Information about astrology

After a long period of development, the ancient astrology in China underwent an important qualitative change in the Tang Dynasty. Before this, astrology has always been pure astrology, but in the Tang Dynasty, it was combined with fortune telling to form a new kind of astrology: astrology, that is, astrology combined with birth date and other factors to analyze and judge a person's life and destiny. Astrology is a theory and technology used to predict catastrophic changes in national society or nature. It is not directed at one person, and astrology is completely different from it. It doesn't care about the country, society, nature and other non-personal affairs, but only wants to know the future fate of a specific person. The two are completely different not only in the object, but also in the prediction time. Astrology generally only predicts recent events, at most, it only involves events in a few years, and in rare cases, it only predicts the results in decades. Astrology is a matter of predicting a person's whole career, generally predicting a person's various fates from birth to death. Because of the appearance of astrology, we say that astrology has undergone a qualitative change and made a new breakthrough. At this point, the two major components of ancient astrology in China were all formed, which made the development of astrology reach its peak. Let's review the development of astrology from two aspects: astrology and astrology.

By the Tang Dynasty, astrology had developed to an unprecedented complexity and detail, which could be said to be all-encompassing. Its concentrated expression is the publication of the astrological masterpiece Kaiyuan Zhan Jing. But prosperity leads to decline, and the development of things is no exception, and astrology is no exception. After the synthesis of astrology in Kaiyuan Zhan Jing, it has actually broken away from the previous close relationship with social reality and is no longer concerned by society and scholars. Its social function and influence on ideological and academic studies are definitely not as good as those of astrology and its works in Han Dynasty, saying that astrology has declined and lost its vitality, and its position has gradually given way to the emerging astrology.

This change in astrology reflects a major change in China's social culture: the center of theological outlook on fate has shifted from the national court to individuals and individual families. With the maturity and consolidation of the feudal system, the astrology of the concept of destiny has become insignificant in its maintenance and consolidation and limited supervision, so its decline is inevitable. On the contrary, it is concerned with how to control individuals and their families, and astrology is one of the effective tools to serve this task. It takes advantage of the unpredictable curiosity and worries of ordinary people about their own destiny, satisfies it with a set of mysterious and complicated theories and techniques, and makes it pin its destiny on astrology, evil spirits and other foreign objects, and give up its own efforts, which is of course conducive to the stability and consolidation of the feudal system. The thought of star destiny is deeply rooted in people's hearts, which makes all living beings unconsciously give birth to a kind of self-control, which is very effective for social control. As a cultural phenomenon, astrology can survive in the secular society and play the role of a religious substitute in the historical process of nearly a thousand years, and it exists in a natural and habitual way, which shows that it is a culture that adapts to the psychological needs and knowledge level of the general public, so it has its own attraction and vitality without external indoctrination. Everything that exists is reasonable. As long as anything can exist alone in the historical process, it shows that it has certain rationality, although this "rationality" may not be established. Generally speaking, astrology originated in the Tang Dynasty, but the specific time of its appearance is not clear. Although there is no data to answer this question directly, we can indirectly infer the time when it came into being and who invented it through some relevant data.

One of the foundations of astrology is eight-character fortune telling, which will definitely not be earlier than Han Yu's era. Li, contemporary with Han Yu, is the originator of eight-character fortune telling, but in his place, only six words are used, that is, the branch of year, month and day, instead of the branch of year and day (eight characters). This is clearly written in Han Yu's epitaph for Li. It can be seen that during the Tianbao period of Tang Kaiyuan, the eight-character fortune-telling has not yet been formally formed, so the astrology will not be before this. On the other hand, the star life will not be later than this time. The evidence is that both Han Yu's A Journey to Three Stars and Du Mu's self-made epitaph have used the method of star destiny to discuss their own destiny. It can be seen that Han Yu and Du Mushi have the ability to live as stars. They died in 824 and 852 respectively, which is a lower limit.

On the other hand, anything can never be created in one morning, and so can astrology. For example, as early as the Eastern Han Dynasty, Wang Chong talked about the fate of Lu from the position of the stars. Of course, what Wang Chong said is not the same as the later astrology, but at least the idea that astrology is linked to personal destiny came into being very early. This can also be said to be the predecessor or source of the star life technique in later generations. It is conceivable that astrology was finally formed through the development process from Han Dynasty to Tang Dynasty. According to records, before Han and Li, there was no written record of people who supported astrology with their birthdays. Although Li only used six characters to predict fate, he basically had the framework and method theory of eight characters to predict fate in later generations, so Han Yu greatly appreciated it, and the experts of eight characters to predict fate in later generations respected it as their ancestor. At this time, it is not surprising that astrology is combined with six books of divination. The development of everything is always simple and rough, and it gradually becomes complex and fine, and the astrology is also tricky; Exceptions. It can be said that astrology in the Han and Li dynasties was still in its infancy, so only six words were used to infer fate. In addition, at the same time, there was a strange man who was praised as the founder by famous astrologers in later generations. This is the Tang Xuanzong, and later generations listed him as one of them, also known as Zhang.

Zhang Guo's astrology was handed down in the form of "League of Nations Q&A". Sure enough, Lian refers to Li Lian. Zhang Guo studied under Leo Lee, so later astrologers regarded Zhang Guo as the originator. Since the appearance of the Tang Dynasty, after the long-term development of the Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing Dynasties, astrology has become increasingly complex in content and methods, and has become a mysterious and difficult knowledge and technology. Therefore, experts who are truly proficient in astrology from ancient times to the present are extremely rare, unlike many experts who often appear in astrology. From Tang Dynasty to Qing Dynasty, only Yuan Dynasty, Zheng Xicheng, Liao Dynasty's Ye Luchun, Ming Dynasty's Wan Minying and Du were experts in astrology. Many experts and masters who are known as the art of star life often only push their lives on the eight characters but don't know the art of star life. Of course, there are also many charlatans who talk about the law of the destiny of the stars through hearsay, so they bluff and deceive the world. For these people, real star life experts are very contemptuous. Today, we trace the history of the fate of stars, also to make it clear that fish and pearls should not be confused.

In addition, it should be mentioned that in the process of independent development of ancient astrology in China, the astrology contents of foreign cultural systems were absorbed and integrated successively. As early as Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties. The astrology of Indian Buddhism has been translated and introduced to China. But there was no communication between astrology in China and astrology in Buddhism at that time. For example, in the Collection of Sui Shu Classics, there are three kinds of Buddhist astrological works, namely, Brahman Astronomy Classics, Brahman Immortal Theory and Brahman Astronomy, which are one of the appendages brought by the introduction of Buddhist culture.

By the Tang Dynasty, with the deepening and transformation of Buddhist culture in China, it had been merged with the cultures of China and Tong Tong to a certain extent, as well as in the field of astrology. For example: famous; China's astrological masterpiece Kaiyuan Zhan Jing was written by Qutanstar, an Indian who worked in the Royal Astronomical Society of China for four generations, which itself is a powerful symbol of the integration of Chinese and Indian astrology. In addition, Qutanstar also translated nine Indian calendars and included them in Kaiyuan Zhan Jing 104, which is another evidence of the integration of the two sides.

In the Ming Dynasty, with the arrival of western missionaries in China, western culture began to be introduced into China in a limited way. In this limited introduction, astrology is even included, which is really thought-provoking. Its outstanding performance is Munige's "Tian Bu Zhen Yuan Human Life Department", in which the specific methods and contents of western astrology at that time were introduced in detail. However, China's astrology did not completely absorb the western methods, but only selectively chose the layout of the zodiac to match the twelve o'clock and the zodiac in China.