Neiye - Section 1 - The Essential Qi

[dawei]

43 minutes ago, Taoist Texts said:

the issue is how the heart is regulated. With qigong or with commonplace morality, such as reducing desires? If the latter then its not 'cultivation'.

 

43 minutes ago, Apech said:

that's a bit limiting on the term 'cultivation' - which is used also in sanskrit 'bhavana'.

 

I recall after about five years of doing Qigong and Medical Qigong, I was at a website and someone asked me, 'what do you cultivate'.  It is the god's honest truth, I had never heard that term used in all my practices and teachers... so I said I don't cultivate anything. The person thought i was trying to play him with words and that was ridiculous and I clearly didn't understand anything about energy practices. 

 

I agree that not all practices are cultivation... or its not clear what they are cultivation in their own terms.  I recall asking a guy who had done 20 years of meditation if he ever felt Qi and he said no

 

 

[dawei]

48 minutes ago, Apech said:

I think Yin/yang is older than this text - the Yijing dated to around 1046 BC.

 

very true... that got me thinking whether Legalist used the concept that much.  I didn't find it in [legalist] Hanfeizi commentary on laozi (first commentary that exists).  But find it in Heshang Gong's commentary...  

 

But searching Guanzi's full text, there is plenty of references, together and apart.   He just doesn't use it in the texts on 'cultivation'.

[Limahong]

1 hour ago, Taoist Texts said:

the issue is how the heart is regulated. With qigong or with commonplace morality, such as reducing desires?

 

Hi Taoist Texts,

 

Does/can the heart regulate on its own ~ as a stand alone?

 

I ask when I think of the fourth chakra as the heart chakra. There are three chakras 'below' it and three 'above' it.

 

Also if the heart is linked to the middle datien, there is the lower datien  and upper datien ~ 'below' and 'above' it respectively.

 

So can the heart regulate by itself ~ if it is part of ONE?

 

What is wrong with desires ~ from the perspective of Nature? Why do they need to be reduced? 

 

Also are desires linked to just the heart? How about the mind?

 

- Anand

 

Edited May 14, 2019 by Limahong
Correct errors.

[Apech]

1 hour ago, dawei said:

 

 

I recall after about five years of doing Qigong and Medical Qigong, I was at a website and someone asked me, 'what do you cultivate'.  It is the god's honest truth, I had never heard that term used in all my practices and teachers... so I said I don't cultivate anything. The person thought i was trying to play him with words and that was ridiculous and I clearly didn't understand anything about energy practices. 

 

I agree that not all practices are cultivation... or its not clear what they are cultivation in their own terms.  I recall asking a guy who had done 20 years of meditation if he ever felt Qi and he said no

 

 

 

Maybe we are going down something of a rabbit hole but anyway I'll press on regardless.

 

'Cultivate' in English of course would be something to do with gardening.  And meditation means to think about something - but is in such widespread use for all kinds of yogic practices and so on that inevitably we would still use it.  Perhaps neither is quite the right word for what we are talking about but we use them anyway.  

 

I 'meditated' for under a year before I started to feel qi - later after some martial arts training, taiji and qigong when I got some to slightly higher level I realised that qi feelings in the body and ordinary feelings in the body were closely related - and that in the broadest terms it's all qi.  There is a difference of course - before and after.

 

I would argue also that stilling your heart and addressing emotions is the most direct and powerful 'technique' (gong?).

 

Who was the target audience for some of these early texts?  The ruling elite, specially the king himself.  This is true for anything coming out of the late Bronze Age/Early iron age - usually these exclusive texts were later 'democratised' and made available for what nowadays would be called the upper/middle classes.  This is because all the skills and so on applied to ruling a kingdom can be applied to yourself - that you become master of your domain as Seinfeld put it

 

e.g.  Horus is both the god of kingship and awareness

the mandalas of medieval India reflect the king (central deity), his court (the attendant deities), his kingdom (the chakra).

in Christian mysticism Christ is King

in Daoism Laotzu gives advice to the sage/king

and so on.

[Limahong]

2 hours ago, Apech said:

... before and after...

