Requirement for Celibacy in Neigong Training

[Taoist Texts]

 

 

Inner alchemists regard yuanjing and post natal jing as dierent manifestations

of a single underlying substance or reality, codependent and mutually promoting one

another. Post natal jing is rooted in yuanjing, and yuanjing is nurtured by post natal

jing. If a mans jing is stirred by sexual desire, and he ejaculates, the jing has become

post natal jing; if it is not stirred by desire, and remains replete within the body, then

the jing retains its pre natal quality.

 

The rst rule of cultivation is to avoid losing any more post natal jing through ejaculation or menstruation. Most Chinese would say that losing postnatal jing will make one sick and can lead one to an early death; sexual cultivators such as Chen Zhixu would even say that the death of any person is in fact caused by the loss of postnatal jing over the course of a lifetime.372

 

(SPREADING THE DAO, MANAGING MASTERSHIP,

AND PERFORMING SALVATION:

THE LIFE AND ALCHEMICAL TEACHINGS OF CHEN ZHIXU

Wm. Clarke Hudson)

 

 

Chen Zhixu (1290-1343+), styled Shangyangzi, a Daoist master and sexual alchemist from south China

 

 

 

 

[Songtsan]

Just checking...I'm searching amongst the immortals to determine things that I don't quite consciously understand...by placing our doubt's and angsts out there, I gain clarity, and know who to trust based on their response...

[damdao]

 

(SPREADING THE DAO, MANAGING MASTERSHIP,

AND PERFORMING SALVATION:

THE LIFE AND ALCHEMICAL TEACHINGS OF CHEN ZHIXU

Wm. Clarke Hudson)

 

 

Chen Zhixu (1290-1343+), styled Shangyangzi, a Daoist master and sexual alchemist from south China

 

 

This work is very interesting, but I think that we must not miss this statement by the author itself:

 

In this chapter I also analyze Chens genealogy with a critical eye, and test the

usual view within the historiography of Daoism that Chen was a new breed of

Southern Quanzhen Daoist. I will take the controversial position that Chen was

Quanzhen in only the barest sense, without any Quanzhen lineage, experience, or

learning to speak of. I will also argue that Chens immediate lineage was a fiction, and

even that one of his two masters was a fiction. Chen invented these patriarchs and

master to boost his authority within the marketplace of daos, and he could only get

away with this because Quanzhen Daoism was not well known within his core area of

operation. Chens invented patriarchs and master are mythical echoes of other figures

from his tradition.  

 

 

SPREADING THE DAO, MANAGING MASTERSHIP,

AND PERFORMING SALVATION:

THE LIFE AND ALCHEMICAL TEACHINGS OF CHEN ZHIXU

Wm. Clarke Hudson p. 42

[thelerner]

Those who hoard secrets that are valuable to man ARE greedy..IMO....snobs. They don't want their 'Heaven' polluted by immortals who are not like them...it can't last forever...one day,..

Not necessarily.   Its human nature to skip steps and while generally that means you don't results, sometimes it means you hurt yourself.  So lineage holders take there job very seriously.  Knowing its often better to teach a few deeply for decades, then write a book or have mass classes thats end up compromising your art. 

[Taoist Texts]

This work is very interesting, but I think that we must not miss this statement by the author itself:

 

 

Chens immediate lineage was a fiction, and

even that one of his two masters was a fiction. Chen invented these patriarchs and

master to boost his authority within the marketplace of daos, and he could only get

away with this because Quanzhen Daoism was not well known within his core area of

operation. Chens invented patriarchs and master are mythical echoes of other figures

from his tradition.  

 

 

SPREADING THE DAO, MANAGING MASTERSHIP,

AND PERFORMING SALVATION:

THE LIFE AND ALCHEMICAL TEACHINGS OF CHEN ZHIXU

Wm. Clarke Hudson p. 42

 

hehe...there is no historical master-student transmission for any longer than 2-3 generations. Anything longer gets lost in the mist of times. Anyone who claims an unbroken  transmission from the beginning of times by known and officially appointed individuals would be lying.

