Bianhua
Bianhua meaning "transformation, metamorphosis" was a keyword in both Daoism and Chinese Buddhism. Daoists used bianhua describing things transforming from one type to another, such as from a caterpillar to a butterfly. Buddhist translators used bianhua for Sanskrit nirmāṇa "manifest through transformations", such as the nirmāṇa-kaya "transformation body" of a Buddha's reincarnations.
Terminology
In Chinese linguistic morphology, biànhuà 變化 "change ; variation; transformation; metamorphosis; reincarnation" is categorized as a "synonymic compound" whose parts are synonyms, e.g., jiannan "difficult; hard" compounds jian "difficult; arduous" and nan "difficult; troublesome".For the Old Chinese etymologies, Axel Schuessler has bian 變 < *prans "to change" cognate with Tai plian "to change" and perhaps Written Tibetan sprul-ba or ˈpʰrul-ba "juggle; appear; change; transform"; and hua < hŋrôih 化 "to transform' change", e.g., from a fish into a bird; people through education; raw food through cooking", cognate with e < *ŋôi 吪 "to move; act; change", with possible Tibeto-Burman etymological links to Kinnauri skwal "to change" or Khaling kʰwaal "to shift; move". Walter Simon proposed the Sino-Tibetan etymological link between Chinese bian "change; transform" and Tibetan language sprul "juggle; perform tricks of illusion; change", and noted that the Chinese and Tibetan Buddhists chose these words to translate the Sanskrit technical vocabulary meaning "change; illusory transformation", such as, both sprul-sku and bianhuashen 變化身 translate nirmāṇa-kaya "transformation body".
In Modern Standard Chinese usage, biàn or means "change; become, change into; transform; perform "; and huà means "change, transform, convert; melt; dissolve, thaw; digest, remove; burn up, incinerate; disguise; die, pass away". Some common chengyu "four-character idioms" based upon bianhua are: biànhuàduōduān 變化多端 "changeable", biànhuàmòcè 變化莫測 "changeable; unpredictable", biànhuàwúcháng 變化無常 "constantly changing; unending changes", and qiānbiànwànhuà 千變萬化 "ever-changing ".
The modern Chinese character 變 for bian is classified as a radical-phonetic graph, combining the semantically significant "strike" radical or at the bottom with the phonetic indicator luan at the top. Bian was first recorded on Zhou dynasty bronze script; "The meaning of the drawing is uncertain, but it contains two hanks of silk, and Xu Shen said that it meant 'to bring into order', as in spinning or reeling". The modern character 化 for hua is classified as a compound-ideograph, combining the "person" radical or on the left and "spoon" radical on the right. However, in earlier bronze script and oracle script forms of 化, the right side was originally a 人 "person" upside-down, depicting "a person who flips, changes".
Chinese has a rich lexicon of words meaning "change", including bian, hua, fan 反 "turn over; return; counter; oppose", huan 還 "go/come back; give back; return; repay", yi 易 "change", and yi 移 "shift; adapt; modify; adjust"; and Joseph Needham notes, "the exact meaning of which are sometimes difficult to differentiate".
Semantically distinguishing between bian and hua is multifaceted. Compare these explanations.
The exact difference between and hua is perhaps more uncertain . In modern Chinese usage, tends to signify gradual change, transformation or metamorphosis; while hua tends to mean sudden and profound transmutation or alteration —but there is no very strict frontier between the words. could be used of weather changes, insect metamorphosis, or slow personality transformations; hua may refer to the transition points in dissolving, liquefying, melting, etc., and to profound decay. tends to be associated with form and hua with matter. When a snowman melts, the form changes as the snow melts to water. In the Sung dynasty, explained bian as implying inward change with full or partial conservation of the external Gestalt or form, and hua as fundamental change in which the outward appearance is also altered.
Hua 化 denotes a fundamental and essential change—a transformation. However, sometimes one also encounters the word , denoting external, momentary, or apparent change. A locus classicus for this distinction is in the ...: "The exemplary man changes in accordance with the times without transforming "... This in turn permits us to understand the passage in the ...: "When the beings take rise, this is called hua ; when the beings have reached their full development ... , this is called .
