Pangu
Encyclopedia
Chinese mythology
Chinese mythology is a collection of cultural history, folktales, and religions that have been passed down in oral or written tradition. These include creation myths and legends and myths concerning the founding of Chinese culture and the Chinese state...
.
The Pangu legend
In the beginning there was nothing in the universeUniverse
The Universe is commonly defined as the totality of everything that exists, including all matter and energy, the planets, stars, galaxies, and the contents of intergalactic space. Definitions and usage vary and similar terms include the cosmos, the world and nature...
except a formless chaos. However this chaos coalesced into a cosmic egg
World egg
A world egg or cosmic egg is a mythological motif found in the creation myths of many cultures and civilizations. Typically, the world egg is a beginning of some sort, and the universe or some primordial being comes into existence by "hatching" from the egg, sometimes lain on the primordial waters...
for about 18,000 years. Within it, the perfectly opposed principles of Yin and Yang
Yin and yang
In Asian philosophy, the concept of yin yang , which is often referred to in the West as "yin and yang", is used to describe how polar opposites or seemingly contrary forces are interconnected and interdependent in the natural world, and how they give rise to each other in turn. Opposites thus only...
became balanced and Pangu emerged (or woke up) from the egg. Pangu is usually depicted as a primitive, hairy giant
Giant (mythology)
The mythology and legends of many different cultures include monsters of human appearance but prodigious size and strength. "Giant" is the English word commonly used for such beings, derived from one of the most famed examples: the gigantes of Greek mythology.In various Indo-European mythologies,...
with horns on his head and clad in furs. Pangu set about the task of creating the world: he separated Yin from Yang with a swing of his giant axe, creating the Earth
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
(murky Yin) and the Sky
Sky
The sky is the part of the atmosphere or outer space visible from the surface of any astronomical object. It is difficult to define precisely for several reasons. During daylight, the sky of Earth has the appearance of a pale blue surface because the air scatters the sunlight. The sky is sometimes...
(clear Yang). To keep them separated, Pangu stood between them and pushed up the Sky. This task took 18,000 years; with each day the sky grew ten feet (3 meters) higher, the Earth ten feet wider, and Pangu ten feet taller. In some versions of the story, Pangu is aided in this task by the four most prominent beasts, namely the Turtle
Turtle
Turtles are reptiles of the order Testudines , characterised by a special bony or cartilaginous shell developed from their ribs that acts as a shield...
, the Qilin
Qilin
The Qilin is a mythical hooved Chinese chimerical creature known throughout various East Asian cultures, and is said to appear with the imminent arrival or passing of a wise sage or an illustrious ruler. It is a good omen that brings rui . It is often depicted with what looks like fire all over...
, the Phoenix, and the Dragon
Chinese dragon
Chinese dragons are legendary creatures in Chinese mythology and folklore, with mythic counterparts among Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, Bhutanese, Western and Turkic dragons. In Chinese art, dragons are typically portrayed as long, scaled, serpentine creatures with four legs...
.
After the 18,000 years had elapsed, Pangu was laid to rest. His breath became the wind
Wind
Wind is the flow of gases on a large scale. On Earth, wind consists of the bulk movement of air. In outer space, solar wind is the movement of gases or charged particles from the sun through space, while planetary wind is the outgassing of light chemical elements from a planet's atmosphere into space...
; his voice the thunder
Thunder
Thunder is the sound made by lightning. Depending on the nature of the lightning and distance of the listener, thunder can range from a sharp, loud crack to a long, low rumble . The sudden increase in pressure and temperature from lightning produces rapid expansion of the air surrounding and within...
; left eye the sun
Sun
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is almost perfectly spherical and consists of hot plasma interwoven with magnetic fields...
and right eye the moon
Moon
The Moon is Earth's only known natural satellite,There are a number of near-Earth asteroids including 3753 Cruithne that are co-orbital with Earth: their orbits bring them close to Earth for periods of time but then alter in the long term . These are quasi-satellites and not true moons. For more...
; his body became the mountain
Mountain
Image:Himalaya_annotated.jpg|thumb|right|The Himalayan mountain range with Mount Everestrect 58 14 160 49 Chomo Lonzorect 200 28 335 52 Makalurect 378 24 566 45 Mount Everestrect 188 581 920 656 Tibetan Plateaurect 250 406 340 427 Rong River...
s and extremes of the world; his blood formed rivers; his muscles the fertile lands; his facial hair the stars and milky way; his fur the bushes and forests; his bones the valuable minerals; his bone marrows sacred diamonds; his sweat fell as rain; and the fleas on his fur carried by the wind became the fish and animals throughout the land. Nüwa
Nüwa
Nüwa is a goddess in ancient Chinese mythology best known for creating mankind and repairing the wall of heaven.-Primary sources:...
the Goddess then used the mud of the water bed to form the shape of humans. These humans were very smart since they were individually crafted. Nüwa then became bored of individually making every human so she started putting a rope in the water bed and letting the drops of mud that fell from it become new humans. These small drops became new humans, not as smart as the first.
