Historical Development of Chi-Gung in China
Chi-gung first took root during prehistoric times in ancient China, when a ceremonial tribal dance known as the ‘Great Dance’ (da-wu) was discovered to have therapeutic benefits for those who frequently performed it. This discovery probably occurred about 10,000 years ago and marks the birth of chi-gung, the earliest branch of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) to develop. At that time, chi-gung and all forms of medicine were the exclusive domain of tribal shamans, whose role it was to commune with the powers of Heaven (tien) and Earth (di) for the benefit of Humanity (ren). By the third century BC, chi-gung had already acquired its role as the core practice in the three major fields with which it is still identified today: medicine, martial arts and meditation.
In Taoist lore, the original progenitor of the health and longevity practices with which chi-gung has been linked so long was the Yellow Emperor (Huang Ti), who ruled over a confederation of tribal clans in northern China around 2700 BC. The Yellow Emperor is said to have practised meditation and breathing exercises and cultivated the internal alchemy of Taoist sexual yoga, engaging in frequent sexual intercourse without ejaculation with his harem of 1200 women, thereby reaching the age of 111 years and achieving spiritual immortality. Huang Ti’s discourses on health and longevity with his chief medical advisor, Chi Po, are recorded in the great medical text entitled The Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine (Huang Ti Nei Ching), which first appeared in written form sometime around the third century BC.
The first written references to chi-gung in China are found in texts dating back about 4000 years, when another dance specifically developed to ward off disease, regulate breathing and balance energy was practised as preventative health therapy in the flood-prone basin of the Yellow River in northern China, where Chinese civilization first took shape. The heavy dampness in this region caused rheumatism, sluggish circulation and energy stagnation in the inhabitants living there. The chi-gung dance, which combined breath control with rhythmic bodily movements, patterned on those of animals in nature, was performed to drive dampness from the joints, muscles and other tissues of the body, to stimulate circulation of blood and energy, and to replenish the entire system with fresh infusions of chi.
Since those ancient times, many different branches of practice have sprouted and grown from the main trunk of chi-gung, each with its own particular style and purpose, all bestowing the same basic benefits of health and longevity, physiological balance and emotional equilibrium, mental clarity and spiritual harmony. Today the art and science of chi-gung continue to develop faster than ever before as new theoretical insights and practical applications are discovered by contemporary practitioners. As the scholar Fu Yi wrote nearly 2000 years ago, ‘Chi-gung is an art that pleases the spirit, slows the ageing process and prolongs life.’
In this age of spiritual discontent, chronic degenerative disease and life-threatening ways of living, chi-gung’s potential for both curative healing and preventative healthcare, as well as for personal self-cultivation and spiritual inspiration, is greater than it ever was before. So let’s take a look at how this remarkable art and science of life developed and progressed through the major dynastic eras of Chinese history, gradually evolving to become one of Chinese civilization’s greatest gifts to the world.
Yin and Chou Periods (18th–4th centuries BC)
One of the main figures referred to in texts of this early era is the legendary ‘Methusela’ of ancient China, Peng Tzu, who is said to have lived for 800 years due to the benefits of chi-gung practice. Credited as the progenitor of the dao-yin method of moving chi through the body with long slow extensions of the limbs combined with deep abdominal breathing, Peng Tzu is said to have risen every morning at 3 a.m. to sit in silent meditation until dawn. His favourite practices included massaging the eyes and other parts of the body with the palms of the hands, churning the tongue around in the mouth to stimulate secretion of the beneficial saliva known as ‘sweet dew’ (gan-lu) from the ducts below the tongue and swallowing it, and very slow, deliberate dao-yin exercises. Peng Tzu is therefore regarded as the founding father of chi-gung as a path to longevity.
During this period, China was a completely agrarian society and therefore paid very close attention to the recurring rhythms of nature and to cyclic cosmic phenomena. Shamans, who were the earliest ‘medicine men’, were responsible for the health of tribal people, and one way they performed this duty was by trying to harmonize human affairs with the enduring patterns of nature (Earth) and the cosmos (Heaven).
