Text | Reading Jun
The ancients paid attention to "avoiding secrets", which was not only for the royal family, high-ranking officials and nobles, but also for ordinary people. The state has "national secrets", the family has "family secrets", and the people have "people's secrets".
For example, At that time, Li Zhi of Tang Gaozong became a special character of the emperor because of a "zhi" character in his name, which led to no one else being able to read and write, and in the writing, if he encountered the word "zhi", he could only be replaced by other synonymous characters.
This kind of avoidance continued until several years after the emperor's death, and even after the demise of the dynasty, it could not be restored again.
As we all know, Chinese are very sensitive and exquisite to age and numbers. Just as Westerners are very sensitive to personal privacy such as income, age, marriage, and love. For example, the old saying "36 does not mention, 73 does not say, 84 does not speak, 100 years old to hide", what does this mean? And what is the emphasis on "avoiding secrecy"?
01 "36 not to mention"
Life is not only a journey, but also a period of grinding and bumps. The ancients believed that in everyone's life, there will always be different life ups and downs, especially at a certain time node.
As the old saying goes, "Thirty and standing, forty without confusion, fifty and knowing the destiny, sixty and obedient, seventy and from the heart, do not exceed the rules." What is mentioned here is a summary of each age stage of life by the ancients.
Similar to this, "36 does not mention, 73 does not say, 84 does not speak, 100 years old to hide", but also particularly emphasizes some taboos of a certain age in life.
We often say "thirty and standing", people reach the age of 30, is an important age node for a person to mature and stabilize. At the age of 36, it is reasonable to say that it is the period of youth and adulthood, when the mind and ability to do things are more mature, and it is the time when the style is flourishing and the fists and feet are displayed. At this time, why is there a saying that "36 does not mention"? There are probably two reasons for this:
First, as we all know, in our traditional culture, the number "9" has a lot of attention. First of all, it is regarded as an imaginary number and a pole number to the yang.
First of all, in the number, it is the largest, for this reason "nine" is regarded as the supreme number, which is favored by the emperor, such as the nine of the "nine-five-five". In addition, the palace building is also often built on the basis of the multiple of nine.
In addition, "nine" has the emphasis of the light nine and the dark nine. What is Ming Jiu? It refers to the number "nine" directly, such as nine, nineteen, thirty-nine, forty-nine...
In ancient culture, "nine" is the number of the yang, "nine" is the largest, as the saying goes, "nine nine to one", people are very jealous of these, so every nine is difficult, such as the "Journey to the West" in the Four Tang monks and apprentices experienced the "nine nine eighty-one difficulties" of the Western Heavens to learn the scriptures. Therefore, at these special ages, people usually feast on guests and pray for blessings and disasters.
What is Dark Nine? Dark nine refers to multiples of nine such as "eighteen, twenty-seven, thirty-six, fifty-four years old, sixty-three years old, seventy-two years old..." Everyone should have heard such a sentence, "Ming Nine is not terrible, Dark Nine is greater than heaven", so people think that Dark Nine is more unlucky, more disasters and difficulties.
In the eighth and eighth episode of "Dream of the Red Chamber", there is such a description: Mandarin Duck Road:
"Because the old lady will be eighty-one years old next year, she is a dark nine, and she has promised a merit of nine days and nights, and she has the heart to write three thousand six hundred and fifty-one Diamond Sutras."
The dark nine here means "great calamity" and many disasters.
Illustration of "Dream of the Red Chamber"
"36 do not mention", the thirty-six years old here, that is, there is the meaning of the dark nine, the so-called four nine thirty-six, and added and "four (harmonious death)" is related, in addition, thirty-six is exactly the year of the life, so it is quite unlucky, so we should try to avoid mentioning, for this reason the ancients said "36 do not mention".
02 "73 don't say, 84 don't talk"
There is an old Chinese saying called "seventy-three eighty-four, the king of Yama does not call himself to go", which refers to these two age points, which are two obstacles for the elderly. Why are these two age points?
Below, the two people mentioned by Shu Shujun must be very familiar to everyone, one is Confucius, the other is Mencius, these two are the most famous figures in Chinese history.
Historically, the life expectancy of the sage Confucius was 73 years, and Mencius was 84 years old. The ancients believed that saints like these two so great and powerful, like gods, would encounter "calamity" at this age and pass away from the world. Then, for ordinary people, it is more necessary to pay attention. To this end, the ancients regarded these two age points as two hurdles in our lives, and we should pay special attention to them.
When the old people in the countryside reach the age of 73 or 84, they usually do not tell the truth, but report one more year old, or say one year younger, or confuse the past in other ways, so as not to be overheard by the king of Yama and hooked.
03 "100 years old to hide"
In ancient times, productivity was low, people's living standards and medical level were relatively low, the average life expectancy of people would be relatively short, 50 years old was already considered longevity, and 100 years old was already considered the ultimate rare high life. To this end, in China's traditional culture, the elderly have a birthday, and our congratulatory words to the elderly are often indispensable to the word "long life and a hundred years".
However, in rural areas, when the elderly reach the age of 100, they often do not directly say 100 years old, but say 99 years old or express it in a cryptic way.
Why hide it? Because there is a saying in the countryside that there is a fixed number of people's life expectancy, once the old man's life expectancy is too long, it will be considered by the old Yama King to be borrowed from the younger generation, which means that the younger generation will have a short life. For this reason, in order not to let the old Yama King know, the old people will deliberately hide their age and not say it directly.
In addition, people often say "long life hundred years", "long life hundred years old", people live to 100 years old, life seems to be coming to an end, which sounds somewhat unlucky meaning, so to "hide", to avoid.
04 Reader Jun said
China is a country that pays great attention to cultural customs, especially the people, and pays more attention to all aspects of life. Many short folk proverbs hide a lot of cultural customs.
However, regarding the saying "36 do not mention, 73 does not say, 84 does not speak, 100 years old to hide" is exquisite, this statement has a relatively strong superstitious color. Of course, even so, many elderly people still believe in this very much. Of course, leaving aside some feudal superstitions, there are some beautiful visions mixed in.
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