Wang Fuzhi's Interpretation of Spirit in His Annotation to the Zhuangzi

Front. Philos. China 2015, 10(2): 239–254 DOI 10.3868/s030-004-015-0018-6

Received January 13, 2014 TAN Mingran ( ) School of Philosophy and Social Development, Shandong University, Ji’nan 250100, China E-mail: [email protected]

RESEARCH ARTICLE

TAN Mingran1

Wang Fuzhi’s Interpretation of Spirit/Shen in His Annotation on the Zhuangzi Abstract This essay systematically explores the concept “spirit” (shen 神) in Wang Fuzhi’s Annotation on the Zhuangzi (Zhuangzi Jie 莊子解). Following Zhuangzi, Wang Fuzhi interprets spirit as a mass of vital force/jingqi, and regards spirit as the master of human life and human body. Through preserving one’s spirit, one will not only be able to preserve one’s body, but also keep all creatures immune from sickness and plague. This can be accomplished, since a well-preserved spirit will contribute harmonious and pure qi to the universe and make the whole universe more harmonious. In an effort to achieve this purpose, Wang Fuzhi proposes “forgetting all external things” and aiming for an empty and detached mind, on one hand, and asks a person to concentrate his spirit with a constant will, one the other hand. Once one’s spirit is well concentrated, one will be a spiritual person (shenren 神人), who will transcend life and death, fortune and misfortune, always living a leisurely and carefree life. One will also forget all cognitive distinctions and fully become one with the transformation of things and Heaven (tian 天). In this way, one’s spirit will achieve eternity, and fully realize the meaning of human life. Keywords spirit (shen 神), brilliance (ming 明), cognition (zhi 知), spiritual person (shenren 神人), concentrating spirit (ningshen 凝神).

1 One short journal article on the same topic as the current paper by Wang Yubin, was published in Chuanshan Journal, 3, 2012. The article shares most content and format of Chapter 5—“The Relationship of Shen and Ming in the Annotation on the Zhuangzi”— of my dissertation (A Study on Wang Fuzhi’s Interpretation on the Zhuangzi, Beijing University, 2003). I develop this essay mainly from my own dissertation.

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Shen (神, spirit, spirituality, or deity) is one of the most complicated concepts in Chinese culture. This character first appeared in inscriptions on bronze vessels of the Zhou dynasty (1100BC–256BC). One inscription says, “I use this offering to conciliate shen and gui (神鬼 , spirits and ghosts), and memorialize my meritorious ancestors. I will preserve my virtue and keep it pure” (Institute of Archeology of CASS 2007, 2286). Here, spirit/shen might refer to either Heaven (God) or the spirits of virtuous ancestors, worthies and heroes. Ghost/gui mainly refers to the spirit of ordinary dead persons. Generally, these two terms share the same meaning with regard to dead persons, and are used together without distinction in Chinese literature. For example, the spirit of Guan Yu, a general of the Han dynasty, can be regarded as a gui, but is generally worshiped as a shen because of his virtue of loyalty. In the Analects and the Zuo Traditions, shen mainly is regarded as the spirit of a dead person, or the spirits of all natural and important things, such as mountains, rivers, wells, doors, kitchens, etc. However, since the time of Mencius and Zhuangzi, shen began to refer to the potentially superior state of human intelligence and experience. For example, Mencius uses shen to describe the unfathomable ability of the sages, saying, “When the sage is beyond our knowledge, he is what is called shen/spiritual or magic” (Yang 1988, 334). When Zhuangzi says, “I once crossed the gulf at Goblet Deeps and the ferryman handled the boat almost marvelously/shen.” “If a person focuses his attention without any distraction, he will achieve a state as perfect as shen/marvel” (Watson 1968, 200, modified). Nevertheless, these two aspects of shen —the spiritual and the magical—are not separable, but are in a relationship of substance and function, for one (spirit) is regarded as the vital force (jingqi 精氣), and the other (the marvelous state) as the power of this force. On the one hand, this vital force forms the essence of all things in the universe, and becomes spirit and ghost when flowing between Heaven and earth in the Guanzi (管子) (Rickett 1998, 39, modified). The Book of Changes (Yijing 易經), follows this tradition and claims, “The vital force creates things, and its changing state forms the roaming spirits” (Wang 1996, 1–520). On the other hand, this vital force has the power to make a person sagely, and is regarded as the origin of the mental power of thinking in the Guanzi (Dai 1994, 268, 271). Hence, we can conclude that ghost, spirit, and human intelligence are assumed as the existential state of vital force/jingqi.

