Mahjong and Hundun Culture | Internal Reference¶
This version presents source texts for deep study. Quotations reflect Xuefeng's original teachings.
I. The Root of Chinese Culture Is Hundun¶
The root of Chinese culture is Hundun — or, more precisely, the primary bloodline of Chinese culture is Hundun culture, not Confucianism, Buddhism, or Taoism.
Hundun culture fully accords with the Tao of the Greatest Creator. However, because "Hundun" implies disorder and chaos, I use the term "Hundun culture" rather than "chaos culture" to convey its true meaning with greater precision.
Many Chinese intellectuals write about "reviving Chinese culture," yet when I asked them, "Which part of Chinese culture do you want to revive?" not one gave a clear answer. This reveals that those who call for cultural revival do not actually know what Chinese culture is.
Chinese culture is Hundun culture. To revive Chinese culture is to revive Hundun culture. (Lifechanyuan Corpus · Revelation Chapter · Mahjong, Hundun, and Chinese Culture, 2007-09-29)
II. The Progenitor Fuxi and the Hundun Phenomenon¶
The cultural progenitor of the Chinese people is Fuxi, whose chief contributions were the River Chart, the Luo Writing, and the Eight Trigrams. All of traditional Chinese culture — Taiji, the I Ching, the Eight Trigrams, the Nine Stars, feng shui — springs from this source. So too do the meridian-channel theories of Chinese medicine, the Five Elements, the Four Pillars, fortune-telling, and shamanism.
What the River Chart and Luo Writing express is a Hundun phenomenon — the cosmic vision Fuxi perceived through unity of Heaven and Humanity.
The meaning of the Hundun phenomenon is cosmic holography: the boundlessly large contains the boundlessly small; every phenomenon, every entity, resonates holographically with the universe. A butterfly flapping its wings in Alaska triggers a storm at the Cape of Good Hope; an Eskimo in the Arctic coughs, and someone falls from a building in Australia. Nothing exists in isolation. (Lifechanyuan Corpus · Revelation Chapter · Mahjong, Hundun, and Chinese Culture, 2007-09-29)
III. Hundun Thinking: The Highest Level of Human Thought¶
In analyzing human thinking, I find that the most profound level is Hundun thinking, followed by non-form thinking, then Taiji thinking, image thinking, and illusory thinking. Confucian thinking operates at the material level — the lowest. Taoist thinking is Taiji thinking. The Buddha's thinking is non-form thinking. Western science-driven thinking is imagistic and associative. Today's popular New Age thinking — Seth, Conversations with God, The Law of One, A Course in Miracles — belongs to the illusory level. The path humanity must ultimately walk is Hundun thinking. Put another way: humanity must inherit, develop, and carry forward Hundun culture. (Lifechanyuan Corpus · Revelation Chapter · Mahjong, Hundun, and Chinese Culture, 2007-09-29)
IV. Four Gateways to Understanding Hundun Culture¶
Hundun culture can be approached through four phenomena: revelation, the Eight Trigrams, Master Huzi, and Mahjong.
Revelation means: "Looking upward, I observed patterns in the sky; looking downward, I examined the models of the earth; I studied the markings on birds and beasts and the conditions of the terrain; near at hand I drew from my own body, farther away from external things." In short: direct dialogue and communion with the Greatest Creator.
The Eight Trigrams: from Wuji (limitlessness) to Taiji, Taiji to Two Poles, Two Poles to Four Images, Four Images to Eight Trigrams, Eight Trigrams to sixty-four hexagrams, sixty-four hexagrams to the ten thousand phenomena of the cosmos.
Master Huzi was the teacher of Liezi, a man who applied the Hundun principle with mastery — studying him illuminates what the Hundun phenomenon is.
Mahjong is the game Chinese people commonly play for recreation. Do not underestimate it — what it enacts is precisely the Hundun principle. (Lifechanyuan Corpus · Revelation Chapter · Mahjong, Hundun, and Chinese Culture, 2007-09-29)
V. Mahjong's Astronomical Combinations and Hundun¶
A standard Mahjong set has 136 tiles. The number of possible arrangements is astronomical. Anyone who plays Mahjong every day for a lifetime will never reproduce the exact same configuration twice. You feel as though you have fallen into a labyrinth — you can see the outcome, but not the cause. Everything seems random and disordered; every time you sit down to play, you rely on luck, with no certainty about winning or losing.
Yet Hundun is ordered. It has principles and laws, meticulous and without gaps. What appears random and accidental is in reality ordered and inevitable. (Lifechanyuan Corpus · Revelation Chapter · Mahjong, Hundun, and Chinese Culture, 2007-09-29)
VI. "Luck" and the Hundun Mechanism¶
Mahjong players speak of "luck" — winning is good luck, losing is bad luck. But what is "luck"?
