Shan Ren Dao

[Alchemistgeorge]

I'm looking for practical / practice-able information on the Chinese healing system known as San Ren Dao (善人道 "Way of the Virtuous Man"), most famously expounded by Wang Fengyi (?)

 

It seems like this system provides methods of healing by releasing or processing buried emotions? This is done largely through  contemplation?

 

I'm not sure if this is a synthesis of Daoism/Buddhism/Confucianism or a Confucian system, my apologies if I have posted this in the wrong forum.

 

There are two books by Wang Fengyi available in English and another about him, do any of these provide the kind of information that would allow one to practice this system? Are there other resources available in English - other books, websites, DVDs, youtube, classes, etc. There seems to one two week retreat each summer in the US.

 

Quote

The emotional healing system known in China as the “Path of the Real Person” (aka Shan Ren Dao) offers us guidance. It recognizes that un-integrated emotions, false beliefs and old ways of relating lodge inside our bodies where they separate us from our authentic expression. Their presence creates toxins which trigger chronic stress responses. These can in-turn lead to physical issues or disease. Shan Ren Dao Retreat 2018

1

 

• Let the Radiant Yang Shine Forth: Lectures on Virtue by Yousheng Li

• Twelve Characters: A Transmission of Wang Fengyi's Teachings by Wang Fengyi 

• Discourse on Transforming Inner Nature: Hua Xing Tan  by Wang Fengyi 

https://wikivisually.com/wiki/Shanrendao

[KuroShiro]

2 hours ago, Alchemistgeorge said:

I'm looking for practical / practice-able information on the Chinese healing system known as San Ren Dao (善人道 "Way of the Virtuous Man"), most famously expounded by Wang Fengyi (?)

 

It seems like this system provides methods of healing by releasing or processing buried emotions? This is done largely through  contemplation?

 

I'm not sure if this is a synthesis of Daoism/Buddhism/Confucianism or a Confucian system, my apologies if I have posted this in the wrong forum.

 

There are two books by Wang Fengyi available in English and another about him, do any of these provide the kind of information that would allow one to practice this system? Are there other resources available in English - other books, websites, DVDs, youtube, classes, etc. There seems to one two week retreat each summer in the US.

 

 

• Let the Radiant Yang Shine Forth: Lectures on Virtue by Yousheng Li

• Twelve Characters: A Transmission of Wang Fengyi's Teachings by Wang Fengyi 

• Discourse on Transforming Inner Nature: Hua Xing Tan  by Wang Fengyi 

https://wikivisually.com/wiki/Shanrendao

 

It's a very powerful system.

I have only read Twelve Characters, I have Discourse on Transforming Inner Nature to read as well.

Check out Dr. Heiner Fruehauf youtube videos.

 

 

 

Also Sabine Wilms (Twelve Characters translator) site:

https://www.happygoatproductions.com/onlinestore/twelve-characters-a-transmission-of-wang-fengyis-teachings

https://www.happygoatproductions.com/wang-fengyi-and-five-element-healing/

 

 

[Walker]

I attended a weeklong Shan Ren Dao teachings in NE China 5 years ago. There's a lot to say about this body of teachings. I'll try and respond to a few of your questions and comments here. 

 

1. Although Shan Ren Dao does incorporate ideas from Daoism and Buddhism, its biggest influences come from Confucianism.

 

2. That said, there were definitely Quanzhen Daoist priests who participated in this movement while Wang Fengyi was still alive. At that time there were smallish groups of teachers in this "school" who traveled around northern China to give teachings and "說病/shuobing," which I guess you could translate as "talk [out] illnesses." Some of the Daoist priests who were a part of this movement survived the early- to late-20th century era of warfare, the communist revolution, and the Cultural Revolution, and went on to continue preaching some of Wang's ideas within their Daoist temples. His teachings have also spread far and wide throughout the Daoist and Buddhist temple "grapevine" in China. For example, I first found Discourse on Transforming Inner Nature: Hua Xing Tan (《化性談》) in the 太子洞/Taizi Cave on Mt. Wudang back in 2010; the famous Buddhist monk who emigrated to the US, Hsuan Hua Shangren (宣化上人) was also a proponent of these teachings, and I was given a VCD of lectures by a young Buddhist hermit on Mt. Wutai in 2011. The teachings were becoming very popular very quickly during those years. 

