Sixth Century BCE to Seventeenth Century
Page 17
drinks the dew,” phenomena that come from Heaven. Elsewhere the Zhuangzi
also mentions the method of regulating or manipulating the qi or breath ( dao-
yin
) as a way of cultivating long life.61 It seems then that the idea of the
xian was originally conceived in terms of the hun- soul, which, being made up
entirely of the Heavenly qi, is able to ascend to Heaven.
The only diff erence between the hun and the xian is that while the former
leaves the body at death, the latter obtains its total freedom by transforming the
body into something purely ethereal, that is, the Heavenly qi . Thus, regulation
of qi or breath and “abstention from grains” were widely believed to be the two
most impor tant means of achieving xian immortality.62 The “Yuanyou”
(Far- Off Journey) in the Elegies of Chu describes a scene of some ancient xian
immortals’ ascension to Heaven in the following lines: “With the ether’s
(i.e., qi’s) transformations they rose upwards, with godlike swiftness miracu-
lously moving. Leaving the dust behind, shedding their impurities— never to
return again to their old homes.” 63 In view of the fact that both the Zhuangzi
and the Elegies of Chu are products of the Chu culture in the south, the family
resemblance between the idea of xian and hun can hardly be a matter of his-
torical coincidence.
As we have seen, in early philosophical and literary imagination, a xian im-
mortal is someone who rejects this human world. He must “leave the dust
behind” and “never return home again.” However, as soon as the idea of xian
immortality attracted the attention of the worldly rulers, such as princes of the
Warring States Period and emperors of the Qin and Han dynasties, it began to
develop into a cult of a this- worldly character. Princes and emperors were not
interested in transforming themselves into xian immortals because they had
suddenly developed a renunciatory attitude toward the honors and pleasures
they enjoyed in this world. On the contrary, they were motivated by a strong
desire to prolong their worldly pleasures forever.
This worldly cult of xian immortality had already gained considerable popu-
larity among the princes of vari ous states before the unifi cation of China in 221
b.c.e., but it reached its zenith during the time of Emperor Wu of Han. Emperor
Wu was led to believe, by a number of professional “necromancers,” that a
meeting could be arranged between him and some xian immortals on the top
of Mount Tai
, the sacred mountain in ancient China, as a preparation for
his fi nal ascension to Heaven. At this time, a story had been fabricated that the
“o soul , c om e b ack ! ” 73
legendary Yellow Emperor did not really die but fl ew to Heaven on a dragon’s
back together with his court assistants and palace ladies after having performed
imperial sacrifi ces to Heaven and Earth at the central peak of Mount Tai. Taken
in by this story, Emperor Wu made his imperial pilgrimage to Mount Tai in 110
b.c.e. and carried out all the religious rituals supposedly in the tradition of the
Yellow Emperor. He returned to the capital assured that he would eventually
join the Yellow Emperor in Heaven as a xian immortal. By the turn of the fi rst
century c.e., at the latest, the cult of xian immortality had already spread from
royal and aristocratic circles to the common people. A Han stone inscription
relates that, in 7 c.e., a yamen underling in the local government of Hanzhong
(in modern Shaanxi) named Tang Gongfang
succeeded in his pur-
suit of xian immortality. Consequently, he ascended to Heaven with not only
his whole family but also his house and domestic animals.
The great popularity of this cult transformed the Han conception of the af-
terlife in a fundamental way. According to the Scripture of Great Peace, only the
xian immortals who had embodied the great Dao were admitted to Heaven.64
Since the immortal xian and the dissolvable hun were conceived as belonging
to two completely diff er ent categories of beings, they were not supposed to mix
in the same Heaven. As a result, a new abode had to be found to accommodate
the hun souls. Thus, the governmental structure of the underworld was ex-
panded. Based on a variety of historical and archaeological evidence, this new
conception of the underworld may be briefl y reconstructed as follows. First,
from around the end of the fi rst century b.c.e., a belief gradually arose that
there was a supreme ruler called Lord of Mount Tai (Taishan Fujun
)
whose capital was located in a place named Liangfu
, a small hill near
Mount Tai.65 Liangfu, it may be noted, was traditionally the place at which im-
perial sacrifi ces had been made to the supreme earthly deity, the Lord of Earth
(Dizhu
).66 It was indeed only a small step to transform the Lord of
Earth into the Lord of the Underworld (Dixia Zhu
) . The title Lord of
Mount Tai— Taishan Fujun— also requires a word of explanation. The term fujun
must not be taken to mean “lord” in a general sense. In fact, it was a popu lar
name referring specifi cally to provincial governors in Han times. Nor should
“Taishan” in this case be understood as the sacred mountain itself. Instead, it was
a reference to the province named after the sacred mountain in which Liangfu
was also located.67 In other words, calling the supreme ruler of the underworld
Taishan Fujun was to indicate both the location of his residence and the bureau-
cratic rank of his offi
ce. Since he was in charge of the dead, he was therefore as-
signed an offi
cial position lower than the supreme ruler of the human world, the
emperor, by one rank. This fi ts perfectly well with some other popu lar names by
which he was also known. For example, stone inscriptions found in Han tombs
often refer to him either as “Lord of Mount Tai” or as “the provincial governor
in the underworld.” 68 Moreover, a popu lar Han religious tract says that he is the
74 “o soul , c om e b ack ! ”
“grand son of the Heavenly God.” 69 The last instance is particularly revealing.
