Beginning of Summer: Xunfeng Facing All Things Show (decoding the twenty-four solar terms)
This year's Lixia solar term will come on May 5th, Beijing time. Since then, the wind is warm and the days are long and everything is flourishing.
Lixia is the seventh solar term in the twenty-four solar terms of the lunar calendar and the first solar term in summer.
Every year around May 6 of the solar calendar, when the sun reaches 45° ecliptic longitude, the beginning of the solar term begins.
The ancient book "The Collection of the Seventy-two Hours of the Moon Order" said, "Li is the beginning of the establishment", "Xia is false, and all things are false at this time."
The "false" here means "big", which means that the spring is gone, the summer begins, and everything has grown up, hence the name Lixia.
Lixia is the peak season for the growth of all things.
In the twenty-four solar terms, each solar term has an interval of 15 days, and every 15 days is divided into three phases.
Each phenotype has periodic natural phenomena such as animals, plants, birds, weather, etc. that change with the seasons. These phenomena are called "phenology".
Lixia is divided into three phases: the first phase of the crickets and crickets, the second phase of the emergence of earthworms, and the third phase of the birth of the king melon.
First, you can hear the chirping of mole crickets in the field, and then you can see earthworms digging the soil, and then the vines of Wanggua (a medicinal plant of the type of melon) begin to climb and grow rapidly.
At this time, all things have faded from the tenderness of spring, and fruits and vegetables and wild vegetables are growing, handsome and lush.
After the beginning of summer, the days get longer, the temperature rises sharply, the summer heat is approaching, thunderstorms increase, and crops enter the season of vigorous growth.
A farmer's proverb says: "When peas arrive at the beginning of summer, there will be one more fork in a night." At this time, winter wheat is blooming, and rapeseed is close to maturity, and the year of summer harvest is basically finalized.
The management of rice planting and other spring-sown crops also entered the busy season at this time.
In ancient China, the beginning of the summer solar term was taken seriously.
According to historical records, in the Zhou Dynasty, on the day of the beginning of summer, the emperor personally led civil and military officials to the suburbs to hold a grand "summer welcoming" ceremony, and ordered officials to go to various places to encourage farmers to work hard.
During the ceremony, all the rulers and ministers wear vermilion dresses and vermilion jade pendants, and even the horses and chariots and flags must be vermilion red to express their respect to the God of Si Xia and their prayers for a bumper harvest of summer crops.
In the Ming Dynasty's "Scenery of the Imperial Capital", it was recorded: "When the summer begins, the ice will be opened, and the ministers of civil and military affairs will be given." On the day of the beginning of summer, the officials in charge of the ice administration at the court will dig out the ice cubes stored in the winter cellar, cut them apart, and give them to the emperor as a reward. officials.
On the day of Lixia, there are many customs around eating. Most of the northern regions have the custom of making and eating pasta, which is intended to celebrate the harvest of wheat.
Some places have the custom of "eating Lixia eggs" and "fighting eggs".
Eggs symbolize completeness. "Eat the eggs in the beginning of summer, and the hot weather will not scorch summer." sick.
In some places, "five-color rice" (made of white rice with red beans, soybeans, black beans, green beans, and mung beans) is eaten, which means "happiness and health, and abundant grains".
In Jiangnan area, there is the custom of tasting "three new" in Lixia.
"Three new" generally refers to fresh food. Anhui eats tender broad beans or peas, fresh bamboo shoots, and boiled glutinous rice with meat; Yangzhou people eat newly marketed fruits and vegetables such as cherries, green broad beans, garlic sprouts, and amaranth.
Other regions in the south of the Yangtze River have similar but slightly different customs – Wuxi people prefer cucumbers and apricots, Changzhou people have a soft spot for saury and shad, and Suzhou people include freshly ripened cherries, green plums and wheat on their menus.
After the beginning of summer, the principle of health preservation in traditional Chinese medicine is "nourishing yang in spring and summer".
Yang Yang focuses on nourishing the heart.
Chinese medicine believes that the heart is in charge of summer, the blood vessels, and fire is connected to the heart.
Summer is in harmony with the heart.
The weather is gradually getting hotter, and people are prone to irritability. Therefore, in summer, we should pay attention to the maintenance of the mind.
As the saying goes: "In the beginning of summer, raise a good heart, and you will be free from disease." In summer, the body's surface is full of yang, while the body's yang is relatively insufficient.
Therefore, even if you feel warm or even hot, you should pay attention to protecting the yang qi.
Taking advantage of the sunshine in the beginning of summer and the lack of heat, cultivating good yang can achieve the effect of "treatment of winter diseases in summer" and relieve diseases that are prone to occur or aggravate in winter.
The rotation of the spring and summer time series brings vitality to the earth, as well as poetic and picturesque.
Ancient poets did not hesitate to describe the first solar term of summer with their brushes.
Liu Yuxi wrote in "Early Summer Song": "The season is too prosperous... Lonely and solitary flying butterflies, peering into the bushes to find late flowers." The spring flowers have withered, and the fruits are adorned on the branches, and the butterflies want to find spring in the "late flowers", As everyone knows, summer has quietly started.
Yang Wanli used images such as plums, plantains, and willow flowers to express the seasonal characteristics of early summer in "Idle Home in Early Summer". Willow".
In "Lixia", Lu You presented a picture of Lixia in which all the flowers are in full bloom, the swallows are hilarious, and the shade of green is getting thicker. picture.
The swallow takes the spring to go, and the wind brings summer to come.
Summer is the season of vitality, with lush vegetation, flowers in full bloom, and the scorching sun.
In recent years, with the increasing attention paid to the excellent traditional Chinese culture, people's cultural awareness has been increasing day by day.
Some areas not only retain traditional customs such as eating "five-colored rice", drinking "Lixia tea", and "fighting eggs", but also creatively integrate Lixia customs into local culture and tourism development, and explore and enrich solar terms culture in leisure, entertainment, diet and health preservation. , traditional cultural education and other functions, such as holding activities such as "running the mountain in the beginning of summer", "riding to welcome summer", "studying to welcome summer", inheriting and innovating the ceremony of "sending spring and welcoming summer", etc.
The colorful activities make the people feel the charm of the traditional customs of the Lixia solar term "living" in the present.
(The author is an associate professor at Beijing Union University)
Wu Yunxia