Part 2: From the 8th century BC to the early Han
SERIES: Books to better understand China
Even if mentalities have changed a little among young Chinese, there is still a certain discretion, reservations about talking about the subject. And so much the better. In the West, the subject goes beyond the private sphere and sprawls back and forth in all the media … But where do what we wrongly call taboos come from, and which are cultural codes that are simply different from ours? A long time ago, but the book remains a benchmark, a great lover of China, great novelist and essayist, Robert van Gulik, tackled the complex question of the history of sexuality in China. Here is the 2nd part of the small presentation of this essential book.
The first sexuality manuals
Huge political changes shake the 8th century BC of the Zhou. Kings lose part of centralized power. Chaos reigns despite the birth of a new class of literate officials who will later produce, still under the Zhou, intellectuals like Confucius.
Social disorder sees the birth of more sexual license and illicit relationships. Paradoxically, we have more material on the sexuality of this troubled time, material in the form of illustrated textbooks, essentially.
It doesn’t take much imagination to imagine the “dancing troupes” owned by princes and officiating at banquets and feasts to entertain and satisfy wealthy guests. They were sometimes given as gifts or sold. Sad fates of slaves and prisoners of war. These poor women are the ancestors of professional prostitutes. More free those. A kind of social elevator. But no need to expand on the subject.
Just like that of certain sensual indulgence of certain officials for their superior in the strict hierarchy of supply.
Of course, van Gulik explains the difficulty of accurately translating ancient Chinese texts open to different interpretations. The question of homosexuality at the time is very difficult to deal with.
The position of women within the family was not easy. The family was already a political entity. Solid. A block in the creation of a cohesive society. The woman had to obey the “three addictions”. That to her father, then that to her husband and, finally, if she survived this husband, she had to obey her son.
But according to Gulik, we are only presenting his book (!), In practice things were quite different if apart from legal texts one reads literature, history and poetry with attention. Wives enjoyed more independence than one might imagine, even hidden behind a screen when guests showed up at the house. Even when they went out in their carriages with the curtains drawn. Complex intrigues could be formed. In fact, some husbands let their wives participate in banquets and hunting. On the other hand, the singers and the women of low conditions traveled in wagons with the curtains raised!
The princes’ harems were structured like the emperor’s harem but smaller and sometimes less serious. There were the “duenna” and the eunuch (ex-criminals or poor people looking for work?).
The general idea defended here by van Gulik is that sexuality seen as exercised only for pleasure, practiced in excess was bad for the health: a waste, a diversion of energy. The sex then caused an “internal fever that affected the mind.” On the contrary, driven under good rules, it was beneficial for health.
THE “YI JING” and SEXUALITY
In parallel to the social disorder, but also to the very strict rules to resist it, new symbols resulting from Chinese philosophy and divination, will appear little by little thanks to books such as the Book of Changes, the Yi Jing, and his famous duo YIN and YANG.
Earth, Moon, Darkness of YIN will rhyme with Woman; Sky, Sun, Light will rhyme with Man. The famous notion of Way or DAO arises from the interaction of YIN and YANG in an infinite process of YI, Change.
Sexuality textbooks will then refer to the notions of YIN and YANG to symbolize the union of woman and man.
The 63rd Hexagram of YIJING will symbolize the union of man and woman. What is interesting is that the Trigram of Earth, water, woman, LI is above him of Heaven, Fire, Man or KANG!
In fact, in the YIN YANG pair, Yin is always what comes first. So China is not so macho! Remnants of the first matriarchal Chinese societies? The Taoists will remember this.
Even in the signs! The Fire is kindled quickly but is extinguished by Water. Water takes a long time ps to boil and only cools slowly. The difference between male and female organs already understood by the Chinese more than 2000 years ago!
The intertwining of the 3 layers of YIN and the 3 layers of YANG in the 63rd Hexagram is also quite clear to understand! “Achieving this harmony was to lay the foundation for a balanced and healthy sex life,” writes van Gulik.
Be careful, the archaic symbols still persist in YIJING with the idea of cloud (female eggs) and rain (male semen). Earth and Sky mated on a stormy night!
