Bamboo Grove
Sit alone, hidden in bamboo.
Pluck the qin and whoop with joy.
Forest so deep no one knows it:
the bright moon comes to shine on me.
—Wang Wei (699–759)
The two solar terms within this moon:
GREAT SNOW
WINTER SOLSTICE
the twenty-four solar terms
The temperature drops even more and snow is plentiful. Farmers actually welcome heavy snow, because the ground then stays at a constant temperature, insulating it from even harsher cold spells. The snow also keeps the ground moist and kills many pests.
However, since snowstorms and blizzards can become significant disasters, people must take the proper precautions.
This exercise is best practiced during the period of 11:00 P.M.–3:00 A.M.
1. Stand with feet shoulder-width apart. Push your hands out to each side, palms facing outward. Slowly and rhythmically stamp your feet.
2. Exhale each time you stamp, inhale between stamps. Repeat thirty-five times on each side.
3. Sit cross-legged and face forward. Click your teeth together thirty-six times. Roll your tongue between your teeth nine times in each direction. Form saliva in your mouth by pushing your cheeks in and out. When your mouth is filled with saliva, divide the liquid into three portions.
4. Inhale; then exhale, imagining your breath traveling to the dantian saliva, imagining that it travels to the dantian.
5. Repeat two more times until you’ve swallowed all three portions.
6. Sit comfortably as long as you like.
Through this exercise, ancient Taoists sought to prevent or treat swelling in the feet and knees; dry mouth; swollen throat; hunger without being able to eat; cough; vision weakness; and feelings of fear, as if about to be seized.
Clear sunlight drives away the year:
the brightness can show what’s coming.
Sitting alone after ten moons—or has it been a lifetime? We’ve spent a long time in contemplation and exploration: what do we know? Perhaps we’ve been successful as we’ve thought about Tao, or perhaps, like Meng Haoran, we’ve been disappointed and rejected. In either case, it’s right to ask what we’ve gained from our efforts.
Let us turn back in our minds, harvest what we’ve discovered, store up what we’ve decided, hold what we value, and look forward to spring. Yes, the clear light burns away the year, but a new year must come afterward. We sit alone, to make sure we have a pure signal from the great expanse within us, and to make sure that there is nothing between us and the great Way.
But we are not simply alone, are we? We are among the pines in the mountains, and the moon comes to shine on us. That light represents our insight: spiritual guidance is always there, as it has been for every generation before us, as it will be for our children and our children’s children, as it is even when the clouds of disappointment and violence obscure it temporarily. Why should we fear? The light is there, even if it too goes through its cycles of waxing and waning.
The brightness can show what’s coming: a time when most will profess to value the spirit.
• Fasting day
Returning to a Broken Hut
Here is a poem by Meng Haoran, “Returning to Nanshan at Year’s End.” As the poem begins, he’s been rejected by the emperor and is contemplating the ending of his career.
No more petitions at the north gate;
I return to a broken hut on Nanshan,
cast aside by an enlightened ruler for lacking talent.
Sick too much, I don’t see old friends.
My white hair shows my speeding age,
clear sunlight drives away the year.
Always pondering and worrying, I can’t sleep:
Pine. Moon. Night. Window. Graves.
Most will profess to value the spirit,
while few confess to actual practice.
Most people profess to value the spiritual. Churches and temples stand in every city and in every country. Places that people deem sacred are all over the world. Yet in our popular culture, few want to go to a religious or spiritual movie. Few say that they read spiritual books, or go to lectures by spiritual leaders. No one wants to be lectured about spirituality, nor will anyone accept being offered spirituality on the street.
That’s odd because we want to know about so many subjects that affect us. We try to be smart. No one wants to be cheated when buying things. Everyone understands the need to know enough math to get by and not be swindled. We want to be smart enough to understand contracts. We want to be informed enough to comment on our political leaders. Most of us want to know what’s going on in the world. While we may cheerfully allow ourselves to be distracted by the latest video or celebrity gossip, we do want to be serious about things at least some of the time. But spirituality is perhaps the least popular of the serious topics.
Thus, one of the most important of endeavors receives the least acknowledgment in our lives. We don’t want to think about it. We want someone else—a priest, a holy person, an author, even a fortune-teller—to tell us what to do. We don’t have enough attention to practice for half an hour, let alone half a lifetime. If someone says that he or she practices spirituality deeply and sincerely, most people will politely move to the other side of the room.
Why are we spiritual? We are, at the very least, because we still have questions.
While few confess to actual practice, sky and mountains awe us, and death scares us.
Turning to the Spiritual
Sakyamuni Buddha lived the first twenty-nine years of his life as Prince Siddhartha in Kapilavastu. His father commanded that his every desire be fulfilled. One day, the prince left the palace to meet his people, but he saw the sick, the aged, and the suffering. Later, Siddhartha went on more excursions, and he saw a diseased man, a corpse, and an ascetic. Siddhartha then turned to the spiritual life and left the palace to be a mendicant.
Confucius’s father died when he was three. His mother raised Confucius in poverty. It’s said that he loved to play with the ritual vases on the altar, a traditional explanation of his inherent spiritual bent. Confucius worked as a shepherd, cowherd, clerk, and bookkeeper and eventually entered the civil service, rising to the position of minister of justice in the state of Lu. However, he did not last long in that position and spent the rest of his life trying to find a lasting patron.
Laozi grew weary of the moral decay and decline of the empire. He mounted a water buffalo and made his way to the wilderness beyond China’s borders.
All three of these sages’ great spiritual work was accompanied by disappointment and wandering.
Sky and mountains awe us, and death scares us.
We continue the search that will free us.
Our spiritual impulse comes from three directions. First, we are awed by this world, and, sensing that there is an order far greater than us, we react with reverence. This is natural. Primitive people and children all know that they are surrounded by wonder, and when they respond with solemnity, joy, care, and trust, they are showing that reverence is natural to us.
Second, we are frightened by all that is wrong with this world. Sickness, death, scarcity, natural disasters, human cruelty, and our own foibles mark our world with misfortune. Again, the reaction against this is natural. We want to find medicine to ease suffering. We want to find enough for everyone to eat. We want to help others when hurricanes, blizzards, tidal waves, and drought strike. We want to help those victimized by others, and we question whether we want a world where one person can prey on millions. We worry when we make mistakes that lead us into accident or wreck all we have worked for. Thus, we search for some greater overall way of life, a way of seeing beyond the immediate problems of the world.
Third, we want to know what truth is. This is inherent in us too. Truth might be as primitive as knowing not to eat poisonous plants or to avoid snakes. It might lie in the realm of education, from simple arithmetic to the ability to accurately convey our needs and understand others. It might be emotional: we want to know if someone really loves us. It might be scientific, from the geneticist wanting to understand the structure of our DNA to the origins of the cosmos. It might be artistic, such as the novelist trying to capture the veracity of life in fiction, or the artist trying to make the purest painting. Above all, we want to know the truth of who we are, why we are here, what made this world, where we are going, and whether death is truly final.
The spiritual impulse is great, and it is part of being human. Whether one calls oneself a Taoist or any other name is immaterial. What’s important is to recognize the impulse, which is as fundamental to us as our heartbeat.
We continue the search that will free us, but why study the words left by Confucius?
Heaven Is Exalted, Earth Is Humble
Zhuangzi gives the order and sequence of all under heaven:
Heaven is exalted, the earth is humble. Spring and summer lead, fall and winter follow, and the four seasons have their order. The ten thousand things change and flourish. Every bud has its proper form, first thriving, then withering, and decaying. Change and transformation is ongoing.
Heaven and earth are spiritual. If they can be exalted and humble, if they can lead and follow, if they can have order, then that should also be the Tao of people. . . .
There is order to the Great Tao. If we speak of Tao but not of its order, then how can we call it Tao?
The Altar of Earth and Harvests (Shejitan) built in 1421, Zhongshan Park, Beijing. Used for soil and grain ceremonies in imperial times.
Yongxinge
Why study the words left by Confucius?
Why hope that the Duke of Zhou will appear?
King Wen, one of the main shapers of the I Ching, suffered in prison for seven years and died before he could establish the nation he had dreamed about. His fourth son, Ji Dan, the Duke of Zhou, served as regent and led a war against two of his brothers to preserve the dynasty. Confucius revered the Duke of Zhou—he once lamented that he had not dreamed of the Duke in a long time, taking it as a sign that heaven no longer favored him. Indeed, Confucius never realized his own dream: he never held an office through which he could truly establish the utopia he envisioned, and many competing philosophers and rulers ridiculed him.
Many great people have suffered to hold their views of life while they have pursued their dreams. There is no finishing in life. There are no permanent accomplishments. One is only as good as one’s last work. In spiritual terms, that means that there is never a day where you can say, “I’ve made it.” Taoists do not believe in a permanent and total enlightenment that spares a person from the vicissitudes of life. This is made explicit by the stories of gods exiled from heaven.
Therefore, there is only the journey. Every place—even if it is in heaven—is only a temporary way station. No matter how enchanting the place may be, one has to travel on. Thus, if one must speak of being a “good” Taoist, it means having an appreciation of the journey, helping others along the way, and being true to oneself. One is never a burden to others, but one is willing to lighten the burdens of others. There is no other life than this one, and this one is meant to be lived to its fullest.
