Chinese sun and moon mirrors water. (Laufer 1915: 221-222). Owing to the similarities of Chinese "yangsui" and "fangzhu" mirrors with Indian "sūryakānta" and "candrakānta" stones, Tang (1935) proposes a trans-cultural diffusion from China to the Mughal Empire. Chinese sun and moon mirrors The yángsuì 陽燧 or sun-mirror was an ancient Chinese burning-mirror that concentrates sunlight to ignite tinder and the fāngzhū 方諸 or moon-mirror was a device that collects nighttime dew by condensation. These two bronze implements are literary metaphors for yin and yang, associating the ""yang"-mirror" "yangsui" with the sun (a.k.a. "tàiyáng" 太陽 "great "yang""), fire, dry, and round, and the ""yin"-mirror" "fangshu" with
Taijitu has its nature. Instead of usual "Taiji" translations "Supreme Ultimate" or "Supreme Pole", Adler uses "Supreme Polarity" (see Robinet 1990) because Zhu Xi describes it as the alternating principle of "yin" and "yang", and ... insists that "taiji" is not a thing (hence "Supreme Pole" will not do). Thus, for both Zhou and Zhu, "taiji" is the "yin-yang" principle of bipolarity, which is the most fundamental ordering principle, the cosmic "first principle." "Wuji" as "non-polar" follows from this. Since the 12th century, there has been a vigorous discussion in Chinese philosophy regarding the ultimate origin of Zhou Dunyi's diagram. Zhu