Wang Xudong
Confucianism, Buddhism, and Taoism are the three main currents that built the system of thought of traditional Chinese culture. In his “Discourse on the Original Way” (“Yuandao Bian”), Emperor Xiaozong of Song assigned them their functions: “Buddhism for cultivating the heart, Taoism for nurturing life, Confucianism for governing the world.” Though not entirely precise, this roughly identifies the main features of the three schools. The phrase “Taoism for governing the body” clearly points to the relationship between Taoism and medicine (the life sciences).
1. Medicine and the Tao Share One Source: Two Systems of Learning Derived from Pre-Qin Taoist Thought
Over a long course of life and production, the early Chinese gradually discovered the laws of life. In the early period of Chinese civilization, the knowledge discovered by early humans came together as shamanic culture. At that time, magic and medicine, religion and science were not clearly separated, and the various schools of learning had not yet formed. So from prehistory to the pre-Qin period, the knowledge people accumulated became the common source of learning for all the later schools. Although the Hundred Schools of Thought later emerged in the Warring States period, early Chinese medicine, like the pre-Qin Taoist school, had its common source in Chinese culture.
Taoism is China's native religion. It took shape in the second century and has a history of some 1,800 years. Taoism honors Laozi as its founder, takes the Tao Te Ching as its principal scripture, and holds “the Tao” as its most fundamental belief, from which all its doctrines are derived. Taoism holds that the Tao embraces everything, is present everywhere, and is the beginning of all. Paired with the Tao is “virtue”: the Tao as it is in me is virtue, and virtue is the work, the function, and the manifestation of the Tao. So Taoism requires its believers to be “cultivating the Tao and nurturing virtue,” seeking oneness with the Tao and harmony with nature and society. The Tao and its Virtue are thus the core and basic teaching of Taoism.
Chinese medicine embodies profound philosophical wisdom and the Chinese people's ideas and practical experience of health and nurturing life over thousands of years. It is a treasure of ancient Chinese science and a key to the treasure house of Chinese civilization. The place and modern value of Chinese medicine in the realm of traditional Chinese culture. Since ancient times “medicine and the Tao share one source”: the vast body of knowledge of Chinese medicine originated in pre-Qin Taoism and is rooted in and interacts with Taoism; it is a hallmark of the finest of traditional Chinese culture.
Chinese medicine, for its part, is a practical technical discipline that developed on the basis of pre-Qin Taoist philosophy. As a primarily practical discipline, it needed both the mainstream thought of its time as a theoretical basis and the knowledge, ideas, and principles of its time to draw on. All this can be confirmed from the classic of Chinese medicine, the Yellow Emperor's Inner Classic (Huangdi Neijing), and from the Taoist classics represented by the Tao Te Ching. The thought of Chinese medicine, therefore, also has pre-Qin Taoist thought as its main source and body of knowledge.
2. Complementary Values: The Mutual Use of Faith, Doctrine, and Methods
Most religions stress “cultivating this life for the next,” placing life's ultimate pursuit after death. Taoism, however, stresses both the ultimate ideal of attaining the Tao and becoming an immortal and health and longevity in this life, pursuing long life and lasting vision, finding joy in life, valuing life and abhorring death. Taoist philosophy therefore tends to look more toward the relationships between people and society, between person and person, and between people and their environment. Thus Taoism and Chinese medicine share a common philosophical foundation, since Chinese medicine itself embodies harmonious relations between people and has a systematic body of techniques. As an important part of China's ancient scientific and cultural heritage, it established from the outset the conviction that humans are the most precious beings in the universe, as in the idea set out in the Suwen, “Discourse on Treasuring Life and Preserving the Body”: “Heaven covers and earth bears up, and all things are complete, but nothing is more precious than humans.” Since it regards humans as the highest existence in the world, it naturally fits perfectly with the Taoist ideas of “valuing life” and “valuing humans,” putting people first and regarding humans as great. On the practical level, the study of nurturing life and medicine are in fact the concrete techniques by which Taoism realizes its life ideal of “immortality.” Indeed, in certain periods of history Chinese medicine was itself a part of Taoism.
Taoism has the aspiration of “helping the world,” and Chinese medicine has the ideal of “helping the world” as well; the two can complement each other. Taoism needs the achievements of medicine to fulfill its faith and pursuits, and medicine needs Taoist philosophy to perfect its own theory and techniques.