 

 

Southern Lineage, which places at its origins Zhang Boduan, the author of the Wuzhen pian (Awakening to Reality). The lineage is formed by him and four other masters:

● Zhang Boduan (Zhang Ziyang, 987?-1082) 

● Shi Tai (Shi Xinglin, ?-1158) 

● Xue Daoguang (Xue Zixian, 1078?-1191) 

● Chen Nan (Chen Niwan, ?-1213) 

● Bai Yuchan (Bai Haiqiong, 1194-1229?)

 

It is now usually accepted that Nanzong was not a "lineage" in the common sense of the term, and that the sequence of its masters was established at a later time, apparently by Bai Yuchan himself in the early 13th century.

 

http://www.goldenelixir.com/jindan/nanzong_beizong.html

[damdao]

hehe...there is no historical master-student transmission for any longer than 2-3 generations. Anything longer gets lost in the mist of times. Anyone who claims an unbroken  transmission from the beginning of times by known and officially appointed individuals would be lying.

I had forgotten that you don't support the concept of school itself, but on this basis Opendao's statement about leakage stands by itself and it is useless to quote other person who says a different thing. It is only word against word, quote against quote. 

[opendao]

I had forgotten that you don't support the concept of school itself, but on this basis Opendao's statement about leakage stands by itself and it is useless to quote other person who says a different thing. It is only word against word, quote against quote. 

 

Taoist Texts doesn't quote Chen Zhixu, he quotes Wm. Clarke Hudson's personal opinion (page 318 of his thesis). Basically, it's not an argument at all, because we know nothing about Mr Clarke's practical results...

 

If Mr Clarke reads that, we can ask him, why, and based on what, he came to conclusion that it's possible to say "yuanjing is nurtured by post natal jing". So far I don't see any support for that nor in classics, nor in alive Neidan masters' teaching. What Chen Zhixu writes about "refining post natal treasures", it's a different practice basically, so I don't know why people can speak about yuan jing here at all... 

[opendao]

hehe...there is no historical master-student transmission for any longer than 2-3 generations. Anything longer gets lost in the mist of times. Anyone who claims an unbroken  transmission from the beginning of times by known and officially appointed individuals would be lying.

 

You quote correct things, but jump to wrong conclusions:

 

It is now usually accepted that Nanzong was not a "lineage" in the common sense of the term, and that the sequence of its masters was established at a later time, apparently by Bai Yuchan himself in the early 13th century.

 

The lineage is not a label. The lineage is a " sequence of masters". And these sequences exist, and it makes the lineages.

Nanzong, Quanzhen Dao etc are labels. Southern schools are mostly in the society now, many of them use Quanzhen or ZhenYi labels, because they are officially permitted. Does it make them to have no lineage? Sure it doesn't, and it's possible to see the internally kept books with unbroken lines of masters, their dates of real life, their achievements etc.

 

So it's just not true to say:

 

there is no historical master-student transmission for any longer than 2-3 generations

 

for example, for Zhang Boduan you can read his lineage in many Chinese books, and it has 5 generations to Lao Zi... Maybe he didn't name his teaching Nanzong, but practically it means very little. He has created a new school by his teaching, that's important. Same for Wang Chongyang. That's why there is Quanzhen Dao and Nanzong - to explain the differences in methods, and what new they brought to Dao legacy from Lao Zi.

[Silent Answers]

This is still going on?

 

Celibacy has energetic benefits, but mostly it's usefulness (primarily/early on) is a mental one.

 

In regards to both the energetics and mental state, everyone is different. In most, it is probably necessary as a stepping stone, but not required by absolutely everyone to advance, until maybe later.

 

Some people are dead against celibacy, which I never really understand. Try doing 2 weeks on 2 weeks off, and alternate like that for a few months. Even in this short period, subtle differences can be felt by almost everybody. I've never gone past 90 days myself.

