36 Tiangang 72 Disha
The Thirty-Six Heavenly Gangs and the Seventy-Two Earthly Fiends come from "Water Margin", one of the four famous classics in ancient China. It has been passed down to this day and has also been made into film and television dramas, which has a profound impact on modern people. The heroes of Liangshan, thirty-six Tiangang and seventy-two evil spirits gathered together to unify the country.
What does Thirty-six Tiangang and Seventy-two Disha mean? It has a strong Taoist color
In "Water Margin", 108 heroes are divided into thirty-six Tiangang and seventy-two Disha. , the sum of 36 and 72 is exactly 108, which has an obvious traditional Taoist color. Taoism believes that there are 36 Tiangang stars in the Big Dipper cluster, and each Tiangang star has a god, collectively called the Thirty-six Tiangang stars; there are also 72 Earth evil stars in the Big Dipper cluster, and each Earth evil star also has a god, collectively called the Seventy-two Earth evil stars. .
Thirty-six and seventy-two: magical numbers with the idea of Five Elements Feng Shui
36 and 72 are two mysterious numbers in ancient Chinese traditional culture and appear frequently. On various occasions: there are 36 strategies in "The Art of War"; there are 36 moves in traditional martial arts routines; there are 36 scenes in the Royal Garden Summer Resort; Confucius had three thousand disciples and 72 sages; it is said that Liu Bang, the emperor of the Han Dynasty, had 72 moves on his left leg There is a black mole; Chi You has 72 brothers; as the saying goes: Seventy-two lines, one will be the number one scholar; and there are also the well-known 72 transformations of Sun Wukong. In addition, people also like to use 36 and 72 to describe beautiful scenery. For example, Wuyi Mountain is said to have 36 peaks, and Huangshan, Hengshan and Songshan are said to have 72 peaks. It seems that the two numbers 36 and 72 occupy a special position in our country's traditional culture.
36 is the sum of six and six multiplied, and six is an auspicious number advocated by ancient Chinese. Each hexagram in "The Book of Changes" has six lines, and the sounds have six rhythms. In ancient times, scholar-bureaucrats had six ministers, and family relationships had six relatives. After Qin Shihuang unified the country, six was used as the numbering system, hats were six inches long, cars were six feet long, six horses were used to drive, and so on. There were originally 36 generals in "Water Margin", so Song Jiang said: Sixty-six flying geese and eight or nine in a row.
As a mysterious number, 72 originated from the Five Elements thought. In the Five Elements Concept, a year is divided into five directions: east, west, south, north, and middle. The 360 days in a year are divided into 72 periods, with each period having 5 days. Mr. Wen Yiduo specially wrote the article "Seventy-Two" for textual research on this issue. He pointed out: "Seventy-two" is the fifth grade of three hundred and sixty days in a year, and this book is an evolution of the Five Elements thought. This term is a representation of a cultural activity. It can be seen that 72 is the basic calculation number in the ancient calendar and is closely related to social production and life. Therefore, it has a profound impact on people's concept of quantity.