The existing literature shows that Taoist cultivation techniques such as alchemy, grain avoidance (bigu), daoyin (guiding and pulling exercises), and qi circulation gradually became important parts of Chinese medicine, while the achievements of Chinese medicine, such as materia medica, physiology, diagnostics, and the study of the meridians, increasingly became part of Taoist cultivation practice or tools for spreading the teaching.
Running through the whole of Taoist theory and the system of Chinese medicine is the proposition of “the unity of humans with their environment in time and space, and harmonious development between humans and the laws of nature and society.” Physicians use science and technology to bring people into unity with the laws of nature; Taoism uses religious faith to regulate harmonious relations between people and society. “Medicine and the Tao share one source” rests on the harmonious unity of human sensory desires with nature in time and space, and expresses a full affirmation of human worth.
We can see, then, that although Taoism and Chinese medicine have different ultimate goals, they share a relationship of mutual reliance and support, coexistence and co-prosperity, in their systems of thought, methods and techniques, and the people they serve.
3. Taoism Carrying Medicine: How Religious Faith and Science and Technology Complement Each Other
Taoist thought holds that the universe has a law that all things must obey, and this law is called “the Tao.” Heaven, earth, and the myriad things all derive from the Tao: “One gives birth to two, two gives birth to three, and three gives birth to the myriad things.” “Virtue” is the expression of this law in human nature, human relations, and human feelings; only what accords with the Tao is called virtue.
From this Taoism holds that human life must not violate the law of the Tao. Virtue has a cumulative and cyclical nature: the faults of earlier generations are borne by later ones, and when forebears bring on disaster their descendants suffer, so the roots of fortune and misfortune cycle endlessly. Only by cultivating perfection in the Tao and doing good deeds can descendants escape punishment. This belief became the most universal and deeply held norm of conduct in Taoist faith. And the theory of “three giving birth to one” is precisely the most fundamental theoretical basis of Chinese medicine, while the Taoist idea of “the continuity of virtue” is deeply woven into the moral theory that governs Chinese medicine.
Taoism holds that for the natural world the most important thing is life, and for individual life the most important thing is moral character. Human health and longevity come from the interaction of physical and mental health, and one whose virtue and conduct are full will surely live long; from this arose the Taoist philosophy of life. So all Taoist religious activities require equal weight on body and spirit and the cultivation of nature and life together, stressing the twofold significance of physical health and moral cultivation. All of this was absorbed without reservation into the knowledge system of Chinese medicine and became basic principles of the study of nurturing life.
Besides the various rituals, one of the daily practices of Taoist priests is training, mainly inner alchemy (neidan), daoyin, and ingestion. The first two had the greatest influence on Chinese medicine, while the last is the product of interaction between medicine and Taoism.
The “Golden Elixir” of Taoist ingestion refers to elixirs refined from mineral ingredients such as sulfur, realgar, lead, and mercury. Alchemy had two aims: to refine a medicine of immortality, and to turn stone into gold. These practices laid the foundation of modern pharmaceutical chemistry and are recognized by the history of science as its beginning. And the “medicinal foods” of ingestion made an even greater contribution.
Ancient Taoist priests mostly lived apart from the world, cultivating in temples, in the wilds, or even in caves. With no steady source of food and an austere life, their circumstances forced them to eat wild plants. Through long practice, Taoist priests discovered many foods beneficial to health, which became their medicines for nurturing life and extending their years, such as poria (fuling), white atractylodes rhizome (baizhu), Solomon's seal (huangjing), lingzhi mushroom, chrysanthemum, pine nuts, and amber. Seen with today's eyes, these are purely natural green foods of great benefit to people.
Taoism's contribution to Chinese medicine is enormous. The ancients said “medicine and the Tao share one source”; precisely because Taoist cultivation aimed at long life and deathlessness, it objectively made a huge contribution to the development of medicine. Some examples:
1. The many medical works in Taoist literature. Taoist figures through the ages left a great many medical works or works closely related to medicine. The Taoist Canon (Daozang) is a large collection containing 1,476 Taoist books, more than 70 percent of which relate to medicine and pharmacology. Medical books and specialized works on inner and outer alchemy number more than 150, and works related to medicine and nurturing life more than 900.
