Turtles in Chinese thought

Turtle-shells were the favourite tool of divination in ancient China.

It was thought that each turtle represented heaven and earth in his shell: the vaulted sky in its carapace or upper shell, the earth in its lower shell. After killing and sacrificing the turtle, its shell would be placed on a fire. From the cracks in its lower shell favourable or unfavourable omens could be read.

In fact, it is almost certain that the shell in the royal shrine referred to by Chuang Tzu in his famous reply to the royal envoys, was precisely a shell venerated and preserved by the monarch because it was believed to confirm the accession of his dynasty.

Sometimes the diviner's interpretation was engraved on the shell next to the tell-tale cracks. Such engravings on tortoise-shells commissioned by the Shong dynasty (l8th-l2th centuries B.C.) are the earliest known Chinese ideographs we possess. In short, no one would have been surprised if Chuang Tzu had caught a turtle to find out what divine counsel could be found on its shell.

The real Taoist "twist" is that Chuang Tzu "reads" the turtle in a new way. There lies a mystery in the turtle, as even diviners admitted.

• We read in Kuan-yin-tzu: "The turtle-shell has no Self and yet it has knowledge of great matters."
• And the I Ching declares: "To unravel complex matters, to search out what is hidden, to bring up what lies deep and reach out to what is far, thereby discerning good from evil among all events under the sky . . . there are no more potent means than yarrow stalks and the turtleshell."

Chuang Tzu agrees with the mystery, but sees it on a deeper level. The turtle carries a divine answer in itself, though not as markings on its shell. It carries it, like any other being, in the mysterious principle that causes it to be and that gives it life.

For the turtle is a remarkable animal. It is hard and soft at the same time. It waddles on land but swims nimbly under water. It has serious eyes and a funny tail. When threatened it pulls in all its limbs and lies rigid as a stone. But when it moves in its own space, in the muddy water of the river, it darts along, happy and agile. The lesson of the turtle is that it can only grow and be happy in its natural surroundings.

How does this apply to human beings? Where is our "space", our natural surrounding? Do we find it in competition, warfare, ambitious production? Do we obtain it by victory, power, wealth? Or does it lie on a deeper plane - when we discover what it means to be human?