Neidan vs Alchemy: The object vs The process

[dawei]

Neidan is best translated as elixir, which is an object.  Alchemy (the 'inner' is a redundant qualifier really) is the process intended to make that object.

 

 

Yes. Alchemy includes all of that and more.

 

I don't think inner is redundant as most associate that to "nei"...   

 

But I think your point is all Alchemy is inner in the end... even outer (ingestion of chemicals) is an inner process (?)

[Taoist Texts]

So your point is neidan is the object... the end goal...  and Alchemy is the process?

Yes

 

I play the piano is the object...

the piano is an instrument for  playing which is the process to produce a phenomena of pleasant soundwaves.

I push on the piano keys and produce sounds when linked together is the music I intended to make... the process.

yes thats the process the goal of which is music

[Taoist Texts]

I don't think inner is redundant as most associate that to "nei"...   

 

But I think your point is all Alchemy is inner in the end... even outer (ingestion of chemicals) is an inner process (?)

Thats true but there is more to it. Some say that the actual physical manipulations in the laboratory alchemy are only the visual aids for inner work.

[opendao]

2nd edit - For what it's worth, I try to avoid the labels internal alchemy and neidan. I don't think they add anything to our understanding, communication, or development. 

 

Dao is more then enough, but the practical Dao schools uses Neidan semantics a lot. Like 内丹术 金丹 (internal alchemy art of the golden elixir) as a common name of a  school. The metaphors like "remedy", "cinnabar" can help to explain some subtle things. Same as "alchemy" as a process of "refinement". So Chinese masters don't avoid it, so what's a point to avoid and invent English explanations? All explanations really depend on the level of the person who explains... Even Dao as a term has a lot of different sides. So I prefer to use Neidan and Dao. They connect people to the root, to the tradition.

[dawei]

Dao is more then enough, but the practical Dao schools uses Neidan semantics a lot. Like 内丹术 金丹 (internal alchemy art of the golden elixir) as a common name of a  school. The metaphors like "remedy", "cinnabar" can help to explain some subtle things. Same as "alchemy" as a process of "refinement". So Chinese masters don't avoid it, so what's a point to avoid and invent English explanations? All explanations really depend on the level of the person who explains... Even Dao as a term has a lot of different sides. So I prefer to use Neidan and Dao. They connect people to the root, to the tradition.

 

my gut feeling is that the weird terminology shift was influenced by Zen's crazy antics and results.  

 

Most of these schools are a product of "The Three are One"... and IMO it would be remiss to not think that the three truly did influence.

 

But your point on simplifying terminology is good..  maybe more so for the western audience.

[voidisyinyang]

The neidan t-shirt test (內丹 汗衫 驗) is a compatibility test between two people (in any combination: straight, gay, bi, etc.) in an on-going sexual relationship. It was submitted by a TaoCurrents reader after seeing my article Merging Essences: Sex, Sexuality And Resonance for Life And Afterlife. In Taoist thinking, sexual practice and sexual intercourse exchange chi energy between the partners for health, longevity and pairing or bonding. Although sexual chi energy is mostly invisible, some of it is very visible in the form of body fluids like semen, vaginal effusion and sweat. (Wile, Art Of The Bedchamber, pp. 6, 49.) When absorbed, sexual chi energy can measurably affect the partner’s physiology. For example, modern clinical studies confirm that semen can stimulate like an antidepressant¹ and intense estrogen exposure can alter a man’s appearance and physiology^2,3. Changes in physiology (such as scent) can be accompanied by changes in psychology according to another clinical study⁴. If the partners are compatible, then the changes in appearance, scent and mentality will be positive. If they are not compatible, then those changes can be negative. The neidan t-shirt test evaluates specifically the change in scent of the test-taker in a new relationship.

 

oh yeah Neidan is definitely a trendy Song dynasty marketing term.

 

http://taocurrents.org/category/sexual-practice/

[opendao]

my gut feeling is that the weird terminology shift was influenced by Zen's crazy antics and results.  

 

At some point in time, people have changed and stopped understanding ancient explanations, like Dao De Jing. So masters have started to use the alchemy terminology to explain things in a more clear way, according to people's change.

Then Chan became more popular and again, for mere people masters have started to use Buddhist terminology. At the modern time, in the West, very often we need to explain things using Christian terminology. It's a part of the culture ("wen") inside a person. Same as the language. That's why some people are so confused and cannot get though the Daoist terminology. It covers a few thousand years, many teachers, schools, approaches to explain and teach. Moreover, modern Western approach is very secular, our alphabet, language, logic etc are not really good to learn sacred things..