An important prince of the early Chou dynasty named Wang Chih-chiao is said to have practised the breathing method known as tu-na (‘expel and draw in’) while sitting in still meditation, as a means of restoring primordial vitality. This early historical reference to chi-gung practice in the royal household shows that ever since ancient times, chi-gung was practised as an integral element in the daily life of royalty and aristocracy in China, and this remained the case until the 20th century.
The early Chou period also produced the ancient book of divination called the I-Ching (Book of Change), one of the most important and influential texts in classical Chinese civilization. The I-Ching is based on a system of divination known as the eight trigrams (ba-gua), from which 64 hexagrams are conjured to predict the probability of future events and to invoke the universal principles of Heaven and Earth as solutions for the problems of Humanity. This is done by ‘reading’ the prevailing patterns and cyclic transformations of nature and the cosmos, as reflected in the arrangement of lines in the particular hexagrams which appear in response to specific questions. The concept of applying the universal principles of nature and the cosmos to the temporal affairs of human life became a fundamental tenet of early Taoist philosophy and a basic precept of chi-gung practice. Four important principles were drawn from the I-Ching during this formative period and adapted as a theoretical basis for chi-gung:
1. Human health and disease, happiness and malaise, all follow the cyclic transformations of Heaven and Earth.
2. When human thoughts, emotions and activities all reach a stable state of integral balance and functional harmony, this produces the most auspicious conditions for human life.
3. Whenever a person falls ill or encounters misfortune, the best way to correct the situation is to still the mind, pacify the emotions, harmonize the bodily functions, and cultivate a state of balance and equanimity. This approach results in the complete recovery of health, the full restoration of vitality and the timely resurgence of good fortune by bringing the human system into a state of synergistic balance with the forces of Heaven and Earth, without resort to medicine or any other external means.
4. Movement and stillness are relative poles in a single unified state of existence, not separate phenomena, just as Yin and Yang are complementary poles of the same basic universal energy.
These principles constituted the fundamental philosophical roots of chi-gung in all subsequent eras.
Warring States, Chin and Han Eras (403 BC–220 AD)
As the Chou dynasty began to disintegrate, a period of political and social turmoil known as the Warring States Period dawned in China. But it was also a time of great intellectual creativity, giving birth to Confucius, Lao Tze and many other sages and scholars. Some of China’s most important medical texts were compiled during this era, based on oral traditions handed down for thousands of years. Since the ‘Old Sage’ Lao Tze, to whom the Tao Teh Ching is attributed, was regarded as the pre-eminent Taoist philosopher of this period, Taoist tradition became known during this time as Huang Lao Tao, or ‘The Way of the Yellow Emperor and the Old Sage’.
In 221 BC, the aggressive Chin kingdom swept down from the northeast frontier and united the warring states of China into a single unified empire for the first time in history. It is from the militant Chin kingdom that the West derived the name ‘China’. The founding emperor, Chin Shih-huang, was deeply interested in alchemy as a means towards longevity, and he kept many alchemists in his court. However, he followed the misguided external school of alchemy, which, like its counterparts in medieval Europe, attempted to concoct a ‘Golden Pill’ (jin-dan) of immortality from minerals, heavy metals and toxic herbs. This ‘magic bullet’ approach to health and longevity, which in many ways resembles modern Western medicine’s chemical approach to curing disease, was also encouraged by the emperors of the early Han dynasty, such as Han Wu-ti. Numerous princes of the Chin and Han eras met an early death after ingesting these toxic mineral concoctions.
