Research On The Filial Piety Thoughts Of Quanzhen Taoism In The Early Stage

Rooted in Chinese traditional local religion,Taoism is one of three pillars of Chinese traditional cultures with Confucianism and Buddhism.As an important link of Taoism,Quanzhen Taoism was produced and boomed in the Jin and Yuan Dynasties.With the purpose of combining three religions,Quanzhen Taoism absorbed the ethical spirits of Confucianism and Buddhism,injected the moral essentials of Taoist ethics into common people and exerted a wide and profound influence on the psychological character and social cultures of Chinese nation.Since Emperor Wudi of the Han Dynasty worshiped Confucianism only,Confucianism has occupied a dominant position in the ancient feudal society.Filial piety,an important moral scope in Confucian ethics,exists in the morality cultivation theory of Confucianism.As a religion,Quanzhen Taoism is complicatedly and closely related to moral principles by nature.The ethical traits of Chinese traditional culture provide fertile cultural soils for the long-term existence of filial piety,the moral philosophy used to adjust the relationships between parents and children and between elders and juniors.Chinese ethical culture in ancient pays much attention to moral cultivation.Confucianism and Taoism established different moral cultivation methods respectively during the pre-Qin period,which were inherited by Taoism in some degree.Among the existing early researches on Quanzhen Taoism,the academic circle achieved a lot of results in the aspect of the theory of temperament and assistance of Buddhists in becoming Taoists.However,there are few explanations of Taoism thoughts with filial piety.Some papers and works involving the filial piety thoughts of Quanzhen Taoism mainly set about the aspects of religion and secularity and focus on the moral practice of filial piety.The concept of filial piety originated from Confucianism,and the founder of Quanzhen Taoism introduced the filial piety to Taoism and supplemented the thoughts of metempsychosis and return of Buddhism,which essentially was a measure integrating three religions.Therefore,the filial piety advocated by Quanzhen Taoism is the product highly integrating Confucianism,Taoism and Buddhism theoretically with an obvious characteristic of absorbing Buddhism and including Confucianism.Some scholars believed that Quanzhen Taoism is more inclined to zen instead of Confucianism.However,by placing the filial piety under the great time of combining three religions in the Song and Yuan Dynasties,it is observed that the lesson that Quanzhen Taoism learned from the filial piety is the key point of communicating and linking tree religions,and two doctrines were extended from Confucian filial piety:human ethnics and immortal ethnics.Filial piety is the basis of human ethnics,and human ethics is the bridge of immoral ethnics.Human ethnics reflected by filial piety can be divided into two meanings:firstly,the filial piety in society is penetrated with the filial piety thoughts of Confucianism(from the perspective of Confucianism,it is an initial approach to be a Buddhist believer);secondly,the filial piety out of society originating from the nature and returning to the nature reflects the filial kindness of Lao Zi.The dual character of filial piety reflected under different thought origins of Confucianism and Taoism directly relates to the cultivation of being a loyal and filial immortal or an immortal out of society.This paper investigates the filial piety in Quanzhen Taoism by placing it in Confucianism or Taoism or Buddhism based on the dual character of Confucian filial piety in Quanzhen Taoism,so as to analyze the reason why Quanzhen Taoism can integrate three religions since the birth and reach the peak of perfection in the Yuan Dynasty and show the doctrine system of Quanzhen Taoism,which is similar to but different from that of Confucianism.In addition,this paper tries to outline the sage-like spiritual outlook of Quanzhen Taoism priests in the early stage from theoretical foundation to moral practice and from the filial piety,human ethnics to immortal ethnics.Moreover,this paper slightly discusses the Jingming Taoism at the end because there was innumerable links between Jingming Taoism and the filial piety thought of Quanzhen Taoism.Taking "Jingming" and "loyalty and filial piety" as the tenet,in order to coordinate the contradiction between the filial piety in society and the filial piety out of society,Jingming Taoism points out that loyal filiality depends on dispositions,which reaches a realm from immoral ethics to human ethics.In any case,in early Quanzhen Taoism,the light of filial piety thoughts can't be hidden,and cutting to the early Quanzhen Taoism from the perspective of filial piety is a beneficial and unique attempt.