The Contemplative Foundations of Classical Daoism

Harold D. Roth

• Publisher: SUNY Press
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9781438482729
• Topic: Filosofía
• Subtopic: Filosofía oriental

In The Contemplative Foundations of Classical Daoism, Harold D. Roth explores the origins and nature of the Daoist tradition, arguing that its creators and innovators were not abstract philosophers but, rather, mystics engaged in self-exploration and self-cultivation, which in turn provided the insights embodied in such famed works as the Daodejing and Zhuangzi. In this compilation of essays and chapters representing nearly thirty years of scholarship, Roth examines the historical and intellectual origins of Daoism and demonstrates how this distinctive philosophy emerged directly from practices that were essentially contemplative in nature. In the first part of the book, Roth applies text-critical methods to derive the hidden contemplative dimensions of classical Daoism. In the second part, he applies a "contemplative hermeneutic" to explore the relationship between contemplative practices and classical Daoist philosophy and, in so doing, brings early Daoist writings into conversation with contemporary contemplative studies. To this he adds an introduction in which he reflects on the arc and influence on the field of early Chinese thought of this rich vein of scholarship and an afterword in which he applies both interpretive methods to the vexing question of the authorship of the Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi. The Contemplative Foundations of Classical Daoism brings to fruition the cumulative investigations and observations of a leading figure in the emerging field of contemplative studies as they pertain to a core component of early Chinese thought.

Part I

Textual Methods

Chapter 1

Psychology and Self-Cultivation in
Early Daoistic Thought

One genuinely unexplored area of early Chinese thought is that of psychology. What are the basic elements that constitute the human mind? How do they interact and function together to express innate human tendencies and shape human experience? And how can they be transformed so that human beings can reach the limits of their inherent natures? While most certainly we cannot expect the ancient Chinese to have conceived of psychology in the same ways that we do, there is no doubt that as human beings they wrestled with many of the same problems that we confront today in trying to understand human consciousness and human potential.

In his 1980 book Xianqin xinli sixiang yanjiu 先秦心理思想研究, Yan Guocai 燕國村 differentiates between “psychology” (xinli xue 心理學), which is a century-old science developed in the West without parallels in ancient China, and “psychological thought” (xinli sixiang 心理思想), a broader category of theories about the mind, which does not necessarily contain the same Western assumptions and is definitely represented in pre-Qin thought.1 While I agree with Yan about the need to distinguish between a definition of psychology based exclusively on Western models and a more broadly-based category, which could be called “psychological thought,” I do not think that the mere use of the term “psychology” must carry with it any particular set of assumptions about the nature of the mind from the wide range of Western schools of psychology simply because the term was coined in the West. Indeed, if one did wish to outline the basic ideas of “Western psychology,” one would be hard-pressed to find a consensus on just what they might be. Should Western psychology be characterized by the theories of Sigmund Freud or the theories of B. F. Skinner? Instead of distinguishing between “psychology” and “psychological thought,” as Yan does, should we not make a distinction between psychotherapy and psychology? In that case, I would agree that there is little evidence of anything resembling Western psychotherapy in ancient China, but I would argue that we can certainly find “psychology” there.

Here I use “psychology” as a generic term referring to any theories of the nature and activity of the human mind, independent of any specific model—either Western or Eastern.2 While I agree with Yan that ancient Chinese ideas on psychology include such aspects as knowledge, emotion, intentionality, and human nature,3 I would expand his list to include the entire range of experiences of self-transcendence that usually fall outside the purview of Western psychology and are considered under the general heading of “religious” or “mystical” experience.

This approach implies that ancient Chinese philosophers did conceive of an inner psychic life. Some modern scholars may wish to extend the arguments of Herbert Fingarette about the absence of such “subjective” notions in Confucius to all early Chinese thinkers, but such arguments cannot stand against the overwhelming evidence in the sources examined in the present study.4 In these sources, an inner dimension is not merely present in human beings but is the basis for the complete realization of our inherent potential. Those scholars who question the presence of psychological theories in ancient China reveal more about their own philosophical presuppositions than about any early Chinese thinker. As I understand it, this is precisely Benjamin Schwartz’s critique of Fingarette, and I wholeheartedly agree with it.5

Questions of human psychology were first raised in China during the fourth century BCE and, not surprisingly, were associated with the philosophical debates about human nature. Such questions are mentioned in the surviving writings of Yang Zhu preserved in the Lüshi chunqiu 呂氏春秋 and the Zhuangzi 莊子,6 and are seen as well in the Confucian works of Mencius and Xunzi and the foundational Daoist texts, the Laozi 老子 and the Zhuangzi. Questions of the nature and functioning of the human mind do not figure prominently in any of these works save the last, or “Syncretist,” stratum of the Zhuangzi, of early Han date.7 But each of these texts takes for granted certain common ideas about human psychology, which may have been discussed more directly in other works that are now lost or have not received the same degree of attention from traditional and modern scholars.

One of the most ancient assumptions about human psychology in China is that the various aspects of human psychological experience are associated with, or even based upon, certain physiological substrates or conditions. Interestingly enough, this assumption is initially discussed in some of the most important passages on self-cultivation in early Chinese thought. Mencius alludes to this in 2A2, where he links the continual practice of acting ethically with the “flood-like vital energy” (haoran zhi qi 浩然之氣). The Inner Chapters of the Zhuangzi touch upon this in the relationship between emptiness (xu 虛) and the vital energy in chapter 4.8 The Laozi as well touches upon this assumption in its passing mention of concentrating the vital energy (zhuan qi 專氣) in chapter 10. Yet despite these scattered references, none of the major Warring States philosophical texts explores the physiological basis of human psychology. This is particularly surprising of the Daoist texts, because in them the process of self-cultivation does seem to involve such mental disciplines as “the fasting of the mind” (xin zhai 心齋)9 and “sitting and forgetting” (zuo wang 坐忘).10 It is also surprising in light of later developments in Daoism.

Despite this apparent absence in the early Daoist tradition, the physiological basis of human psychology does play a major role in the theory and practice of the nei dan 內丹, or “physiological alchemy,” which emerged somewhat later when Daoism became institutionalized and took on many of the characteristics we usually ascribe to a religion. The linking of psychological experience to physiological conditions—in this case to the generation and/or manipulation of the vital energy (qi 氣), the vital essence (jing 精), and the numen (shen 神)—contains a significant theoretical assumption.11 If psychological experiences—especially the exalted and desirable ones traditionally attained through meditation—are based upon physiological conditions, then it is possible to attain these states through exclusively physiological means such as dietary control, the consumption of certain physical substances, and even carefully regulated physical exercise. This makes possible a whole range of nei dan practices, which seem to have preceded the Daoist religion but which became fully developed therein.12

One problem that has perplexed those scholars who have investigated the possible links between the Daoist religion and the texts it often claims as foundational, the Laozi and the Zhuangzi, is just when and from what sources did these practices of physiological alchemy enter the tradition? Some, such as Henri Maspero, have found evidence of them in these early philosophical sources.13 Others, such as H. G. Creel and Fung Yu-lan, see them as part of a supposed corruption of Daoist philosophy caused by its intermingling with various superstitious popular elements during the Han dynasty.14 Others-especially Japanese and Chinese scholars (such as Fukui Fumimasu, Sakai Tadao, Yamada Toshiaki, Zhou Shaoxian...