Tujia Folk Beliefs and Culture: Totem Worship (Part 1)
Chapter One: Totem Worship. A totem is a primitive object of worship taking the form of an animal, plant, inanimate object, or natural phenomenon. There are various interpretations of the meaning of totem, which can be summarized as follows: in the primitive mind, the totem is an ancestral deity or blood relative, the guardian spirit of the clan, and the clan's symbol. The Tujia ancestors, the Ba people, historically...
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Chapter One Totem Worship
A totem is a primitive object of worship taking some animal, plant, inanimate object, or natural phenomenon as its object. There are many explanations of the meaning of totem, and summed up they roughly include the following meanings: in the minds of primitive people, the totem was an ancestral spirit or blood relative, the guardian spirit of the clan, and also the symbol of the clan. The Ba snake totem and white tiger totem that existed in the history of the Ba people, ancestors of the Tujia, contained these meanings.
The totem of the Ba people, ancestors of the Tujia, took Lin Jun as the dividing line and was utterly different before and after: before Lin Jun it was the Ba snake, and after him it was the white tiger. From the Ba snake to the white tiger, there undoubtedly occurred a transformation like being reborn.
I. The Ba Snake Totem
The ethnic name of the Ba people, "Ba," was taken from the snake totem and had nothing to do with the tiger, which shows that the tiger was not the earliest totem of the Ba people.
The Ba people's custom of worshipping the white tiger began with Lin Jun; however, Lin Jun was not the earliest ancestor of the Ba people. When historical books narrate Lin Jun's origins, they say "the Ba clan's son Wuxiang," which shows that before Lin Jun there were already Ba people. The early Ba people before Lin Jun did not worship the tiger, but worshipped the snake. "Classic of Mountains and Seas" says: "In the southwest there is the state of Ba. Taihao begot Xianniao, Xianniao begot Chengli, Chengli begot Houzhao, and Houzhao was the first of the Ba people." Taihao is Fuxi, who is said to have been "a snake body with a human head, possessing sagely virtue." According to Mr. Fan Wenlan's speculation, he may have come from a clan that took the snake (or dragon) as its totem. Since the Ba people were a branch of Taihao Fuxi, they too may naturally have taken the snake as their object of totem worship.
Xu Shen's "Explanation of Words and Analysis of Characters," explaining the character "Ba," says: "Ba, a worm." Or it says, "a snake that eats elephants." "Ba" as the ethnic name of the Ba people clearly took its totemic object of worship, because the phenomenon of using totems as clan names was universally present among primitive clans throughout the world.
The formation of a totem is always accompanied by the production of corresponding myths and legends. "Ancient Novels Recovered" compiles "Records of the Mysterious Middle" saying: "Northwest of Kunlun there is a mountain, with a circumference of thirty thousand li, around which a giant snake coils, making three circuits." The Kunlun mountain range, five or six thousand years ago, had a relatively mild climate and was a place of origin for giant snakes and elephants. "Classic of Mountains and Seas: Classic of the Great Wilderness, North" says: "In the southwest there is the state of Ba. There is a black snake with a blue head that eats elephants." "Classic of Mountains and Seas: Classic of Regions Within the Seas, South" says: "The Ba snake eats elephants, and after three years it expels their bones. If a gentleman consumes it, he will have no heart or abdominal ailments. The snake is blue, yellow, red, and black. One says it is a black snake with a blue head, west of the rhinoceros." "Classic of Mountains and Seas: Classic of Regions Within the Seas" says: "There is Ba Sui Mountain, from which the Mian River flows. There is also the state of Zhujuan. There is a black snake with a blue head that eats elephants."