 

One last thing for any beginners, there's no shame in failing to restrain yourself. It takes time to pass from 'determined' to freely making the choice. The well will fill again sure enough.

 

The best thing you can do is just try it! Forget what sages have written about it and experience it for yourself.

[Taoist Texts]

[voidisyinyang]

ClosedDao caught blatantly lying again. Hilarious!

 

http://thedaobums.com/topic/38379-requirement-for-celibacy-in-neigong-training/page-6#entry627105

Posted 26 May 2015 - 07:30 AM

Innersoundqigong, on 26 May 2015 - 09:03, said:

I never said it was easy but it does require celibacy at minimum. Paypal may disagree. Btw ur founder is very clear in his huiming ching the end of leakage refers to no ejaculation. There's an image showing that in the book. It's copy blocked so people gotta go to the link i posted twice but then willful ignorance is also not helpful. Haha.

 

wrong, think again.

[voidisyinyang]

 

http://thedaobums.com/topic/38379-requirement-for-celibacy-in-neigong-training/page-6#entry627105

 

Posted 26 May 2015 - 07:30 AM

Innersoundqigong, on 26 May 2015 - 09:03, said:

I never said it was easy but it does require celibacy at minimum. Paypal may disagree. Btw ur founder is very clear in his huiming ching the end of leakage refers to no ejaculation. There's an image showing that in the book. It's copy blocked so people gotta go to the link i posted twice but then willful ignorance is also not helpful. Haha.

 

ClosedDao: wrong, think again.

[opendao]

Obviously this picture means nothing about "no ejaculation", moreover, this picture is not even about the "end of leakage". Again nothing. Zero knowledge. So miserable.

[Brian]

ClosedDao caught blatantly lying again. Hilarious!

 

http://thedaobums.com/topic/38379-requirement-for-celibacy-in-neigong-training/page-6#entry627105

Drew, you need to stop with the name-calling and accusations.

[Taoist Texts]

I never said it was easy but it does require celibacy at minimum. Paypal may disagree. Btw ur founder is very clear in his huiming ching the end of leakage refers to no ejaculation. There's an image showing that in the book. 

Of course there is. The characters are very straightforward and easily verifiable by anyone 

 

之路   漏盡

 

The Path...End of Leakage

 

The pipe represents genitals that is why it is drawn not on the back or on the top of the head.

 

But here is the catch. Lets say I sell seminars for eternal life and make a disclosure: 'this stuff only works if you abstain from sex forever'. How many seminars i will sell? Thats right, zero. This picture is not a good poster for seminars thats for sure;)

[opendao]

 

Of course there is. The characters are very straightforward and easily verifiable by anyone 

 

之路   漏盡

 

The Path...End of Leakage

 

people can see that such direct translation contradicts to what we see on the picture.

 

The lower end of the leakage road is not the same as "stopping the leakage".

 

Daoist texts, starting with DDJ, have their own logic and methods to transmit the meaning to people, and this logic and textual methods, obviously, are mostly unknown to the scholars outside of the tradition. That's why it's really true saying: "it's impossible to understand scriptures without a teacher".

 

 

 

The pipe represents genitals that is why it is drawn not on the back or on the top of the head.

 

no, it doesn't represent genitals. Do you know how genitals look like and where in the body are they? 

 

 

As you see Mingmen ("Gate of Ming") is much higher then Seminal vesicle (it's below Urinary Bladder #8). And even basics of the anatomy can suggest that the pictures in Huimingjing cannot be mapped to any physical process.

 

The image itself says nothing about genitals, "end of ejaculation", celibacy or other fantasies of the Internet "taoists on hormones". The real practice is a miracle, what you guys try to forge is just a secular mistake.

