Lectures on Taoist thought: how the Taoist Canon came together, Quanzhen and the Three Teachings, Taoism in ancient Japan, grotto-heavens, Taoist diet and more.
Taoism is far more than fortune-telling, feng shui, and worshipping immortals. This article introduces its core ideas, centered on the Tao as the highest object of faith: the unity of heaven and humanity, revering heaven and ancestors, inherited burden, returning to simplicity, being like water, clarity and non-action, “my life is in my hands,” and following naturalness.
An inquiry into the cultural background and origins of the immortality arts of The Seal of the Unity of the Three, the history of its outer- and inner-alchemy commentaries and its influence. The author argues that its secret teaching is the Great Elixir of the Human Element—paired male-female cultivation—and recommends Lu Xixing's commentary.
A systematic study of the pre-Tang Taoist theory of grotto-heavens and blessed lands: its roots in ancient ideas of heavenly pillars and earth veins, the formation of the Ten Great and Thirty-Six Lesser Grotto-Heavens, the Seventy-Two Blessed Lands, and the water palaces, and the types, ecology, inhabitants, and distinctive time and space of these hidden worlds.
Examining the Japanese Rite for the Lord of Mount Tai, performed since the Heian period, this article traces Taoism's influence on ancient Japanese belief: Taoist prayers and vermilion-on-yellow writing in the ritual petitions, the Taoist origins of the twelve underworld deities, and parallels with Taoist memorial-and-offering rites.
An account of how Quanzhen Taoism takes Taoist inner alchemy as its substance, Confucian ethics as its function, and Buddhist teaching on mind and nature as its method—absorbing Confucian benevolence, loyalty, and filial piety, Buddhist ideas of suffering, conditions, karma, and removing the false, and Chan theory of mind.
Using Emperor Huizong of Song, the Jiajing emperor, Zhu Yuanzhang, and Zhu Di as examples, this article explains why ancient emperors mostly followed Taoism while commoners mostly followed Buddhism: this life versus the next, universal salvation versus personal cultivation, celibacy versus the bedchamber arts, and economic means.
Quanzhen Taoist priest Liang Xingyang explains why sages who were never Taoist priests—the Yellow Emperor, Laozi, Guan Yu, Yue Fei, Mazu—are worshipped as Taoist deities: Taoism proclaims their merit through proclamations and liturgy, and a priest's duty is not to dream of becoming immortal but to guard the path to immortality for all.
An explanation of why the Zhengtong Taoist Canon includes Confucian, Mohist, Logician, Legalist, Yin-Yang, military, medical, and Eclectic works: from Sima Tan's view that Taoism “adopts the best of the Confucians and Mohists,” to the Xuandu Abbey catalog, to the expanded canons of Tang and Song.
Beginning with early humanity's reverence for language and writing, this overview explains the features, structure, and types of incantations, the difference between talismans and registers, the origins and forms of talismans, their spread into folk custom and politics, and legends such as Ge Xuan summoning rain with a talisman.
The Qing-dynasty preface and line-by-line commentary by Supu Sanren on Lü Dongbin's Hundred-Character Stele, tracing the stages of inner alchemy from nurturing qi and subduing the mind to returning the elixir, forming the sacred embryo, and nine years of facing the wall.
An introduction to Taoism's dietary ideal of light, mainly vegetarian food and grain avoidance, and to the food prohibitions of the Taoist tradition: the Quanzhen ban on the “five pungents and three abhorrences,” the “four foods not eaten” of the Celestial Masters' Mansion, and the reasons for avoiding the five pungent vegetables.