Like the Guanzi and the Book of Changes, in the Annotation to the Zhuangzi, Wang Fuzhi regards shen as the spirit of qi, the vital and essential part of the cosmic qi (Wang 1964, 93, 162). He assumes that spirit is what causes all things to exist “wonderfully”, and believes that if a person acts according to his spirit

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instead of his cognition, he will be able to enter a marvelous realm. He sees that spirit, as the intuitive power, is able to grasp the essence of all things. If a person acts following the instructions of his spirit, he will be able to confront ferocious fire and deluge without losing his ease and tranquility of mind; he will also be able to empathize with other things and transform them without any sign of coercion. He even assumes that all phenomena, including Heaven and earth, are just the tips, or residue, of the transformation of spirit (Wang 1964, 5, 120, 276). Wang’s description shows that he emphasizes the mental or unfathomable power of shen and, like Zhuangzi, sees it as intuition and empathy.

However, in his Confucian works, such as the Annotation to Master Zhang’s Correcting the Ignorance (Zhangzi Zhengmeng Zhu 張子正蒙注), Wang Fuzhi mainly interprets shen as the pure and penetrating principle of yin and yang: “In Great Harmony there are both qi and shen/spirit. Shen is nothing but the pure and penetrating principle of yin and yang” (Wang 1996, 12–16). He further regards mental ability as the activating principle of shen, and human nature as the locus of shen in human beings (Wang 1996, 12–90, 255). This difference from his description of shen in the Annotation on the Zhuangzi shows that Wang Fuzhi has different emphases depending on a Daoist or Confucian context. That is, in the Daoist context, he follows Zhuangzi’s understanding of shen as pure and harmonious qi which allows one to achieve the spiritual realm of “sitting down and forgetting everything (zuowang 坐忘)”; in a Confucian context, he identifies spirit as human nature, and sets it as the basic principle under the achievement of harmony. After setting ritual propriety as the main way to achieve harmony and preserve spirit/shen, Wang Fuzhi even criticizes Zhuangzi’s zuowang as an invalid approach for achieving harmony (Wang 1996, 554–5).

Considering the different meanings of shen in Wang Fuzhi’s Daoist and Confucian texts, in order to facilitate my discussion in this essay I focus on shen as the pure and harmonious qi and the spirituality or mental power of human mind in the Annotation on the Zhuangzi. My purpose is to analyze Wang’s remarks on the relationships between spirit and body (xing 形) and brilliance (ming 明) and cognition (zhi 知), and to elucidate the degree to which he has been influenced by the Zhuangzi as well as his attempt to interpret the Zhuangzi via Confucianism.

1 Spirit and Body

In Wang’s view, the marvelous power of spirit results from the fact that it is a part of Heaven, the origin and essence of all things residing in human body. When a part of Heaven is stored or endowed in a body, this part of Heaven is called spirit. “A person is born when spirit/shen enters a formed body. However,

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when the body decomposes and cannot hold the spirit, it will be abandoned. The liberated spirit will no longer be called spirit, but Heaven. It is called spirit when it is in a body, but will be called Heaven when it is not there. Is there any difference between its being in a body or not” (Wang 1964, 33)? Therefore, spirit and Heaven are distinguished in terms of their relationship to body. Spirit is the specific part of Heaven in a human body. It is to Heaven just as air in a bottle is to air in the universe. Despite their different locations, they are the same in quality or nature.

The identity of spirit with Heaven dictates that spirit shares with Heaven all its features. Like Heaven, it is unfathomable, but it gets all things done perfectly without deliberation. As Heaven is the Great Harmony (a universe full of harmonious qi), spirit is harmonious and vacuous, and can attract more harmonious qi. Also, humanity and Heaven can influence each other. That is, if a person protects her spirit through good deeds, she will be able to enhance the harmonious state of Heaven; if a person indulges in greed and evil, she will destroy her own spirit, add disastrous qi to the universe, and thus cause trouble to future generations. In order to make spirit fully display its potential, a person should protect and cultivate her spirit, and maintain its original pure and harmonious state. However, many people do not know how to protect their spirit because they believe that the body is the master of spirit. Therefore, to protect and nourish spirit, a person should deal properly with the relationship between the spirit and the body.

Wang Fuzhi clearly states that spirit should be the master of the human body, just as a lodger is the owner of her lodge. However, some people put their spirit under the command of their bodies, and exhaust their spirit without scruple. As a result, they lose their spirit and maintain spiritless bodies. They are alive on the surface, but are actually no better than lifeless things. In order to sustain one’s spirit, Wang Fuzhi first asks a person to forget her body. He says,

If a person can forget her body and delight her mind in the realm of non-reliance, she will see no difference between beauty and ugliness, glory and disgrace, and nobleness and lowliness. [She will] purify herself of mundane opinion, and awaken to the great ancestor which governs Heaven, earth and the myriad things. (Wang 1964, 50)

The great ancestor is the universal harmony, or Heaven. In other words, once a person transcends her body, she will reunite her spirit with Heaven, and be in accord with the process of the universal harmony. Her spirit will spontaneously be protected and nourished.

