DECODING ANCIENT FENG SHUI TALISMANS Jing Wei University of Wisconsin Madison, USA ABSTRACT This article discusses talismans in Dunhuang Feng Shui manuscripts. It re-decodes Guan Gong Ming Talismans ( 管公明神符 ) by analyzing different components of each talisman. Then this article discusses Door Talismans ( 门符 ). After discussing Door Talismans and Healing Talismans ( 祛病符 ) posted on doors, this article shows that exorcising ghosts is the pivotal function of the talismans to cure patients. Also this article analyzes the characteristics of these talismans in order to study the relationship between their appearance and their function. KEY WORDS talisman, feng shui, compound form, combining form INTRODUCTION Chinese Fulu is a term of Daoist talismans, consisting of secret pictures, characters, and symbols. It is usually written on paper or incised into wood in order to provide good luck or end misfortune. Feng Shui practioners always use talismans to balance the energy of houses and graves, such as obstructing Sha ( 煞 Bad energy) and optically building the missing corner. For example, a significant branch of Daoism, Lv Shan Sect ( 闾山派 ), attaches importance to Feng Shui Talismans (Chen Jinguo, 2002). In Daoist documents, there are talismans, names of which contain House Guarding, House saving, Earth Guarding, and Temple Guarding proving that they are obviously for Feng Shui purpose. One of the most famous ancient Feng Shui books, Yang Zhai Shi Shu ( 阳宅十书 ), including a volume titled Discussing Guarding Talisms describes numerous talismans with Feng Shui function. The earliest existing talismans associated with Feng Shui are painted in Dunhuang manuscripts. It could promote the research of Feng Shui talismans origin and the study of relationship between Daoism and Feng Shui by analyzing Dunhuang Feng Shui manuscripts. This article regards two types of talismans as Feng Shui ones. The first type is obviously used to protect houses and the dwellers within them; the other type, despite its function not concerned with houses, is also considered as Feng Shui talismans, because they are usually put on the door or in the house. 1
Dunhuang Daoist talismans can be classfied according to functionality as Zhen Zhai Fu ( 镇宅符 House Guarding Talismans), Zhi Bing Fu ( 治病符 Healing Talismans), Qu Gui Fu ( 驱鬼符 Exorcism Talismans), and so on. For example: there is one House Guarding Talisman in P. 2615a, and three Hu Zhai Shen Li Juan ( 护宅神历卷 Magic House Guarding Volume) in Dunhuang Feng Shui manuscripts; S. 6216 and P. 2856, as Healing Talismans, are used to cure sickness; S. 5775 is for flying (e.g., magically mounting the clouds and riding the mist); and P. 3835V is to exorcise the ghosts. All Dunhuang Daoist Talismans can also be classified based on the method of application: to hang on the door, to put in a specific location, to be carried on the body, to swallow after burning, and so on. In addition, some talismans have a variety of functions, such as a talisman in P.3358 which is a kind of House Guarding Talisman and is capable of protecting wealth as well as curing sickness. Each talisman, has both a compound form and combining forms. The compound form is the complete form of the talisman. The combining forms are the different parts of the talisman. For example, the complete form of Yang Fu ( 阳符 Masculine Talismans) in Dao Men Ding Zhi 道门定制 looks like, its combining forms include Zhong Tian 中天 in the top right, Fei Tian 飞天 in the top right, and 收捉阳玉玉界五 in the bottom right, Da Sheng 大圣 in the top left, Jie Ji 捷疾 in the top left, 方无道之鬼付天一北狱依律治罪唐葛 周三将军 in the bottom left, and 真武将军卓剑相待 in the middle of the bottom. Generally, a talisman is composed of Fu Tou ( 符头 head of the talisman), Fu Jiao ( 符脚 foot of the talisman), and Fu Qiao ( 符窍 key of the talisman). Fu Qiao, as the soul of a talisman plays an important role in its magic power (Li, Yuanguo, 1998). There are two kinds of Fu Qiao, visble and invisible. For up-down structure talismans, Fu Tou refers to the top parts, Fu Jiao refers to the bottom parts; for left-right structure talismans, Fu Tou refers to the left parts, Fu Jiao refers to the right parts. I. Guan Gong Ming Shen Fu ( 管公明神符 Divine Talisman of Guan Gong Ming) In Dunhuang House Guarding Talismans, there is one called Guan Gong Ming Shen Fu ( 管公明神符 Divine Talisman of Guan Gong Ming). Guan Gong Ming 管公明 is Guan Lu 管辂, a famous Feng Shui scholar, even earlier than Guo Pu 郭璞 in the Jin Dynasty (265-420 AD). According to the statistics of Jin Shenjia (2007), there are two Guan Gong Ming Shen Fu in Dunhuang manuscripts: picture 3 in P. 3358, and picture 1 in S. 5775. There are two phrases below talisman 3 in P. 3358: 2