We will meet many people ahead, not just the Duke of Zhou, not just Confucius. They are not ghosts, but spirits. In their benevolence, they have left brilliant lights to guide our way. It is what we see by their light that so brings us joy on the road.
Why did Confucius dream of the Duke of Zhou, and why do we still dream of Confucius? We still have an ear for their words.
Why hope that the Duke of Zhou will appear, when in the garden, all you see is the wall?
• Festival for Confucius
King Wen and Two of His Sons
King Wen (1099–1050 BCE) was the founder of the Zhou dynasty. He was initially the Prince of Zhou, a vassal state to the Shang dynasty (1600–1046 BCE). Di Xin, the king of the Shang, imprisoned him for seven years, and it was during this time that King Wen revised the I Ching. Other officials and states worked to free him, and even after he returned to Zhou, King Wen planned the overthrow of Shang carefully, aided by his sons and Jiang Taigong. However, he died before the dynasty could be fully established, leaving his son, King Wu, to complete the task.
King Wu (d. 1043 BCE) was the second son of King Wen and led the armies that finally overthrew the Shang dynasty. However, he died three years later. His son, King Cheng (r. 1042–1021 BCE), was too young to rule at first. King Cheng’s uncle, the Duke of Zhou (d. 1105), served as regent for seven years and was also a contributor to the I Ching.
The God of Dreams
Confucius, who lived roughly five hundred years after the beginning of the Zhou dynasty, made this rueful statement recorded in the Analects: “Great is my decline! For so long, I have not had another dream where I saw the Duke of Zhou.” In folk legends, the duke will appear to a person if an important event is about to happen. The Duke of Zhou is therefore known as the God of Dreams.
In the garden, all you see is the wall.
Looking up, you see the limitless sky.
Studying the lives and works of others is important, but we must also assess them and allow our beliefs to change. This process has been a part of spiritual life for thousands of years. It’s happening now: gods being forgotten, legends being combined, new forms of worship being adapted to what people need today.
Every garden wall we build also blocks the view. Every temple we build limits our view of the sky. In the same way, the philosophies we construct may benefit us immensely, but they can also wall off the openings to new and further immensity.
If you ask ten people and they can’t agree on the exact date of a festival, if you hear ten different versions of the old stories, if you hear arguments that “it was never done that way where I came from,” then that is all good. It exposes the process of adaptation that is crucial to a living spiritual tradition. If the purists shudder that there are combined Confucian-Buddhist-Taoist practices, let them keep trembling, because in a hundred years’ time, our spirituality will have evolved even more. There may be people who argue for doing it “just like the masters,” but any examination of the past thousand years will show that no one in any given generation did everything just like the preceding one.
The crucial thing is that one learn thoroughly before one changes and adapts. This is true of anything—science, music, art, literature, government, business. There’s a vast difference between an ignorant pretender and an enlightened master. We must all take the trouble to master tradition, and then afterward, we must be free to improvise something new.
Looking up, you see the limitless sky—and there is only one trail up the mountain.
A Story from the Classic of Rites
Confucius held an archery contest in a garden. Many people gathered outside, wanting to enter. Confucius told his disciple Zilu to take up his bow and arrows to address them: “No general of a defeated army and no officer who’s lost a country may come in. The rest may enter.”
Half departed and half entered.
Then Gongwang Qiu raised a horn cup: “Are the young and strong and the elderly all firm in propriety? Do you avoid following licentiousness? Are you resolute to death? If so, take your honored places.”
Half departed and half remained.
Finally, Xu Dian raised a horn cup: “Are you excellent in learning without tiring? Are you excellent in propriety without wavering? Do you who are old expound Tao without confusion? If so, take your honored places.”
Only a few remained.
Know That You Don’t Know
Laozi wrote in Chapter 71 of the Daodejing:
Knowing that you don’t know is superior.
Not knowing wisdom is sickness.
The sage is not sick
because he knows that his sickness is sickness.
Since he knows that his sickness is sickness, then he’s not sick.
There is only one trail up the mountain:
the way is steep for all who seek heaven.
Chenshiyuan
Huashan is a place of many stories and fables. Its beauty is so ethereal that anything seems possible there. And it is remote—the popular saying is that there is only one path up the mountain. All in all, it’s been a place of retreat for countless Taoist practitioners.
Those of us who want to understand spirituality better may despair that we don’t have a Huashan to climb or to retreat to. While there’s no doubt as to the wonderful quality of being in Huashan, we must find our own way in our own place and time. Each of us has a mountain to climb—the mountain of our own life. Like Huashan, that mountain has only one path, and we should trudge it every day.
Will we stay on the slopes? Will we find a little plot somewhere off the trail and be content to work it each day? Will we lack enough curiosity to see what’s further ahead? Each of us must make his or her own choice, but the mountain is always there.
Every mountain climbed leads upward toward heaven. The arrangement and the possibilities of life are simple to understand.
The way is steep for all who seek heaven—learn, but don’t fully trust teachers or gods.
• Birthday of the Great God of the Western Peak (Xiyue Dadi)
• Festival day for the Jade Emperor
Huashan
Huashan (Splendid Mountain), Shaanxi, is the western mountain of the Five Sacred Mountains and the fourth of the Thirty-Six Lesser Grotto Heavens. Its guardian is the Great God of the Western Peak (Xiyue Dadi), whose statue is in the Mountain Guarding Temple (Zhenyue Gong). The god receives the offerings of the people, grants wishes, and guards an entrance to hell.
A cluster of five peaks, with the highest being 7,087 feet high, Huashan has been a retreat for generations of Taoist hermits. Legend places Laozi there as he compounded the elixir of immortality, suggesting that it was a Taoist place even in the sixth century BCE. Legends and history abound about nearly every turn of the trail up the mountain, and it has inspired painters as well as poets such as Li Bai and Bai Juyi.
On the Eastern Peak, the Losing at Chess Pavilion memorializes the story of the Taoist Chen Tuan (920–989) playing a game of chess with Taizu (r. 960–976), the first emperor of the Song dynasty (960–1279). The emperor staked Huashan on the game, and when he lost, the mountain was given to the Taoists.
Chen was credited with creating the martial art Six Combinations, Eight Methods (Liuhebafa). He is also known for his qigong, most famously his Sleeping Qigong, where he slept continuously for one hundred days at a time.
307 Don’t Trust Teachers Fully
Learn, but don’t fully trust teachers or gods.
Stay independent and true to yourself.
If life were as simple as listening unquestioningly to your teachers and parents—as thousands of years of Confucian training would have us do—don’t you think we’d all do it? Instead, everyone goes through a period of disappointment at the failings of teachers and parents, sometimes with a bitterness that is difficult to overcome.
If spirituality were as simple as memorizing scriptures, chanting to gods, and abdicating critical thinking for a painted idol, don’t you think we’d all do it? Instead, the scriptures turn out to be misinterpreted, the chants vary from school to school, and no one comes to protect us when evil appears.
If knowledge were as simple as applying everything our teachers taught us, don’t you think we’d be finished learning upon graduation? Instead, knowledge keeps changing; the important part of a theory is later proved wrong; our teachers turn out to be mistaken or no smarter than we are, or they turn out to be ardent subscribers to crackpot theories.
There are no persons in the world to whom you can fully trust your spiritual life. They are fallible, they can make mistakes, they are corruptible, they are doomed. Why cling to someone on a flaming mountain? At best, they might be able to point you to some way out, but you still have to decide whether to take it.
So if teachers and, by extension, gods are unreliable, what are we to do with the grand tradition we have inherited? We have to sift through all of it and find what works for us. We have to be careful not to be infected by outmoded ideas. Yes, we have to do this even with a spiritual tradition. Spirituality is not finished once one has acquired membership, made vows, memorized holy words, understood history, and even absorbed the mistakes that have been made. Nor does spirituality dwell in a group of adoring disciples and a smug guru. Spirituality consists of the hardheaded exploration, the honesty with oneself, the commitment to act with integrity and morality, and the determination to face death with dignity and calm. Trust yourself.
Stay independent and true to yourself when both belief and gods are forgotten.
Visiting the Gods
There was once an old teacher who set his students to their lessons while he slept at his desk. Each time he excused himself by saying that he had been visiting the gods.
There came a day when one of the students fell asleep at his desk, and the teacher angrily woke him with a stick in his hand.
“I was visiting the gods,” claimed the boy.
“Is that so?” the teacher replied furiously. “And just what did the gods say?”
“I asked if my teacher ever came to visit, and they said that they had never heard of such a fellow.”
When both belief and gods are forgotten,
why should we still preserve and revere gods?
We are watching the pantheon of Taoist gods changing before our eyes. The Nine Emperor Gods are primarily worshipped in Southeast Asia, outside of China. Mother Ancestor has a powerful following, but it’s concentrated in coastal areas and overseas communities. All sorts of gods are no longer worshipped nor remembered. Who remembers the Spirit of Pockmarks, Ma Shen? Or the God of the Left Kidney, Chuan Yuanzhen, who is exactly 3.70 inches in height and whose body can be any one of five colors? When we see gods being forgotten or changed, and we see legends overlapping one another, it shows how people are subconsciously revising and combining their beliefs.
Altar to Mother Ancestor (Tian Hou, Mazu), Hong Kong.
