The Sleeping Giant Under the Peach Tree: A novel explanation for the prominence of the peach in Daoist iconography.
Will Ceurvels, China Medical University Department of Classics, Taiwan
Abstract:
This paper draws on chinese folklore, chinese medical theory, chinese materia medica and western ethnobotany and comparative religion to construct a theory of how the common infestation of ganoderma lucidum on peach trees in China would have led to an association of peach trees with immortality, daoist alchemy and the ability to vanquish ghosts and evil spirits. The author goes on to demonstrate how the importance of ganoderma lucidum with regard to immortality, alchemy and exorcism can be understood through an analysis of the pathophysiological basis of ghost haunting and daoist inner alchemy and the corresponding pharmacological benefit that the fungus confers in relation to these pathophysiologies.
Keywords: materia medica, chinese medicine, daoist alchemy, peach tree, ganoderma lucidum, ling-zhi
Tumid, pendulous fruit, swelling with nectarine juice. Branches bent under the heft of blood red ripened drupes, round and ruddied, suckling sap from the roots. To the ancients no doubt, the peach, whose flowers first burst forth from the hoary frost of winters past and usher in the new spring season, would have inspired intimations of the vast productive potential of the natural world recently awakened from its hibernal slumber. As many scholars have noted, this particular phenotypic display must have contributed in no small part to the singular importance of the peach in chinese symbolism. As with any early society, the ancient chinese were likely to have fetishized the fruit for its connection to the spring season and thus to notions of fertility, rich harvest and so on.
Yet, the function of the peach in chinese semiology goes far beyond mere fertility: the peach, the peach tree and it’s wood confer magic powers connected to daoist ascetic, alchemical and shamanic traditions. The Song Dynasty Imperial Reader (太平御覽） cites the pre-Han script Dian-shu （典術）characterizing the peach tree as, “the greatest of the five woods, the immortal wood, which dispels evil spirits and vanquishes all ghosts. Today people make talismans from the wood to ward off evil spirits.”1 Peach tree wood is also known as “immortal wood” (仙 木）, “dragonslayer wood”（降龍木） or “ghostfright wood”（鬼怖木）. Swords carved from peach wood are utilized by daoist practitioners in exorcism ceremonies or placed in the household to protect its inhabitants. As early as the Han dynasty, the tradition of hanging a
1 《典術》云：『桃乃西方之木，五木之精，仙木也。味辛氣惡，故能厭伏邪氣， 制百鬼。今人門上用桃符，辟邪以此也。』 peach tree wood charm on the front door of the household to counteract the resurgence of “Yin” or dark, negative energy (traditionally associated with the ghostworld) following the vernal equinox was widespread. 2
In addition to its spirit-warding properties, the peach fruit is also associated with immortality, a primary conquest of the daoist adept. The Queen Mother of the West (西王母 or “Xi-wang-mu”) , one if not the highest ranking deity in the pantheon of daoist gods is most closely associated with her garden of Peach Trees, the fruit of which is said to confer immortality. Magu, (麻姑) the female goddess of longevity, is traditionally pictured carrying a peach tree branch and the Old Man of the South Pole (南極仙翁), the male god of longevity, is also nearly always seen carrying an outsized ripened peach.