From the above myths it can be seen: First, the places of origin of the Ba snake recorded were either the birthplace of the Ba people or places where the Ba people migrated and lived. These places either used "Ba" as a place name or called the snake "Ba," which shows that the relationship between the Ba people and snakes was very close. Second, the image of the Ba snake was fierce and enormous, clearly processed through fantasy, and its prototype should have been the python produced locally. This fantasy and processing expressed the Ba people's worship of snakes. Third, from the brief records it can be seen that the divine deed of the Ba snake was swallowing elephants; conversely, it can also be said that the snake that swallowed elephants was precisely the Ba people's totem, the Ba snake. The divine deed of swallowing elephants was created by the Ba people out of worship of the snake totem, and swallowing elephants thus became the characteristic of the Ba people's snake totem. The myth and legend of the Ba snake are in fact strong corroboration that the Ba people's totem was the snake.
In myths and legends, the relationship between the Ba Snake and Fuxi is also revealed. For example, Volume 158 of the Beitang Shuchao quotes the Shiyi Ji by Wang Zinian: "In ancient times, Bo Yu followed the mountains and dredged the rivers, carrying a night-glowing pearl to guide Yu. Yu then traveled day and night, covering more than thirty li, and no demons or spirits did he encounter, and the caves he dug were also wide. At last he came to a chamber, where there was a man with a body like snake scales, sitting on a stone. Yu spoke with him. He spoke of the time when the sun and moon first shone, and also of the present age, when great waves cover the sky and heavenly fire scorches, and earth and stone are all charred — this refers to the ages of Yao and Tang." The man with a body like snake scales must surely be Fuxi, and the great snake was Fuxi's follower. The snake was ten zhang long, with a tall body, and its belly was sufficient to contain an elephant; it must have belonged to the same category as the Ba Snake that swallowed elephants. This legend also reveals the subordinate relationship between the Ba Snake clan and Fuxi. In fact, the Ba Snake totem originated from the snake totem of the Central Plains in the Yellow River basin; from this it can be inferred that the Ba Snake totem also belonged to the Central Plains dragon totem. In the Central Plains and even in traditional Chinese belief culture, snake and dragon are interchangeable. In ancient texts, dragon and snake are often not distinguished; dragon and snake are often regarded as the same kind of thing, that is, the same kind of water creature:
The Zuo Zhuan, Duke Xiang, Twenty-First Year, says: "In deep mountains and great marshes, dragons and snakes indeed are born."
The Mencius, Teng Wen Gong II, says: "In the time of Yao, the waters flowed backward and flooded China. Snakes and dragons dwelt there, and the people had no settled place."
The Zuo Zhuan, Duke Zhuang, Fourteenth Year, commentary says: "Fu Qian says: The snake is a water creature of the north." The Zuo Zhuan, Duke Zhao, Twenty-Ninth Year, says: "The dragon is a water creature."
The Erya, Explaining Fish, says: "Li is the snake." Guo Pu's commentary: "It is of the dragon kind, able to raise clouds and mist and roam within them."
The Tang Shu says: "In the Xiantian period, Emperor Ming went in person to Longshou Pool to pray because of drought, and a red snake came out from the pool, and rain fell in season."
Fu Xiuyi of the Jin Dynasty, in his Ling She Ming (Inscription on the Divine Snake), says: "Blessed is this divine snake, cut yet able to rejoin. It flies without wings, moves without feet; above it soars to the clouds, below it roams the mountains. Meeting this bright pearl, it joins the dragon clan."
Guo Pu of the Jin Dynasty, in his Li She Zan (Praise of the Li Snake), says: "The Li snake mates with the dragon, leaping because of mist; though it wishes to ascend to heaven, when the clouds disperse it falls back to land."
Snake and dragon are divine beings of the same kind, with a relationship of origin. From the relationship of origin between dragon and snake, the ancients further created legends of snakes transforming into dragons:
The Xu Xian Zhuan says: "Sun Simiao once saved a green snake, which was a dragon's son. Later he was summoned by the Dragon King to the water palace and obtained three thousand prescriptions from the dragon palace, and composed thirty volumes of the Qianjin Fang, none of which existed in the human world."
