一切經音義 36.52

36.52

祆祠: The first character has the fanqie xian + jian (xiān). Originally there was no such character. The Hu people refer to deities as 'Heaven' (tian), and through phonetic shift pronounced tian as xian. Earlier scholars created this character in response to the sound, writing it with the 'altar' (示) and 'heaven' (天) radicals to distinguish it. The second character, ci, has the fanqie si + zi (cí). The *Erya* says: 'Ci means to offer sacrifice.' The *Baihu tong* says: 'Ci means to succeed (ci); shrines of all spirits are called ci.' He's commentary to the *Gongyang* says: 'Ci means food sacrifice; composed of the 'altar' (示) semantic and si (司) phonetic.' Shi (示) is pronounced qi.