Is there evidence of Noah’s flood in Chinese culture?

[ChetSinger]

Assyrian's point still stands, though...

If you google the idea you'll find all kinds of confirmation among Christian websites. A couple of them look quite exhaustive and go all the way back to the original "bone" character set. So there's data there if folks are looking for it.

But Christian websites can be accused of all kinds of bias. I wanted to get a sample set of my own, from Chinese acquaintances.

 

[Fascinated With God]

First, to God. The original Chinese deity, Shang Di (meaning “Lord of heaven&#8221, is so much like the God of the bible that some Christian missionaries preach that they are one and the same.

It is a little known fact that Confucianism is very much monotheistic. The Book of Changes, written about the same time as the 1st five books of the OT, which was the book Confucius' devoted most of his time to, repeatedly uses the phrase "Supreme Ruler" to refer to God.

 

[Assyrian]

If you google the idea you'll find all kinds of confirmation among Christian websites. A couple of them look quite exhaustive and go all the way back to the original "bone" character set. So there's data there if folks are looking for it.

But Christian websites can be accused of all kinds of bias.

The only Christians who are likely to be interested enough in the argument to write about it one their website are likely to be creationists. I have come across Christian sites that mention the oracle bone characters, but they just made vague claims about them rather than producing any evidence showing how boat was written. You need to look websites that debunk the idea, even if they aren't Christian sites.

I wanted to get a sample set of my own, from Chinese acquaintances.

Which was a good place to start your search, the problem is your friends are probably only familiar with the modern characters you would need to talk to linguists who know the history and development of the Chinese characters to see if the argument holds any water.

 

[Papias]

Originally Posted by Papias

Chet, that doesn't help your point because 1 peter never mentions "mouths" anyway.

I think we may be talking past each other.

The observation is that the symbols for "eight" and "mouth", meaning "eight people", are included in the Chinese character for "boat". And knowing that the Chinese people have a primeval flood story, and that eight people were saved on the ark, the character may indicate knowledge of participation in our shared history.
​

Chet, that's like saying that because the Chinese have a legend about a great, strong hero, and so do the greeks, that Hercules must really have existed.

The fact is that the symbol you are claiming means "8" often means "to divide", which is how it is meant here - to divide the water. The "mouth"symbol also has a wide meaning, often meaning "porthole", opening, or window - again, it certainly doesn't require it to be a human mouth - it doesn't even require it to be a mouth at all. "porthole" is probably what is meant by it in association with "boat".

Overall, if that's that kind of "evidence" that flood literalists use to support their case, then it is clear that they don't have any real evidence.

Papias

 

[juvenissun]

I think the danger here is the Rorschach inkblot effect, it is too easy for people to see what they want in complex designs. I don't think it is enough to ask people who can read Chinese, you would need to talk to people who know Chinese linguistics and the history and etymology of the characters.

The word 船 is indeed made of three parts: boat, eight and person. (note: among the three, the "eight" presents the biggest problem. It may or may not mean number 8. It could also mean "scattered", or "random", which is an auxiliary meaning of eight. This is similar to the use of four in the Bible.)

How to interpret the integrated word is another matter. There could be several ways to do that and it could lead to a few different meanings. However, there is nothing in the word which implies a direct link to flood, or Noah.

Personally, I don't use the word to imply the event of Noah's Flood. It brings a big gap to interpretation and is hard to fill.

 

[Papias]

Juvi wrote

Originally Posted by Papias

Juvi-

Do you have a Chinese source for that (that the symbol means "human mouth", not "animal mouth" - add, or are you just making it up?

After all, you've already misrepresented the symbol (because it doesn't contain the symbol for "family" anyway - Juvi just added that himself).

Being familiar with this, I could post about the wide range of meanings, and name for, that part of the symbol, but I decided against doing Juvi's legwork for him.

Papias

三口之家 (or 一家三&#21475: three mouth(s) family
牲口: (domestic) animal mouth
​

Juvi, thanks for proving my point. Everyone can now see for themselves that in those words, the same symbol (&#21475 is used to mean "human mouth" or "animal mouth", and in others it means "porthole" or "window" or "opening".

Just the fact that the symbol is used doesn't require that it mean "human mouth".

So there are a hundreds, at least, 口 's on the ark.

I think this all shows that you are correct in your last post, where you wrote:

There could be several ways to do that and it could lead to a few different meanings. However, there is nothing in the word which implies a direct link to flood, or Noah.

