28 APhoenixAmidtheFlames:MountEmeiBigDipperFinger-PointMethod, DaoyinandQigong Liao Yuqun 廖育群 Introduction The images presented here are taken from the Emei shan tiangang zhixue fa 峨眉山天罡指穴法 (Mt Emei’s Big Dipper1 Finger-point Method) by Zhou Qianchuan 周 潜川 (1905–71), from Sichuan province. Zhou was a re- nowned physician operating in an arcane and mystical tradition.2 The book describes 28 different hand positions for manipulating Qi 氣 in others. However the book has had a troubled history and does not exist in its complete original form. Though first published in 1962, the original Figure 28.1 The cover of Emei shan tiangang zhixue fa 峨眉山天罡指 text with any accompanying images was destroyed. The 穴法 (Mt Emei’s Big Dipper Finger-point Method) 1985 edn book’s author, Zhou Qianchuan, came to be regarded as a miscreant for his work in regard to Qigong and religious a week and when in the early 60s Zhou was invited to medicine, subjects that came to be regarded as mixin 迷 Shanxi to work, he specified that any remaining patients 信 (outlawed superstition). This chapter offers a window in Beijing should be referred to my father. After a while my on to the 20th-century history of a secret medico-religious father gave up his job in Beijing to follow Zhou to Shanxi. tradition through the biography of a major protagonist and However their relationship was brought to a stop by the the reconstruction of one of his key works by his disciples political movements of the mid-60s and thereafter my and others who were close to him. father had to return to Beijing. Zhou was persecuted and imprisoned. After a period of unemployment, my father had some great good fortune in the form of a backdated My Family Involvement pension allowance. It was the fulfilment of a prediction that Zhou had had made that my father would enjoy a More than 50 years ago, I used to accompany my father to f inan cial windfall in his early forties. Zhou himself had no Zhou’s house in Beijing where my father had become one such good fortune and died for want of adequate medical of Zhou’s students. I would then see my father, a marine treatment while still in prison in 1971. engineer by profession, go home and make drawings of the techniques Zhou had taught him (Fig. 2). My father and his family had a longstanding interest in Chinese medicine and herbal medicine in particular. My great-uncle had received a secret transmission of analgesic herbs from a doctor who posed for a while as a vagrant, in order to establish my great-uncle’s suitability to receive the recipe. When my father had fallen ill in 1957, he had cured himself with herbal medicine. Then Zhou arrived out of the blue from Shanghai and my father was introduced to him. My father would study with Zhou several times 1 Emei mountain is a famous Daoist temple site in Sichuan, while ‘Tiangang’ is the constellation Ursa Major, also know as the Big Dipper, an object of veneration in Daoist ritual. 2 In an earlier publication, in 2001, I erroneously gave the year of Zhou Qianchuan’s death as 1962. Here I have corrected this in line with Zhou Huaijiang’s 1985 article. Zhou Huajiang is Zhou Figure 28.2 Emei Tiangang Zhixue Fa: (above) two of my father’s Qianchuan’s grandson. illustrations; (below) from the 1985 publication 398 liao yuqun 廖育群 ZhouQianchuan’sCareerandHistoryofhisBook After the end of the Cultural Revolution, Zhou’s case was reassessed and he was exonerated. Interest in both Zhou Qianchuan was from Sichuan Province. He began Qigong and Daoist medicine then started to grow again, his career as an army medical orderly. Subsequently, with as it had in the 1950s. With the appetite for information financial support from his well-to-do father-in-law, he was about such techniques reaching a nationwide fever pitch,4 able first to attend Wuhan University, and then to travel to in 1985 Zhou’s son had his father’s book republished (Fig. Great Britain to further his studies in military engineering. 1). It was the survival of the unpublished lectures collected After suffering an injury while practising martial arts, by his students that made the re-publication of the text he was successfully treated using Mongol medicine. This possible. However some of the original images were missing aroused his interest in Chinese medicine in general. He and had instead been to be replaced by brief descriptions. went to the Emei and Wudang mountains, where he studied It is by comparing the illustrations in my possession that a wide range of subjects from many different traditions, were made by father in the 1960s with the ones re-published including divination and the martial arts. However his core in 1985 that I can verify the accuracy of the latter. interest was in Chinese medical theories and techniques. His research in this field enabled him to develop his own unique form of practice. AnalysisoftheText After the civil war Zhou began to practise medicine in Shanghai. Then in the 1950s he was invited to treat Mt Emei’s Big Dipper Finger-Point Method List of patients in Beijing by some of the celebrated figures there. 