Wuxing (Chinese philosophy)

For other uses, see Wuxing (Chinese philosophy) (disambiguation).

Diagram of the interactions between the Wu Xing. The generation cycle is illustrated by black arrows running clockwise on the outside of the circle, while lines of conquest are represented by white arrows inside the circle.

Wuxing
Chinese	五行
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin wǔxíng Wade–Giles wu3 hsing2 Yue: Cantonese Yale Romanization ng5 hang4 Southern Min Hokkien POJ Ngó͘-hân Ngó͘-hîng

The Wu Xing, (五行 wŭ xíng) also known as the Five Elements, Five Phases, the Five Agents, the Five Movements, Five Processes, and the Five Steps/Stages, is a fivefold conceptual scheme that many traditional Chinese fields used to explain a wide array of phenomena, from cosmic cycles to the interaction between internal organs, and from the succession of political regimes to the properties of medicinal drugs. The "Five Phases" are Wood (木 mù), Fire (火 huǒ), Earth (土 tǔ), Metal (金 jīn), and Water (水 shuǐ). This order of presentation is known as the "mutual generation" (xiangsheng 相生) sequence. In the order of "mutual conquest" (xiangsheng 相勝) or "mutual overcoming" (xiangke 相剋), they are Wood, Earth, Water, Fire, and Metal.

"Wu Xing" is often translated as Five Elements and this is used extensively by many including practioners of Five Element acupuncture. This translation arose by false analogy with the Western system of the four elements. Whereas the classical Greek elements were concerned with substances or natural qualities, the Chinese xing are "primarily concerned with process and change," hence the common translation as "phases" or "agents." By the same token, Mu is thought of as "Tree" rather than "Wood". The words Element is thus used within the context of Chinese medicine with a different meaning to its usual meaning. Evolution of language in this way is not without precedence. It should be recognized that the word Phase although commonly preferred may be better, but is not perfect. Phase is a better translation for the five 'seasons'(五運 wŭ yùn) mentioned below, and so Agents or Processes might be preferred for the primary term Xing. Manfred Porkert attempts to resolve this by using 'Evolutive Phase' for Wu Xing (五行 wŭ xíng) and 'Circuit Phase' for Wu Yun (五運 wŭ yùn), but these have the drawback of being unwieldy terms. In some ways arguing for one one term over another is a flawed argument because any single word is probably inadequate for translation of what is a concept.

Some of the Mawangdui Silk Texts (no later than 168 BC) also present the Wu Xing as "five virtues" or types of activities. Within Chinese medicine texts the Wu Xing are also referred to as Wu Yun (五運 wŭ yùn) or a combination of the two characters (Wu Xing-Yun) these emphasise the correspondence of five elements to five 'seasons' (four seasons plus one). Another tradition refers to the wu xing as wu de 五德, the Five Virtues (zh:五德終始說).

The system of five phases was used for describing interactions and relationships between phenomena. After it came to maturity in the second or first century BCE during the Han dynasty, this device was employed in many fields of early Chinese thought, including seemingly disparate fields such as geomancy or Feng shui, astrology, traditional Chinese medicine, music, military strategy and martial arts. The system is still used as a reference in some forms of complementary and alternative medicine and martial arts.

Cycles

The doctrine of five phases describes two cycles, a generating or creation (生, shēng) cycle, also known as "mother-son", and an overcoming or destruction (剋/克, kè) cycle, also known as "grandfather-nephew", of interactions between the phases.

Generating

The five elements are usually used to describe the state in nature:

• Wood/Spring: a period of growth, which generates abundant wood and vitality
• Fire/Summer: a period of swellness, which overbrews with fire and energy
• Metal/Autumn: a period of fruition, which produces formation and bears fruit
• Water/Winter: a period of retreat, where stillness pervades
• Earth: the in-between transitional seasonal periods

The common memory jogs, which help to remind in what order the phases are:

• Wood feeds Fire
• Fire creates Earth (ash)
• Earth bears Metal
• Metal carries Water (as in a bucket or tap, or water condenses on metal)
• Water nourishes Wood

Other common words for this cycle include "begets", "engenders" and "mothers."

Overcoming

• Wood parts Earth (such as roots; or, Trees can prevent soil erosion)
• Earth dams (or muddies or absorbs) Water
• Water extinguishes Fire
• Fire melts Metal
• Metal chops Wood

This cycle might also be called "controls", "restrains" or "fathers".

Cosmology and feng shui

Another illustration of the cycle.

Main article: Feng shui

According to Wu Xing theory, the structure of the cosmos mirrors the five phases. Each phase has a complex series of associations with different aspects of nature, as can be seen in the following table. In the ancient Chinese form of geomancy known as Feng Shui practitioners all based their art and system on the five phases (Wu Xing). All of these phases are represented within the Ba gua. Associated with these phases are colors, seasons and shapes; all of which are interacting with each other.