FlyingToaster at en.wikipedia
Offerings to ancestors have kept up with the times, and people burn effigies of computers, cell phones, iPads, and the like, leading some people to ask mockingly whether wireless services have been installed in the underworld. “I don’t know,” one man shrugged when asked this question. “All I want is to do my best for them.” Indeed, the Asian Funeral Expo held in Hong Kong featured paper effigies of designer homes, gyms, spas, nightclubs, and yachts.
Why do people continue to worship even as they are completely involved with the primarily materialistic and rationalistic world we live in today? Is it stupidity? Or is there a basic need to be fulfilled?
Why should we still preserve and revere gods when we find a priest may be lustful beneath his holy robes?
• Fasting day
Some Gods Who Are Rarely Worshipped Today
There are many gods who have been forgotten or are rarely worshipped. The list below is not exhaustive, but merely gives some examples taken at random.
The God of Basketmakers
The Barefoot Immortal
The Goddess of Brothels
The Centipede Spirit
The Goddess of Wig Sellers
The God of the Bowels
The God of the Lungs
The Frog Spirit
The God of the Brain
The Thunder God of the Ninth Heaven
The God of the Classics
The Goddess of the Corner
The Goddesses of the Corpse
The God of Cruelty
The Duke of the Bed
The Earl of Wind
The Grabbing Commissioner
The Goddess of Grasshoppers
The Cup-Boat Monk
The God of the Road
The God of Scorpions
The President of the Ministry of Time
The Gods of the Tongue
The Tortoise Spirit
The First Princess of the Azure Clouds
The God of the Ribs
The Servant of the White Lotus
The God of Lust, Sin, and Death
The Solemn Emperor of the Golden Palace
The God of Drains and Ditches
The Spirit of Pustules
The God of the Stomach
A priest may be lustful beneath his holy robes,
but the sacred symbols on his robes will not change.
Taoism—just like every other spiritual tradition in this world—has struggled with people who exploit it to abuse others. From promises of divine healing, extraordinary wealth, and sexual ecstasy to spirit possession, demon enslavement, and consorting with hell, there have been plenty of corrupt Taoists throughout the centuries—and they exist even today.
Anyone interested in Taoism has to be forewarned that such people must be avoided—and that, sadly, such abusive figures are far more likely to present themselves to sincere seekers than are the true masters.
However, the existence of abuse and evil is no invalidation of the core value of Taoism. The philosophy of Taoism; the health exercises; the appreciation of nature; the deep entwining with art, poetry, and music; the scientific attitude; and the centering on great reverence are important and powerful. Yes, bad people have victimized others while dangling Taoism as bait, but that doesn’t make Taoism wrong.
It seems that every month there are new revelations of innocent people abused by those in power. The worst thing is to be silent about it. We must speak out against the use of religion and spirituality to deceive and injure others.
The I Ching gives us the perfect test. In Hexagram 27, Nourishing, the Statement reads: “Watch the jaws and what one seeks to fill one’s mouth.” In other words: watch what a person says, and look to see what that person really wants. If it’s power, money, fame, adoration, or sex, then that person must be avoided, no matter what he or she promises you. If you apply that test, though, you’ll find that there are very few true teachers in this world.
We have to learn for ourselves and not be beholden to any one school or teacher. The masters don’t have all the answers, the scholars don’t have all the answers, and certainly the fortune-tellers and magicians are even less likely to have the answers.
No tricks! Don’t go for smoke and mirrors. Look for Tao. And do the looking yourself.
But the sacred symbols on his robes will not change when confronted with the ridiculous.
Taoist Mistakes
Throughout the history of Taoism, there have been grand theories, grand experiments, and grand failures. Here are some of them:
The Three Worms Some Taoists believed that every person is born with three worms that feed on grains. When the worms become strong enough, they consume the person and cause death.
External Alchemy Believing that physical immortality was possible, alchemists tested numerous substances in a search for the right formula. Many of these were toxins such as mercury and lead, and the experimenters died (although their followers hid these results by claiming that they had become immortal).
Penglai An isle of immortals was believed to exist somewhere in the Pacific Ocean east of China. Qin Shi Huang, the First Emperor of China, sent numerous unsuccessful expeditions to find the mythological island.
Taoist Scams
Scams by Taoists, or people purporting to be Taoists, have existed for a long time. In the time of Qin Shi Huang, for example, it was shown that many of the so-called Formula Doctors (fangshi ) could not show any benefit to their prescriptions, and they were executed.
Many scandals have involved sex. Some Taoist nunneries were actually brothels. Taoist theories of sexual cultivation were exploited. Even today, people offering Taoist “sexual empowerment” are arrested and convicted for sexual abuse.
Then there are all sorts of scams involving fake feng shui, clearing of karma, exorcism, immortality, and even the granting of divinity. All of these scams are in some way based on distortions of traditional practice.
When confronted with the ridiculous,
will you choose a fantasy or belief?
As is so often the case, both sides in the story of the temple medium have muddled the situation. However, there are some traditional elements to be affirmed here. The idea of helping someone be reincarnated comes from Buddhism and has been adopted by some Taoist sects. Trying to make contact with the deceased is a ritual that brings comfort and acceptance of death. Unfortunately, everyone involved in this situation has distorted the tradition nearly beyond recognition. Anyone mildly interested in Taoism could understandably lose all enthusiasm after reading such a story.
We often seem to believe most stubbornly in what we know the least about. Let us ask then, is belief simply what we do to fill in the gaps of what we don’t know? Are we mere children, making up stories of demons in the closet, or reasons why a fairy star will come down and help us? This is the kind of belief that we must try to outgrow. Fantasy-as-belief is not reliable.
Life is a mystery, and belief is an essential ingredient of sanity. This is not the belief that is fantasy, but the belief that is faith.
This faith is the sense that the world is inherently good, that people are inherently good, and that our values are essential to living in harmony with nature, others, and ourselves. It is belief in ourselves, that we are capable of meeting life’s challenges, and that we have integrity, honesty, and kindness. It is the faith that we will work toward the good whenever there is the evil of disaster.
As Laozi says, knowing that you don’t know is superior. Belief is necessary, but choose the belief of faith and not the belief of fantasy—even if the fantasy has the name of your favorite religion. We need to move beyond telling ourselves stories to comfort ourselves and instead try to perceive the truth directly.
Will you choose a fantasy or belief? Why not choose the ultimate sum? “One.”
Selling iPhones in the Underworld
When Steve Jobs, the founder of Apple, died in 2011, a temple medium in Penang, Malaysia, held a ritual at Pulau Jerejak, near a statue of Mother Ancestor, so that Jobs could be reincarnated. The medium also announced that he was authorized as a general agent for iPhones in the underworld. He added that Yama, the King of the Underworld, would use an iPad to access the records of the living and dying.
The ritual asked participants to take a bite from an apple and observe three minutes of silence before throwing the apple into the sea. Some people ate their apples before the ritual was completed.
Other Taoists spoke out against the ceremony, saying that the dead could only receive items that were burned. One declared: “Taoist believers burn only traditional items like houses and maids.”
Ceremony to Taiyi to save all souls.
© Saskia Dab
The ultimate sum? “One.”
The ultimate goal? “One.”
How do we understand a world of gods, demons, ghosts, and humans? How do we comprehend unlimited heaven and earth?
Heaven gained the one and became pure: without oneness, heaven would be complexity without order.
Earth gained the one and became serene: without oneness, earth would be multiplicity without sequence.
The gods gained the one and became divine: without oneness, the gods would be immortal without purpose.
The valley gained the one and became full: without oneness, there would be receiving without fullness.
On this one day, the eleventh day of the eleventh moon, the eleventh day of the Great Snow, think back to the one. You came from one and need only return to one for all to be—one.
The ultimate goal? “One.” We kneel as pilgrims to the temple gods.
• Festival for the Great One Heavenly Ruler
The Great One
The Great One Heavenly Ruler (Taiyi Jiuku Tianjun) personifies a complex philosophical concept. Here are some of the many beliefs about him:
Emperor Wudi (156–87 BCE) of the Han dynasty was not succeeding in his search for immortality, and he was told this was because his sacrifices had omitted Taiyi. Ceremonies to this god began from that point.
Taiyi was an immortal with medical knowledge, invited to the banquet of the Queen Mother of the West.
He listens to those who are suffering and saves them, sending a boat of nine lotus flowers to ferry them to the shore of salvation.
He represents cosmic matter before it congealed into material shape.
The Great One as a Philosophical Concept
In Chapter 39 of the Daodejing, Laozi writes:
Since ancient times, these things gained the one:
Heaven gained the one and became pure.
Earth gained the one and became serene.
The gods gained the one and became divine.
The valley gained the one and became full.
All things gain the one and grow.
We kneel as pilgrims to the temple gods
and we see the world as if through their eyes.
The gods are archetypes and role models. Just as children go through predictable fantasies—the warrior, the princess, the mommy and daddy, the hero, and so on—each generation needs gods to worship. Our values of compassion, ethics, loyalty, courage, and faith are passed on.
The very fact that the gods are divine—meaning that we believe them to be above the foibles of mortals—shows that we want to celebrate our ideals. Objecting to gods because they are impossibly mythologized or that we don’t think they exist is illiterate. The gods represent ideals, and we need ideals.
