“類”与“禷”祭

《诗经》、《尚书》、《周礼》、《礼记》等经籍提到的“禷”祭(又作“類”祭),是上古中国一项有着深厚民俗文化背景和深远历史影响的祭仪。不幸其礼早亡,汉儒已经难究其详。影响及今的《尚书》古文家说和郑玄《礼记》注等,将“禷”祭解为祭天之礼。但根据经籍中的记载来看,“禷”祭指的是当国有大事时,向上帝或社稷宗庙祈福禳灾的一种“祷祈”仪式,与祭天之礼并不是一回事。据《说文解字》等书,“類”字本义是一种犬,可能是白犬。“禷”祭应是指特以“類”为牺牲的祭仪。《山海经》等说“類”具有“自为牝牡”的神奇特性,这与该书所记“白犬有牝牡,是生犬戎”的传说非常相似。在先秦文献中,“類”字常用来指出自同一祖先的子孙后代。这些材料表明“類”与古代中国某些族群的祖先神话有着密切的关系。“禷”祭之形成,正植根于此种观念之上。“禷”祭当属于曾广为流行于上古中国北方地区的犬祭礼俗中某种特定的类型,它的消亡可能与周人颇具理性色彩的的礼制改革有关。

Lei and the Ritual Named Lei

A ritual named Lei, mentioned in some ancient books, was an early Chinese ritual, which rooted in the folk culture and had a profound influence on later times. Basically, the ritual already disappeared before the Han dynasty and the scholars of that time could not made it clear out. The two most authorities among them regarded it as a ritual worshiping the "Heaven".While the records of all those ancient books indicated that this ritual was performed respectively for bless of the God, or ancestors, or the god of Earth, on the very moment when a momentous affair should be acted or a disaster occurred. The ritual named Lei was entitled from the character Lei, whose original meaning was a kind of dog. It was told that the dog was bisexual, which similar to the traits of the white dog from which an ancient tribe in early China originated in folklore. One acceptation of the character Lei is descendants in pre-Chin books. All of these indicated that Lei maybe the Totem worshiped by some ancient tribes in early China, and the ritual named Lei gradually came into being rooted on the Belief of the dog named Lei.