Introduction

A BRIEF OVERVIEW OF TAOISM

Taoism has influenced numerous writers, artists, poets, craftsmen, politicians, philosophers, and a horde of others from all walks of life to produce exceptional works and live carefree lives. It has also given us most incredible herbal, sexual, contemplative, alchemical, and spiritual arts for the prevention of illness, for natural living, and for the longevity of life. Even if we were never to achieve the lofty goal of immortality, the benefits of the path of Taoism grant us common mortals both great health and longevity for just attempting to imitate the methods of the true immortals.

Taoism itself is primarily a philosophy of living naturally within the world, neither contending with nor altering nature. Taoist thought is permeated with the notion that humanity and heaven are a unified whole, that the entire universe is contained within humanity. This whole is known as the tao.

Ultimately, in Taoism, the ideal is to realize the way of heaven and humanity, hun and p’o, yin and yang, existence and nonexistence, form and formless, production and nonproduction, conditioned and unconditioned. These pairs are not composed of two separate things. Returning to the Source in Taoism is not merely a statement on becoming an enlightened being; rather, it is a statement on the actual reality of things. All things are one. It is only the mind’s illusory concepts and discriminations that envision them as two.

For those of you unfamiliar with Taoist thought, it is essential to understand that Taoism is not a religion in the Judeo-Christian sense of the word. Both in its philosophical origins and in its form as an organized religious system Taoism is devoid of dogmatism. The I Ching (Book of Changes) says, “All things on Earth are first an archetype in Heaven.” Taoism is an expression of this statement, adopting the ways of Heaven as an example for us living on Earth. Gods, in the daily life of Taoists, have about as much importance as do kangaroos to people living in New York City. Taoists accept the existence of gods, but not their relevance. To the Taoist, gods and spiritual beings are mythical symbols engaged to draw out the spiritual, heavenly qualities within us. Taoism sees no conflict in maintaining an outer shell that has a pious religious appearance while holding on to the inner belief that all things are returnable to the Source, the Tao.

Lao-tzu in the Tao Te Ching, which is a Taoist classic doctrine of the unproduced nature of all things, makes no distinction between Creator and No-Creator, claiming that “all things come from emptiness.”¹ To the Western mind, Taoism may appear the most paradoxical of teachings, for Lao-tzu’s comments are formed against the backdrop of such a vast array of Taoist gods, immortals, deities, and spirits that no single text—not even the Tao Tsang, the official documents of Taoism—has ever attempted to record them all. On the other hand, to be a Taoist requires no belief in a supreme being or in any particular heavenly deity. All celestial inhabitants may be regarded or disregarded at your discretion. The Taoist looks upon such beings as we might view extraterrestrials; they have no real importance in our lives. For the Taoist, the idea of God as some supreme attendant, as in the Christian sense, would be rather amusing if not totally erroneous. In Taoism supreme beings were more useful as symbols or mythic images, representing one or another spiritual aspect within oneself. Supreme beings, like the Jade Emperor, who sits at the top of the Taoist pantheon, are both real and unreal to the Taoist sensibilities. The Jade Emperor is more real as a mental-spiritual-internal image than he is as one who resides in some faraway Heaven.

The Chinese understand the spiritual usefulness of self-created images. On the one hand they personify everything, but on the other they know that everything is all Mind. The Jade Emperor is Mind, and the Mind is the Jade Emperor. Or as the Buddhist Heart Sutra puts it, “Emptiness is just form, and form is just emptiness.” These are not two things; rather, they are one. But since the rational mind cannot discern this Oneness, the ideal is personified. The Jade Emperor in all respects represents the highest ideal of spirituality, the embodiment of Tao.

To the Taoist, spirituality is not religious; it is the practical self-cultivation of three forces that embody Heaven, Earth, and humanity: ching (essence), qi (vitality), and shen (spirit). The restoration, accumulation, and transformation of these three inner forces are what constitute true spiritual illumination and immortality.

In Taoism two streams of thought and practice always appear, sometimes simultaneously. One is the process of cultivating natural internal energies or essences and the other is living the most natural life possible. In the first one we see all specific practices and methods and in the second we find the philosophy, a living of the Way, so to speak. This is why Taoists were so apt to seek to be master artists, musicians, or engrossed in whatever their livelihood was to make it an aspect of their personal Tao. Thus, when reading about Taoism and Taoists there will always be this aspect of cultivating (Nourishing Life Arts) and/or living the Tao through life endeavors.