 

 

 

But here is the catch. Lets say I sell seminars for eternal life and make a disclosure: 'this stuff only works if you abstain from sex forever'. How many seminars i will sell? Thats right, zero. This picture is not a good poster for seminars thats for sure;)

 

you're wrong even here, the celibacy doesn't contradict the idea of "the true spiritual teachings" in the heads of Westerns, grew up on Christianity, so it's much easier to promote it then the idea of the Daoist practice, which is new and mostly unknown even today. People in general love polarities, and don't really want to accept the idea of balance. You can find examples even in this thread, even in your own posts. I see this topic is very interesting for you, maybe because the idea of torturing yourself sounds very appealing to your mind... But it has no relation to Daoism, it's just a legacy of a false understanding of Christianity during last 2000 years.

 

It's a pop, "new age" modern pseudo-culture, which destroys people's ability to see the truth.

[voidisyinyang]

The text of your school founder refers to the "external kidneys" several times - that is the genitals indeed.

 

 

"Your entire consciousness, whole and melded, resembles the Great Void. When you have been still for a long time, your lower body fuses and moves, extending to the external kidneys. Why is this?

 

"In reply, he said, "....When you begin work on huiming, you are able to do [this] method to gather it and return it to the original place. That is why it's called dual cultivation."

 

 

There is a footnote after lower body.

 

"That is, the genital area."

 

p. 77.

 

"According to the commentary, when the external kidneys (that is, the testicles or ovaries) do not move,....there is no death."

 

 

footnote on page 44

 

"In reply, he said, "In the method of refinement where the True Seed is produced and the dharma-wheel is thereby obtained, it is none other than the count being complete and the external kidneys not lifting."

 

page 72.

 

"As for the correct Tao, ...then the external kidneys absolutely do not rise or move."

 

page 74

[Taoist Texts]

The text of your school founder refers to the "external kidneys" several times - that is the genitals indeed.

 

Thats probably new-age external kidneys, or is it old-new-old age? So confusing.

 

 

Anyway Drew i heard there is the taoist practice of bedroom arts where the male conserves his essence..is that  neidan? whats your take on it?

[voidisyinyang]

Thats probably new-age external kidneys, or is it old-new-old age? So confusing.

 

 

Anyway Drew i heard there is the taoist practice of bedroom arts where the male conserves his essence..is that  neidan? whats your take on it?

 

I have found no evidence that it is neidan and Taoist Yoga gives lots of specifics why it is the worst problem in Neidan training.

 

Again any thoughts about reproduction cause the yuan qi to shoot down the spine - from the Cavity of Prenatal Vitality - the pineal gland - and then deconverts the Ocean of Qi - the yin jing - into generative fluid. The same thoughts also cause the Heart's Fire aka the dragon yin qi to shoot out of the eyes via the Yuan Shen. So you get the reverse small universe as loss of energy.

 

So even if there is no loss of generative fluid - the yuan qi is being deconverted back into yin qi and lost out of the eyes or body into the female. Meanwhile when the female climaxes, the perineum of the male sucks in the lust lower emotional yin jing energy of the female along with her lust yuan shen - and so it is stored in the body as a lower emotional holographic blockage - or what's the fancy Chinese term for that? A Yin Gui? - a ghost blockage.

 

Yeah I did that path and so I did become a Ghost Immortal. What happens is that when the Yuan Qi is used up then it no longer can hold the yin qi from shooting out of the eyes via the yuan shen. So then the person becomes dependent on postnatal sources of energy - food or the yin jing of people around them - and the only way to fix that is 6 hours a day of Emptiness meditation, as Wang Liping says - full lotus on hard surface to restore the Yuan Qi.

 

I did the tantra practice doing 5 to 10 mutual climaxes a day in full lotus - with females - for about 8 years - and so I know the limits of the practice. It is a catalyst to clear out lower emotional blockages and it does enable activation of the yang qi energy by opening up the heart. This is called Emptying out the Realm of Desire and the lower realm of form - in Mahayana Buddhism - Master Nan, Huai-chin and Bill Bodri detail the limits of tantra. So then at that point - unless the female also goes deep into Emptiness and basically you are doing spiritual cultivation together whereby she is a dakini - then otherwise the limitation of tantra has been achieved. It is hardly any yang qi cultivated - because you need total purification of the jing energy.