Phrase 1: Guan Gong Ming Shen Fu exorcises ghosts which walk out when they see the character Kou ( 口 mouth, exit, entrance ) 管公明神符却鬼见口走出 ; Phrase 2: it cures all sickness and protects wealth when it is hung on the door 万里病患自除, 宜保财物, 安门大吉. According to the above information, Liu Xiaoming considers talisman 3 in P. 3358 to be not only a Guan Gong Ming Shen Fu, but also a Men Fu ( 门符 Door Talisman) since it consists of several Kou 口 and is on the top of the two phrases. Also, Christine Mollier(2004),a French scholar, considers the above two phrases to be related to picture 3 in P. 3358 and identifies this talisman as Guan Gong Ming Shen Fu. However, as picture 2 in P. 3358 lacks any description and the above two phrases that follow picture 3 have a line between them, it is doubtful both phrases describe picture 3. They are also impossible to be the descriptions of picture 4 below them, since that talisman has its own description. The comparison between the combining forms of the top area of picture 1 in S. 5775, which is clearly a Guan Gong Ming Shen Fu based on the picture, and picture 1 in P. 3358, indicates that they are the same talisman. The desciptions of picture 1 in P. 3358 and picture 1 in S. 5775 show that they share the same main function: guard the four corners 镇四角. The difference is that picture 1 in P. 3358 can exorcise ghosts and cure sickness, and picture 1 in S. 5775 does not have that sub-function. It is obvious that picture 1 in P. 3358 is not only a complete talisman, but also the Fu Tou (head of the talisman) of picture 1 in S. 5775. Usually, talismans with the same head belong to the same category and their different Fu Jiao (foot of the talisman) let them have different sub-functions, so that these two talismans are both used to guard the four corners, but their sub-functions are different. It can be seen that picture 2 in P. 3358 is the same talisman as picture 2 in S. 5775 by analyzing their combining forms. Additionally, picture 2 in P. 3358 is composed of seventy one Kou ( 口 mouth, exit, entrance ) as its talisman head and three Gui ( 鬼 ghost) as its talisman foot. This talisman highly corresponds with the description in phrase 1, which means ghosts leave when they meet mouth 管公明神符却鬼见口走出. It is reasonable to take picture 2 in P. 3358 rather than picture 3 as Guan Gong Ming Shen Fu. Thus, picture 2 in S. 5775, as the same talisman as picture 2 in P. 3358, is also Guan Gong Ming Shen Fu. The name Guan Gong Ming Shen Fu located at the right of picture 1 in S. 5775 can be viewd as the title of picure 1 and 2 in S. 5775. 3
In summary, Guan Gong Ming Shen Fu should be picture 1 in P. 3358, picture 2 in P. 3358, picture 1 in S. 5775, and picture 2 in S. 5775. II. Door Talisman and Healing Talisman Gao Guofan (1990) takes above phrase 2 as the description of picture 4 and considers it as Men Fu ( 门符 Door Talismans). Yao Zhouhui (2004) agrees with Gao Guofan s opinion in his study. However, according to the analysis above, picture 3 in P. 3358 to be located on the door can be named as Men Fu and the description of picture 4 in P. 3358 is written directly below it. Also picture 8 in P. 3358 is a Door Talisman in Dunhuang Feng Shui documents. Door Talismans exist not only in Dunhuang Feng Shui documents, but also in other documents of divination, such as a talisman in S. 6216 1 and a series of talismans in P. 2856 2. There are two categories of Healing Talismans in P. 2856. One is created based on the day people get sick, another is created based on the Nianli ( 年立 a kind of Younian method to divine by analyzing Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches 天干地支 and ages) of patients. In S. 6216, there are two talismans between two phrases of talisman description. The desciption on the right is similar to the one in P. 2856 for patients getting sick on Day Zi 子日得病. Another phrase on the left is similar to the one in P. 2856 for patients getting sick on Day Chou 丑日得病. It is not possible to assign a talisman to each phrase by just reading this document alone, since parts of the phrases are missing and the two talismans are both between the phrases. 1 There is description in S. 6216 as: Patient swallow this talisman or put it on the door 2 In P. 2856: divination of the ghost s name on the day people get sick draw the shape of exact ghost on a talisman swallow it or put it on the door 4