We are entangled with the cult of personality more intensely than at any other time in history. Gossip magazines, memoirs, reality television shows, social networking, microblogging, real-time video uploads of every significant event—we’re more involved with people than ever. Yet, we quickly spin raw history into stories. We mythologize everyone from singers to boxers, athletes to national leaders. They become the ideals we idolize.
That ideals such as peace and love, honesty and integrity, loyalty and courage, learning and improvement, good government and social justice are hard to achieve does not negate their value. We want people to embody those ideals. We want Taoist gods to embody them, too.
When a physicist tries to explain a complicated concept, mitigating factors are often set aside to facilitate communication: “Now let’s look at this first in two dimensions,” or “For the moment, let us assume that there’s no air friction.” Our ideals and our gods are the same way. We set aside difficulties—although we don’t forget them—until we can reach the right conclusion. Then when we add back the difficulties, we still keep in mind the basic principles we were trying to affirm.
And we see the world as if through their eyes. We want to stand in peace at stone altars.
The Evolution of Gods and Myth
The role of gods continues to evolve to adapt to people’s needs.
Lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender issues will be among the fundamental civil rights issues of the early twenty-first century. Accordingly, the Lady at the Water’s Edge has become a protector of lesbians, and the Rabbit God (Tuershen) has been established in Yonghe City, Taiwan, as the patron god of homosexuals.
China launched its first moon probe in 2007, naming the mission after Chang’e. In 2011, China completed its first successful docking of its space lab module Tiangong-1 (Heavenly Palace) with the unmanned spacecraft Shenzhou-8 (Divine Vessel). The names and the numerology are quite Taoist. Furthermore, many citizens saw it as the romantic reenactment of the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl from the Double Seven Festival, proclaiming the docking to be a long “space kiss.”
Taoist and Buddhist figures appear every year in films from Hong Kong, Taiwan, and China. They also appear in novels, manga, and computer games. Chinese operas, many of which preserve folktales, legends, historical events, or religious themes, are regularly staged.
Many contemporary martial arts and exercise classes have Buddhist and Taoist heritages. Shaolin martial arts comes from the Shaolin Temple at Songshan, Taijiquan is based on a Taoist idea, Baguazhang is based on the I Ching, and qigong is almost completely Taoist in origin.
Finally, Taoism and Buddhism continue to be live religions, with priests still presiding over marriages, births, and funerals, and with individuals worshipping gods according to their professions—police have statues of Guan Yu, and sailors have images of Mother Ancestor.
We want to stand in peace at stone altars.
All is shifting—where do we stand today?
This table has stood in a Suzhou garden for years, impervious to the rain and the sun. It’s made of solid granite, with a top that is nearly a foot thick. It’s a bridge on three trestles, mighty, permanent, unmoving, and undoubtedly having outlived its makers and its owners. What was this table used for? Maybe it was merely used for a child to set down her toy, or for someone to set out tea during a charming garden party. On the other hand, this looks like the kind of table to use for sacrifice, for observations of the moon, for offerings. It is more altar than garden table.
Such was the sensibility of the past. The tombsite chosen by the best geomancer was meant to bring a thousand years of glory. Neither rain, nor snow, nor sun dulled the edges of those granite memorials. If you talked to the old man who moved a mountain, he would not have whispered even a moment of doubt that his family line would continue the work that he set out to achieve.
Now we live in a world where the tabletop is virtual, bodies are burned into nearly weightless ash, and the will of one is sublimated to crowd-sourcing. This table in Suzhou was a place to make vows in reverence. Where do we stand today?
All is shifting—where do we stand today? How can you keep belief and reverence?
Stances in Chinese Martial Arts
Stance is crucial in martial arts. Without a stable stance, all other actions are impossible. The basic stance is called the horse stance, because it’s the posture of someone riding a horse. All other stances are derived from it, and when people admire someone’s “horse,” they mean that they admire the stability with which the person stands.
Confucius on Reverence
This passage is from the Analects:
The noble person holds three things in reverence: Reverence for heaven’s command. Reverence for great people. Reverence for the words of the sages. The inferior person does not know heaven’s commands and doesn’t know to revere them. Such a person does not respect great people and ridicules the words of sages.
How can you keep belief and reverence
without the trap of magical thinking?
Spirituality can degenerate into superstition. We must avoid that. No magical thinking.
Belief is good. For example, we need to believe in ourselves. We say that to encourage our children, cheer our favorite sports team, support a political candidate, or make a commitment to a spiritual path. Yes, we need to believe in ourselves—but mere belief alone does not carry the day.
How do we keep all the good of belief while avoiding the pitfalls of magical thinking? How do we support ritual, prayer, offering, and sacrifice without falling into superstition? How do we avoid compulsive behavior because we long too much for miracles?
Magical thinking is done to get a reward. We act as if we are manipulating some supernatural physics. Perhaps this is one reason why the Chan Buddhists and Taoist masters emphasize practicing with no thought of reward. By removing any expectation of a result, they remove the basis for magical thinking. On a deeper level, they assert that we practice for the sake of realizing emptiness. Now, encountering the void is surely not what most people expect from magical thinking. That is no obvious “reward.” But it leads to the truth that transcends belief.
Without the trap of magical thinking, can you see that self-knowledge is enlightenment?
• Fasting day
Stationed at a Stump to Wait for a Rabbit
This is a famous idiom that originated with the philosopher Han Fei (280–233 BCE). His text, the Han Feizi, is a core book of Legalism (Fa Jia), which focuses on advice to a ruler.
Once there was a farmer in the state of Song who was working in his field when he saw a rabbit dash by. It collided with a stump, broke its neck, and fell down dead. The farmer got a rabbit without having to catch it or buy it.
From that day on, he abandoned his farming and waited by the stump each day for the next rabbit to appear. But none did, and in time his fields were overgrown with weeds.
Self-knowledge is enlightenment
and self-control is great power.
Disaster tempts us into magical thinking. When life seems uncontrollable, when our ambitions fall apart, when our loved ones die, when our country is overrun, then we become desperate to comprehend. If we panic, we may make up reasons rather than search for understanding.
If we’re too overwhelmed, we may even long for rescue. We may call on the bodhisattva and the immortal, the Buddha and the god to save us. When we feel helpless to lift ourselves out of terror, we will turn to any source for salvation.
However, Taoists strive to stay aware no matter how terrible their fates. They strive to save themselves rather than expect others to rescue them. They try to learn from each experience, but they know that they cannot change the past. They walk resolutely into the future.
No external power substitutes for inner spirituality. Nothing is better than walking your own path. You need to do that with eyes wide open, powered by your own heartbeat and breath.
Laozi states: “To know others is wise; to know yourself is enlightenment. To conquer others is strength; to conquer yourself is power.” For Laozi, self-knowledge is enlightenment, and self-control is power.
Trust in your understanding and walk the Way. No matter what the hardships, understand yourself, conquer yourself, and find your power. Then you will not be trapped in the past, and your future will be ever open.
And self-control is great power—if you know that every year has its darkest day.
• Fasting day
The Boxer Rebellion
Between 1898 and 1901, China had a corrupt and weak imperial government faced with foreign imperialism, a debilitating opium trade, unequal treaties, and resentment of Christian missionaries. The Righteous Harmony Society (Yihetuan) arose in response. This movement originated with peasants of Shandong Province who had lost their livelihoods to imperialism, opium addiction, and national disasters. Thousands embraced martial arts, spirit possession, and incantations to Taoist and Buddhist gods. They believed that they could fly and resist bullets, and that millions of spirit soldiers would descend from heaven to help them. They were tragically mistaken, but the conflict became known in the West as the Boxer Rebellion.
Knowing Yourself
Laozi gave one of the wisest pronouncements about self-knowledge in Chapter 33 of the Daodejing:
To know others is wise; to know yourself is enlightenment.
To conquer others is strength; to conquer yourself is power.
To know what’s enough is wealth.
To move resolutely is will.
Those who do not lose what they have will go a long way.
Those who do not die will have longevity.
the twenty-four solar terms
This is the shortest day and the longest night. From this point on, the days will gradually lengthen again, although the weather will still be cold for weeks to come.
This exercise is best practiced during the period of 11:00 P.M.–3:00 A.M.
1. Begin by sitting with your legs stretched out straight before you. Grasp your knees. The thumb squeezes the side of the knee; the index and second fingers push into the indentation on either side of the lower leg, just below the patella.
2. Squeeze your knees and press the points. Exhale as you clench, hold momentarily, then inhale as you relax. Repeat fifteen times.
3. Sit cross-legged and face forward. Click your teeth together thirty-six times. Roll your tongue between your teeth nine times in each direction. Form saliva in your mouth by pushing your cheeks in and out. When your mouth is filled with saliva, divide the liquid into three portions.
4. Inhale; then exhale, imagining your breath traveling to the dantian and then swallow one-third of the saliva, imagining that it travels to the dantian.
5. Repeat two more times until you’ve swallowed all three portions.
6. Sit comfortably as long as you like.
Through this exercise, ancient Taoists sought to prevent or treat cold and dampness in the hands; loss of sensation or excessive heat in the feet; pain in the lower ribs, between the shoulders, in the navel, or in the middle thighs; pain in the torso and limbs; diarrhea; and excessive longing.
