Discipline and transformation: Body and practice in the lives of daoist holy women of Tang China

Women and Confucian Cultures in Premodern China, Korea, and Japan

Volumn , Issue , 2003, Pages 251-278

  Cahill, Suzanne E ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 84887666800     PISSN: None     EISSN: None     Source Type: Book    
DOI: None     Document Type: Chapter

References (45)

1. A very different way of perceiving the whole body and its parts from what we understand today in the West is vividly presented in Barbara Duden, The Woman Beneath the Skin: A Doctor's Patients in Eighteenth-Century Germany (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1991). The process by which the body is dismembered and agonizingly separated from the internal self to produce the modern person is described in Francis Barker, The Tremulous Private Body: Essays on Subjection (New York: Methuen, 1984). A statement of the argument that gender is a performance rather than a state appears in Judith Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (New York: Routledge, 1990). The argument that even our interpretations of the physical manifestations of what we call biological sex are cultural constructions appears in Thomas Laqueur, Making Sex: Body and Gender from the Greeks to Freud (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1990). One exploration of the ways in which we might link self and body in various cultures in future research is found in Nancy Scheper- Hughes and Margaret M. Locke, "The Mindful Body: A Prolegemonon to Future Work in Medical Anthropology," Medical Anthropology Quarterly i, no. i (1987): 6-41. Discipline of the body as a means to liberation finds its classic study in Peter Brown, The Body and Society: Men, Women, and Sexual Renunciation in Early Christianity (New York: Columbia University Press, 1988).On the body in China, see Angela Zito and Tani Barlow, eds., Body, Subject, and Power in China (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994)
2. On Confucianism during the Tang dynasty, see David McMullen, State and Scholars in Tang China (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988). For a history of the Daoist religion,see Stephen R. Bokenkarnp, Early Daoist Scriptures (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997). On making saints in the Daoist tradition, see Suzanne Cahill, "Smell Good and Get a Job," in Presence and Presentation, ed. Sherry Mou (New York: St. Martin's, 1999). To compare Catholic canonization, see Kenneth L. Woodward, Making Saints (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1990).
3. On body as self in early China, see Roger T. Ames, "The Meaning of the Body in Classical Chinese Philosophy," in Self as Body in Asian Theory and Practice, ed. Thomas E Kasulis,Roger T. Ames, and Wimal Dissanayake (Albany: State University of New York Press,'993)-
4. Phrases like "longevity greater than that of metal or stone" are frequently inscribed on bronze mirrors of the late Han dynasty. One example is a second- to third-century bronze mirror (9.240) in the Freer Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C
5. The work of Ann Waltner on the Ming holy woman Tan Yangzi provides an example of historical scholarship that situates the saint in the cultural and religious context of her times. See Ann Waltner, The World of a Late Ming Visionary: Tan-yang-tZf and Her Followers (Berkeley: University of California Press, forthcoming)
6. The most important text for this study is Du Guangting, Yongchengjixian lu, "Records of the Assembled Transcendents of the Fortified Walled City," in Tunji qiqian, "Seven Slips from a Bookbag of Clouds," HY 1026, zh. 114. The text is found in the Daozang, "Treasure House of the Way," or Daoist Canon, Zhengtong edition (Taipei: Yiwen, 1976, vol. 38), pp. 30323-47. (Hereafter this text is cited as DG, followed by page number.) Daoist texts are referred to here by the letters HY, followed by the number assigned to the text in Weng Dujian, Daozang zimuyinde, "Combined Indexes to the Authors and Titles of Books in Two Collections of Taoist Literature" (Peking: Harvard-Yenching Institute, 1935), vol. 25. Tang poems cited are found in the Quan Tang shi (Complete Tang poetry [anthology]) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1979) (hereafter QTS, followed by page number)
