Lu Yu and Tea Classic

With LuYu in the middle of the eighth century we have our first apostle of tea. He was born in an age when Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism were seeking mutual synthesis. The pantheistic symbolism of the time was urging one to mirror the Universal in the Particular.  LuYu, a poet, saw in the Tea-service the same harmony and order which reigned through all things.  In his celebrated work, the " Tea Classic" (The Holy Scripture of Tea) he formulated the Code of Tea. He has since been worshipped as the tutelary god of the Chinese tea merchants.　

The " Tea Classic" consists of three volumes and ten chapters. In the first chapter LuYu treats of the nature of the tea-plant, in the second of the implements for gathering the leaves, in the third of the selection of the leaves.  According to him the best quality of the leaves must have "creases like the leathern boot of Tartar horsemen, curl like the dewlap of a mighty bullock, unfold like a mist rising out of a ravine, gleam like a lake touched by a zephyr, and be wet and soft like fine earth newly swept by rain."　　

The fourth chapter is devoted to the enumeration and description of the twenty-four members of the tea-equipage, beginning with the tripod brazier and ending with the bamboo cabinet for containing all these utensils.  Here we notice LuYu's predilection for Taoist symbolism. Also it is interesting to observe in this connection the influence of tea on Chinese ceramics.  The Celestial porcelain, as is well known, had its origin in an attempt to reproduce the exquisite shade of jade, resulting, in the Tang dynasty, in the blue glaze of the south, and the white glaze of the north.  LuYu considered the blue as the ideal colour for the tea-cup, as it lent additional greenness to the beverage, whereas the white made it look pinkish and distasteful.  It was because he used cake-tea.  Later on, when  the tea masters of Sung took to the powdered tea, they preferred heavy bowls of blue-black and dark brown.  The Mings, with  their steeped tea, rejoiced in light ware of white porcelain.