Nevertheless, among the alchemists who served the royal courts of China were also a few genuine Taoist adepts who kept the true traditions of Huang Lao Tao alive and continued to develop chi-gung and other natural health and longevity techniques. For example, the Chin prime minister, Lu Pu-wei, compiled a text entitled Spring and Autumn Book of Lu, in which he collected and commented upon many ancient practices involving the ‘Harmony of Heaven and Humanity’, particularly the integration of human activity with seasonal cycles and other natural forces. The comprehensive Taoist healthcare system known as Yang Sheng Tao, ‘The Way of Cultivating Life’, became codified during this time and included such tried-and-true methods as balanced diet, deep breathing, dao-yin-style exercises and sexual yoga.
During the later Han period, there appeared one of the greatest figures in the history of TCM as well as Taoist internal alchemy – the physician Hua To, who systematized the exercise form known as ‘Play of the Five Beasts’ (wu-chin-shi) into a type of physical therapy for curing disease. One of Hua To’s most distinguished patrons and patients was the famous military hero Tsao Tsao, who practised chi-gung as part of his own personal health regime. The Taoist adept Wei Po-yang also lived during the late Han and wrote one of the most important texts on Taoist alchemy ever produced, Tsan Tung Chi (The Union of the Triplex Equation), in which he discusses the internal alchemy of deep breathing and energy transformation and the Dual Cultivation of sexual yoga. The Tai Ping Ching (‘Classic of Great Peace’) also appeared at this time, summarizing many of the traditional teachings of the Huang Lao lineage.
Recent archaeological excavations at the Ma Wang tombs in Chang Sha, Hunan Province, have yielded concrete historical evidence that many of the most important chi-gung methods still used today were widely practised in China during the late Han era, nearly 2000 years ago. Documents and scrolls with detailed diagrams of the human energy system, illustrated instructions for performing dao-yin and other chi-gung exercises, and anatomical charts showing how deep diaphragmic breathing works were found in these tombs. These finds provided conclusive evidence that by the second century AD, the internal school of energy cultivation had supplanted the external school of toxic mineral compounds as a basis for the alchemy of human longevity, and that the human energy system had been clearly recognized as the key to health and longevity.
Thus, by the end of the Han dynasty, the emphasis on health and longevity practices had made a decisive shift away from ‘magic potions’ to the internal methods of energy management that have prevailed ever since. This was a crucial development in the evolution of chi-gung, because it reflected the recognition that the only true ‘elixir of life’ was the immaterial elixir of internal energy, and that the only way to obtain this elixir was through disciplined personal practice. This made health and longevity available to anyone who was willing to learn and practise the techniques, rather than only to the rich and influential segments of society who could afford expensive medicines. Medicinal herbs and diet remained important supplementary supports of chi-gung, but from this point on, the primary focus in human health and longevity rested on energy. The central importance of energy as the most decisive factor in health and longevity still remains the most distinctive hallmark of chi-gung as well as TCM in general, distinguishing it clearly from most Western medicine, which still attempts to conquer disease and extend life by the long discredited means of expensive drugs, toxic chemical compounds and mechanical devices.
The Three Kingdoms, and Northern and Southern Dynasties (200–580 AD)
After the disintegration of the Han dynasty, there followed another period of political turmoil and rapid social change that stimulated significant new developments in the field of medicine and chi-gung. Around 300 AD, in the Chin kingdom, an important text called Huang Ting Ching (‘Yellow Court Classic’) appeared, in which the internal elixir (nei-dan) school of thought became the prevalent theoretical basis of chi-gung, citing internal energy rather than external medicinal compounds as the key to its practice. The Three Elixir Field theory of internal alchemy was also clearly elucidated in this text, with vital energy centres located in the brain, solar plexus and lower abdomen serving as the three seats of energy transformation, with spirit, particularly intent (yi), firmly in command of the entire process. This text also describes practices whereby the hormone essence secreted by sexual and other glands is utilized as a source of essential energy, which is then further refined and drawn up through the spinal channels into the brain to nourish the higher spiritual faculties, a technique referred to as huan jing bu nao, or ‘recycling essence to tonify the brain’.
