The mysterious culture of sacrificial love

 

The mysterious culture of sacrificial love

 

Lacuo, Agu Denba, A Zhuo, Chu Sanxing and his party left Myanmar along the Tea Horse Road and came to Yunnan. On the way, Lacuo said: The Jinsha River in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River once surrounded an "ancient Naxi kingdom", where countless stories of joys and sorrows of the Naxi people were staged here. The human tragedy of dying for love exists among all ethnic groups around the world, but no place or ethnic group is as tragic as the Naxi people. Among the Naxi people, the tragedy of dying for love has given birth to a possibility that is unique in the world. "Culture of Sacrifice for Love".

Lacuo said to Agudengba, Azhuo and Chu Sanxing:

Because of the existence of this mysterious custom of committing suicide, the main area inhabited by the Naxi people and the area where the tragedy of suicide is the most serious and concentrated is Lijiang. Lijiang is called "the capital of suicide in the world" and "the kingdom of suicide in Asia" by Chinese and foreign people. As a result, the Naxi people have become even more mysterious and mysterious.

Group sacrifice for love seems to be a long-standing custom. The first tragic literary work of love sacrifice in the Dongba Sutra, "Lu Ban Lu Rao", describes the collective sacrifice of 90 shepherd boys and 70 shepherd girls grazing in the mountains. s story. In modern times, most lovers died in pairs, but it also often happened that three, four or even seven or eight pairs of lovers died together.

Agudengba, Azhuo, and Chu Sanxing have arrived at Lijiang.

Lacuo said:

Countless beautiful myths, epics, legends and stories of the Naxi people are written on homemade antique paper by their priest Dongba with homemade bamboo pens, ink and Dongba script.

A large number of studies have shown that numerous tragedies of the Naxi people's death occurred in the first year of Yongzheng in the Qing Dynasty, that is, in the long years after 1723 AD, and became a social trend. What exactly happened in Lijiang in 1723?

All I know is the so-called "return the native land and return it to the locals" policy. In the process of promotion of this reforming political system, it had a fierce collision with the Naxi people's original frank and adaptable social and cultural customs, and it actually caused a pair of Naxi couples who could not stay together to compete for love. The main cause of death. Those lively and cheerful lives may only choose to die calmly for love.

In the process of implementing the "reform and return to local rule", the Qing regime measured the social life of ethnic minorities based on the lifestyle of the Manchus and Hans at that time and the ethics and morals of Confucian culture that had been alienated by the rulers in the Qing Dynasty. The "transformation of barbarians" policy, forced arranged marriages, child betrothal, feudal patriarchal system, three obediences and four virtues, the concept of chastity, and ethical ethics were also forcibly imported to the Naxi area in Lijiang. The young men and women of the Naxi ethnic group have become victims of feudal ethics. Their free love, born in the snow-capped mountains and rivers under the blue sky and beautiful sun, has been imprisoned. What's even more fatal is that their free love was unrestrained and passionate without taboos before 1723, at least before the Yuan and Ming Dynasties.

Lacuo said:

At that time, Naxi men and women could have sex freely. Both men and women were like bees coming out of their nests to pick flowers. Whichever flower they wanted to fly to, the flower would docilely offer nectar. Young men and women gathered around the fire pit. They fell in love and combined freely on the mountain pastures. The stars watched the joy of the young men and women in the world and blinked their eyes happily.

The increasingly strengthened arranged marriage system after 1723 and the corresponding feudal ethics caused the Naxi people to form a dualistic marriage and love pattern under the impact of the compulsory customs change policy: "love is free before marriage, but not free after marriage." This form of dualistic marriage and love has become the core part of many reasons leading to suicide in love.

In the past Naxi society, youth before marriage was the best time in life. Young men and women could fall in love freely according to traditional rules and play together freely. This was the time when life had the least constraints. Once you enter an arranged marriage, it marks the end of a lifetime of freedom and happiness, it means eternal separation from the person you love, and it means an eternal farewell to the free and happy youth of the past. Especially for Naxi women, getting married is a heavy burden. From then on, they will bear the burden of the family and be placed under multiple oppressions of feudal ethics. The free youth and life after marriage become a dividing line between happiness and suffering. Sacrifice for love has become a tragic choice for Naxi young people, and it has become more and more popular.

Lacuo brought his caravan, Agudenba, Azhuo, and Chu Sanxing to a green meadow beside the Lijiang River. The Yunnan horses carrying loads roamed leisurely among the grass and wild flowers. Even Agudenba's The donkey, Azhuo's white-hoofed horse, and Chu Sanxing's hunting dogs Dahuang and Dahei also looked very happy.

