PASSAGES FROM HERRLEE G. CREEL
The convenient ambiguity of the Lao Tzu was exploited to the
full in what is sometimes called Neo-Taoism and sometimes called religious
Taoism. This movement – one hesitates to call it a school – was in itself
complex and various, including both ignorant religious fanatics and highly
cultivated scholars. It appears to have arisen close to the beginnings of the
Christian Era, and taken form during the first several centuries AD.
A distinctive name for this kind of Taoism is badly needed.
Both “Neo-Taoism” and “religious Taoism” are somewhat ambiguous. This kind of
Taoism, in its varying manifestations, is marked by one constant aim: the
achievement of immortality. The goal is to become a “hsien” a Taoist immortal.
In Chinese works written as early as the first century BC we find its practices
called “hsien tao” … “the way of the hsien”. I propose to call this doctrine “Hsien
Taoism”, to distinguish it from philosophical Taoism.
The immortality in question was a perpetuation of the
physical body. It might be possible, by special means, for one already in the
tomb to be resurrected, but best of all was during life to become a “hsien”,
forever deathless and ageless. Many ways, “tao”, were believed to conduce to
that happy state. One of the most important was to take drugs, sometimes herbal
but more frequently, it seems, the products of alchemical manipulations.
Complex techniques involving breath control and gymnastics, which have been
compared to the Hindu yoga, are prominent. One should not eat any of the five grains.
He must repent his sins, practice virtue (including such Confucian virtues as
filial piety and benevolence), and give to the poor. A single bad action will
wipe out an accumulation of 1,199 good ones. Varying emphasis was given to
sexual practices which curiously combined licence with austerity. Feats of magic
and charms played a prominent part in Hsien Taoism; mirrors were potent
talismans, and many of the bronze mirrors that have come down to us were no
doubt considered magical. In a series of heavenly palaces deities (in many
cases identified with stars) function as “T’ien kuan”, “Heavenly officers”, in
a graded hierarchy. A “hsien” who goes up to heaven must take a lower place,
since he has no seniority; this is why some prefer to stay on earth. Furthermore,
this whole spiritual hierarchy has its exact counterpart in spirits living
inside the body of every human being. There were periodic collective ceremonies
designed to achieve various ends. One important objective, in Hsien Taoism, was
to avoid or abbreviate the tortures of hell.
The differences between Hsien Taoism and philosophic Taoism
are striking, to say the least. The mere idea of all this toiling for
immortality is repugnant to that of “wu wei”, not striving. The Confucian moral
tone, and concern for rank in a heavenly hierarchy, conflict with the moral
indifference and robust anarchism of Taoist philosophy. As for the idea of
hell, it is doubtful that the authors of the Chuang Tzu ever heard of it, but
if they had it would undoubtedly have struck them as exceedingly funny. Yet
both doctrines are called Taoism, and the distinction between them is sometimes
made poorly if at all. How did this situation come about?
There are many views, but most explanations are variations
on a single theme. It is generally believed that in some manner Taoist
philosophy gradually took into itself indigenous practices and “superstitions”,
absorbed much from Buddhism, and was transformed into Hsien Taoism. Maspero
calls this view “superficial”, certainly it leaves a vast amount unexplained.
In my opinion, philosophic Taoism (including both the
“contemplative” and the “purposive” aspects) and Hsien Taoism not only were
never identical; their associations even, have been minimal. At an undetermined
date, perhaps around 300 BC, there arose what we might call a cult of
immortality. Also around 300 BC, and perhaps in the same areas, Taoist
philosophy arose. The cult and the philosophy seem to have been almost entirely
distinct until perhaps as late as the middle of Former Han times. During the
Han dynasty those seeking immortality gradually took over the name of Taoism
(perhaps for the respectability it afforded) and much of the jargon of “purposive”
Taoism, but they did not take over Taoist philosophy. In Latter Han times Hsien
Taoists took over Buddhist practices to develop a popular Taoist religion.
Although there was some miscegenation, Taoist philosophers have commonly
considered the quest for immortality to be fatuous or worse, and some Hsien
Taoists have reciprocated the lack of cordiality. The evidence for this
hypothesis is voluminous. Here it can only be summarised.