During the early part of the fourth century AD, a Taoist philosopher, physician, and chi-gung practitioner by the name of Ko Hung wrote a milestone compendium of Taoist theory and practice entitled Pao Pu Tze (‘He Who Embraces the Uncarved Block’). Still regarded as one of the most influential texts in the development of chi-gung practice, the Pao Pu Tze was the first book to clearly distinguish the two goals of physical longevity and spiritual immortality, which for many centuries had confused and misled many a practitioner into believing that immortality of the physical body could actually be achieved. Ko Hung pointed out that with disciplined practice, corporeal longevity could certainly be accomplished, but that the ultimate goal of practice was spiritual immortality, which could only be achieved by ultimately abandoning the corporeal body. These two goals could be pursued together, he pointed out, because the common element in both is energy. Thus, by cultivating internal energy, one could live a long and healthy life in this world, while also gaining sufficient time and energy to lay the foundation for immortal existence in the spiritual world after the death of the body.
Ko Hung stressed the importance of correct breathing as the key to chi-gung practice, citing breath as the postnatal manifestation of prenatal energy and thus the key to cultivating internal energy. He combined breath control with the soft, slow dao-yun form of exercise, resulting in the ‘moving meditation’ style of practice which still prevails in chi-gung today. In addition, he advocated the daily practice of still sitting meditation, using internal focus of attention (tsun seh), one-pointed awareness (shou-yi), and visualization (guan-siang) as the primary techniques for regulating energy directly with the mind. As part of his eclectic style of practice, he also discoursed at great length on the benefits of Dual Cultivation sexual yoga (shuang-shiou) as a swift means of building up internal energy for use in higher spiritual practice. This method involves prolonged intercourse without male ejaculation and with multiple female orgasm in order to build up strong polarity between male and female, so that at the moment of female orgasm, a fusion of Yin and Yang energies would occur spontaneously in both partners, balancing their chi and raising vitality to ever higher levels.
During the Southern Liang dynasty (502–557 AD), there appeared in China an eccentric old Buddhist monk from India named Bodhidharma. The Chinese called him Ta Mo. Dressed in tattered robes and professing an unorthodox style of tantric Buddhism, Ta Mo entered the famous Shao Lin Temple, retired to a cold stone chamber, and sat there in seclusion for nine years, meditating in total silence. It is said that a Chinese monk, eager to receive teachings from Ta Mo, chopped off his own hand and presented it to the master on a tray to stir him from his long reverie, but Ta Mo was not moved by this act.
When he finally emerged from his meditation, Ta Mo began to teach the monks at the Shao Lin Temple how to strengthen their bodies as a foundation for higher spiritual practices. At the same time, he taught Chinese martial artists how to apply spiritual cultivation to enhance their martial skills. Prior to Ta Mo’s arrival, Taoist adepts focused themselves single-mindedly on either prolonged still sitting meditation for spiritual purposes, or on rigorous physical training for martial prowess. Consequently, Chinese monks suffered from all sorts of physical ailments due to lack of exercise, while martial artists became violently aggressive pugilists with virtually no foundation in spiritual awareness. Ta Mo brought meditation and martial arts together in a single unified system of practice, completely revolutionizing both spiritual and martial cultivation in China. Introducing the pranayama breathing exercises and yoga stretching techniques of India, he combined them with the indigenous Chinese dao-yin and ‘Play of the Five Beasts’ regimes. The result was Chinese chi-gung and martial arts as we know them today.
Ta Mo went on to become the founding patriarch of Chan Buddhism, which blended elements of Chinese Taoism with the tantric Buddhism he brought from India. It was this form of Buddhism that later spread to Korea and Japan, where it became known as Zen. The subsequent paradox of martial monks and spiritual martial artists which henceforth characterized the Buddhist and Taoist scene in China developed as a direct result of Ta Mo’s teachings.
