The Chinese Culture Essay -- essays research papers fc

The Chinese Culture This report is about the myths and beliefs of the Chinese culture. It's about the stories the Chinese created to explain the world around them, and generally how they perceived their surrounding environment. This report deals with ancient myths and the people who believed them, and what the current believes of these people are. The Southwest Creation Story The Southwest creation story is a myth which explains why people are different. The myth begins by saying that there were people on earth who were all alike, meaning there weren't people who were black, white, oriental, etc.. It states that the humans on earth all generally were the same. There were also gods who lived above the clouds in the heavens. And there was a huge heavenly ladder which started on a mountain and reached all the way up to heaven's door. It goes on to tell a story of a man who had two children. One was a girl and the other was a boy. They lived in a house which had a huge very thick roof. The man had built the roof so thick because it rained almost every day. He hated the rain. He knew it had its benefits but too much of it ruined his crops, destroyed his livestock and every time it rained the roof of the house was destroyed. And every time the man rebuilt it, he made it thicker and thicker. He blamed all his misfortune on the Duke of Thunder. The Duke of Thunder was one of the gods who lived in the heavens. He was the god of rain and thunder. The man dispised the Duke very much and had a pure hatred of him. Every time it rained the Duke would descend from the heavens and stand on a hilltop. There he would watch with pure delight as the rains and thunder came down harder and harder. Finally the man had had enough. One day he took his axe and waited on the hilltop for the Duke to arrive. When the rains came so did the Duke, and the man slashed him in the back.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  The Duke was hurt but not killed because he was a god. The man caged him and brought him home. He put him in a corner and warned the kids not to go near him. And to especially not give him water. The next morning was a beautiful sunny one, but the Duke looked horrible almost as if he was dehydrating. The man told the children he had to go to the market and said again not to go near the Duke no matter wha... ... his son. Zoa was killed by his own brother who was ashamed of what his younger sibling had become. What the magician didn't tell Zoa was which close relative would kill him. Zoa who had become overconfident wasn't as great as he thought he was. And he was too arrogant to not know that the gods should not be challenged. This myth tells that becoming overconfident will eventually hurt you and that no one could beat their destiny. The Chinese in this story believed in the gods, they were very religious people and this myth tells that the gods should not be challenged. Both of these myths were written a long time ago and I don't think that the people today still believe in these myths as strongly as the people who wrote them did. I think it's like Halloween in our culture. We still practice the custom as the ancient people did but we don't have as much as a strong believe in ghosts and goblins as our ancestors did. Bibliography Birch, Cyril. Chinese Myths And Fantasies. Great Britain: London, 1992. Fei, Charles. Strange Creatures. New York, 1990 Ke, Yuan. Dragons And Dynasties. China: Beijing, 1993 *Chinese Myths.* Grolier Encyclopaedia, 12th ed. 1996.