2. The many physicians among Taoist figures. Those who cultivated the Tao mostly had a thorough grasp of medicine, and many Taoist priests were themselves famous physicians; Taoist priests renowned for medicine through the ages number in the thousands, such as Ge Hong, Tao Hongjing, and Sun Simiao. Ge Hong's Baopuzi records the properties of many drugs, such as ephedra for coughs and asthma, turpentine for arthritis, and realgar and mugwort for disinfection. Ge Hong was also the first person in China to record smallpox and to propose an immunization method for treating rabies, and his understanding of infectious diseases such as tuberculosis and scrub typhus (sand-mite disease) is broadly consistent with modern medicine. Tao Hongjing's Collected Commentaries on the Classic of Materia Medica (Bencao Jing Jizhu) and Supplementary Records of Famous Physicians (Mingyi Bielu) also hold a very important place in the history of medicine. Sun Simiao, a physician of superb skill, was hailed by later generations as the “King of Medicine,” and his Essential Prescriptions Worth a Thousand in Gold (Qianjin Yaofang) and Supplementary Prescriptions Worth a Thousand in Gold (Qianjin Yifang) are famous at home and abroad and had a profound influence on the development of medicine in Japan and Korea.
3. The practice of nurturing life in Taoist cultivation. Taoism values life and abhors death and aims at long life. It made dispelling illness and strengthening the body both a main means of spreading the teaching and part of the cultivation toward “attaining the Tao and becoming an immortal,” and created a great many theories and techniques of nurturing life, such as qi circulation, daoyin, dietary therapy, sexual health care, and medicines.
Another important practice of Taoist priests was gathering and preparing medicines. Although the aim was immortality, it objectively advanced pharmacology. As the forerunner of modern chemical pharmaceuticals, alchemy's contribution to the history of medicine is plain for all to see. Elixirs invented by Taoist priests, such as the Seven Star Elixir and the Red Rising Elixir, are still called miraculous Chinese medicines around the world. In addition, during alchemy it was discovered that mixing sulfur, realgar, saltpeter, and honey could cause violent combustion—the precursor of the invention of black gunpowder.
In sum, the close fusion of Taoism and medicine embodies an organic combination of spiritual faith and scientific exploration, and is a special phenomenon in the history of science and technology.
4. Medicine Carrying the Tao: The Many Secrets of the Life Sciences Contained in Taoist Medicine
Religions pay special attention to cultivating the heart and mind, so most of them have psychological effects. Taoism not only stresses the arts of nurturing life; in its religious activities one can also find modern psychotherapy, physical therapy, and qigong therapy.
1. Psychotherapy in Taoist methods. A considerable part of Taoist ritual consists of visualization. Explained in today's language, visualization is a medical art that uses the objects the patient believes in and worships or fears, and through words and actions brings the patient into a particular psychological state in order to achieve a therapeutic effect.
Because patients believed that ghosts and spirits caused their illness, words and actions were used to suggest things to them and so obtain a psychological effect. This psychological effect, as a subjective consciousness, drives out illness through the patient's own strength, sometimes also using forms such as regulating qi and guiding. For example, the Treatise on the Origins and Symptoms of Diseases (Zhubing Yuanhou Lun) records that the “Daoyin Methods of the Formulas for Nurturing Life” says: “Regularly at cockcrow, keep in mind and recite three times the gods of the four seas; this wards off the hundred evils and vicious ghosts and keeps one from falling ill. The god of the Eastern Sea is named Aming, the god of the Southern Sea Zhurong, the god of the Western Sea Jucheng, and the god of the Northern Sea Yuqiang.” It also says: “Visualize the heart qi as red, the liver qi green, the lung qi white, the spleen qi yellow, and the kidney qi black, coming out and surrounding the body; this also wards off evil ghosts. To drive away all evils and the hundred ghosts, always visualize the heart as a blazing fire the size of a dipper, radiant and bright, and the hundred evils will not dare to trouble you. One can then enter the midst of an epidemic.” The Formulas for Nurturing Life says: “Always on one's birth-year day, when first combing the hair, tap the teeth nine times and silently incant: The Great Emperor disperses the numinous, the Five Elders return to the True; the mysterious flower of Niwan keeps the essence and long endures; on the left I hold the hidden moon, on the right I draw the root of the sun; the six directions are clear and refined, and the causes of a hundred illnesses are cured. Swallow saliva three times, and do this often. It keeps the teeth from aching and the hair firm and not white.” These incantations are full of Taoist color, with a great deal of language invoking Lord Lao the Most High (Taishang Laojun) and the Yellow Emperor, strict observance of the directional scheme of the Azure Dragon, White Tiger, Dark Warrior (Black Tortoise), and Vermilion Bird, and reverence for divine powers descending to subdue evil; and in practice they formed a complete ritual.
