East Wind Melts the Ice: The Way of the New Year's Beginning and the Origination of All Things in Lichun
This article offers an in-depth interpretation of Lichun (the Beginning of Spring), the first of the Twenty-Four Solar Terms, through the multiple lenses of pre-Qin Confucian and Daoist philosophy, philology, and astronomical phenomenology. By tracing the origin of the character "chun" (萅), the image of the three yang lines ascending in the Tai hexagram, and the mythic archetype of the wood spirit Goumang, it reveals the profound significance of Lichun as the node of the year's beginning and the origination of all things, returning readers to the ancient world of the ancestors' communion between Heaven and humanity.
Chapter 13: The Rites and Folk Customs of Lichun: Welcoming Spring, Whipping the Spring Ox, and "Biting Spring"
I. Welcoming Spring at the Eastern Suburbs: From State Ceremony to a Festival of the Whole People
The rite of Lichun has its origin in the state ceremony described earlier in the "Monthly Ordinances" of the Book of Rites—"the Son of Heaven personally leads the Three Dukes, the Nine Ministers, the feudal lords, and the great officers to welcome spring at the eastern suburbs." This tradition of welcoming spring, originating in high antiquity, over the course of several millennia gradually evolved from a ceremony exclusive to the Son of Heaven's court into a festival celebrated throughout the realm, deeply embedded in popular custom. To understand the folk customs of Lichun, we must begin with the fundamental spirit of this "welcoming of spring."
The two characters "ying chun" (迎春, "welcoming spring") themselves embody a profound conception of Heaven and humanity. Spring, of itself, arrives "naturally"—it comes unsummoned, unbidden (this is precisely the Daoist meaning of "the Dao models itself on what is so of itself"). Yet the ancients specifically chose to solemnly "welcome" it—why$21 Because, in the ancients' view, humanity ought not to be merely a passive recipient of the Way of Heaven's operation, but rather an active participant, a welcomer, an assistant. "Welcoming spring at the eastern suburbs" is humanity's most solemn, most fervent gesture of welcoming, responding to, and participating in the generative growth of Heaven and Earth—it expresses humanity's celebration of "generation," its gratitude for and cooperation with Heaven and Earth's "virtue of generating and regenerating." From the solemn grand ceremony of the Son of Heaven proceeding to the eastern suburbs, to the later folk customs of costuming a "Spring Official," proclaiming "spring has arrived," and setting up a "Spring Platform," this spirit of "welcoming" has continued unbroken—humanity, with joyful and exuberant feeling, welcomes the new year, welcomes vitality, welcomes hope.
II. Whipping the Spring Ox (Beating Spring): A Surviving Sympathetic Magic to Rouse Vital Qi, and Its Deeper Meaning of Encouraging Agriculture
Among the folk customs of Lichun, the most distinctive, the most redolent of antiquity, is "whipping the spring ox" (鞭春牛), also called "beating spring" (打春)—"beating spring" has all but become an alternate name for Lichun itself. The custom is this: a "spring ox" is sculpted from clay (in later ages, sometimes from paper pasted over a frame), and on the day of Lichun, an official (or someone costumed as the "spirit Goumang") wields a colorful whip to strike it, breaking the spring ox to pieces, whereupon the people scramble to seize fragments of the clay.
The layered meaning of this custom is extremely rich. First, it is a surviving vestige of sympathetic magic aimed at "rousing vital qi." The ox, a beast of the plow, is a symbol of the earth, of soil (in certain correlations, the ox belongs to Earth, presiding over agriculture); "whipping" the spring ox is, by way of a form of sympathetic magic, a means of urging on and awakening the earth (the clay ox) that has slumbered through an entire winter, prompting it to "stir" from its hibernation and begin the new year's generation and growth and agricultural labor. This bears a profound inner consistency with the phenological sign of "hibernating insects begin to stir," and with Lichun's spirit of "rousing the yang qi beneath the earth"—whipping the spring ox is humanity's ritual manner of "urging" that dormant vitality to awaken quickly.