Given all this, one must wonder, can the mere fact of the peach tree’s phenotypic association with “fertility” and “spring” account for its apparently extensive magical and alchemic properties? daoist alchemy is fundamentally practical, it is concerned with the use of specific substances and practices to achieve the prolongation of life and the theoretical attainment of immortality. Thus, the centrality of the peach in daoist iconography would imply that the plant directly confers some medicinal benefit to the practitioner, but from a review of relevant literature it appears that only the sap of the peach was used by ascetics, and this only in a limited capacity. 3
The apparent lack of spagyric substances directly associated with the peach tree should not deter us from further investigation. For, a prominent feature of daoist texts is their extensive use of code words and secret language in the description of alchemic processes. As an example, the daoist classic The Scripture of the Inner Effulgence of the Yellow Court is a detailed manual of internal alchemy that contains specific meditation practices for promoting longevity, and yet the names of parts of the body are often coded and unascertainable from the text itself. For instance, “yellow court” is alternately interpreted as the stomach or middle burner（中焦）, as the upper elixir field (上丹田 ）or lower elixir field （下丹田）. That the main concept in this daoist classic is, as a result
2 《後漢書》仲夏之月，萬物方盛。日夏至，陰氣萌作，恐物不楙。其禮：以朱索連 葷菜，彌牟蠱鍾。以桃印長六寸，方三寸，五色書文如法，以施門戶。代以所尚為飾。 夏后氏金行，作葦茭，言氣交也。殷人水德，以螺首，慎其閉塞，使如螺也。周人木 德，以桃為更，言氣相更也。漢兼用之，故以五月五日，朱索五色印為門戶飾，以難 止惡氣。 3 The daoist classic Baopuzi claims that peach sap fermented in mulberry ash could make the body light and radiant and improve night vision, but there is no mention of longevity or immortality.《抱朴 子．內篇．仙藥》：「桃膠，以桑灰汁漬服之，百病愈。久服之，身輕有光明，在晦夜之地， 如月出也。」Peach sap is also not included in the list of the great immortal herbs, which includes even some very basic medicinal herbs such as poria. “仙藥之上者丹砂，次則黃金，次則白銀，次 則諸芝，次則五玉，次則云母，次則明珠，次則雄黃，次則太乙禹餘糧，次則石中黃子，次則 石桂，次則石英，次則石腦，次則石硫黃，次則石臺，次則曾青，次則鬆柏脂、茯苓、地黃、 麥門冬、木巨勝、重樓、黃連、石韋、楮實、象柴，一名托盧是也。” of the intentional vagueness of the term, open for wide interpretation, speaks to the central importance of coding and secrecy in daoist symbolism.
Could it be, that the peach tree is in fact a stand-in for some other object with direct ties to daoist alchemy? One of the oldest and most well-known legends regarding the peach tree might just offer an unexpected answer to this question. The Han dynasty classic book of legends Illustrations of the Motherland (括地圖) contains the following story,
“On Tao-du Mountain there grew a Peach tree so tall that its high branches spiralled into the heavens for thousands of miles. Atop the tree stood a golden cock that announced the break of dawn and at its trunk two gods named Yu-lü and Shen-shu who carried whips made of reeds to slay inauspicious spirits and ghosts stood guard.”
The centrality of this story in the lore of the peach tree cannot be overstated. The Han dynasty use of peach-wood talismans decorated with the figures of “door god” guardians is attributed directly to this story. Though the talismans are no longer made from peach wood, the door guardians are still a highly prominent decorative feature of the chinese household to this day. Despite the fact that the “door gods” are one of the most enduring and widespread symbols in all of chinese culture, the identity of these two Gods and their association with the peach tree is not well understood mainly because the contents of Illustrations of the Motherland survive only in fragmented references found in later tomes. The most popular current theory, based on etymological analysis of the gods’ names along with historical inference holds that the two gods represent the whip of reeds and the tiger god of early China, both of which were associated with spirit-warding and exorcism. 4 However, the whip of reeds is already a separate element in the original story, so it would seem odd that one of the gods would also additionally represent the whip of reeds. A more enticing interpretation comes from an etymological analysis offered by the Song dynasty scholar Luo Mi who claimed that the names Shen-shu and Yu-lü （神荼，鬱壘） were homonyms for two opposing physical states: Yu-lü (鬱律）is an old poetic term which alternately refers to a powerful volatile force that is being suppressed, the echoes of a deep and muffled rumbling, or the state of being coiled and twisted, Shen-shu (伸舒) by contrast refers to expansion, release, and unfurling. Taken together, he concluded that the two gods represented thunder and lightning. This inference is in keeping with the traditional chinese understanding of thunder as the outward manifestation of the inward conflict of the opposing forces of yin and yang. The neo-confucian classic of metaphysics Zhang-zi’s Correction of the Ignorant describes thunder as such,