[steve]

Dao is more then enough, but the practical Dao schools uses Neidan semantics a lot. Like 内丹术 金丹 (internal alchemy art of the golden elixir) as a common name of a  school. The metaphors like "remedy", "cinnabar" can help to explain some subtle things. Same as "alchemy" as a process of "refinement". So Chinese masters don't avoid it, so what's a point to avoid and invent English explanations? All explanations really depend on the level of the person who explains... Even Dao as a term has a lot of different sides. So I prefer to use Neidan and Dao. They connect people to the root, to the tradition.

I have no problem using words like alchemy and neidan to refer to a specific practice or process as in the example you cite.

My comment was related more to the use of alchemy and neidan as generic terms relating to heterogeneous groups of practices.

I don't find such generic usage to be useful. 

On the other hand, I do respect the effort to be clear in our use of terminology but in my experience such discussions are rarely productive. 

[opendao]

I have no problem using words like alchemy and neidan to refer to a specific practice or process as in the example you cite.

My comment was related more to the use of alchemy and neidan as generic terms relating to heterogeneous groups of practices.

I don't find such generic usage to be useful. 

On the other hand, I do respect the effort to be clear in our use of terminology but in my experience such discussions are rarely productive. 

 

Generic usage is useful only if we can highlight the common principles between different schools. My teacher has done this work (based on his knowledge of texts and practices in various schools), so behind all differences in the terminology and practices, we can say that there is one common principle. And it is the same not only for the single cultivation, but also for the external alchemy and pair cultivation. That's why in texts we see Great Dao, Dan Dao, "3 teachings are one" - ancient masters understood it very well. 

[Taoist Texts]

Yes now we are ready to proceed. The baker bakes bread. Baking involves taking flour water eggs mixing kneading putting into oven taking out when ready. Thats how a loaf of bread is made. How is the neidan pill made?

 

The neidan pill is made by manipulating bodily energies according to a secret recipe.

Everybody agreable with this definition? Is this the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?

[opendao]

The neidan pill is made by manipulating bodily energies according to a secret recipe.

Everybody agreable with this definition? Is this the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?

 

just simply wrong 

[dawei]

The neidan pill is made by manipulating bodily energies according to a secret recipe.

Everybody agreable with this definition? Is this the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?

 

maybe start by defining the neidan pill and what role that plays.

[voidisyinyang]

From that first link you posted - neidan originally refers to the "External pill" and so it's application is limited. It refers to the purification of the mundane energy - but nevertheless it's still mundane energy.

 

I did a blog post on this actually.

 

http://innersoundqigong.blogspot.com/2015/06/on-moving-of-yin-and-yan-exercise.html

 

 

"The dragon and tiger, respectively, are the yang and yin components of mundane generative energy."

 

That's internal pill - but it's the yin elixir.

 

hold on.

 

yeah internal pill - but the first stage while the 2nd stage is weidan as external pill for immortality.

Edited June 6, 2015 by Innersoundqigong

[Taoist Texts]

maybe start by defining the neidan pill and what role that plays.

 

Sure. According to 

Eva Wong (trans.) - The Tao of Health, Longevity, and Immortality (Chung-Lü Ch'uan-Tao Chi)

 

1. It cures diseases just like the waidan does 身病、年病，所治之药而有二等：一曰内丹，次曰外丹。”  

2. it comes from the heart and the kidneys 当以详陈内丹之理，内丹之药材出于心肾

3 i makes the adepts immortal in spirit "Lu asked;"You have told me that when we attain the golden pill, we will  shed our shells, rise to immortality, and return to the ten islands. "

 

Since the neidanists are unable or unwilling to come up with a simple definition we will make use of the one above and turn to the next issue which is alchemy.

 

Alchemy is a religious process of making the elixir which includes not just the bodily energies manipulation but the overal human condition of the alchemist. In other words - the making of neidan is the recipe only, the alchemy is the Dao, the cosmos, the gods, the humanity, the alchemist and as a distant last - the recipe. Thats what makes them so vastly different.

[opendao]

Sure. According to 

Eva Wong (trans.) - The Tao of Health, Longevity, and Immortality (Chung-Lü Ch'uan-Tao Chi)

 

1. It cures diseases just like the waidan does 身病、年病，所治之药而有二等：一曰内丹，次曰外丹。”  

2. it comes from the heart and the kidneys 当以详陈内丹之理，内丹之药材出于心肾

3 i makes the adepts immortal in spirit "Lu asked;"You have told me that when we attain the golden pill, we will  shed our shells, rise to immortality, and return to the ten islands. "

 

Since the neidanists are unable or unwilling to come up with a simple definition we will make use of the one above and turn to the next issue which is alchemy.

