Beijing
China's capital is a beautiful city. I actually went here before reaching Xi'an. Below you will see the Temple of Heaven, the Temple of Confucius (where you can see children on field trips learning how classes would have been in Confucian times), and the Forbidden Palace. I also took an excursion to the Great Wall.
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While travelling through China, I read Seven Bamboo Tablets of the Cloudy Satchel, the second book in a trilogy by Deng Ming-Dao. The trilogy is a biography of a Chinese martial arts teacher called Kwan Saihung, who had lived and trained with the Grand Master of Huashan (Mount Hua) until the cultural revolution forced him to pursue his training outside of his homeland. This was the greatest book I had read since Siddhartha (read for the first time at age 16), and it interested me very much to learn about the intersection between Chinese culture, philosophy, and martial arts. Kwan Saihung, by the way, also performed with the Beijing Opera!
Louguan Temple
Many aspects of modern Chinese culture are influenced by Taoism, the indigenous "religion" of China that predated both Confucianism and Buddhism. Just outside of Xi'an is the Louguan temple, dated to around 600 BCE, around which is built the Taoist Cultural Center of China. They chose this site for the cultural center because it was where Lao Tzu, the writer of the Tao Te Ching, was said to have lectured on philosophy. The photos of Louguan Temple below include a painting of Lao Tzu riding an ox, a ceramic sculpture of Shouxing (a legendary figure called "Old Man of the South Pole"), a mural of the legendary Eight Immortals, and a bronze sculpture referencing an interesting Taoist myth about a snake coiled around a turtle.
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According to the legend, Lao Tzu was discontented with the politics of his state and so he set out westward on his ox. Xi'an, of course, was the westernmost point in China before the silk road began, and so Louguan Temple was where Lao Tzu gave his last known lecture. His followers (which, by the way, included Confucius) asked him to write down the essence of his teachings on a manuscript before he left. Lao Tzu then sat down and wrote the Tao Te Ching, which remains the central text of Taoism to this day.
Wudangshan (Wudang Mountain)
For nearly 2 years prior to visiting China I trained at Wudang International Martial Arts Academy in Seattle, learning Ba Gua Zhang, the most clearly Taoist form of Chinese martial art. My teachers, Dr. Lu Mei-Hui and Master Chang Wu-Na, were trained at Wudang Mountain, a 7-hour train ride from Xi'an. Wudang Mountain is one of the sacred Taoist mountains in China and said to be the birthplace of Ba Gua Zhang. Martial arts did not come naturally to me, but I persevered and did my best to improve. Inspired by my instructors (and by Kwan Saihung's biography), I set out to learn more.
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Martial arts (wushu, in Chinese) are another example of how Taoism has shaped Chinese culture. Taoist philosophy (represented by the Yin-Yang symbol) is based on the union of opposites: light and dark, hard and soft; active and passive; giving and receiving; and so on. In wushu, one has to know how to strike but also to yield; to push but also to fall; to lead the opponent's energy but also to follow it. Music, in a sense, works the same way: you have to know how to play but also how to listen; how to make sound expressively but also how to pause expressively; how to be bold and confident but also to be humble and vulnerable. The phrase kung fu, though commonly associated with martial arts, technically applies to any skill that one has practiced with great discipline, including music performance.
The Ultimate "Non-Religion"
Following my trip to Greece in the previous year, I carried the question of whether Eastern culture had created a set of "ultimate truths" different from Western culture and yet equally true. Christianity, for the ancient Greeks, was a movement to unite the best wisdom and worship practices (including music) from Greco-Roman indigenous traditions into a common language of philosophical and spiritual concepts, all based around the central revelation of Christ. Taoism, in China, was indeed a parallel movement, except with one striking paradox: the truth of Taoism (at least as I understood it) was gained by leaving the religion of Taoism behind, rather than following it. Wait, what?
Let me explain. Taoist teachings are filled with thought-provoking, riddle-like sayings that seem to contradict common sense: "He who knows does not speak, he who speaks does not know"; "If you want to lead the people, you must learn to follow them"; "Throw away morality and justice, and people will do the right thing." The idea is that when you are trying to be something or know something, you are blind to what you are not and don't know. When you try to follow a certain teaching, you are blind to what the teaching doesn't tell you. As a case in point, Lao Tzu wrote down his teachings, but in doing so, they limited what the teachings could say and made them incomplete. A finite set of words, in the Eastern tradition, by nature of its finiteness can never express the whole Truth. In essence, the Truth is unspeakable! This actually sounds a bit like what the Greeks' called negative theology (trying to define God as un-limited, un-knowable, in-describable, etc. because He can't be fully defined by any positive attribute).
In this way, the contrast between Eastern and Western "ultimates" is quite poetic. Greek philosophy focuses on definitions and meaningful concepts. Christian theology is concerned with the specific and personal nature of God--in identifying this person as Jesus of Nazareth, Christianity was created to be the ultimate religion. In contrast, Taoist philosophy focuses on getting away from names and concepts and perceived identities in order to experience what actually is. Lao Tzu wrote: "The Way that can be explained is not the true Way"; and "When people lose their sense of awe, they turn to religion." In Taoism, the true and nameless animating force of the universe just is, and we live it rather than define or know it conceptually--in this way, Taoism is the ultimate non-religion!
