In today’s world, weapon competition under high-tech integration measures the infinite possession of material wealth and fierce economic strength. But, do you know how gunpowder for weapons was invented as one of the four major inventions in ancient China and why it was all about human #health?
Ancient Chinese believed that living between heaven and earth, humans can prolong their lives by absorbing the essence of heaven and earth. About 4000 years ago, during the Yellow Emperor period, they started to collect this essence to improve health so that they could live in longevity. In 1700 BC, the existence of the Oracle character of “丹(dān) – red, cinnabar, powder, pill” recorded the early birth of ancient mining, refining, alchemy, and how 丹 was used in making a life-prolonging elixir.
Vividly, 丹 draws a mining well and the mining powders inside. Nowadays, the basic meanings of 丹 include 1)cinnabar, 2) the color of vermillion; red, 3) a kind of refined medicine.
Unlike many other religions’ beliefs on this planet that God will forgive human repentance and give immortality to the afterlife, ancient Chinese always looked for present longer life and spent a big amount of effort in making pills of immortality out of the mining essence of earth. Historical books and museums give proves of the existence of the ancient alchemy furnaces that hold the secret knowledge of longevity over thousands of years.
When we dig deeper, we will find that 丹 has an extended meaning of whole-hearted, or, absolute sincerity. Why?
While people were refining pills out of earth essence for immortality, with the Yin & Yang theories, with the traditional medical concepts regarding the human body and mind as a whole, experienced Taoists told us that humans have our own essence for prolonged life in our body too.
Many people know about Qi Gong(气功) and heard about Dan Tian(丹田). Qi Gong practices body Qi flow through a deep breath down to the abdomen area where the human lower Dan Tian resides. The human brain, where the human upper Dan Tian is, regulates all human biochemical processes, behaviors, and mental emotions. In the middle is the heart, also the king of the body, acting as the bridge, the energy amplifier of body Qi and Blood circulations. In another word, the human heart transforms the human body and spiritual energies.
With an absolute sincerer whole #heart, a human’s innate essence of life would be awakened to blossom into higher spirits.
After a long time of enormous manpower and resources spent in over-consuming earth’s essence to satisfy human’s material needs and pursuits, while war, conflicts, violence, poverty are still threatening human harmony and development, now, it is everyone’s responsibility to act in stopping the gunpowder’s killing earth and lives and pursuing a harmonious and peaceful world together with #MotherEarth.
This is what history meant for the world’s future.
1 Green Planet 