Riding the Wind with Liezi: New Perspectives on the Daoist Classic ed. by Ronnie Littlejohn, Jeffrey Dippmann (review)

120 Journal of Chinese Religions As a natural outcome of the thorough studies throughout the book, there is a rich bibliography in Lian Xi’s book and also many informative notes supplementing every chapter. Redeemed by Fire will be necessary reading for anyone with interest in Chinese church history, but is also important for understanding Chinese modern history in general. There are many leads to be picked up from Lian’s book that may provide for further interesting studies on post-1949 and post-Mao developments, both in the Chinese church and in Chinese society in general. FREDRIK FÄLLMAN, Stockholm University Riding the Wind with Liezi: New Perspectives on the Daoist Classic Edited by RONNIE LITTLEJOHN and JEFFREY DIPPMANN. Albany, NY: SUNY Press, 2011. viii, 264 pages. ISBN 978-1-4384-3455-1. US$75.00 hardcover. This edited volume takes an important step towards filling a gaping hole in Western scholarship concerning this classic text of the Daoist tradition. Aside from A. C. Graham’s flurry of work on dating and authorship issues, along with his translation of the entire text in 1990, only a few Western scholars have published on the Liezi 列子. Given the popularity of the text within the Chinese literary tradition, this is an unfortunate oversight, so the world of Chinese studies benefits greatly from the presentation of this volume. Almost every essay is well worth a solid read, providing some excellent insights into Lao-Lie-Zhuang 老列莊 Daoism and the Liezi as a text. In general, however, the volume could benefit from more thematic coherence and a clearer vision of what it wished to accomplish. An abiding problem that resounds throughout many of the essays is the Liezi’s relationship to what the authors refer to as “Daoism.” While certain authors are clear about not wanting to reify the misguided conceptualization of “philosophical Daoism” vs. “religious Daoism” (Dippmann), others use the term “Daoism” without any qualification, assuming that the readership knows exactly what they mean by it. Yet, although by the fourth century there existed names for the “the School of Dao 道家,” “Huang-Lao 黃老,” “Dark Learning 玄學,” the “people of Dao 道民” (referring to the members of Celestial Master parishes, and even the popular revolts of the late Han), there was no single term that captured the various religious movements, writings, as well as ritual, alchemical, bodily, and immortality-seeking practices that are often encompassed in the term “Daoism.” Since the term “Daoism” as used by Book Reviews 121 scholars of the early period often varies from scholar to scholar, and since it is by no means an uncontested term, the incorporation of the Liezi into this panoply of movements, practices, and texts begs clarification. I think this volume might have been strengthened by a more concerted attempt to elaborate on how the Liezi either complicates or helps disentangle the thorny issue of defining “Daoism” for the pre-Shangqing 上清 and Lingbao 靈寶 periods. It is important in a volume dedicated to the Liezi that authors not only highlight its similarities to the Zhuangzi 莊子 and Daodejing 道德經, its most ostensible influences, but that they also draw out features and approaches that may distinguish it from such earlier texts. Most contributors do mention the close relationship among these texts, but oddly enough, only a few chapters (including those by Thomas Michael, Jeffrey Dippmann, Erin Cline, and David Jones) explicitly compare passages or themes from these texts. Sometimes authors simply assume or assert a likeness, and proceed to analyze a particular “Daoist” theme common to all. But the overall effect of this is that one might as well have been discussing the Zhuangzi or Laozi, which defeats the point of the volume. By choosing to frame their discussions in terms of common “Daoist” themes without also highlighting the subtle differences among the Lao-Lie-Zhuang texts and traditions, some authors inadvertently contribute to the impression that the Liezi is a negligible, copy-cat text. This is not an impression that I think any of the authors would agree with, yet it is one that is implicit in the way some authors of the volume discuss the Liezi. The volume is divided into three sections. The “The Liezi Text” section, which discusses the...