Page 106 - The Encyclopedia of Taoism v1_A-L

66 T HE ENC YC LO PE DIA OF TAO ISM VOL . I

This pattern was to become even more common in ensuing centuries. Zhao
Gongming ~ 1,; ~ is named in *Tao Hongjing's own notes in the Zhengao
as a fever demon (IO.I7b). However, the Niiqing guilii. names Zhao as one of
the demon lords just mentioned- and hence as a spirit capable of rising from
demonic to divine status. This was precisely what happened. By Song times,
Zhao had become a Taoist spirit-general, one of the Prime Marshals (yuanshuai
j[; BrjJ). His powers, and those of his subordinates, could then be drawn upon
by Taoist priests and lay ritual masters (*fashi). Similar careers- from object
of popular cult to a place in the Taoist pantheon- may be traced for other
figures who became important in Song and later times, e.g. *Wen Qiong and
Ma Sheng HiJ MJ (Lagerwey 1987C, 241- 52; Cedzich 1995; Davis E. 2001, esp.
278- 79 note 14, and 284-87 note 49). However, this is not to say all followers
of such deities took cognizance of the Taoist "superscriptions" that turned
the gods of the people into Taoist spirit-functionaries (Katz P. R. 1990; Katz
P. R. 1995a). Nor was it the case that the tensions between local cults, on the
one hand, and Taoism (together with central government authority), on the
other, had become completely relaxed. State officials, sometimes themselves
trained in Taoist exorcistic techniques, might still come into conflict with local
deities and their supporters (BoltzJ. M. 1993a).
Although the barriers separating the Taoist/ divine from the popular / de-
monic became even more permeable during Song times, they still continued
to exist, and the Song produced its share of "demon statutes": the Shangqing
gusui lingwen guilii L:ffl1tfllHix;ift (Devil's Code of the Spinal Numi-
nous Script of the Highest Clarity; CT 461), edited by *Deng Yougong some
time before II16, and several others. However, these new statutes were very
different from the medieval Niiqing guilii. The Song statutes address demons
themselves-such as those that attach themselves to or possess humans-and
also members of the lower echelons of the Taoist otherworldly administra-
tion, such as spirit generals and their minions (and even Taoist ritual masters),
who fail to protect people from demons. Such statutes then go on to specify
the punishments to be suffered by the guilty. Hence, disease and misfortune
were no longer attributed to the misbehavior of the afflicted, to human sin-
ners, but instead to the demons and other beings that had allowed people to
be harmed in the first place (Davis E. 2001, 22-23, 41-42). The medieval link
between misfortune and immorality had been severed, and thus the forces
of the spirit world were expected only to behave properly and leave people
alone (or help them), not to enforce a revealed Taoist moral code.
The three modes of interaction between Taoism and demonology delineated
above may appear to represent chronological phases. Contemporary practice,
however, evinces the continued prevalence of each of those several modes of
interrelationship. For instance, the horoscopic calculations, sometimes carried