Ta Mo is credited as the author of two pithy books of teachings that for many centuries were held in well-guarded secrecy by senior monks and martial arts masters. These two classics form the pillars of all the later schools of internal (nei-gung) style chi-gung practice in China and are probably the most influential written texts in the entire history of chi-gung. The first is called Yi Chin Ching, or ‘Tendon Changing Classic’, and the second, more esoteric, volume is entitled Hsi Sui Ching, or ‘Marrow Cleansing Classic’. Together, these two volumes cover everything from basic stretching and loosening exercises that limber the body for meditation as well as martial arts practice, to the most advanced practices of internal alchemy, including techniques for transforming sexual essence and energy into spiritual vitality. The importance of these two texts in the evolution of chi-gung, martial arts and spiritual self-cultivation in China cannot be overstated, yet today they remain relatively unknown in the Western world.
Ta Mo’s great contribution to chi-gung was to bring body and mind together for spiritual as well as physical self-cultivation, linking the two poles of practice by focusing attention on the common denominator of energy. This fusion also bridged the gap between internal and external, movement and stillness, power and awareness, and other dualistic qualities that still divide Western philosophy, religion and science into two hostile camps. According to Ta Mo’s teachings, the key to entering the highest state of awareness is to avoid making arbitrary distinctions between ‘this’ and ‘that’ and to transcend all distinctions by finding the common ground in both. As he wrote in the Tendon Changing Classic, ‘Of paramount importance is to seek movement within quiescence and to seek quiescence within movement, moving softly and continuously until one enters the sublime state.’
The sublime state might refer to spiritual awareness, physical vitality, emotional equilibrium or perfect health, depending on the focus of the practice, while the fusion of movement and quiescence may be found in slow-moving exercise or still-sitting meditation, depending on the form of practice. Ultimately, it doesn’t make any difference, because when body and mind are linked together with energy, the goals of spiritual as well as physical practice are simultaneously realized. As an old Taoist maxim puts it, ‘If you can open this one door, all other doors open as well.’
Tang Dynasty (618–906 AD)
Widely regarded as the ‘Golden Age’ of Chinese civilization, the Tang dynasty was a particularly fertile period for Taoism in China, and chi-gung continued to develop under the auspices of imperial patronage. Since the imperial family carried the same surname (Li) as the great Taoist sage Lao Tze, Tang emperors regarded themselves as direct descendants of this venerable figure, and therefore Taoism enjoyed immense favour during this period.
The physician and Taoist adept Sun Ssu-miao, who lived to the age of 101 during the early Tang, outliving several of the emperors he served, wrote an important treatise on medicine entitled Chian Chin Fang (‘Precious Recipes’), in which he described several methods of healing the body with chi-gung. The method of healing with sound, known as the ‘Six Syllable Secret’, was explained in detail in this book, which also emphasized the importance of correct breathing as a means of regulating human energy. Another physician named Chao Yuan-fang wrote Chu Ping Yuan Hou Lun (‘Discussion of Causes and Symptoms of Disease’), in which he described over 250 ways of enhancing the flow of energy in the human system with various forms of chi-gung.
The Taoist adept Ssu-ma Cheng Chen (647–735), who advocated strict adherence to the original quiescent spirit expounded by Lao Tze in the Tao Teh Ching, wrote extensively on the internal elixir (nei-dan) method of Taoist meditation. He stressed that the key to awakening ling-chi, or ‘spiritual energy’, was first to still the postnatal human mind, i.e., to stop thinking. In order to awaken the true primordial spirit and activate the energy of higher awareness, one must first silence the brain, particularly the cerebral cortex. Here again we see the subtle interaction of movement and stillness in Taoist practice. In this case, as long as the human mind (brain) is moving with constant discursive thought, the primordial spirit of higher awareness lies dormant. But when we still the brain, we thereby allow the original spirit to awaken and transform our mental energy into pure primordial awareness. Ssu-ma also recommended a strict vegetarian diet, claiming that animal foods such as meat overstimulated and polluted the body, making it more difficult for the mind to enter the states of quietude.
