Page 665 - The Encyclopedia of Taoism v1_A-L

LAOZI XIANG'ER ZHU 623

The text accompanying the commentary is an important witness to the
early history of the Laozi text. William G. Boltz (1984) has argued, based on a
detailed comparison with the *Mawangdui manuscripts of the Laozi, that the
text interleaved with this commentary is the earliest transmitted text version
and the closest in filiation to the Mawangdui manuscripts, This also links it
with the "5,000 character" versions of the text.
The commentary presents a distinctive interpretation of the Laozi that sheds
much light on early Celestial Master thought and the way that they appropri-
ated this classical text for their own purposes. Among the more distinctive
features of this work, the conception of the Dao as a conscious, anthropomor-
phic deity, identified with a divinized Laozi (*Laojun), who speaks directly to
humans (in the first person) is striking. The reader is encouraged to devote
him/herself to the Dao and the title, if Bokenkamp is correct, refers to how
the Dao is constantly "thinking of you." The text advocates a physiological
process based on "clarity and quiescence" (*qingjing) that seeks to absorb and
circulate the breaths (*qi) of the Dao so as to attain longevity and the status
of Transcendent Lord. This practice must be founded upon moral excellence,
and to this end a set of nine precepts derived from the text of the Laozi and
a set of twenty-seven derived from the Xiang'er commentary were published
separately and seem to have been more infl uential in later periods than the
commentary itself (see under *Xiang'er jie).
Also prominent are warnings concerning "deviant" teachings and "false
arts abroad in the world" that point to a variety of competing movements
that differed with the Celestial Masters on issues of doctrine and practice. For
example, specific acts of sexual self-cultivation based on semen retention are
condemned despite the Celestial Master practice of communal sex rites called
"union of breaths" (*heqi).
The Xiang'er commentary also provides information on the earliest Taoist
eschatology, a way for followers to pass through the world of the dead or the
Great Yin (Taiyin * ~): "If a person of the Dao is perfect in their conduct, the
Taoist gods (daoshen.@: f~l) will return to them; they will hide from the world
by feigning death, then passing through the Great Yin, they go to be reborn
(fUsheng ~j:), and thus do not perish (buwang /fl'~). That is why they are
long-lived. The profane have no moral merit. Their dead belong to the Earth
Office. That is to perish" (see also trans. Bokenkamp 1997, 135). Here we see
that it is the moral excellence of the Taoists that assures their longevity and
ultimate survival of death.

Terry KLEEMAN
ID Bokenkamp 1993; Bokenkamp 1997, 29-148 (trans.); Boltz W G. 1984; Ku-
suyama Haruki 1979. 239-69; Mugitani Kunio 1985 (concordance); Qing Xitai
1988-95, I: 181-9 2 ; Rao Zongyi 1956 (crit. ed.); Seidel 1969, 75-80; 6fuchi Ninji