The first writer to record the myth of Pangu was Xu Zheng (徐整) during the Three Kingdoms
Three Kingdoms
The Three Kingdoms period was a period in Chinese history, part of an era of disunity called the "Six Dynasties" following immediately the loss of de facto power of the Han Dynasty rulers. In a strict academic sense it refers to the period between the foundation of the state of Wei in 220 and the...
(三國) period.
Origin of the myth
Three main views emerge to describe the origin of the Pangu myth. The first is that the story is indigenous, and developed or was transmitted through time to Xu ZhengXu Zheng
Xú Zhěng was a Three Kingdoms period Daoist author of the "Three Five Historic Records" . The "3-5" refers to the "Three August Ones and Five Emperors" .-References:...
.
Senior Scholar Wei Juxian states that the Pangu story is derived from stories during the Western Zhou Dynasty
Zhou Dynasty
The Zhou Dynasty was a Chinese dynasty that followed the Shang Dynasty and preceded the Qin Dynasty. Although the Zhou Dynasty lasted longer than any other dynasty in Chinese history, the actual political and military control of China by the Ji family lasted only until 771 BC, a period known as...
(西周朝). He cites the story of Zhong (重) and Li (黎) in the "Chuyu" section of the ancient classics Guoyu
Guoyu (book)
The Discourses of the States or Guoyu is a classical Chinese history book that collected the historical records of numerous states from Western Zhou to 453 BC. Its author is unknown, but it is sometimes attributed to Zuo Qiuming, a contemporary of Confucius...
(國語). In it, the King Zhao of Chu
Chu (state)
The State of Chu was a Zhou Dynasty vassal state in present-day central and southern China during the Spring and Autumn period and Warring States Period . Its ruling house had the surname Nai , and clan name Yan , later evolved to surname Mi , and clan name Xiong...
asked Guanshefu (觀射父) a question: "What did ancient classic "Zhou Shu" mean by the sentence that Zhong and Li caused the heaven and earth to disconnect from each other?" The "Zhou Shu" sentence he refers to is about an earlier person, Luu Xing, who is having a conversation with the King Mu of Zhou
King Mu of Zhou
King Mu of Zhou or King Mu of Chou or Mu Wang or Mu Wang was the fifth sovereign of the Chinese Zhou Dynasty. The dates of his reign are 976-922 BC or 956-918 BC.-Life:...
(周穆王). King Mu's reign is much earlier and dates to about 1001 to 946 BC. In their conversation, they discuss the "disconnection" between heaven and earth.
Derk Bodde
Derk Bodde
Derk Bodde was a prominent 20th century American Sinologist and historian of China. He authored pioneering work in the history of the Chinese legal system....
linked the myth to the ancestral mythologies of the Miao people
Miao people
The Miao or ม้ง ; ) is an ethnic group recognized by the government of the People's Republic of China as one of the 55 official minority groups. Miao is a Chinese term and does not reflect the self-designations of the component nations of people, which include Hmong, Hmu, A Hmao, and Kho Xiong...
and Yao people
Yao people
The Yao nationality is a government classification for various minorities in China. They form one of the 55 ethnic minority groups officially recognized by the People's Republic of China, where they reside in the mountainous terrain of the southwest and south...
in southern China.
An indirect but possibly more substantive conclusion is that China is unique in not "creating" its creator. In this view, Xu Zheng
Xu Zheng
Xú Zhěng was a Three Kingdoms period Daoist author of the "Three Five Historic Records" . The "3-5" refers to the "Three August Ones and Five Emperors" .-References:...
(徐整), or a relatively recent predecessor, perpetuates the Pangu myth from other cultural influences.
Professor Qin Naichang, head of the Guangxi Institute for Nationality Studies
Guangxi Institute for Nationality Studies
Guangxi Institute for Nationalities in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, southern China.-History:The university was founded in 1952.It has trained over 50,000 professionals, 75 percent of whom are ethnic students, for roles in government, medicine, culture, education, media, and...
proposes the myth originated in Laibin city, Guangxi
Guangxi
Guangxi, formerly romanized Kwangsi, is a province of southern China along its border with Vietnam. In 1958, it became the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region of the People's Republic of China, a region with special privileges created specifically for the Zhuang people.Guangxi's location, in...
