Taoist precepts and monastic rules: the main precepts of the Quanzhen and Zhengyi schools, the Five Precepts, the Nine Xiang'er Precepts, and temple rules.
The full text of the Proclamation of Monastic Rules of the Zixiao Palace on the Wudang Mountains: a preface followed by twelve rules and prohibitions, with penalties such as expulsion from the hall, burning, flogging, and dismissal for factionalism, lewdness, embezzlement, bad company, slander, and theft.
The full text of the Proclamation of Monastic Rules of the Taihe Palace on the Wudang Mountains, listing six rules and their penalties—kneeling with incense, flogging and expulsion, dismissal, and burning of the body—for disturbing meditation, defiance, embezzling Golden Hall funds, breaking the rules, swindling temple property, and adultery or theft.
The full text of the monastic rules of the Nanyan Palace on the Wudang Mountains: thirty-three articles setting penalties—forced return to lay life, flogging and expulsion, expulsion from the hall, or kneeling with incense—for lewdness, gambling, smoking, meat and wine, theft, leaving without permission, and noise during stillness.
Explains five taboos in Taoist meditative practice—deliberate discrimination, wandering thoughts, delighting in phenomena, letting the mind follow outer scenes, and casually overhearing others’ instructions—and how chasing sensations, distraction, or trying other people’s methods can lead practice astray.
An interpretation of the thought on precepts in the Recorded Sayings of the early Ming master Liu Yuanran: loyalty, filial piety, and fasting as the root, a daily journal for self-examination, criticism of empty ritual and profiteering, precepts as the basis of stillness and dual cultivation, and lessons for today.
The Proclamation of Monastic Rules of Xianyang Taoism, drawn up by the Xianyang Taoist Association: an account of why it was made, followed by three parts—guiding principles of the Tao, norms of precepts and conduct, and monastic rules with penalties such as kneeling with incense, being urged to leave, and expulsion.
The full text of the Proclamation of Monastic Rules compiled by the management committee of Beijing’s Temple of the True Lord of Fire Virtue according to ancestral rules, listing ten rules with penalties of reflection before the gods or expulsion from the Taoist order for irreverence, factionalism, and extortion.
Ren Farong, former president of the China Taoist Association, explains the meaning of precepts from the structure of the character for “precept,” cites the daily liturgy, the Classic of Clarity and Stillness, the Hidden Talisman, and the Zhuangzi, and argues that all cultivation and all renewal of Taoist conduct begin with keeping the precepts.
A systematic introduction to the main Taoist precepts—the Nine Xiang'er Precepts, the Five Precepts of Lord Lao, the Nine Perfect Precepts, the Precepts of Initial Perfection, the three hundred Great Precepts of the Central Ultimate, and the Great Precepts of the Celestial Immortal—along with fast days and penalties for breaking precepts.
Starting from what the Book of Changes, Mencius, and the Book of Rites say about fasting and abstinence, this article explains how Taoism adopted the practice to discipline body and mind and to worship the gods, how it joined with scripture recitation, and why it is a ladder to the Tao.
Traces the origins of the Zhengyi school’s precepts, from the Xiang'er Precepts of Lord Lao in the Way of the Five Pecks of Rice and the many codes added in the Wei, Jin, and Northern and Southern Dynasties, to Zhang Yuchu’s Ten Rules for the Taoist Community, with the full texts of the Xiang'er and Twenty-Seven Precepts.
A compilation of the original Essentials of Quanzhen Monastic Rules: tracing lineages to their source, the seven treasures a wandering Taoist carries, the nine styles of cap and the proper crowns and robes, the rules for lodging, worship, and daily deportment, and how to question a newly met Taoist to tell true from false.
An introduction to the Nine Xiang'er Precepts from the Xiang'er Commentary on the Laozi: nine precepts in upper, middle, and lower grades distilled from the Tao Te Ching by the early Celestial Masters, regarded as Taoism’s earliest precepts, and the rewards of keeping each grade.
An explanation of the Precepts of Initial Perfection, the Quanzhen gateway into the Tao: the three refuges in Wang Changyue’s Precepts of Initial Perfection, the text of the Ten Precepts with a commentary on each, and a record of the ordination master expounding the first seven precepts at an ordination ceremony.
An introduction to the Five Precepts of Lord Lao—against killing, stealing, sexual misconduct, false speech, and alcohol—their correspondence with the five planets, Five Peaks, Five Phases, Five Emperors, and five organs, and why they are called the root of conduct and of the teaching.
An introduction to the Nine Perfect Precepts, said to have been proclaimed by the Divine Lord of the Nine Heavens for the souls of the dead, with the nine precepts as recorded in a Northern Emperor scripture and related passages from the Corpus of Taoist Ritual and other texts.