Fán Wù Liú Xíng 凡物流形
All Things Flow in Form (modern editorial title, from the opening phrase)
(anonymous; excavated bamboo manuscript, no attributable author)
About the work
Fán Wù Liú Xíng 凡物流形 is one of the texts in 馬承源 Mǎ Chéngyuán ed., 《上海博物館藏戰國楚竹書》 vol. 7, Shànghǎi gǔjí chūbǎnshè 上海古籍出版社, 2008, comprising approximately 20 bamboo strips in 18 sections. The text is a sustained cosmological-philosophical inquiry organized around paradoxical questions about the nature of things, the cosmos, life and death, ghosts and spirits, and the mystery of the “One” (yī 一). It is one of the most ambitious philosophical texts in the entire Shanghai Museum corpus and has been compared to the Zhuāngzǐ 莊子 (Tiānwèn 天問), the Guōdiàn Tàiyī Shēng Shuǐ 太一生水, and the Shanghai Museum Héng Xiān 恒先 KR2p0042.
Abstract
Series of cosmological questions (§§1–8). The text opens with a rapid-fire series of paradoxical questions about cosmological transformation:
§1: “All things flow in form (fán wù liú xíng 凡物流形) — how do they come to complete themselves? Flowing form becomes body — how does one not die? [Something] already complete, already born — why so little that it cries out? Already rooted, already established — what comes after what comes before? The dwelling-place of yin and yang — how does it become fixed? The harmony of water and fire — how does it avoid danger?”
§2: “I ask: Human beings flow in form — how do they come to be born? Flowing form becomes body — what is lost when one dies? [Something] is obtained and completed — yet one does not know the situation of left and right. Heaven and Earth establish the ending and the beginning. Heaven sends down the five degrees — how do I reckon horizontally and vertically?”
§3: “The five pneumata (wǔ qì 五氣) come together — how do I differ, how do I agree? The five words (wǔ yán 五言) in humans — who makes them public? Nine [things] emerge — who seals/allocates them? I am already grown and perhaps old — who presents and supports [me]? Ghosts come from humans — how are they divinely luminous (shén míng 神明)?”
§4–5: On ghosts: “When the bones and flesh have already dissolved (jǐ mí 既靡), their wisdom grows ever more manifest; where does their resolution go? Who knows their boundary? Ghosts come from humans — why do I serve them? When bones and flesh have dissolved, the body is no longer seen — why do I feed them myself? They come without measure — how do I time them? The sacrificial vessels — how do they ascend? How do I make them full? Following Heaven’s Way — what do I put first? I want to obtain the harmony of the hundred surnames — what do I do for them? Reverence toward Heaven’s brightness — how to obtain it? What do the spirits of ghosts eat? What does the wisdom of the former kings prepare?”
§6–8: Cosmological questions about Sun, Moon, wind, rain: “As the sun begins to rise, why is it large and not [consumed]? As it reaches the middle, why does it grow small?” “Who is Heaven, who is Earth, who is the thunder spirit, who is the Lord (dì 帝)?” “How does earth come to be level? Water to be clear? Grasses and trees to be born? Birds and animals to cry out?” “When rain comes — who spits and shoots it? When wind comes — who breathes and disperses it?”
Teaching passages on the Way (§§9–18). After the paradox-questions, the text shifts to positive instruction introduced by the formula wén zhī yuē 聞之曰 (“I have heard it said”):
§9: “By examining the Way, sitting without leaving one’s mat, holding upright the written documents, without engaging in affairs — one knows the four seas in advance, hears a thousand li, sees a hundred li. Hence the sage, sitting in his place, can know in advance the danger or safety, survival or ruin of the state, and the arising of bandits.”
§10: “If the heart cannot overcome the heart, the six disorders (liù luàn 六亂) arise. If the heart can overcome the heart — this is called ‘small penetration’ (xiǎo chè 小徹). What is called ‘small penetration’? People themselves become clear (bái wèi chá 人白為察) — how do we know their clarity? Throughout one’s lifetime, by being naturally one’s own true self (zì ruò 自若); if one can be sparing in words, I can unify myself (wú néng yī wú 吾能一吾) — this is called ‘small completion’ (xiǎo chéng 小成).”
§11: “What the people prize is only the lord; what the lord prizes is only the heart; what the heart prizes is only the One (xīn zhī suǒ guì wéi yī 心之所貴唯一). Grasp it and unravel it — above, you are a guest at Heaven; below, you spread into the deep. Sitting and pondering it, you plan a thousand li away; rising and applying it, you extend to the four seas.”
