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AI summary
Why does the tiny rat rank first among the twelve zodiac animals? This question has puzzled both ancient philosophers and modern thinkers. The rat is the smallest of the twelve animals, easily held in one's palm. It can't compare to the ox's strength, the tiger's ferocity, the dragon's mythical power, or the horse's agility. In terms of character, the ox's steadiness, the rabbit's kindness, the horse's diligence, the goat's gentleness, and the pig's honesty all seem far superior to the rat. Even in intelligence, the monkey's cleverness and the dog's wisdom surpass the rat. And if we're talking about who's the most vicious, surely the snake should come before the rat. Yet, the fact remains that the tiny rat ranks first among the twelve zodiac animals!
This puzzle remains unsolved to this day. Some jokingly suggest that the official in charge of ranking the zodiac animals must have been corrupt, accepting a massive bribe from the rat to place the unworthy creature at the top. Of course, this is just a far-fetched joke. The truth is, humans have never found a convincing explanation for this. However, being the most intelligent of animals, humans eventually created a folk tale to explain why the rat ranks first in the zodiac. This story, known as "The Rat Comes First," is popular in the Hunan and Hubei regions of central China:
After the rat, ox, horse, goat, and others were chosen as the twelve zodiac animals, the rat declared, "I should be placed first." The ox, horse, and goat disagreed, asking, "Why should you be first?" The rat replied, "Because I'm big, so I should be first." The others laughed, "Are you bigger than us?" The rat suggested, "Let's not argue among ourselves. Let's let humans decide." They all agreed to let humans judge.
So they devised a plan: led by the ox, followed by the horse, goat, and rat, they would walk down the main street one by one to see how people would react.
On the main street, as the ox passed by, people said, "That ox is strong." When the horse came, people said, "That horse is tall." When the goat walked by, people said, "That goat is plump." Finally, when the rat strutted by with its belly out, people suddenly saw a rat on the street and chased after it, shouting, "What a big rat! What a big rat!" With this, the ox, horse, and goat had nothing more to say, and let the rat take first place.
There are other similar folk tales about how the zodiac animals were ranked.
The story of how the twelve zodiac animals were ordered goes like this:
When the universe was first formed and the heavenly stems and earthly branches were just established, the Jade Emperor issued a decree calling all animals to come forth. He wanted to select twelve animals to represent the twelve earthly branches: Zi, Chou, Yin, Mao, Chen, Si, Wu, Wei, Shen, You, Xu, and Hai.
When the news spread, it caught the attention of two good friends: the cat and the rat. The cat said to the rat, "We need to go to the Heavenly Palace at dawn tomorrow for the selection. I have a habit of oversleeping, so please wake me up!" The rat repeatedly agreed, "Of course, of course!"
However, early the next morning, the dishonest rat secretly left without waking the cat.
That day, a multitude of beasts gathered at the Jade Emperor's palace for the selection. The Emperor chose twelve animals based on their attributes of sky and earth: dragon, tiger, ox, horse, goat, monkey, rooster, dog, pig, rabbit, snake, and rat. At that time, the rooster had two beautiful horns and was classified as a beast.
Just as the Jade Emperor was about to rank them, the pig stepped forward. Despite its clumsy appearance, it loved to stir up trouble. It said, "Your Majesty, since you've already selected the leaders, this humble servant wishes to ease your burden by being the impartial judge to rank my brothers." The Jade Emperor was delighted and instructed the pig to be fair in its judgment before retiring.
As soon as the Jade Emperor left, the twelve zodiac animals erupted into chaos.
Initially, everyone unanimously voted for the gentle and kind ox to take the first place. Even the mighty tiger and dragon respected it and agreed. However, the rat, who had been hiding in a corner, came out to protest. It said, "In terms of greatness, I'm the greatest. If you don't believe me, let's go to the human world and hear what the people say." So the ox and the rat went to a busy street.
When the ox walked through the crowd, people didn't react. Then, the rat swiftly climbed onto the ox's back and stood up. People in the street started shouting, "What a big rat!" When people came with sticks to chase it away, the rat had already run off.
The rat returned, boasting about its victory. All the other animals felt sorry for the ox, except for the pig, who was secretly pleased. The pig thought that this confusion of big and small, good and bad, would allow it to take advantage of the situation. So, with a flourish of its brush, it ranked the rat first and the ox second.
This angered the tiger and dragon, who were watching from the side. They roared so loudly that it made all the other animals tremble. The animals quickly bowed to the dragon and tiger, unanimously electing the tiger as the king of the mountains and the dragon as the king of the waters, ruling over all. The monkey wrote a golden plaque with the character for "king" and hung it on the tiger's forehead. The rooster gave its two horns to the dragon. From then on, the dragon wore a crown. Having gained power in the human world, the tiger and dragon were content to be ranked after the rat and ox.
At this point, the troublemaking rabbit jumped out and sneered, "Hey! I look similar to the rat, but I'm bigger. I'm the mountain king's guard, so I should be ranked before the sea king."
The dragon was furious when it heard this and said, "Don't be ridiculous. If you're not convinced, let's have a competition."
The pig was delighted to hear this and quickly said, "It's settled then. You'll have a race, and the hunting dog will be your judge."
The dog and the rooster had never gotten along. Seeing that the rooster had pleased the dragon, the dog wanted to play a trick on them. It chose a thorny path for the race and secretly told the rabbit, "Your tail is too long. It will hinder you in the race. You should cut it off." It then cut off a large portion of the rabbit's tail, leaving only a small stub.
