Cultivating Perfection: Mysticism and Self-transformation in Early Quanzhen Daoism by Louis Komjathy (review)

Book Reviews 153 Cultivating Perfection: Mysticism and Self-transformation in Early Quanzhen Daoism LOUIS KOMJATHY. Leiden: Brill, 2007. xv, 553 pages. ISBN 978-90-0416038 -5. €138.00, US$195.00, hardcover. This book is a very detailed and thorough study of the beliefs and practices of Quanzhen 全真 Daoism in its early years, during the time of founder Wang Chongyang 王重陽 (1113-1170) and his first-generation disciples. The author, Louis Komjathy, characterizes the early Quanzhen School as “a Daoist religious community comprised of a few renunciants dedicated to religious praxis centering on asceticism, alchemical transformation and mystical experiencing.” Their soteriological system, he emphasizes, was “alchemical”—it entailed a process of rarification and self-divinization that constituted “a shift in ontological condition from ordinary human being to alchemically-transformed being.” In his view—to which I strongly agree—early Quanzhen was a “sophisticated Daoist religious movement with a nuanced understanding of the human condition and the path of self-cultivation and transformation;” many of the previous hermeneutical accounts by modern scholars, which have most typically emphasized the movement’s syncretic or reformist nature, are unsatisfactory. The scope of this book is very close to that of my own recent (2004) monograph, The Teachings and Practices of the Early Quanzhen Taoist Masters. In Komjathy’s general understanding of the nature and significance of the Quanzhen movement, there is in fact very little that differs from my own, although, as he points out, my study does place comparatively greater emphasis on the “quietistic” aspects of Quanzhen theory and practice, where one is said to “recover” one’s original nature, as opposed to “alchemically” transforming into a new ontological condition. On this issue I would maintain that one simply cannot dismiss either the “quietistic” or “alchemical” model of interpretation. While the final goal is indeed the attainment of immortality in the Yang Spirit (yangshen 陽神; an entirely different ontological condition from that of ordinary people)—this Yang Spirit (or Perfect Nature [zhenxing 真性]) is also clearly thought to be something that one has always partaken in—only, it has become entrapped and badly corrupted. In several ways, Komjathy’s book clearly surpasses mine. Most importantly, his discussion of the more advanced and intricate practices of Quanzhen internal alchemy is far more rich and detailed. In carrying out this discussion, Komjathy not only displays an extraordinary knowledge and command of the large body of early Quanzhen literature, but also draws amply and fruitfully from internal alchemical literature of the Northern Song and Yuan, as well as from relevant studies on Chinese medicine and comparative religion and mysticism. His discussion also seems to be greatly enriched and inspired by his own personal experiences in meditation, as well as his numerous interactions with contemporary Daoist practitioners. Also highly welcome and helpful are the appendices, particularly the analytical catalog of the early Quanzhen textual corpus (Appendix Three; I especially like his summaries of the contents of each work) and the glossary of technical terms (Appendix Four). 154 Journal of Chinese Religions Perhaps Komjathy’s most important contribution to the field—which is also potentially very controversial—is his full translation (with introduction and copious footnotes) of the Jinguan yusuo jue 金關玉鎖訣, which is one of the most unique and fascinating texts in the Daoist Canon, and which is attributed to Wang Chongyang. While acutely aware of the controversy surrounding this attribution, Komjathy argues for the view that the text most likely does date to the lifetime of Wang Chongyang, and does contain his oral teachings that were remembered and transcribed by his disciples. In making this argument he does a very good job of documenting how much of the terminology and content of the Jinguan yusuo jue does match that which is to be found in texts that are less controversially attributed to Wang Chongyang. However, Komjathy seems to ignore, or to simply be unaware of a noteworthy feature of the Jinguan yusuo jue (a feature that I myself failed to pay attention to). In the text one can find two passages that are oddly similar to what one might expect to find in lay sectarian baojuan 寶卷 literature of the sort that began to appear in the 15th century. In one...