From the Shang oracle bones we know that already in the
second millennium BC it was believed that spirits of the dead might harm the
living, and apparently influence their health. From an early day there were
individuals known as “Wu”, often called “shamans”, who held séances with
spirits and were believed to be able to heal the sick. The invention of medicine
is attributed to a certain Wu. From healing the sick and forestalling death temporarily,
it is only a jump to the idea of forestalling death permanently. Wu are said to
have been especially numerous in the southern state of Ch’u, and also in Ch’i which
occupied roughly the area of modern Shantung Province.
Wu are important in the background of Hsien Taoism, and so
are magicians, who also flourished in Ch’i. The Historical Records says that
magicians of the states of Ch’i and Yen, claiming command of the art of
immortality, “transmitted but could not understand” the methods of the
philosopher Tsou Yen, whose name is associated with the rise of the doctrine of
“wu hsing” or “five forces”, and with the “yin yang” theory. It also seems to
be in Ch’i, and again not far from 300 BC, that the first mention occurs of the
Yellow Emperor. Although he appeared so late, his fame spread with great
rapidity. His name, also, is linked with medicine. He was early, though by no
means universally, associated with longevity and immortality. He came to be regarded
as the earliest ruler of China, and a patriarch of Hsien Taoism.
Since Chuang Tzu is believed to have lived in the latter half
of the fourth century BC, and at least two important philosophical Taoists are
said to have lived and written at the capital of Ch’i at this time, this has
been pointed out as a striking association between the origins of what I call
Hsien Taoism, and philosophical Taoism.
The critical testing ground is the Chuang Tzu, which a
number of scholars have believed to be shot through with the search for
immortality. This is largely because there is a good deal of the Taoist
insistence that most men, by their unnaturally hectic way of life, not only
destroy their piece of mind but shorten their lives. It is of interest to note
that the medical profession is saying the same thing today. There is some emphasis
on longevity in the Chuang Tzu, but every student of bronze inscriptions knows
that this is one of the most ancient and universal Chinese desires. Yet even
this is ridiculed, in the Chuang Tzu, as stupid preoccupation with the
vicissitudes of one’s body.
The prevailing attitude in the Chuang Tzu is that “no one is
so long-lived as a child who dies in infancy, and P’eng Tzu [supposed to have
lived for many centuries] died young; heaven and earth were born together with
me, and all things with me are one.” Time after time we are told that for the
enlightened Taoist both death and life are matters of indifference, and in some
passages death is even called desirable. Despite the fact that Hsien Taoists
later took the Yellow Emperor and Lao Tzu as their patriarchs, in the Chuang
Tzu both of these sages are quoted as advising that no importance be attached
to either life or death.
Various elements later found in Hsien Taoism are referred to
– often derogatorily. A sorcerer, Wu, is elaborately derided. One passage which
describes the practice of breath control and gymnastics has often been cited as
showing that the Chuang Tzu advocates such exercises. But in fact, this passage
says that these are the pursuits of those who are merely “avid for longevity”;
the enlightened man, it avers, does not bother with such practices, but regards
death calmly, as a natural event. Already in the Chuang Tzu we see the conflict
between the immortality cult and Taoist philosophy.
What, then, is “Taoism”? Clearly, the term has been used to
embrace the most diverse doctrines. They may be grouped, in the most general
way, under two headings. On the one hand we have philosophic Taoism, a
philosophy saying much that is still pertinent even in this day of great
sophistication and scientific complexity. This philosophy has not always been
studied with the seriousness it deserves, in part because it has often been
regarded as a system of mystical incomprehensibilities. Another part of the reason
is that it has sometimes been confused with the other kind of Taoism, which I
suggest should be known as Hsien Taoism. The doctrines that fall under this heading,
aiming at the achievement of immortality by a variety of means, have their
roots in ancient Chinese magical practices and an immortality cult. Hsien
Taoism also incorporates elements from Confucianism, Moism and Buddhism. But
there is one element that we might expect to find which is completely absent
from Hsien Taoism. That is the central insight of philosophical Taoism.
