The rat is the first of the twelve zodiac animals. What does the rat mean in the zodiac?

The rat zodiac sign has a stubborn personality, but has the shortcomings of being greedy and reckless. So what is the meaning of the zodiac sign Rat? Let’s take a look at the editor below!

Answer 1:

Why the rat ranks first among the twelve zodiac signs is a question that troubles many Chinese people. Compared with dragons, horses, and oxen, rats are not the fastest. Besides, rats, as a kind of pest, look very disgusting, so many people will find it strange: How did rats enter the ranks of the twelve zodiac animals, ranking first?

Hexi

There is a widely circulated legend that the twelve zodiac signs hold a running competition in which seats are arranged. The mouse is mini-sized, and it uses this advantage to jump on the back of the cow. When it reached the finish line, it jumped up and jumped over the finish line first, thus winning first place.

This is just a legend. There is no record in ancient books. If there is a powerful dragon in the running game, why is it only ranked fifth? Tiger is also the king of the forest. Why is it ranked third? Also, can a rabbit outrun a horse? All kinds of questions cannot be answered in this story.

We know that the zodiac is the animal manifestation of the twelve earthly branches. The zodiac signs and the earthly branches correspond one to one. These are the ones we are familiar with: Squirrel, Chou Niu, Yinhu, Maotu, Chenlong, Sishe, Wuma, Weiyang, Shenhou, Jiyou, Baigou, and Haizhu.

So where did the twelve earthly branches come from? Earthquake is an astronomical concept, the core content of ancient Chinese astronomy, and the most important symbol of ancient Chinese astronomy. The twelve earthly branches are derived from the year expression of the 28th century. The method of creating the Earthly Branches is to use some twenty-eighth century astrological symbols.

The stars in the southern sky are divided into twenty-eight groups. A circle of stars distributed along the ecliptic or the celestial equator is the twenty-eighth constellation. It is divided into four groups, also known as the Four Elephants, the Four Beasts, the Four Dimensions, and the Four Directions Gods. They are also known as "Left Green Dragon, Right White Tiger, South Suzaku, and North Xuanwu".

Oriental Green Dragon:

Jiaojiao, Kang Jinlong, Ditu raccoon dog, Fangri rabbit, Xinyue fox, tail fire tiger and Ji water leopard.

Southern Suzaku:

Well Wooden Tiger, Ghost Golden Sheep, Willow Tree, Xingri Horse, Zhang Yuelu, Winged Fire Snake, Earth Dragon. < /p>

Unicorn, Ox and Taurus, Female Earth Bat, Virtual Japanese Rat, Crisis Moon Swallow, House Fire Pig, and Wall Pheasant.

As you can see, there are seven stars in each direction, corresponding to the five elements of metal, wood, fire, and water. Each of the twenty-eight stars is named by three characters. The first character is the name of the star, the second character is the five elements, the sun and the moon, and the third character is the animal, which is the image of the animal represented by the combination of stars.

If you compare, you will find that there are twelve animals that appear in the twelve zodiac signs at the same time: the virtual rat, the ox Taurus, the tail fire tiger, the room rabbit, the Kang Jinlong, the winged fire snake, and the star. Horse, ghost gold sheep, jackal monkey, god rooster, floor gold dog, house fire pig. The animals of the zodiac are actually born from twenty-eight families. In other words, the rat at the head of the zodiac sign is not a rat in real life, but a star in the sky, or more strictly speaking, an empty house. There are two stars in this empty house. Empty House One belongs to Aquarius, Empty House Two is above Empty House One. It is a fourth magnitude star and belongs to the constellation Sagittarius. The connection between the two stars is a bit like the mouse in the eyes of the ancients, hence the name: Virtual Rat.

When we stayed late at night in the south of the sky, it was the winter solstice season. The birth of the first sun in winter is the beginning of a new year, just like the birth of the first sun at midnight is the beginning of a new day. So the night is also called midnight, and the first of the twelve hours is called midnight, which is the two hours from 23:00 to 1:00. Therefore, the question of the twelve zodiac signs is actually an astronomical question, and it has nothing to do with whether the rat can outrun the tiger or not.