Personally, I don't use the word to imply the event of Noah's Flood. It brings a big gap to interpretation and is hard to fill.

Papias

 

[juvenissun]

Juvi wrote


Juvi, thanks for proving my point. Everyone can now see for themselves that in those words, the same symbol (&#21475 is used to mean "human mouth" or "animal mouth", and in others it means "porthole" or "window" or "opening".

Just the fact that the symbol is used doesn't require that it mean "human mouth".

So there are a hundreds, at least, 口 's on the ark.

Papias

You still don't get it.

If one only wrote "口", It would be interpreted as human mouth, but not animal mouth. If I ask you how many "口" in your family, I mean how many people, and it does not include your dog(s). That is the way to use the language. There is not much logic in it.

 

[Assyrian]

The word 船 is indeed made of three parts: boat, eight and person. (note: among the three, the "eight" presents the biggest problem. It may or may not mean number 8. It could also mean "scattered", or "random", which is an auxiliary meaning of eight. This is similar to the use of four in the Bible.)

How to interpret the integrated word is another matter. There could be several ways to do that and it could lead to a few different meanings. However, there is nothing in the word which implies a direct link to flood, or Noah.

Personally, I don't use the word to imply the event of Noah's Flood. It brings a big gap to interpretation and is hard to fill.

The problem is, the character isn't made up of three parts it is made up of two. It's a bit like a game of charades, the first the semantic element gives you the category... its a type of boat. The second part is phonetic, it sounds like.... chuan.

You can find the same phonetic element as
ship: 船 chuan2
in the words:
lead (the metal): 鉛 yan2
along or edge: 沿 qian1

To see how the semantic element on the right works have a look at lead and some other metals

lead.. 鉛
Copper. 銅
Iron.. 鐵
Vanadium 釩

Does the metal lead have eight mouths or does it sound like chuan?

 

[juvenissun]

The problem is, the character isn't made up of three parts it is made up of two. It's a bit like a game of charades, the first the semantic element gives you the category... its a type of boat. The second part is phonetic, it sounds like.... chuan.

You can find the same phonetic element as
ship: 船 chuan2
in the words:
lead (the metal): 鉛 qian1

Does the metal lead have eight mouths or does it sound like chuan?

You are very good and I am impressed.

The "eight-mouth" part indeed is made of two original words, the eight and the mouth. However, when put together, it becomes another word. The most common idea is that the combined word means "public" or "common". This is derived from another meaning of the "eight" which is "scattered" or "random".

So, when put the words "common" together with "metal", which metal are we talking about? The easily melting lead is not a surprising candidate in the bronze age. (I don't really know when did the qian1 word appear in Chinese history)

 

[Assyrian]

You are very good and I am impressed.

The "eight-mouth" part indeed is made of two original words, the eight and the mouth. However, when put together, it becomes another word. The most common idea is that the combined word means "public" or "common". This is derived from another meaning of the "eight" which is "scattered" or "random".

So, when put the words "common" together with "metal", which metal are we talking about? The easily melting lead is not a surprising candidate in the bronze age. (I don't really know when did the qian1 word appear in Chinese history)

You need to remember the Chinese language long predated writing and lead was one of the first metals discovered. If you have a ring of stones around a camp fire and they contain lead ores like galena, you will have metallic lead at the bottom of your camp fire the next morning. They would have had a name for lead long before they started carving characters on oracle bones. When they eventually wanted to write the name of lead down, they didn't make up a new name from a set of ideograms, they took the ideogram for metal and the another symbol which told you what it sounded like, not what it meant. You could make up a whole etymology of why lead sounds the same as led, and trace its roots through the Germanic verb to lead because it was pliable or easily led, or because it was the first metal led out of ores. But in fact it come through Celtic luaide from an even older root meaning to flow.

 

[juvenissun]

You need to remember the Chinese language long predated writing and lead was one of the first metals discovered. If you have a ring of stones around a camp fire and they contain lead ores like galena, you will have metallic lead at the bottom of your camp fire the next morning. They would have had a name for lead long before they started carving characters on oracle bones. When they eventually wanted to write the name of lead down, they didn't make up a new name from a set of ideograms, they took the ideogram for metal and the another symbol which told you what it sounded like, not what it meant. You could make up a whole etymology of why lead sounds the same as led, and trace its roots through the Germanic verb to lead because it was pliable or easily led, or because it was the first metal led out of ores. But in fact it come through Celtic luaide from an even older root meaning to flow.