The Winter Solstice Festival (Dongzhi) is celebrated when the sunlight is at its weakest and the days are the shortest. Therefore, it is deeply tied to the observation of yin and yang: yin is at its greatest, and yet people know that yin must recede as yang becomes ascendant with each subsequent day. Like all the other festivals, the Winter Solstice is a time to gather as a family, and naturally, food and visits to one’s ancestral temple are involved.
One central custom, especially for southern and overseas Chinese, is the making and eating of tangyuan (soup with spherical dumplings). Tangyuan are balls of glutinous rice flour. Their diameters vary according to the tradition of the maker. Some make the balls up to a few inches in diameter and serve them with smaller sizes, while others make the balls the same size and about an inch in diameter. The balls can be plain or stuffed, and the dish can be sweet or savory. The entire family is expected to gather—tangyuan sounds like tuanyuan, which means family reunion.
Some people make a dish of glutinous rice and red beans in the belief that this will drive away evil spirits. According to one story, Gong Gongshi had an evil son who died on this day, but came back as a malignant spirit who made people ill. Knowing that his son was afraid of red beans, Gong taught everyone how to cook this dish to repel his evil son.
The white spheres symbolize the completeness of cycles, that there is returning, and that all will be smooth.
In the north, dumplings rather than tangyuan are eaten. This practice is tied to the Han dynasty physician, Zhang Zhongjing (150–219). Seeing poor people suffering from chilblains on their ears, he ordered his apprentices to make mutton dumplings to distribute to the poor. The dumplings themselves were shaped like ears, and he named the soup “Expelling-Cold Tender-Ear Soup” (quhan jiao’er tang).
Another northern Chinese custom is to eat a dumpling soup called huntun. During the Han dynasty, the Huns, led by two leaders, Hun and Tun, invaded China. The huntun dumplings became a way to show anger for the enemy. Some people believe there’s a connection between the huntun and the wonton dumpling soup popular today, but this is difficult to establish with certainty.
In the old days, those clans that still maintained family temples had reunions of all members at the ancestral shrines for ceremonies and sacrifice, followed by lavish meals.
The Solstice in the I Ching
Some hexagrams of the I Ching are associated with the seasons. Hexagram 24, Returning (Fu), is specifically linked to the winter solstice and the eleventh moon. Understanding the graphic structure of this hexagram can help make the philosophy and symbolism of the solstice clear.
The bottom of the hexagram is the early stage of a situation; the top is the ending of a situation. Viewed as a diagram of time, the top five lines of the hexagram’s split lines, representing yin, show a situation of nearly complete darkness (one of yin’s attributes). Only one yang line, represented by an unbroken line, has appeared at the bottom, the traditional “entrance” to the hexagram. Therefore, this hexagram is seen as a graph of light returning to nearly complete darkness.
Commentators on the I Ching have explained that all movement is analyzed according to the six stages represented by the six lines of the hexagram. The seventh stage brings return. Corresponding to this, the winter solstice occurs in the seventh moon after the summer solstice, as sunrise occurs in the seventh double-hour after sunset.
Three texts accompany each hexagram of the I Ching. One of the three texts is called the Image, reputedly written by Confucius himself.
Thunder in the center of the earth: returning.
The ancient kings closed the borders during the solstices.
Traveling merchants did not journey.
Sovereigns did not tour the provinces.
This means that the winter solstice was seen as a time of rest and renewal. During winter, life energy is dormant and nature is resting. The movement that will bring a restoration of life is underground. If one looks at the hexagram spatially, the yang line that represents the return of life is still under the earth. The sages extrapolated from this to suggest what we should do whenever there is darkness in our life: we rest and renew ourselves. Whether this means the return of health after illness, the return of understanding after conflict, or the return of good fortune after disaster, the return of good has to be allowed to come in its own time, and it must be strengthened by rest and care.
The Statement, contributed by King Wen, emphasizes the forbearance necessary to accept the cyclical nature of life. Since the I Ching is partially a book of divination, the profundity of how it would have us accept cycles and to work with returning is of vital importance:
Returning. Continue.
In coming and going, there is neither sickness nor distress.
Companions come without fault.
Returning is its Tao.
In seven days, returning comes.
Gain by having a place to go.
The Winter Solstice Festival is the time to reunite with our families, enjoy good food that will aid in renewal, and to contemplate the truth of the seasons. Whenever we are oppressed by darkness, light is sure to return.
Every year has its darkest day;
each dark day is followed by light.
Who among us goes through three hundred days without any misfortune or trouble? All of us experience trials. Trouble can often drive us to madness and leave us staring bewildered through our windows at the dark.
For all of us, then, winter solstice is a reminder that darkness comes to its greatest extreme—for exactly one day. On this day, as on all the others, there is a dynamic and precise proportion between dark and light. It is measurable, it is complete. It is, for one day, immutable. The darkness of the solstice cannot be avoided—but human beings can outlast it and live to see the next day.
The people of the past have left us many hints about what to do: families come back together, nourish themselves, give thanks to their ancestors, and, in looking at the round balls of glutinous rice in their round bowls sitting at round tables, reaffirm that all of life is a smooth cycle. Taoists observe the day precisely, aligning themselves with the greater cosmic cycles of sunrise and sunset and the turning of the earth. They also celebrate the Three Pure Ones, worshipping and turning to faith at a time when the sky is dark and the cycles of life so profoundly change. The lunar calendar is calibrated by the winter solstice, so this day is the reference point for the year to come.
At any time of your life, you may find yourself in a winter, and you may feel that you are in the darkest of times. Think back to this day then and do what has been done for thousands of years: unite with your family, nourish yourself and others, fix your mind on the truth of cycles, and take refuge in reverence for the holy.
Each dark day is followed by light—remember that if you want a happy future.
• The Winter Solstice Festival
• Festival day for the Three Pure Ones
Visiting the Temple of Auspicious Omen Alone on Winter Solstice
Su Shi goes to the temple with no other visitors present. The weather is cold and rainy, and it isn’t the season for the lovely flowers that attract people at other times of the year. Perhaps musing to himself, he asks who else would go to the temple on such a frigid and rainy day.
Wan sunlight cannot warm the well’s bottom,
and cold, sighing rain soaks the withered roots.
Is there anyone more like Mr. Su?
This is not the season for flowers and still I come alone.
If you want a happy future,
just use your skill to serve others.
It’s clear from the transliterated names that the luohans had their origin in the Indian arhats. However, like the rest of Buddhism, the arhats became sinicized.
Angida or Yinjietuo, the Calico-Bag Luohan, became one of the most popular of the group. Whether he simply appealed to people or, as we will see in a moment, he got combined with Maitreya Buddha, people love him because of his message: the future will be good and filled with plenty. While obesity may be a problem today, it was virtually unknown in ancient times. Drought, flooding, famine, and daily effort without machines guaranteed that most people were thin. Even today, the polite way to compliment someone who might confess to being overweight is to say, “You’ve had more good luck.”
According to one legend, Angida was a snake catcher who wanted to prevent snakes from biting people. Once he caught a snake, he carried it in his bag, removing its venomous fangs before releasing it in the mountains. This led to his enlightenment. He’s been combined with Budai Luohan, or Maitreya, the Buddha of the Future. In any event, he represents the wishes of the people for plenty and happiness.
Angida, and the other luohans, certainly represent an eclectic and odd grouping. But the message is that there is room for everyone and a need for each person’s talents. Angida had the impulse to use his snake-catching ability for good. In the same way, we can each contribute to the holy cause by being who we are, and by finding a way to use that for compassionate service. If we find our place in life that way, there is no reason for doubt.
Just use your skill to serve others as we wish each other long life and good health.
• Day of the Eighteen Luohans
The Eighteen Luohans
Here is one version of the membership of the Eighteen Luohans. A zunzhe is a senior monk.
1. Pindola the Bharadvaja (Binduluo Baluoduoshe Zunzhe) The Deer-Sitting Luohan
2. Kanaka the Vatsa (Jianuojia Facuo Zunzhe) The Happy Luohan
3. Kanaka the Bharadvaja (Jianuojia Baliduoshe Zunzhe) The Raised-Bowl Luohan
4. Nandimitra (Supintuo Zunzhe) The Raised-Pagoda Luohan
5. Nakula (Nuojuluo Zunzhe) The Meditating Luohan
6. Bodhidruma (Batuoluo Zunzhe) The Overseas Luohan
7. Kalika (Jialijia Zunzhe) The Elephant-Riding Luohan
8. Vijraputra (Fasheluofuduo Zunzhe) The Laughing-Lion Luohan
9. Gobaka (Xubojia Zunzhe)
The Open-Heart Luohan
10. Pantha the Elder (Bantuojia Zunzhe) The Raised-Hand Luohan
11. Rahula (Luohuluo Zunzhe)
The Thinking Luohan
12. Nagasena (Najiaxina Zunzhe)
The Ear-Scratching Luohan
13. Angida (Yinjietuo Zunzhe)
The Calico-Bag Luohan
14. Vanavasa (Fanaposi Zunzhe) The Plantain Luohan
15. Asita (Ashiduo Zunzhe)
The Long-Eyebrow Luohan
16. Pantha the Younger (Zhucha Bantuojia Zunzhe) The Doorman Luohan
17. Nantimitolo (Qingyou Zunzhe)
The Dragon-Taming Luohan
18. Pindola (Bintoulu Zunzhe)
The Tiger-Taming Luohan
We wish each other long life and good health.