This can explain why there are no cats in the 12th house, because there are no cats in the 28th house. Why don’t 28 hotels have cats? Because domestic cats were introduced to China from Egypt, Persia and other places during the Han Dynasty, there were no domestic cats in China before the Han Dynasty. The cats mentioned in the ancient books of the Pre-Qin Dynasty, such as the cats in "Chu Ci", all refer to the 12 constellations of the Western Zodiac that represent the moon and are the constellations we like to talk about. In fact, there is a correspondence with the twelve branches. Rat corresponds to Aquarius. Not only that, the Chinese dichotomous system, twelve temperaments, and twenty-four solar terms are also related to the twelve earthly branches and twelve constellations.

In ancient times, the balance of the week near the ecliptic was divided into twelve times, such as astrology, mystery, etc. When the sun moves to a certain time, it is called a certain solar term. In fact, the twenty-four solar terms represent twenty-four different positions of the earth in its orbit around the sun, and when observing, the ancients also liked to use the different positions of the Big Dipper to determine time. Because the North Star, when viewed from the earth, does not move all year round, but the Big Dipper stars that revolve around the North Star are always moving. The direction of the handle of the Big Dipper is called the moon tower. Taking the Big Dipper as the direction and determining its initial starting point in the twelve-minute system, it can be used to record the moon. 055-79000 said, "The fifteenth day is a festival, used to change the twenty-four hours, and Dou refers to the winter solstice; adding 15 days refers to Gui and Xiaohan; adding 15 days refers to Chou and Dahan." In this way, the twenty-four solar terms can be determined. It is equivalent to the climate law established by the position of the sun every 15 degrees on the ecliptic.

In addition, Jupiter takes about 12 years to orbit the sun. The ancients observed that Jupiter would appear in the same star area again about 12 years later, so they divided the celestial equator and the ecliptic into 12 equal parts and used the observed position of Jupiter to determine the age. Therefore, Jupiter has two new names, called Sui Xing or Tai Sui. The so-called "aging into old age" committed by the people is actually Jupiter. Although the names and methods are different, they are essentially the same thing as the twelve earthly branches and twelve constellations, which is to divide the zodiac into twelve equal parts.

Tracing back to the roots, it was the Babylonians who first divided the zodiac into twelve parts. As early as 3000 BC, the Babylonians divided the solar zodiac, which moves once a year, into twelve constellations for astrological purposes. Although the names of the Babylonian constellations are not the same as those in China in the 28th century, some people still believe that Chinese stargazing probably originated in the ancient Babylonian country, but was transformed by the Chinese cosmology, just like the ten signs of the zodiac we are now familiar with. The second house constellation is the same, a mixture of ancient Babylon, Egypt, and Assyria.

Answer 2:

Twelve Zodiac Stories

At that time, the mouse and the cat were good friends. They agreed to go to the Heavenly Palace together to fight for the twelve zodiac animals, and they agreed to set off together when the mouse called the cat. But the smart little mouse thinks that many animals in the world are more beautiful than him and are also useful to humans, such as cats chanting scriptures, rabbits worshiping the moon, dogs looking after the house, dragons and snakes controlling water, monkeys controlling mountains, oxen and horses plowing fields, and pigs and sheep for human consumption. , I have to find a way to seize it. So, on the morning of the scheduled day to go to the Heavenly Palace, the little mouse quietly got up without calling the cat, secretly jumped into the horns of the old cow and hid. The most resilient and diligent Niu took him to the Heavenly Palace, and the old Niu was the first to arrive at the gate of the Heavenly Palace. At dawn, the four heavenly kings had just opened the gate of the Grand Palace. Before the cow had time to lift its hooves, the mouse jumped off its horns and headed straight for the Temple of Heaven. Although the Jade Emperor didn't want to call this little mouse the Zodiac. But there was no joke in the king's mouth, and he could not change his rules, so the Jade Emperor had no choice but to declare the rat as the first of the twelve zodiac animals. [1]

The cat waited at home for a long time, but there was no sign of the mouse, so he had to rush to the Heavenly Palace alone. Due to the delay in waiting for the mouse, by the time the cat arrived at the Heavenly Palace, the quota for the twelve zodiac signs was full, and not a single cat was left. From then on, the cat hated the mouse so much that when it saw the mouse, it would pounce on it and bite it to vent its anger. The mouse also felt a little sad for its cat friend and ran away when it saw the cat. To this day, cats and mice remain mortal enemies. People also believe that the first rat in the zodiac is n