The more one examines Taoism, the more it becomes abundantly clear that the very reason for cultivating qi and living naturally within nature is to attain immortality. Indeed, the mysticism of immortality is Taoism at its heart. Just as Buddhism is about the attainment of Buddhahood and the immortality of nirvana and Christianity is about entering eternal life in Heaven, Taoism is about attaining immortality through the Way. Over the last three thousand years we can scarcely find anything within Taoist history that is not directed toward this ideal.

In the writings of some of the most famous Taoists—Lao-tzu, Chuang-tzu, and Lieh-tzu—immortality is at the center of everything. While these classic writers of Taoism professed a philosophy, aired political and social problems, and countered the misinterpretations of rival doctrines, their writings were not just about philosophy, political and social agendas, or doctrinal struggles. They were, rather, a unique weave of words that could be interpreted toward all of those ends, while teaching about immortality and living the Tao itself.

When reading these texts it becomes evident that the philosophy is about attaining the Way (actual immortality); the social commentary is about how the imperials and politics of the day prevented men from living naturally so that they might achieve immortality and about how popular doctrine of the day, namely Confucianism, prevented men from living naturally as well. To approach Taoism correctly, there must be this understanding of its undercurrent of immortality and immortals. As will be seen later in this work, Taoism professes that everything one needs for this ideal and natural living and for achieving immortality is no farther from reach than one’s own body and is within nature itself. We need not, as Lao-tzu clarifies, “leave our own back yard.” All the minerals and herbs lie before us, and all the internal and spiritual energies lie within us. To the Taoist, immortality is not necessarily a secret rite of passage. It is instead a natural spiritual quest of every individual from the moment of birth. These great sages of old understood clearly that within every person lies a primal need for freedom of body and spirit, to live in joy and contentment with nature, to live forever in peace and harmony, and to maintain youthfulness even during old age. With these as the basis for Taoism, it is little wonder the theory attracted so much attention throughout China’s history.

To the Taoist immortality is not necessarily a secret rite of passage. It is instead a natural spiritual quest of every individual from the moment of birth.

What follows is a brief overview of some of the more significant moments in the history of Taoism. I’ve divided this history into the formative years and the more contemporary years in order for the reader to better view the progression and development of Taoist thought. The reason for doing this is that sometimes students have the impression that Taoism somehow always existed as we view it today, but this is erroneous. The philosophy and associated arts and practices have been accumulating over a very long period of time. Indeed, what we now see as Taoism would most likely be unrecognizable to those Taoists living two thousand years ago. With this in mind, the following chronology of people, texts, and events is given.

The Formative Years of Taoism

The origin of what we have come to know as Taoism is as elusive and obscure as the experience of Tao itself. There is no single event, creator, or text that gives us precise knowledge of when Taoism began. Nor is there one text within Taoism that tells us precisely what Tao is or how to attain it. Lao-tzu, the attributed founder and sage of philososphical Taoism, tells us in the Tao Te Ching, “The Tao that can be explained is not the true Tao.” Yet despite all this elusiveness and obscurity, Taoism has maintained a very long history in both popularity and practice. It is one of the two indigenous religious-philosophical traditions of China, and of these two it was the first.

In attempting to find an origin of Taoist practices for immortality, we must begin with Emperor Huang Ti (the Yellow Emperor). It is through his work that we find what were to become the first Taoist observations and teachings about attaining immortality. Huang Ti desperately sought the means to attain immortality. Within his attributed work the Nei Ching (Inner Classic), we find many references that go back further than his time. One of these references is to the Western Royal Mother (Hsi Wang Mu), who, along with her three female attendants (Multihued Girl, Mysterious Girl, and Plain Girl), provided the emperor with instructions on sexuality for the attainment of immortality. We also find his physician Ch’i Po giving him advice, which has become the basis for acupuncture, qigong, yin-yang and Five Element (Wu Hsing) theory, and preventive Chinese medicine. Despite the massive scope of the Nei Ching, it is still not the origin of Taoist ideas and philosophy.

