Tag Archives: Inner Alchemy

BOOKS: “Practical Taoism” ed. / trans. by Thomas Cleary

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Practical TaoismPractical Taoism by Thomas Cleary
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Publisher Site – Shambhala

Like a number of Eastern systems, Taoism is thought of in many different ways by many different people, and a few of those ways are fairly “out there.” To some, it is a philosophy. To others, it is a religion. To still others, it is a style of magic. By “practical Taoism” Cleary is suggesting that the many varied sources from which he drew snippets, assembling them together to make a coherent whole, reflect some of the more down-to-earth philosophy of “inner alchemy.” [Not to be confused with the “alchemy” in which lead is turned to gold, but sharing the central idea that methods exist to convert a low-quality entity into a high-quality one, but in the case of inner alchemy these methods are breathwork, meditation, and movement techniques that improve one’s vitality as a human being.]

The good news is that Cleary does collect a group of ideas that seem less arcane and cryptic than the average Taoist inner alchemy manual content (or, at least, they are translated so as to seem so.) The bad news is that the average Taoist inner alchemy manual was apparently pretty darn arcane and cryptic, such that even this selection isn’t exactly clear as a limpid stream. Some parts of it are straightforward, but one still has some work to do to make sense of what the original authors were trying to get across. [Some readers will enjoy that more than others.]

Presumably owing to the attempt to simplify through selection and translation, the book isn’t annotated, nor does it feature much ancillary material besides a relatively lengthy introduction to setup the reader with a contextual backdrop. So, there is not a lot of help to clarify ideas that are murky. (I do recognize the translator’s challenge in that there is only so much he can do to try to clarify ideas without imposing upon the authors’ intensions.)

I enjoyed, and learned from, this book — even if I didn’t always feel I was reading a “practical” guide to self-betterment.

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BOOKS: “Original Tao” by Harold D. Roth

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Original Tao: Inward Training (Nei-yeh) and the Foundations of Taoist Mysticism (Translations from the Asian Classics)Original Tao: Inward Training (Nei-yeh) and the Foundations of Taoist Mysticism by Harold D. Roth
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Publisher site – Columbia University Press

This book is built around a translation of an old Taoist manual called “Inward Training” (i.e. 内业,) and the book serves not only to elaborate the meaning of the twenty-six poems that make up the manual, but also to put this work in a context with respect to its place in early Taoist mysticism — which raises further questions as to what constitutes early Taoism and early Taoist mysticism. (Just as the earliest followers of Jesus didn’t think of themselves as “Christians” – at least not as we understand that term – it’s an open question as to when people started to think of themselves as Taoists and how that start relates to when people began holding a set of proto-beliefs that formed the basis of the school(s) of philosophy.)

“Inward Training” presents breathwork and meditational exercises that Roth calls “inner cultivation” — or what some have called “inner alchemy.” The book does contain the entire manual both in Traditional Chinese and an English translation, as well as a much more extensive elaboration of the teachings of the manual. The latter is necessary because, like many old manuals, sparse description, archaic language, and assumptions about common knowledge du jour make it difficult for the layman to get any depth of understanding from the manual, itself.

This is a scholarly work, which means that its readability isn’t the highest and it does dive into matters that will be arcana for non-expert readers. That said, particularly as works of academic philosophy go, its readability isn’t bad. The book is heavily annotated and offers and extensive bibliography.

If you are interested in Taoist practices of breath, meditation, and alignment, this book is well worth investigating.

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BOOKS: “The Secret of the Golden Flower” ed. / trans. by Thomas Cleary

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The Secret of the Golden Flower: The Classical Chinese Book of LifeThe Secret of the Golden Flower: The Classical Chinese Book of Life by Lü Dongbin
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Online – Archive.org

This is a manual on Taoist inner alchemy practices, particularly a meditative practice called “turning the light around.” The book has been attributed to Lü Dongbin, said to be an immortal who lived during the Tang Dynasty, though there are differing views about the manual’s actual origins. While it is nominally a Taoist manual, it also discusses the Buddhist approach extensively (and Confucian ideas to a lesser extent) such that it could be considered a Buddhist teaching as much as a Taoist one.

The Cleary translation seems to exist not merely to provide an English translation of this Chinese manual, but to combat the misunderstandings perpetrated by the earlier English translation, that of Richard Wilhelm, a translation famously associated with the psychoanalyst Carl Jung. Neither Wilhelm nor Jung had any depth of understanding of Taoist and Buddhist methods and philosophy, and Wilhelm’s grasp of the Chinese language, itself, seems to have been fairly rudimentary. (At least the Chinese of the 1600’s, which is when the edition that Wilhelm is believed to have worked from is dated.) Thus, there is a lot of peddling of the notion that the ideas of this manual were in line with twentieth century psychotherapy in ways that were really not true — either because Wilhelm was mistaken or wanted them to be true or some combination, thereof.

The translation, itself, is quite short and makes up less than half of the text length of this book. More than half consists of extensive notes as well as an Afterward. While I have complained many times about publishers padding out pamphlet length publications to make them salable at book prices, in this case I believe the “ancillary” matter is helpful to achieving a better understanding of the text. The translation itself is not only sparse but features a bit of Taoist and Buddhist arcana that is likely to be unfamiliar — even to those with some understanding of the traditions. The notes and afterward help one to comprehend this book’s ideas much better.

If you’re interested in Taoist inner alchemy or Buddhist meditative practices, this book is worth checking out. That said, it can be a bit of a tedious read, flipping between the translation and the notes to make sense of ideas that don’t readily translate.

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BOOKS: “Taoism: An Essential Guide” by Eva Wong

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Taoism: An Essential GuideTaoism: An Essential Guide by Eva Wong
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Publisher Site

This book offers the reader clarity about the scope of Taoism, a daunting challenge given Taoism’s long history and how it overlaps with other schools of philosophy as well as with Traditional Chinese Religion, more broadly. The book is divided into three parts: history, specialties (magic, divination, ceremony, inward training, and karma yoga,) and practices (meditation, somatic practices [e.g. qi gong and taijiquan,] and rituals and ceremonies.) The history section covers a period from pre-Taoist shamanic practices of 5,000 years ago, practices that would inform early Taoism, to a period during which Taoism became entwined with Buddhism and Confucianism. The specialties and practices sections attempt to give the reader a broad overview while avoiding discussion of “how-to.”

I found this book to be informative and interesting. It did feel more effectively geared toward someone with an interest in Taoism as religion rather than Taoism as a philosophy. The discussion does sometimes get into the weeds on issues like ceremonies and talismans (again, not in a how-to fashion, but with some arcane detail nevertheless,) but — at the same time — besides some discussion of the teachings of the Tao Te Jing and some exploration of Taoist metaphysics in the Divinational Taoism chapter, there’s not a lot of insight into Taoism as philosophy. That said, it does end each chapter with a “Further Reading” section that can point readers interested in a specific topic elsewhere.

If you’ve ever been overwhelmed at one of those bright and complicated Chinese temples and would like some insight into what Taoists do and how it’s different (or not different) from what Confucianists, Traditional Chinese Religion practitioners, and Zen Buddhists do, this is a good book to check out. If you’re solely interested in Taoism as a school of philosophy or otherwise have a specific focus such as qi gong and breathwork practices, you can probably find books that are better tailored to your needs.

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