While alone, our tears run from our torment.
When we gather with our friends, we wish them long life and good health. They wish us the same. The value of good health is unquestioned, and long life is one of the major goals of Taoism.
At the same time, we all endure the torment of life. We have our anxieties, our pains, our poverty, our frustrations. When Buddha said all of life was suffering, he was stating a truth as much emotional as philosophical. Why, then, if life is so awful, do we urge each other to have more of it?
Today, we are no different than the ambitious Confucianists of imperial China. We exhort our children to study harder, to find careers of great power and wealth, to find cures for cancer or become world leaders. We worship fame and accomplishments, lavishing more attention on the logo of a champion’s water bottle than we give to someone thirsty on the street. We climb over one another for money, elbow others aside for gleaming cars, and trample anyone for the sake of getting ahead. Then, when it all collapses in the cross fire of greed and corruption, of impossibility and selfishness, of exploitation and sheer incompetence, we fall apart with it. We cover it up with makeup. We cover it up with grins and touched-up photographs. We cover it up with excuses. We cover it up by blaming others. And then we wish each other long life and good health so we can do it all again.
Li Zongyuan knew the antidote to the poison of ambition when he composed “River Snow.” In winter, when all the color of growth and ambition has been bleached away and only the most vital needs are being met, it’s a good time to contemplate. The old man on the boat knows why he’s fishing, knows why he’s old, and knows what sustains him as he fishes alone in the cold river snow.
While alone, our tears run from our torment: we see that light has no form, form has no light.
• Fasting day
River Snow
Liu Zongyuan (773–819) was a Tang dynasty poet and writer, and one of the Eight Great Prose Masters of the Tang and Song. While he was initially successful as an official, he was exiled first to Hunan Province and then to Guangxi Province, where he eventually became a city governor. He wrote poems, fables, essays, and travelogues, and his writings combine elements of Taoism, Confucianism, and Buddhism.
A thousand mountains, with no birds in flight,
ten thousand paths, with no one’s tracks.
Old man in bamboo raincoat and hat, alone on a boat,
the only one fishing in the cold river snow.
© andelieya
Light has no form. Form has no light.
Truth comes from light and not from form.
All that we see around us, we see only because light has been reflected off forms. Only then do we perceive shape.
However, we can’t fully perceive light itself separate from its striking some object. The sun may be blinding, but we can’t see its beam as having shape unless it passes through smoky air.
Light has been taken as a constant. We measure both time and distance in light-years. Physics has found light to be one of the most significant areas of study. We can still see light from billions of years ago, leaving us the possibility that we can see almost to our beginnings. Light reveals something of the immense and the near infinite.
The light from the sun is imperative to our survival. To be imprisoned away from light for any significant amount of time leads to swift deterioration. We may have bodies composed of a little earth and a vast amount of water, but we need the light of the sun to live and be whole.
Spirit is universally described as radiant. The sages assert that there is a light inside us—the light of the soul. Just as cosmologists tell us that the beginning was a sudden burst of light, so too do many spiritual teachers agree that the beginning was light. Therefore, the central goal is to reopen ourselves to the light within.
When you find the light within, then you find the soul.
When you find the soul, then you find that it is light.
When you find the light, then you find that the soul is not divided from all other souls, just as light forever remains light.
When you see yourself as light, then you are enlightened.
When you are enlightened, then you see that all is light, you are light, and that all is you and you are all.
Truth comes from light and not from form: belief is nothing but focus.
• Worship of the Sun God
The Sun God
The Sun God, along with the Moon Goddess, brings hot and cold weather. He is impartial, shining on good and evil alike; he brings increase to the earth, and he protects people from misfortune. Since the sun itself can suffer misfortune—in the form of clouds, storms, and eclipses (referred to as being eaten by the Heavenly Dog)—the ancients burned incense and lit firecrackers to frighten off malignant influences.
Belief is nothing but focus,
just as the glass narrows the sun.
If we focus the sun’s rays with a magnifying glass, they have the power to burn. All we did was take the sunlight and direct it to a pinpoint. Belief in ourselves is like that. This is the belief that says we are strongly determined to reach a goal or overcome a problem. This is the belief that is the result of our focused attention.
Belief in gods is the same thing. By focusing on a god, the story, the devotion, and what we’re trying to do, we sharpen our energy. Worship is a magnifying glass.
Meditation is the same. By focusing on meditation—the sitting, the breathing, the concentration, and the opening to our own inner powers—it sharpens our minds. Meditation is a magnifying glass.
One of the strongest goals we can have is to understand ourselves. This process requires great courage and perseverance. And like all great ventures, it takes belief. Again, we are at the metaphor of the magnifying glass, but here, we can do one more thing with it. We can look through it to understand ourselves.
In the focus that is belief, then, the two aspects of the magnifying glass are merged. The glass becomes both the means to concentrate our minds and the means to examine our minds. When those two functions unite, then true enlightenment is possible.
Just as the glass narrows the sun, why resent the sages’ wisdom?
On Concentration
The Classic of History describes the sovereign using his own person to concentrate power on behalf of his people:
The sovereign builds himself to the highest degree. He concentrates the five kinds of happiness, and spreads them to all the people.
Zhuangzi also gives a description of concentration that depends on gathering powers together in a person. Only in this case, the subject is a hunchback—a far different kind of person than the magnificent sovereign mentioned in the Classic of History.
As Confucius was on his way to Chu, he passed through a forest and saw a hunchback catching cicadas with a sticky rod. “What is this?” he asked. “Do you have a method?” (For the word “method,” he uses the word Tao.)
“I do,” replied the hunchback. (He literally says, “I have Tao.”) “For five or six months, I tried balancing two pellets on my rod without them falling. When I could do the same with three pellets I missed catching only one cicada out of ten. Once I could balance five pellets without dropping them, I caught cicadas as if I were grabbing them with my hand. My body is like a broken stump, my arm is like a withered branch. Heaven and earth are great. The ten thousand things are many. I only notice cicada wings. I don’t turn, I don’t lean. Nothing distracts me from the wings; how could I not succeed?”
Confucius turned to his students: “Use an undivided will and you concentrate the spirit. That is what this venerable hunchback is telling you.”
Why resent the sages’ wisdom
when you still read advice columns?
One piece of advice often given to writers is this: “Don’t be didactic.”
The very definition of “didactic” is tinged with suspicion. The word means: “intended to teach; having moral instruction as an ulterior motive.” The very definition implies that someone is trying to trick us, to slip morality into our subconscious under the guise of entertainment.
We also use “didacticism” to mean treating someone in a patronizing way. We speak of the tedium of slow, plodding, didactic lecturing. There’s no doubt that we resent teaching, we resent morality, we resent being lectured. Certainly, those charged with teaching morals don’t do the subject any favors. They couch their lessons in warnings, stories of foolish and doomed people, or dry proverbs tethered to some dusty story from the remote past. Worse, many of these pedagogues prove themselves unable to even hold up their own standards out of weakness or hypocrisy.
Most people would say we should be ethical and moral. We just don’t want to talk about it. It’s left practically to accident, in the same way we leave a couple to figure out how to have sex, or throw people helplessly into a crowd to get to know others, or leave it to parents to find their own way in raising children. In so many vital aspects of our lives, we are left untaught.
In the meantime, people avidly read advice columnists. They want to know how to use their technology. They want to try new recipes. There’s no shortage of people eager to learn and no shortage of information to help them. Why is it bad to be didactic? How can we learn about ethics, morality, religion, and spirituality if we don’t listen to teachers?
When you still read advice columns, do you see that body, instinct, and mind are officials?
An Essay by Han Yu
Han Yu was exiled in 803 for opposing a reform movement, and was only recalled when the group declined.
In 815, Han was demoted from the head of the Supreme Academy to the lowest academic position when he allegedly offended the emperor. In response, he wrote the essay “Explanation upon Entering the Academy” (“Jinxuejie”), describing a scene in which his students challenge him. He was clearly alluding to the Confucian duty to criticize one’s superior—be it teacher or ruler—a principle the emperor did not bear graciously.
Teacher, you never stop reciting the Six Arts. Your hands never leave the books of the Hundred Schools. . . . you refute heresies, you rebut the Buddhists and Taoists. . . . yet in public affairs you are not trusted by others, and in private you are not helped by friends. . . . fate colludes with your enemies, and you have met defeat several times. . . . you don’t know to worry about this and instead teach others how to act.
Instead of punishing the student, Han Yu says, “Oh my! Come forward!”
In the past, Mencius was good at debate and clarified Confucianism, but he trekked through all under heaven and died of old age on the road. Xun Qing held to what was right, giving great discourses on profound truths, yet ended up fleeing slander at Chu and died rejected at Lan Ling. . . . yet every month I get a salary and each year eat government grain. . . . I act and get slandered, but fame also follows.
When this essay was read, Han was promoted to a higher office.
In 819, Han Yu wrote a memorial in protest of the emperor’s fascination with a relic, supposedly a finger bone of Buddha. The memorial also opposed the government’s overinvolvement with Buddhism in general. This again aroused the emperor’s anger. Han was nearly executed but was sent into exile instead.
