Zhongyongdaoist

It's easy enough to call it Wen Chang's home and invite him to move in. After all it has his name on it.

I have found your post interesting, but since I was not familiar with Brook Ziporyn or Shi Daosheng AKA Juelang Daosheng, I could not reply immediately. So I had to do some research before even forming any preliminary judgement, a very unusual step on the internet, though offhand I do find the notion of Zhuanzi as a dyed in the wool Confucian to be a little farfetched. Based on what I have found so far, I assume you are referring to this fellow: 覺浪道盛 Juelang Daosheng (1592-1659) and I found some references, first was a book: Enlightenment in Dispute, The Reinvention of Chan Buddhism in Seventeenth-Century China by Jiang Wu Which has several references to Juelang Daosheng. The site on which I found it has a PDF with the usual blank pages, possibly from Google Books, as well as an OCR of the PDF, which I copied for analysis, but I am pretty sure that Dao Bums policy on respecting copyright would prohibit me from post a link to it, but not that the information is out there. Then there was this paper: The Unity of the Three Traditions in the Caodong School during the Late Ming: A Study of Juelang Daosheng's Thought by Tsai Chen-feng Which appeared in the December 2013 issue of Hanxue Yanjiu (Chinese Studies);2013, Vol. 31 Issue 4, p. 19. The English abstract is interesting and suggestive: But I haven't found an English translation, and so I cannot comment beyond noting "Juelang Daosheng's view of Zhuangzi as an esoteric Confucian and Confucius as the great systematizer of the three traditions stands in sharp contrast to the views of other Buddhists", and that at least for now I agree with the other Buddhists. The one thing that I will note is that, when I researched Warring States intellectual history to look at the development of Confucianism in context I saw ideas that appear in the Neiye, in both Mengzi and Zhuangzi with the implication that someone might argue some sort of connection, but with everything else I am working on I have not had time to develop those similarities in greater detail. These are just my preliminary findings. I have not finished with the references to Juelang Daosheng in the above mentioned book and may have more to say after that. As for this "excellent Zhongyongdaoist" fellow that you mention, I hope this doesn't go to his head and he starts insisting people address him as "your excellency", but that may be too much to hope for. ZYD

