To Become a God

Evidence from Shang oracle bones to memorials submitted to Western Han emperors attests to a long-lasting debate in early China over the proper relationship between humans and gods. One pole of the debate saw the human and divine realms as separate and agonistic and encouraged divination to determine the will of the gods and sacrifices to appease and influence them. The opposit...

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Evidence from Shang oracle bones to memorials submitted to Western Han emperors attests to a long-lasting debate in early China over the proper relationship between humans and gods. One pole of the debate saw the human and divine realms as separate and agonistic and encouraged divination to determine the will of the gods and sacrifices to appease and influence them. The opposite pole saw the two realms as related and claimed that humans could achieve divinity and thus control the cosmos. This wide-ranging book reconstructs this debate and places within their contemporary contexts the rival claims concerning the nature of the cosmos and the spirits, the proper demarcation between the human and the divine realms, and the types of power that humans and spirits can exercise. It is often claimed that the worldview of early China was unproblematically monistic and that hence China had avoided the tensions between gods and humans found in the West. By treating the issues of cosmology, sacrifice, and self-divinization in a historical and comparative framework that attends to the contemporary significance of specific arguments, Michael J. Puett shows that the basic cosmological assumptions of ancient China were the subject of far more debate than is generally thought.

Introduction
Secondary Scholarship
Method of Analysis
Outline
1. Anthropomorphizing the Spirits: Sacrifice and Divination in Late Bronze Age China
The Foundations of Chinese Cosmological and Bureaucratic Thought
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Introduction
Secondary Scholarship
Method of Analysis
Outline
1. Anthropomorphizing the Spirits: Sacrifice and Divination in Late Bronze Age China
The Foundations of Chinese Cosmological and Bureaucratic Thought
The Agon of Humans and Spirits in the Late Shang
Placing the Ancestors: The Construction of the Shang Pantheon
Transforming the Spirits: Sacrifice in the Shang
A Moral Cosmos: The Zhou Conquest and the Mandate of Heaven
Pacifying the Spirits: Western Zhou Sacrificial Practice
The Art of the Sacrifice: The “Sheng min” Poem of the Shijing and Hesiod’s Theogony
Conclusion
2. Gaining the Powers of Spirits: The Emergence of Self-Divinization Claims in the Fourth Century BC
Spirits Within Humans: The Issue of Shamanism in Early China and Early Greece
Humans and Gods in Early Greece
Comparing China and Greece
Humans and Gods in Early China
Heaven and Man in the Lunyu
The Moral Cosmos of the Mohists
Separating Humans and Spirits and Dividing Heaven and Earth: The “Chu yu, xia” Chapter of the Guoyu
Becoming Like a Spirit: The “Neiye” Chapter of the Guanzi
Conclusion
3. Accepting the Order of Heaven: Humanity and Divinity in Zhuangzi and Mencius
“Nothing Can Overcome Heaven”: The Notion of Spirit in the Zhuangzi
The Resignation of the Sage to the Order of Heaven: The Cosmology of the Mencius
The “Naturalism” of Zhuangzi and Mencius
4. Descendants of the One: Correlative Cosmology in the Late Warring States
The One and the Many: Secondary Scholarship on Early Chinese Cosmology
Totemism and Sacrifice: From Granet to Lévi Strauss and Back Again
The Great Unity of the Cosmos: The Taiyi sheng shui
Becoming an Ancestor to the People: The Laozi
Using the One to Explore Heaven: The Shiliujing
Becoming a Spirit: The “Xinshu” Chapters of the Guanzi
Becoming Like Heaven: The Lūshi chunqiu
The Pattern of Heaven and Earth: The Xunzi
Submitting to the Trigrams: The Xici zhuan
Conclusion
5. The Ascension of the Spirit: Liberation, Spirit Journeys, and Celestial Wanderings
How to Read the Ascension Literature
The Liberation of the Spirit: Question Four of the Shiwen
Liberation and Ascension in the Outer Chapters of the Zhuangzi
Transcending Heaven and Earth: The “Yuan you” of the Chuci
Conclusion
6. A Theocracy of Spirits: Theism, Theomorphism, and Alchemy in the Qin and Early Han Empires
Kingship and Sacrifice: From Granet to Dumézil and Back Again Through Sahlins
Competing Cosmologies in the Qin and Early Han
Emperors and Gods in the Early Imperial Courts
The Ascension of Huangdi: Divine Kingship in the Qin and Early Han
The Order of Textual Authority: Lu Jia’s Xinyu
Conclusion
7. Aligning and Orienting the Cosmos: Anthropomorphic Gods and Theomorphic Humans in the Huainanzi
Following the Way: The “Yuandao” Chapter
The Ascensions of Huangdi and Fu Xi: The “Lanming” Chapter
A Cosmos Aligned by Spirits: The “Jingshen” Chapter
Conclusion
8. The Sacrifices That Order the World: Divine Kingship and Human Kingship in the Western Han
The Sacrifices of the Sage: Dong Zhongshu
The “Fengshan shu” Chapter of Sima Qian
Determining the Position of Heaven and Earth: The Ritual Reforms at the End of the Western Han
Conclusion
Conclusion: Culture and History in Early China
Reference Matter
Bibliography
Index
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