Try this: if you are sleep-deprived, physically unwell, or have had sexual activity within the past twenty-four hours, your luck will be poor — your probability of losing will far exceed your probability of winning, unless the other three players are in an even worse state. The direction you face and the Five Elements constitution of all the players also affect the outcome. To win at Mahjong, one must be vigorous in energy, physically well, and have abstained from sex in the near term. Under these conditions, luck is good.
The point is this: among the astronomical number of seemingly random arrangements, the tiles align perfectly with each player's energy state. If your energy is poor, no matter how clever or experienced you are, you will still lose. The mystery within is the Hundun principle. (Lifechanyuan Corpus · Revelation Chapter · Mahjong, Hundun, and Chinese Culture, 2007-09-29)
VII. Hundun in Society¶
Many wealthy people have little formal education and are not especially industrious, yet they amass fortunes. Many officials lack high intelligence or moral virtue, yet they rise to positions of power. Many educated, wise, kind-hearted, and hardworking people remain poor or never attain official rank. The mystery at work is the Hundun principle.
"Cleverness defeated by its own cleverness" — why? Because of Hundun.
Zhang Baosheng, China's most accomplished practitioner of extraordinary abilities, had little formal education, yet his thinking operated in a Hundun state. That is the secret.
The more concepts fill the mind, the farther one is from Hundun.
The more moral rules and precepts fill the mind, the farther one is from Hundun.
The richer one's knowledge, the farther one is from Hundun.
The more rules one masters, the farther one is from Hundun.
The more one seeks, the farther one is from Hundun.
(Lifechanyuan Corpus · Revelation Chapter · Mahjong, Hundun, and Chinese Culture, 2007-09-29)
VIII. How to Draw Near to Hundun — and Lifechanyuan's Mission¶
Laozi taught us to "return to the state of the infant." Jesus taught us to "become like little children." Zhang Sanfeng said: "Following the flow, one remains ordinary; reversing the flow, one becomes an immortal — and therein lies the turning." The Buddha taught: "Depart from all appearances" and "give rise to a mind that abides nowhere." These are the most sublime methods.
The Tao of the Greatest Creator is the Tao of Hundun. What Lifechanyuan transmits is Hundun information and the Hundun principle. The culture Lifechanyuan is building is Hundun culture — and in doing so, it is reviving China's root culture, the most essential culture of China.
Boundlessly wondrous, and enormously fun! (Lifechanyuan Corpus · Revelation Chapter · Mahjong, Hundun, and Chinese Culture, 2007-09-29)
IX. Games and Recreation as Gateways to the Tao¶
Is the Tao at work in card games, Mahjong, shuttlecock-kicking, and hide-and-seek? Without question — the Tao is in all things, and all things are in the Tao.
The Tao governs the evolution of all things, so games and recreation are also within the Tao. Games and recreation are an opportunity for understanding the Tao, a form of cultivation practice; through play, the Tao can be attained. (Lifechanyuan Corpus · Preaching Chapter · Seeing the Tao at Work in Games and Recreation, 2023-06-14)
X. "Man Proposes, Heaven Disposes" — The Deeper Teaching of the Hundun Mechanism¶
Regardless of how superb a player's skill, regardless of how excellent the tiles in hand, the Hundun mechanism under the Tao's control can still bring total defeat. Conversely, regardless of how poor one's skill or tiles, there is always the possibility of reaching the top. Look at the world: a handsome or beautiful person may lead a wretched life; an ordinary-looking person may enjoy a hundred peaceful years. A person of towering genius and virtue may die in agony; an ignorant person may pass through life unscathed.
This is the Hundun principle: within apparent disorder are strict laws that are difficult to fathom; behind those laws are secrets that cannot be seen, heard, or touched. Those secrets are the Hundun truth — though not the whole of it. The true core is the Hundun mechanism of the Tao.
Understanding the Hundun mechanism liberates one from impatience, anxiety, coercion, and competition.
To play, to experience, to feel within the Hundun mechanism — this is the supreme way of living. Only by understanding the Hundun mechanism of the Tao can a person become an immortal. (Lifechanyuan Corpus · Preaching Chapter · Heaven Decides · The Revelation of Having One's Underwear Stripped Off, 2023-03-08)
XI. The Highest Teaching: A Playful Approach to Life¶
Approach the card game with a playful spirit; approach life itself with a playful spirit. Such a person is magnanimous, is one who has awakened to life, is a sage among people, and is life's greatest winner.
Let your emotions be spirited, your heart be calm. See through things as a sage does; be mischievous as a child is. That is the true master of the game — and the immortal of the journey of life. (Xuefeng Corpus · Miscellaneous Essays Chapter · Insights from the Card Game "争上游," 2019-09-16)