 

Alchemy is a religious process of making the elixir which includes not just the bodily energies manipulation but the overal human condition of the alchemist. In other words - the making of neidan is the recipe only, the alchemy is the Dao, the cosmos, the gods, the humanity, the alchemist and as a distant last - the recipe. Thats what makes them so vastly different.

 

Now anybody can open Neidan books, and find "Dao, the cosmos, the gods, the humanity, the alchemist and as a distant last - the recipe", so there is absolutely no difference between Neidan and Alchemy.

 

Damn, major texts in Neidan literature are about what is Dao and how it manifests in cosmos, but this point was totally missed.

 

So basically, returning to the beginning, we see that what Taoist Texts defined as an "alchemy" is the same as Neidan. It's not surprising, because there is nothing else.

[Taoist Texts]

To pinpoint the difference between the technological approach of neidan and the holistic  way of alchemy lets garner some historical substantiation from the western hemisphere:

 

Religiosity

 

Martin Luther,  the father of the Protestant Reformation:

"The science of alchemy I like well, and, indeed, 'tis the philosophy of the ancients. I like it not only for the profits it brings in melting metals, in decocting preparing, extracting, and distilling herbs, roots; I like it also for the sake of the allegory and secret signification, which is exceedingly fine, touching the resurrection of the dead at the last day. For, as in a furnace the fire extracts and separates from a substance the other portions, and carries upward the spirit, the life, the sap, the strength, while the unclean matter, the dregs, remain at the bottom, like a dead and worthless carcass; even so God, at the day of judgment, will separate all things through fire, the righteous from the ungodly."

 

 

Nicolas Flamel

 

26. Thou hast now the treasure of all worldly felicity, which I a poor country clown of Pointoise did accomplish three times in Paris, in my house, in the street des Ecrivains, near the chapel of St. Jacques de la Boucherie, and which I Flammel give thee, for the love I bear thee, to the honour of God, for His glory, for the praise of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

[Taoist Texts]

Personal Virtues

 

 

The true alchemist seeks sanctity rather than wealth: 'he on whom the Most High has conferred the knowledge of this Mystery esteems mere money and earthly riches as lightly as the dirt of the streets. His heart and all his desires are bent upon seeing and enjoying the heavenly reality of which all these things are but a figure.'3 Thomas Charnock advises the would-be adept that 'if you thinke to obtaine your Intent, / Fear God and keepe his Comandement'.4 Alchemy was not intended for personal benefit, and we are told repeatedly that the Art should be used for 'the glory of [God and] His most Holy Name, and for the good of thy suffering fellow man*.5 If you 'desire to struggle with this process', John Dastin advised, you 'ought not to approach it unless you have a mind that is pure and dedicated to God, and humbly beseech him for help'.6 Purity was an essential prerequisite of success for the alchemist:

 

Iyfe thow wilt thys warke begyn.

Than schrevy the clene of alle thy Seyne:

Contryte in hert wyth alle thy thowght.

And ever thenke on hym that the der bowght.7

 

We are told that the alchemist should be 'Sober, Honest, and Meeke'.8 The medieval alchemists sometimes recommended a fairly conventional piety:'take thee to thy Beades and praye', Pierce the Black Monk admonished, and proceed with 'Prayers, Penaunces, and Piety'.9 George Ripley advised the aspiring alchemist to

 

Live clene in soule, to God doe none offence;
Exalt thee not but rather keepe thee Lowe,
Ells wyll thy God in thee no Wysdome sowe.10

 

The ungodly excluded themselves from mastery of the Art: 'God gives not this gift to the wicked, who despise His word, but to the godly who strive to live honestly and quietly in this wicked and impure world, and to lend a helping hand to the needy brethren'."

 

The alchemical outlook sometimes implied a degree of withdrawal from mundane activities. One alchemist advises a quietist asceticism: 'let your minds and thoughts be turned away from all things earthly, and, as it were, created anew and consecrated to God alone'.12 The alchemist, according to Henry Pinell, should 'live a serious and private life, free from all other employment and businesse in the world'.13 The alchemical art, however, required more than a personal cleanliness of spirit and an ascetic quietism.