In order to break with egoism, or attachment to the human body, Wang Fuzhi proposes his doctrine of “being able to accept changes (nengyi 能移)” (Wang


1964, 197). This doctrine holds that all things continuously change from one form into another, and that it is impossible to make sure which is right and which is wrong. If a person realizes that there is no eternal truth or falsehood, she will follow natural processes without attachment to any manifestation. Then she will see no difference between herself and Heaven, or herself and others. As a result, she will return to the non-differentiated mental state of a baby and preserve her spirit and body without effort.

It goes without saying that the highest realm of non-differentiation is the transcendence of life and death. At this point, Wang Fuzhi advocates a dualism of spirit and body. He insists that spirit can live forever, while the body will perish after a period of time. He compares the human body to a candle and the spirit to fire. Although the candle is burned out, the fire will go on to another candle. A person should see spirit as the master of his life and thus transcend the birth and death of his body (Wang 1964, 33)2. Wang Fuzhi also compares life and death to the bending and stretching of a finger, and claims that if a person realized that his spirit is same as the harmonious qi of Heaven he would maintain calm and be peaceful in the face of life and death, completion and destruction (Wang 1964, 48). Hence, he would preserve his spirit perfectly and become one with Heaven—resonating with Zhuangzi’s idea that “All things in the world are nothing but the transformation of a mass of undifferentiated qi” (Guo 1993, 733).

Wang Fuzhi may have held the belief that a well-preserved spirit is the precondition for a vigorous body. He claims that if a person’s mind is disturbed, she cannot hold her spirit within and her body will subsequently be harmed (Wang 1964, 161). However, Wang Fuzhi asserts that both spirit and body are formed by qi: the former by the purest and finest qi, the latter by a coarse qi. For example, he states, “From Dao comes the spirit/shen, from the spirit comes the essence (jing 精), and from the essence comes the body. Then, from the body, things are generated endlessly” (Wang 1964, 188). “Things are what is made from the coarse and stagnant part of qi” (Wang 1964, 157). It would follow that he would then explain what causes the essential or qualitative difference between spirit and body in terms of qi in the heavenly transformation. Regretfully, he does not provide further explanation.

In short, Wang Fuzhi’s discussion concerning the relationship of spirit and body does not go beyond Zhuangzi’s thought. His contribution lies in identifying 2 When Zhuangzi says, “When the grease in firewood is consumed, fire will transfer to another place (firewood), and no one knows when the fire will perish” (Guo 1993, 129), he is relating the idea that human spirit as a mass of harmonious qi will leave the human body and reside elsewhere. Wang Fuzhi grasps this idea and believes that spirit will exist forever as a mass of harmonious qi, but he does not necessarily see it as the Buddhist individual spirit or soul which can reincarnate in another body.

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spirit with Heaven from the perspective of harmonious qi. His creativity lies in elucidating the relationships among spirit, brilliance, and cognition, and elevating preserving spirit to the height of maintaining the Great Harmony.

2 Spirit, Brilliance (Ming 明) and Cognition (Zhi 知)

Wang Fuzhi also points out another reason why a person might take her body as the master of her life: because she does not use her spirit properly but turns it into cognition (zhi 知). In Wang’s view, spirit knows or interacts with other things by intuition or empathy, while cognition knows other things by analysis and distinction. Therefore, once a person investigates things with her cognition, she already departs from intuition and cannot grasp the wholeness and essence of the universe; she will therefore mistake the body for the master of her life and cannot understand that all things are nothing but the flux of qi. As a result, how one uses one’s spirit determines whether one can preserve it or not.

Wang Fuzhi calls the proper use of spirit, “brilliance” (ming 明 ). He distinguishes it from cognition, saying, “Brilliance is similar to cognition, so some ignorant people mistake cognition for brilliance. However, brilliance is to cognition as the sun is to a lamp. The sun lights up everything, while the lamp illuminates only a room, and becomes dim in distant place” (Wang 1964, 17). This metaphor illustrates that brilliance can facilitate a comprehensive knowledge of the universe, but cognition cannot.