Bian has the sense of alteration among states of being or of variation within defined parameters. It differs from hua 化, "transformation", in implying alternation or variation rather than fundamental and lasting change. The change from a caterpillar to a butterfly, for example, which is both substantive and irreversible, is a frequently cited instance of hua in the earlier literature. By contrast, a change that involves the realignment of constituent parts in a dynamic system, such as that from day to night and back again, would be considered an instance of bian.
Wing-Tsit Chan lists bianhua "transfiguration and transformation" as a basic Chinese philosophical concept. Bianhua has very diverse meanings, from basic "change and transformation" to "universal life" or "creation", even referring to the Daoist "science of metamorphosis" and generically "supernatural powers obtained by either magical practices or meditation exercises".
Early usages
The encyclopedic Guanzi text uses bianhua 5 times. Where the Xingshi 形勢 "Conditions and Circumstances" chapter says "The Way brings about the transformation of the self", the corresponding 形勢解 "Explanation" chapter elucidates "The Way is the means by which the self is transformed so a person will adhere to correct principles."The ancient Yijing or Book of Changes has 12 usages of bianhua describing the manifestation of everything in heaven and on earth. All occur in the Ten Wings commentaries, and none in the core hexagram and line statements.
For hexagram 1 Qian 乾 "The Creative", the Commentary on the Decision says:
- The way of the Creative works through change and transformation, so that each thing receives its true nature and destiny and comes into permanent accord with the Great Harmony; this is what furthers and what perseveres..
Bianhua occurs most often in the Appended Judgments Commentary or Great Commentary. Three contexts mention the work of divine sages.
- The holy sages were able to survey all the confused diversities under heaven. They observed forms and phenomena and made representations of things and their attributes ... Through observation and discussion they perfected the changes and seasons.
- The Master said: Whoever knows the tao of the changes and transformations, knows the action of the gods".
- Heaven creates divine things; the holy sage takes them as models. Heaven and earth change and transform; the holy sage imitates them.
Daoist usages
The Daoist idea of bianhua, "that the certainty that the world is in flux leaves open the possibility that things may transform from one type to another", can be traced from the Zhuangzi through the Shangqing School.The Zhuangzi was the first Daoist text to explain bianhua "transformation and metamorphosis". The word occurs five times, referring to the ability of things to change from one category to another. For instance,
Spring and summer precede, autumn and winter come after—such is the sequence of the four seasons. The myriad things evolve and develop; even twisted little shoots have their own special shapes—such are the gradations of fullness and decline, the flow of transformation and evolution .
The Zhuangzi text begins with a parable about interspecific metamorphosis.
In the darkness of the Northern Ocean, there is a fish named K'un. The K'un is so big that no one knows how many thousands of tricents its body extends. After it metamorphoses into a bird, its name becomes P'eng. The P'eng is so huge that no one knows how many thousands of tricents its back stretches. Rousing itself to flight, its wings are like clouds suspended in the sky.
The Zhuangzi uses the closely related word wuhua 物化 "transformation of things" ten times, most famously in the story of Zhuangzi dreaming he was a butterfly.
Once upon a time Chuang Chou dreamed that he was a butterfly, a butterfly flitting about happily enjoying himself. He didn't know that he was Chou. Suddenly he awoke and was palpably Chou. He did not know whether he was Chou who had dreamed of being a butterfly or a butterfly dreaming that he was Chou. Now, there must be a difference between Chou and the butterfly. This is called the transformation of things.
A Zhuangzi passage explains change in the sense of evolutionary continuity.
In seeds there are germs . When they are found in water they become filaments. When they are found at the border of water and land they become algae. When they germinate in elevated places they become plantain. When the plantain is found in fertile soil it becomes crow's foot. The crow's foot's roots become scarab grubs and its leaves become butterflies. The butterflies soon evolve into insects that are born beneath the stove. They have the appearance of exuviae and are called "house crickets:" After a thousand days the house crickets become birds called "dried surplus bones." The spittle of the dried surplus bones becomes a misty spray and the misty spray becomes mother of vinegar. Midges are born from mother of vinegar; yellow whirligigs are born from fetid wine; blindgnats are born from putrid slimebugs. When goat's-queue couples with bamboo that has not shooted for a long time, they produce greenies. The greenies produce panthers; panthers produce horses; horses produce men; and men return to enter the wellsprings of nature . The myriad things all come out from the wellsprings and all reenter the wellsprings.
