Folklore Friday: The Creation of the Elements

Hey guys, welcome to Learn Feng Shui, where you'll learn Feng Shui from a classical point of view taken out the myths and superstition. If you like weekly tips as well as fun folklore tales, you'll enjoy learning Feng Shui with me. Hey guys, welcome to Folklore Friday. Today I'm going to be telling you a creation story about the five elements and how they became men. Hey guys, another fun book that I got that I wanted to kind of do a reading from for the folklore Fridays is one called Chinese fairy tales and legends.

And it's by Richard Wilhelm and Fred. Eric H. Martins and I'll put a link to the book below in the notes. The first story I'll be reading is one called How the Five Anxions Became Men. And this is a little bit of a play on the creation story.

I think every culture has one. I really like this book because it does note at the bottom of the page, you know, whether it's a oral tradition that was passed on or you know, whether it's been written down, it kind of the origins of it. So I highly recommend this book. I really like it. It actually has a really beautiful cover of a lovely Chinese dragon in the front.

But here are the notes that says this fairy tale brings together the five elemental spirits of earth, fire, water, wooden metal to offer your creation myth. It says here the philosopher credited with this Taoism, a stat, sorry, establishing Taoism is Latsu or Latsu. And Latsu was born in 601 BCE and his teachings had considerable influence during the Tang Dynasty, which was from 618 to 10. 10.9.07.000. How the five ancients became men.

Although there are some similarities, this fascinating creation myth, which also explains how the Chinese philosophy of Taoism came into being, is very different to Western versions. Before the earth was separated from the heavens and there was only a great ball of water evapour called Chaos. And at that time, the spirits of the five elemental powers took shape and became the five ancient. The first was called the Yellow Ancient and was the ruler over the earth. The second was called the Red Lord and was the ruler over fire.

The third was the Dark Lord, he was the ruler over water. And the fourth was known as wood prints and he was the ruler of wood. The fifth was called the Mother of Metals and ruled over them all. I actually really like that because I myself am a metal day master. So if you do Chinese astrology and Bazi, you'll know that everybody has an element they're associated with and also an animal.

So I think I want to be now referred to as the Mother of Metals. I'm going to tell my kids. These five ancients set their primal spirit into motion so that the water and earth sank down. The heavens flooded upwards in the earth grew firm in the depths. Then they allowed the waters to gather into rivers and seas and hills and plains made their appearance.

So the heavens opened up and the earth was divided. And there was a sun and a moon and a stars in the wind clouds and rain and dew. The yellow ancient said earth's purest power spinning in a circle and added the effect of fire and water there too. Then came forth grasses and trees, birds and beasts and the tribes of the serbots and insects, fishes and turtles. The wood prints and the Mother of Metals combined light and darkness and thus created the human race of men and women.

And thus the world gradually came to be. At the time there was one who was known as the true Prince of the Jasper Castle. He had acquired the art of sorcery through the cultivation of magic and the five ancients begged him to rule as the supreme god. He dwelt above the three and thirty heavens and the Jasper Castle of white jade with golden gates with his. The four hymns to the stewards of the eight and twenty houses of the moon and the god of thunder and the great bear.

In addition a class of baneful gods whose influence was evil and deadly. They all aided the true Prince of the Jasper Castle to rule over the thousand tribes under the heavens and deal out life and death fortune and misfortune. The lord of the Jasper Castle is known as the great god and the white jade ruler. So after this subsequently they kind of withdrew as they had already done their work and they lived there after in quiet purity. So they were just chilling guys.

The red lord dwells in the south and is the god of fire. The dark lord dwells in the north and he is the mighty master of the somber polar skies. He lives in a castle of liquid crystal and in later age he seems confused down on earth as a saint. Hence the saint is known as the son of crystal. The wood prince dwells in the east and he is honored as the green lord and watches over the coming into being of all creatures.

In him lives the power of spring and he is the god of love. And remember guys spring time it's honored in the Chinese tradition as why the elunar new year celebrated and the new solar cycle comes in during the spring time. The mother of metals dwells in the west by the sea of Jasper and is known as the queen mother of the west. She leads around the fairies and watches over change and growth telling you I relate to this lady even more now. I'll leave a charge of fairies guys.

The gill ancient dwells in the middle and he's always going about the world in order to save those in distress. The first time he came to earth he was the yellow lord who taught mankind all sorts of arts. In his later years he fathomed the meaning of the world in the ethereal mount and flew into the radiant sun. Under the rule of the chod dynasty he was born again and he when he was born he actually had a white hair in a beard. And I think I've probably talked about him before because that sounds so familiar.

So for which reason they called him old child. He wrote the book of meeting of life and spread his teachings throughout the world. He's honored as the head of Taoism. And at the beginning of the reign of the Han dynasty he appeared again as the old man of the river. And he spread the teachings of the Tao abroad mightily so that from this time on Taoism greatly flourished.

These doctrines are known to this day as the teachings of the yellow ancient. There's also a saying of First Lantzi was and then the heavens were. And that must mean that Lantzi was the very same yellow ancient of the primal days. So a quick little aside again talking about the center area of you know where this yellow ancient was supposed to come from. One of the things that I would like to kind of point out is that if you know a lot of people when they start doing Feng Shui you may know that you are a certain guan number.

So a certain area in your home affects you more you know you might be a guan 7 or a guan 3 or whatever right. And so you know that you know if you're a guan 7 you look towards the west right and you know it gives you favorable and unverable directions you know that. But one of the things that I kind of want to point out is that a true gua 5 comes from the center although it is true that you know it reverts to a 2 or 8. If you're a true gua 5 there's something very powerful about that and it said you can actually control the energies and stuff like that. And so I'm actually still learning more about that but don't discount that 5 as a guan number because it actually makes you special.

One thing I have noticed in people that are a true gua 5 is that they have extreme highs and lows in life or they have extreme events happen to them. So I would actually urge you to go calculate your guan number you just do it based on the year you're born. And it's called your guan number GUA and sometimes it's KUA. And I would urge you to look if you're a 5 I would wager to bet that you've had some extreme things happen to you and you can actually you're actually one of the people that can control the 5 star and actually use it to your advantage. And I will say though I don't encourage you to try that because it needs to be activated under very specific circumstances to be beneficial.

And I do not encourage you to try to use it without knowing what you're doing. So with that being said I hope you find that interesting but again don't forget to check out my monthly Feng Shui Workshop that's just open to everybody. Go register for that and I hope to see you there.