Body, instinct, and mind are officials.
Our one soul within us is the ruler.
Many of the classics are couched as advice to a ruler. From the I Ching to the Daodejing, the authors are addressing the emperor and urging enlightened rule over the people. These books were radical for their day and remain so today: they assume that the emperor is not perfect and needs teaching, and they ultimately urge selfless and kind governance over a nation.
In fact, a ruler has always needed advice. The Yellow Emperor was guided by advisors. Every dynasty has had officials who dared to remonstrate with the emperor, sometimes dying for it, like Bigan, or merely being exiled, like Su Shi. This assumption that the ruler always needs advice, balance, and teaching is incorporated into the Three Pure Ones: the Jade Emperor rules, but Laozi, as the Great Supreme Old Lord, and the Heavenly Lord of the Primal Origin advise and support him.
We play the part of the ruler in our own lives, and all the classic advice can be taken for our own use. Who are our officials and our subjects? They are all the different aspects of ourselves: our priorities, our ambitions, our thoughts, our minds, our subconscious, our health, and so on. All these have to be kept in harmony and ruled in an enlightened way if the nation of our personality is to prosper continually.
Every nation needs a leader, and every leader makes a difference in the progress of a country. Good governance is essential. In the same way, we as individuals must rule ourselves and our worlds with kindness and understanding—and never allow any one aspect of ourselves to overrun the others.
Our one soul within us is the ruler: whether dreams or thoughts, our minds make their shapes.
Advice to the Ruler
“When the ruler excels in propriety, the people respond easily,” said Confucius, according to the Analects.
“When a ruler practices benevolent government, nothing can hold out against it,” said Mencius.
“The ruler’s duty lies in making his people abundantly wealthy, making Tao clear, and upholding righteousness,” stated the Model Words of Master Yang.
The Statement of Hexagram 15 in the I Ching reads:
Mountains in the middle of the earth: humility. The wise person takes from the ample to add to the meager, weighing and balancing fairly.
In Chapter 66 of the Daodejing, Laozi begins by observing that the rivers and oceans act as kings of a hundred valleys because “they are adept at being below them.”
That’s why the sage who wants to rule the people
must speak as if he were below them.
If he wants to lead the people, he must stand behind them.
That is why, when the sage rules, the people do not find it heavy.
The ruler leads, but the people are not harmed.
All under heaven gladly support him and do not despise him.
He does not contend, so nothing under heaven can contend against him.
Whether dreams or thoughts, our minds make their shapes
using nothing more than pictures and words.
We communicate through words and pictures, and we go about this in complex and sophisticated ways. The very Chinese language, for example, has many words that are word and picture, combining sound, meaning, and depiction in a single ideogram. Poets use clusters of words to form images, similes, and metaphors. And on an entirely different level, we can hardly digest the daily news without photographs, diagrams, charts, tables, and animations to show what is happening.
What faith it takes to put words down. Specifically, what faith it took to have the words carved in stone, as in this photograph taken over one hundred years ago in the Temple of Confucius. Surely the carvers wanted the stones to survive long after they died.
Such words are completely dependent on the reader, not the writer. First, someone has to find them. Second, someone must be able to read and interpret them. Third, someone has to find them useful. Finally, we hope that someone will preserve them for others. The wisdom of the past has been set down for us to find and to use, and we should do so.
Ultimately, this reflects how we think: our minds work in words and pictures. What will we inscribe today?
Using nothing more than pictures and words, we take all colors beamed together to make white.
• Fasting day
The Ten Stone Drums
In the days before paper, carving in stone was the means of preserving words. A famous set of ten stones inscribed with poems shows characters in the Great Seal Script. These stone drums were discovered in a field during the Tang dynasty (618–907), and poets such as Du Fu, Han Yu, and Su Shi praised the inscriptions as models of both poetry and calligraphy. Archaeologists have dated this set of stones to at least the fifth century BCE.
Song of the Stone Drums
Han Yu wrote a long poem about the stone drums that is preserved in Three Hundred Tang Poems. Someone had given him tracings of the inscriptions. Han wrote an emotional paean to the drums. He describes the inscriptions as being like:
fast swords chopping live crocodiles,
luan birds and phoenixes soaring as a host of immortals descend,
coral and jade trees in interlocking branches,
golden cords and iron chains locked together tight,
ancient ding, leaping water, soaring dragons.
Han Yu goes on to urge that the drums be rescued from the field to preserve them, but he laments that he cannot get the academy president to fund moving them, leaving them for “herd boys to strike . . . for fire, and for cows to polish their horns on them.”
Luan birds are mythological companions to the phoenix. The ding are three-legged bronze vessels from the Zhou dynasty (1046–256 BCE) that were considered emblems of the legitimacy of rule.
The stones are worn and damaged, but still preserved today in Beijing. They are the oldest known stone inscriptions in China.
All colors beamed together to make white:
you make the brightness a unified self.
When all the colors of the rainbow are added together, the result is white light. By extension, true brilliance of character is only possible when we have combined all our different sides. Just as no color of the spectrum can be eliminated without tinting the combined rays, we can never be successful denying or suppressing any part of ourselves. Rather, we bring our different aspects into balance. The key to this is to adjust the amounts and proportions of our different “colors” until the result is—colorless.
There are different systems of color symbolism. In one, white represents purity, plainness, and simplicity. The Yellow Emperor learned about health from Su’nu. The word “su” means “raw silk,” “white,” “plain,” “unadorned,” and more. The implication that white is pure, natural, and essential is unmistakable. Metaphorically, the Yellow Emperor learned of balance from the White Woman—color balanced becomes colorless.
If we unify all our aspects, keeping them in harmony with one another, then the result is pure radiance. This reminds us of the sun, of the light that spiritual people mention in their experiences, of the light that one is supposed to perceive when one reaches higher spiritual centers, of the light that one is supposed to merge with upon death. This light is the light of the spirit, and in it there are no distinctions and therefore no conflicts.
In winter, the snow gradually covers the world in its whiteness. The trees lose their leaves, the fence posts become black lines, and the flowers and shrubs are crushed under white. The world becomes drained of color. Most of the time, we consider winter death. By the metaphor of white light, the world approaches wholeness in winter.
Live your life by the pure light.
Open the pure light within you.
When the pure light appears, go into it without hesitation.
You make the brightness a unified self, if you collect, cover, and store.
• Fasting day
Newton and the Prism
Prior to Isaac Newton (1642–1727), scientists believed that white was the natural color of light and that colored light occurred by an additive process. Newton passed white light through one prism and then through another. No colors were added. Instead, the light was refracted back into a single color, demonstrating that white light is the combination or presence of all colors.
Newton’s work was eagerly adopted in China. When he published Theory of the Moon’s Motion in 1702, showing how to find the moon’s longitude to determine universal time and find longitude at sea, imperial China quickly seized upon the work. It allowed the more accurate prediction of lunar eclipses. This was a cultural imperative, since unpredicted eclipses were regarded as signs that heaven was displeased with the emperor.
White, Plain, and Su’nu
Some explain that the word “white,” bai, is a picture of a burning candle, while others say it’s the rising sun. In either case, the idea of white light is inherent in the pictogram.
The word su (shown at right) depicts the shining threads of silk and also means “white.”
Su’nu, whose name means Plain or White Woman, was the legendary teacher of the Yellow Emperor. She instructed him on the importance of yin and yang in sexual union, and her book, the Classic of Su Nu (Su’nujing), is a frank and fundamental book on sexuality in the context of health, longevity, and spirituality. While the book is framed as a dialogue with the Yellow Emperor, current scholarship places the book no earlier than the third century.
If you collect, cover, and store,
you can weather any winter.
If it’s the essence of Tao to live in harmony with the seasons, then what does winter mean for us? Traditionally, winter is the symbol of storage. All of nature stores its energy and goes dormant in the cold months. The trees drop their leaves, insects and other small animals burrow into the ground, bears hibernate. That makes sense, for the bursting of spring will show the energy and potential that was stored during the winter.
In the same way, we are urged to follow the wisdom of storing. Where people depend on firewood for fuel, it is prudent to chop and stack enough wood to last through the winter months. We need to keep our houses in good repair, prepare warm clothes, and bank food in the cellar to provide for the entire family.
We store at the grander levels of our lives, too. Saving money is one aspect of such storing. A good education in our youth is another. But spiritual storing is also important: we practice when times are calm so that we have the stamina and resources to bear the calamity that will inevitably come.
The full blizzard of disaster can come at any time, so we have to be wise enough to accumulate when times are good. Hopefully, most of your life is peace. If so, then commit yourself to spirituality. Only then can you endure all that you must.
You can weather any winter. Just remember: what is the beat of the world that you feel?
Storing in Winter
The Classic of Rites emphasizes the essential activity of storing for the winter.
The breath [qi, the vital energy] of heaven flies upward, and the earth’s energy sinks downward. Heaven and earth do not commune. All is shut and sealed by the eleventh month. The hundred officials are ordered to cover things and store them. The minister of instruction is ordered to check that the people have made their stores, and that nothing is left ungathered.
What is the beat of the world that you feel?
Why shouldn’t your heartbeat be the one heard?