The Bei Meng Suo Yan says: "In the Tongguang period, a man from Cangzhou named Zilu met a white snake on the road and tied it with a rope; he swung it and its head fell off. In a moment thunder and lightning snatched this man up into the air and he was burned to death by lightning. He fell to the ground with red writing on his back saying: This man killed the An Tian Dragon and was executed by the heavenly tally."
The Jian Sheng Ye Wen says: "Taizu was at Chu and once washed his hands in Baizi Pool; five snakes came to him and lingered, so he prayed to them saying: If the Mandate of Heaven rests on me, do you forever attach yourselves to me. One day after battle was finished, the lord sat on the ground, and suddenly a snake coiled at his side. The emperor then covered it with his helmet. Shortly after, battle was reported again, and he hastily put on his helmet and went. That day he killed very many with his own hand. By military law, after victory one must sacrifice to armor and helmet. The assembled generals, since the emperor's merit was greatest, placed the helmet in front and had just made the offering, when suddenly thunder crashed loudly, and a white dragon, sinuous and agile, emerged from the helmet, carrying thunder and grasping firelight, and soared into the sky. From this the generals were awed and submitted."
These legends reflect the ancient idea that snakes can transform into dragons, and also show that in traditional belief, snake and dragon are often hard to distinguish from each other. Therefore, the ancient Ba people's snake totem, inherited from the Central Plains, is also a form of expression of the dragon totem.
The Ba people and their Tujia descendants often merged snake worship with dragon worship. The Tujia myth "The Divine Dragon Creates Heaven, Earth, and Humanity" can also be seen as inherited from the ancient Ba people's snake totem myth: The myth says that in ancient times all was chaos, and the clear and turbid qi respectively transformed into the Yang Dragon and the Yin Dragon. After eight thousand eight hundred and eighty rounds of flying thunder and eight thousand eight hundred and eighty falls of falling blossoms, the Yang Dragon finished creating heaven and the Yin Dragon finished creating earth. But who would have thought that heaven was made small and earth was made very large. The Yin Dragon, seeing that part of the earth still lay outside heaven, was so anxious that it rolled on the ground, causing some ground to sink and other ground to rise. Heaven and earth then joined. The raised parts became high mountains, the sunken parts became deep valleys, and the cracks became rivers. The Yang Dragon governed heaven, and the Yin Dragon governed earth. Later, the Yin Dragon gave birth to two dragon sons, one with a human head and dragon body, and one with a dragon head and human body. They continually begot offspring, and through generations of evolution gradually became complete human form. In the myth, the dragon is both a creator god and an ancestral god, precisely embodying the characteristics of totem worship.
Ba Snake totem worship still exists today in Tujia legends. These legends are stories centered on snakes or dragons, such as "Big Brother Black Snake," "The Snake Son-in-Law," "The Snake Mother," "The Cowherd and the Red Snake," "The Origin of Dragon Cave Water," "Xiang Wang and the Green Dragon," "Five-Clawed Water," and so on, too numerous to count.
Traces of snake-dragon totem worship also remain in Tujia customs and daily life. The Tujia have several festivals related to dragons. On the sixth day of the sixth month they air dragon robes, and at the Dragon Boat Festival they race dragon boats and paste up "Dragon Boat Festival charms" inscribed with "The Green Dragon spreads rain, the White Tiger sits in the hall." On the fifteenth day of the first month they perform dragon lanterns, and the dragon lanterns and the way they are played are the same as those of the Han Chinese. The Tujia also have a unique "straw bundle dragon," made of tied straw with lit incense sticks inserted. It is said that dancing the straw bundle dragon can drive away evil. If a snake appears in a Tujia home, it must not be struck, because the snake is considered a household deity. Red snakes in particular are even more protected. The usual practice is, when a snake comes into the home, to burn paper and incense in the corner of the house and beg it to leave. To dream of a snake is considered an omen that a happy event will come. All of these can be seen as survivals of ancient Ba Snake totem worship.