§12: “Extending to ultimate knowing (zhì qíng ér zhī 至情而知); examining knowing is spirit (chá zhī ér shén 察知而神); examining spirit is sameness (chá shén ér tóng 察神而同); examining sameness is all (chá tóng ér jiǎn 察同而僉); examining all is straitness (chá jiǎn ér kùn 察僉而困); examining straitness is return (chá kùn ér fù 察困而復). Hence the old becomes the new; humans die and become humans again; water returns to Heaven.” The principle: nothing truly perishes — everything transforms and returns.
§13: “All hundred things do not die — like the Moon, which sets only to rise again, ends only to begin again, reaches [fullness] only to turn [back]. Examine these words — arising from one point.”
§14: “One generates two, two generates three, three generates female [= the fourth], female completes knot [= pattern / the many]” (yī shēng liǎng, liǎng shēng cān, cān shēng nǚ, nǚ chéng jié 一生兩，兩生參，參生女，女成結). This cosmogonic formula is closely comparable to Dàodéjīng 道德經 §42 (“the Way generates one, one generates two, two generates three, three generates ten thousand things”). “Hence having one — under Heaven nothing does not exist; not having one — under Heaven equally nothing has one. Without [eyes?] yet knowing names; without ears yet hearing sounds.”
§15: “Grasses and trees obtain it to live; birds and animals obtain it to cry out. Distant — it reaches to Heaven; close — it reaches to human beings. Hence examining the Way is how one cultivates the self and governs the household and the state.”
§16: “If one can examine the One, nothing of the hundred things is lost; if one cannot examine the One, all hundred things are lost. If you wish to examine the One — look up and observe it; bow down and measure it; do not seek it far away; at your own body, consult it.”
§17: “Grasp the One and chart it — like seizing all under Heaven and holding it. Grasp the One and think it — like seizing all under Heaven and governing it. Hold to the One as the purport of Heaven and Earth.”
§18: “Hence: the One has taste when you chew it, has scent when you smell it, has sound when you beat it, can be seen up close, can be grasped when you seize it — yet if you grip it you lose it; if you break it, it withers; if you destroy it, it vanishes. Examine these words — arising from one point.”
Genre and intellectual context. Fán Wù Liú Xíng is a sustained cosmological-philosophical text of the highest importance in the Warring States philosophical corpus. The opening sequence of paradoxical cosmological questions recalls the Chǔcí 楚辭 Tiānwèn 天問 (Heavenly Questions), while the positive teaching sections in the second half align closely with the “yī 一 mysticism” of the Dàodéjīng, Guǎnzǐ Xīnshù 心術 chapters, and the Guōdiàn Tàiyī Shēng Shuǐ 太一生水. The cosmogonic formula “one → two → three → female/fourth → knot” is a variant of the Dàodéjīng §42 formula and provides independent evidence for a pre-Hàn “One generates many” cosmogonic tradition. The text’s treatment of ghosts and spirits — how to serve them properly given that their material basis (bones and flesh) has dissolved — is a rare direct philosophical engagement with the religion of ancestral spirits that complements rather than dismisses the tradition.
Translations and research
- 馬承源 ed., 《上海博物館藏戰國楚竹書》 vol. 7, Shànghǎi gǔjí chūbǎnshè, 2008 — editio princeps.
- Perkins, Franklin. “All Things Flow into Form (Fanwu liuxing) and the ‘One’ in the Laozi.” Early China 38 (2015): 195–232 — the only major English-language study focused specifically on this text; discusses the One cosmology and its relation to the received Dàodéjīng.
- Allan, Sarah. The Shape of the Turtle: Myth, Art, and Cosmos in Early China. SUNY Press, 1991 — contextual background on early Chinese cosmological thought.
- Ames, Roger T., and David L. Hall. Dao De Jing: A Philosophical Translation. Ballantine, 2003 — for the Dàodéjīng §42 parallel.
Other points of interest
The cosmogonic sequence “一生兩，兩生參，參生女，女成結” (yī shēng liǎng, liǎng shēng cān, cān shēng nǚ, nǚ chéng jié) in §14 is a genuine Warring States period parallel to Dàodéjīng §42. The use of nǚ 女 (“female” — the fourth stage) in place of the Dàodéjīng’s “ten thousand things” is unique and invites cosmological interpretation: in some early Chinese cosmologies the “female” principle is the generative nexus from which patterned multiplicity (jié 結 = “knot, pattern”) emerges. The text thus provides evidence that the Dàodéjīng cosmogonic chain was one among several competing formulations in late Warring States speculative thought.
Links
- Wikipedia (Shanghai Museum bamboo texts): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai_Museum_bamboo_texts