 

Hi Apech,

 

When I try to cultivate something (e.g. X) or to have X realized, achieved, attained, substantiated... ~ sensing the difference "before and after" is important.

 

"before and after" entails a temporal connotation and what is/has manifested is dependent on what X is.

 

2 hours ago, Apech said:

I would argue also that stilling your heart and addressing emotions is the most direct and powerful 'technique' (gong?)

 

I have quoted your above argument in relation to the story line when X = qi.

 

"stilling your heart and addressing emotions" is important to me when I was expecting qi as something not defined with words. Why?

 

... because I don't know what qi was... until one fine day...  and I still sense it today.

 

I am not going to define what qi is. Why?

 

To each his/her own... without words.

 

- Anand

 

[vonkrankenhaus]

7 hours ago, dawei said:

2. Jing is the essential aspect for Qi and blood to be in harmony.  There is no more transformational thought of Jing to Qi than there is of Jing to Blood.  Jing seems to stand on its own, yet almost synonymous with Qi. 

3. Is Jing (精), vital essence, the key to Jing (靜), tranquility ,  wu-wei ?

4. Jing is not to be grasped or sought, thus one cannot 'store' it or try to do so as that would go against its own nature.  Being non-active, non-purposeful, non-attentive state, Jing becomes aware as just Qi: JingQi

 

Jing, or "Essence" in the human is polarities and potentials, inherited and acquired.

 

Qi is movement (Yang) between the poles of polarities.

 

Blood is substance (Yin).

 

Substance is moved and formed by movement.

 

So we can say "JingQi".

 

No Polarity = no Movement.

 

"Storage" of Qi really means maintaining a polarity or potential and not the physical storage of a physical substance.

 

Yet, realize that some polarities depend on substance being present.

 

Wu Wei here might just mean not making stuff up to try to explain things not yet understand.

 

 

 

 

 

 

-VonKrankenhaus

[Bindi]

12 hours ago, Taoist Texts said:

the issue is how the heart is regulated. With qigong or with commonplace morality, such as reducing desires? If the latter then its not 'cultivation'.

 

I think emptying the heart of worries and happiness, love and anger, and desire for profit, is not actually achieved by commonplace morality though. Morality is a restriction on these things, more like a suppression of them, the clearing that is being referred to reminds me more of clearing accumulated conditioning and returning to a clear slate. 

 

Re: Cultivation, how does the Neiye refer to its method in this line from later in the text? Maybe a term can be agreed on from this.  

 

修 心 靜 意 

道 乃 可 得 

 

 

 

Edited May 15, 2019 by Bindi

[Limahong]

5 hours ago, vonkrankenhaus said:

Wu Wei here might just mean not making stuff up to try to explain things not yet understand.

 

Hi vonkrankenhaus,

 

Then  無爲  is more likely to encourage...  無-words  ...?

 

- Anand

 

[Bindi]

I think it is important that the Neiye's method of 'reverting back to what is natural' is fundamentally based on opposites, perhaps someone with more general understanding of yin and yang in Chinese history would know whether the opposites referred to in the Neiye are reminiscent of the way they are used in either the Yijing or in Daoism. 

 

The Neiye is being classified as 'proto-Daoist' as far as I can understand it because it doesn't align with Daoist thinking? But does it align with Yijing philosophy? 

 

 

 

[Limahong]

58 minutes ago, Bindi said:

Morality

 

Hi Bindi,

 

Whatever the perception/perspective, I like to believe that morality has a positive presence somewhere within Neiye.

 

- Anand

[Apech]

1 hour ago, Bindi said:

I think it is important that the Neiye's method of 'reverting back to what is natural' is fundamentally based on opposites, perhaps someone with more general understanding of yin and yang in Chinese history would know whether the opposites referred to in the Neiye are reminiscent of the way they are used in either the Yijing or in Daoism. 

 

The Neiye is being classified as 'proto-Daoist' as far as I can understand it because it doesn't align with Daoist thinking? But does it align with Yijing philosophy? 