 

3. This brings us to an important question: can you nowadays find Daoists monks or nuns teaching Shan Ren Dao? The answer is no--at least not publicly. Why? Last year the Chinese Communist Party, fearing--as it always does--any and all movements that might allow for a concentration of power/influence and/or the empowerment of its citizenry officially labelled these teachings as a "cult," banned the printing and distribution of the relevant texts, forced the closure of numerous Shan Ren Dao schools, forced Liu Shan Ren (劉善人--I think that's him in the YouTube thumbnail in the striped sweater on the right) to stop traveling the country offering teachings, sent cadres to temples to collect and destroy Shan Ren Dao books, and so forth. This "crackdown" affected a lot of people I know, most of whom have more or less walked away from Shan Ren Dao (either teaching, running schools, or printing books) in order to stay out of jail and not be tortured. It is a shame, but hardly surprising given Xi Jinping's predilection to use the types of techniques of governance he appears to have learned during his youth in the Cultural Revolution. Contrary to what images of glamorous-looking skyscrapers and luxury cars in Shanghai and Shenzhen might suggest, the fact is that times are always tough in countries where authoritarianism reigns. 

 

4. I don't know if there are any other English resources out there. For the record, Transforming Inner Nature: Hua Xing Tan was not written by Wang Fengyi, it was written by a student in this school of thought whose name escapes me (I think this person may have studied directly with Wang, but I'm not sure). At any rate, just like many self-cultivation teachings from China, while reading books is a great way to pick up the knowledge, you'll always be missing something by not training with the people in the "lineage" (or whatever word better applies here). Liu Shan Ren, for instance, devotes part of his book to talking about how long it took for him to really learn how to treat people's illnesses with oral teaching from his master--if I recall correctly, it was a long process taking years if not decades. Having been through a Shan Ren Dao teaching session, I can tell you that when you are in a group of people offering public confessions, singing and chanting together, sleeping and eating under the same roof, forbidden to leave except for two trips to a local bathhouse in a week, forbidden to even talk, forbidden to do any other cultivation practices one may have learned elsewhere, etc., then a certain "qi" is created, and it puts people into a state of high malleability, concord, and openness; in this environment various types of catharsis are possible, and indeed I witnessed a lot of people (myself included) be quite deeply affected. The person I accompanied there, for example, had more or less lost his mind and been on the run in China for 3 years in a state of such madness that all the Western psychiatrists in Shanghai had declared him incurable; after the week long class, he went and lived as a guest in a Daoist temple for three months and then eventually returned to his family. He recovered his mental health (the Daoists are probably most to be thanked for this, as dozens or hundreds of hours of rituals were done on his behalf) and eventually he returned to his family and later was able to finish high school and go to college in the US, where I think he is now, and doing fine. So, in sum, no matter how deep the inspiration Transforming Inner Nature: Hua Xing Tan gives you might be, it is unlikely to come close to actually participating in these teachings; if you can afford it, the class in the US might be worth going to (traditionally these teachings were offered for free in China, but that probably was only possible thanks to the contributions given by wealthy individuals; in the US, where millionaires and billionaires don't seem to prone to patronizing wandering sages, I guess tuition of some sort might be necessary). If you were inspired enough spend 5+ years becoming fluent in Chinese and adventuring in off-the-beaten-track China, you probably would be able to find a way to study firsthand in the underground there. 

 

5. I should add that while I witnessed some impressive healings during the course I took, they were all on the mental/emotional level. I've heard many stories about people's physical illnesses being improved or cured by Shan Ren Dao "talking [out] illness," but I never saw it with my own eyes.

 

6. The famous modern TCM doctor Liu Lihong (劉力紅) was able to get a graduate program for researching Shan Ren Dao off of the ground at Guangxi University of Traditional Chinese Medicine several years before the crackdown last year. It is possible that this graduate program has survived, but even if it has, I suspect it has been severely "harmonized," as they say (just like the "qigong tuina department" at Xiyuan Hospital in Beijing where I asked a doctor how they incorporate qigong into their treatments. His answer? "We don't do any qigong here, that's just on the sign." Sigh. PRC. Fuck.)
 

7. Transforming Inner Nature: Hua Xing Tan heavily emphasizes the 5-phase correspondences that show up in the 5 zang and 6 fu organs, the 5 virtues, relationships, and so forth. This kind of teaching can probably fairly accurately be called "Confucian." It also talks about the 3 different types of "human nature," how they relate to each other, and what we must do to address them in our training. All of this was a big part of the course I attended, but what was perhaps more important were 1. group confession, 2. group vow-making, 3. public expressions of gratitude for all those Confucianism typically places "above us" in its conception of human relationships, 4. 認不是--learning to identify and admit to our own shortcomings whenever we find ourselves unhappy with others, 5. 找好處, learning to think about the good in others the moment we are unhappy with them, and 6. reciting certain healing affirmations with special intonations that in some ways bear a resemblance to the famous "six healing sounds" of Daoism and Tientai Buddhism. Some of the vows we were encouraged to make (no sex before marriage, ever, being one example; also, never taking a piss outdoors, even in the woods; never having sex outside of our homes, even in a paid-for hotel room) were arguably quite out of step with the times. Daoists tend not to be so rigid in their prescriptions for non-monastics, recognizing that nature does not always conform with the social standards of a particular place, time, and people,

 

That's all I can think of. Good luck. 

Edited September 5, 2018 by Walker