Weak River (mythology)

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"Weak River" redirects here. For the geographic river Ruo Shui (Weak River"), see
Ruo Shui
.
Oil lamp depicting the Queen of the West in her Heavenly Paradise together with relevant mythological geography and beings. Eastern Han ceramic unearthed at Chengdu, China.

The Weak River also known as the Weak Water or Ruoshui (

Sun Wukong, and companions must cross over on their mission to fetch the Buddhist scriptures from India and return them to Tang China.[1]

Mythical geography

Chinese mythology and imagination developed an extensive collection of ideas.

Weak Water River

The Weak River, or Weak Water, was so-called because nothing could float in it.[2]

Nearby features

Various mythological geography is associated with the Weak River, including one or more of the eight mountain pillars, especially the (mythological) Kunlun Mountain, the Red River, intervening terrain, such as the Moving Sands. Jade Mountain was also in the vicinity.[3]

Ideas

Main article: Kunlun (mythology)

As the mythology of the Weak River and related mythical geography developed, it was influenced by ideas from the

Mount Sumeru as an axis mundi, together with related cosmological features, such as rivers.[4] Also India was the goal of the Buddhist priest Xuanzang
and his companions in the Journey to the West.

Literature and poetry

Literature

The companions in one episode of Journey to the Weet. Mural in the Long Corridor, a covered walkway in the Summer Palace in Beijing, China.
Further information: Journey to the West

In the novel Journey to the West the Weak Water river forms one of the barriers on the way, one of the many difficult areas which the Xuanzang the Monk, Sun Wukong the Monkey, and their companions must cross over.

Poetry

Further information:
Chuci

The Weak Water River is an allusion in various Chinese Classical poems, the early Chuci anthology included. Pulled through the sky by a team of dragons, Qu Yuan soars above all obstacle rivers and hostile terrain at will during his spirit journey as described in his poem "

Zhuang Ji also known as Yan Ji in the second century BCE.[5] Also known as "Ai shi ming" this poem is an example of the use of the Weak Water River as an image, where in lines 15-22 the poet laments that he is not only irremediably separated from his lord due to earthly rivers which are wide and bridgeless, but that his desire to visit the Hanging Garden of Kunlun is not possible due to his inability to pass the barrier of the "rushing Weak Water".[6]
Apparently he was less worthy than Qu Yuan and chose to write a poem lamenting this.

Western Paradise

Queen of the West in her paradise. Eastern Han ceramic tomb tile. Unearthed at Chengdu, China.

The Weak River was often seen as a protective barrier against the profane and unworthy, protecting a Western Paradise. Often this Paradise was presided over by Xiwangmu, the Queen Mother of Meng Hao in the West, in later accounts was relocated to a palace protected by golden ramparts, within which immortals (

magical crane or dragon. The Wu
or shamans were people that practiced divination, prayer, sacrifice, rainmaking, and healing: they in specialized traveling by spirit flight, induced through the usual shamanic means.

Real Ruo Shui

Taklimakan
Desert, with real Ruo Shui visible as the faint green trace to the right of the satellite image.
Main article:
Ruo Shui

There is a real, geographical Ruo Sui (

Ejin Basin in the Gobi Desert, forming one of the largest inland deltas or alluvial fans in the world, its drainage basin covering about 78,600 square kilometres (30,300 sq mi) in Gansu and Inner Mongolia
: on the other hand, the mythological Ruoshui River circles Kunlun and is the scene for all sorts of activities by deities, immortal, would-be immortals, and so on, and generally exists in an alternate reality of culture. However, both Ruo Shui rivers are directionally located in a somewhat northern and western way.

See also

References cited

  1. ^ Yu 1980
  2. ^ Hawkes 2011, p. 337
  3. ^ Yang 2005, pp. 160โ€“162
  4. ^ Christie 1968, p. 74
  5. ^ Hawkes 2011, pp. 262โ€“263
  6. ^ Hawkes 2011, p. 264, line 21
  7. ^ Christie 1968, pp. 78โ€“79
  • Christie, Anthony (1968). Chinese Mythology. Feltham: Hamlyn Publishing.
    ISBN 0600006379
    .
  • ISBN 978-0-14-044375-2
    .
  • Yang, Lihui, ed. (2005). Handbook of Chinese Mythology. New York: Oxford University Press.
    ISBN 978-0-19-533263-6
    .
  • Wu Cheng'en (1980) [c. 1592]. Yu, Anthony C. (ed.). The Journey to the West. Translated by
    ISBN 978-0-226-97150-6
    .
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