Whether Taoist spells and zhuyou (healing by incantation) work depends mainly on the patient's subjective state of mind. That is why the “Classic of Spells” in the Supplementary Prescriptions Worth a Thousand in Gold states explicitly, “Do not perform spells for those who do not believe.” This relies on the patient's mental set of trusting and fearing “ghosts and spirits,” improving the patient's mental state through suggestion and consolation, and thereby indirectly adjusting the functions of the body. For example, for patients “possessed by demons” (showing mental disorder), the practitioner uses painted carts and horses, money, and silk to send the “ghost” back to its place of origin according to the demon's name and dwelling direction, giving the patient a relaxed feeling that “the demon has gone,” which helps the illness improve.
2. Physical therapy in Taoist ritual. At rituals for driving out epidemics, Taoist priests leap and run according to set patterns, such as the “Pace of Yu,” a stepping method that moves the body according to fixed rules. The Secret Canon of the Jade Case (Yuhan Midian) explains the movements of the Pace of Yu: “Hold the breath; first step forward with the left foot, then with the right foot, and bring the left foot alongside the right: that makes three steps.” The chapter “Climbing Mountains and Crossing Rivers” in the Baopuzi says: “Stand upright with the right foot in front and the left foot behind; then step forward again with the right foot, then forward with the left foot, and bring the right foot alongside the left: that is two steps. Then step forward again with the right foot and bring the left foot alongside the right: that is three steps. Thus the way of the Pace of Yu is complete.”
According to tradition, the Pace of Yu was created by Yu the Great, a chieftain of high antiquity, hence its name. When Taoist priests led patients in walking and dancing together, they were in essence doing physical exercise under the name of spells, which moves the sinews and bones and opens the meridians; combined with the effects of psychotherapy, it ultimately has a positive influence on illness.
3. Qigong therapy in Taoist spells. During spell rituals, both the Taoist priest and the patient are in a state of intense mental concentration. The priest seeks to summon spirits and drive out ghosts, and the patient seeks to be cured, so both must cast off distracting thoughts and enter a state of “stillness.” The “Classic of Spells” in the Supplementary Prescriptions Worth a Thousand in Gold requires the shaman and the patient to “think quietly and reflect quietly, without stray thoughts.” Add the psychological suggestion of chanting spells, and the patient often quickly enters a hypnotic state, which already meets the basic requirement of “entering stillness” in qigong practice.
Besides “entering stillness,” qigong therapy places even more emphasis on the role of intention, and this too comes from the art of spells. The Supplementary Prescriptions Worth a Thousand in Gold quotes the ancient Scripture of the Immortals: “There are six methods of using spells: first, the teeth spell—quickly bring the qi to the teeth; second, the eye-tending spell—open one eye and close the other; third, the intention spell—hold intention to dispel thoughts, and all illnesses are removed; fourth, the finger-eye spell—meaning there are fifteen ‘eyes’ on the hand; fifth, the qi-path spell—namely chui, hu, he, xu, xi, and si; sixth, the spirit-holding spell—visualize where the illnesses are.” Although this passage is not as systematic and detailed as the later “inner vision method,” it shows that the early art of spells was indeed a source of intention work in qigong.
These examples confirm that Taoist arts do contain much of scientific value. It can be said that this scientific material advanced the development of traditional Chinese physical therapy, qigong therapy, and suggestion (psychological) therapy. Setting aside its religious aims, it can essentially be regarded as a forerunner of these therapies, and the healing principles hidden in it still deserve in-depth study.
5. Medicine and the Tao Are Not Alone: A Living Source for the Values Guiding Popular Behavior
The way of thinking of Taoism and Chinese medicine, full of dialectical spirit and holistic outlook, supplements and corrects the cognitive approach of modern science, which is characterized by formal logic and analytic reduction.
Both Taoism and Chinese medicine follow the idea that “the Tao follows what is so of itself” and stress “the unity of heaven and humanity.” This offers inspiration, warning, and correction to the modern practice of one-sidedly stressing economic returns and pursuing “predatory development” of nature. In particular, it serves as a reference and model for protecting ecosystems and shaping the environment. The Suwen, “Great Discourse on Regulating the Spirit According to the Four Qi,” holds: “The yin and yang of the four seasons are the root of the myriad things … Go against them and calamities arise; follow them and severe illnesses do not occur.” It asks humans to revere nature and follow its laws, knowledge that can play a positive role in ecological construction today.
