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A Dictionary of Chinese Symbols 48
Book Book
shu
The book is one of the eight symbols of the scholar; it represents his learning.
Until quite recently, parents used to lay out various objects before a son on his first
birthday – money, silver, a tortoise, a banana and a book. If the baby tried to
grasp the book, it was a sign that he would be studious.
For more than two thousand years, the literary topos of the handing down of a book
from supernatural powers has figured ‘not only in the initiation but also as a harbinger of
a new age: a concept which has struck particularly deep roots in the Dao-inspired secret
societies’ (Wolfgang Bauer).
Books and a spray of almond blossom: ‘May you pass
your examination and achieve high official rank’
Chinese ways of thought have always been based on certain books – whether ‘the five’
classics, or ‘the four books’ of Confucianism. In the Tai-ping-jing (‘Way of Supreme
Peace’), a Taoist work of the 2nd century AD, we find this theme dealt with in a teacher’s
answer to disciples who have asked him what, in the long run, is the real use, if any, of
