What’s in a Word?

The term “tea leaves” first appeared in Chinese written records somewhere around 3,000 years ago. An ancient text called the “Er-Ya” (爾雅), which was a dictionary of sorts, stated that “jia”(檟) was a bitter tea, “ku tu” (苦荼). “Ku” (苦) is the Chinese character for bitter and “tu” (荼) was the controversial word for many different plants. As the word “tu” was used throughout different texts, sometimes poetic other times mundane, it’s difficult to know exactly when it was used for tea, referring at other times to sow thistle, certain flowers, and other spices in cooking. Wherever one stands with regards to this etymological debate, it is clear that the word “tu,” as well as several other words like “chai” and “ming,” evolved into the character for tea or were used thusly in certain times and places as early as the Zhou Dynasty. For quite some time, there were many characters and ways of saying “tea,” depending on the region and era. Then, during the Tang Dynasty, all the earlier characters for tea were abandoned, and a new character was created to replace them. This was done by modifying the character “tu” (荼). The lower part “he” (禾) was changed to “mu” (木)—meaning wood. The new character “cha” (茶) has remained the Chinese term for tea ever since. The various pronunciations of the character “tea” spread far and wide. The Mandarin pronunciation of the character, as “cha,” spread overland to the north and west of Yunnan. Tea is, for example, called “chai” in India, Greece, Russia, etc. Another pronunciation of tea as “tey” followed a second sea-route from Xiamen of Fujian Province. The Western sailors that stopped in Xiamen and other local ports would adopt the way tea was said in the local Fujian dialect; and “tey” would later become “tea” in English. In contemplating the character for tea, one can corroborate the extent to which ancient Chinese revered tea as a sacred plant. The radical for grass is drawn at the top, with trees at the bottom and man in between. Perhaps a more mundane interpretation of this would be that the character refers simply to any edible leaf. And actually, the word “cha” does refer to any leaf steeped in water; and even teas that we would today call “herbal” or “tisane” were still considered “cha” by Chinese doctors and tea sages, as well as more mundane applications related to culinary pursuits. There are therefore other plants, in Yunnan and elsewhere, that ancient mendicants were also utilizing to heal and commune with Nature. I have drank a few kinds of lichens in such a manner, for example. The roots of the character for tea date back beyond the Tang Dynasty to the Han Dynasty (206 bce-220ce) or even earlier, and have deeper elements if one but looks for them. Calligraphers often have the ability to see beyond the characters to the deeper essence hidden in the words. The ancient Taoists invented several scripts that were only legible to initiates, and often resembled the leaves of trees, ripples of water, or even animal footprints—all of which was intentional, as the script was derived from intense contemplation of Nature. One of my venerable tea teachers, Huang Chan Fang, is a “tea doctor” in every sense of the word. If any artist, teacher, or tea master is connected to the pulse of those ancient Chinese healers, it is he. He spent many years searching for the spirit of the character “cha.” Last year, he made the drawing shown here. One can almost immediately recognize the poignancy of painting tea in this way. It is the perfect representation of man in tune with Nature. The person isn’t just climbing the tree to pick leaves, he is living within the tree itself. Many Chinese characters have stories—pictographic lessons hidden deep in the ways they have been drawn over time. For me, this drawing of “tea” captures all the majesty of those lost ages when tea, as an aspect of Nature, and Man were in harmony. Furthermore, the symbol of a human in the tree is a very ancient and deep picture, representing the axis mundi around which the earth rotates—the center of the universe. Tea can root us in the ground, as well as free us beneath the sky. There is much in the etymology of the character for tea that I find inspiring. I am moved by the simplicity of drawing a man between leaves, roots, and the trunk of a tree. I once read a Native American myth that told of a warrior that turned into a tree when his people died; first his arms became branches, then his feet slowly moved

beneath the earth and extended his spirit into roots, and finally he was a tree left to watch over the land he had been born on. The metaphor of becoming Nature is also expressed, to me, in this interpretation of the character for tea. The idea is that we also can live tea, becoming a part of Nature rather than standing outside of it as an observer; and that such a “becoming” is really a return to our original state.