of Changes took place in the Western Zhou Dynasty, that is, writing hexagrams, so the Book of Changes is called the Book of Changes. Because Zhou Wenwang was the pioneer of the Zhou Dynasty, he was called the "inventor" of Zhouyi, the so-called "Yan Wen Wang Gua". The historical fact is more likely that Zhou Wenwang is just a name to mark the times. "King Wen's divination" means that the first writing of the Book of Changes appeared in the King Wen's era, or the era initiated by the King Wen.
Because the inscriptions on bronze and Oracle Bone Inscriptions are almost the same, and the writing and language are highly out of sync, the Book of Changes in the Western Zhou Dynasty is very literary, and the main body of its content is still not literal, but continues to maintain the state of word of mouth. Although the scriptures in Zhouyi provide more information than the original gossip symbols, they are still seriously incomplete, and more are tips and mnemonic symbols.
It is worth noting that in the period of Shang, Zhou and Oracle Bone Inscriptions, the popularity of characters was very small, only existed in the government, and was mainly used to worship gods and ancestors, but there were no characters among the people. Therefore, the compilation of the first Book of Changes in the Western Zhou Dynasty must be done by the government. This is not to say that the Book of Changes does not exist among the people. On the contrary, the foundation of the Book of Changes still exists among the people. However, the folk Yijing is still passed down from mouth to mouth under the gossip symbol. This is also the more important reason why the scripture of Zhouyi, and even the heavy divination incident, are mistaken for the actions of King Wen.
The second writing of the Book of Changes took place in the biographical era marked by Confucius. But the true stereotype of biography was not completed until the Western Han Dynasty. Biography is actually a literal translation of the content that is still passed down from mouth to mouth except for the gossip symbols and classics in the Book of Changes. So Biography is also Jing, but it was written a little late.
It is precisely because the writing time of Biography is relatively late, and the main stage is the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period. Therefore, it is bound to be influenced by the "new ideas" in that particular historical period, and it is mixed with things different or even opposite to the Book of Changes itself. Therefore, there are non-classics in biographies, which need to be distinguished by later learners.
From Confucius to the Vernacular Movement in the Republic of China, the synchronization of China's writing and language was basically stable for about 2,500 years, and the writing and language always kept a distance and refused to be completely synchronized with the language. Why did China's writing and language keep a distance before the Republic of China? This is a question that we need to think about and answer. It can't be simply attributed to "backwardness".
People in China have long noticed the synchronization of writing and language, and made in-depth thinking, which is unique in the history of human civilization and writing.
The Book of Changes: "Confucius said:' The book is not full of words, and the words are not full of meaning. "However, the meaning of the saint is invisible? Confucius said,' A saint tries his best to set up an image, and his divination is empty. How can he make the best use of his words, change his interests, and dance his drums to the best of his ability?' The "book" here is a character, the "image" and "hexagram" are eight diagrams symbols, and the "word" and "word" are all languages.
This passage is actually discussing the relationship among gossip symbols (texts), words, language and meaning. But among the four, meaning is the center and the purpose, and gossip symbols, characters and languages are all tools to express meaning. However, the most direct and thorough expression of meaning is neither language nor words, but images, which are gossip symbols, "setting images as best as possible".
Zhuangzi foreign things: "The hoof is in the rabbit, so you get the rabbit and forget the hoof. The speaker was so concerned that he forgot to say it proudly. " Here, only the relationship between words and meanings is mentioned, while the graphics and words are ignored. In Zhuangzi's conclusion, even language can be ignored in the end, because meaning is the most important and fundamental purpose.
On the basis of predecessors, Wang Bi said in the Book of Changes: "So people who say it clearly understand the image, but forget to say it; Elephant, so it is meaningful, and it is smug to forget the elephant. Those who still have hooves are so among rabbits that they get rabbits and forget hooves; So, if you are in the fish, you get the fish and forget it. "
Wang Bi discussed the relationship among hexagrams (texts), words and meanings, ignoring the words. The Book of Changes, Zhuangzi and Wang Bi all put words in a very unimportant position. Only the copula Yijing mentioned words, which are also "insufficient words", while Zhuangzi and Wang Bi directly chose to ignore words.
Different from any civilization in the whole history of human civilization, Chinese civilization realized the existence and importance of "Yi" a long time ago, to be exact, at the beginning of civilization, and at the same time developed an abstract symbol to express "Yi", namely, the hexagrams in the Book of Changes and China's earliest "Wen". That is to say, before the appearance of writing, China had already formed a mature abstract symbol system, namely "writing system". This system is completely independent and transcends language, and its purpose is to express "meaning" rather than the symbolization of language.
It should be noted that the meaning here is not in the general sense. Personal meaning is not the meaning of a saint, but the meaning of justice and morality, which is the same as righteousness. Of course, the meaning of "sage" is not absolutely different from that of ordinary people. Mencius Gao Zi Shang: "What is empathy? It is also reasonable and justified. The saint first got my inner sympathy. " Therefore, "the will of the saints" is just a kind of "general will". Therefore, "literature carries Tao" is a true description of "literary system", and its historical starting point is in the Yijing era, which is also the era of Chinese civilization.
In fact, writing is between "text" and language, which includes both elements from the beginning of hexagrams. The purpose of inheriting "Wen" is to convey "meaning" and "righteousness". At the same time, words have sounds, which establish a corresponding relationship with language. So "incomplete books" has two meanings. The first layer, as far as the purpose is concerned, words are not for expressing language, nor are they tools of language; On the second level, in terms of the number of words, there are fewer words than languages, and complete synchronization cannot be established. These two meanings are related.