Liu An's Huainanzi uses bianhua 17 times. For instance, this hunchback story about Ziqiu 子求 "Master Seek", adapted from the Zhuangzi description of Ziyu 子輿 "Master Chariot".
Ziqiu had lived for fifty-four years when an injury made him hunchbacked. The arch of his spine was higher than his forehead; his chin pressed down on his chest; his two buttocks were on top; his rectum pointed to the sky. He crawled over to peer at himself in a well: "Amazing! That which fashions and transforms us! How has it turned me into this crumpled thing?" This shows that from his viewpoint, alterations and transformation are the same.
The Huainanzi describes transformations in nature : "Now the frog becomes a quail, the water scorpion becomes the dragonfly. These give rise to what is not their own kind. Only the sage understands their transformations." To know the bianhua of things is the hallmark of spiritual knowledge.
While the Daodejing text does not use bianhua, its commentary attributed to Heshang Gong 河上公 uses the word twice, explaining the transformations of dragons and spirits. The text and commentary for Section 26 says:
Section 39 says:
The Laozi bianhua jing 老子變化經 "Scripture of the Transformations of Laozi", which is preserved in a fragmentary Dunhuang manuscript discovered in the Mogao Caves, uses bianhua to describe the many historical reincarnations of Laozi 老子, deified as Laojun 老君 "Lord Lao". This text says Laozi "can make himself bright or dark, disappear and then be present, enlarge or diminish himself, coil up or extend himself, put himself above or below, can be vertical or horizontal, can go forward or backward." In every generation, this Master of Emperors cosmically "transforms his own body" in order to teach humanity, through the incarnate power of the Dao, he assumes numerous identities, and leaves behind adapted writings with his teaching. The transformations of Laojun began with the first mythical ruler Fu Xi, included Gautama Buddha, the Yellow Emperor's teacher Guangzhengzi 廣成子 "Master Broadly Complete", and ended with a 155 CE manifestation in the Sichuan region.
Mark Csikszentmihalyi distinguishes between early Daoist discussions that tended to emphasize the way in which bianhua applies to human beings in the same way it does to the natural world, and later Daoism that stressed the potential for the adept to harness bianhua, particularly in the eschatological picture of the Shangqing tradition.
Like Laozi, the diverse spirits of the Shangqing tradition are able to transform themselves, and the adept had to be able to identify their different manifestations. Adepts, in turn, might use bianhua to transform themselves. The Shangqing text Shenzhou qizhuan qibian wutian jing 神州七轉七變舞天經 describes methods for transforming into clouds, light, fire; water, and dragons.
Isabelle Robinet notes that "the powers of metamorphosis had always been a key characteristic of the immortals, but these powers came to be even more central in Shangqing where they were synonymous with deliverance and salvation."
Bianhua was employed by both Daoist mystics and Fangshi magicians. The Daoist adept practices metamorphosis both internally through meditation on colored breaths and gods within the body, and externally using magic to change the appearances of things. Ge Hong's Baopuzi explains these extraordinary powers of Daoists. Describing the multilocation technique called fenxing "divide/multiply the body", Ge Hong says his uncle Ge Xuan could be in several dozen places at once : "When guests were present there could be one host speaking with the guests in the house, another host greeting guests beside the stream, and still another host making casts with his fishing line, but the guests were unable to distinguish which was the true one." Yinxing 隱形 "invisibility" is another manifestation of bianhua. The Baopuzi says: "What is it that the arts of transformation cannot do? May I remind my readers that the human body, which is normally visible, can be made to disappear. Ghosts and gods are normally invisible, but there are ways and means to make them visible. Those capable of operating these methods and prescriptions will be found to abound wherever you go."
