China, the Talented Child

Great artworks are religious as they all pursue truth and care for the eternity of the souls.

By Qu Feng

I

Whenever I visit the bookstores, I find a lot of books about education for talented children. I also read a lot of similar articles in the newspaper. In China, people have been crazy about talented children since ancient times, and we have been so used to such craziness. In the Tang Dynasty, some of the Imperial Examinations were specially designed for talented children. Some families made themselves a laughing stock while trying to train talented children.

I suppose the emphasis in Chinese tradition on talented children must have its cultural and psychological reasons. And I believe these reasons are not necessarily as incomprehensible as they would seem. The Chinese people have long been zealous about discovering and cultivating talented children because the Chinese culture itself is a culture of precocity.

None of us can avoid discussing the precocious nature of the Chinese culture. And this is true in the history of religion as well as the history of art.

Contrasting to other ancient civilizations in the world, there were no native epics in the Chinese history, which is very surprising and unsettling to historians of the world. An epic is typically part of the origin of an ancient civilization. It is almost impossible for a nation with rich ancient tradition not to have an epic. For example, the Greeks have Odyssey and Iliad, the Babylonians have Gilgamesh, and the Indians have Mahabharata. Even the Northern European Germanic people, who do not have an ancient civilization, manage to offer a few glorious epics.

China is the only exception. Precocity is the reason why China quickly bypassed the era of epics. Thus, what was supposed to be an era of foolishness, the Chinese people went through it without being foolish. What was supposed to be an era of superstition, the Chinese people went through it with historic and moral order. What was supposed to be an era of epics, our ancestors came up with the elegant verses of The Book of Songs.

Most children need to be fed with fables, but talented children only need adult logic. Likewise, epics were never necessary in the precocious ancient China. Besides, China's written language also contributed to China's failure to give birth to epics. All epics started out as an art of oral narration. As they became mature, they were acknowledged and accepted by the emerging written language. So epics were born in the transformational process from oral literature to written literature. The Chinese written language was born way too early for this kind of oral literature to survive and therefore there were very few records of oral tradition in ancient Chinese literature.

Indeed, the invention and development of Chinese characters also became important characteristics of the precocity of Chinese culture. China had a fairly complete pictographic system as early as the Shang Dynasty. There is another important point. According to philanthropic theories, the earlier the written language emerged for a nation, the weaker the religious belief for the nation and the stronger the intellectual mind.

II

Talented children possess inspirations that are beyond our comprehension. They are born that way and their wisdom is above that of others. They do not entertain blind worship because they do not have a childhood of ignorance. As a result, talented children typically do not have the kind of humbleness and piety that are necessary for social survival. They lack the sense of religion. This will have a negative impact on the rest of their life if there is no timely and true self-examination.

For this reason, the spiritual backbones of the Chinese culture were morality, humanism and realism. Most of the well-known Chinese ancient writings did not contain any flavors of religion or legends. Wisdom, realism and utilitarianism became the main streams of the Chinese culture. Although in the Shang Dynasty the worship of heavens and the worship of ancestors were very popular and systematic, the Zhou Dynasty, Shang's successor, established its own rituals and system of justice and it completely abandoned the serenity of the religious flavor established by its predecessor. Therefore, spiritual value was replaced with earthly value. And China had since lost the opportunity of building up religious beliefs.

By the time Confucianism, centered at the colorful Doctrine of the Mean, was officially accepted in the Han Dynasty, the nation had already entered a spiritual mindset that focused on worldly life. Utilitarianism prompted them to pick their own idols to worship based on their daily needs and this was especially true following the birth of Taoism and the inflow of Buddhism. Emperors could dictate religious practice as they wished and they could even grant titles to gods. Both Taoism and Buddhism continually made flexible adjustments based on the tastes of the public. It became one of the important aspects in China's religious life to worship or make gods according to their own needs.

The Buddhist sects represented by Zen immediately fell into China's spiritual convention. Their original religious spirit and nature easily subsided. Although Taoism promoted tranquillity and peace, the oriental nihilism it demonstrated and the spiritual incarnation it emphasized all resulted in ego-centricism. It never seriously entered the realm of religion due to its refusal of divine values. Without repentance, without the realization of sinful nature and ultimate values, this oriental religion was never a religion in reality.

On the positive side, thanks to the precocity of the Chinese culture, to the nation's pursuit of utilitarianism and realism and to Confucianism that neutralized the society with the Doctrine of the Mean, the Chinese civilization, like a talented kid, managed to escape depression, tension and other disasters like no other civilizations and stubbornly survived with unprecedented adhesion like no other civilizations.

III

Lack of religious mentality prompted oriental artists to pursue their own spirituality, which was consistent with their precocious culture. Contrast to their occidental counterparts, oriental artists were experts in showing off their talent and personality through poetry and paintings, and in creating fascinating sensuality. They might be on exile, but they were able to appreciate the ocean waves and mountain forests in their heart and to translate them into elegant paintings. They might be homeless or they might have a hard time feeding themselves, but a simple piece of instrument, whether a two-stringed Hu or a bamboo flute, was all they needed to transform poverty into colorful, and sometimes enviable, romanticism. Sensuality became a noble thing. It demonstrated a strong push for individual spirituality and indulgence. At the same time, it also uncovered the nation's lack of divinity in its oriental culture.

