Fangshi

Fangshi (Chinese: 方士; pinyin: fāngshì; literally: 'method master') were Chinese technical specialists who flourished from the third century BCE to the fifth century CE. English translations of fangshi include alchemist, astrologer, diviner, exorcist, geomancer, doctor, magician, monk, mystic, necromancer, occultist, omenologist, physician, physiognomist, technician, technologist, thaumaturge, and wizard.

## Contents

* 1 Etymology
* 2 History
* 3 Notable fangshi
* 4 Connections
* 5 Criticism
* 6 See also
* 7 References
* 8 Further reading
* 9 External links

## Etymology

The Chinese word Template:Zhp combines Template:Zhp and Template:Zhp.

Many English-language texts transliterate this word as fangshi (older texts use fangshih), but some literally translate it.

* "gentlemen possessing magical recipes"[1]
* "recipe gentlemen"[2]
* "masters of recipes"[3]
* "'direction-scholar', that is, one versed in interpreting omens from their orientation"[4] [from fengjiao "wind angle" divination below]
* "Esoteric Masters"[5]
* "gentleman who possess techniques, technician"[6]
* "masters of recipes and methods"[7]
* "masters of methods"[8]
* "masters of esoterica"[9]

The Chinese historian Yu Ying-shi concludes that "as a general term, fang-shih may be translated 'religious Taoists' or 'popular Taoists,' since all such arts were later incorporated in the Taoist religion.[10] Only in specific cases depending on contexts, should the term be translated 'magicians,' 'alchemists,' or 'immortalists.'" Fangshi "is an elusive term that defies a consistent translation"[11]

There is general agreement that the shi in Template:Zhp means "master; gentleman; trained specialist" (cf. 道士; Daoshi), but considerable disagreement about the meaning of fang.

The etymology of fangshi is "subject to various interpretations", writes DeWoskin.

> By the end of the Later Chou, there are several occurrences of the word "fang" in two new binomes, fang-shu [方書] and fang-shuo [方說], literally, "fang books" and "fang theories". The word "fang" in its various common contexts meant "efficacious," "formulaic," "parallel," "correlative," "comparative," "medicinal," "spiritual," or "esoteric." Throughout archaic times, the word also occurs commonly in the compound ssu-fang [四方], meaning four outlying areas, and hence refers to people, places, and cultures removed from the central court. Each of these meanings is potentially a factor in the etymology of the term."[12]

Harper says "DeWoskin's attempt at a definition for fang shih which admits every possible meaning of fang into its analysis renders the term meaningless".

> Whatever fang or shih as separate words meant in an earlier period, when they were combined to form the name for wonder-workers who gathered at the Ch'in and Han courts, the name expressed some essential quality of these people. Automatically most of the meanings for fang which DeWoskin claims are "potentially a factor in the etymology of the term" can be eliminated, especially the series "parallel, correlative, comparative." In analyzing the term fang shih, earlier scholars have focused primarily on the meaning "method" or "tablet on which a method is recorded, recipe," in which case fang shih means "master possessing methods" or "master possessing recipes."[13]

Based upon words that Han texts use to describe occult practices, Template:Zhp and Template:Zhp, Harper concludes, "The possession of writings containing occult knowledge which might be revealed to select patrons was the chief characteristic of all who were known as fang shih." Describing the background of fangshi, DeWoskin suggests an "other" etymology.

> It is possible to group the antecedents of fang-shih thought and techniques into three distinct areas: astrology and calendrics; the practices of wu mediums and conjury; and pharmaceutical and hygienic medicine. Virtually all the fang-shih prominent enough to be included in dynastic histories specialized in only one of these areas. Because the three areas are not historically related, and the typical fang-shih does not embrace them all, the grouping suggests that the common sense of the name fang-shih was somewhat akin to "others," and did not attach to any readily definable school or tradition.[14]

Harper also faults this hypothesis, concluding, "A more judicious examination could not lead to this sort of reductio ad absurdum."

Summarizing how Chinese authors used the word fangshi from the Han through the Song dynasties, Sivin lists four general criteria.

