诗的源起及其早期发展变化--兼论中国古代巫术与宗教有关问题

The Origin of Poetry and Its Early Development:With an Analysis of Issues Relating to Sorcery and Religion in Ancient China

中国古代诗歌起源于原始巫术咒语。咒语也可称为巫诗。巫诗盛行于五帝时代早期及其之前。到五帝时代中期,由于生产力发展,剩余产品出现,有了阶层分化,原始巫术中通天神的仪式和巫诗,开始被少数氏族贵族阶层垄断,并成为其统治社会的政治工具而发展为宗教与史诗。这种现象一直延续到夏商西周。在这两千多年中,中原各民族的史诗,由世代口耳相传到逐步写成文本,形成了"史诗传统"。史诗既是各氏族早期历史的载体,也是中国古代诗歌早期发展的特殊形式,更是夏商周三代王官之学的集中体现。到春秋战国时期,社会再次出现大变革,"史诗传统"也随之出现变化,即"王者之迹熄而诗亡,诗亡然后春秋作"。所谓"诗亡"只是史诗形式的终结,而史诗精神却在当时新起的文献体式中获得了继承与升华。

Ancient Chinese poetry originated from primitive magical incantations,incantations that can also be regarded as magical poetry.They were common before and in the early years of the era of the Five Emperors.In middle years of that era,class polarization appeared as a result of the development of the productive forces and emergence of surplus products.The primitive magical rituals of communication with the gods and magical poetry began to be monopolized by a stratum of a few aristocratic clans;they served as the political tools of their rule and developed into religion and the epic.This phenomenon persisted up to the Xia,Shang and Western Zhou dynasties.Over these two thousand odd years,the epics of the peoples of the central plain were handed down orally from generation to generation until they gradually assumed written form,giving rise to the 'epic tradition.' The epic was not only a vehicle for early clan history but also a special form of the early development of ancient Chinese poetry,as well as a concentrated embodiment of the official knowledge of the Xia,Shang and Zhou dynasties.Great changes once again took place in the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods,accompanied by changes in the 'epic tradition.' Specifically,'after the influence of the true kings came to an end,epics died and then came the history written in prose.' The so-called 'death of epics' refers only to the epic form;the epic spirit was inherited and sublimated in the forms of the newly emerging literature of the time.