Clearly, the idea of “grand son of the Heavenly God” was derived analogously
from that of the “Son of Heaven,” that is, the emperor.
Second, like the supreme ruler of the human world, it was believed that the
Lord of Mount Tai also had a bureaucracy to assist him in governing the dead.
Judging by the vari ous offi
cial titles found in Han tombs and other texts, the
bureaucratic structure of the underworld was closely modeled on the adminis-
trative system of the Han Empire. The fi rst thing the newly dead had to do was
to go to the capital of the underworld to register. There is further evidence sug-
gesting that the underworld government could send for the souls of those
whose allotted span on earth, according to the Register of Death, was up. As
time wore on, the idea of postmortem punishment also found its way into the
Han belief about the afterlife. The Scripture of Great Peace of the second century
c.e. has the following vivid description of the administration of ju
stice in the
underworld:
If a man commits evils unceasingly, his name will then be entered into
the Register of Death. He will be summoned to the Underworld Govern-
ment ( tufu
) where his body is to be kept. Alas! When can he ever get
out? His soul will be imprisoned and his doings in life will be questioned.
If his words are found to be inconsistent, he will be subject to further
imprisonment and torture. His soul is surely going to suff er a great deal.
But who is to blame?70
This new conception of the underworld may well have been a faithful refl ection
of the cruel realities of interrogation and torture in the imperial and provincial
prisons, especially during the second century c.e.71
Third, we have reason to believe that as the supreme ruler of the under-
world, the authority of the Lord of Mount Tai was originally conceived to be ex-
ercised over the hun- souls. Several historical and literary sources specifi cally
link the hun, but not the po, to Mount Tai, which itself calls to mind the under-
world in which the Lord of Mount Tai reigns supreme. The hun- soul is said to
be either “returning” or “belonging” to Mount Tai.72 It may be recalled that
Heaven was now populated by the xian immortals; it was no longer a place to
which the hun- souls could return. For the Han Chinese, therefore, Mount Tai
was the highest place imaginable, second only to Heaven. Strictly speaking,
however, the hun- souls could not even ascend the central peak of that sacred
mountain because it had also been transformed into a meeting place between
the emperor and the xian immortals. The hun- souls could only travel to
Liangfu, the capital of the underworld in which the Lord of Mount Tai operated
his central administration. It may be further noted that in Han popu lar cul-
ture, Mount Tai itself, especially its peak, was a symbol of life and immortality,
whereas Liangfu was that of death. However, the simple fact that Liangfu not
“o soul , c om e b ack ! ” 75
only was located in the vicinity of Mount Tai but also fell under the jurisdiction
of the province bearing the name of the holy mountain gradually gave rise to
widespread confusion in Han popu lar beliefs about the afterlife. With the prov-
ince bearing the name of Mount Tai inextricably confused with the mountain
itself, texts from the second century c.e. on often speak of the departed hun-
souls as if they were to “return” to the holy mountain. But it is impor tant to
point out that in all probability the original conception was that the hun- soul of
the newly dead would go to the Liangfu hill in Taishan Province, to register its
name with the underworld government.
Fi nally, a word about the po- soul is in order. Since the hun- soul now went to
the underworld instead of Heaven, what happened to the po? It is in ter est ing to
observe that the po was under the care of a separate department of the under-
world government. According to Dongfang Shuo (ca. 160 b.c.e.–ca. 93 b.c.e.),
the court jester of Emperor Wu’s time, the offi
ce in charge of the dead was
called bo
. Clearly, po and bo share the same etymological root; the name bo
may well have been derived from the belief that it was the abode of po- souls. More-
over, the same jester also defi ned bo as “the court of the ghosts” ( guiting
).73
In Han times, the term ting commonly designated the yamen of a county mag-
istrate, just as fu was the popu lar name of the offi
ce of a provincial governor.74
This fi ts perfectly well with the bureaucratic hierarchy of the Han underworld:
the deity in charge of the po- souls was lower by one level in rank than the deity
in charge of the hun- souls, the Lord of Mount Tai. In approximately the middle
of the fi rst century b.c.e., the name Gaoli (or Haoli)
, suddenly gained pop-
ularity as an abode for the dead. It is in ter est ing to note that it turns out that
Gaoli was another place of deep religious signifi cance at the foot of Mount Tai,
where Emperor Wu performed the ritual of sacrifi ce to the Lord of Earth in 104
b.c.e.75 Later in Han popu lar lit er a ture, Gaoli also came to be identifi ed as the
Lower Village (Xiali
) or the Yellow Springs in which the dead take their
permanent residence.76 At fi rst it seems puzzling that there should be two diff er-
ent places in the Han underworld for the departed souls. However, the puzzle
dis appears as soon as we remember that each person was believed to be in pos-
session of two separate souls, the hun and the po. There is clear evidence from
inscriptions found in Later Han tombs that both the hun and the po are subject
to the call of the underworld government.77 This suggests the good possibility
that the po- soul of the newly dead would be required to report to the underworld
government in Gaoli in a way similar to the hun- soul’s journey to Liangfu. As a
response to the rise of the popu lar cult of xian immortality, which prevented the
hun- soul from returning to Heaven, the Chinese underworld seems to have
been fundamentally restructured along a dualistic line to accommodate the
hun and the po, respectively.
