The Jade Emperor

Cats do not like rats. The reason is simple, but we have to look back in time to uncover the truth.

In Greek mythology, Zeus ruled the Pantheon of Gods, and in Chinese folklore and Taoist tradition The Jade Emperor served an equivalent role among his deities. As the standard bearer for Taoism's fundamental principle of "wu wei", or "non doing", the Jade Emperor did very well for himself, and employed an immense civil service to make sure that nothing ever got done - in the Taoist sense, that is. Some like to believe that he lived in the Jade Castle of Abstraction, high above the earth and the thirty-three heavens. Others like to believe he lived on the Mountain of Jade in the K'un Lun mountains. Here, on the shore of the Jade Lake grew a monumental jade tree, which measured three hundred arm lengths across and whose red jade fruit conferred the blessing of eternal life.

Wherever the Jade Emperor lived, at some point he realized that he was unfamiliar with Earth's creatures. What did they look like? What did they do? How did they move? Were they clever? The Emperor had questions, and he needed answers. He summoned his chief civil servant. They talked candidly and concluded that there were too many animals for the Emperor to realistically view. The Emperor asked his envoy to select 12 creatures for him to inspect. The servant thought hard and made a list. He invited a rat, and told him to give an invitation to his friend the cat. Invitations were sent to an ox, a tiger, a rabbit, a dragon, a snake, a horse, a ram, a monkey, a rooster, and a dog, asking each to present himself before the Emperor at six o'clock the following morning.

The cat was mightily pleased to learn of his eligibility. Concerned that he might be caught napping as cats are wont to do, he asked the rat to be sure to wake him in good time. The rat agreed. Then the rat had second thoughts. The rat worried that the Emperor might be disappointed with the rat's appearance compared to the cat's sleek and gracefully manicured demeanour. The rat slyly changed his mind.

The day came, and the animals appeared before the Emperor. The Emperor was unreservedly pleased. He realized, too, that only 11 animals were on parade. The cat was not there. Twelve is divisible by two, and is therefore a balanced proposition. 11 is not, and presents significant difficulties in a binary world where the laws of harmony require balance. He queried his envoy. "Why might this might be?" "I do not know", was the usually reliable bureaucrat's predictable civil service response. The Emperor dispatched his servant to find another animal to address this awkward situation, whereupon the servant materialized on a dusty rural Chinese lane facing a startled and unambitiously tasked farmer who was en route to market with his pig. A pig would do.

The opulently dressed civil servant explained the day's predicament, and the farmer was privileged to offer the pig to the Emperor's servant. The servant duly returned to the Emperor with a pig in tow, and so it was that the Chinese zodiac was established. The pig took the cat's place, and cats are to this day rather at odds with rats.

If there is a moral to the story, it is that this could only ever happen in China, because in Wales the farmers around here do not trust anyone, let alone an officer from the Ministry of Agriculture.

There is a purpose to this story. The "dark arts", a rarified and mysterious Taijiquan skill otherwise known as Taoist Internal Alchemy, looms on my learning horizon. It is a contentious discipline. I have no aspirations to become a Taoist. Yet, Taijiquan is an extension of Taoist philosophy. It makes little sense to ignore the philosophy behind the application. For instance, we may joke about the Taoist concept of "wu wei" as a concept of doing nothing. It is nothing of the sort. It is a complex Taoist core belief, not easily explained, which underpins the Wudang martial arts systems among other things, and Taijiquan generally. In those rather odd hours before dawn, when I am now horrified to find myself wide awake and fully charged, no thanks to my Taiji, I browse the web in search of authority on Taoist tradition.

At at a time when the cost of rescuing the world's banking system at the taxpayer's expense will go down in legend, too, and on the day that Downing Street demonstrated "wu wei" in its more fully defined context by effectively nationalising the UK's banking system with a $350 billion recapitalization plan, it is reassuring to know that even the Jade Emperor had difficult moments with numbers, too.