Second, it carries the concrete meaning of "encouraging agriculture." The whipping of the spring ox symbolizes the formal beginning of spring plowing, a signal to all under Heaven proclaiming "agricultural labor has begun, do not miss the farming season"—its spirit continuing unbroken from the Son of Heaven's Rite of the Sacred Field, "personally plowing the Sovereign's field." The people's scrambling to seize the broken clay of the spring ox, in turn, embodies their prayer for the year's abundant harvest (whoever obtains a piece of the spring ox's clay is said to be blessed with fitting fields and livestock, and a bountiful year). This custom of "whipping the spring ox" fuses together the ancient sympathetic magic of "rousing vital qi," the agricultural admonition of "not violating the farming season," and the simple wish for "praying for a bountiful year"—it may be called the most vivid, most concrete folk crystallization of Lichun's spirit. It is worth noting that whoever wields the whip to strike the spring ox is often costumed as the "spirit Goumang"—this wood spirit, this spring spirit, being precisely the assistant spirit of the first month of spring; that he should preside over the rite of whipping the spring ox to rouse vitality is entirely fitting.
III. Biting Spring: A Culinary Rite of Welcoming Vital Qi through Mouth and Tongue
Lichun also has a distinctive culinary folk custom—"biting spring" (咬春), that is, eating specific seasonal foods on the day of Lichun, so as to "bite into" and welcome that newly born spring qi. The foods eaten for "biting spring" mainly include the spring pancake (a thin pancake wrapped around seasonal vegetables), the spring platter (an assortment of fresh, tender greens and pungent, aromatic vegetables), and raw radish, among others.
Why "bite into" these particular foods at Lichun$22 The spirit behind this continues unbroken from the tradition, described in the "Monthly Ordinances" of the Book of Rites, of the Son of Heaven "eating wheat and mutton," of "matching one's food to the season"—through the consumption of foods corresponding to the season's vital qi, one "absorbs" the generative qi of Heaven and Earth into one's own body. The foods eaten for "biting spring" are mostly fresh, tender vegetables newly sprouted in early spring (such as spring chives, lettuce, bean sprouts) and pungent, aromatic, dispersing foods (such as radish, scallion, garlic). Eating fresh, tender seasonal vegetables draws upon their qi of "new life"; eating pungent, aromatic, dispersing foods carries a deeper meaning within health cultivation—the pungent flavor belongs to "dispersal," being able to open up passage and promote upward, outward growth, precisely helping the human body accord with spring's trend of yang qi rising and vital qi reaching through. The old saying, "on the day of Lichun, eat raw radish; this is called biting spring, taking its power to open up the qi" (立春日食生萝卜，谓之咬春，取其能通气), captures precisely this meaning.
The very act of "biting" is itself worthy of contemplation. It is not a lukewarm "eating," but a forceful "biting"—this faintly corresponds to Lichun's life-posture of "breaking through the soil," "rising up amid difficulty," and to the force of "breaking through" contained within the character "tun" (屯). To bite forcefully with one's teeth into that pungent, fresh flavor of spring is as if a person, through their own body, participates in, shares in, and confirms that vigorously sprouting vitality now occurring between Heaven and Earth. "Biting spring" is the ancients' most intimate and most wise manner of grounding the grand resonance between Heaven and humanity in everyday food, in the space between one's lips and teeth.
IV. The Shared Spirit of Lichun's Folk Customs: Participating in Transformative Growth, Celebrating New Life
Welcoming spring, whipping the spring ox, biting spring, and indeed the rich and varied Lichun customs found throughout different regions (such as wearing spring streamers, pasting up "fitting for spring" placards, drinking spring wine, and spring outings)—though their forms differ greatly, their spiritual core is highly unified: it is, through humanity's active participation, to welcome, rouse, receive, and celebrate the newly sprouting vitality and new life between Heaven and Earth.