Based on a particular directional energy flow from one phase to the next, the interaction can be expansive, destructive, or exhaustive. With proper knowledge of such aspect of energy flow will enable the Feng Shui practitioner to apply certain cures or rearrangement of energy in a way they believe to be beneficial for the receiver of the Feng Shui "Treatment".

Element	Wood	Fire	Earth	Metal	Water
Material	Wind, Moisture, Air, Minerals, Mana, Ink, Mind, Rubber, Paper, Plants, Poison, Wax, Dissolve, Carbon, Clouds, Health, Space	Heat, Light, Lava, Radiation, Sparks, Plasma, Explosions, Burn, Blaze, Oil, Ash, Smoke, Glass, Napalm, Sun, Matter	Clay, Rock, Dust, Sand, Mud, Crystal, Powder, Shadow, Space, Darkness, Gravity, Bone, Quake, Silicon	Lightning, Magnetism, Electric, Rust, Gold, Silver, Steel, Iron, Platinum, Titanium, Copper, Bronze, Brass, Blood, Forge, Stars, Diamond, Energy	Sea, Ice, Storms, Rain, Steam, Fluid, Sound, Mist, Acid, Slime, Salt, Time, Pressure, Moon, Mirror, Snow, Frost, Sugar
Color	Green	Red	Yellow	White	Black
Shape	Rectangular	Triangle	Square	Round	Curve
Cardinal direction	East	South	Center	West	North
Planet	Jupiter	Mars	Saturn	Venus	Mercury
Heavenly creature	Azure Dragon 青龍	Vermilion Bird 朱雀	Yellow Dragon 黃龍 / Qilin 麒麟	White Tiger 白虎	Black Tortoise 玄武
Heavenly Stems	甲, 乙	丙, 丁	戊, 己	庚, 辛	壬, 癸
Phase	New Yang	Full Yang	Yin/Yang balance	New Yin	Full Yin
Direction and Natural phenomena	Expansive and exterior (in all directions)	Ascending	Stabilizing (representing harmony)	Contracting and interior	Descending
Season	Spring	Summer	Change of seasons (Every third month)	Autumn	Winter
Climate	Windy	Hot	Damp	Dry	Cold
Development	Sprouting	Blooming	Ripening	Withering	Dormant

Ba gua

Main article: Ba gua

The movements have also been correlated to the eight trigrams of the I Ching:

Movement	Metal	Earth	Wood	Wood	Water	Fire	Earth	Metal
I Ching	Heaven	Earth	Thunder	Wind	Water	Fire	Mountain	Lake
Trigrams	☰	☷	☳	☴	☵	☲	☶	☱
Trigram hanzi	乾	坤	震	巽	坎	離	艮	兌
Trigram pinyin	qián	kūn	zhèn	xùn	kǎn	lí	gèn	duì

Chinese medicine

Five Chinese Elements - Diurnal Cycle

Main article: Traditional Chinese medicine

The interdependence of Zang Fu networks in the body was noted to be a circle of five things, and so mapped by the Chinese doctors onto the five phases. For instance, the Liver (Wood phase) is said to be the "mother" of the heart (Fire phase), and the Kidneys (Water phase) the mother of the Liver. The key observation was things like kidney deficiency affecting the function of the liver. In this case, the "mother" is weak, and cannot support the child. However, the Kidneys control the heart along the Ke cycle, so the Kidneys are said to restrain the heart. Many of these interactions can nowadays be linked to Western physiological pathways (such as Kidney pH affecting heart activity).

The key thing to keep in mind with the Chinese medical application of the five elements is that it is only a model, and it is known to have exceptions.

The citation order of the Five Phases, i.e., the order in which they are cited in the Bo hu tong 白虎通 and other Han dynasty texts, is Metal, Wood, Water, Fire, and Earth. The organs are most effectively treated, according to theory, in the following four-hour periods throughout the day, beginning with the 3 a.m. to 7 a. m. period: Metal organs (see the list below), Earth organs, Fire₁ organs, Water organs, Fire₂ (the "non-empirical" Pericardium and Triple Burner organs), and Wood organs, which is the reverse of the citation order (plus an extra use of Fire and the non-empirical organs to take care of the sixth four-hour period of the day). These two orders are further related to the sequence of the planets going outward from the sun (Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, or Water, Metal, Fire, Wood, and Earth) by a star diagram similar to the one shown above.

The sequence of the five elements (Traditional Chinese medicine)：promotion, inhibition, Cheng (bullying), Wu (insult).

