Page 584 - The Encyclopedia of Taoism v1_A-L

JIAO 543

petitioning," zhangfa ~1! , appear, at least since the end of the Six Dynasties,
to have been specifically connected with the jiao liturgy. The term zhangjiao
mmt "offering (that includes) a petition," is frequently mentioned in Tang
ritual manuals, while the Sui dynasty author Fei Changfang Jl~ff5 (writing
in 597) anachronistically attributes the origin of a whole system of zhangjiao
to the first Celestial Master, '*Zhang Daoling (see Li Xianzhang I968, 204 and
2I3-14). It is clear, furthermore, from the description in the Suishu, that the
jiao liturgy of this time was viewed as specifically addressed to the high god
of the firmament, *Taiyi, as well as to various other stellar deities, including
the administration of human destinies located in the Northern Dipper. The
same focus is evident throughout the Tang dynasty and in the early Song.

Song to present day. However, it is clearly the all-inclusive compensation of
the (subordinate) spirits that assisted the priest in performing his tasks that
constituted the rationale for adding a jiao at the end of a zhai service. The
liturgists of the early Song dynasty generally attribute this new system to *Du
Guangting, who is said to have instituted the tradition of performing an Offer-
ing of Thanksgiving (xie'en jiao ~ ,~, M), either as a direct continuation of the
zhai service, or in a separate ceremony on another day (preferably taking place
at a sacred grotto in the mountains). A special reason for this development was
the growing importance in this period of a host of new martial spirits derived
from the emerging traditions of exorcism, spirits who were invited as special
protectors of the sacred area in a newly-designed ritual called Announcement
(*fabiao), performed at the very outset of the program.
Some liturgists of the period of the Five Dynasties protest against the new
emphasis on the jiao within the zhai liturgy, claiming that it distorts the focus
of this liturgy by shifting attention to subordinate deities, at a point when the
supreme deities addressed in the zhai have already left the scene (presumably
escorted by these subordinate deities). A somewhat related stance is repre-
sented by the founders of the *Lingbao dafa (Great Rites of the uminous
Treasure), who comment critically on the expansion of thejiao in their time,
and on the "separation" [sic] of the zhai and the jiao into two independent
units and liturgical styles, attributing the first to the Lingbao and the second
to the Zhengyi tradition (see *Shangqing lingbao dafa; CT I22I, 59-20b-23a; CT
I223, 39.3a- 4b). The end result of the liturgical development of the period
was a situation in which the two forms of liturgy had become fused to the
point where the two terms were sometimes used interchangeably, but where
the growing importance of the jiao component of the whole gradually led to
the substitution of this term for the former as the general designation of the
combined liturgy, when applied in ceremonies for the living. The important
background for this development was the fact, mentioned above, that since the
Song dynasty the Taoist communal liturgy had achieved its survival through a