 

What happens is that as long as the yin qi is going up the front of the body and out of the skull into the female - as it does through desire and lust - then it will always also pull up the lower body blockages - the anaerobic bacteria that leaches out of the skull - and so this is why tantra is dirty. The energy is supposed to go down the front of the body - not up the front of the body.

 

I suppose in the practices you are referring to - I read a description yesterday of the aristocracy in China with all the concubines and mistresses, etc. - doing tantra - and so the male in that case would supposedly just be taking in the female's energy without losing his own energy. I suppose that is possible but personally I would not want to do that as it is energy vampirism - feeding and stealing other people's energy. I was taught you always give people energy first when you are healing them and so that is what I always did.

 

But again if you keep giving out the yin qi energy - the problem is that it takes a lot of yin jing to make yin qi and so the energy you are taking in is not the same value as the energy you are giving out - so you lose energy over time.

 

So still I do know of male pervs who want to take energy all the time - but since they are not sublimating it then it never goes past yin jing energy for them and they just have to ejaculate it back out again.

 

So I suppose it is possible to just keep feeding off female energy while sublimating it up - but again the real practice has to be based on True Intention which is Emptiness meditation through purification - and so the bad intention of taking someone's energy on its own would be against the real practice which arises from virtue or Te of the heart-mind.

 

Still yes you can use tantra for healing out lower emotional blockages - and such blockages are also the main source of physical illness I think. Western science is proving more and more that stress is the main cause behind chronic disease which is the main killer in the U.S. And what is stress really - but from male ejaculation addiction which spikes the cortisol and our culture is based on that problem.

 

I mean the teacher I have mainly experienced said it's all good, better and best. For example he told a story of how a couple in his class were using bad intentions to take his energy. Instead of fighting them he just let them take as much energy as they wanted since he can just fill it up as fast as they take it. So what happens is then the couple has to face their experiential truth that the source of the energy is indeed unlimited and so their mentality of trying to take from someone else is wrong - because the energy is not some zero-sum game of winners and losers.

 

But he said he doesn't practice tantra because you take in too much bad energy and then the other qigong master had to clear out the blockages I had taken in. When he did so he said, "interesting." A few months later I asked him what he was referring to and what he had picked up. He said, "all the women." haha. Indeed I used to post stories about my daily tantra experiences and I could have posted many more.

 

Even still when the moon is full I get chased around by females wanting my qi energy. I feel bad if I try to just "conserve" my energy because I know that when females climax they sublimate their energy, whereas when males ejaculate it spikes the stress level. So the original human culture was against "Hoarding the N/om" and the energy was supposed to be used for healing the females. I think Neidan originated from males breaking away from the communal trance dance shamanism and then the males building up the yang shen abilities. This problem is described in the original human cultures. Alchemy first originated out of Ethiopia and then spread to Egypt and the rest of the world from there.

 

So to build up energy is very difficult. I know in the 1980s in China the females in public were not supposed to initiate conversation with the males. And so even during the qigong fever period the gender relations were "traditional" or in the eyes of 2nd Wave feminism - sexist. So when I was building up my energy I was basically harassed - females staring at my genitals and then the reproductive organ would leap up into erection. haha. I still get that sometimes or at least get hit on a lot and chased down. I know some females who have very strong techniques to suck up yin jing energy - basically masturbating while staring at me and standing up.

 

So I tend to think that the Neidan path for immortality relies on basically misogyny since you have to hoard the energy so much. At the same time - the females will chase down the males to get their energy. haha.  On the other hand the modern female, what I call the techno-feminist, is basically trying to be like a male. So then they tend to cut off that part of themselves - the 2nd wave feminist movement tried to teach that males were not needed.