You get tired each day. You discharge all your energy, and then you need to sleep. Unless you do that, you cannot recover from the day, your mind cannot process your experiences, and you cannot rest.
But during that rest, you are not only repairing damaged and exhausted parts of yourself, you are also learning. Whatever happened to you that day cannot be mastered until you spend one or more nights resting. The alternation of the active days and restful nights is one example of the rhythms of our lives.
Each day, then, is meant to be challenging enough so that you must adapt and change. You change daily. You aren’t a static person going through the years. You’re always changing, always preparing yourself for the challenges that will come.
All this forms a beat, a rhythm. It’s a regular response to each day’s stresses and rewards, each day’s questions and insights. That beat is constant and steady: it is your own personal structure.
You’re the drummer. This is not a passive process. It’s one of participation. Hear your beat. Hear your timing. Drum along with it. What greater joy is there than to be on the beat?
Why shouldn’t your heartbeat be the one heard if you are sitting under a boulder?
Drums
This passage is from the Classic of Rites. The word “wen,” or “culture,” has multiple meanings. It also means “language,” “writing,” “formal,” “literary,” “gentle,” “civilian” (as opposed to military), and is an old measure word for “coins.”
The sage is concerned with culture [wen], displaying it in carts and robes; brightening it in splendid colors; praising it in song and music; and illuminating it in poetry and writing.
However, if the ritual vessels are not set out, the jade and silk not properly distributed, the zither and harp not struck, or the bells and drums not beaten, then I do not see a sage.
© Saskia Dab
If you are sitting under a boulder,
it would be fitting to move to one side.
You can do many things with a boulder. You can use it to build a wall, to put in your garden, to carve a memorial, to shore up a roadway, or to make a seawall. But there’s one certainty for a boulder on a hillside: loosen it and it will roll downhill.
It seems obvious that the riskiest place to sit is beneath such a boulder. There’s no question that it will roll. The only real question is when. Do you want to be there when that happens? If so, you will want that rolling to be useful to you, and you will not want to be in the way.
The thief found dead beneath a safe at the foot of the stairs might be laughed at for being dumb, but how many times do we play with forces equally ponderous, thinking that we’ll “get away with it”? Luck won’t hold a boulder back.
It’s not very hard being a Taoist. Certainly not as long as you know where to sit, know what to loosen, and know the right timing.
It would be fitting to move to one side. Avoid two blades, two levers joined.
Utilizing the Energy of Stones
The Art of War (Sunzi Bingfa) is a superb book of military strategy that has been used by military leaders the world over, including Mao Zedong, Douglas MacArthur, Napoleon, and American Gulf War generals Norman Schwarzkopf and Colin Powell. The text has been taught at West Point and other military academies. It has also been popular as a guide to management and business.
When the right energy is used, warriors move like rolling logs and boulders. The nature of logs and boulders is to be still when level and to move heavily when precarious; to stop when square, and to move when round. Thus good warriors know how to use natural energy, traveling like a round boulder down a thousand-foot mountain. That is energy.
Two blades. Two levers joined
by a hollow pivot.
Scissors are so simple and admirable. Two blades that are equals are joined together by the emptiness of a pivot. We concentrate so much on what the cutting edges are doing that we don’t always notice that they are levers too, increasing our hand strength for cutting. Depending on how one uses the scissors, sometimes both blades cut, and sometimes one is anvil for the other. The scissors do their job with nothing extra needed.
Isn’t this a wonderful metaphor for everything else we need to do in life?
Can we uphold the same principle as the scissors—working with another as two equals joining to do a simple job, each one faithful to the agreed-upon direction?
Can we have the sharp eyesight to see the line we must follow, and then cut straight down that line?
Can we be the scissors that both destroy and create? If we don’t cut, say, an armhole in the jacket we’re making, how will the garment function? If we don’t cut the cloth according to the pattern, how will we shape our garment? And if we don’t cut the threads, trimming them neatly after we’ve sewn, how will we have clothes that are both beautiful and functional?
Where would we be without scissors? Every piece of clothing we wear needed scissors to make it. We use scissors for crafts, for gardening, for cooking, and for dozens of other applications. At the very least, we need scissors to trim our nails and cut our hair.
A pair of scissors becomes a beautiful companion, fitting the hand, existing in the length of blade perfect for its task.
Is it difficult to see the truth of life? Perhaps the answer is close at hand.
By a hollow pivot, turn to ask: are you dancer of the dance?
• Fasting day
Zhang Xiaoquan Scissors
Zhang Xiaoquan of Hangzhou set out to make scissors in 1663 with the motto, “Good steel, excellent workmanship.” He became noted for a wide range of scissors: some were utilitarian, while others were carved with motifs such as the West Lake landscape, birds, and animals. Their making involved as many as seventy-two distinct processes, including repeated forging of different kinds of iron and steel and hand sharpening.
Emperor Qianlong (1711–1799) adopted the scissors for the imperial court. According to one story, he secretly came to Zhang in person in 1781, buying scissors for all the concubines in the palace. Zhang Xiaoquan scissors won prizes outside of China at the Southern Coast Industrial Exposition in 1910, the 1915 Panama Pacific International Exposition, and the 1926 Sesqui-Centennial International Exposition in Philadelphia.
Are you dancer of the dance?
Or is the dance dancing you?
Dancing is thrilling. There’s nothing quite like spirit, breath, mind, heart, and body all working together. When the dance is expertly performed, it transcends what the dancer does even in practice. It’s quite common for a dancer to describe a performance as the “best one yet” and “far beyond what I dreamed I could do.” Those privileged to watch good dance will use words such as “extraordinary,” “ethereal,” and “superhuman.”
Another common description is of the dancer becoming totally lost in the dance. The dancer’s everyday mind is somehow suspended, and he or she is so absorbed in the dance that there is no separation between dancer and dance.
The Great Yu had a dance that took him to the stars and the gods. That may be beyond most of us, but if we dance well, then we are just as uplifted, just as transcendent, as if we were with deities. We can be the dancer who is the dance—on a spiral that first turns inward and ends in the stars.
Or is the dance dancing you to show: what is the best way to learn Tao?
• Fasting day
Method of Walking the Earth’s Pattern and Flying Through the Heavenly Net
The diagram below shows the Steps of Yu, a way to shamanistically integrate oneself with the cosmos. The spiral shows the path to the North Star and the Big Dipper. The steps on the right lift a dancer to heaven, and the diagram at the bottom shows steps in the pattern of the Big Dipper.
The Great Yu (2200–2100 BCE) was one of the legendary rulers of China and famous for his work to control flooding. According to mythological beliefs about him, Yu was able to change into a bear and could travel to the stars and learn from the gods. The Steps of Yu are the dance of power that made such journeys possible. Preserved in Taoist texts, the method is still practiced by Taoist priests, mediums, and sorcerers.
Some people believe that the idea of a pattern of steps that leads to transcendence is part of the foundation of Chinese martial arts and dance.
The dance starts with a spiral inward and in the center takes the zigzag pattern of the Big Dipper.
What is the best way to learn Tao?
Go beyond schools. Follow nature.
Within Taoism, we have different schools of thought. Within each school of thought, we have various subjects and teachers. When we’re still learning about Tao, it makes sense to find a good school and a good teacher. There isn’t one school or a single teacher right for everyone. It’s the combination of school and student that matters. As long as you find the school of thought that fits who you are, then it’s right.
Every school has its advantages and its limitations. Every teacher has abilities and shortcomings. In time, when you have absorbed the best of what can be taught and have also confronted the limitations, then what do you do?
Laozi is an excellent guide here. First he establishes the very root of what we are looking for: the beginning of all that we know. If we can find the beginning, then our understanding is grounded in the most fundamental way possible. This beginning is mysterious, enormous, beyond definition. As a label, we call it Tao. Just as we are at the end of the eleventh moon and heading toward the end of the year and therefore the beginning of a new one, so too must we go back to the beginning whenever we want to validate our philosophy. The year flows, the year returns. The great flows, and the great returns.
Laozi places humanity on a par with heaven and earth. We are a part of everything. Therefore, if we want to know more about this life, we need only look around us. The astronomer gazes at stars. The physicist explores natural forces. The poet writes about what is around him or her. When we want to continue learning beyond schools, we must look to nature. Tao is ultimately to be found by travel and observation.
Is there a knowing that is beyond learning from nature? Yes, there is. According to the masters, our goal should be to become one with Tao itself. Tao patterns its law on itself. At the highest level, you become Tao that is self-defined.
Go beyond schools. Follow nature. But ask: why do all ships carry lifeboats?
• Fasting day
The Four Greats in the World
In Chapter 25 of the Daodejing, Laozi takes us from the beginnings of the universe to a simple basis for our laws and principles:
There was something chaotic yet complete
here before heaven and earth were born.
How silent and still it was, how singular and unaltered,
turning without stop.
Perhaps it was the mother of all under heaven.
I do not know its name,
but if it must be given a word, call it Tao.
If a name must be made for it, call it great.
The great flows.
What flows goes far.
What goes far returns.
Therefore, Tao is great.
Heaven is great.
Earth is great.
Humanity is great.
In this world, these four are great,
and humanity is one of them.
People pattern their law after the earth.
Earth patterns its law after heaven.
Heaven patterns its law after Tao.
Tao patterns its law on itself.