Historically, Wang’s idea is a development of Zhuangzi’s “great brilliance” (daming 大明). In the Zhuangzi, when the Yellow Emperor asked a legendary figure called Guang Chengzi how to cultivate one’s life, he was told, “let there be no seeing, no hearing, enfold the spirit in quietude and the body will right itself.” Then he would be led up above the Great Brilliance (Watson 1968, 119–20). The Great Brilliance does not rely on the perception of the five sense organs, but refers to the perception of Dao, or the state of perceiving the wholeness of the world. Similarly, Wang Fuzhi points out, “The great brilliance is what sheds no light on other things” (Wang 1964, 97). That is, the great brilliance is an illuminated state achieved by directly grasping the highest principle of the universe, or a spiritual realm of union with Heaven. In such a state, although one does not shed light on any specific thing or perceive it, one knows things comprehensively.

Wang Fuzhi also calls this brilliance the light of Heaven (tianguang 天光), because the brilliance results from the union of one’s spirit with Heaven. “The brilliance under the charge of spirit is called the light of Heaven. …Therefore, the perfect man unites his spirit with Heaven. Once this has been done, his brilliance is issued from Heaven, too” (Wang 1964, 276). In other words, when


the brilliance is under the charge of spirit, it will be held within the spirit and will interact with external things by intuition and empathy, which resonates with Wang Fuzhi’s words: “When spirit hides its light and does not illuminate specific things, the light of Heaven will be emitted from it. This light of Heaven will illuminate everywhere, just as a light shines a vacuous room completely” (Wang 1964, 276). Here, “the light which is hidden” and “the light of Heaven” are different. The former refers to cognition, while the latter refers to intuition or empathy. This light of Heaven is not sunlight, but a clear understanding of the general principle of the universe. To properly use one’s spirit and preserve it, one must rely upon intuition instead of cognition.

However, brilliance is susceptible to degenerating into cognition when it confines its attention to specific things. In this process, brilliance departs from the intuition of spirit and relies on the functions of ears and eyes to seek external things. This is the state in which “spirit is under the control of brilliance and degenerates into a petty person’s knowledge” (Wang 1964, 276). This occurs because, when brilliance becomes the master of spirit, it will go its own way and ignore the order of spirit, and thus dissipate its light externally, focusing on specific things instead of the universe and ultimately degenerating into cognition. In contrast, if brilliance is under the control of spirit, it will conceal its light within while penetrating the whole universe with empathy, as previously mentioned. In this case it will always be one with spirit and keep spirit intact and preserved, as Wang Fuzhi states: “Although spirit manifests itself as brilliance, it still maintains itself intact” (Wang 1964, 276). In short, brilliance is the intuitive function of spirit that grasps the wholeness of the universe, while cognition is the perceptive and analytical function of spirit that aims at specific things and principles. The former will not attach to any specific thing or commit the mistake of “chasing after the ten thousand things, never coming back,” and thus resides within the spirit and does no harm to it. The latter instead will chase after and attach itself to external things, and thus exhaust one’s energy and do harm to the spirit.

Therefore, cognition is a limited brilliance, just like the light of a lamp, and its achievement is partial knowledge of the universe; it cannot match the general principle of the universe or Dao. If we apply this partial knowledge to cultivating life and governing the world, it sooner or later will result in conflicts and disasters. For this reason, Wang Fuzhi concludes, “knowledge and ignorance both arise from the true great ancestor (via brilliance), but they harm it in return” (Wang 1964, 75). “The true great ancestor” refers to Heaven or spirit. Knowledge and ignorance are both forms of a partial understanding of the world, resulting from the attachment of brilliance to external things. When knowledge and ignorance focus on specific things, they will block the penetrating power of the spirit to grasp the wholeness of the world. Thus Wang Fuzhi follows Zhuangzi in stating, “The Way/Dao cannot be known analytically, and cognition cannot

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access Dao” (Wang 1964, 185). He further indicates that Song Rongzi 宋榮子

and Liezi (列子)3 both are limited by their cognitive distinctions and knowledge, and cannot understand that the true state of Heaven originally has nothing specific (i.e., a chaotic mass of qi) within it (Wang 1964, 20).

Wang Fuzhi goes on to elaborate how cognition will harm spirit. First, cognition and its achievements (knowledge) will imprison the spirit and cause a person to lose the realm of free and easy wandering (xiaoyao 逍遙). “Cognitive distinction leads to choice; choice leads to acceptance and rejection. The mind of acceptance and rejection thus establishes distinction by cognition. This distinction again produces further distinctions. Then the mind is far from free and easy wandering” (Wang 1964, 4). These distinctions form one prison after another and detain the human mind within. As Wang Fuzhi identifies mind with spirit,4 when the mind cannot wander easily and freely the spirit will be imprisoned, too. Second, cognition will take spirit as its servant. It will become entangled with other things and use the spirit or mind in strife. Then, disasters resulting from human affairs and natural process (yin-yang) will be unavoidable, and will blunt his “knife” (spirit) (Wang 1964, 30).