 

 

"As a result, they waste their limited time on earth, chasing after pleasures and desire.... Desiring a long life, they entertain false hopes of attaining longevity, not knowing they have squandered their primordial yang by letting the true vapor escape."

 

p. 87

 

 

Eva Wong's English translation of a Nei Dan (Daoist Internal Alchemy) classic, the Chung-Lü Ch'uan-Tao Chi

 

Regarding the techniques of the bedroom chamber it says:

 

"The vapor of the kidneys leak out easily; therefore it is difficult to obtain the true tiger.... Using techniques of the bedroom chamber these substances can be tempered and refined into the great elixir.... If you think that you can enter the celestial realm by holding onto the external pill and applying fire to it daily, then you are mistaken...." pp. 73, 76, 79

 

 

So the external pill refers to the tantra practice. It has to be ultimately rejected for the internal pill method.

 

So at best the external pill tantra method can be used to restore the mundane essence but not the primordial essence.

 

Once the mundane essence is filled up and the yang vapor emerges then the internal pill method has to be relied on.

 

And most people never even fill up the mundane essence but I can state that after 4 to 6 months of celibacy then if the qi does leave the lower tan tien it converts back to generative fluid and if that fluid is lost - it is a lot of fluid. On the other hand if the  Quick Fire method is used then the fluid can be converted back into yin jing energy. Then a lot of Emptiness meditation is required to restore the mundane generative essence - not to mention the primordial prenatal or yuan jing as the real "internal pill" for neidan.

Edited June 4, 2015 by Innersoundqigong

[opendao]

The text of your school founder refers to the "external kidneys" several times - that is the genitals indeed.

 

 

 

 

There is a footnote after lower body.

 

"That is, the genital area."

 

p. 77.

 

 

 

footnote on page 44

 

"In reply, he said, "In the method of refinement where the True Seed is produced and the dharma-wheel is thereby obtained, it is none other than the count being complete and the external kidneys not lifting."

 

page 72.

 

"As for the correct Tao, ...then the external kidneys absolutely do not rise or move."

 

page 74

 

So what? You and TT were saying that the picture represents genitals and "the end of leakage", trying to prove that it means the celibacy, and that "leakage" is a physical leak of semen. Now you quote about "not rising and moving" the penis, but you don't even bother that the text speaks about the stage when the leakage is already stopped... 

 

Again, you wrote that the celibacy can return yuan jing, that leakage is a physical leak, and by the celibacy it is possible to "stop the leakage". That's all doesn't work. As well as "swallowing the saliva". 

 

Btw, if you compare what you've suggested so far with the list from http://thedaobums.com/topic/35815-minor-schools-and-inconsistent-methods-from-zhong-l-chuan-dao-ji/#entry569095 you can see that you've tried almost everything. Now TT wants you to try "bedroom arts" (I sustain from any jokes here), but it's also in the list.

[Aithrobates]

I always had a problem understanding this whole do-not-ejaculate thing. I mean not only in the context of chinese traditions, but in any tradition. While chastity can be a good thing in certain situations (taking a bit of distance from the passions for a while, keeping yourself for a goddess so that she won't be jealous, etc...) I don't see that a as "high" spirtitual practice.

 

This thread speaks a lot about sex or no sex, keeping your fluids, or your energy for yourself. But one thing is clear, the point of menstruating and ejaculating is reproduction. The fact that we are able to produce new lifes, new bodies from our own resonates with the fact that Empitness produces everything in this world of multiplicity. It's the nature of Reality, it unfolds itself. And we are a part of it, so we work like that too, at our own level. Stoping this process in yourself instead of integrating it with its wider, deeper, cosmic version, can only lead, IMO, to duality, to polarity. How is that wise ? Nature does not work like that.