A text called The Yin Convergence Classic, on the attainment of Tao, is thought to predate the Nei Ching, but this is uncertain. This small writing occupies the first text presented in the Tao Tsang (Taoist Canon), and many of the ideas and terms expressed in this work greatly influenced later Taoist writings. The popular divination process, later to become the I Ching (Book of Changes), also supposedly predates the Yellow Emperor. Going still further back there is Fu Hsi, the first emperor of China, who supposedly invented the Eight Diagrams of I Ching and is therefore considered the founder of folk Taoism and the divinational roots of Taoist spiritualism. But all of this is conjecture; it is cloaked in wild history and further confused by what’s known as “the Burning of the Books” of another emperor of the Ch’in dynasty, also called Huang Ti, who was responsible for constructing the Great Wall of China. Much of Chinese history was lost under his tyrannical rule.

Moving on in history we find Lao-tzu of the Chou dynasty around 400 B.C., who left behind what has come to be the main text of Taoism, the Tao Te Ching (The Classic on Tao and Virtue). In this work we see the inspiration for Chuang Chou—one of China’s preeminent Taoist philosophers and surely one of its greatest writers—who produced the Chuang Tzu, and also for the Lieh Tzu, by Lieh Yu-kuo. These classics have become the three main philosophical works of Taoism. Chang Tao-ling (A.D. 146) was the first philosopher to organize Taoism into a formalized religion. Chang Tao-ling was followed by Ko Hung, the Sung dynasty Taoist who wrote the first personal examination of Taoism and immortality, called the Pao P’u Tzu (see chapter 2). From here we come to such Taoist greats as Lu Tung P’in and his band of the Eight Immortals.

In looking much closer at the history of Taoism we find that each philosopher gave us something in particular that continues to color and flavor all of Taoism. Even though these descriptions are brief and do little justice to these noble and gifted men, they provide an overview of how Taoism and its ideologies were formed.

FAMOUS TAOISTS, THEIR WORKS, AND IMPORTANT EVENTS

Fu Hsi (circa 3000 B.C.) gave Taoism the first sense of human spirituality and the possibility of immortality through his divine vision of the Eight Diagrams.

Huang Ti (circa 2800 B.C.) gave Taoism the primary theory of the Three Treasures, sexual yogas, and Chinese medicine.

Lao-tzu (circa 400 B.C.) gave Taoism the philosophy of wei wu wei (active nonaggression) and the very notion of this enigma called Tao.

Chuang Chou (circa 300 B.C.) gave Taoism the premise of the “naturally just so” and the illusionary aspects of the mind.

Lieh Yu-kuo (circa 100 B.C.) gave Taoism a better and broader sense of both immortals and immortality.

Chang Tao-ling (circa 100 A.D.) gave Taoism its first established religious organization under the name of the Celestial Masters sect.

Ko Hung (circa 320 A.D.) gave Taoism its first personal record of a search for the alchemical solution to immortality.

Chung-li Ch’ uan (circa 700 A.D.) gave Taoism the first established practices of Tao Yin in the form of the Eight Brocade exercises.

Lu Tung P’ in (circa 800 A.D.) gave Taoism the ideal of the wandering Taoist, poet, and martial artist. Along with Chung-li Ch’uan and others, Lu formed the Eight Immortals, which became the most popular of all Taoist folk legends.

Wang Chung-yang (circa 1150 A.D.) gave Taoism its first monastic approach to practice with his sect of Complete Reality.

Liu Hai-chan (circa 1150 A.D.) preserved many of Taoism’ s more traditional teachings, especially those concerning the more magical and sexual arts of traditional Taoism.

Ch’ iu Ch’ ang-ch’ un (circa 1200 A.D.), the disciple of Wang Che, formed the Dragon Gate sect.

Chang Po-tuan (circa 1200 A.D.), the disciple of Liu Hai-ch’ an, was first to instill the teachings of the sixth patriarch of Ch’an Buddhism, Hui Neng, into the teachings.

The teachings that emerged from the time of Wang Chung-yang and Liu Hai-chan (circa 1150 A.D.) form the basis of contemporary Taosim. The schools of Wang Chung-yang and Lui Hai-chan, northern and southern respectively, were greatly influenced by the religious aspects created by Chang Tao-ling and the philosophical tenets of Lao-tzu, forming a trilogy of ideology, so to speak. Both schools saw the vital importance of nourishing and preserving the Three Treasures (ching, qi, and shen) toward the goal of achieving immortality. Because both of these schools remain influential to contemporary Taoist philosophy and both incorporated the teachings of The Jade Emperor’s Mind Seal Classic, they are treated with greater historical depth in the following section.