>   1. The fang-shih usually belonged to the tiny privileged segment of the population who could read books and leave records. The writings we have, not a random sample, are of high literary quality. Early stories about technicians often have them confounding philosophers. The fang-shih usually came from a family that we know held official rank, even in periods when such rank was normally hereditary.
>   2. The fang-shih himself did not usually hold high rank in the regular civil service. If he did, it tended to be obtained irregularly, most often as an imperial gesture. Someone who reached a high post through a conventional career, although he might have considerable mechanical skill, scientific knowledge, or mastery of the occult, was not often called a fang-shih. ...
>   3. The fang-shih did not strive for the personal goals that the well-born expected of their own kind. He usually held conventional moral and political opinions, if we can rely on the record, but the stigma of inappropriate technical enthusiasms, however faint, is commonly visible. Someone in a conspicuous position of orthodoxy, regardless of technical expertise, was not considered a fang-shih.
>   4. The fang-shih had powers only rarely seen in the orthodox literatus – to foresee the future, to arrogate to himself the shaping and transforming powers of natural process (tsao hua 造化), and so on. At the same time descriptions of him never limn the full humanity, the mastery of the social Way, of the more conventional great.[15]

## History

Fangshi are first recorded in early Chinese canonical Twenty-Four Histories: Sima Qian's (c. 91 BCE) Template:Zhp, Ban Gu's (82 CE) Template:Zhp, Chen Shou's (289 CE) Template:Zhp, and Fan Ye's (445 CE) Template:Zhp. DeWoskin[16] translated fangshi biographies from the latter three histories, but some reviewers[17] criticized him for ignoring Ngo's French translation of the same biographies.Cite error: Closing `</ref>` missing for `<ref>` tag

Some fangshi practices like Template:Zhp were closer to parlor magic than esoteric techniques. DeWoskin explains

> The repertory by which fang-shih won their patronage included not only storytelling, but glib dissertations on astrology, omenology, and esoteric philosophy and various performances of magical arts. The histories record many instances of a fang-shih challenge game, she-fu 射覆, where masters the likes of Tung-fang Shuo, Kuan Lu 管輅, and Guo P'u 郭璞 (276–324) guessed the identity of hidden objects before gatherings of dinner guests or skeptical officials.[18]

## Notable fangshi

Many famous fangshi "method masters" are considered Daoists.

* Xu Fu 徐福 (fl. 219–210 BCE), sent by Qin Shi Huang to find elixir of immortality
* Luan Da 栾大 (d. 112 BCE), professed to know the secrets to immortality, transmutation of gold, and power over the Yellow River
* Gan Ji 干吉 (c. 2nd century CE), Daoist priest
* Zuo Ci 左慈 (c. 3rd century CE), Daoist master, teacher of Ge Xuan
* Ge Xuan 葛玄 (164–244), Daoist master, grandfather of Ge Hong
* Guan Lu 管輅 (209–256), famous diviner
* Guo Pu 郭璞 (276–324), commentator and author
* Ge Hong 葛洪 (283–343), Daoist author of the Baopuzi
* Elder Zhang Guo 張果老, (c. mid 8th century), one of the Eight Immortals
* Chen Tuan 陳摶 (c. 920–989), Daoist master, originator of Liuhebafa gungfu

The term fangshi sometimes occurs in contemporary usage. For instance, Wong[19] applies the fangshi tradition to explain the author Liu E 劉鶚 and his (1904) novel the Travels of Lao Can.

## Connections

The fangshi tradition has diverse origins and affiliations. When first recorded around the fourth century BCE, fangshi were connected with Zhou dynasty astrology, divination, and record-keeping. During the Qin and Han dynasties, fangshi developed many new techniques, which were gradually absorbed by Daoist religions (e.g., Shangqing School), Daoist movements (e.g., Way of the Five Pecks of Rice), Chinese alchemy (both internal Neidan and external Waidan), Buddhist meditation, and traditional Chinese medicine.

"The genealogy of the fangshi is complex", Robinet writes. "They go back to the archivist-soothsayers of antiquity, one of whom supposedly was Laozi himself; under the Shang and Zhou they were the only ones who knew divination and writing".[20] DeWoskin describes how the fangshi consolidated several ancient Chinese traditions.

> Their divination practices can be traced back to late Shang-dynasty oracle-bone culture, Chou-dynasty milfoil-stalk procedures, and Chou astrological and calendric technology. This historical connection between divination practices, especially calendric and astrological types, and the chronicling of events is reflected in the conspicuous literacy of the fang-shih and their propensity for authoring biographical, geographical, and other narratives. Their medical practices combine elements of the Confucian medical tradition (ju-i 儒醫) and popular medical practices, derived in large part from shamanic ritual. Hence they practiced a range of therapies from acupuncture and pharmacology to incantation and talismanic exorcism. Their immortality practices encompass both alchemical (wai-tan 外丹) and hygienic (nei-tan 內丹) techniques adumbrated in the Taoist classics and elaborated in the emerging religious Taoist movements.[18]

Daoist religions appropriated many fangshi techniques. Holmes Welch hypothesized that Daoism was a river that united four streams of philosophy, hygiene, alchemy, and Penglai mythology. fangshi are associated with the latter two.