 

 

 

 

I think we might have to go further through the text to answer that one.  I would be surprised though if were not influenced by the Yijing since it is the classic of all classics for Chinese literature.

 

Calling something proto-Daoist because it doesn't align seems a little perverse to me.  I would suggest that the definition of Daoism is, or should be, much broader than whatever fits with a certain school.  Its also fair to mention that many Chinese philosophies use the word dao in their own ways.

[Bindi]

34 minutes ago, Apech said:

 

I think we might have to go further through the text to answer that one.  I would be surprised though if were not influenced by the Yijing since it is the classic of all classics for Chinese literature.

 

Calling something proto-Daoist because it doesn't align seems a little perverse to me.  I would suggest that the definition of Daoism is, or should be, much broader than whatever fits with a certain school.  Its also fair to mention that many Chinese philosophies use the word dao in their own ways.

 

I've researched a bit about proto-Daoism just now, and found that the “Neiye” 内業 , Daode jing 道德經 , and Zhuangzi 莊子 are all considered to be proto-Daoism/classical Daoism/early Daoism. What I was interested in earlier was in what ways the Neiye is different to the Daode jing in its philosophy and methods, because I was assuming (and might be wildly wrong in this assumption) that Daoists in general look to the DDJ. 

[dawei]

1 hour ago, Bindi said:

 

I've researched a bit about proto-Daoism just now, and found that the “Neiye” 内業 , Daode jing 道德經 , and Zhuangzi 莊子 are all considered to be proto-Daoism/classical Daoism/early Daoism. What I was interested in earlier was in what ways the Neiye is different to the Daode jing in its philosophy and methods, because I was assuming (and might be wildly wrong in this assumption) that Daoists in general look to the DDJ. 

 

I would recommend The Creation of Daoism by Paul Fischer

 

https://digitalcommons.wku.edu/phil_rel_fac_pub/14/

 

[OldDog]

1 hour ago, Apech said:

Calling something proto-Daoist because it doesn't align seems a little perverse to me.  I would suggest that the definition of Daoism is, or should be, much broader than whatever fits with a certain school.  

 

I don't mind the term proto-daoist so much. Its just a device to refer to what came before and lead up to what we previously understood to be the origin and standard for daoism, the DDJ. As long as we keep that in mind then we should be OK. After all, aren't the terms daoism and daoist relatively recent designations themselves?

 

But what do these earlier and contemporary other texts represent? I have to believe that there is some sort of continuity running from antiquity through to today ... from the Yijing through "proto-daoist through Laozi, Chuangzi, Leizi all the way up to current dates. So, what we are talking about as proto-daoist are just a phase along an evolutionary procession.

 

A lesson that was driven home for me came from the Cantong qi. Its main lesson was to show that these collections of things are unified in their being part of a greater continuity.

 

So, I am not too concerned over discussions that seem to want to classify things as belonging to this or that,  being exclusive or inclusive of this tradition or that. The real questions involve what we can learn from these things and does it help us as individuals to construct and practical understandings of our realities.

 

 

 

[dawei]

7 minutes ago, OldDog said:

But what do these earlier and contemporary other texts represent? I have to believe that there is some sort of continuity running from antiquity through to today ... from the Yijing through "proto-daoist through Laozi, Chuangzi, Leizi all the way up to current dates. So, what we are talking about as proto-daoist are just a phase along an evolutionary procession.

 

IMO, you should be reading a lot more of legalist thought and alignment with Daoism.. but we did that before.

https://www.thedaobums.com/topic/38060-legalism-vs-daoism/

 

Not sure that answers your questions but it should broaden the thought. 

[Taoist Texts]

4 hours ago, Bindi said:

Re: Cultivation, how does the Neiye refer to its method in this line from later in the text? Maybe a term can be agreed on from this.  

 

修 心 靜 意 

修 xiu is cleaning and the thing is, unfortunately there is no method to clean heart from desires in Neye. You just do it, simply forcing yourself to desire less and less. Sorry, there is no qigong in Neye apart from that.

[OldDog]

Morality. Does daoism have a morality? And if so, what must it be.