Some alchemists, however, continued to promote the ‘magic bullet’ approach as a short cut to longevity. However, when the Emperor Hsien Tzung died in the prime of life in the year 820, after ingesting a pill prepared for him from toxic minerals and heavy metals by the alchemist Liu Pi, this chemical approach to health and longevity finally fell into disgrace once and for all, and the internal elixir (nei-dan) school, which advocated internal energy work as the only effective path to health and longevity, gained permanent acceptance.
Another great name in Taoism during the Tang era was the adept Lu Tung-ping, who later became enshrined as one of the beloved ‘Eight Immortals’ of Taoism. Lu wrote extensively on the internal elixir school of practice, and emphasized the importance of the internal alchemy of the Three Treasures as the sole path to the primordial awareness of enlightenment. As Lu Tung-ping puts it:
The human body consists entirely of essence, energy, and spirit, and these are known as the Three Treasures. Enlightenment and spontaneity are both achieved from these, yet very few people recognize the Three Treasures, even in their postnatal manifestations . . . Essence can only be concentrated with energy, but both essence and energy can only be regulated by spirit, and cultivating energy is only a matter of conserving the spirit. To conserve the spirit, one must stop thinking.
Sung and Yuan Dynasties (960–1368 AD)
During the Sung period, chi-gung continued to progress rapidly, particularly the internal elixir school. Among the many masters who appeared in China at this time, the most outstanding was Chang Po-tuan, the major lineage holder of the Complete Reality School of Taoism. Chang advocated intensive practice of the internal alchemy of the Three Treasures as the main path to health and longevity as well as spiritual enlightenment, but he also stressed the importance of other supplemental regimens such as diet and herbs, physical exercise and sexual discipline, to support the internal elixir practices.
Chang Po-tuan wrote many important texts on internal alchemy, including detailed instructions on practice and lucid explanations of theoretical principles. Among his writings, the most outstanding are The Secret of Opening the Passes, The Four-Hundred Character Treatise on the Golden Elixir, and his greatest work of all, Understanding Reality. Selections from his work have been translated into English by Thomas Cleary in Vitality, Energy, Spirit (Shambhala Publications), including these passages on internal alchemy from his text on the Golden Elixir:
When the eyes do not look, the ears do not listen, the tongue doesn’t speak, the nose doesn’t smell, and the limbs do not move, this is called the five energies returning to the source.
When vitality is transformed into energy, energy is transformed into spirit, and spirit is transformed into space; this is called the three flowers gathered on the peak . . .
Refining the vitality means refining the basic vitality. It does not refer to the vitality felt through sexuality. Refining the energy means refining the basic energy. It does not refer to the energy of breathing through the nose and mouth. Refining the spirit means refining the basic spirit. It does not refer to the spirit of mind and thought.
Another important master of the early Sung period was Wang Che, a martial artist as well as an erudite scholar from northern China who retired from a flourishing professional career at the age of forty-seven in order to devote himself fully to internal practice of the Tao. He is most renowned for his rigorous training of seven devoted disciples who carried the torch of Complete Reality Taoism far and wide throughout China.
Chi-gung’s central role in Traditional Chinese Medicine also received a major boost during this time, when the physician Wang Wei-yi cured the Emperor Jen Tzung of a serious ailment using acupuncture. As a result, the emperor himself took up acupuncture practice, established an imperial institute for research and training in acupuncture, and built a temple in honour of the ancient physician Pien Chueh, enshrining him as the patron saint of acupuncture. In 1026 AD, Wang Wei-yi designed the famous ‘Brass Man’, which today is still used as a master template for the major meridiens and points used in acupuncture therapy. These developments further established chi as the central factor in the treatment of disease.
During the later Southern Sung period, the great military hero Yueh Fei created a system of chi-gung exercises that is still practised widely throughout the world today. This famous set is called the ‘Eight Pieces of Brocade’, and it was designed to stimulate and balance the flow of energy throughout the entire human system, while simultaneously toning muscles, stretching tendons and loosening joints throughout the body. It remains one of the most effective and practical sets in the entire chi-gung repertoire. Yueh Fei is also credited with developing the well-known Hsing-Yi style of internal-energy martial arts.
