Pangu Created Heaven and Earth
2 min readAccording to the Chinese legend of creation, in the beginning Heaven and Earth were one. The universe consisted of a primordial mass of Chaos that resembled a giant egg.
Sleeping inside this egg was hu- manity’s ancestor, Pangu. After 18,000 years Pangu awoke to find himself surrounded by blackness bear the constriction, he grasped a great axe, striking out unt ing out until the great egg of Chaos that enclosed him split open with a thunderous crash. The light and clear Yang elements that were released ascended to become Heaven, and the dark dense Yin elements coalesced to become Earth. In this way primordial Chaos was differentiated into Heaven and Earth, and the universe was created. This legend affirms that Yin and Yang are the two basic elements of Creation, and that all things, including human- ity, result from their interaction.
The concept of Yin and Yang permeates Chinese legends concerning the origins and development of humanity. It is said that Nuwa, the goddess of the moon, is the embodiment of Yin and her husband anun, is the embodiment of Yang. Through their fusion of Yin and Yang, they gave birth to the human race. The ancient Chinese believed that the universe is composed of two primal elements, Yin and Yang. Yang, which originally referred to the sun, represents the positive or active force, while Yin, or absence of sun, represents the negative or receptive force.
The relationship between Yin and Yang is comple- ntary, embodying both opposition and unity. The theory of Yin and Yang which developed f this concept formed the basis of the Chinese ancestors’ understanding of the material world, and also became the theoretical foundation of traditional Chinese medicine. The theory and clinical practice of traditional Chinese medicine, including TCM’s views of physiology, pathology, disease prevention, treatment, and recovery, all developed from the theory of Yin and Yang.