> It was probably between 350 and 250 B.C. that the names of Lao Tzu, Chuang Tzu, and Lieh Tzu became associated with what we shall call "philosophical Taoism"; their books testified in turn to the existence of a "hygiene school," which cultivated longevity through breathing exercises and gymnastics; early in the same period the theory of the Five Elements was propounded by Tsou Yen, whose followers are thought to have started research on the elixir of life; and lastly, along the northeastern coasts of China, ships began to sail out in search of the Isles of the Blest, hoping to return with the mushroom that "prevented death".[21]

Welch concludes that fangshi developed alchemy, "although Tsou Yen gradually acquired alchemistical stature, he himself knew nothing of the art. It was probably developed by those of his followers who became interested in physical experimentation with the Five Elements. The first elixir they developed was cinnabar, or mercuric sulphide".[22]

Joseph Needham traced the origins of Daoism to an alliance between fangshi, Template:Zhp and philosophers such as Laozi and Zhuangzi:

> At the heart of ancient Taoism there was an artisanal element, for both the wizards and the philosophers were convinced that important and useful things could be achieved by using one's hands. They did not participate in the mentality of the Confucian scholar-administrator, who sat on high in his tribunal issuing orders and never employing his hands except in reading and writing. This is why it came about that wherever in ancient China one finds the sprouts of any of the natural sciences the Taoists are sure to be involved. The fang shih 方士 or 'gentlemen possessing magical recipes' were certainly Taoist, and they worked in all kinds of directions as star-clerk and weather-forecasters, men of farm-lore and wort-cunning, irrigators and bridge-builders, architects and decorators, but above all alchemists. Indeed the beginning of all alchemy rests with them if we define it, as surely we should, as the combination of macrobiotics and aurifaction.[23]

Needham defined his "carefully chosen" words: macrobiotics "the belief that, with the aid of botany, zoology, mineralogy, and alchemy, it is possible to prepare drugs or elixirs which will prolong life, giving longevity (shou 壽) or immortality (pu ssu 不死)" and aurifaction "the belief that it is possible to make gold from other quite different substances, notably the ignoble metals".

Csikszentmihalyi summarizes Daoist-fangshi connections,

> The "methods" of the fangshi may be seen as forerunners of organized Taoist practices on several levels. In the Han, the concept of the Dao served to explain the efficacy of the myriad of newly forming disciplines, and many of these disciplines were the province of the fangshi. This explains why the term Template:Zhp was already beginning to replace the term Template:Zhp in the Hanshu, resulting in its gradual eclipse of the latter term. On a more concrete level, many specific techniques of spirit transcendence, medicine, and alchemy initially used by fangshi found their way into later Taoist practice.[24]

## Criticism

Gu Yong 谷永 (d. 8 BCE), minister to Emperor Cheng of Han, specialist on the Yijing, is known for harsh criticism of the contemporary fangshi practices:

> All those occultists, who turn their backs on the right path of benevolence and correct duty, who do not revere the model of the Five Classics but who rather are brimming with claims about the strange and marvelous, about spirits and ghosts, who stand in unquestioning reverence of the sacrificial practices of every locale,... who say that immortals are to be found in this world and who imbibe all manner of longevity drugs, who capriciously set out on distant quests and travel so high that their shadows are cast upwards,... who have mastered the transformation of base metal to gold, who have made uniform the five colors and five stores within their bodies — those occultists cheat people and delude the masses.[25]