Indeed, before the Tao Te Ching was interpreted and formalized as a religion, the goal of Taoism existed--it was that "sense of awe" one during moments of spiritual centeredness--but it wasn't called "Taoism." When the word "Taoism" came about, the Truth that it tried describe became hidden; we became limited by the imperfect words of the teachings. To reach the goal of Taoism, therefore, one must reach the point of losing the religion. You give up all notions that you are on the road to enlightenment in order to finally become enlightened. (Lovely paradox, isn't it?)
Let me explain. Taoist teachings are filled with thought-provoking, riddle-like sayings that seem to contradict common sense: "He who knows does not speak, he who speaks does not know"; "If you want to lead the people, you must learn to follow them"; "Throw away morality and justice, and people will do the right thing." The idea is that when you are trying to be something or know something, you are blind to what you are not and don't know. When you try to follow a certain teaching, you are blind to what the teaching doesn't tell you. As a case in point, Lao Tzu wrote down his teachings, but in doing so, they limited what the teachings could say and made them incomplete. A finite set of words, in the Eastern tradition, by nature of its finiteness can never express the whole Truth. In essence, the Truth is unspeakable! This actually sounds a bit like what the Greeks' called negative theology (trying to define God as un-limited, un-knowable, in-describable, etc. because He can't be fully defined by any positive attribute).
In this way, the contrast between Eastern and Western "ultimates" is quite poetic. Greek philosophy focuses on definitions and meaningful concepts. Christian theology is concerned with the specific and personal nature of God--in identifying this person as Jesus of Nazareth, Christianity was created to be the ultimate religion. In contrast, Taoist philosophy focuses on getting away from names and concepts and perceived identities in order to experience what actually is. Lao Tzu wrote: "The Way that can be explained is not the true Way"; and "When people lose their sense of awe, they turn to religion." In Taoism, the true and nameless animating force of the universe just is, and we live it rather than define or know it conceptually--in this way, Taoism is the ultimate non-religion!
Indeed, before the Tao Te Ching was interpreted and formalized as a religion, the goal of Taoism existed--it was that "sense of awe" one during moments of spiritual centeredness--but it wasn't called "Taoism." When the word "Taoism" came about, the Truth that it tried describe became hidden; we became limited by the imperfect words of the teachings. To reach the goal of Taoism, therefore, one must reach the point of losing the religion. You give up all notions that you are on the road to enlightenment in order to finally become enlightened. (Lovely paradox, isn't it?)
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The more I learned about Taoism, the more I realized its implications for music and other arts. I discovered that my approach to music has always contained a kind of sensibility described by Taoism. The Tao (in English, "the Way") is a way of doing things that brings harmony to all the opposite forces that one interacts with. When I make music, I intuitively balance the light and the dark, the major and the minor keys, the hard and the soft, the melody and the silence. I've been doing it all these years, even though I never would have described myself as a Taoist!
But, in a strange way, for a Westerner to label oneself as a Taoist is to miss the point of what Taoism actually is. When you call yourself a "Taoist," you immediately separate yourself from all that is "not-Taoist," and you create an imbalance between these two opposites. You then lose the very harmony that you were aspiring for by calling yourself a Taoist. Lao Tzu wrote: "When people see somethings as beautiful, other things become ugly. When people see somethings as good, other things become bad. Being and non-being create each other." In other words, we may use words to describe things like "beauty" and "knowledge" and "morality," but inside each word is a concept that we have to un-learn in order to fully embody. Trying to define ourselves through words and concepts brings us out of balance and gets in the way of actually being "beautiful" or "wise" or "just" (whatever the concept entails). Trying to be a "great musician" or a "great martial artist" is pointless; you have to get rid of your concept of what is "great" and just be yourself in order to find greatness, whether in music or martial arts or in any other kung fu.
But, in a strange way, for a Westerner to label oneself as a Taoist is to miss the point of what Taoism actually is. When you call yourself a "Taoist," you immediately separate yourself from all that is "not-Taoist," and you create an imbalance between these two opposites. You then lose the very harmony that you were aspiring for by calling yourself a Taoist. Lao Tzu wrote: "When people see somethings as beautiful, other things become ugly. When people see somethings as good, other things become bad. Being and non-being create each other." In other words, we may use words to describe things like "beauty" and "knowledge" and "morality," but inside each word is a concept that we have to un-learn in order to fully embody. Trying to define ourselves through words and concepts brings us out of balance and gets in the way of actually being "beautiful" or "wise" or "just" (whatever the concept entails). Trying to be a "great musician" or a "great martial artist" is pointless; you have to get rid of your concept of what is "great" and just be yourself in order to find greatness, whether in music or martial arts or in any other kung fu.
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Regarding the religion, however, I found that there were many similarities between the Taoist monastic tradition and that of the Greek Orthodox monks. Both had similar dress, hair styles, prayer regiments, and strict eating conventions (though the specifics differed). Chanting and music were integral components to both monastic ways of life.
Here is a great short documentary on Taoism (sometimes spelled "Daoism") as it relates to martial arts. |
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