 

And he that will come thereby.

Must be meeke, and full of mercy:

Both in spyrit and in Countenaunce,

Full of Cheriti and good Governaunce ...

And all the ryches that he ys sped.

To do God worschyppe with Almes deede.14

 

William Bloomfield admonished those who aspired to obtain the Stone that they should 'to the Poore be not unkind... be gentle to all men ... Fatherles and Widows have alwaies in thy minde.*'5 A late seventeenth-century alchemist informs us that, although 'Divine Truths are adumbrated' in the spagyric art, *it gives not the possession thereof, which is alone Entailed
upon that Divine excellency that never fails; Charity'.16

 

 

Spirituality and the Occult

Brian Gibbons

[Taoist Texts]

By collecting higher and higher levels of the "immortal medicine". And letting this medicine refine your spirit. You don't even need written language to do this. Though correct words from a true teacher can be a great aid.

Exactly. This is how the neidan pill is done. Something is being manipulated. What is not a part of the equation in neidan though? The manipulator. What kind of a person he is does not matter, his relationship with the fellow humans (De) does not matter, his relationship with the universe (religion) is non-existent.

 

The latter is attested by the vehement abhorrence of religion by the modern neidanists, the former is proven by textual analysis.

[Aithrobates]

"Alchemy" is based on arabic article "al" and ancient greek "khumos". "Khumos" is exactly equivalent to "dan".

So yeah from a stricly linguistic point of view Neidan = Inernal Alchemy. In the west too the name of the goal was applied to the name of the practice. You're fighting over labels ^^

[Taoist Texts]

 

"Alchemy" is based on arabic article "al" and ancient greek "khumos". "Khumos" is exactly equivalent to "dan".

So yeah from a stricly linguistic point of view Neidan = Inernal Alchemy. 

 

 

 

• alchemy (n.) 
• mid-14c., from Old French alchimie (14c.), alquemie (13c.), from Medieval Latin alkimia, from Arabic al-kimiya, from Greek khemeioa (found c.300 C.E. in a decree of Diocletian against "the old writings of the Egyptians"), all meaning "alchemy." Perhaps from an old name for Egypt (Khemia, literally "land of black earth," found in Plutarch), or from Greekkhymatos "that which is poured out," from khein "to pour," related to khymos "juice, sap" [Klein, citing W. Muss-Arnolt, calls this folk etymology]. The word seems to have elements of both origins.

 

 

 

 

 

丹 (radical 3 丶+3, 4 strokes, cangjie input 月卜 (BY), four-corner 7744₀, composition ⿻冂亠)

2. cinnabar (native HgS)
4. vermilion (artificial HgS used as pigment)
6. (medicine): tablet, capsule, pill

 

 

 

 

 

 

You're fighting 

fighting?;

[Ish]

- 

Edited July 26, 2016 by Ish

[Aithrobates]

fighting?;

 

Fighting is not a good term to describe and animated discussion, an argument ? Is it too strong ? English is not my language. I'm sometimes not good with nuances... Anyway the cute smiley was there too show that is was not a serious statement ^^ .

 

As for the definitions, I was referering to khumos and dan being images of the elixir in theirs respective contexts. And so the western and eastern practice use the same referent to name themselves. But this is only partly relevant, as there are many other names.

[Taoist Texts]

How do you experience your neidan pill? Is it in meditation?

actually yes. At first you have to be still for it to incept, then as it matures it is felt inside at all times.

[hagar]

Discussions such as these are not really all that fruitful, and can possibly lead to confusion of someone potentially able to reckognize and start the practice.

 

In my experience, and probably I am not alone in this, reading Nei Dan texts is as informative as reading notes while not being trained jn music. 

 

I´ve practiced internal alchemy for a decade, yet haven´t started to grasp the initial subtleties yet. The only thing I have learnt is that fundamentally what you call it, and what text you read is totally irrellevant, as much as having a degree in geology can harness the heat in a volcano.

 

When the Daoist canon states that the subtleties must be intuited, it´s an understatement. 

 

If you want to practice, find a teacher. It takes fire to start a fire.

 

Don´t waste your time.

 

h

[Taoist Texts]

Thanks for sharing Hagar

Discussions such as these are not really all that fruitful, and can possibly lead to confusion  

 

I´ve practiced internal alchemy for a decade, yet haven´t started to grasp the initial subtleties yet. 

 

 

 

If you want to practice, find a teacher 

I dont mean to pry but if i may..is that how you started 10 years ago? With a teacher?