Sixth Century BCE to Seventeenth Century
Page 14
more controversial example is the worship of Huang- Lao Jun
for prolongation of
life ( HHS, 80.1b). One commentator, Liu Bin
, takes the term as a corruption of
“Huangdi Laojun,”
an interpretation that has been challenged by Wu Renjie
, who does not believe that Huangdi and Laozi were “Heavenly gods”
and
points out that there was a Huang- Lao Jun in the Daoist pantheon according to Daoist
lit er a ture of the Six Dynasties Period ( Liang Han kanwu buyi
, Zhipuzu
zhai
edition, 10.3b–4a). Hui Dong suggests that Huang- Lao Jun was one of the
fi ve “Heavenly emperors”
, who might also be known as “Heavenly gods” ( HHSbu-
zhu, 5.317). None of the three scholars off ers evidence in support of these guesses, and
in Han lit er a ture, the term appears only in HHS, 80. Prob ably misled by Wu and Hui,
Maspero advances a theory that this par tic u lar cult was established early during the
Former Han and that the Yellow Turbans regarded Huang- Lao Jun as the Supreme De-
ity. In other words, he does not consider the term related to Huangdi and Laozi, but de-
rived from huang (yellow), the color of the center, and lao (old) (see Maspero, Le taoïsme,
219–222). More recently, Akitsuki Kanei has advanced another theory according to
which the name represents the deifi cation of both the Yellow Emperor and Laozi into a
single god, as well as the incarnation of the Dao, and worship of Huang- Lao Jun was
thought to bring about immortality or longevity (Akitsuki, “Genealogy,” 77). Since, as
we have seen above, Emperor Huan’s worship of Laozi was motivated by his craving for
immortality, Huang- Lao Jun must have been related to Huangdi and Laozi. See also
Tsuda, Dôha no shisô, 346–347; Creel, “What Is Taoism?,” 149n97; and Holmes H. Welch,
“Syncretism in the Early Daoist Movement,” Papers on China (Cambridge, Mass.: East
Asian Research Center, Harvard University, 1956), 13–14. It should be noted that even as
late as the early fourth century c.e., the term Huang- Lao was still used to indicate the
Yellow Emperor and Laozi rather than a single deity ( BPZ, neipian, 10.178). For our pur-
poses, however, the origin of the name of the cult is of less importance than the fact that
it was primarily a cult of immortality.
142. Yu Xun
, “Po liti cal Thoughts of Early Daoists”
[in Chinese],
Furen xuezhi
11 (1942): 101.
143. Examination of the relations of some Later Han princes with daoshi or fangshi show
similarities to those of the Prince of Huai- nan. In 70 c.e., Prince Ying
of Chu was
also accused of dealing with such fangshi as Wang Ping
and Yan Zhong
, and
of making preparations for rebellion. He too committed suicide ( HHS, 72.2b–3b).
According to the Lunheng, a daoshi
named Liu Chun
induced the same prince
to eat fi lth ( LHJJ, 139; Forke, Lun Heng, 1:290). These incidents show how active fangshi
or daoshi were in the court of one prince. And Tang Yongtong has pointed out that al-
most all the brothers of the Prince of Chu were involved in witchcraft and shared the
prince’s religious beliefs ( Fojiao shi, 1.51–52). Yan Zhong also turns up at the court of
Prince Kang of Jinan
, where he instigated him to commit sedition ( HHS,
72.3b–4a). Liu Chun, Hui Tong suggests, is to be identifi ed with Liu Zichan
,
who was also at the court of Prince Kang ( HHSbuzhu, 5.447). In 147 c.e., Prince Suan of
Qinghe
won the support of a “Wizard rebel” (
) named Liu Yu
in his
l ife a nd im m or ta l i t y in t h e mind of h a n c h ina 57
bid for the empire. The term in HHS refers in most cases to a Daoist (cf. He Changchun
, “Pop u lar Slogans During the Uprising of the Yellow Turbans in the Han Dy-
nasty”
[in Chinese], LSYJ, 6 [1959]: 34). As a fi nal example, in 173
c.e., Prince Chong of Chen
was accused of sacrifi cing to the Heavenly God with
his chancellor Wei Yin
, with seditious intent. This “Heavenly God” was later dis-
covered to be none other than Huang- Lao Jun ( HHS, 80.1b).
144. HHS, 10.6a.
145. Zhong Rong
, Shipin
, WYWK, 1.6.
146. Ibid., 25.
147. Ibid., 221.
148. Ibid., 698. This passage may be read in conjunction with BPZ, neipian, 2.27.
149. TPJHJ, 724.
150. Ibid., 676. Cf. also Tang Yongtong, “Du Taipingjing shu suojian,” 26, and Fojiao shi,
104–105.
151. Cf. Chen Yinke in ZYYY 3, no. 4 (1934): 439–466; Yu Xun, “Early Daoists,” 92–102.
152. According to Chen Zhi ( Hanshu xinzheng, 120), there was actually another palace, the
Yanshou Guan, in Lantian
, also in modern Shaanxi.