Movement	Wood	Fire	Earth	Metal	Water
Planet	Jupiter	Mars	Saturn	Venus	Mercury
Mental Quality	Sensitivity	Creativity	Clarity	Intuition	Spontaneity
Emotion	anger	happiness	love	grief, sadness	fear, scare
Zang (yin organs)	liver	heart/pericardium	spleen/pancreas	lung	kidney
Fu (yang organs)	gall bladder	small intestine/San Jiao	stomach	large intestine	urinary bladder
Sensory organ	eyes	tongue	mouth	nose	ears
Body Part	Tendons	Pulse	Muscle	Skin	Bones
Body Fluid	Tears	Sweat	Saliva	Mucus	Urine
Finger	index finger	middle finger	thumb	ring finger	little finger
Sense	sight	speech	taste	smell	hearing
Taste	sour	bitter	sweet	pungent	salt
Smell	Rancid	Scorched	Fragrant	Rotten	Putrid
Life	birth	youth	adulthood	old age	death
Animal	scaly	feathered	human	furred	shelled

Celestial stem

Main article: Celestial stem

Movement	Wood	Fire	Earth	Metal	Water
Heavenly Stem	Jia 甲 Yi 乙	Bing 丙 Ding 丁	Wu 戊 Ji 己	Geng 庚 Xin 辛	Ren 壬 Gui 癸
Year ends with	4, 5	6, 7	8, 9	0, 1	2, 3

Music

Main articles: Chinese music and Chinese musicology

The Yuèlìng chapter (月令篇) of the Lǐjì (禮記) and the Huáinánzǐ (淮南子) make the following correlations:

Movement	Wood	Fire	Earth	Metal	Water
Colour	Green or Blue	Red	Yellow	White	Black
Direction	east	south	center	west	north
Basic Pentatonic Scale pitch	角	徵	宮	商	羽
Basic Pentatonic Scale pitch pinyin	jué	zhǐ	gōng	shāng	yǔ
solfege	mi	sol	do	re	la

• The Chinese word 青 qīng, has many meanings, including green, azure, cyan, and black. It refers to green in Wu Xing.
• In most modern music, various seven note or five note scales (e.g., the major scale) are defined by selecting seven or five frequencies from the set of twelve semi-tones in the Equal tempered tuning. The Chinese "lǜ" tuning is closest to the ancient Greek tuning of Pythagoras.

Martial arts

T'ai chi ch'uan uses the five elements to designate different directions, positions or footwork patterns. Either forward, backward, left, right and centre, or three steps forward (attack) and two steps back (retreat).

The Five Steps (五步 wǔ bù):

• Jìn bù (進步) Forward step
• Tùi bù (退步) Backward step
• Zǔo gù (左顧, in simplified characters 左顾) ) Left step
• Yòu pàn (右盼 ) Right step
• Zhōng dìng (中定) Central position, balance, equilibrium.

Xingyiquan uses the five elements metaphorically to represent five different states of combat.

Movement	Fist	Chinese	Pinyin	Description
Metal	Splitting	劈	Pī	To split like an axe chopping up and over.
Water	Drilling	鑽	Zuān	Drilling forward horizontally like a geyser.
Wood	Crushing	崩	Bēng	To collapse, as a building collapsing in on itself.
Fire	Pounding	炮	Pào	Exploding outward like a cannon while blocking.
Earth	Crossing	橫	Héng	Crossing across the line of attack while turning over.

Tea ceremony

There are spring, summer, fall, and winter teas. The perennial tea ceremony ("perennial", literally means four steps or sequences that are linked together, each representing a season of the year) includes four tea settings(茶席) and a tea master(司茶). The tea settings are:

• earth, center incense, yellow, up and down
• wood, 春風(Spring Wind), green, east
• fire, 夏露(Summer Dew), red, south
• metal, 秋籟(Fall Sounds), white, west
• water, 冬陽(Winter Sunshine) black, north

Each tea setting is arranged and stands for the four directions (north, south, east, and west). A vase of the seasons' flowers is put on tea table. Sometimes if four tea masters are included then five chairs are arranged per tea setting, making a total of twenty plus the 4 tea masters equalling 24, which symbolizes the 24 solar terms of the Chinese calendar, and represents that nature continues or is perennial.

See also

Tablet, in Chinese and Manchu, for the gods of the five elements in the Temple of Heaven

• Color in Chinese culture
• Flying Star Feng Shui
• Humorism
• Qi
• Wu Xing Painting
• Zang Fu

Bibliography

• Feng Youlan (Yu-lan Fung), A History of Chinese Philosophy, volume 2, p. 13
• Joseph Needham, Science and Civilization in China, volume 2, pp. 262–23
• Maciocia, G. 2005, The Foundations of Chinese Medicine, 2nd edn, Elsevier Ltd., London