Page 424 - The Encyclopedia of Taoism v1_A-L

DU GUANGTlNG

Du Guangting

850-933; zi: Binsheng ttr M; haG: Guangcheng xiansheng
.nX;7t~ (Elder of Wide Achievement)

Life. Little is known of Du Guangting's background. He appears to have been
a native of Chuzhou wHH (Zhejiang), but his family may also have established
a residence in a district close to Chang'an. No information has survived on his
family, but his father must have held some important office in the government
since Du studied at the Directorate of the Sons of State (Guozijian ~ rid),
the agency in charge of schools in the capitals that admitted only the sons of
ranking bureaucrats. He was apparently a diligent student who devoted four
out of five days to the study of the classics, histories and philosophers as well
as to mastering the rhetorical forms of official documents. In short he received
a typically Confucian education whose purpose was to prepare a student for
the civil service examinations and eventually a government position.
Unfortunately, he failed the examinations about 870. So he repaired to
Mount Tiantai (*Tiantai shan, Zhejiang) where he became the disciple of
a Taoist master. He spent the next five years or so learning Taoism. In 875,
on the advice of a chief minister, Tang Xizong (r. 873-88) summoned Du to
Chang'an where he conferred a purple robe-one of the highest honorary
distinctions bestowed on the clergy-on the priest and appointed him to the
office of Drafter of Compositions at Imperial Command (wenzhang yinzhi X.
~ ~ 1fj~) . His responsibilities in that post included writing documents for the
emperor, but he also served as a kind of court chaplain and performed Taoist
rituals on the behalf of the throne and state. His secular education served him
well at court. The first three juan of his collected works- the Guangcheng ji
.!J.X; 1t (Anthology of Wide Achievement; CT 6I6, seventeen juan, originally
IOo)-contain his addresses to the throne on a host of matters, addresses that
other ordinary officials were also submitting. In addition, he apparently also
served as Grand Academician (da xueshi *-* ±) at the Institute for the Ven-
eration of the Mystery (Chongxuan guan *~ito, an official Taoist school
in the *Taiqing gong-the temple for the dynasty's veneration of Laozi as
its ancestor- just south of the palace. In 88I Du accompanied the court on
its journey to Chengdu when it fled Chang'an as the rebel Huang Chao Ji.
:m approached. In 885 he returned with the emperor to the capital where he
found widespread destruction of churches and libraries.