Except for Chinese civilization, all civilizations, whether it is the "oldest" ancient two-river civilization that used cuneiform characters or the civilization that later used alphabetic characters, have no independent "meaning" and "righteousness", and of course there is no abstract symbol system that directly expresses "meaning" and "righteousness". That is, before the writing system appeared, there was no "writing system". Therefore, the purpose of their writing is only to express language, which is the symbol and tool of language.
Measured by the standard and history of China characters, these characters are not only "low-level", but also incomplete. The low level lies in the purpose, not in conveying morality and justice, but only in conveying language. What is incomplete is history. Before writing, they all lacked an independent "literature" history, which in turn originated from the imperfection of independent morality.
Incomplete morality, incomplete "writing system", therefore, the source of the ancient two rivers cuneiform, known as the oldest human writing, has become a problem. According to China's traditional concept, Zi is only the extension and continuation of Wen, the son of Wen, and Wen is Zi's mother. Then, how did the ancient Lianghe civilization, which lacked a "literary system", suddenly invent words out of thin air? In fact, for the ancient civilization of the two rivers, writing was a motherless son.
Preface to Shuowen: "The ancients recorded the king of the family in the world, looking up at the image of heaven and overlooking the earth, observing the culture of birds and animals and the suitability of the land, ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… Shennong, on the other hand, tied the rope and unified its affairs. Cang Xie, the official historian of the Yellow Emperor, made a book contract first. ..... The orator preached to the king's court ... At the beginning of writing, it was like an pictograph, so it was called Wen. After that, the form and sound benefit each other, that is, the word. The writer is the foundation of image; The word, the word is breastfeeding and foaming. "
This passage is an extremely important historical material of the origin of China characters, and of course it is also an extremely important historical material of the origin of human characters. This passage itself is not difficult to understand. What is difficult is the Zhouyi quoted in it, which will be elaborated in more detail in the future.
Xu Shen clearly divided China's writing into two stages, the writing stage and the writing stage. There is a clear difference between text and words. Words are the foundation and matrix of words, and words breed words. Xu Shen believes that gossip symbols, knots and book stories all belong to literature. However, the book contract is a special text, which is the intersection of words and characters, with both words and characters. The book contract is the most primitive writing, and the knot and hexagrams before the book contract are words rather than words.
Xu Shen's use of "nurturing milk" is not a metaphor, because it is the original meaning of the word "zi". The modern "Zi" shape is very close to the early bronze inscriptions, and it is the second son of Bao. The hijab represents the family, and the son is the youngest son and baby. Therefore, the original meaning of this word is fertility, incubation, breastfeeding, pregnancy and so on, and the meaning of this word is derived from it. Using "word" directly refers to words, that is to say, the words of words are also children, whose children are they, and the children of words.
In a word, whether it is the records in Zhouyi, or the exposition of images, words and meanings in Zhuangzi Wangbi, the meaning of characters' glyphs, Xu Shen's tracing back to the origin of characters, and more importantly, our previous research on the symbols of the contract and the knot points to a historical fact: before the appearance of characters, Chinese civilization had a mature character symbol system, and the character system started from the character system.
Xu Shen correctly pointed out three subsystems of the writing system: eight diagrams symbols, structures and calligraphy. However, he would think that writing originated from the era of calligraphy and deeds, and it was actually Oracle Bone Inscriptions in Shang Dynasty. Xu Shen's more fatal mistake is that he thinks that the writing system and the formation principle of the writing system are all pictographs, so-called "Gai Yi-like pictographs, so it is called words"; "The author is the foundation of the image."
In fact, gossip symbols, structures and inscriptions are essentially numbers, numbers, not images. I ching, knot and book contract are all applications of abstract mathematics, but their application fields are different. The Book of Changes applies mathematics to the simulation of world changes, while knots and book contracts apply mathematics to the signing of economic contracts. Knot and book contract are essentially economic contracts, and they are also the oldest and most primitive economic contracts of mankind.
Because gossip, knot and essay are all numbers, abstract mathematics is the basis of their similarity, and their appearance is also based on the appearance of abstract mathematics. The origin of abstract mathematics will be discussed in detail in the following article. It is only pointed out here that the abstract mathematics of China and even the whole human civilization appeared at the same time as the Book of Changes, and its primary application is the gossip system.
Because digital symbols are artificially endowed and artificially agreed, they also have contractual attributes. This may be another reason why Zhouyi thinks that knotting, signing books and gossip are related. All three are based on digital symbols and have contractual attributes.
Traditionally, it has always been believed that Chinese civilization began with "Fuxi painting hexagrams" and the Fuxi era when the Book of Changes came into being. This means that China civilization and abstract mathematics came into being at the same time. At the beginning of Chinese civilization, there were abstract recording symbols, that is, gossip symbols composed of numbers. This is the beginning of "Wen" and "Wen Zai Dao".
In other words, the whole Chinese civilization has an abstract recording symbol system from the beginning. This symbol system is divided into two stages as a whole: the writing stage and the character stage. At the same time, there are also differences in the formation principle between words and characters. Ideographic characters are indeed the formation principle of a considerable number of characters, but there is no pictographic characters at all. Therefore, words and characters are not only two stages, but also two different systems.
Writing is the son of literature, and literature is the mother of writing. In the previous series of articles, we have pointed out that many important words in Oracle Bone Inscriptions are symbols directly inherited from book contracts and knots. When words appeared, the writing of the structure and the writing of the book contract were integrated into the writing system, and their independence disappeared. Of the three subsystems of the text, only the gossip system still exists independently.
Therefore, the most fundamental formation principle of characters is not pictographic, but inheritance, which is the inheritance of characters and thoughts and the direct inheritance of symbols. This truth has been forgotten and ignored by later generations.