“Naturalness and non-action (wuwei)” is especially evident in nurturing life. The ancients advocated following nature and governing through non-action, “showing plainness and embracing simplicity, lessening selfishness and reducing desires,” living a calm and even-tempered life of a pure heart and few desires, with regular habits, and casting off the mindset of seeking quick success and hankering after vanity.
To nurture life, one must first nurture one's nature, achieving the “clarity, stillness, and non-action” advocated by the Tao Te Ching, returning to simplicity and authenticity, and keeping one's nature pure and honest. As it says, “The five colors blind the eye, the five tones deafen the ear, the five flavors dull the palate, and galloping and hunting madden the heart”—precisely a discussion of the harm of greed. The Yellow Emperor's Inner Classic says: “Avoid the depleting evils and harmful winds at the proper times; be calm and content, in emptiness and nothingness, and the true qi will follow; keep essence and spirit guarded within, and from where could illness come?” This too stresses a pure heart with few desires and clarity, stillness, and naturalness. As such, it is also an intellectual resource for moral construction in today's socialist society.
The main components of traditional Chinese culture—philosophical thought represented by yin and yang and the Five Phases, ecology based on Taoist philosophy and religion, astronomy and geography under the banner of the study of the I Ching (Book of Changes), ethics and sociology guided by Confucian thought, and the theoretical system formed by the mutual blending of the various traditional fields of learning—make up the solid cultural background and knowledge base of the Chinese nation.
Taoist culture and the culture of Chinese medicine are important sources of traditional Chinese culture, bodies of knowledge in which scientific and humanistic culture blend like milk and water. Handed down from generation to generation, the two cultures are a direct expression of the Chinese nation's distinctive views of the cosmos, nature, life, and living, and have become part of the Chinese way of life. Uncovering and promoting the finest elements of Taoist culture and the culture of Chinese medicine will also strengthen the cultural roots of the religious and Chinese medicine communities themselves, purifying and optimizing their cultural genes and setting them on a healthier and smoother path of development.
6. The Great Tao Is Utterly Simple: Sound Choices in Passing On Traditional Chinese Culture
Admittedly, Taoist culture, the culture of Chinese medicine, and the universal values expressed in “medicine and the Tao share one source” all contain a great deal that is mysterious, obscure, and hidden—a cultural phenomenon with historical causes. This is exactly why we need to study them deeply, look through the veil of history, and uncover and explain this tacit knowledge.
Expressions in medical and Taoist learning of the correspondence between heaven and humans, such as “heaven has the sun and moon, humans have two eyes,” may not impress people today, but the holistic view of “the unity of heaven and humanity” they contain should not be rejected. Medicine may no longer use tiger bone or bear bile, but the therapeutic ideas running through it are sure to endure for a long time.
Furthermore, although “medicine and the Tao share one source” and are rooted in and interact with each other, this does not exclude exchange and blending with other schools of learning. For example, Chinese medicine took on the ethical and moral ideas in the Taoist worldview and methodology, and Taoism and Confucianism are very similar in their humanitarian spirit, namely the affirmation of mutual help and mutual love among people in society. The Confucian classic Book of Rites, in the chapter “The Conveyance of Rites,” drawing on the human relations of primitive communal society, set forth a blueprint of a civilized, ritually ordered world of Great Unity: “When the Great Way prevailed, the world was shared by all. The worthy and able were chosen, trust was spoken and harmony cultivated. So people did not treat only their own parents as parents, nor only their own children as children. The old were provided for to the end of their days, the able-bodied had work to do, and the young were raised; widowers, widows, orphans, the childless, the disabled, and the sick were all cared for. Men had their roles and women their homes. People hated to see goods wasted on the ground, but did not hoard them for themselves; they hated not to use their strength, but did not use it only for themselves. Thus scheming was shut off and did not arise, and robbers, thieves, rebels, and traitors did not appear, so outer doors were left unlocked. This is called the Great Unity.” This depicts a land of kingly peace in which the world is shared by all, appointments are made by merit, people trust, respect, and help one another, and there is ample food and clothing. Taoist teaching, too, everywhere reveals a longing for the equality and freedom of primitive clan society, which is abundantly reflected in the Yellow Emperor's Inner Classic. This example shows that in passing on knowledge from traditional culture, one should grasp its essence without clinging to its wording, and recognize its essence while also seeing its limits; only then will one not be held back by the shortcomings of historical understanding.
(Wang Xudong, research fellow, Institute of Literature on Chinese Medicine, Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine)