Xianyou (Transcendent Journeys): The Pursuit, Inquiry into and Experience of Dao in the Quanzhen School of Daoism

The following paper is a translation of National Zhengzhi University Professor Li Fengmao’s original Chinese article. This translation was completed with the express approval of Professor Li, and under the direction of Professor Stephen R. Bokenkamp.
Quanzhen Daoism (“The Way of Complete Perfection”) is a sect of Daoism founded by master Wang Chongyang (王重陽 1113-1170) in the twelfth century AD. The tradition is, in essence, the systemization and formalization of traditional Daoist practices through the implementation of Confucian and Buddhist infrastructure. Synthesizing Confucian practices of study and copying of classics, proper human relationships, and master-student succession, and Buddhist chujia (出家 “to leave the household”) and large public monastic systems, Quanzhen Daoism established systematic mechanisms which facilitated the zealous advancement of practitioners.
The Quanzhen sect formalized the Daoist tradition of “famous mountains and enlightened teachers” and integrated the respective practices of residing in a monastery and participating in fangdao (訪道) as required components of personal cultivation, constituting “monastery residence” and “travel” experiences. These two components complemented each other and eventually came to form the integral experiences of Quanzhen cultivation. The establishment of a uniform “household system,” inter-monastery exchange system, “Pure Rules,” “Collection of Orthodox Chants,” “percept transmission system,” and “name assignment system” streamlined the acclimation process for both entering the household of religion and participating in required ceremonies during travel.
Ultimately, the systemized infrastructure established by Quanzhen Daoism allowed for the formation of a complete ordered society outside of the secular world. This Quanzhen world, in turn, provided the framework for large-scale, practical implementation of Daoist techniques, the most ideologically significant of which are participation in arduous travel and actualization of “an irregular accordance with the Dao.”