compatriots around 250 c.e. is a misnomer, and should be replaced by the
contemporary terms “Pure Conversation” (ch’ing t’an) and “Dark Learning”
(hsüan hsüeh).
This definitional strategy buys clarity in some areas at the cost of obscurity
elsewhere. What we miss is the oppositional stance which crystallized while
Confucianism was becoming a state orthodoxy and a religion, and the fluctu-
ating lines of syncretism which took place within this oppositional united front.
One can agree that “Taoism” is an anachronism before the time of Tung
Chung-shu, though not after. But the elements that became “Taoism” preex-
isted this time. Schematically, these included: (1) wu (sorcerers) and fang shih
(shamans or spirit mediums), with their methods of curing the sick, prophesy-
ing, inducing trances and visions; (2) a practice of physical hygiene which
sought longevity through breathing exercises and gymnastics; (3) experiment-
ers with drugs and metals seeking an elixir of life; and (4) politically and
philosophically oppositional hermits and primitivists, ranging from the follow-
ers of Yang Chu up through the author of the Tao Te Ching (Welch, 1965:
88–112).
These doctrines represent quite different social settings and historical peri-
ods. The magicians and shamans were members of surviving aboriginal tribes
or practitioners among the lower classes. The philosophical primitivists, by
contrast, were members of the educated classes. Where we hear of them putting
their ideas into practice, such as Ch’en Chung of the ruling house of Ch’i, ca.
320 b.c.e. (Fung, 1952–53: 143), we find something like a utopian community
or “hippie commune,” quite different in spirit from the involuntary primitive-
ness of life among the peasantry. Some ideas and practices of the magicians
percolated into court circles by the time of the Ch’in and early Han. Magicians
vied for the patronage of superstitious and aging emperors; in response, court
intellectuals propounded new methods of physical hygiene and concocted new
elixirs, intellectualizing and extending the themes of tribal magic. In this
evolving mix, the political and metaphysical themes of Chuang Tzu and the
Tao Te Ching stand apart from the crude materialist goals of longevity and
physical immortality for the individual.^18 Nevertheless, all these elements were
thrown together in compilations such as the Huai-nan Tzu (130 b.c.e.) and
the Lieh Tzu (ca. 300 c.e.). Such amalgamations gave pointed contrast to the
officializing doctrines of public morality and political-religious responsibility
that made up the core of the Confucian position. The earliest group identity
as “Taoist” was a coalition formed of disparate elements, which began just as
Confucianism was putting together its synthesis with the cosmologies of the
divination schools.
The Taoist church began to form in the late Han as factional struggles at
court against the official cult of the Confucians, sponsoring sacrifices to a
166 •^ Intellectual Communities: Asian Paths