 

And this Essence we are so concerned with... It does not belong to us, it comes from the Ancestors, we are part of an ancestral stream, we recieved it from our parents and can transmit it to our children. Parents recieved it from their own parents, and so on. I dont think we have the right to claim it for us, we share it with Nature, and more locally with our anscestry. Why thinking it a small thing of our own ? To me it seems fairly individualistic, and so quite incompatible with the goal that is to be a conscious part of the great natural process.

 

When we  come to this world as babies, we start recieving it, untill we reach our adult age, and we are now in a position to emit it. We can materialize things and tell how children have such a big and soft pineal gland, and how it dies later when the sexual glands start to work. But it is only the bodily, fleshy manisfestation of the process, just like creating a new life is transmitting the anscetral flow, while materially our sexual fluids create a body for it.

 

So we want to refuse playing our roles as adults and we do not want to emit ? That is not only quite literally childish, but pointless. Those twos stages are only two halves of a natural process. Choosing one over the other is equally half-wise. Come on! It's not about plumbery! It is about this quality of consciousness we lose when we start to have this "adult" egoistic, isolated, state of mind, and that in the same time we are fully socialized, and identify more and more with humanity, less and less with the rest of Nature.

 

So if you chose to keep your energy for yourself, don't you think that you feed that individualism? I consider that its wiser to let if flow naturally, and to do the same with conscioussness, so that it is not confined to that transitory body. This way we can carry it on to a more sublte body, one day, even maybe to the great body/non-body/wathever that is Emptiness.

 

I studied this subject quite a bit in the context of western civilisation, and I think I know at what point this notion of not ejaculating entered greek philosophy, and the harm it did.

 

In the homeric language, that was still used by early philosophers, you have a system of "souls" that is not so far from the chinese one. A psukhê (a po if you like) and a complex of logos-menos-thumos that is related to shen-qi-jing. The raw power of feelings and passions, that includes attraction and lust was in the domain of thumos.

 

Then came Plato, and it changed the system. Not only did he say that the "three parts" were parts of the unique soul, that is to say that shen, qi and jign are part of po, but he did something else. The three were now logos, thumos and epithumia. The menos was banished, and the "lower parts" were now a thumos and and even lower thumos. The higher, intellectual part of the soul is now logos. And nous (a form of the world noos)  is afterwards considered, as mind, intellect, and as the finest part of the soul. So the two concepts are very close, we can see that logos continued in a different way the archaic term of noos.

 

So you have only a po constitued by a shen, a jing, and another jing o_O

 

An then he told that sexual activity was  not "lower part", not thumos attribution, but the result of spiritual activity when it was turned to the external world. So we have to renounce to sexuality, in order to turn the fluids upside and keep it for a spiritual usage. Sounds familliar?

 

And in a single clever work we have eveything. A single soul and the need to oppose sexuality in order not to give its power to the body. This vision lasted for long and influcenced deeply our civilisation. It would be the position of mainstream christianity, a spirituality we are not sastisfied with so that we turn to the East, only to misinterpret its teachings in the light of that "western unwiseness".

 

D.G. White wrote "Kiss of the Yogini" to show how this western view virtually destroyed the original indian approach of tantrism, and I think that we extended that view to China as well.

 

Last but not least this view is sexist, as menstrual blood is seen as the female counterpart of sperm (even in scientific terms it works: spermatozoids are in sperm, ovualas in the blood, right ?). So while a male can choose not to ejaculate, a woman has to bleed. So women are seen as sprititually inferior. Platonic love, the anti-sexual "love" of the philosopher is stricly male-male.

Edited June 5, 2015 by Aithrobates

[Taoist Texts]

Then came Plato, and it changed the system. Not only did he say that the "three parts" were parts of the unique soul, that is to say that shen, qi and jign are part of po, but he did something else. The three were now, in his lingo, nous (a contracted form of the word noos), thumos and epithumia. The menos was banished, and the "lower parts" were now a thumos and and even lower thumos. So you have only a po constitued by a shen, a jing, and another jing o_O

 

An then he told that sexual activity was  not "lower part", not thumos attribution, but the result of spiritual activity when it was turned to the external world. So we have to renounce to sexuality, in order to turn the fluids upside and keep it for a spiritual usage. Sounds familliar?