7. On the Gaoseng zhuan, see Arthur F. Wright, "Biography and Hagiography: Hui-chiao's Lives of Eminent Monks" [1954], in Studies in Chinese Buddhism, ed. Robert M. Somers (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1990). On the Biqiuni zhuan, see Kathryn Ann Tsai, Lives of the Nuns: Biographies of Chinese Buddhist Nuns from the Fourth to Sixth Centuries (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1994). The Lienil zhuan, a tradition of biographies of illustrious women, begins with a work of that name by Liu Xiang of the Han dynasty. On Lienit texts, see Marina Sung, "The Chinese Lieh-nu Tradition," in Women in China: Current Directions in Historical Scholarship, ed. Richard W. Guisso and StanleyJohanesson (Youngstown, N.Y: Philo Press, 1981); and Lisa Raphals, Sharing the Light: Representations of Women and Virtue in Early China (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1998). For tales of Daoist transcendents, see the Liexian zhuan, "Biographies of Arrayed Transcendents," HY 294; and Robert Ford Campany, To Live as Long as Heaven and Earth: A Translation and Study of Ge Hong's Traditions of the Divine Transcendents (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002)
8. DG, pp. 30334-35.
9. On "liberation by means of the corpse," see Isabelle Robinet, "Metamorphosis and Deliverance from the Corpse in Taoism," History of Religions 19 (1979): 37-70
10. DG, pp. 30335-36.
11. pp. 30336-37. On Hua Gu, see Russell Kirkland, "Huang Ling-wei," Journal of Chinese Religion 19 (1991): 47-72.
12. DG, pp. 30337.
13. pp. 30337-38. This biography appears in Edward Shafer, "Three Divine Women of South China," Chinese Literature: Essays, Articles, and Reviews i (1979): 31-42. The story of the monks is repeated in Du Guangting, Daojiao lingyanji, Tunji chichian, HY 1026,zh. 117-22. Minister Zheng Tian has a biography in LiuXu et al.,Jiu Tangshu (The Old Book of Tang) (Beijing: Zhonghua, 1975), zh. 178
14. DG, pp. 30340-42. This biography is translated in Suzanne E. Gahill, "Pien Tunghsuan: A Taoist Woman Saint of the T'ang Dynasty," in Women in World Religions: Biographies, ed. Arvind Sharma (New York: State University of New York Press, 2000). Other biographies of Bian appear in Li Fang et al., Taipingguangji (Broad records of the Era of Great Peace) (Beijing: Renmin wenxue, 1969), 63:2a-b; and in the Lishi zhenxian tidao tongjian (A comprehensive mirror of the perfected and transcendents who have embodied the Dao throughout successive ages), by Zhao Daoyi of the Yuan, HY 297, vol. 8, 6534
15. DG, pp. 30342-43.
16. p. 30344. This biography is translated in Schafer, "Three Divine Women of South China." Du Guangting based his account on Su O's Duyang zabian. The Taiping guangji, 36:413, preserved another version. The Complete Tang Poetry preserves three of her poems, QTS, p. 9756.
17. Daoist nuns, like Catholic and Buddhist nuns, traditionally cut their hair when they entered holy orders. On Taoist ordination for women, see Charles D. Benn, The Cavern- Mystery Transmission (Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 1989)
18. DG, pp. 30344-46. This biography is translated by Suzanne Cahill, "Biography of the Daoist Saint Wang Fengxian by Du Guangting (850-933)," in Under Confucian Eyes: Writings on Gender in Chinese History, ed. Susan Mann and Yu-Yin Cheng (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2001)
19. Yellow Courtyard Classic," Huangting jing, in "Seven Slips form a Bookbag of Clouds," Tunji qiqian, HY 1026, zh- 17
20. DG, pp. 30346-47.
21. On uncovering a female voice in the conventional and heavily selected poetry of Tang and late imperial China, see Maureen Robertson, "Voicing the Feminine: Constructions of the Gendered Subject in Lyruic Poetry by Women of Medieval and Late Imperial China,"Late Imperial China 13, no. i (1992): 63-110; and Susanne Cahill, "Resenting the Silk Robes That Hide Their Poems: Female Voices in the Poetry of Li Ye, Lu Meiniang, and Yu Xuanji," forthcoming in Tangyanjiu (Tang Studies), Peking University, Beijing
22. A short biography of Li Ye and five poems appear in the Tangshijishi (Record of affairs or circumstances concerning Tang poetry), by Ji Yugong of the Song dynasty (Hong Kong: Zhongguo shuju, 1972), vol. 2, pp. 1123-24. She has sixteen poems in QTS, pp. 9057-60
23. QTS, p. 9057.
24. DG, p. 30324.
25. QTS, p. 9059.
26. pp. 9050-51. The earliest extant biography of Yu Xuanji is found in the "Little Tablets [by the Fellow] from Three Rivers," Sanshm xiaotu, by Huangfu Mei, completed in about 910, in Wang Guoyuan, Tangren xiaoshuo (Tang peoples' fiction) (Hong Kong: Zhonghua shuju, 1958), pp. 293-95. A short biography and some poems appear in the Tangshijishi,vol. 2, pp. 1125-26. The Complete Tang Poetry preserves fifty of her poems, plus fragments (QTS, pp. 9047-56)
27. QTS, p. 9052. Visiting a recluse who was not there is a conventional topic in Tang poetry. Several Tang poets (such as Wang Wei, QTS, p. 974) also wrote in praise of Refined Masters. For a study that provides methods for investigating women's culture, see Dorothy Ko, Teachers of the Inner Chambers: Women and Culture m Seventeenth-Century China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1994)
28. QTS, pp. 9047-48.