, in the center of the Pearl River
Pearl River (China)
The Pearl River or less commonly, the "Guangdong River" or "Canton River" etc., , is an extensive river system in southern China. The name Pearl River is usually used as a catchment term to refer to the watersheds of the Xi Jiang , the Bei Jiang , and the Dong Jiang...
Valley. He suggested that Pangu myth from this region originally involved two people. He also suggests that this Chinese mythology of Pangu had come from India
History of India
The history of India begins with evidence of human activity of Homo sapiens as long as 75,000 years ago, or with earlier hominids including Homo erectus from about 500,000 years ago. The Indus Valley Civilization, which spread and flourished in the northwestern part of the Indian subcontinent from...
, Egypt
Ancient Egypt
Ancient Egypt was an ancient civilization of Northeastern Africa, concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in what is now the modern country of Egypt. Egyptian civilization coalesced around 3150 BC with the political unification of Upper and Lower Egypt under the first pharaoh...
, or Babylon
Babylon
Babylon was an Akkadian city-state of ancient Mesopotamia, the remains of which are found in present-day Al Hillah, Babil Province, Iraq, about 85 kilometers south of Baghdad...
. Apparently, this story mingled in with the origin stories of other cultures, eventually changing into the later narrative more popular today.
This is Professor Qin's reconstruction of the true creation myth preceding the myth of Pangu. Note that it is not actually a creation myth:
A brother and his sister became the only survivors of the prehistoric Deluge by crouching in a gourd that floated on water. The two got married afterwards, and a mass of flesh in the shape of a whetstone was born. They chopped it and the pieces turned into large crowds of people, who began to reproduce again. The couple were named 'Pan' and 'Gou' in the Zhuang ethnic language, which stand for whetstone and gourd respectively.
Paul Carus writes this:
P’an-Ku: The basic idea of the yih philosophy was so convincing that it almost obliterated the Taoist cosmology of P’an-Ku who is said to have chiseled the world out of the rocks of eternity. Though the legend is not held in high honor by the literati, it contains some features of interest which have not as yet been pointed out and deserve at least an incidental comment.P’an-Ku is written in two ways: one means in literal translations, “basin ancient”, the other “basin solid”. Both are homophones, i.e., they are pronounced the same way; and the former may be preferred as the original and correct spelling. Obviously the name means “aboriginal abyss,” or in the terser German, Urgrund, and we have reason to believe it to be a translation of the Babylonian Tiamat
TiamatIn Babylonian mythology, Tiamat is a chaos monster, a primordial goddess of the ocean, mating with Abzû to produce younger gods. It is suggested that there are two parts to the Tiamat mythos, the first in which Tiamat is 'creatrix', through a "Sacred marriage" between salt and fresh water,...
, “the Deep.”The Chinese legend tells us that P’an-Ku’s bones changed to rocks; his flesh to earth; his marrow, teeth and nails to metals; his hair to herbs and trees; his veins to rivers; his breath to wind; and his four limbs became pillars marking the four corners of the world, — which is a Chinese version not only of the Norse myth of the Giant Ymir, but also of the Babylonian story of Tiamat.
Illustrations of P’an-Ku represent him in the company of supernatural animals that symbolize old age or immortality, viz., the tortoise and the crane; sometimes also the dragon, the emblem of power, and the phoenix, the emblem of bliss.
When the earth had thus been shaped from the body of P’an-Ku, we are told that three great rivers successively governed the world: first the celestial, then the terrestrial, and finally the human sovereign. They were followed by Yung-Ch’eng and Sui-Jen (i.e., fire-man) the later being the Chinese Prometheus
PrometheusIn Greek mythology, Prometheus is a Titan, the son of Iapetus and Themis, and brother to Atlas, Epimetheus and Menoetius. He was a champion of mankind, known for his wily intelligence, who stole fire from Zeus and gave it to mortals...
, who brought the fire down from heaven and taught man its various uses.The Prometheus myth is not indigenous to Greece, where it received the artistically classical form under which it is best known to us. The name, which by an ingenious afterthought is explained as “the fore thinker,” is originally the sanskrit pramantha and means “twirler” or “fire-stick,” being the rod of hard wood which produced fire by rapid rotation in a piece of soft wood.
We cannot deny that the myth must have been known also in Mesopotamia, the main center of civilization between India and Greece, and it becomes probable that the figure Sui-Jen has been derived from the same prototype as the Greek Prometheus.