Therefore, the beauty of oriental art brings excitement to its audience. The fruitful orchid in the east, the beautiful pasture in the south and the graceful sea life in the north all emphasize formality and techniques. In contrast, the beauty of occidental art brings speechless silence to its audience. Oriental artists throw themselves into excitement and indulgence, and they feel the supremacy and freedom of mankind and the emptiness and transparency of the world. In the end they fall into the trap of self-indulgence without realizing it. Occidental artists, however, find themselves in melancholy and heart-broken sorrows, through which they feel the insignificance and humbleness of mankind and the burden of the world. In the end they experience love and life through hardships.

For the purpose of illustration, let us compare Tolstoy of the West with Cao Xue-qin of the East. In Tolstoy's novels, we do not see Cao's leisure, his concise structure and plot development, his musical and artistic approaches, his knowledge in astronomy, geography and medicine, his interests in cooking, riddles, astrology and other oriental intellectualism. In fact Tolstoy's writing style is by no means graceful. Sometimes it is even a bit dull. But the entire world acknowledges him as one of the greatest writers ever. One big reason is his writings are filled with care for the ultimate life and self-examination of the soul.

IV

A few days ago, I read a newspaper article written by a renowned contemporary writer, trying to defend oriental culture. The writer claims that oriental literary pieces, though not as heavy as occidental tragedies, are nevertheless rich and elegant and they elevate the souls into tranquillity and peace. Then the writer strongly criticizes those scholars who deny oriental literature with occidental viewpoints, as though they try to compare cheese of the West with cabbage of the East. This writer's viewpoint not only demonstrates the uncompromising confidence in traditional Chinese scholars toward oriental culture; it also uncovers China's deep-rooted uncompromising confidence toward mankind.

It is not hard to understand why China, like a talented child, decided to favor humanity over divinity. This, however, does not mean that the Chinese people had true humanism in the ten centuries before the Western Enlightenment. Just as a scholar pointed out, the 13^th-century humanistic movement of the West was by no means a humanistic challenge against the Divine. Rather it was a humanistic rebellion against false gods and a return to the true God. In other words, humanity finds its root planted in pursuing divinity.

When a man gets too excited, it is hard for him to keep his composure. It is like a bunch of friends having a cocktail party, a happy event to start with. Then somebody becomes drunk, lost his consciousness, smashed the bar and beat up others. Then all things turn sour. Humanistic movement is like a car losing its brakes. It goes too far and in the wrong direction too. As they overturn the altar of the false gods, they also overturn the spiritual altar for the true God. Consequently they fall into the deep trap of nihilism, in which Nietzsche shockingly shouted: "God has died."

Be it the age of spirituality or that of nihilism, however, Western culture remains in a state of true religion because it always evaluates itself with divinity. The Chinese culture, on the other hand, evaluates itself with humanity. In China's history, you will not find the kind of conflicts that Western culture witnessed in humanistic movement. China's morality and utilitarianism differ from Westerners' consciousness of the Divine. They also differ from the kind of nihilism that recently fills the entire Western sky. Oriental culture is based on humanism and from the very beginning it has strong belief in human beings. It never humbles itself in front of the altar of God, and yet it never runs into serious conflicts with God either. It never gives up the Divine to go after nihilism. Although it emphasizes humanism, it also keeps a fuzzy relation with God. It lacks piety, and yet it tries to draw closer to God, or more accurately, the Lord is slowly drawing it to Him.

Chinese people believe that the graceful move of the Spirit is no more than transcendental overflow of human nature. They fail to realize that this is exactly what God grants to the East. All mankind is one. Both the West and the East have the same God. And so it is impossible that God would abandon the East. Men abandon God and God never abandons men. When oriental people mistake the wisdom from God as their own talent and feel pretty good about themselves, God laughs. Dealing with a naughty, arrogant, simplistic and transparent "talented child", He can only fix His eyes at him with expectations.

V

Therefore, even in the East where there is no religion, men cannot completely stay away from God. In fact, a pleasant realistic lifestyle without God only belongs to the long-lasting fuedalist era with pastoral life. Today, the structure of conventional morality in the East has long been smashed to pieces in revolutionary movements. The entire world, be it the East or the West, be it materialistic culture or spiritual culture, is gradually coming together as a single entity, and the call for God has become a common voice for the entire human race. And God once again leaves it to us to seize the religious opportunity and the right of choice.

In China, those who are close to my age and who were born during the Cultural Revolution are probably the last group that still have strong impressions about the Cultural Revolution. The tragedy of the Cultural Revolution is that the Chinese people, living in religious vacuum, were given a political doctrine to worship as if it were God. Such self-blasphemy of the souls directly excites their inner desire of destruction. Even today, Chinese people have not completely stepped out of this religious crisis. This is also one of the important reasons why Qi Gong is becoming real popular in the East.

It is the spiritual orientation of the East, and that of the entire human race as well, to seek and find Divinity that is lost in the oriental culture. Poetry is always supposed to be an expression of God's will. True art is always a praise of the Lord as it is not to please men but God. Therefore, great artworks are religious as they all pursue truth and care for the eternity of the souls. Just as a contemporary Chinese philosopher put it: "Our cultural art has long been bound by the territorial and national shadows so that it is no longer able to express eternal holy light, so that we forget we are but human beings. Our art ought to be spiritual. It is supposed to run through the four layers of structure: the heaven, the earth, mankind and God.

As a talented child, China has plenty of wisdom. But it does not have enough foolishness. And such foolishness is truly wisdom itself. To abandon the Divine is to abandon life. To abandon faith is to abandon love. If we continue to refuse the light of the Divine, our oriental wisdom will remain human wisdom or earthly wisdom. And the East will always be a child that sings with a beautiful voice outside the gate of Heavens.

The author is an archaeologist. He lives in China.