29. On clothing depicted in art purposely providing information about the subject, see Ann Hollander, Seeing through Clothes (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975)
30. Song Yu's Gaotangfu appears in Xiao Tong, Wen Xuan (Selections of refined literature)(Shanghai: Shangwu, 1973), vol. i, pp. 393-400. Yu Xuanji's language resembles descriptions of celestial goddesses in the Shangqing Daoist scripture entitled Zhengao, "Declarations of the Perfected," HY 1010
31. On another source, poems by Tang men concerning Daoist women, see Suzanne E.Cahill, Transcendence and Divine Passion: The Queen Mother of the West in Medieval China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1993), chaps. 4 and 6
32. Daoist practices for nourishing the vital essence (yangqi), have been studied by Henri Maspero. Several of his articles appear in Taoism and Chinese Religion, trans. Frank Kierman (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1981). On ritual texts, see John Lagerway, Taoist Ritual in Chinese Society and History (New York: Macmillan, 1987). On meditation texts, see Livia Kohn, Seven Steps to the Tao: Sima Chengzheris "Zuowan /Mn/'Monumenta Serica Monographs (Nettetal: Steyler Vcrlag, 1987); and Isabelle Robinet, Taoist Meditation: The Mao-shan Tradition of Great Purity, trans. Julian F. Pas and Norman J. Giradot (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1993).
33. On separate titles for female transcendents, see DG, p. 30333; on the Way of female transcendence, see DG, p. 30333. On the Way as one, see DG, p. 30324; on the granting of celestial office based on virtue and talent rather than distinctions of male and female, see DG, p. 30333. On the holy woman as living omen, see DG, p. 30347.
34. On separate texts and practices for women, see Douglas Wile, Art of the Bedchamber: The Chinese Sexual Yoga Classics including Women s Solo Meditations Texts (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1992).35- DG biography of Xu Xiangu, p. 30337
35. DG biography of Xu Xiangu, p. 30337.
36. On the importance of food in women's religious practice, see Rudolph Bell, Holy Anorexia (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995); and Caroline Walker Bynum, Holy Feast and Holy Fast: The Religious Significance of Food to Medieval Women (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1987)
37. On the importance of food in women's religious practice, see Rudolph Bell, Holy Anorexia (Chicago: University f Chicago Press, 1995); and Caroline Walker Bynum, Holy Feast and Holy Fast: The Religious Significance of Food to Medieval Women (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1987).
38. A well-known passage in the Daxue, "Great Learning," on rectifying one's heart, one's family, and finally the state, makes the individual, in particular his heart, the center of thought and ethical action. It appears in James Legge, trans., The Chinese Classics (Taipei: Wenshi zhe chubanshe, 1972; reprint of 1892 edition), vol. i, pp. 357-59
39. See Saint Augustine, The Confessions of Saint Augustine, trans. Edward B. Pusey (New York: Collier, 1961); and Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison, trans. Alan Sheridan (New York: Vintage, 1989)
40. See Charlotte Furth, "Rethinking Van Gulik: Sexuality and Reproduction in Traditional Chinese Medicine," in Engendering China: Women, Culture and the State, ed. Christina Gilmartin, Gail Hershatter, Lisa Rofel, and Tyrene White (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1994).
41. On body gods, see Kristofer Schipper, The Taoist Body, trans. Karen C. Duval (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993)
42. The image of the body as crucible or kiln goes back to the Zhuangzi and is frequently used in Taoist religious texts concerning inner alchemy (neidari)
43. On the stages of a Daoist holy woman's career, see Suzanne E. Cahill, "Practice Makes Perfect: Paths to Transcendence for Women in Medieval China," Taoist Resources 2,no. 2 (1990): 23-42.
44. On the continuities in women's physical practices contrasted to the abrupt inversions typical for men, see Caroline Walker Bynum, Fragmentation and Redemption (New York: Zone Books, 1992). Bynum argues that Victor Turner's descriptions of religious austerities as creating a liminal state pertains more to men than to women. Men can humble themselves by imitating women, but women cannot do the same by imitating men. Women, already marginal, use their identification with the body, suffering, and birth to forge religious practices for themselves that identify them with the means of their salvation
45. On the importance of smells in the West before the time of Pasteur and their relation to body, health, society, and sanctity, see Alan Corbin, The Fragrant and the Foul (Cambridge,Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1986). A fragrant body was a potent sign of holiness