## See also

* Fangxiangshi
* Chinese ritual mastery traditions
* Daoshi

## References

* Csikszentmihalyi, Mark (2008). "Fangshi 方士 'masters of methods'". in Fabrizio Pregadio. The Encyclopedia of Taoism. Routledge. pp. 406–409.方士+'masters+of+methods'&rft.atitle=The+Encyclopedia+of+Taoism&rft.aulast=Csikszentmihalyi&rft.aufirst=Mark&rft.au=Csikszentmihalyi, Mark&rft.date=2008&rft.pages=pp. 406–409&rft.pub=Routledge&rfr_id=info:sid/en.wikibooks.org:Philosophy:Fangshi">
* Doctors Diviners and Magicians of Ancient China: Biographies of Fang-shih, Columbia University Press, 1983
* DeWoskin, Kenneth J. (1986). "Fang-shih". in William H. Nienhauser. The Indiana Companion to Traditional Chinese Literature. 1. Indiana University Press. pp. 378–380. ISBN 9780253329837.
* Early Chinese Religion - Part two: The Period of Division (220–589 Ad). 1. BRILL. 2009. ISBN 9789004175853.
* Sivin, Nathan (1995). "VII - Taoism and Science". Medicine, Philosophy, and Religion in Ancient China, Researches and Reflections. Variorum. ISBN 9780860784937. http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~nsivin/taos.pdf.
* Welch, Holmes (1957). Taoism: The Parting of the Way. Beacon Press.

Footnotes

1. ↑ Needham, Joseph. 1956. Science and Civilisation in China: Volume 2, History of Scientific Thought. Cambridge University Press. p. 134.
2. ↑ Welch 1957, p. 96.
3. ↑ Harper, Donald (1986). "Review of Doctors, Diviners, and Magicians of Ancient China: Biographies of Fang-Shih by Kenneth J. DeWoskin." Journal of the American Oriental Society 106.2 (1986), p. 394.
4. ↑ Walters 1986:304.
5. ↑ Roth, Harold D. 1991. "Psychology and Self-Cultivation in Early Taoistic Thought", Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 51.2:599–650. p. 604.
6. ↑ Sivin 1995, p. 27.
7. ↑ Sakade Yoshinobu. 2000. "Divination as Daoist Practice," in Daoism Handbook, ed. by Livia Kohn, Brill Academic Publishers, 541–566. p. 545.
8. ↑ Csikszentmihalyi 2008, p. 406.
9. ↑ Campany, Robert Ford. 2009. Making Transcendents: Ascetics and Social Memory in Early Medieval China. University of Hawaii Press. p. 33.
10. ↑ Yü, Ying-shih (1965), "Life and Immortality in The Mind of Han China," Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 25: 80–122. p. 105.
11. ↑ Toh, Hoong Teik. 2010. "Notes on the Earliest Sanskrit Word Known in Chinese", Sino-Platonic Papers 201\. p. 4.
12. ↑ DeWoskin 1983, pp. 1–2.
13. ↑ Harper, Donald (1986). "Review of Doctors, Diviners, and Magicians of Ancient China: Biographies of Fang-Shih by Kenneth J. DeWoskin." Journal of the American Oriental Society 106.2 (1986), p. 395.
14. ↑ DeWoskin 1983, p. 6.
15. ↑ Sivin 1995, pp. 28–9.
16. ↑ DeWoskin 1983.
17. ↑ E.g. Boltz 1985 and Harper 1986.
18. ↑ 18.0 18.1 DeWoskin 1986, p. 379.
19. ↑ Wong, Timothy C. 1992. "Liu E in the Fang-shih tradition," Journal of the American Oriental Society 112.2:302–306.
20. ↑ Robinet Isabelle and Phyllis Brooks, tr. 1997. Taoism: Growth of a Religion. Stanford University Press. p. 37.
21. ↑ Welch 1957, pp. 89–90.
22. ↑ Welch 1957, pp. 96–7.
23. ↑ Needham, Joseph. 2000. Science and Civilisation in China: Volume 6, Biology and Biological Technology; Part 6, Medicine. Cambridge University Press. p. 58.
24. ↑ Csikszentmihalyi 2008, pp. 408–9.
25. ↑ Liu Kwang-ching, “Socioethics as Orthodoxy,” in Liu Kwang-ching, ed., Orthodoxy In Late Imperial China, Berkeley, 1990, 53–100:59. Quoting DeWoskin 1983, p. 38.

Cite error: `<ref>` tag with name "trWatson1996_14" defined in `<references>` is not used in prior text.

## Further reading

* DeWoskin, Kenneth J. 1981. "A Source Guide for the Lives and Techniques of Han and Six Dynasties Fang-shih," Bulletin of the Society for the Study of Chinese Religions, 79–105.
* Ngo Van Xuyet. 2002. Divination, magie et politique dans la Chine ancienne. Librairie You-Feng.

## External links

* Fang Shih, Overview of World Religions

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