“Yin” accumulates and suppresses the natural flow of dynamic Yang energy, the outward-bearing tension of Yang against suppressing Yin eventually
4 王寧. 釋《莊子·在宥》的“炊累”——兼釋神名“鬱壘”的含義 culminates in a sudden climacteric dispersion of Yin which outwardly manifests as thunder. 5
Given this description, it seems fairly feasible that the paired concepts of “release” and “suppressed force” could indeed be a coded representation of thunder and lightning. Indeed, Luo Mi’s theory was dominant from the Song dynasty onward until all but very recently when the Song scholar’s theory was criticized because there seemed to be no apparent connection between thunder and the Peach Tree. Yet, the connection between the peach tree and thunder extends beyond this one legend. In the making of the peach-wood swords mentioned earlier, the most valuable and purportedly most potent swords are made from peach-wood that has been struck by thunder. Thus, the notion that thunder somehow imbues the peach tree with magic potency seems to be a consistent and widespread belief in Chinese culture. What then is the magical connection between thunder and the peach tree? For students of western ethnobotany, the combination of trees and thunder in the setting of an alchemical or magical context should immediately trigger certain associations. Take, for instance the oak tree, which is thus described in George Frazer’s comparative religion classic The Golden Bough:
In the religion of the ancient Germans the veneration for sacred groves seems to have held the foremost place, and according to Grimm the chief of their holy trees was the oak. It appears to have been especially dedicated to the god of thunder, Donar or Thunar, the equivalent of the Norse Thor; for a sacred oak near Geismar, in Hesse, which Boniface cut down in the eighth century, went among the heathen by the name of Jupiter's oak (_robur Jovis_), which in old German would be _Donares eih,_ "the oak of Donar."
Frazer goes on to show how the oak tree was worshipped for its connection to the god of thunder throughout ancient Europe. As in the case of the Peach tree, the connection to thunder seems arbitrary until we take into consideration the following two facts: 1.) the acidic soil and mycorrhizal networks extending from the oak provide an ideal host for the hallucinogenic mushroom amanita muscaria or fly agaric, 2.) in the context of religion and magic, the invocation of thunder never entails just thunder - whether it be the Buddhist Vajra or Thor’s hammer, thunder is the catalyst for the production of sacred mushrooms, the true objects of the alchemist’s pursuit. 6 Thus, there was nothing arbitrary about the worship of the oak tree in connection to thunder - only the confluence of oak and thunder could reliably produce the mushroom cult’s most sacred object, the fly agaric mushroom.
5 張子正蒙》然不有陰氣凝聚，陽在內不得出，奮擊為雷霆者乎. 陽在內者不得出，則 奮擊而為雷霆；內，地中也。陰氣在外錮之，迫而怒發。《震》，二陰錮一陽於內， 雷從地出之象。
6Modern research conducted in Japan has also found that the application of electric pulses to wood mushroom cultures dramatically enhances productive output. For further reading, please see Takaki, Yakamoto et al. Improvement of Edible Mushroom Yield by Electrical Stimulation. J. Plasma Fusion Res. SERIES, Vol. 8 (2009) This leads one to wonder, could the frequent synergy of the peach and thunder in Chinese iconography suggest that, like the oak, the real object of veneration is not the tree itself, but a third substance for which the confluence of the peach and thunder provide the essential conditions? Certainly, the Chinese were well aware of the fact that mushrooms appeared on or near trees following thunderstorms. For instance, the name of a medicinal mushroom that grows on bamboo stumps is called simply “thunder ball”. The Qing dynasty materia medica classic Ben-cao Chong-yuan states, “the thunder ball is the excess qi of the bamboo, which coalesces in response to jolts of thunder.” Could then the real object of veneration encoded in the peach symbology be some potent mushroom? A review of the relevant literature yields a fascinating revelation: one of the most common fungi to infect the peach tree is the ganoderma lucidum, the mushroom venerated by the daoists as the “magic mushroom” or Ling-zhi. (靈 芝）Additionally, ganoderma lucidum is mostly likely to infect peach trees that have been stressed and exhibit cracks in the bark. Invariably, one such stressor would be damage due to a direct or proximity strike from lightning. Just as shen-shu and yu-lv sit at the trunk of the tree in the tale of the giant peach tree, peach trees infected with ganoderma lucidum will exhibit fungal fruiting bodies at the base of the tree. Given the fact that the ling-zhi is one of the most venerated of all chinese medicinals in the daoist and chinese medical literature alike, the apparent association of the fungus with the peach could help explain the long-lived veneration of the tree and its fruit.