This is precisely the most vivid embodiment, at the level of folk custom, of the Chinese thought of "the unity of Heaven and humanity." Humanity does not coldly stand by and watch the arrival of spring, but rather, with body and mind, through ritual, through food, through celebration, throws itself wholeheartedly into this grand event of Heaven and Earth's revival—"welcoming" it (welcoming spring), "rousing" it (whipping the spring ox), "receiving" it (biting spring), "celebrating" it (various festivities). Within these customs, Lichun is no longer an abstract astronomical node, but becomes a tangible, perceptible, participatory, celebratory, living festival of life. Through these customs, the ancients repeatedly reaffirmed that most fundamental conviction: humanity is a part of Heaven and Earth, and human life is intimately connected with the life of Heaven and Earth; when Heaven and Earth sprout new life, humanity ought to welcome, participate in, and bring to fruition this new life with the greatest fervor—this is precisely the spiritual wellspring by which the folk customs of Lichun have continued, generation after generation, across several millennia.
V. Wearing Spring Streamers and "Fitting for Spring" Placards: The Folk Wisdom of Summoning Spring Qi through "Written Words"
Among the many folk customs of Lichun, there is another category rich in cultural meaning—wearing "spring streamers" (春幡) and pasting up "fitting for spring" placards (宜春帖, also called "spring writings" or "spring placard slips"). The so-called spring streamer is a small pennant-like ornament (in the shape of a small flag, a swallow, a flower, etc.) cut from colored silk, worn upon the head or attached to a flowering branch; the so-called "fitting for spring" placard is a placard on which the two characters "yi chun" (宜春, "fitting for spring") or auspicious words of blessing are written on red paper (or silk), pasted upon the lintel of the door on the day of Lichun.
The spiritual core of this category of custom is "summoning spring qi through written words and symbols." The two characters "yi chun" are especially worth contemplating—"yi" means fitting, suitable for; "yi chun" is thus a prayer that this year be fitting for spring's generation and growth, that all affairs proceed as smoothly as spring itself. Writing and pasting up "yi chun" on the day of Lichun is the ancients' way of, through the written word, calling forth, confirming, and praying for the arrival and smooth flow of spring's vital qi. This continues unbroken, in spirit, from the solemn grand ceremony of "welcoming spring at the eastern suburbs" in high antiquity—both are gestures of active welcome by humanity (whether going out to the suburbs to greet it, or writing placards to summon it), welcoming and bringing to fruition Heaven and Earth's generative growth. The difference lies only in this: at court, spring was welcomed with grand ceremony, while among the common people, spring was summoned with intimate spring streamers and spring placards—differing in refinement and simplicity of form, yet identical in their celebration of, and prayer for, spring's vital qi.
The custom of wearing spring streamers also carries a further, implicit meaning of "responding to spring with one's own body." By wearing the colored streamers and colored swallows that symbolize spring's vital qi upon the head, attached beside the body, a person lets their own body participate in, and be adorned within, this grand scene of spring's generative growth—humanity is no longer merely a bystander to spring, but, through their own body, becomes a "vessel" of spring's vital qi, a "fluttering spring streamer" in its own right. This accords entirely, in spirit, with the tradition, described in the "Monthly Ordinances" of the Book of Rites, of the Son of Heaven "wearing green robes, adorning himself with green jade," of "matching one's dress to the season"—whether it is the Son of Heaven's green robes and azure jade, or the common people's spring streamers and colored swallows, both are means of adorning the body so as to respond to and accord with the ascendant Wood virtue of the season. From this we may see: from the court to the common people, from the Son of Heaven to the ordinary person, the various customs of Lichun, each in its own way, repeatedly express that same ancient and warm conviction: humanity, with the whole of body and mind, ought joyfully to blend into the generative growth of Heaven and Earth, bringing this year's new life to its fulfillment.