This dualistic structure of the pre- Buddhist Chinese underworld is clearly
refl ected in the following four lines from a song about Mount Tai by the famous
writer Lu Ji
(261–303):
76 “o soul , c om e b ack ! ”
On the hill of Liangfu there are hostels ( guan
),
In Gaoli, there are also lodges ( ting ) for the travelers,
Along the dark path stretch ten thousand ghosts ( gui), one
following the footsteps of another,
In the spiritual houses ( shenfang
) are gathered hundreds of
spirits ( ling ).78
Here the poet is describing imagined scenes of the trips of both the hun-
souls and the po- souls to their separate destinations— Liangfu and Gaoli. In his
imagination, the poet introduces the Han system of travelers’ inns ( guan and
ting) into the underworld.79 There can be no question that the term gui (ghosts)
refers specifi cally to the po- souls and the term ling (spirits) to the hun- souls. In
a Confucian treatise from the Han Period, “Jiyi”
(The Meaning of Sacri-
fi ce), gui and shen are given as the names of po and hun, respectively, when the
pair separate at death.80 The identifi cation of gui as the name for po after death
is already confi rmed by the saying of Dongfang Shuo, quoted above. The term
ling in the poem can also be shown to be a variant of hun or shen. For example,
Lu Ji’s brother, Lu Yun
(262–303), in his “Dengxia song,”
uses ling-
po
instead of hun- po.81 It is therefore safe to conclude that even as late as
the third century, the Han dualistic conception of afterlife was still very much
alive in the Chinese mind, namely, at death when the hun and the po part com-
pany, the former returns to Liangfu and the latter to Gaoli. It is impor tant to
note, however, that neither the nature of the two souls nor their relationship
underwent any basic change as
a result of the restructuring of the underworld.
The original idea that the hun, being made of the Heavenly qi and light, moves
upward, while the po, being made of the earthly qi and heavy, moves downward,
was retained without change. Indeed, in this new conception, the destination of
the hun- soul is located high on the Liangfu hill, whereas that of the po- soul is
down in Gaoli, identifi ed as the Lower Village (Xiali) in popu lar culture. This
point is also further borne out by another poem of the same writer in which it
is explic itly stated that after death, the hun “fl ies” and the po “sinks.” 82
In conclusion, it is impor tant to point out that the popu lar belief in Han
China linking the underworld to Mount Tai prepared the ground for the Chinese
people to adjust themselves to the much more power ful Buddhist idea of “hells”
in the centuries to come. It is in ter est ing to note that in some of the earliest
Chinese translations of Buddhist sûtras attributed to the Parthian monk An
Shigao
(?–168) and the Sogdian monk Kang Senghui
(?–280), the
term niraya (hell) is often rendered as “the underworld prison in Mount Tai”
(Taishan Diyu
) . One translated text even says something to the eff ect
that both the hun- and po- souls are harshly tortured in the Taishan Diyu.83 This
description agrees remarkably well with the indigenous Chinese idea of postmor-
tem punishment as found in the Scripture of Great Peace quoted earlier. Needless
to say, as Buddhism gradually gained ground in China, Chinese conceptions of
“o soul , c om e b ack ! ” 77
the soul and afterlife were to be totally transformed. As a result, the pre- Buddhist
belief in a dualistic underworld was eventually replaced by the Buddhist belief in
“Ten Hells” each governed by a “King” ( yamarāja) . Nevertheless, the Han tradi-
tion about the Lord of Mount Tai in charge of the dead survived this radical trans-
formation. Instead of being completely forgotten, the Lord of Mount Tai secured
a permanent place in the Buddhist underworld as one of the Ten Kings— King of
Mount Tai.84 It is a point worth stressing that popu lar Chinese beliefs about the
afterlife in their post- Han form, which developed under the infl uence of Bud-
dhism, cannot be fully understood without knowledge of indigenous beliefs in