New Classic Press

Author：Ye Shuxian

Translator: Xiong Chengxia

Publishing house: New Classic Press

Publication date: 2022

Introduction：

Introduction: “Chinese Mythology Philosophy” searches for mythological conceptions in the Chinese thinking system and explores the narrative structure of “metalanguage” in mythology and philosophy from the original relationship between mythological thinking and philosophical thoughts. The author attempts to break the boundaries between

* myths and philosophy (metaphysical verses concrete concepts);
* opinions from different disciplines such as comprehensive literal anthropology, archaeology, exegesis linguistics, and social science; and * research theories and methodologies between “Eastern” and “Western” studies.
Using the principles from literal anthropology, Claude Lévi-Strauss’ Structuralist theory of mythology, Jung’s mythical and archetypal criticism and Shizuka Shirakawa’s Linguistic Palaeontology, he re-examines and re-interprets Chinese mythical texts, religions and psychological structures, demonstrating the endeavour of a Chinese scholar in his search of international discourses and the cultural consciousness and roots of native theories.

This book consists of three parts. Titled “Taichi of the Yi (Change)”, Part I reconstructs the metalanguage of Chinese mythological philosophy according the theory of archetype model, unveils the mysteries of and the links between the emperor’s Ming Tang (ancestor’s hall) and the four faces of the Yellow Emperor, explores the legend about the seven holes of Hundun the Chaos and the cosmological view of the Seven Day Creation, the origins of the magical earth, Xirang and the expression of “Shenzhou”, the sacred country. It analyses the ancient sacrificial ceremony “Taiyi”, myths of the four seasons and related rituals and reveals the cultural messages hidden behind, establishes the space and time coordinates for the Chinese mythical cosmological model, and explains the theorical origins of Chinese philosophical concepts including the Yin and Yang theory, the Five Elements, the “Union of Heaven and Man”, and the Dao of Laozi and Confucius’.

In Part II “The Four Faces of the Yellow Emperor” and Part III “The Land of Jiuzhou /China”, the author gives in-depth discussions on the space/time and life philosophies of Chinese mythology. He compares the myths of the “Four-faced Yellow Emperor” with the four-faced Brahma from India as well as the mythical archetypes of the cosmologtree and the Cross across the world, and decodes the hidden correlation between the “four faces, one heart” of the Yellow Emperor and the “four halls towards the central one” in the Ming Tang architectural structure. From the ancient Chinese creation myths, i.e., “The Seven Holes of Hundun” and “The Chicken-Man Creation”, he uncovers the foundation of 3-D spatial concepts in Chinese philosophy, and validates the unique spatial structure of the Shang culture in central China from the corresponding relation in animal sacrifices between chicken, dog, sheep/goat and pig and the directions of the East, South, West and North.

“Chinese Mythology Philosophy” explores the philosophical content of ancient mythological texts from individual myths, reveals the general structural rules and the indicative model of the metalanguage of ancient Chinese myths. It will offer great references and insights to the comparative study on the mythical thinking of the world.