Other Chinese creation myths
This myth appears to have been preceded in ancient Chinese literature by the existence of ShangdiShangdi
Shangdi , also known as Di in Oracle Bone Inscription and Thirteen Classics, refers to the supreme god or a divine power regarded as the spiritual ultimate by the Chinese people from the Shang Dynasty. He controlled victory in battle, harvest, the fate of the kingdom, and the weather...
or Taiyi. Other Chinese myths, such as those of Nuwa
Nüwa
Nüwa is a goddess in ancient Chinese mythology best known for creating mankind and repairing the wall of heaven.-Primary sources:...
, or the Jade Emperor
Jade Emperor
The Jade Emperor in Chinese folk culture, is the ruler of Heaven and all realms of existence below including that of Man and Hell, according to a version of Taoist mythology. He is one of the most important gods of the Chinese traditional religion pantheon...
, try to explain how people were created; and do not necessarily represent "world creation" myths. It is important to note there are many variations of these myths.
The Pangu myth in Buyei culture
Pangu is also honored as the creator of the world in BuyeiBuyei
The Buyei are an ethnic group living in southern mainland China. Numbering 2.5 million, they are the 11th largest of the 56 ethnic groups officially recognized by the People's Republic of China...
legend, but in addition, he is also honored as the ancestor of Buyei people. According to the Buyei legend, Pangu became an expert in rice farming after creating the world, and subsequently married the daughter of the Dragon King
Dragon King
The four Dragon Kings are, in Chinese mythology, the divine rulers of the four seas . Although Dragon Kings appear in their true forms as dragons, they have the ability to shapeshift into human form...
, and that was the beginning of the Buyei people. The daughter of the Dragon King and Pangu had a son named Xinheng (新横) but later, the son disrespected his mother, and the angry mother returned to heaven and never came down, despite the repeated pleas of her husband and son. Pangu was forced to remarry and eventually died on the sixth day of the sixth month of the lunar calendar
Lunar calendar
A lunar calendar is a calendar that is based on cycles of the lunar phase. A common purely lunar calendar is the Islamic calendar or Hijri calendar. A feature of the Islamic calendar is that a year is always 12 months, so the months are not linked with the seasons and drift each solar year by 11 to...
and Xinheng's nightmare had begun. The stepmother treated Xinheng badly and almost killed him, and the angry Xinheng threatened to destroy the rice harvest of his stepmother. Realizing her mistake, the stepmother made peace with Xinheng and since then, on every sixth day of the sixth month of the lunar calendar, they paid their respect to Pangu. The day became an important traditional Buyei holiday for ancestral worship. This legend of creation is one of the main characteristics that distinguishes Buyei from Zhuang
Zhuang
The Zhuang are an ethnic group of people who mostly live in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in southern China. Some also live in the Yunnan, Guangdong, Guizhou and Hunan provinces...
.
Pangu worship
Pangu is worshipped at a number of shrines in contemporary ChinaChina
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
, usually with Taoist
Taoism
Taoism refers to a philosophical or religious tradition in which the basic concept is to establish harmony with the Tao , which is the mechanism of everything that exists...
symbols, such as the Bagua
Bagua (concept)
The bagua are eight diagrams used in Taoist cosmology to represent the fundamental principles of reality, seen as a range of eight interrelated concepts. Each consists of three lines, each line either "broken" or "unbroken," representing yin or yang, respectively...
.
The Pangu King Temple built in 1809 is located in Guangdong Province, northwest Huadu District
Huadu District
Huadu District is a district in Guangzhou, Guangdong, China. It is located in the far northern suburbs of Guangzhou.Xinhua Town is the seat of local government, and of the district CCP committee....
(west of G106 / north of S118), north of Shiling Town
Shiling
Shiling is a town on the outskirts of Guangzhou, China. Its name means "Lion Ridge", so called because of the local mountain ridge that is shaped like a lion . Shiling Town has long consisted of small farms abutting the mountains from which it gets its name. In the 1970s the government began...
at the foot of the Pangu King Mountain. The Huadu District is located north of Guangzhou
Guangzhou
Guangzhou , known historically as Canton or Kwangchow, is the capital and largest city of the Guangdong province in the People's Republic of China. Located in southern China on the Pearl River, about north-northwest of Hong Kong, Guangzhou is a key national transportation hub and trading port...
to the west of the Baiyun International Airport
Baiyun International Airport
Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport or Pai Yuen Airport was the main airport in Guangzhou, People's Republic of China, until August 5, 2004, when it was replaced by the identically named Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport, some 25 kilometers north away. The airport was opened in 1932....
.
See also
- Chinese creation myth
- First man or womanFirst man or womanFirst man or woman may refer to:* The spouse of an elected head of state, see First Lady, First Gentleman.* First Man, the biography of Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon....