The Complete Reality School and the Dragon Gate Sects

In the Sung dynasty the Taoist priest Wang Chung-yang (or Wang Che) (A.D. 1112–1170) formed what was to become the northern sect of the Chuan Chen Tsung (Complete Reality School), from which the Lung Men (Dragon Gate) sect later developed.

The Complete Reality School incorporated what Wang Che considered the best aspects of China’s three major divisions of religious thought: Taoism, Confucianism, and Buddhism.

From Taoism, the school chose the Tao Te Ching of Lao-tzu, the Chuang Tzu of Chuang Chou, the Pao P’u Tzu of Ko Hung, and the Lieh Tzu of Lieh Yu-kuo as its principle teachings. Wang Che also composed many works, such as the Jade Lock Treatise, which was primarily a code of conduct for his disciples. His writings are an attempt to create a Taoist vinaya (the Buddhist monastic code). The school placed particular emphasis, however, on six important Taoist classics: The Jade Emperor’s Immortality Classic, The Clarity and Tranquillity Classic, The Yin Convergence Classic, The Jade Pivot Classic, The Response and Retribution Treatise, and The Highest Truth Classic. All Taoist novices of the Complete Reality and subsequent Dragon Gate sects were required to study and memorize these works, which are as important to a Taoist’s training as the Tao Te Ching, Lieh Tzu, Pao P’u Tzu and Chuang Tzu but are in many ways more succinct and clear.

From Confucian teachings, the Complete Reality School included the ideas of filial piety and the study of the Doctrine of the Mean, and from Buddhism it incorporated the teachings of Bodhidharma and the Pure Land (Chin T’u), as the Bodhisattva Kuan Shih Yin was held in high esteem. Disciples of the Complete Reality School expounded on and studied the Heart and Diamond Sutras (Prajna Paramitas). In fact, the two monastic systems of Chuan Chen Taoism and Ch’an Buddhism were so similar that in the Ching dynasty Buddhist monks were accepted, and sometimes invited to stay, at the Taoist White Cloud Monastery in Beijing.

Considered a fanatic and portrayed as extremely eccentric, Wang Che was a native of the northwestern province of Shaanxi and taught in this region all his life. For a two-year period he buried himself ten feet underground to meditate. One of the extreme ascetic practices he advocated, as in Ch’an Buddhism, was to forgo lying down and sleeping. Many of his disciples would practice this for ten years, remaining in a perpetual state of wakefulness. Such extreme ascetic practices, however, tapered off under his successors.

Wang Che claimed to be a disciple of the famous Lu Tung P’in, one of the Eight Immortals of the Tang dynasty. Yet Lu had, as Taoists like to say, “ascended into heaven” three hundred years prior to Wang Che’s birth, making it quite doubtful that Wang studied with this great immortal. But as so many stories of early Taoism relate, the transmission of knowledge from Lu must have occurred through dreams and visions. Another tradition claims that Wang received his insights from two strangers he met during his seclusion, but nothing can be concluded about who these two strangers were.

The southern sect of the Complete Reality School was founded by Liu Hai-chan, who also claimed to have studied with Lu Tung P’in, thus making him a disciple of the same lineage as Wang Che and able to operate under the same name. As with Wang Che, however, Liu would have had to be an astonishing 270 years old for his path to cross with Lu Tung P’in’s. Liu Hai-chan was also born in Shaanxi province, but his teaching took place mostly in the southern regions of China. Even though Wang Che and Liu Hai-chan each formed a sect of Taoism and claimed his to be different from the other’s, the two really were fundamentally the same; the only tangible difference was that in the southern sect monastic life was not required. Each sect, however, changed with time. Wang Che disciple Ch’iu Ch’ang-ch’un softened the rules and formed the Dragon Gate sect. Liu’s southern sect was eventually taken over by the old Celestial Masters sect of the Dragon and Tiger Mountain. By the end of the thirteenth century the Changs were the imperial favorite of the Celestial Masters and gave themselves the new name of Cheng I (Right Unity) sect. This new sect actually brought back many of the older traditions of Taoism and separated itself from all the Buddhist influences Liu Hai-chan and Chang Po-tuan had accommodated.

This new southern school of Cheng I differed considerably, bringing back the arts of herbalism, magic, divination, alchemical elixirs, and sexual yoga, claiming them all useful and legitimate means for self-cultivation. The northern school forbade such practices and does so even to this day, which is entirely in keeping with its more Buddhist-derived principles and practices.