One of the talismans in S. 6216 is similar to the talisman for patients getting sick on Day Zi 子日 in P. 2856 after analyzing its combining forms. Then it corresponds to a talisman for patients getting sick on Day Zi 子日. Another talisman in S. 6216 is not similar to any talisman in P. 2856, however, the descripting of patients getting sick on Day Zi 子日 in P. 2856 and the phrases on the right in S. 6216 both describe the shape of a ghost on Day Zi 子日. The ghost has four heads, one foot, and sticks its tongue out, which is exactly the appearance of another talisman in S. 6216. In a word, both talismans in S. 6216 are related to the phrase at the right of them, which is for the patient getting sick on Day Zi 子日. Furthermore, most of the Healing Talismans in Dunhuang documents contain the symbol Kou ( 口 mouth, exit, entrance ) or Gui ( 鬼 ghost). There are in total forty Healing Talismans in S. 6212 and P. 2856. Not counting one illegible talisman that cannot be read, thirty two contains the character Gui. Except for the talisman above, which depicts the image of a ghost, thirty nine each contain various Kou. In two Dunhuang Feng Shui manuscripts, P. 3385 and S. 5775, except for Guan Gong Ming Shen Fu, the other talismans for curing the sick all contain Kou, Gui, or both. According to the analysis of the words describing them, it is obvious that Guan Gong Ming Shen Fu is much more powerful than the others, because it can exorcise all ghosts and eliminate all evils. Based on above analyses, in Dunhuang talismans culture, ghosts are considered as the cause of the sickness. Thus, the key to treat diseases is exorcising ghosts. It seems that Dunhuang Healing Talismans try to achieve that purpose by writing down the Gui( 鬼 name of all ghosts), drawing the appearance of specific ghosts, and painting various Kou. In Inner Chapters of Bao Pu Zi ( 抱朴子 内篇 ), written by the Jin dynasty scholar Ge Hong 葛洪 (283-343B.C), mentions the method to exorcise ghosts by knowing the names of them and Bai Ze Tu Jiu Ding Ji (edited by Wang Ming, 1998). Exorcising ghosts by knowing their names is an interesting phenomenon in both Chinese and Western Cultures. In addition, since Kou ( 口 ) could mean exit, and a phrase in P. 3358 indicates ghosts walking out when seeing this charactor, it is reasonable to consider those Kou above show exits forcing ghosts to leave. 5
CONCLUSION In conclusion, to study talismans, it is necessary to discuss their combining forms seperately. By comparison, it is reasonable to take picture 1 in P. 3358, picture 2 in P. 3358, picture 1 in S. 5775, and picture 2 in S. 5775 as Guan Gong Ming Shen Fu, and picture 3 in P. 3335 should have nothing to do with Guan Gong Ming Shen Fu. Additionally, there are two talismans between two phrases in S. 6216. Instead of one talisman to one phrase correspondence, both talismans are related to the phrase at the right of them, which is for the patient getting sick on Day Zi 子日. Furthermore, in these early Feng Shui talismans, the Chinese characters Kou ( 口 mouth, exit, entrance ) or Gui ( 鬼 ghost) are frequently used as crucial parts of a talisman to heal sick people. The analyses above improve the understanding of Feng Shui talismans, especially its earliest existing forms, styles, functions, and purposes. It will benefit the further researches on history of Feng Shui Talismans, relationship between Daoism and Feng Shui, social and cultural reasons for the formation of various contemporary solutions to Feng Shui problems, and so on. REFERENCES Chen, J 陈进国 (2002). The Usage of House Guarding Talismans and the Radiation of Feng Shui Belief. Studies in World Religions No. 2002-4, Institute of World Religions, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, PRC, p.107 Gao, G 高国藩 (1990). Ancient Customs in Dunhuang and the Transformation of Folk Customs: Investigating Chinese Folk Customs. Nanjing: Hehai University Press. Jin, S 金身佳 (2007). Annotation of Dunhuang Zhai and Zang Manuscripts, Publishing House of Minority Nationalities. Li, Y 李远国 (1998). Discussion of Talismans Structure and Calligraphy. Religious Studies, p.9. Mollier, C (author) and Marc Kalinowski (editor) (2004). Divination et société dans la Chine médiévale, Bibliothèque de France, pp.421-427. Wang, M 王明 (1998). Revision and Annotation of Inner Chapters of Bao Pu Zi. Zhong Hua Book Company, p.308. Yao, Z 姚周辉 (2004). Incantation of Secret Talisman. Guangxi People s publishing house, pp.195-204. 6
S. 5775 S. 6216 7
P. 2856 Corresponding Author: Dr Jing Wei University of Wisconsin Madison, USA Email: jingweichn@gmail.com P. 3358 8