Now you see me, now you don’t!

Fajin,
I’m sure you will have fun revisiting your old stomping grounds in wudang.

If you want to read a detailed analysis of Quanzhen daoists roots in chan, you can down load Louis Komjathy’s PhD thesis on Quanzhen Mysticism (costs $30. for 550 page text). Scholarly, but has interesting translation of quanzhen founder Wang Chongyang’s early writings and influences, which were syncretic. It was popular ata the time to synthesize confucian, buddhist, and daoist ideas. I bought it to get his translation of the Gold Pass and Jade Lock scripture.

http://www.daoistcenter.org/Contact.html and click on:
Cultivating Perfection: Mysticism and Self-Transformation in Early Quanzhen Daoism. By Louis Komjathy.

Komjathy notes that Wang Chongyang would tell the lay public at lectures to do simple chan type practices of sitting in stillness and clarity (orginally taken from Daoists in Tang dynasty). But to his disciples he taught rigorous and complex Daoist alchemical trnasformational methods. Over 30 Daoist alchemical methods are mentioned in the Jade Lock text, which was conversations recorded between him and his early quanzhen disciples.

All of the Wudang Daoists are quanzhen sect, as far as I could see. But some of them may have derived their neidan practices from different sources, such as emei shan. And let’s not forget than Chang San Feng was NOT a quanzhen daoist….

Let us know if you discover anything interesting…..:)

Love, qi, blessings,
Michael

I’ve met Fu,
I liked him personally, but his packagers I find quite off-putting and extravgant in their claims about their “Grandmaster “(“father of qigong medicine” – please!).

He tried to used his methods of generating mass audiences in the USA that were commony used in the 80’s in china – and failed. He toured the USA giving away free workshops, hoping to build a following that would keep expanding and payoff on the backend. Hasn’t happened, from what I’ve seen.

He advetised a Taoist workshop near Asheville some years back, and I went. I walked into the room and could tell immediately he was Buddhist, altho that was never stated. All the chi came from his head down. The Taoist chi generally rises from the earth up. His qigong is all taoist and largely medical , however, and no problem there, I support his efforts and wish him well. He has a few wierd numbers, like using an acupuncture doll and sticking needles in its to project chi to other people, kind of a buddhist medical voodoo….

I think you’ll get more out of Louis Komjathy’s PhD. thesis….

chi
michael