Wang also explains how spirit is harmed. In his view, spirit is the vital force/jingqi in a human body, and its origin is the harmonious qi of the universe. Once this harmonious qi is controlled by cognitive distinctions, it will end in dissipation or destruction. He argues,

The metamorphosis of knowledge/ cognition produces eight virtues … These virtues will drive a person’s qi to chase for things and opinions. As a result, her qi will dissipate daily; her harmony will be destroyed daily, and her principle of life will not be able to govern her body. Once her principle of life loses its power, she is no more than a lifeless body waiting for its collapse. (Wang 1964, 30)

Here, the person’s qi, harmony, and principle of life all are relevant to the

preservation of her spirit. When her qi dissipates, her harmony is disturbed, and she loses her principle of life; she will harm her spirit rather than preserve it. As a 3 Song Rongzi and Liezi are two figures in Free and Easy Wandering/Xiao Yao You in the Zhuangzi. Song Rongzi can maintain detached toward worldly glory and disgrace by drawing a clear line between the internal and the external. Liezi goes further to forget this distinction, and can temporarily ride with the wind. Although they both are superior to common people, they are far from the spiritual person who identifies oneself with the flux of cosmic qi in Zhuangzi’s eye. Wang Fuzhi here follows Zhuangzi to criticize Song Rongzi and Liezi. 4 He says, “Without form or body, without brightness or darkness, containing all things but forgetting them, sharing something with the myriad things but being different from them, this is the substance of Heaven and earth, and the mind of human beings” (Wang 1964, 97–98). Obviously, this substance of Heaven and earth is spirit, so spirit is identical with human mind in Wang Fuzhi’s discourse.


result, she will not be able to understand the wholeness of Heaven and earth, and will cause endless trouble for the world.

In addition, Wang Fuzhi indicates that knowledge obtained through cognition cannot protect a person’s body, either. When people become attached to their knowledge, they wish to demonstrate, and have other people acknowledge, their superiority. As a result, they will be hated or even killed, for no one likes to be disdained or humiliated. For example, Guan Longpang (關龍逄) of the Xia Dynasty, Bi Gan (比干) of the Shang dynasty, and Wu Zixu (伍子胥) of the State of Wu in the Spring-Autumn period were all killed by their kings because they coerced them to accept their superiority in knowledge. In Wang Fuzhi’s view, these people first used their knowledge—the spear and knife in their mind—then fought with others and were killed in the end (Wang 1964, 272). Thus, knowledge cannot preserve one’s spirit, or one’s body. To achieve a peaceful life and enjoy one’s natural lifespan, one should first abandon a reliance on knowledge.

In order to avoid harm to the spirit, Wang Fuzhi suggests one attain true knowledge. True knowledge will illuminate a person’s mind with the light of Heaven, and the person will no longer be deceived by sense perception and will preserve his spirit intact, whether facing life or death, fortune or misfortune. Hence, true knowledge is identical with great brilliance, the light of Heaven, and is different in essence from cognition/knowledge. Wang Fuzhi’s further definition makes this idea clear. He says, “To unite life and death, Heaven and man, one will see no difference in his knowledge. He will not regard birth as birth, nor think death as death. This is the true knowledge of the authentic person (zhenren 真人)” (Wang 1964, 57). Specifically, to possess true knowledge is to see everything as one, and to get rid of cognitive distinctions.

As to how to achieve true knowledge, Wang Fuzhi proposes awakening to the transformation of things (wuhua 物化) in the Zhuangzi. Zhuangzi assumes that all things are in the process of constant change, and that the human body is just a stage of this process. One should therefore be satisfied with every stage involved, just as Zhuangzi enjoys being Zhuang Zhou when awake and is happy to be a butterfly when in a dream. Wang Fuzhi elaborates on this idea, and claims that because all things, including human body, are in constant transformation, “there is no fixed body to support the right-wrong distinction people often make”—there is no difference between right and wrong, dreaming and wakefulness, or Zhuang Zhou and butterfly. If this is the case, then what Confucians and the Mohists argue loses its foundation (Wang 1964, 29). Here, Wang Fuzhi follows Zhuangzi to claim that the universe is nothing but a flux of qi, and that everything, including human beings, is only a stage of this flux. Therefore, we should abandon any attachments or cognitive distinctions, follow natural processes where they take us, and thus set our mind and spirit free in the