28 Hand Positions Thanks to his exceptional therapeutic results, he received • Hezui jin5 鶴咀勁 (The Crane’s Beak) 風釵勁 a recommendation to the central government, and a vice • Fengchai jin (The Phoenix and Hairpin) 鷹嘴勁 minister in the Ministry of Health arranged for him to move • Yingzui jin (The Eagle’s Beak) 蛇頭勁 from Shanghai and practise at Beijing’s Sanshi3 xuehui 三 • Shetou jin (The Snake’s Head) 時學會 • Yazui jin 鴨嘴勁 (The Duck’s Beak) (The Three Era Study Association), an influential 日月扣勁 lay Buddhist research centre in Beijing. In the evenings he • Riyue kou jin (Fastening Sun and Moon) • Chongtian chu jin 沖天杵勁 (Soaring Pestle) gave lectures on medicine, which my father would attend. • Yizhi chan jin 一指禪勁 (Single Finger Meditation) In those days Zhou’s treatments cost five yuan; equivalent • Jingou jin 金鈎勁 (Golden Hook) to a month’s salary. From that we can tell that he enjoyed • Wuding kai shan jin 五丁開山勁 (Five Fingertips Open considerable status and respect. In the early 1960s, he was the Mountain) invited to work at the Shanxi tcm Research Institution after • Huzhao jin 虎爪勁 (Tiger Claw) successfully treating some off icials from that province. Zhou • Long tan zhua jin 龍探爪勁 (The Dragon’s Claw) accepted the offer on condition that he would be able to • Dingtou jin 丁頭勁 (Head of Strong Man) continue to research, teach and publish on Chinese medi- • Yingzhua jin 鷹爪勁 (The Eagle’s Claw) cine and neidan 內丹 alchemy, a form of inner meditation • Long xian zhu jin 龍銜珠勁 (Dragon with Pearl in its aimed at refining the elixirs of life (See Despeux, Chapter 2 Mouth) 平指勁 in this volume, pp. 63–4). In Shanxi, Zhou regularly treated • Pingzhi jin (Even Fingers) 複雨翻雲勁 members of the political and military elites. He published • Fu yu fan yun jin (Recurrent Rain and Rolling a number of books during this time, including the Qigong Clouds) • Tongtian jin 通天勁 (To Reach the Sky) yao’er liaofa 氣功藥餌療法 (Qigong Tonics and Remedies) • Liangtianchi jin 量天尺勁 (Ruler to Measure the sky) and the Emei shi’er zhuang shimi 峨眉十二莊釋密 (Secret • Jian juekai qi jin 劍决開氣勁 (Sword to Open Qi) Explanation of the Emei Shi’er Zhuang), and he also gave • Lijing jin 離經勁 (Separating the Channels) a series of unpublished lectures which his students would • Luoyan jin 落雁勁 (Wild Goose Landing) record and circulate amongst themselves. • Pengsha jin 捧沙勁 (Cupping Sand) • Taiji mo yun jin 太極摩雲勁 (Taiji Rubbing Clouds) • Shaoyang zuqi jin 少陽祖氣勁 (Shaoyang Ancestral Qi) 3 Sanshi (tri-kāla), a Buddhist term, refers to ‘[t]he three divisions of the day, i.e. dawn, daylight, and sunset, or morn ing, noon, and evening; also the three periods, after his nirvāna, of every 4 Editor’s note: on Qigong fever (氣功熱) see D.A. Palmer, Qigong Buddha’s teaching, viz., 正 correct, or the period of orthodoxy Fever, New York, Columbia University Press, 2007. and vigour; 像 semblance, or the period of scholasticism; and 5 Jin 勁 at the end of each name simply means ‘force’. It can be 末 end, the period of decline and termination’ (Soothill and taken as an indication of their distinct, dynamic and transform- Hodous 1937, p. 536). ative natures in the eyes of the practitioner. a phoenix amid the flames 399 Figure 28.3 Hezui jin (The Crane’s Beak) Figure 28.4 Chongtian chu jin (Soaring Pestle) • Bao pu jin 豹撲勁 (Leopard Pounce) In Chongtian chu jin, the Qi rushes up to the heavens. It is • Xiudi jin 袖底勁 (Sleeve Ends) only taught to girls for self defence against attackers. If a 死穴 • Tuotian jiedi jin 托天截地勁 (Support the Sky and Press master teaches its use on the sixue (death point), the the Earth) result will be fatal. This must not be taken lightly. Each hand position has some descriptive verses dedicated to it, followed by a further explanation. The verses are Chongtian Chu Jin(SoaringPestle)(Fig.4) somewhat antique in style and content. They include both the traditional master/disciple teaching that Zhou This belongs to the f ield of advanced martial arts, known as received and his own, subsequently developed, personal yi jing zhi dong 以靜制動 (stillness overcoming movement). understanding and interpretation of the subject matter. An adept looks to strike his opponent’s death points thus The f irst verse on each gesture usually describes the shape putting an end to matters.