153. HS, 25B.2b.
154. Lao Gan
, Juyan Hanjian
(hereafter Hanjian) (Taipei: Zhongyang yanji-
uyuan lishi yuyan yanjiu suo, 1960), Shiwen
, no. 2038, 42; no. 2145, 44; no. 4092,
83.
155. Hanjian, no. 509, 11.
156. Ibid., no. 3999, 81; Juyan Hanjian Jiabian
(Beijing: Kexue chubanshe, 1959),
no. 1192, 50.
157. Hanjian, no. 1274, 26.
3. “O Soul, Come Back!”
A Study in the Changing Conceptions of the Soul
and Afterlife in Pre- Buddhist China
In this study, I propose to investigate indigenous Chinese conceptions of the
afterlife in the period before the arrival of Buddhism in China. I shall take
the ritual of fu
, “Summons” or “Recall,” as the point of departure, for in my
judgment, this ritual embodied the crystallization of a variety of ideas about
human survival after death that had developed in China since high antiquity.
After a reconstruction of the ritual of fu, I shall proceed to inquire into the ori-
gin and development of the notions of hun
and po
, two pivotal concepts
that have been, and remain today, the key to understanding Chinese views of the
human soul and the afterlife. Fi nally, I shall examine the changing conceptions
of the two afterworlds before Buddhism transformed them into “Heaven” and
“Hell.”
A study of this kind must be based on every type of evidence now available—
historical as well as archaeological, written as well as pictorial. My central pur-
pose is to identify a common core of beliefs in Han China that were shared by
the elite and popu lar cultures. In this par tic u lar area of Han thought, the
bound aries between Confucian ideology and popu lar Daoist religion, which
was a syncretism of all the indigenous religious beliefs and practices at the
popu lar level, are blurred and often impossible to distinguish. For example,
views about the hun- soul and po- soul found in the Han Confucian Liji
(Classic of Rites) bear a strong resemblance to those found in the Laozi heshang
zhu
(Heshang Commentary on the Laozi), a popu lar Daoist text of
“o soul , c om e b ack ! ” 59
Han
origin.1 Such blurring also occurs in the Taipingjing
(Scripture of
Great Peace) popu lar beliefs concerning the afterlife at the end of the Han Pe-
riod. Portions of this text are clearly traceable to the Han times and can throw
impor tant new light on our subject, especially when they are used with caution
and in combination with other newly discovered documents proven to be from
the Han Period.2
Fi nally, a word about the prob lem of cultural unity or diversity is also in or-
der. The general picture presented below refl ects what all our evidence tells us,
but no claim is made that the beliefs described constitute in any strict sense a
unifi ed belief system, much less the only one, embraced by all the Chinese of
the Han Empire throughout the four centuries of its existence. Some of the
beliefs and practices discussed in this study may well have been of only local
subcultural importance. On the other hand, however, it would not be worth-
while to attempt to identify every belief or practice with the regional culture
from which it originally arose. For example, the idea of hun, though possibly of
a southern origin, had already become universally accepted by the Chinese by
the third century b.c.e. at the latest, and the Taishan cult had also assumed a
nationwide religious signifi cance by the second
century c.e., if not earlier.
Throughout this study, I shall identify, whenever pos si ble, the date and local ori-
gin of each piece of supporting evidence. Nevertheless, given our pres ent stage
of knowledge, it is not always clear what sorts of conclusions can be drawn from
such identifi cations.
T H E F U
R I T U A L
In Han China there was an impor tant death ritual called fu, “the Summons of
the Soul.” It was the fi rst of a series of rituals to be performed for the newly
dead. Although this fu ritual, as variously reported in the Zhouli
(Rites of
Zhou), the Yili
(Book of Etiquette and Ceremonial), and the Classic of Rites
is a highly complex one, it may nevertheless be briefl y described. As soon as a
person dies, a “summoner” ( fuzhe
), normally a member of the family,
climbs from the east eaves to the top of the roof with a set of clothes belonging
to the deceased. The summoner faces the north, waves the clothes of the de-
ceased, and calls him by name aloud: “O! Thou so- and-so, come back!” After
the call has been repeated three times, the summoner throws down the clothes,
which are received by another person on the ground. The receiver then spreads
the clothes over the body of the dead. Afterward, the summoner descends from
the west eaves. Thus, the ritual of fu is completed.