The most renowned master to appear in the ensuing Mongol Yuan dynasty was Chang San-feng, the progenitor of what has become the most widely practised of all chi-gung forms in the world today – Tai Chi Chuan. But Chang was more than just a martial artist. He was also a master meditator, a medical practitioner and a highly erudite Taoist philosopher. The underlying theme in all of his practices and writings is the central importance of chi as the foundation of the internal elixir that confers health, longevity and spiritual awareness. Here’s a sample of his writing from Thomas Cleary’s compendium Vitality, Energy, Spirit:
It is said that when you breathe out you contact the Root of Heaven and experience a sense of openness, and when you breathe in you contact the Root of Earth and experience a sense of solidity. Breathing out is associated with the fluidity of a dragon, breathing in is associated with the strength of the tiger. As you go on breathing in this frame of mind, with these associations, alternating between movement and stillness, it is important that the focus of your mind does not shift.
Let the true breath come and go, a subtle continuum on the brink of existence. Tune the breathing until you get breath without breathing; become one with it, and then the spirit can be solidified and the elixir can be made.
Ming and Ching Dynasties (1368–1912 AD)
The Ming and Ching dynasties were periods of consolidation and integration in all branches of chi-gung practice. Chi-gung’s role in medicine became increasingly important as a primary form of therapy in the treatment of disease, while at the same time chi-gung became the central focus in the Chinese martial arts, resulting in the ascendancy of the soft ‘internal’ forms over the hard ‘external’ forms. The third great internal style of martial arts was developed at this time by Tung Hai-chuan. Known as Pa Kua Chang (‘Eight Trigrams Palm’), this intricate, beautiful style of practice involves continuous circular manoeuvres around one’s opponent, with graceful turns and rhythmic movements of the limbs and torso based on the cyclic transformations of the eight trigrams in the I-Ching. Together, Tai Chi Chuan, Hsing Yi and Pa Kua Chang have become the triumvirate of the internal martial arts style in which chi-gung plays the central role.
Distinctions between Taoist, Buddhist and Confucian applications of chi-gung also began to dissolve during this era, and chi-gung became a system unto itself, transcending arbitrary sectarian boundaries. In the past, the distinctions between ‘prenatal’ and ‘postnatal’, ‘internal’ and ‘external’, ‘nature’ and ‘cosmos’, and so forth had divided chi-gung practice into two stages, two schools, two aspects and other dualistic distinctions. During the Ming and Ching period, chi-gung masters increasingly emphasized the fundamental unity of the primordial and temporal, breath and energy, body and mind, movement and stillness, encouraging practitioners to seek results in actual experience and to dispense with debates about doctrine. This culminated in the syncretic approach set in motion by Ta Mo during the sixth century, and set the stage for chi-gung’s dissemination throughout the world during the latter part of the 20th century.
A good example of the syncretization that occurred during this period is the work of the Ching dynasty adept and writer Liu I-ming. Liu spent most of his life seeking teachings from various masters of his time, practising what he learned, sorting out the real from the false traditions, and writing lucid expositions based upon his own inner realizations. A fine selection of his insights are collected in translation by Thomas Cleary in Awakening to the Tao, including this observant remark:
The Tao is unique, without duality – why do deluded people divide it into high and low? . . . When you recognize that the principles of the sages are the same, you will realize that Taoism and Buddhism are alike. If you do not understand this and seek elsewhere, you will get involved in sidetracks, wasting your life in vain imagining.
