庄周梦蝶
Zhuangzi’s butterfly dream, and what it means
Name: ________________ Date: ________
你有没有做过一个特别真实的梦？醒了以后好几秒钟，梦里的场景还清清楚楚，你都分不清自己在哪儿，甚至分不清哪边才是真的。两千多年前，有个中国人也有过这样的经历，而且把它写了下来，只用了短短几行字。这几行字，后来成了中国哲学史上最有名的段落之一。
这个人叫庄周，生活在战国时期，后人尊称他为庄子，他是道家最重要的思想家之一。有一次，庄周做了一个梦，梦见自己变成了一只蝴蝶。那只蝴蝶在空中轻轻地飞来飞去，时而飞高，时而飞低，自由自在，心满意足。它完全沉浸在做蝴蝶的快乐里，根本不知道世界上还有一个叫庄周的人。
忽然，庄周醒了。他发现自己好好地躺在那里，手是手，脚是脚，明明白白就是庄周本人。他愣住了，躺在那里半天没动，心里不禁冒出一个奇怪的念头：刚才到底是庄周做梦变成了蝴蝶，还是一只蝴蝶正在做梦，梦见自己变成了庄周？
乍一听，这像是一个玩笑。可是仔细琢磨一下，你会发现它很难反驳。做梦的时候，我们几乎从来不怀疑梦是假的；只有醒过来，才恍然大悟：“哦，原来是一场梦。”既然如此，我们凭什么断定，眼前这一刻就不是另一个更长的梦呢？
有意思的是，庄子并没有回答这个问题。故事的最后，他只留下一句话：庄周和蝴蝶之间，一定是有区别的，这就叫做“物化”。
“物化”是什么意思？对此，人们的理解并不一致。一种常见的理解是：世界上的万物一直在变化，人可以变成蝴蝶，蝴蝶也可以变成人，“我”只是这场变化中暂时的一个样子。庄周和蝴蝶确实不同，但这种不同并不是本质上的，也不是永远不变的。
这个故事出现在《庄子》中《齐物论》这一篇的结尾。这一篇反复追问：我们凭什么认为自己是对的？人们总爱争论谁对谁错、什么是美什么是丑，可是换一个角度看，这些界限也许并没有我们以为的那么绝对。这个故事的智慧恰恰在这里：庄子不想给出一个标准答案，他更想让人放松下来，别把自己的看法看得太重。
今天，“庄周梦蝶”已经成了一个成语，人们用它来形容人生如梦、真假难辨。所以，下次你从一个特别真实的梦里醒过来，不妨问自己一句：现在的我，会不会是一只蝴蝶的梦？
Key words
| Word | Pinyin | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| 梦 | mèng | dream; to dream |
| 醒 | xǐng | to wake up |
| 经历 | jīnglì | experience (things one has been through) |
| 真实 | zhēnshí | true; real; authentic |
| 哲学 | zhéxué | philosophy |
| 时期 | shíqī | period; time; era |
| 蝴蝶 | húdié | butterfly |
| 空中 | kōngzhōng | in the sky; in the air; aerial; airborne |
| 本人 | běnrén | oneself; in person |
| 如此 | rúcǐ | so; such; like this |
| 一致 | yízhì | unanimous; in agreement; consistent |
| 反复 | fǎnfù | repeatedly; over and over |
English (for the teacher)
Have you ever had a dream that felt completely real? For a few seconds after waking, the scene is still sharp in your mind, you can’t tell where you are, and you can’t even tell which side is the real one. More than two thousand years ago a man in China had the same experience, and he wrote it down in just a few short lines. Those lines went on to become one of the most famous passages in the history of Chinese philosophy.
His name was Zhuang Zhou; he lived in the Warring States period, later generations honoured him as Zhuangzi, and he is one of the most important thinkers of Daoism. Once, Zhuang Zhou had a dream in which he became a butterfly. The butterfly drifted lightly through the air, now high, now low, free and perfectly content. It was so wrapped up in the joy of being a butterfly that it had no idea there was anyone in the world called Zhuang Zhou.
Suddenly, Zhuang Zhou woke up. There he was, lying where he had been, hands and feet and all, unmistakably Zhuang Zhou himself. He froze and lay there a long while without moving, and a strange thought came to him: just now, had Zhuang Zhou dreamed he became a butterfly, or was a butterfly dreaming right now that it had become Zhuang Zhou?
At first it sounds like a joke. But think it over carefully and you’ll find it very hard to argue with. While we are dreaming we almost never suspect the dream is false; only when we wake do we realise, “Oh, it was just a dream.” If that’s so, on what grounds can we be sure that this very moment isn’t another, longer dream?
The interesting thing is that Zhuangzi never answers the question. At the end of the story he leaves just one remark: between Zhuang Zhou and the butterfly there must be a difference, and this is called “the transformation of things”.
What does “the transformation of things” mean? Readers have never agreed. One common reading is that everything in the world is always changing: a person can become a butterfly, a butterfly can become a person, and “I” is only a passing shape in that change. Zhuang Zhou and the butterfly really are different, but the difference is not essential, and it does not last for ever.
The story comes at the very end of the chapter “On the Equality of Things” in the book Zhuangzi. That chapter keeps asking: what makes us so sure we are right? People love to argue about who is right and who is wrong, what is beautiful and what is ugly, but seen from another angle these lines may not be as absolute as we think. That is where the story’s wisdom lies: Zhuangzi doesn’t want to hand us a model answer; he would rather we relaxed and didn’t take our own views so seriously.
Today “Zhuang Zhou dreams of the butterfly” is an idiom, used to say that life is like a dream and the real is hard to tell from the unreal. So next time you wake from a dream that felt completely real, you might ask yourself: could the me right now be a butterfly’s dream?