Chinese civilization is one of the oldest cultures in the world, from where it has radiated to many East Asian and Southeast Asian countries. Its language, script, art, military science, and countless customs, such as eating with chopsticks, spread to many of the neighboring countries, where they rooted and developed in varied ways.
However, we cannot say that China possesses a single culture, uniform and monolithic, because in its vast territory there are diverse groups that speak different dialects, have dissimilar social structures and are governed by different customs and habits.
Lóulán 樓蘭 was an ancient kingdom that flourished in the 2nd century BC on the margins of the Silk Road. It was an independent city-state until the Hàn dynasty 漢朝 took control of the region, and proliferated for some more centuries until it was mysteriously abandoned in the 3rd century of our era, leaving only ruins that remained buried in the desert sands for nearly two millennia.
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The Silk Road (丝绸之路 Sīchóu Zhīlù) was a network of land roads that made up one of the most important trade routes in history. Zhāng Qiān 張騫 was an important figure in the opening of this trade route and the cultural exchange between East and West.
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A gōng’àn 公案 (“public case”; better known by its Japanese name, kōan) is a phrase, dialogue, or short story used in Chán 禪Buddhism to arouse doubts in the practitioner and test his understanding. In China, a Chán system of meditation was developed that based obtaining spiritual enlightenment on concentration on these phrases.
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According to the Chinese conception of human being, it is composed of ‘two souls’: Pò 魄, ‘corporeal’ or ‘terrestrial soul’, and Hún 魂, ‘ethereal soul’. This way of understanding the human being is closely related to the practice of veneration of ancestors.
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In Chinese Martial Arts, the figure of the teacher is of vital importance, since anyone who wants to learn a martial art needs a teacher to transmit the teaching. In the West, many times the role of the teacher is misinterpreted; to understand it better, we must first examine the figure of the teacher in the religious tradition of China.
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“Clouds and Rain on Mount Wūshān” (巫山雲雨 Wū Shān yún yǔ) is an expression provenient from an erotic scene contained in a poem from the 3rd century B.C. The Chinese have incorporated this expression into spoken language to poetically signify the physical act of love between man and woman. Let’s take a look at the story behind it, whose authorship is attributed to Sòng Yù 宋玉.
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In Chinese culture, the concepts of Wǔ 武 and Wén 文, which represent the military and civil spheres in government, are considered opposite but complementary. At the individual level, these concepts find their best representation in two seemingly antithetical but very similar arts: swordsmanship (Dāo Fǎ 刀法) and calligraphy (Shū Fǎ 書法).
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The Spring Festival (Chūn Jié 春节) marks the beginning of the new year according to the Chinese calendar, on the second new moon after the winter solstice.
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According to legend, Bodhidharma transmitted Chán 禪 Buddhism to the Shàolín 少林 monks, and taught them some physical exercises that would later develop into Kung Fu. However, the available historical records are not exactly in line with this belief…
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Calligraphy (書法 shūfǎ) is, along with ink painting, with which it is closely related, one of the most practiced ancient arts in China. Scholars, poets and painters were often great calligraphers. This art is regarded not only as an aesthetic form of writing but also as a way to cultivate one’s own character and to develop gōng fu 功夫.
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