Towards the end of this period, the wall of secrecy that once surrounded chi-gung began to crumble, and it became available to whoever was willing to learn and practise it. This unfortunately led to occasional abuses, the most striking example being the so-called ‘Boxer Rebellion’ at the turn of the century. Thousands of poverty-stricken peasants were recruited to participate in a mass uprising against foreign occupation in Peking, with tacit support from the notorious Empress Dowager and her decadent Manchu court. Briefly trained in rudimentary martial arts and chi-gung exercises and empowered with ersatz initiation ceremonies, this ragtag corps of insurgents was assured that their bodies were now immune to the bullets and cannon fire of foreign weapons, due to protection from the ‘iron armour’ of chi. They soon discovered the contrary to be the case, and thousands of them, armed with nothing but swords and spears, died in mass attacks against the well-fortified bunkers and blazing cannons of Western troops.
Modern Era (1912–Present)
Today, chi-gung continues to develop at a faster pace than ever before, supported by scientific research programmes in China and elsewhere, and its growing popularity throughout the world as a system of preventative healthcare. While chi-gung’s central role in Chinese martial arts and meditation remains important, it is in the field of medicine that chi-gung has aroused the strongest interest and greatest support for further development. It is also in medicine that chi-gung arouses the most controversy and vitriolic opposition from die-hard proponents of chemical and surgical medicine.
The first such instance in China occurred in Shanghai, in 1929, when young Chinese students trained in modern Western medicine in Japan returned to China and demanded that all forms of Traditional Chinese Medicine be legally banned as superstitious hangovers from the past. This provoked widespread resentment among the elderly quarters of society, who still preferred the holistic therapies of TCM to the invasive, caustic techniques of modern Western medicine. A delegation of renowned Chinese physicians was appointed to petition the Nationalist government for formal support for their profession, and demanded legal guarantees that they could continue to practise alongside modern Western-trained physicians. Since so many of the ageing Nationalist government leaders themselves depended on TCM, the petition was accepted, and on 17 March a bill was passed to protect traditional practitioners from interference by proponents of modern medicine. This day is still celebrated in China as ‘Chinese Doctor’s Day’.
More recently, after the communist takeover of China, and particularly during the Cultural Revolution, radical revolutionaries once again threatened a wholesale annihilation of everything associated with traditional Chinese culture, including medicine and chi-gung. However, like before, chi-gung was spared from oblivion due to the support of Chinese leaders themselves. Chairman Mao was quoted as saying that Chinese civilization’s two greatest gifts to the world would prove to be Chinese food and Chinese medicine, a prediction that is certainly proving true. Western observers often comment on the remarkable longevity of Chinese leaders, particularly the late Deng Hsiao-ping, who despite a lifelong habit of chain-smoking cigarettes, lax attention to diet, and many past hardships in life, managed to live to the age of ninety-two. Others have survived even longer. The reason for their longevity is well known in China: each leader is treated daily with emitted chi by master chi-gung therapists during their entire tenure of power, and this therapy continues throughout their retirement. While they also use herbal supplements and follow special dietary guidelines towards the end of their lives, the central factor in their amazing vitality and tenacious longevity is daily infusions of healing chi from recognized masters of this method. Indeed, one of the quickest ways to guarantee oneself a lifetime of security and comfort in China today is to demonstrate a gift for fa-chi, ‘emitting chi’, for such practitioners are in great demand among the wealthy and powerful elite in China.
Meanwhile, in society at large, chi-gung is being practised with growing enthusiasm in China and elsewhere in the world, both as a form of preventive health and as orthodox therapy in curative medicine. There are entire hospitals now in China where the only treatment provided is chi-gung, both in the form of self-practice and as emitted chi from master healers, without the supplementary use of Chinese herbs or Western drugs. These hospitals have treated tens of thousands of patients, including advanced cases of cancer, with a successful cure rate that exceeds anything ever accomplished with traditional herbal medicine or modern Western therapies. Examples of these cures are presented in Chapter 5.
Suffice to say here that chi-gung promises to become the next big wave in alternative medicine as we head into the twenty-first century, and that it will make a far greater impact on the world’s approach to healthcare, and present a far graver challenge to the chemical/mechanical approach of modern medicine, than any other form of traditional therapy ever has before.