The race began. The dragon soared through the clouds and quickly flew ahead. However, when it reached the thicket, its horns got caught in the vines and it couldn't free itself. The rabbit, on the other hand, bounded over eighteen ridges in one leap and reached the finish line in no time.
Despite the objections of the other animals, the pig ranked the rabbit after the tiger but before the dragon.
The dog went to congratulate the rabbit, saying, "If I hadn't chosen this path and helped you cut your tail, how could you have won today?" The rabbit, who had been sadly looking at its severed tail, heard the dog's words and sneered, "Hmph! I won by my own abilities. Without you, I wouldn't have lost this beautiful tail!" The dog, hearing this, became furious and said, "If you're so capable, let's have a race ourselves!" The rabbit arrogantly replied, "That's easy. I'll run first, and if you can catch me, I'll treat you to a bone." With that, it started running smugly. The hunting dog sharpened its claws and shot after the rabbit like an arrow. Soon, it caught up with the rabbit and bit its neck, saying between bites, "Now it's my turn to gnaw on some bones."
For this incident, the dog was also punished and ranked last.
After losing the race, the dragon often complained privately that the rooster's horns had burdened it. When the rooster heard this, it felt both regretful and sad. It went to the seaside and said to the dragon, "Brother Dragon, since these two horns are of no use to you, please return them to me." The dragon craftily replied, "Although these horns have caused me trouble, they do adorn my appearance. Returning them to you is not difficult, but it will happen when the sun rises in the west and the moon sets in the east." With that, it dove into the sea.
The naive rooster believed this and woke up early every day, hoping to see the sun rise from the west. It would often stretch its neck towards the sea and call out, "Brother Dragon! Give me back my horns..."
From then on, the rooster lost its two horns and was also ranked towards the end.
Only the rankings of the monkey, snake, horse, goat, and pig remained undecided. The pig, with ulterior motives, stirred things up again: "Brother Monkey is the king of acrobatics on land, and Brother Snake is the master of swimming in water. Who should go first?" After some discussion, they decided to have another test in the human world, this time performing acrobatics.
The green snake invited the red horse, while the monkey invited the mountain goat to help with costumes and props.
At that time, the snake had twelve legs on its belly, making it clumsy and slow. The red horse, always eager to help, quietly made a tubular dragon costume for the snake using thin leather. It decorated the costume with a checkered pattern made from horsehair, making it look quite attractive. The red horse then scraped a layer of grease from its belly and applied it to the dragon costume, making it very slippery. When the green snake put on the dragon costume, it covered its awkward legs and allowed it to glide instead of walk, making it both agile and beautiful.
The mountain goat had always disliked the monkey, annoyed by its constant jumping around and trampling the grass. So it wasn't very enthusiastic about helping the monkey. The monkey, wanting to cover its bare bottom, pleaded with the goat, "Brother Goat, please give me some of your wool so I can cover my behind." The goat grumbled, "It's getting cold, and you know I rely on this precious coat!" The monkey had no choice but to remain bare-bottomed.
On the day of the competition, the green snake, wearing its dragon costume, coiled around tree branches like a vine one moment and glided across the water surface like a shuttle the next. It raised its head and neck, touching the ground only with the tip of its tail, performing various acrobatic feats. The audience cheered continuously. When it was the monkey's turn to perform, it climbed poles and swung on swings, also earning many cheers. However, when it came to the "inverted bamboo curtain" act, where the monkey hung upside down from a tree branch by its tail and performed various daring moves, someone suddenly shouted, "Look! The monkey's bottom is on fire!" Everyone burst into laughter. The monkey, always protective of its weaknesses, became flustered and embarrassed. It quickly tried to cover its bottom with its tail, but in doing so, it lost its grip and fell headfirst, landing in a heap.
As a result, the green snake and red horse were ranked higher, while the mountain goat and monkey were placed lower.
After ranking all the animals, the pig wrote its own name at the top of the list, thinking to itself, "This is my chance for promotion, wealth, fame, and fortune!" It went to the Jade Emperor's palace and presented the list. The Jade Emperor took one look at the list, said nothing, crossed out the pig's name from the top, and placed it at the very end. Then, the Jade Emperor had the God of Venus write out the final order according to the earthly branches: Rat (Zi), Ox (Chou), Tiger (Yin), Rabbit (Mao), Dragon (Chen), Snake (Si), Horse (Wu), Goat (Wei), Monkey (Shen), Rooster (You), Dog (Xu), and Pig (Hai). He issued a decree for the celestial officials to announce this order to the human world.
With the selection complete but his anger not yet subsided, the Jade Emperor added a few words of punishment for the pig:
"Useless fool, confusing right and wrong.
Punished to eat slop, slaughtered once a year."
Demoted, the pig suddenly became bloated with anger. It spent its days lying in its sty, too lazy to meddle in affairs anymore. But sometimes, it still felt an itch and couldn't help but use its snout to push things around, stirring up trouble.
The rat returned home, happily twirling its three and a half whiskers and dancing, waking up the sleeping cat. The cat asked, "Isn't it time yet?" The rat replied, "It's long past, and I even got first place!" The rat then boastfully described its cleverness to the cat. The cat regretfully said, "I asked you repeatedly, why didn't you wake me?" But the rat retorted, "Don't you have ears? If I had called you, you might have taken my place!" Hearing this, the cat became furious, its whiskers standing on end and its eyes wide with anger. It extended its sharp claws and pounced on the rat in one swift move, eating it up.
From that day on, cats and rats became eternal enemies.
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