Looking at it from the side, it looks like a ridge and the side looks like a peak
- Appreciation of Su Shi’s philosophical poetry (Part 1)
Wang Chuanxue
Philosophical poetry is expression The poet's philosophical views and poems reflecting philosophical principles. The content of this kind of poetry is deep, subtle, and meaningful, and often contains abstract philosophy in vivid artistic images. The imagery is vivid, the language is implicit, and the truth is embedded in the image. Su Shi, the great poet of the Song Dynasty, created many philosophical poems with his rich life experience, rich cultural heritage, and wise thinking language.
Among Su Shi's philosophical poems, some are the poet's experience of observing nature and understanding the world.
Let’s first look at Su Shi’s “Inscription on the Western Forest Wall”, which vividly illustrates the principle that “to understand the truth and full picture of things, we must transcend a narrow scope and get rid of subjective prejudices”:
Heng It looks like a ridge with peaks on either side, with different heights near and far.
I don’t know the true face of Mount Lu, just because I am in this mountain.
?The title Xilinbi: written on the wall of Xilin Temple. Xilin Temple is located at the northern foot of Lushan Mountain in Jiangxi.
When Su Shi was demoted from Huangzhou to Ruzhou to serve as deputy envoy of regiment training, he passed through Jiujiang and visited Mount Lu. The magnificent mountains and rivers triggered great thoughts, so I wrote several travel notes on Mount Lu. "Tixilinbi" is a summary after visiting Mount Lushan. It describes the changing appearance of Mount Lushan and uses the scenery to reason. It points out that observation issues should be objective and comprehensive. If it is subjective and one-sided, no correct conclusion can be drawn.
The first two sentences, "Looking at it from the side, it looks like a ridge and a peak on its side, with different heights from near and far", which is a realistic description of what you see when you travel to the mountains. Lushan Mountain is a large mountain with crisscrossing hills and undulating peaks. Visitors will see different scenery depending on their location. These two sentences summarize and vividly describe the ever-changing scenery of Lushan Mountain.
The last two sentences, "I don't know the true face of Mount Lu, just because I am in this mountain" are reasoning in the scene and talking about the experience of traveling in the mountain. Why can't we recognize the true face of Mount Lushan? Because we are in Lushan Mountain, our field of vision is limited by the peaks and ridges of Lushan Mountain. What we see is only one peak, one ridge, one hill and one ravine of Lushan Mountain, only part of it. This is bound to be one-sided. This is what you see when you travel to the mountains, and it is often the same when you observe things in the world. These two poems have rich connotations. They enlighten people to understand a philosophy of dealing with people - because people are in different positions and have different starting points for looking at problems, their understanding of objective things will inevitably be one-sided; to understand the truth of things and the overall picture, we must transcend the narrow scope and get rid of subjective prejudices.
This is a philosophical poem, but the poet does not make an abstract discussion, but closely talks about his unique feelings about the mountain tour. With the help of the image of Mount Lu, he uses popular language to express the philosophy in a simple and profound way. , so it is friendly and natural.
Su Shi's "Tang Taoist said that when you look down at the thunderstorm on Tianmu Mountain, you can hear the thunder and lightning in the clouds", telling people that the results of looking at the same thing will be very different depending on their location:
< p> The external name has changed to the external body, and the mere thunder and lightning are like gods.The top of the mountain is only for babies to watch, and there are countless people who have lost their chopsticks in the world
A Tang Taoist named Zixia once wrote "Records of the Real Realm of Tianmu Mountain". Tianmu Mountain is in the northwest of present-day Zhejiang Province. The poet Zha Shenxing of the Qing Dynasty quoted from "Xian Chun Lin'an Chronicles" as saying: "There is the Thunder God's House in Tianmu Mountain, halfway up the west peak." "Huayang Guozhi", Cao Cao once discussed the world's heroes with Liu Bei, "Cao Cao calmly said to the late master (referring to Liu Bei): 'Today's heroes are only the envoys and Gu'er, the disciples of the original Chu (referring to Yuan Shao), and there are not many of them. "The first master was eating, and he lost his dagger and chopsticks." "At that time, there was a thunderstorm, and Beiyin said to Cao: 'Thunder and wind will change.'" Chopsticks.
The meaning of the whole poem is: Tang Taoists have put aside their reputation, so how can a mere thunder and lightning be called a thunder god? Watching thunder and lightning on Tianmu Mountain, the sound was like a baby crying, but when people down the mountain heard it, it was so loud that they were so shocked that they even dropped their chopsticks to the ground.
The connotation of this poem to the world is very rich. From the perspective of natural science, different understandings of the same phenomenon can be obtained by changing the orientation and perspective. From a social psychological perspective, the same thing has different feelings due to different moods. The reason why people in the world lose their chopsticks when they hear the thunder is because they are uneasy and compete to show off their cleverness and wits. Therefore, they are always moved by external things and cannot obtain the freedom of the soul. The poet created an image of a person standing on Tianmu Mountain who "has become more famous than he is". Because he has a "normal heart", he can "just look at the top of the mountain as a baby" and treat it with a detached attitude, so he is in harmony with the world. Naturally there is affinity, that is, there is no separation. In other words, those "people who have lost their chopsticks" are actually in a state of "separation". Of course, from the perspective of the poem itself, the positions of the two people compared are not the same, that is, they are not in the same natural space. However, what the poet wants to emphasize is the difference in psychological endurance, so he omits the details. Written in a big way, it becomes a wonderful metaphor for the realm of life.
Su Shi's "Poetry on the Qin" reveals the interconnectedness of things from the beautiful sound of the piano:
If there is sound on the qin, put it in the box Why don't you sing? ?
If the words are heard on your fingertips, why not listen to them on your fingertips? ?
Beautiful music is an organic whole, and the whole is composed of several parts and elements that influence and restrict each other.
In the music and the sound of the piano, parts and elements such as the fingers, the piano, the player's thoughts and feelings, and playing skills are interdependent and indispensable. They influence and restrict each other, and are closely connected. Materialist dialectics believes that the fundamental content of universal connections is the connection between contradictory parties within and between things. Therefore, what this poem reveals is the contradictory relationship between the piano, the fingers and the sound of the piano. If the performer is included, then the relationship between the performer's thoughts, feelings and skills and the piano and fingers can be seen as the relationship between the internal contradictions of things (internal causes) and the external contradictions of things (external causes). . The former is the basis for the production of music, and the latter is the condition for the production of music. Both are indispensable.