 

Thats an excellent find thanks for that.

[damdao]

Then came Plato, and it changed the system. Not only did he say that the "three parts" were parts of the unique soul, that is to say that shen, qi and jign are part of po, but he did something else. The three were now, in his lingo, nous (a contracted form of the word noos), thumos and epithumia. The menos was banished, and the "lower parts" were now a thumos and and even lower thumos. So you have only a po constitued by a shen, a jing, and another jing o_O

 

An then he told that sexual activity was  not "lower part", not thumos attribution, but the result of spiritual activity when it was turned to the external world. So we have to renounce to sexuality, in order to turn the fluids upside and keep it for a spiritual usage. Sounds familliar?

 

I wonder where did he say so.

[Aithrobates]

I wonder where did he say so.

 

Timaeus, Phaedrus, Republic. That's where he talks about the three part of the soul. He uses different terms, but the tripartite theory is constant.

 

The names and the attributions of the parts is not really important, as they are just aspects of one of the two soul. But what strikes me as a reform is that now we have onely one soul, one psukhê, with three parts, while in earlier tradition psukhê and the threefold complex are distincts. And this two "souls" view is very old and very common. It's like hun and po, with many names in different cultures.

 

So by reforming this, Plato effectued a dramatic shift in the consciousness of the civilisation that he was about to influence so much. And that is in that context that the notion of sperm retention appeared for the first time in the west.

 

McEvilley has this paper about Plato: https://www.scribd.com/doc/124767577/The-Spinal-Serpent

And for the archaic notion of the souls, see:  http://press.princeton.edu/titles/182.html

 

 

 

PS: I realise that I was too synthetic about nous. Sorry, I always do that, being too synthetic... The higher, intellectual part of the soul is referred (by Plato) as logos. And as nous is afterward considered, as mind, intellect, and as the finest part of the soul. The two concepts are very close, we can see that logos continued in a different way the archaic term of noos. -- My post will be edited to make that more clear. The reader will have the quoted part of my text in other posts to see the difference.

Edited June 5, 2015 by Aithrobates

[voidisyinyang]

That Spinal Serpent article is good in so much it elucidates the Platonic knowledge - or Pre-Socratic Orphic knowledge of kundalini energy - the Aion up the spine.

 

But as for Platonic ideas somehow spreading to China - via India I guess - this is silly because all this stuff comes from Africa and spread around the world via shamanic cultures out of  Africa.

 

So the end of the article gives one quote from Lorna Marshall and leaves it at that!

 

In fact celibacy training was well known for the original human culture which practices the same trance dance music from before human language was invented!

 

Instead the author writes it off as "pre-history" but these people are still alive as spiritual masters as Dr. Bradford Keeney's work has detailed in several books on the Bushmen healing culture - the Ropes to God is probably the best.

 

But there's half a dozen good books on Bushmen spiritual healing training - its' called Tshoma - the males go off for a month of fasting and trance dancing and this is focused on the young males who are celibate - the idea being to transform their life force energy.

 

So the young females are first menstruation are considered to be the strongest source of life force energy.

 

On the contrary - it's honoring that this power of N/om - boiling energy of the stomach - is actually of female origin.

 

But the females do rely on the males to hunt and so provide iron which is lost through menstruation - and so there are taboos already about females avoiding males when females are menstruating - but the males are out hunting. Meanwhile during full moon the males trance dance all night to suck in and transform the female N/om energy - and send it back to the females as spirit energy - via !Kia trance healing.

 

This ability is the same level as the qigong masters (insert fancy Chinese term here).

 

I have direct quotes from the Bushmen saying that the power of the spiritual energy is based on the "staying power" of the males - aka celibacy.

Edited June 6, 2015 by Innersoundqigong