If indeed ganoderma is the Ling-zhi of daoist lore, its frequent growth on the peach tree could certainly contribute to the tree’s elevated status in daoist lore. However, many commentators have been hesitant to accept ganoderma lucidum as the true Ling-zhi despite ample evidence. The experience of western ethnobotany holds that the sacred plants of the west - peyote, ayahuasca, cannabis, amanita muscaria and so on - are worshipped primarily for their “entheogenic” properties, or their ability to engender an experience of the divine within. These are hallucinogenic, psychogenic substances which directly alter consciousness and serve thus as a means of direct communion with the divine. Ganoderma Lucidum while boasting abundant health- conferring properties, is entirely psychogenically inert: scientifically speaking, a cup of coffee causes a more pronounced change in consciousness than this supposedly sacred mushroom. As a result, there is a tendency in the western literature to question the identity of the Ling-zhi7 - after all, the sacred plants at the heart of religious ceremony and inner alchemy, they reason, directly elevate human consciousness to the plane of the divine and thus a psychologically inactive substance like ganoderma lucidum simply wouldn’t qualify as a sacred plant.
Yet in daoist thought, the path to immortality is, by contrast, in many ways a very practical and physiological affair. The daoist classic Comprehensive Mirror to Immortals through the Ages puts it simply, “to become an immortal, one must first take herbs to vanquish the three worms.”
7 Joseph Needham, for instance, suggested that Ling-zhi was most likely a name for fly agaric or some other psychogenic substance. (or “hidden corpse”(伏尸） or “ghost infixation”(鬼疰)) In Daoist belief, the three worms or corpses are, to paraphrase Paul Unschuld, “etiological agents of disease”, that if not banished, impair the adept in his quest for immortality. In the classic of Chinese medicine The Origin, Development and Change of Disease, describes the hidden corpse as,
“the product of disease, which causes an imbalance of yin-yang, and a deficiency of the meridians.. leading to stagnation and fixation (within the viscera) ... lying concealed in the five viscera, they accumulate over years, causing bloating, fullness and sharp pain in the abdomen and chest”
The ghosts or corpses represent places in the body where the dynamic flow of yang is constricted or interrupted do to a build-up or excess of yin. This is why, for instance, the pores of the body are called “ghost gates” in Chinese medicine. The pores excrete this excess buildup of fluid from the body. If this fluid were to remain in the body and become stagnant, it would ever more obstruct the dynamic flow of yang and thus, over time, become to the daoist adept a “ghost infixation”. The Ming Dynasty daoist scholar and doctor Zhang Jie-bing, put it simply: “where qi stagnates, ghosts arise”.
Thus, as interpreted by chinese medicine, the three corpses represent nothing more than stagnations in the viscera and chest - this might translate in modern medicine to atherosclerosis, impaired lymph drainage, buildup of stones in the bladder and kidneys, impaired blood flow in capillary beds and so on. That is to say, in daoism the seemingly transcendental affair of achieving immortality is, in many ways, first a physiological concern. Thus, the Yuan dynasty daoist tome Essentials of the Golden Elixir holds, “As long as yin stagnation remains within the body, the achievement of immortality is impossible.” By contrast, the role of the mind in the adept’s practice is comparatively passive. Effort or engagement of the mind poses a barrier in the pursuit of immortality and is interpreted as having direct physiological consequences. Thus, The Golden Elixir continues, “when the mind is still, yang flows unimpeded, but when the mind is consumed with thought, yin accumulates.” As such, it would seem that the hallucinogens listed above, insofar as they produce a profound engagement of the mind, would in fact be entirely antithetical to the spagyric processes of the daoist adept. Western commentators have read their own biases into the coded language of daoist inner alchemy, and as such have failed to understand the centrality of the body as a vehicle for the attainment of immortality and thus the necessity of herbs which address the concrete pathologies which inhibit the adepts progress.