I haven't had time to write anything specific for this thread, but I have been reviewing my posts in general and have some further comments about some issues that I raise in my review of Benebell Wen's excellent work as mentioned above: I needed to keep a review short and so I did not reference this thread: Agrippa's Doctrine of Occult Virtues, a core concept examined and explained Which deals with the most important important, and importantly, most misunderstood, aspects of Traditional Magic, which is the notion of "Occult Virtues", which is just Latin for "Hidden Powers", and is an aspect of Traditional Magic that was left out of the Nineteenth Century revival of Western magic because its philosophical basis in Plato and Aristotle was no longer understood by the people who were researching magic and trying to understand it in terms that seemed "reasonable" circa 1800, but which had already been seriously corrupted by the Seventeenth Century revival of Epicurean materialism under the guise of "Corpuscular Philosophy", and which meshed well with nominalist version of Christianity, which are the antecedents of modern fundamentalism, as opposed to those influenced by Western Philosophy, which were suppressed even by the Roman Catholic Church during the polemical war with Protestantism, which through the Patrisitc writings had been strongly influenced by not only by Plato and Aristotle, but also by "esoteric" writings, such as the Hermetica. The result being that Occult Virtues were simply dismissed as quint superstitions that owed their influence to the suggestibility of the practitioner and not to any inherent power which they contributed to the practice of magic. The astrological aspects of magic suffered a similar fate, and the result was the creation of "Ceremonial Magic" as a standalone practice based solely on the will power and imagination of the practitioner. So, what does this have to do with Chinese Talismanic Magic? It points back to the importance of these Occult Virtues to the practice of magic in general, which should be rooted in what Agrippa calls "Natural Magic", the subject of the first book of his Three Books on Occult Philosohy, and thus the dependency of magical practice in general, and talismanic magic in particular on the nature, and thus the occult virtues, of those things used as the basis of the talisman. Now the important part of Aristotle's theory for Occult Virtues and thus for Talismans is the Formal Cause, the Form, or in the Greek, morphe, is the source of the inherent potential to become an active "Occult Virtue". Now where this ties in which traditional Chinese practice and its root in Chinese Cosmology is in the traditional Chinese Li/Qi or Principle/Substance Cosmology and its relation with the Aristotelian Hylye/Morphe or matter/form cosmology, which I examine in detail in the posts in the "A Science of Wu Wei?" thread beginning here: While I have mentioned the similarity between Li/Qi and Hylomophism many times in the past on Dao Bums, in these posts I examine it in detail with quotes from the Neiye, Dao De Ching, and the Zhuangzi, and establish the importance of Li, and thus of Li/Qi as an explanatory concept to traditional Daoism. I may also quote some from the Huainanzi, but I can't remember offhand whether I do or not, but I do reference and possibly quote from an essay by Harold Roth in which he basically argues the some point and even cites some of the same references to Zhuangzi's writings as I do, as well as quoting extremely suggestive quotes from the Huainanzi which indicate that the idea continues to influence Daoist thought into the middle Han. That these ideas are important is confirmed by Professor Jerry Alan Johnson's: Daoist Mineral, Plants & Animal – Final Edition Which is basically a text on Chinese "Natural Magic". In his discussion Professor Johnson seems to take the notion that the power or occult virtue of the mineral, plant and animal agents with which he is concerned is inherent in them and is only activated by the practitioner. This impression is confirmed when one looks at his ritual for opening and activating a mineral, i.e. page 101 and elsewhere in a ritual that occupies pgs. 89-101. While some of Professor Johnson's language "imprinting" and "programming"; could be used to give a reductionist interpretation, such as the practitioner is only creating a stone as a physical focal point for a thought form, he also uses the word activate in a way which implies that he is activating something in the "Stone of Power", and that his imprint/programming is only a direction to fulfill one of several possible powers of the stone, such as protect, heal or spiritual development. How one further interprets this is going to depend on their personal ontological commitments, but from a perspective of both Daoist and Western magical tradition, a belief in the Occult Virtues is just as "rational" a belief as any reductionist one, which would write off Occult Virtues on a priori grounds. As a person who has spent decades practicing magic in both Western and Chinese modes, and also understands both the details and implications of post 1900 physics and the history of "the Scientific Revolution", as well as the basis of the earlier worldview and it implications, I favor a belief in the efficacy of Occult Virtues, but I am not going to further debate the subject in this thread. I have addressed it to a certain extent in my posts over the years, and may create a more detailed summary of my criticisms of a reductionist framework. My criticism of reductionism are founded on the potential usefulness of a revival of the notion of formal causes in physics and difficulties with the notion of chance and chaos, and the problems presented to cognitive psychology by the notion that the brain is an "organic computer", based on implications of the mathematics of computability related to the notion that "machines can think", all of which lead me to the strong conclusion that formal causes are by far a more rational approach than reductive materialism and any approach to magic based upon it. Finally, what is the importance of the similarity between Li/Qi and Hylomorphism? These two seem to have arisen independently of each other, they occur at roughly the same time, around 300 BCE, and there is little concrete evidence for, and thus little reason to believe, that they are the result of "cultural diffusion". As independent discoveries they reinforce and tend to confirm the notion that, from both East and West there is a magic and spirituality friendly cosmology based on Formal Causes which has arisen because of the experience and reflection of two different cultures, and that as such it could be argued that these similarities arise because they are a "true" account of the fundamental nature of reality, and that reductionist materialism is a fallacious misdirection in human thought and cultural development and should be abandoned. Taken by themselves these similarities are not enough, but do add weight to the notions I mentioned before for rejecting reductionist materialism. This post has been longer than I originally intended, but I hope that these ideas are interesting and helpful. ZYD

I'm not associated with this school at all: Shen Gong So I cannot say anything pro or con to its approach or its value, however the general information at the site will point you in the right direction, which is do searches under Shen Gong read what's there and think about it. Good luck in your research. ZYD

Thank you for mentioning it. I was going to refer to it myself at some point, but I have been busy and had not had time to come back here to do so. I hope to have time to write a little more in this thread when I can make the time. I am glad you, and apparently, judging by the number of likes it seems to have gotten, other people appreciated it. ZYD

I am afraid that you are mixing things up a bit. Proclus is a couple of centuries after Iamblichus who is a contemporary of Plotinus' disciple and editor Porphory. There is some connection between Iamblichus and the Plotininian school, though in many ways Iamblichus is a reaction against Plotinus' version of Platonism. The issues at stake are complex and I would have to do a little review of sources to say more about the exact connection between Iamblichus and the Plotinian school. Unfortunately Iamblichus is not that clear about the practical details of his Theurgy, though Gregory Shaw has written both extensively and convincingly on the matter. I have not had time to sit down with the latest translations of any of these things, though I have many of them in my library, to be able to say much more about contemporary opinion in these matters. As a final note Julian is as I recall in the Iamblichus line through Maximus the Theurgist. I just did a quick search to confirm on that, the site cited is an excellent source for this type of material. I have mentioned it before on Dao Bums. ZYD

