The Taoist religion

[sean]

I've had limited experience with Tao/religion. I've only been in touch with Tao/bodybuilding, Tao/philosophy, Tao/morality and of course Tao/ForumSpeak. I've never heard or read about the transformation to Tao/demon as a gateway to Tao/Godliness. I've had experience with two different Zen temples where rarely the notion of demon/God reference is made.

 

Am I missing some rudimentary basic understanding of Tao? Is there some Pagan splinter group you are more referring to? I feel confused over this.

 

Bruce the lizard

I recently read The Taoist Body by Kristofer Schipper on the advice of my Taoist teacher Liu Ming. I highly highly recommend everyone here with even a passing interest in Taoism read this book. The Taoist religion is the least understood of the major religions and this is one of a miniscule number of books available in English bridging this gap. According to Ming it's also the best with Taoism: Growth of a Religion a close second (which I will start soon).

 

From the book:

 

The widespread ignorance concerning Taoism can by no means be imputed to the nature of the Chinese religion as such: until the persecutions that descended on it a century ago and which still go on, it was alive, visible, and acccessible in daily life. Taoism moreover, which can be seen as the most elevated expression of Chinese popular religion, possesses a rich and vast literature comprising more than a thousand works, covering all aspects of its traditions. Rather, this loss of interest on the part of Western scholars is due, I think, to the difficulty in understanding Chinese religion. The very notion of religion as we define it in the West is an obstacle, and a great number of observers have fallen into the trap of failing to see that in a society so dissimilar from ours the religious system must also be very different.

 

In everyday life, religious activity had no particular name or status, since - as the French sinologist Marcel Granet was fond of pointing out - in China, religion was formerly not distinguished from social activity in general. Even its most distinguished representatives, the Taoist masters, were generally integrated in lay society and enjoyed no special status. In modern times and in imitation of Western culture and its concept of religion as something setting humanity apart from nature, the authorities have applied themselves to the task of classifying and dividing the people, trying in vain to convince the ordinary peasant that he was either a Confucian, a Buddhist, a Taoist, or more recently still - in keeping with the party line - simply "superstitious". In fact, none of this really applies and certainly no ordinary person would call himself a Taoist, since this designation always implies an initiation into the Mysteries, and consequently is even now reserved for the masters, the local sages.

 

Traditionally, no special term existed to express religious activity. In order to translate our word religion, modern Chinese usage has coined the term tsung-chiao, literally "sectarian doctrine". This may be correct for Islam or Catholicism, but when this term is used for the Chinese popular religion and its highest expression, Taoism - that is to say, a religion which considers itself to be the true bond among all beings without any doctrinal creed, profession of faith, or dogmatism - it can only create misunderstandings.

 

One may say that it is the absence of definition that constitutes the fundamental characteristic of Chinese religion.

 

To answer your question about gods and demons, it's funny to me now (after reading Taoist Body) to see how Taoism was imported mostly as a philosophy and later as a form of Yoga while it's incredibly rich, almost exhaustive pantheon of gods for nearly anything you can imagine has been so thoroughly neglected that most people (myself included) didn't even associate deities with Taoism at all.

 

Ordinary people thus have no need for their souls to be saved, given that true salvation occurs in the natural course of things. As we have seen, the aid of the gods results in a debt to be repaid and expiated. If all goes well, a person owes nothing to the gods, nor will he become a god himself. Indeed the pantheon's origin lies in the extraordinary, in the accidental.

...

The God of the Hearth is supposed to have been a man who committed suicide by leaping into a kitchen fire; and the Earth God, a brave servant who died of the cold in order to protect his mistress. In popular legends, none of the gods has died of natural causes; the have all either been executed, or have committed suicide, or died virgins - a terrible fate. Thus, by definition, they are all ku-hun, orphan souls. Normally, among the ku-hun, virgins who - like Ma-tsu - died young without fulfilling their female destiny are especially feared, for they have their maternal power intact and ready to avenge themselves. And according to the normal scheme of things, Lord Kuan or Mr. Kuo ought to have become fearsome demons.

 

What then is the difference between a demon and god? Honestly speaking, there is no ontological distinction between them, only a difference of spiritual power. If Mr. Kuo had been an ordinary man, his violent death would have made of him a common demon, one of many. But his moral strength, the determination and intensity of his devotion as a perfect servant, enabled him to transcend his humble position. The spiritual power of his souls was no longer that of a simple person who died a violent death, but that of a god.

...

The road to sainthood is long. The concentration of one's vital forces, maintained through self-perfection, makes one a formidable demon becfore one becomes a gentle and beneficial power. The career of each being, as carefully codified by the Taoist masters, leads from the status of minor local spirit, even from the spirit of a stone or a plant, to the summits of the heavens where spiritual strength becomes astral. All the same, those higher beings are capable of wordly feelings. Despite her elevated position, Ma-tsu still remains subject to her own whims, and Lord Kuan, who is just as illustrious since he is a Celestial Emperor, remains capable of turning his anger on those who fail to respect him. The demoniacal character of the minor gods is clearer still and is expressed in their iconography itself.