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open and boundless realm. Based on the above analysis, it is obvious that Wang Fuzhi conscientiously

follows Zhuangzi’s disapproval of cognition as a way to know Dao. In contrast to Zhuangzi, Wang Fuzhi concentrates more on the harm cognition does to spirit, while in Zhuangzi’s discourse, Dao, not spirit, is the focus. This difference results from their different philosophical structures. For Zhuangzi, the perception of Dao is the objective, and the preserved spirit and spiritual person are its spontaneous result. For Wang Fuzhi, the maintenance of the Great Harmony (the universal harmonious qi) is his ultimate concern. As spirit is a part of this harmonious qi in a human body and will return to the Great Harmony after death, Wang Fuzhi believes that everyone should preserve and nourish their spirit so the amount of the universal harmonious qi will be augmented. Hence, Wang Fuzhi is using Zhuangzi’s method to develop the harmonious society aimed at by Confucius, which demonstrates his purpose to transform Zhuangzi’s thought into the Confucian way of the nobleman.

3 Concentrating Spirit (Ningshen 凝神)

Concentrating spirit is to keep spirit intact and preserve it from cognition. Wang Fuzhi proposes two approaches to preserving spirit. From the negative or passive perspective, he recommends “forgetting”—forgetting all external things, including fame and disgrace, gains and losses, life and death. After one forgets all things, including oneself, one’s spirit will be able to fully prevail and exert its potential. When explaining why the ferryman can handle his boat marvelously, Wang points out the secret is “forgetting all things.” To the ferryman, his boat is like a chariot, deep water like a hill, gold like a tile; he sees no difference between them, and looks at all external things as trivial, so he can concentrate on the important thing, and handle the boat skillfully.

However, although a person may understand the importance of forgetting things, he often cannot put it into practice or give it priority over the enjoyment of wealth and reputation. As a Daoist disciple once told his master, “My mind is still lingering in the magnificent palace, although my body is in a hermit’s hut” (Guo 1993, 979). Wang Fuzhi’s solution is that one should be satisfied with one’s lot, and realize that all things are beyond one’s effort and determined by the natural process. He argues, “If a person is good at forgetting the world, she will know that all created things are determined by Heaven (and cannot be changed by human effort). She will let them be in their places, and her spirit will be calm. For her, there are no things, no self, and so it will be unnecessary to accept or reject” (Wang 1964, 160).

Undoubtedly, the highest realm of forgetting is to forget one’s ego and body,


one’s life and death. If a person remains calm and constant in face of life and death, Wang Fuzhi says, she will rest on the Heavenly Equality (tianjun 天鈞), and nothing will be able to exhaust her spirit and brilliance (Wang 1964, 25). This again brings us back to his doctrines of “the transformation of things” and “being able to accept change,” which we have already discussed.

From the positive or active perspective, Wang Fuzhi proposes “to maintain one’s will with serious attention, and to concentrate one’s spirit with will” (yi zhuan chi zhi, yi zhi ning shen 以專持志，以志凝神). This means that one should maintain a constant will by cultivating serious attention, and should concentrate one’s spirit with this constant will or mind. In Wang’s view, will is where spirit resides, and is that whereby spirit regulates qi’s movement. Qi here refers to the coarse qi forming the human body, while spirit refers to the fine and harmonious qi forming human mind or soul. Analogously, spirit is to bodily qi as mind is to body. Just as mind can be influenced by bodily action, spirit can be overpowered by bodily qi’s unruly activities. Hence, in order to restrain bodily qi’s unruly activities, Wang Fuzhi proposes to set one’s will as the master of mind and body and to use it to regulate one’s bodily qi. He believes that a calm mind will make both spirit and qi follow their courses and will cause them to increase slowly and gradually. In the end, spirit will reside in bodily qi peacefully as the latter maintains stability and constancy without overflowing (Wang 1964, 162). Here, qi is compared to water, and is assumed to be increased without overflowing if carefully handled. Once this has been done, one’s spirit will be concentrated, free from any attachment or disturbance. One will be able to fully realize the potential of the spirit and achieve perfection in doing everything, just as the ferryman handles his boat.

Then, how can one maintain one’s will with serious attention? Wang Fuzhi suggests forgetting external things. Since the ferryman forgets all external things, he can focus his will on handling the boat without being disturbed. Human desires are the most critical of those things which one must forget. He says, “How can external things disturb my will, sway my spirit, harm my body, transform me into objects, and make me indulge in external things? Or what causes my will, spirit, and body to be overpowered by external things? It is nothing but my desire and mind seeking profit” (Wang 1964, 160). Therefore, in order to maintain a constant will, one should empty the mind, just as Yan Hui “fasts his mind” (xinzhai 心齋) and “sits down and forgets everything” (zuowang 坐忘). This also means that one should be satisfied with one’s lot or fate, see no difference between self and others, and completely wipe out the disturbance of desire.

