Jiang Ziya — Jiāng Zĭyá (姜子牙) — is the great sage, strategist, and apotheosis-master of Chinese legend: the wise old counsellor who, fishing patiently with a straight, baitless hook, was discovered by King Wen, became the chief strategist who helped overthrow the tyrannical Shang dynasty and found the Zhou, and who — in the great novel Investiture of the Gods — deified the worthy dead, appointing the gods of the Chinese pantheon. The grand strategist and god-maker, Jiang Ziya is one of the most revered figures of Chinese myth.
The Sage Who Fished with a Straight Hook
Jiang Ziya (also Jiang Taigong, Lü Shang) was, by legend, a man of great wisdom and ability who spent most of his long life in obscurity and poverty, waiting for the right ruler to serve. His most famous image is of the patient sage fishing on the bank of the Wei River — with a fishing line that had a straight hook, no barb, no bait, and held three feet above the water. When asked how he hoped to catch any fish that way, he replied that he was not fishing for fish but for a king — he was waiting, by this strange device, for the right ruler wise enough to recognise his worth and seek him out. And so it happened: King Wen of Zhou, guided by a prophetic dream and an omen, came upon the old man fishing, recognised his greatness, and made him his chief advisor — the talented man finally found by the worthy ruler, an icon of patient virtue rewarded.
The Strategist of the Zhou Conquest
Jiang Ziya became the supreme strategist and counsellor of the Zhou. He served King Wen and then his son King Wu, and was the great mastermind behind the overthrow of the cruel, decadent last king of the Shang dynasty (the tyrant Zhou of Shang, and his wicked consort Daji) and the founding of the Zhou dynasty — one of the foundational events of Chinese history and the subject of the great mythological novel Fengshen Yanyi (Investiture of the Gods). As the leader of the Zhou cause, Jiang Ziya directed the war against the Shang, commanded armies, and (in the novel) marshalled the gods, immortals, and magical forces of the righteous side against the demons, sorcerers, and spirits who fought for the doomed Shang. He is honoured as the founder of military strategy in China (the strategic classic the Six Secret Teachings is attributed to him).
The Investiture of the Gods
Jiang Ziya’s most extraordinary role, in the Investiture of the Gods, is as the great apotheosis-master — the one who deified the dead and appointed the gods. The terrible war between Shang and Zhou killed countless heroes, immortals, and spirits on both sides; and at its end, Jiang Ziya was given the sacred List of Investiture (the Fengshen Bang) — the roster of the gods — and the authority to confer godhood upon the worthy slain. Standing before the assembled spirits of the dead, Jiang Ziya read out the list and appointed each worthy soul to its divine office in the celestial bureaucracy — making this one the god of thunder, that one the god of a star, another the god of a mountain or a function — thereby establishing and populating the very pantheon of Chinese gods. He is thus the figure who, in legend, organised and appointed the gods themselves — the grand investitor of the divine bureaucracy.
The Grand Strategist and God-Maker
Jiang Ziya embodies the Chinese ideals of patient wisdom, the worthy minister found by the worthy king, the master strategist, and the sage who orders even the heavens. The old sage who fished with a straight hook for a king, the strategist who overthrew the Shang and founded the Zhou, the god-maker who deified the worthy dead and appointed the gods of the pantheon — Jiang Ziya is one of the greatest and most revered figures of Chinese mythology, the grand strategist and investitor of the gods.