But Lacuo was not happy. He told Agudengba, Azhuo and Chu Sanxing:

The beautiful meadow in front of us is actually a famous place for people to die for love.

Azhuo asked strangely: This is an empty grassland, how could he commit suicide in love?

Lacuo pointed to a tree not far away and said: Do you see that tree? That tree is the love tree. Some people hang themselves in trees and some take poison under the trees.

Lacuo sighed:

Some treatises on the mystery of suicide have talked about the "vulnerability of suicide". Before committing suicide, suicides are generally "dejected, depressed, depressed, slow in thinking, loss of appetite, weight loss, depersonalization, and distraction." "But many cases of young Naxi men and women committing suicide are not like this.

The person who died for his love remained calm after deciding to die for his love, and most of his family and friends could not see any abnormality in his mental state. Those who die for love make preparations before committing suicide very calmly and even optimistically. They choose a date, buy clothes, food and decorations, and bid farewell to their close friends secretly.

Before their death, they would wear heavy makeup and costumes, sing and dance, and set up a tent at the place where they died, decorated with flowers and green branches. They would spend the last days of their lives in a very romantic way and die calmly with a smile on their face. This beautiful and tranquil open grassland has become the first choice for those who commit suicide.

Lacuo took Agudengba, Azhuo, and Chu Sanxing to the tree on the grass.

Lacuo said:

An old Naxi singer once witnessed a young couple hanging themselves in love here. There is also a strange phenomenon in Lijiang where people who have died in love are summoned by their wandering souls. In the book used for rituals held for those who died in love, there are records of many boys and girls who were seduced by the ghosts of those who died in love and followed them to die in love. This book is the Dongba Sutra. The book says that there were three young shepherds. When they were herding their sheep on the silent mountain, they heard the mysterious songs sung by the ghosts of four martyred girls and the sound of oral strings played by them. So, they suddenly felt lonely and decided to follow the wandering ghosts of these lovers to die. Each of them tied a rope around his own neck, and the ghosts of the four martyred women came over and tightened their ropes. These four elves made them see various visions before they died. They believed that the sobs of the mountain wind were the lonely sighs of the beautiful woman who had died in love. They felt their own loneliness and desolation in the sobs and sighs. They decided to live with these ghosts who died for love, live in that eternal happy place, and roam with the wind.

Lacuo said again:

According to many eyewitnesses of those who died for love, mouth strings were found on the bodies of those who died for love, and some even died with mouth strings in their mouths. Therefore, it is very common among the Naxi people to believe that those who die for love are tempted by the ghost of love. It is said that this temptation often occurs in places with high mountains and deep forests. Therefore, it is still a folk taboo among the Naxi people to sing and play the mouth string in the place of love-sacrifice. Many people still believe that doing so will attract the ghost of love-sacrifice to lure you to death.

It is also said that in the Naxi people's love affairs, there are far more women than men. Women are more inclined to die for love than men, and their determination to die for love is stronger than men. Some people also call them Naxi women who laugh in the face of death.

Lacuo sighed again:

Some victims of love even ended their lives by extremely painful means such as taking poison, rolling rocks, and committing suicide. The reason for this calm approach to death is also the spiritual temperament of not being afraid of death, and the psychological motivation to die for love and justice.

The Naxi people's love-sacrifice is a life tragedy completed in songs and poems, and popular tragedy literature of love-sacrifice has also been produced among the people, the most representative of which are "Lu Ban Lu Rao" and "You Bei". What is conveyed in "Lu Ban Lu Rao" is the call of the love gods Youzu Azhu and Gotu Xigong, facing Meijiumijin.

After leaving the grassland, Lacuo opened his throat and sang the Naxi tune "Lu Ban Lu Rao":

 

Open the beautiful gold!

Your painful eyes,

Come here and see the flowers on the meadow!

your tired feet,

Come here and step on the green grass!

your painful hands,

Come here to milk the yak!

You do it,

Come to these snowy peaks shrouded in clouds!

Come here to eat wild honey from the trees,

Come here to drink the clear spring water from the mountains,

Come here and fill your head with beautiful wildflowers.

Use the red tiger as your mount,

Use white deer to plow the land in the mountains.

bring it on,

You come here to milk the broad-eared doe,

You come here to weave the fluttering white wind and white clouds.