It seems that “forgetting all things” and “maintaining a constant will” are in conflict, but actually they are not. “Forgetting” aims to get rid of all deliberation and return to a pure mind without any preferences. In such a state, the mind is like a mirror, and will perfectly reflect all things. With such a mind, a person will

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be able to spontaneously focus on what she is doing without being disturbed by something else, just as in the Zhuangzi, the gamecock can defeat all other cocks and the hunchback can catch cicadas as easily as picking up something at hand (Watson 1968, 199, 204). That is, “forgetting” results in “a constant will.” Our experience also shows that when we are completely engrossed in something, we forget everything, including what we are doing. Moreover, “maintaining a constant will” cannot be understood as a deliberate action either, but an action following natural processes. This idea is borrowed from the Mencius by Wang Fuzhi. Mencius uses it to cultivate his “vast-flowing power” (haoran zhiqi 浩然

之氣), and insists that this cultivation should follow natural processes without any calculating mind, just as a farmer grows his crop according to the crop’s nature. His method is to “always be doing something without expectation. Let the mind not forget its objective, but let there be no artificial effort to help it grow” (Yang 1988, 62). Mencius’ method is similar to the hunchback’s cicada-catching skill in the Zhuangzi, and this similarity shows that for both Mencius and Zhuangzi, “forgetting” and “maintaining a constant will” will not conflict with each other. When Wang Fuzhi first uses both approaches to preserve spirit, it reveals his attempt to meld them into one and to converge Zhuangzi’s thought with Mencius’.

Therefore, through “forgetting external things” and “maintaining one’s constant will,” one will be able to regulate one’s qi and concentrate one’s spirit. The result will be this: one not only enjoys free and easy wandering and shatters the shackles of external things, but also lets all things be themselves, just as the spiritual person in the Guye Mountain (guye shan 姑射山) not only completely frees himself from any trouble and maintains himself as tender as an infant, but also protects other things from sickness and plague and makes the harvest plentiful (Watson 1968, 33).

4 The Spiritual Person

For both Zhuangzi and Wang Fuzhi, the spiritual person is the person who can concentrate and preserve his or her spirit. Zhuangzi describes the spiritual person on Guye Mountain who concentrates his spirit. He also defines this kind of person thus: “without departing from his essence (jing 精), he is called a spiritual person” (Guo 1993, 1066). The essence is the fine qi, spirit, so a spiritual person is one who does not lose his spirit. Wang Fuzhi continues this idea, and says, “To a spiritual person, his spirit is concentrated, nothing else” (Wang 1964, 7). However, in contrast to Zhuangzi who sees the perfect person (zhiren 至人), the spiritual person (shenren 神人), and the sage on the same level, Wang Fuzhi thinks the spiritual person is superior to the sage. He argues,


By letting things be themselves, the spiritual person will follow natural process and accomplish whatever he does. This is the merit which the spiritual person enjoys alone. …He sees as no different from an ordinary person’s bustle what the sages, worthies, and noblemen fruitlessly busy themselves with. If the spiritual person does do something, even startling other people, he also accomplishes it according to the time and the situation. (Wang 1964, 244)

Here, Wang Fuzhi clearly indicates that the spiritual person is care-free and

leisurely but timely in his action, while the sage is fettered by worldly affairs, and struggles purposelessly. The reason is that the sage has not been truly united with the Way/Dao (in Daoist sense), and is still on the level of cognition, and cannot penetrate things purely by intuition. Hence, the sage cannot transcend mundane affairs, and is concerned about specific things such as the effect of his governance. In contrast, the spiritual person forgets both merits and governance. He lets all things follow their own courses and reach their own ends. Wang Fuzhi thus concludes, “By concentrating his own spirit, the spiritual person makes all things rest in their places according to their size and lots. He indeed does nothing, and neither he nor other things will be harmed” (Wang 1964, 7). Therefore, the spiritual person establishes both himself and creatures in the whole world through concentrating his own spirit.

However, Wang Fuzhi again denies that the spiritual person lives completely in idleness. He believes that the spiritual person will automatically assist the transformation of Heaven and of things at the same time as he enjoys free and easy wandering. The Doctrine of the Mean (Zhongyong) proposes “assisting the transformation and nourishment of Heaven and earth,” and it is evident that Wang Fuzhi tries to add this capacity to the spiritual person whom he sees as superior to the Confucian sage. For instance, he argues, “For Zhuangzi’s doctrine, it is broad and deep, elucidates the Way of Heaven, and governs the transformation of Heaven, so it is more than getting rid of knowledge and preserving spirit through keeping quiet” (Wang 1964, 270). Specifically, Wang Fuizhi assumes that the spiritual person aims to purify the Great Harmony of the polluting negative consequences of human knowledge and desire, and to maintain its pure and harmonious state. In this way, the spiritual person will be able to benefit the creatures in the world with his pure and harmonious qi, leaving good things to endless generations. In more detail, when a person preserves her spirit and body well, her qi will participate in the process of heavenly transformation, i.e., flowing and changing together with the flux of qi. When she dies and her qi dissipates and returns to the universe, it will improve the brightness of the sun, the moon, and stars; it will also make the creatures more prosperous. Even though it loses its materiality, it will also attract other

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harmonious qi and produce kinder and gentler things on the earth. For this reason, this person’s contribution will be timeless and boundless. This is why the perfect person is busy preserving his spirit (Wang 1964, 156).