 

As long as they are gods, these beings remain subject to the rule of time. No investiture, not even a stellar one, lasts forever, for everything that has a beginning also has an end, and to concentration correspond dispersal and diffusion, which are the priveleged actions of the Tao.

 

 

Sean

[minimoke]

Thank you for the insight on demon/Gods. I of course, see the judeo distinction of demon vs. God, and not the Tao progression.

 

Do you, if you don't mind the intrusion, attempt to accept all of your Taoist Teachers views upfront or instead always question "somewhere in the back of your brain/being" against all the knowledge you hold?

 

Thanks,

 

Bruce the lizard

[Ian]

I recently read The Taoist Body by Kristofer Schipper on the advice of my Taoist teacher Liu Ming.

 

Dude, I know Liu Ming! Little guy, ever so slightly camp, really, really well informed and scholarly. Yes?

Comes over once a year to do a weekend with th British Taoist Association. I went about three years ago. Drove back round the M25 totally relaxed, hands at the bottom of the steering wheel.

 

He's really cool. Several killer articles by him in "The Dragon's Mouth", journal of the BTA. See www.taoists.co.uk Some back issues still available.

 

And, yes, the book's good too!

[sean]

Thank you for the insight on demon/Gods. I of course, see the judeo distinction of demon vs. God, and not the Tao progression.

Why is that of course?

 

Do you, if you don't mind the intrusion, attempt to accept all of your Taoist Teachers views upfront or instead always question "somewhere in the back of your brain/being" against all the knowledge you hold?

Heh. This is a really funny question. First, from a wider angle is it even humanly possible to accept conceptual ideas without comparing them to previous knowledge? Isn't an idea the meaning that you derived from it based on your own existing concepts? Then, assuming that this is somehow possible to just allow another persons thoughts to enter unfiltered directly into our brains and instantly begin assuming them as our own, if the person you were asking this question to were conscious enough to recognize that this was what was going on, wouldn't they have already stopped doing that? In other words, when you ask this question do you ever expect to get a stunned response of "Damn! You know, all this time I have been accepting my teachers thoughts without a single question and for the mere fact that he or she said so".

 

Anyway, I guess to answer your question, at the most fundamental level of which I am aware, I am nothing that holds beliefs or pushes them away. Taoist is just a word. Fundamentally, in the space between my thoughts and sensations, it means nothing more to me than Yogi, Christian, artist, employee, man, or even Sean. Words are just words. I don't believe or disbelieve in a man-demon-god progression but I do find it interesting and in the moment I find it more credible than an absolute distinction between demon and God, especially if by God you are attributing any specific qualities.

 

Dude, I know Liu Ming! Little guy, ever so slightly camp, really, really well informed and scholarly. Yes?

Comes over once a year to do a weekend with th British Taoist Association. I went about three years ago. Drove back round the M25 totally relaxed, hands at the bottom of the steering wheel.

 

He's really cool. Several killer articles by him in "The Dragon's Mouth", journal of the BTA. See www.taoists.co.uk Some back issues still available.

That's the guy! Isn't he a trip!? Very scholarly, yes, and he damn near comes off like a standup comedian in his lectures. And yes the Presence comes through being around him.

 

Thanks a lot for the tip about his articles, I will follow up on that. He has been working on a translation and commentary of the DaoDeJing for many years now that I believe will be published soon. Currently it's just circulated in photocopied sections in the meditation group and it's really good.

 

Sean

[minimoke]

Why is that of course?

I seem to have this internal conflict of how I was raised (Catholic) and now what I have progressed to. That's all I meant by "of course". It was mentioned merely for my benefit as a reminder of how I should not "lock" myself into a belief system created by others.

 

 

 

Heh. This is a really funny question. First, from a wider angle is it even humanly possible to accept conceptual ideas without comparing them to previous knowledge? Isn't an idea the meaning that you derived from it based on your own existing concepts?

 

Sean

 

When I read my question before I posted it I said to myself, DAMN that's a stupid question. Somewhere between my brain that thought it and my fingers that typed it, it turned to mush. I decided to post it as is to see what response it would recieve and DARNit if you didn't see it as funny also. It's just that in dealing recently in person and also on other chat boards, I get the feeling that too much is accepted as "gospel" without a filtering of what the teacher is preaching. Your postings seem to "shake" my brain up and I thank you for that.

 

Bruce

[sean]

When I read my question before I posted it I said to myself, DAMN that's a stupid question. Somewhere between my brain that thought it and my fingers that typed it, it turned to mush. I decided to post it as is to see what response it would recieve and DARNit if you didn't see it as funny also. It's just that in dealing recently in person and also on other chat boards, I get the feeling that too much is accepted as "gospel" without a filtering of what the teacher is preaching. Your postings seem to "shake" my brain up and I thank you for that.

Heheh... I wouldn't say it was stupid, just curious. I think it's cool that you went with your first impulse, even though you doubted it afterwards. I know what you mean about people accepting things as gospel. It's possible I've created a bubble of open minded people around myself and easily forget that most of the world is still stuck in fundamentalism.

 

Sean