With all due respect SirPalomides, the equivalent rite would be that described in the Hermetic Aesclepius. As I recall Iamblichus is very critical of the "makers of efficacious images", and has something else in mind with "Neoplatonic" Theurgy. Assuming that the descriptions found in Prof. Jerry Alan Johnson's books are accurate the analogy of the Aesclepius is very exact. However I am working from memory here, and while my memory is good, I can't provide exact citations right now, but should it be necessary, I could at some time in the future. ZYD

I always found it a useful feature when it was available and my most vehement gripe after the upgrade was how clumsy the quote function was and it definitely messed with my posting until I figure out how to work around how many problems its seeming simplicity hid. Being able to go back and forth between editing on a word processor on my computer in code and bring it back here to finish it up was a big help to me and also kept a better record of what I had posted. The quality and quantity of my posting has suffered over the past few years because of the change, but my understanding is that bringing in some types of source could pose a security problem. I don't know how serious a problem it could be, but that was a concern in not making it generally available. ZYD

It is my understanding that no Jesuit ever leaves the order. Whatever else they do is done in the service of the order.

Could you give some pointers for further reading on Taiyi Tianzun? I vaguely recall a paragraph or two about him in Eva Wong’s guide and I’d love to learn more. Thanks! Awhile back I posted this in my PPF: He has been a focus of my practice for a long time and I see a real need for him in general, both because he can help to achieve and maintain internal congruence, but also for furthering peace and understanding. The link in the above quote should work, but just in case here is a link to the main page of the site described above: The Taoist Culture and Information Center Bookmark the site is extremely useful. Also, you might find some of the other things I have posted in my PPF interesting. ZYD

Thanks for this dawei, I have been so busy I have not seen this until now. I have downloaded the paper which looks very interesting. The notion of Junzi is very interesting and powerful concept in Chinese thought, one which it is worthy to meditate on. ZYD

First and easiest, peach wood is sacred in Ritual Daoism because of the Peaches of Immortality, which are an important part of Daoist belief. As for the rest of the things that you mention, certainly a Daoshi is going to be able to use these safely and effectively, and even prepare efficacious versions of these for others, but most of what is offered for sale is going to be useless to most people, however it is possible to learn enough through available books to be able to make some of it practical. I reviewed just such a book here: It is practically an encyclopedia of traditional Chinese symbolism as well as practical instructions in traditional Chinese Talismanic Magic. I hope this is helpful. ZYD

In Qigong there is a relationship between qi and blood like there is in TCM as described here: Qi and blood in Qigong Anyone who is seriously interested in Qigong should study TCM enough to understand the underlying traditional Chinese physiology, and how it relates to Qigong practice. It is also very useful to study Chinese herbology and traditional cooking theory. The importance of these is taken for granted by the Chinese, but getting Westerners to take it seriously is more difficult. A good introduction to these ideas is Between Heaven and Earth by Harriet Beinfild and Efrem Korngold, a book which I have been recommending since it came out in the early Nineties. The other aspects that you mention have more to do with religion and magic and are not part of Qigong proper. There is a lot of "superstiion" in religious and magical attitudes about blood, but there is also a core of practical knowledge, but that is another matter and too long and complex to examine now.

Professor Johnson's teaching site is: Temple of the Original Thunder While at the top it is not clear that 2019 registration for his seven year program is closed, it gets around to saying that at the bottom, where it also has a form to be notified if and when a new class series opens up. As I posted a few years back: They seem to agree with me because their guide to buying Daoist books recommend buying . . . (books from the medical qigong series, at the time of my post, the first two, but see below for more recent recommendation, ZYD) Also at the bottom is the list of texts used in his course and it now includes the first three of his Chinese Energetic Medicine series, which, in the earlier version, is what I had recommended in some posts about the same time as the above. These Texts can be purchased here: Order Chinese Energetic Medicine I have the earlier versions of the series which had a different title so I haven't seen or worked with these, but they should be like mine which are hundreds of pages each and packed with useful information, so at $80.00 a piece for the new ones, they are a good investment which could keep someone occupied for one to two years depending on their experience and starting point and lay a good foundation for future practice. I hope this information is helpful. ZYD

A lot of people think that they can just start doing the MCO and that is enough there is a warning about this at the end of Chapter Four: You need to go back to Chapter One: Sometimes an "outer method" of the MCO involving visualization is taught to still the mind, such visualization is not doing the MCO, the MCO cannot by "done" by such methods, it is something that arises naturally when one has reached a deep enough level of meditation and become aware of aspects of oneself of which one is ordinarily unconscious. Do whatever you have to do to sit and forget, if imagining empty water wheels helps, do that, but they are not the MCO. I hope this is helpful. ZYD