In this way, Wang Fuzhi distinguishes his “spiritual person” from Zhuangzi’s, and makes his Annotation more Confucian, for Wang Fuzhi endows his spiritual person with the mission to increase good things in the universe, while Zhuangzi strives to neutralize good and bad.

5 Conclusion

Although spirit/shen has multiple meanings in Chinese culture, in his Annotation on the Zhuangzi, Wang Fuzhi consistently interprets spirit/shen as the fine part of qi in a human body, and assumes that it is originally a part of the universal harmonious qi of Heaven. Hence, a person can interact with Heaven through proper cultivation of his or her spirit. In an effort to do this, a person should first take spirit as the master of her life and body. Otherwise, bodily activities and cognition will misuse and exhaust one’s spirit in the pursuit of external things, leaving disharmonious qi to coarsen Heaven after one’s death. In order to properly use one’s spirit, one should use its intuitive or empathetic power to penetrate all things, rather than its analytical power to investigate specific things. Wang Fuzhi calls the spirit’s intuition and empathy “brilliance” (ming), and its analytical power, “cognition” (zhi). He praises brilliance as the right way to use spirit and to unite with Heaven, while downplaying cognition as the cause of disharmony and conflicts. In his belief, the meaning of human life lies not in pursuing cognitive knowledge, but in concentrating one’s spirit and seeing all things as different stages of a flux of qi. Once this has been done, one will not only cultivate one’s own life but also protect other creatures from plague and sickness. The reason is that by concentrating one’s own spirit, one brings harmonious qi to the universe, and lets all things follow their own course. Besides “forgetting,” Wang Fuzhi also suggests an active way to concentrate spirit. He asks people to set up a constant will in the process of cultivating their spirit. With this will, one will gradually accumulate one’s qi and provide spirit a peaceful residence, just as one slowly fills a glass with water and maintains the peace of the water’s surface. Once one’s spirit is well-cultivated and preserved, one can be the spiritual person who will not only enjoy free and easy wandering, but also benefit the whole world.

Wang Fuzhi’s discussion of spirit shows his attempt to meld Zhuangzi’s thought with Confucianism, especially regarding the cultivation of harmony in his Annotation to Master Zhang’s Correcting the Ignorant, and the assistance to


the transformation of Heaven and earth in the Doctrine of the Mean. However, Wang Fuzhi cannot completely transform Zhuangzi’s ideas because Zhuangzi’s cosmic and existential realm is broader than the Confucian humanist realm. The result is that Wang Fuzhi is led by the Zhuangzi to endorse the doctrine of following the natural processes and leaving things alone when he tries to insert his Confucian belief into his commentaries. For example, on the one hand, Wang Fuzhi follows Zhuangzi to admit that the spiritual person is superior to the sage (Wang 1964, 244); on the other hand, he again criticizes Zhuangzi’s free and easy wandering as inadequate, and supplements it with the mission of assisting the transformation of Heaven (Wang 1964, 156). He may have realized that his agreement with Zhuangzi would degrade Confucian sages such as Yao and Shun, so he again goes on to elevate them to the level of the spiritual persons. He argues, “From the point of view of the spiritual person, the records of Yao and Shun’s governance are nothing but Yao and Shun’s dust and leavings, but not where Yao and Shun’s spirit exists. What Yao and Shun have preserved is their concentrated spirit” (Wang 1964, 7). In other words, Yao and Shun’s governance does not contain their true spirit; their spirit has gone away with them. As the spiritual person is a person who concentrates his spirit well, Wang Fuzhi tacitly assumes Yao and Shun are spiritual persons, too. This inconsistency shows the difficulty in his melding Confucianism and the Zhuangzi. If his different definitions of shen (see the introduction) were taken into account, this inconsistency would be more evident. Nevertheless, Wang Fuzhi’s attempt demonstrates again the truth that Confucianism and Daoism jointly renew Chinese culture in Chinese intellectual history.

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Wang Fuzhi's Interpretation of Spirit in His Annotation to the Zhuangzi

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