OK. But I do not see any "sound" in the Chinese word of lead.
That is why I suspected that the Chinese character of lead is an imported word and could be pretty modern in origin. In your examples, the only one I can see some etymological meaning is the word for iron.

 

[Assyrian]

? ? ?

 

[Papias]

Juvi wrote:

You still don't get it.

If one only wrote "口", It would be interpreted as human mouth, but not animal mouth.

Again, do you have a chinese source to back that up? Your statement above has no backing, and is contradicted by the use of the character. I asked you on the first page of this thread for a chinese source to back up your claim that "口" meant "human mouth", and even after post after post from you, and now being on the 4th page of the thread, you still haven't supplied one. You really seem to think that something can be true just because Juvie says so.

I don't "get it" because I don't just take Juvi's word for it. Are you going to now claim you are a native chinese speaker, just as you claimed earlier that you are a native english speaker (even though anyone reading your posts can see that you aren't.)?

If I ask you how many "口" in your family, I mean how many people, and it does not include your dog(s).

Again, there you go sticking in "family", which is not in the original discussion. By putting in "family" in there, you are changing the context (and still, your statement is unsupported anyway).

Have you had discussions in china with families about then number of mouths in the family? Or again are you just making things up and expecting us to buy it because Juvi said so?

I have been in china, and have discussed language with a family, including discussion of their dog. You know what they had named their dog? Their dog was named "dog" (in mandarin, go-go). But that's my experience. What's yours?

That is the way to use the language. There is not much logic in it.

Hey, look at that, Juvi is again telling us how to use the chinese language. And again without a reference to anything from a chinese source. So again, Juvi, are you a native chinese speaker, or are you just making unsupported statements? We saw from Assyrians post that we can't just go by your assertions (because lead doesn't have a mouth), and then you followed that up with a post that doesn't seem to make any sense.

So could you please supply some basis for your assertions, or admit that you aren't a native chinese speaker and have no support for those statements?

Papias

 

[juvenissun]

Juvi wrote:



Again, do you have a chinese source to back that up? Your statement above has no backing, and is contradicted by the use of the character. I asked you on the first page of this thread for a chinese source to back up your claim that "口" meant "human mouth", and even after post after post from you, and now being on the 4th page of the thread, you still haven't supplied one. You really seem to think that something can be true just because Juvie says so.

I don't "get it" because I don't just take Juvi's word for it. Are you going to now claim you are a native chinese speaker, just as you claimed earlier that you are a native english speaker (even though anyone reading your posts can see that you aren't.)?





Again, there you go sticking in "family", which is not in the original discussion. By putting in "family" in there, you are changing the context (and still, your statement is unsupported anyway).

Have you had discussions in china with families about then number of mouths in the family? Or again are you just making things up and expecting us to buy it because Juvi said so?

I have been in china, and have discussed language with a family, including discussion of their dog. You know what they had named their dog? Their dog was named "dog" (in mandarin, go-go). But that's my experience. What's yours?



Hey, look at that, Juvi is again telling us how to use the chinese language. And again without a reference to anything from a chinese source. So again, Juvi, are you a native chinese speaker, or are you just making unsupported statements? We saw from Assyrians post that we can't just go by your assertions (because lead doesn't have a mouth), and then you followed that up with a post that doesn't seem to make any sense.

So could you please supply some basis for your assertions, or admit that you aren't a native chinese speaker and have no support for those statements?

Papias

No source and no back up. Take it or not is up to you. I don't really care if you don't.

 

[Papias]

there are 50 foot tall cockroaches!!

No source and no back up. Take it or not is up to you.

 

[juvenissun]

there are 50 foot tall cockroaches!!

No source and no back up. Take it or not is up to you.

What are the size of its legs?
You must think that it is easy to make up things.
Grown up!

 

[Assyrian]

What are the size of its legs?
You must think that it is easy to make up things.
Grown up!

Are you saying you are much better at making things up?

 

[Papias]

Juvi wrote:

You must think that it is easy to make up things.
Grown up!

Oh, so you have a hard time making up things? Even after all that practice?

Do you still claim to be a native english speaker?

Papias

 

[juvenissun]

Are you saying you are much better at making things up?

Compare to Papias, I certain am.

 

[juvenissun]

Juvi wrote:



Oh, so you have a hard time making up things? Even after all that practice?

Do you still claim to be a native english speaker?

Papias

It is quite pointless to have any discussion with you. I forgot about it.