This belief is not a certain god, but a common identity with heaven, earth, ancestors, and family and country. It is written on stone, carved in bronze, cast into gold ingots, and never interrupted.

What do you believe in?

Let me talk about archaeological discoveries first. The Chahai Ruins in Fuxin, Liaoning, dates from about 8,000 years ago. The archaeological team discovered a stone dragon in the center of the settlement, with a total length of 19.7 meters and a width of nearly two meters. Long Ang’s head opens his mouth, and there are large house locations at both ends.

Imagine that in the middle of the ancient village, a dragon is placed such a big one. It is not a decoration, but the core of the sacrifice. Dragon is a symbol used by the early Chinese to communicate with the world.

This is the prototype of faith. It is not a single god, but it ties everyone's hearts together. People in the village hope to get protection through common rituals when facing wind and rain, harvest and disease. Shilong is the "backbone" in everyone's heart.

Look at the Taosi ruins in Linfen, Shanxi again. It was a king-level tomb four thousand years ago. Archaeologists found a pottery plate with dragon patterns painted on it. Putting it with the turquoise dragon-shaped vessel of the Erlitou site can see a significant continuation. It shows that the symbol of the dragon has been passed down from Chahai to the Xia Dynasty and has never stopped.

The role of faith is here: It allows the scattered tribes to form cohesion. Everyone knows that if a group wants to survive, they must have a common spiritual support. The belief of the Chinese nation is not an abstract slogan, but practical systems and rituals.

Sacrificing to heaven and ancestors, everyone participates together. This sense of ritual tells people: We are a family.

After the Shang Dynasty, oracle bone inscriptions appeared. Archaeological discoveries of 150,000 oracle bones are all recorded in divination. Whether the war can be won, whether the crops can be harvested, and whether the ancestors are blessed. Behind these problems is actually the real function of faith.

The king wants to ask God's will and then record it with inscriptions, and the national affairs will be decided.

So, the belief of the Chinese nation has never been illusory. It is rooted in life, built on the earth, and integrated with eating, fighting and governing the country. The stone dragon from eight thousand years ago, the dragon-patterned pottery plate from four thousand years ago, and the oracle bone inscriptions from three thousand years ago, are connected into a line, proving that the belief of the Chinese nation has always existed and has never been interrupted.

How can this belief continue?

Many civilizations have been glorious, but eventually disappeared. Babylon, Maya, Inca, today there are only ruins left. Why can Chinese civilization last for five thousand years? The answer is hidden in the two keywords "continuity" and "unity".

Give an example. In 221 BC, Qin Shihuang completed unification. He not only defeated the six countries, but also wanted to let the people of the whole country know that this was "orthodox". Therefore, in 219 BC, he ordered Prime Minister Li Si to carve stones on Yishan, Zoucheng, Shandong. The inscription was written as a declaration of unifying the world.

Later, this stone tablet was destroyed and re-engraved in Xi'an in the Song Dynasty. You can still see rubbings today. The concept of unity is truly carved on stones and left to future generations.

Why carve stones? Because we must let future generations know that we are a family and have common rules. Unified words are the best examples. The Qin Dynasty promoted the "same writing" so that the words written by Shaanxi people could also be understood by Shandong people. The unified text seems to be technical details, but it is actually the implementation of faith. If the whole country has a common language, common recognition can be formed.

And, faith has another characteristic - it can continue. It is common for dynasties to change, but no matter how they change, the habit of worshiping ancestors and worshiping heaven has not been eliminated. The King of Shang worshiped ancestors, the people of Zhou talked about the destiny of heaven, the Emperor of Qin worshipped the ancestors, and Emperor Wu of Han worshipped Taiyi, and continued to use it in the Tang, Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties. The country can change its dynasty, but the roots of faith have never wavered.

Scholars summarized it very clearly: the unity of Chinese civilization determines that the country is inseparable, the nation is not dispersed, and civilization is not cut off. This is why after foreign tribes entered the Central Plains, they would take the initiative to accept the local etiquette system and put themselves into the framework of China.

So, faith can be continued, not by external power or by chance luck, but because it is always written into the national system. Stone tablets, words, and etiquette are all hard evidence. They tell us that the beliefs of the Chinese nation have long been bound to the national form.

What is the power of this belief?

Faith not only keeps us alive, it also shapes the way we behave. The most typical case was Zheng He's voyage to the West in the Ming Dynasty.

During the Yongle period, Zheng He voyaged seven times in the West, and his fleet was huge in size, covering Southeast Asia, South Asia, and even arrived in East Africa. You have to know that such a powerful fleet can be plundered and colonized. But the answer given by archaeology and literature was unexpected: They chose to buy and sell and be friendly.

The Hubei Provincial Museum collects a gold ingot with the engraved "Buy it from the Western Region in April of the 17th year of Yongle". A few words say everything - things are "buyed" rather than robbery. The Chinese cast peace and fairness on gold, leaving the hardest evidence.

Zheng He brought porcelain and silk, and brought back spices and rare treasures. More importantly, what he left behind was a cooperative relationship. Compared with the colonial expansion in the Western Age of Discovery, the routes are similar, but the practices are completely different. Westerners rely on artillery to plunder, while Chinese people rely on faith to choose peace.

Why is this happening? Because Chinese local beliefs emphasize "harmony is the most important" and "harmony is different". For thousands of years, from worshiping heaven to rituals and music, faith has emphasized that people should be harmonious and the country should be friendly. Zheng He’s choice was not a personal character, but an inevitable externalization of civilized beliefs.

Today we look back and understand the true meaning of "believe". We believe in not only our ancestors, not only our heaven and earth, but also our culture, peace and our country. It allows us to go out, not to conquer, but to communicate. It keeps us immortal in turmoil, but continues.