When talking about Taoism or Buddhism, it seems that the northern schools have always been considered the legitimate ones. This opinion really has nothing to do with the validity of the teachings themselves, but comes from the fact that the Han (or Mandarin-speaking) ethnic group controlled the capitals of China and the imperial families. Northern China has always held the south in contempt as not true Chinese, and as barbarians in many respects. In its practices and thinking, however, the southern sect of the Complete Reality School was much freer and resembled the multifaceted avenues of Taoist cultivation more clearly than did the northern sect.

Wang Che, or, as he was called later, Wang Chung-yang, was a military officer who after retiring from service went to live in seclusion. After receiving the revelations of Lu Tung P’in, he left his meditation hut to preach and form his new school. One of Lu Tung P’in’s epithets was Chun Yang (Pure Yang), and this was actually the original name of Wang’s new sect, which he then attached to his own name. When preaching in Ninghai (Shandong province), he briefly changed the name of the sect to Chin Lien (Golden Lotus), after the hall from which he taught.

Later, Wang came to call his sect Chuan Chen, or Complete Reality (enlightenment). After Wang began teaching his new vision of Taoism, his following grew very large in a short time, becoming without question the most popular form of Taoism during the Sung dynasty. This is true even of present times; in mainland China the Complete Reality sect continues to be the leading school of Taoism, and is the only surviving monastic form of Taoism. However, even though this sect is the most popular school of Taoism in China today, mainly because of its organized monastic structure, the more influential teachings, both philosophically and in literature, have come out of the southern sect of Cheng I, which is richer in the more traditional aspects of Taoism. The northern sect had simply rid itself of many Taoist traditions in order to be monastic and to compete with the growing Buddhist imperial influences.

In the traditions of Hua Shan and Wu-t’ang Mountain, the hygiene and martial-art practices of Taoism predominated, and most of what we now know of t’ai chi ch’uan, qigong, and so on come from these two traditions. The Mao Shan sect dealt primarily with magic and spirits, and it influenced much of Taoism with these teachings. But the hermits, the recluses, and the cloud wanderers found their influences mainly in the southern sects of Taoism.

Wang had seven accomplished disciples, six men and one woman, who all continued on as leaders of the sect. But the Wang Che lineage of the Complete Reality sect continued to flourish through his disciple Ch’iu Ch’ang-ch’un and his newly formed Dragon Gate sect.

It was Ch’iu Ch’ang-ch’un who took up residency at White Cloud Monastery (Po Yun Kuan) in Beijing and started a sub-sect called Lung Men (Dragon Gate). White Cloud Monastery then became the headquarters for both sects, and continues to be so today.

The resemblance of Wang Che’s Complete Reality sect to the Ch’an Buddhist monastic life and practice is remarkable and includes withdrawal from the world, celibacy, intensive meditation, ascetic practices such as never lying down to sleep, abstentation from wine and meat, and generally avoiding anything pleasing to both physical and mental senses. The whole idea, as in Ch’an Buddhism, was to restore man’s original nature and purity through meditation and the monastic life.

Even though the Complete Reality and Dragon Gate sects of Taoism accentuated and practiced within the confines of monasticism and the Cheng I sect practiced more in the temple, hermitage, and wanderer modes, Taoist teachings in and of themselves never dictate that a certain lifestyle is preferable to another. Whether someone is an ordained priest, a monk, or a layperson, the Tao is accessible to all who strive for it.

I mentioned but a handful of great Taoists in China’s incredibly long history, but there are countless others, a host of mortal men and women, immortals and immortalesses, and spirits and gods that make up the pantheon of Taoism. In the end, all these cumulative efforts of several centuries gave humankind one of its greatest and most enduring philosophies of personal freedom, humanity, nature, and spirituality. Being one of the most undogmatic of all spiritual traditions, Taoism focuses on the development and freedom of the individual, seeing nonconformity, nonaggression, and non-interference in the doings of others as the ideal conduct of a human being. Frugality, mindfulness, and compassion are other ideals. Taoism is simple, and relies only on a person being what Chuang-tzu called “naturally just so” and the “uncarved block.” Mortals injure themselves spiritually through all their scheming for position, shorten their lives with their desire for fame and profit, and harm their true nature by clinging to the red-dust world.