Page 285 - The Encyclopedia of Taoism v1_A-L

THE ENCYCLO PE D I A OF TAO I SM A - L

Changchun zhenren xiyou ji

Records of a Journey to the West
by the Real Man Changchun

This short narrative work (CT 1429) was written in 1228 by Li Zhichang * it
'ffi (n93-1256; Qing Xitai 1994, I: 338-40), who was *Quanzhen patriarch from
1241 to 1256. It tells about the travels of *Qiu Chuji and eighteen of his disciples
from Shandong to Inner Asia at the summons of the Mongol emperor Chinggis
khan (Taizu, r. 1206-27). A convocation in Chinese, drafted by an unknown
counselor, reached Qiu in 1219; he left Shandong for Beijing, and Beijing for
Inner Asia in 1220. The chronicle of the epic journey, during which one disciple
met his death, and the poems written by Qiu at all major moments of the
journey compose most of the narrative. The party eventually met the khan
near Samarkand in the spring of 1222 and stayed with him for nearly a year.
The khan was pleased with Qiu, entrusting him with the direction of all of
China's Taoists and granting privileges to abbeys including fiscal exemption.
The return journey, aided by the Mongols, was much faster and is described
as something of a triumphal march.
Parts of the dialogue between Qiu and Chinggis were noted down and
transmitted in the Xuanfeng qinghui lu 1r oo.m~~ (Accounts of Felicitous
Meetings with the Mysterious School; CT 176), dating from 1232, and fit the
traditional genre of dialogues between a sovereign and his Taoist adviser. Qiu's
advice focused not on his ascetic way, but on the emperor's own duty which is
to secure peace and prosperity for his subjects. Therefore, both Confucian and
Taoist traditions credit Qiu with saving many Chinese lives. What is certain
is that from that time onward the Quanzhen institution was able to rescue a
large number of people from the Mongol soldiers.
The Xuanfeng qinghui lu wa probably compiled by Yelii Chucai IIHf~
*;1" (n89- 1243), a Qitan adviser to Chinggis and one of the earliest sinicized
high-ranking officers of the Mongol emperors. Yelii, however, who returned
to Beijing shortly after Qiu, also wrote his own record of his travels to the
West, the Xiyou lu gsjaf~ (Account of a Journey to the West; 1229), which
is mostly a polemical account of his acquaintance with the Quanzhen patri-
arch. A staunch Buddhist aristocrat, Yelii came to dislike Qiu's manners, and
his ad hominem attack was exploited by later Buddhist polemicists against the
Quanzhen organization.