- ManuManu (Hinduism)In various Hindu traditions, Manu is a title accorded to the progenitor of mankind, and also the very first brahman king to rule this earth, who saved mankind from the universal flood. He was absolutely honest which was why he was initially known as "Satyavrata"...
- TiamatTiamatIn Babylonian mythology, Tiamat is a chaos monster, a primordial goddess of the ocean, mating with Abzû to produce younger gods. It is suggested that there are two parts to the Tiamat mythos, the first in which Tiamat is 'creatrix', through a "Sacred marriage" between salt and fresh water,...
- YamaYamaYama , also known as Yamarāja in India and Nepal, Shinje in Tibet, Yanluowang or simply Yan in China, Yeomla Daewang in South Korea and Enma Dai-Ō in Japan, is the lord of death, in Hinduism and then adopted into Buddhism and then further into Chinese mythology and Japanese mythology. First...
- YmirYmirIn Norse mythology, Ymir, also called Aurgelmir among the giants themselves, was the founder of the race of frost giants and was later killed by the Borrs.-Etymology:...
Sources
- Xu ZhengXu ZhengXú Zhěng was a Three Kingdoms period Daoist author of the "Three Five Historic Records" . The "3-5" refers to the "Three August Ones and Five Emperors" .-References:...
(徐整; pinyinPinyinPinyin is the official system to transcribe Chinese characters into the Roman alphabet in China, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan. It is also often used to teach Mandarin Chinese and spell Chinese names in foreign publications and used as an input method to enter Chinese characters into...
: Xú Zhěng; 220-265 AD), in the book Three Five Historic Records (三五歷紀; pinyinPinyinPinyin is the official system to transcribe Chinese characters into the Roman alphabet in China, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan. It is also often used to teach Mandarin Chinese and spell Chinese names in foreign publications and used as an input method to enter Chinese characters into...
: Sānwǔ Lìjì), is the first to mention Pangu in the story "Pangu Separates the Sky from the Earth". - Ge HongGe HongGe Hong , courtesy name Zhichuan , was a minor southern official during the Jìn Dynasty of China, best known for his interest in Daoism, alchemy, and techniques of longevity...
(葛洪; pinyinPinyinPinyin is the official system to transcribe Chinese characters into the Roman alphabet in China, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan. It is also often used to teach Mandarin Chinese and spell Chinese names in foreign publications and used as an input method to enter Chinese characters into...
: Gě Hóng; 284-364 AD), in the book Master of Preserving Simplicity Inner Writings (抱朴子内篇; pinyinPinyinPinyin is the official system to transcribe Chinese characters into the Roman alphabet in China, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan. It is also often used to teach Mandarin Chinese and spell Chinese names in foreign publications and used as an input method to enter Chinese characters into...
: BaopuziBaopuziThe Baopuzi , written by the Jin Dynasty scholar Ge Hong 葛洪 , is divided into esoteric Neipian 內篇 "Inner Chapters" and exoteric Waipian 外篇 "Outer Chapters". The Daoist Inner Chapters discuss topics such as techniques for xian 仙 "immortality; transcendence", Chinese alchemy, elixirs, and demonology...
Neipian), describes Pangu (Werner, E.T.C. Myths and Legends of China (1922)). - Ouyang XunOuyang XunOuyang Xun , courtesy name Xinben , was a Confucian scholar and calligrapher of the early Tang Dynasty. He was born in Hunan, Changsha, to a family of government officials; and died in modern Anhui province.-Achievements:...
(歐陽詢; pinyinPinyinPinyin is the official system to transcribe Chinese characters into the Roman alphabet in China, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan. It is also often used to teach Mandarin Chinese and spell Chinese names in foreign publications and used as an input method to enter Chinese characters into...
: Ōuyáng Xún; 557-641 AD), in the book Classified Anthology of Literary Works (藝文類聚; pinyinPinyinPinyin is the official system to transcribe Chinese characters into the Roman alphabet in China, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan. It is also often used to teach Mandarin Chinese and spell Chinese names in foreign publications and used as an input method to enter Chinese characters into...
: Yiwen LeijuYiwen LeijuThe Yiwen Leiju is a Chinese encyclopedia completed during the Tang Dynasty by the calligrapher Ouyang Xun.It was divided into 47 sections and many subsections. It covered all subjects and contains many quotations from older works, many long lost. It also cites its sources. It was completed by...
), also refers to Pangu. - Carus, Paul (1852-1919) in the book Chinese Astrology, Early Chinese Occultism (1974) based on an earlier book by the same author Chinese Thought (1907).