According to the Han commentator Zheng Xuan
(127–200), the pur-
pose of the fu ritual is “to summon the hun- soul of the dead back to re unite
with its po- soul” ( zhaohun fupo
) . In fact, the ritual is predicated on the
belief that when the hun separates from the po and leaves the human body, life
60 “o soul , c om e b ack ! ”
comes to an end. At the moment when death fi rst occurs, however, the living
cannot bear to believe that their beloved one has really left them for good. The
living must fi rst assume that the departure of the hun- soul is only temporary. It
is pos si ble, then, that if the departed soul can be summoned back, the dead
may be brought back to life. A person can be pronounced dead only when the fu
ritual has failed to achieve its purpose, after which the body of the dead will be
placed on the bed in his or her own chamber and covered with a burial shroud
called hu or fu . 3
Remarkably, this Han ritual practice has been confi rmed by recent archaeo-
logical discoveries. From 1972 to 1974, three Han tombs were excavated at
Mawangdui, in Changsha, Hunan. At the time of its excavation, Tomb No. 1
aroused worldwide attention primarily because of the well- preserved body of its
occupant, the wife of Licang
, the Marquis of Dai
, who prob ably died
sometime after 175 b.c.e. (hereafter “Countess of Dai”). In Tomb No. 3, dated
168 b.c.e. and belonging to Licang’s son, a large quantity of silk manuscripts of
lost ancient writings were found. Since their discovery, the scholarly lit er a ture
on these two tombs and their unusually rich contents has been enormous and
is still growing. My discussion below will be confi ned to the light that this spec-
tacular discovery sheds on the fu ritual. For this purpose, I will focus on the
two T- shaped polychrome paintings on silk from Tombs No. 1 and No. 3, respec-
tively. In addition to these two, similar paintings have also been found in other
Han tombs. A Chinese archaeologist has summarized the contents of the Han
paintings as follows:
They are all of silk and are painted with fi ne colored pictures. The picture
is divided into three sections, depicting, from top to bottom, Heaven,
man’s world, and the underworld. Both Heaven and the underworld are
represented by mythological images; the Heaven picture has sun, moon,
and sometimes stars, and the sun has a golden crow and the moon has a
toad and a white rabbit, and sometimes a picture of Chang- e, the Goddess
of the moon. The underworld picture shows vari ous aquatic animals, rep-
resenting an aquatic palace at the bottom of the sea. As for man’s world,
the picture depicts scenes from daily life and also a portrait of the master
of the tomb.4
This characterization is on the whole accurate, taking as it obviously does the
painting from Tomb No. 1 at Mawangdui as typical of its kind. Scholars are gen-
erally agreed that the central theme of the painting is the “Summons of the
Soul.” According to Yu Weichao
, the two male fi gures above the aged
woman, who can be clearly identifi ed as the Countess of Dai, are most likely the
“summoners.” Judging by the position they occupy and the robes and hats they
wear, these two men are represented as calling the departed soul back from a
rooftop.5 While other identifi cations have also been suggested, Yu’s seems to fi t
“o soul , c om e b ack ! ” 61
with the main theme of the painting best, especially, as we shall see momen-
tarily, when the function of the painting is clarifi ed.6 Moreover, the lady below
the moon, instead of being the goddess of the moon (Chang- e
or Heng- e
), may well have been a repre sen ta tion of the departed soul of the Countess
of Dai herself. A comparison with the T- shaped silk painting from Tomb No. 3
shows that the most noticeable diff erence between the two heavenly scenes lies
in the absence of the so- called Chang- e in the latter.7 Michael Loewe has also
made an in ter est ing suggestion that the beautiful woman’s fi gure ending in a
serpentine tail at the central apex of the painting may not be intended to repre-
sent any of the mythological fi gures that scholars have put forth. Instead, it may
have been the artist’s intention to represent the fi nal stage of the countess’s
journey to Heaven when she has reached her destination.8 In other words, o
ne
of the two fi gures must be a repre sen ta tion of the countess’s hun- soul. It is
impor tant to note that in the round central space of the second painting, the
female fi gure is replaced by a male fi gure. This diff erence of gender makes better
sense when we take into consideration the gender of its occupant. It is quite
reasonable to assume that the male fi gure in this case is also a repre sen ta tion of
the soul of the countess’s son in Heaven.9
The establishment of the central theme of the T- shaped paintings as the
summons of the soul also helps to identify the function of the silk painting.
While the suggestion that the painting was a banner used in funeral pro-
cessions cannot be completely ruled out, it is more likely that it was the burial
shroud, hu, frequently referred to in Han texts in connection with the fu ritual.
In the Han inventories of funeral furnishings found in both tombs, there is an
item listed as “feiyi, twelve feet long,” which has been identifi ed with the
T- shaped silk painting.10 The identifi cation seems fi rmly grounded. Feiyi
means “mantle,” “shroud,” or “cover.” Moreover, in ancient ritual texts, fei and
hu are interchangeable in meaning. According to Han commentators, a hu was
a cloth painted red and used to cover the corpse of the newly dead and, later, the
coffi
n.11 This description agrees perfectly with the silk painting. The current
view that it was a mingjing
, or “funerary banner,” is therefore questionable,
to say the least; literally, mingjing means “inscribed funerary banner.” The basic
purpose of a mingjing was “to identify the departed hun- soul” by means of a
name inscribed on a banner. The use of the mingjing, widespread at the time of
Xunzi (third century b.c.e.), continued throughout the Han Period.12 In fact,
none of the mingjing excavated from Han tombs in recent de cades lacks such an
inscription.13 Since the names of neither the mother nor her son are inscribed
on the T- shaped paintings, they must not be mingjing.
To conclude this section, it seems reasonable to assert that the T- shaped
paintings not only take the ritual of fu as their main theme, but their function
is also closely related to that same ritual. We may say that these paintings pro-
vide archaeological confi rmation of the ritual of fu as recorded in the vari ous