What kind of herbs, then, are most suitable for addressing the physiological impairments of the adept in his alchemic quest? The celebrated Qing dynasty materia medica scholar Zou Run-an in his seminal work, Commentary on the Classic of Materia Medica analyzed over 30 herbs used in the treatment of the three corpses and ghost infixation, he concluded: “to vanquish the stagnations which lie deep in the viscera, the herbs should be either 1.) ethereal and fast-penetrating, 2.) brute and powerful 3.) aromatic and pervasive or 4.) down bearing and noxious. Such herbs can penetrate through the interstices of the viscera to jolt the long-entrenched pathogens from their deep strongholds.” 8 We can compare this analysis with Miny dynasty scholar Lu Zhi-yuan’s description of the effects of Ganoderma in his seminal work Ben-cao Cheng- ya Ban-jie in which he writes, “Once, on Gu-ling Mountain, I had the great fortune of finding a Ling-zhi. (ganoderma) I broke off a piece and held it in my mouth, slowly chewing. As it passed down my throat I felt a cool, moistness like the slow dispersion of mist. It coiled and spiralled through the five viscera as rarefied and pure as qi itself. None of the celebrated enriching and supplementing herbs could deliver the same kind of feeling, a mystic, protean, intangible sensation that seemed to emerge out of nothing and recede without warn. There is great merit to the veneration this potent elixir has enjoyed through the ages.”9 As is evident, the description is consistent with several of the qualities mentioned by Zou Run-an - ganoderma has an ethereal quality which allows it to penetrate and pervade the deepest interstices of the body unimpeded. Notably, it circulates within the inner viscera of the abdomen, which is the most common site of ghost and corpse fixation. Thus, it is with little surprise that we find commonly attested in the literature the claim that Ling-zhi “vanquishes the three corpses, lightens the body and leads to immortality” and “treats stagnations of the upper abdomen and over time lightens the body and leads to immortality.”10 Notably, none of the above descriptions seem to allude to hallucinogenic properties of herbs, which in medical literature is usually described as “causing visions of ghosts and spirits.”
Given the tendency of ganoderma to grow on peach trees, and also given the relation of the medicinal mushroom to thunder and ghost vanquishing as demonstrated in the above arguments, it is thus the opinion of the author that the privileged status afforded to the peach tree in the lore of daoist literature might derive not from the peach tree itself, but from its function as a host for this prized medicinal and sacred herb of the daoist adepts. This essay endeavors to explicate how, when taken in the context of the theory of chinese medicine, the ghosts of daoist iconography can be interpreted as concrete pathological agents which correlate to specific categories of chinese medicinals, of which ganoderma lucidum is undoubtedly a primary member. In light of this discovery, the mystery of the seemingly innocuous peach tree’s involvement in daoist exorcism and ghost vanquishing takes on a new and unexpected light. This research, was inspired in part by the very fine work of Delaware Tea Society and the author
8《本經疏證》 觀篇中用意，皆假變幻靈通之質，威厲猛烈之性，芳香走竄之氣，沉雄惡毒 之味，按其為中軀體，為中藏府，循隙析理而投之，以震驚其居住之堅牢 9 《本草乘雅半偈 》予從固陵山中，獲小黃芝，細咀微咽，頃之喉間涼潤如云，盤繞五內，信 是氣鐘；非灌溉滋生之比，靈異無根，如優曇一現，宜特尊諸首。 10 《神農本草經》：味苦平。主治胸中結，益心氣，補中，增智慧，不忘。久食輕身不老，延 年神仙。一名丹芝。生山谷。 hopes that the ideas expressed here might provide some inspiration and new direction for their research.
Magu pictured with peach tree and ganoderma lucidum. A painting of ganoderma lucidum growing on a peach tree by the empress Ci- xi. The door gods of chinese lore: shen-shu and yu-lv. A daoist exorcism sword made from peach tree wood.