At the same time, the YIJING already responds to all the current tensions between male, female and “X” “genders”!
Because “YIN at its maximum becomes YANG and YANG at its minimum becomes YIN”.
Man contains part of the feminine and Woman contains part of the masculine! 2000 years before Sigmund Freud’s psychoanalysis in Vienna.
THE LAOZI’s « DAO DE JING”
This moral disorder before the Han generates the idea that there was a golden age in the past. An age close to Nature, far from society and its vices, where man was more innocent. Lao Zi’s philosophy will therefore advocate a Return to Nature according to his Way, the DAO. The Taoists will celebrate the Negative, the Yin, evil Woman, the passivity and the Non-Act in the face of noisy and reckless actions.
Men withdraw to connect in Nature to the austere Meditation, “to commune with the original Powers of creation”. Woman is the original being who gives birth and is linked with the Matrix of the world.
It is also a question of attaining Immortality through asceticism, a diet, a simple and spiritual life. Taoists revere Woman and think of her original “constituents” as being able to help them create the Elixir of Life. We come back to the idea of the almost sacred vaginal secretions of women because they are infinite … Unlike the finite reserves of the male’s semen.
But also a healthy life. And this is where sexuality will know a special fate under the influence of the Taoists!
But to understand better, we must be interested in the current of Confucianism. Conversely, “Interviews” and other books advocate a very hierarchical and very YANG, masculine society. Men have power and authority. Male lineages are essential. Women are inferior to men. As if it was dangerous for the stability of society. It is the great return of Morality and Benevolence, beyond the “empty” gestures of Rites and Ceremonies.
This current will also give its definition of sexuality. The woman gives birth. He is an essentially biological being whose emotional life must be erased. Sex for reproduction takes place only in the bedroom (this idea is common to all Chinese). Any other bringing together of bodies in social life is prohibited. It is the “separation of the sexes” of male and female. Remember that for the Chinese, a kiss is a sexual act. No kisses on the streets in China. Even even now in small towns or in the countryside!
Chastity outside of reproduction is the guarantor of the solidity of the family and therefore of society.
Van Gulik who always seeks the truth in real life, not only in laws or official texts, distinguishes a private life, in the bedroom, according to a Taoist sexuality, and a public life which indeed follows the rules of Confucianism. We will find this idea with the Han emperors. But the idea that it is men who regulate and perform the Rites for the ancestors, the only conditions for their decent life in the hereafter, will persist for a long time. A child who is born will have to be male for his reasons as well as for the work of the fields.
TOWARDS TAOISM AND CONFUCIANISM UNITY IN SEXUALITY
The idea that the man strengthens himself thanks to the secretions of the Woman and that the Woman sees her passive YIN, positively “shaken” by the YANG of the man, will not be frowned upon by the followers of Confucius, as long as we procreate. The rules are even quite strange at this level… moral. A male will have to make love with many women (second wives, concubines) without enjoying it (without ejaculation) but drawing his strength from it (in Yin secretions) to fertilize at best from a biological point of view (and according to his strongest YANG), his wife and have a male descendant. The period of relationship with the wife was to coincide with her highest YIN… a YIN maintained by many relationships without actual fertilization with her husband! (YIN’s YANG shakes!)
It is therefore a man’s “duty” to create maximum pleasure for his wife so that she can accumulate YIN essence, but without the man thus ejaculating during this “training”.
All of this ceremonial was very Taoist, but Confucianists recommended it for purposes other than Immortality or as an Elixir of Life! For Confucianists, the female was also believed to be the most fertile “on the 5th day” after menstruation.
We touch here on the Chinese essence of sexuality with this idea of “coitus reservatus”, linked to polygamy and health as well as for the pure reproduction of male descendants. This design will last almost 2000 years! And will always be very far, despite the rigor of the purely reproductive biologism of Confucianists, very far from “abominations and sins of the flesh” as during our very Christian Middle Ages in Europe!
Of course, this Chinese essence of sex will experience variations! We talk about it in the next chapter. But already know that male masturbation will be banned for “energy dispersal”. On the other hand, for women …