 

4 hours ago, Bindi said:

Morality is a restriction on these things, more like a suppression of them ...

 

I see where you are going. It is just such a line of thinking that makes me want to stop, suspend what I think I know and reconsider what morality ... a daoist morality ... might be. For sure, I don't want to imposed a conventional or contemporary morality on daoism. Which one would I choose? And if I chose, what would adherents to other moralities think. A daoist morality would have to be universal ... all inclusive ... and as pervasive as Dao.

 

If a daoist morality exists, it would have to be consistent with what we are told of the Dao, its impartiality, its workings, its balances. Yet, we are also told of sages being close to Dao and that their behavior of compassion, frugality and humility is laudable. Are these a morality? How do we square them with the impartial working of Dao?

 

I am not ready to say what daoist morality is.

[Taoist Texts]

1 minute ago, OldDog said:

Are these a morality? How do we square them with the impartial working of Dao?

It is simple. Working. What is it that Dao does?

[vonkrankenhaus]

3 minutes ago, OldDog said:

I am not ready to say what daoist morality is.

 

Start here:

Confucius (/kənˈfjuːʃəs/ kən-FEW-shəs;[1] 551–479 BC) was a Chinese philosopher and politician of the Zhou dynasty.

The philosophy of Confucius, also known as Confucianism, emphasized personal and governmental morality, correctness of social relationships, justice and sincerity.

 

Etc.

 

 

 

 

-VonKrankenhaus

[OldDog]

Confucius? Umm, I don't know.

 

Are not Laozi and Zhuangzi fsirly critical of confucian doctrines? Seen as contrived ... gone far astray ... and not natural? Confucian morality may be necessary for social reasons but is it a morality that is fundamental and universal ... close to Dao?

 

Someone earlier suggested that I take a look at legalism ... and now, Confucianism is suggested. Prehaps I should explore those some.

 

 

[dawei]

4 hours ago, Bindi said:

Re: Cultivation, how does the Neiye refer to its method in this line from later in the text? Maybe a term can be agreed on from this.  

 

修 心 靜 意 

道 乃 可 得 

 

What is the reference for this chinese ?

 

And what is your translation ?

 

And relationship to the Neiye?

[Bindi]

2 minutes ago, dawei said:

 

What is the reference for this chinese ?

 

And what is your translation ?

 

And relationship to the Neiye?

 

This was from my copy of the Neiye by Linnell in a later verse, but it seemed relevant because Linnell himself translated 修 as cultivate. My best understanding is that 修 refers to 'repairing' the 心.

[dawei]

4 minutes ago, OldDog said:

Confucius? Umm, I don't know.

 

Are not Laozi and Zhuangzi fsirly critical of confucian doctrines? Seen as contrived ... gone far astray ... and not natural? Confucian morality may be necessary for social reasons but is it a morality that is fundamental and universal ... close to Dao?

 

Someone earlier suggested that I take a look at legalism ... and now, Confucianism is suggested. Prehaps I should explore those some.

 

As the Guodian Loazi text revealed, the Laozi was not critical of Kongzi; so later editions, or someone changed that.  ZZ was critical of everyone who used their brain.  The Neiye was not critical either because the Guanzi collection was a mix of thinkers. 

 

Here is a topic on the six schools if you want:

www.thedaobums.com/topic/38074-the-six-schools-of-chinese-philosophy/

 

 

[Bindi]

5 minutes ago, Taoist Texts said:

修 xiu is cleaning and the thing is, unfortunately there is no method to clean heart from desires in Neye. You just do it, simply forcing yourself to desire less and less. Sorry, there is no qigong in Neye apart from that.

 

If there is no method as you say, then why do you assert that forcing yourself to desire less is the right method? It's not a method that I use.  

 

 

[dawei]

6 minutes ago, Bindi said:

 

This was from my copy of the Neiye by Linnell in a later verse, but it seemed relevant because Linnell himself translated 修 as cultivate. My best understanding is that 修 refers to 'repairing' the 心.

 

Ok, so that is a later section.  Why not just show the english for all to understand some context...