Several centuries after Chinese Buddhists borrowed the Daoist meaning of bianhua or hua "manifest through transformation; incarnate", early Tang dynasty Daoists elaborated the Buddhist doctrine about a Buddha's "three bodies" into a theory that the True Body of the Dao, the Supreme Truth, assumes different metaphoric "bodies" in order to manifest as specific deities, including those in the Laozi bianhuajing. The Daoist Sanlun yuanzhi 三論元旨 explains that: "The saint responds to all things, but his essence is distinct from them. Therefore, since his transcendent root is immobile, he is called the "true body" and since he propagates the form of the Law, he is called the "responsive body" . This text further contrasts the True Body with the "transformation body" and the "trace body" , in the sense that all teachings are traces of Truth.
Buddhist usages
Early Buddhist translators chose Chinese bianhua 變化 as the equivalent for Sanskrit nirmāṇa "transformation; supernatural manifestation; reincarnation".Charles Muller's Digital Dictionary of Buddhism defines bianhua as basically meaning "transformation of things", and distinguishes four senses:
- The transformation of myriad forms in manifesting appearances, especially the mutation of buddhas and bodhisattvas, e.g. 變化人 becoming men; also 變化土 the land where they dwell, whether the Pure Land or any impure world where they live for its enlightenment.
- To transform, change, change into, become. To manifest through supernormal power.
- The mind that discriminates all objects as having inherent existence.
- The third of the four kinds of reality-bodies of the Buddha, according to Yogâcāra.
The common Buddhist term bianhuashen 變化身 or huashen 化身 "transformation-body; manifested-body" refers to one of the sanshen 三身 "three bodies " doctrine, along with the fashen 法身 "dharma-body; truth-body", and baoshen 報身 "reward-body; bliss-body". Contexts describing Buddhas manifesting as animals and humans use the related terms bianhuaren 變化人 "magically manifested human body", bianhuatu 變化土 "transformation land where the inhabitants reincarnate", and *bianhuasheng 變化生 "birth by transformation; miraculous materialization".
Besides bianhua 變化, Buddhist translators used other Chinese bian compounds for Sanskrit words dealing with supernatural manifestations. This semantic complex includes bianxian 變現 translating both vikurvaṇa "manifestation through transformation" and prātihārya "miraculous", and shenbian 神變 translating prātihārya "supernatural/miraculous powers; magical feats" and vikurvana "manifestation; transformation".
Victor Mair traced the historical semantics of Chinese bian before and after the introduction of Buddhism, when it started being used as to translate Sanskrit nirmāṇa meaning "discontinuity or break with reality ". The pre-Buddhist concept of Chinese bian referred to "change ", through which one thing becomes another thing. The post-Buddhist concept extended bian to mean "strange" in the sense of "transformation from nothing to something; magically creative power to conjure". The early "strange incident; supernatural transformation" sense of bian became popular during the early Tang dynasty period, for instance, the Fayuan Zhulin "Pearl Grove in the Garden of the Dharma" used bianhua " transformation" to describe strange incidents.
Later usages
The Neo-Confucian philosopher Zhu Xi's interpretations of the Chinese classics, which scholars and officials from the 12th to 19th centuries considered to be canonical, differentiated between two types of "change": sudden, transformational bian and gradual, evolutionary hua.For instance, Zhu explained an ambiguous Yijing statement within the Xici zhuan 繫辭傳 "Commentary on the Appended Phrases", "That which transforms things and fits them together is called change ; that which stimulates them and sets them in motion is called continuity", with a lunar analogy : " from the first day to the thirtieth day is hua. Having reached this thirtieth day, concluded and made one month, the next day belongs to the next month. This is pien." This "change" distinction also applied to lines in the Yijing hexagrams, which are either unbroken, solid Yang lines or broken, open Yin ones: "Pien is from a yin to a yang . changes suddenly. Therefore, it is called "change". from yin to yang naturally grows to become sudden. This is called change. From yang to yin, it gradually goes on vanishing and wearing out."
Zhu Xi used the bian/hua distinction to explain a difficult passage in the Doctrine of the Mean – "When moved, it is change; when changed, it is transformed " – "When changed, its old conventions have already been altered, but there still are traces. When transformed, they have completely vanished and transformed, and there are no longer any traces."
Bianhua continues to be a linguistically productive word, as evident in Chinese technical neoloigisms like bianhuali "paradigm", bianhuaqiu 變化球 "breaking ball", bianhuayu 變化語 "inflective language", and bianhuamangshi 變化盲視 "change blindness".