Shifu Lin - Taoist Thunder Magic Traditions

Tao Jiao Lei Fa: Taoist Thunder Magic Traditions and Their Relationship to Nei Kung Meditation Presented by Lung Hu Shan Publications Author: Shifu Lin Editors: Arman Alfares, Shifu Hern Heng © 1996-2012. All Rights Reserved.

Introduction In the West, amongst Taoist enthusiasts, there are many misconceptions about what constitutes Taoism and Taoist practice. Many flirt with the Daodejing (Tao Te Ching) and assume that Taoism is merely philosophical. One of my students, a Nei Jia teacher under me and through several other respected lineages, lives in a town where there are many Taoist enthusiast who cannot pull themselves off the couch to train in a local Baguazhang class he teaches. When asked what makes them “Taoist” as they claim, he explained that many speak about ideas, Yin and Yang, “harmony” and so on, but none – he has explained to me – has ever once broached a discussion of how their practices make them Taoist. Nowhere is this more fundamentally a misunderstanding than when it comes to more extensive and esoteric of Taoist rituals. I have written at

length in other works about my studies of the notorious Mo Pai Taoist system of Nei Kung. I have argued convincingly that its origins of practice are in fact from Lung Hu Shan ( 龍 虎山 ) Taoism, and that there is nothing that I have learned in the first four levels (themselves lengthy years of practice, which typically span two decades for the practitioner), which is not paralleled in other esoteric Taoist lineages that I have learned at the feet of great masters. Like Mo Pai, however, these lineages are also very secretive and do not typically parade their hidden practices all over Internet message forums, or even in publish books lining the shelves of local booksellers. When there is secrecy, there is often misinformation (sometimes disinformation) to fill the gap. This is, of course – I have explained – one of the main reasons why I began teaching Mo Pai Nei Kung ( 墨派 内 功 ) to non-Chinese and to Westerners: because there were charlatans, hucksters, and liars who were filling the void of authentic instruction with their nonsense. Since I began teaching, it has become well-known that my teaching of Mo Pai is authentic, with some of the most well-known and oldest students of the system confirming that I am teaching it, even whilst some of them disapprove of it. One of the most enigmatic and esoteric aspects of more advanced Mo Pai practice, well beyond the first four levels and the elusive Yin Yang Kung ( 陰陽功 ), is that of Taoist Thunder Magic ( 道教雷法 ). Even while

the first four levels were thought by some of my teachers to have been unique to the Mo Pai system, I have demonstrated to my students that there are parallels in other lineages, and that Mo Pai originates from Taoism, even with its veneration of Mozi, which was not uncommon at certain periods of Taoism. Thunder Magic too is a practice that is not at all unique to the Mo Pai Nei Kung system. This text will not focus on Mo Pai, but on Thunder Magic as it exists throughout Tao Jiao. It will then speak on how the first four fundamental levels of Mo Pai Nei Kung, building towards Yin Yang Kung is used as a basis for advanced levels of the system, which involve nothing short of Taoist Thunder Magic, of a very traditional type.

What is Taoist Thunder Magic ( 道教雷法 )? First of all, it must be clarified that each line practicing Thunder Magic in Taoism, does so with some variation. Many of these variations are not in and of themselves important, but are visualizations and dogmas which were found useful by advanced teachers over the generations, for the purposes of “making it work.” With Taoist Thunder Magic, there can be no secondguessing, nor doubt. If the practitioner does not believe the rituals will work, they will not work. As well, if the practitioner does not have sufficient Qi, sufficient control of their Qi, ability to absorb qi with the yi, and ability to hide the abdominal Dan T’ien from spirits (shen), then Taoist Thunder Magic

can not only be dangerous, it can be life-threatening. It is for this reason that the foundational levels of Thunder Magic lineages are always concerned with Nei Dan Nei Kung alchemy, and are not – as scholars are sometimes unaware – simply rituals that one performs as in other magic traditions. No point could be more important to emphasize than this. Speaking to the universality of Thunder Magic in Taoism, author Florian C. Reiter explains that, “Today Taoist Thunder Magic or Thunder Rituals (Lei-fa 雷法 /Wu-lei fa 五雷法 ) constitute an established element in Taoist religious culture.” Indeed, this is no new phenomenon. The bulk of Thunder Magic sources extend throughout Taoist history, found primarily, however, in the Tao Fa Hui Yuan, which nevertheless seems inaccessible to non-Chinese. Chapters on Qingwei and Shen Xiao rituals are found in the first 101 chapters. Other strains are found in the Fahai Yizhu. The Jingyu Xuanwen, Lei Fa Yi Xuan Pian, Tao Fa Xin Chuan, Ming Tao Pian, Yu Yang Qi Hou Qin Ji and Tao Fa Zong Zhi Tu Yan Yi all contain additional materials and references on Tao Jiao Lei Fa. These traditions are not limited to one secret lineage, but are rites which scholars and inner-door Taoists are well aware of, throughout Taoist culture. Reiter correctly explains a Sung era date for the emergence of a somewhat codified Thunder Magic system, suggesting that, “Many ritual practices, convictions and emblems of Thunder Magic stem from antique

traditions. The name of Thunder Magic emerged during the Sung period (11th-13th centuries), uniting, developing and rationalizing exorcist and ritual methods that were already current in earlier periods of Taoist history albeit without the label of Thunder Magic.” This academic perspective is not far off the mark, though it is a bit over-simplified. Early sources on Taoist practice have always been the most elusive, with scholars often claiming the Philosophical-Speculative Era of Taoism to have been one devoid of alchemical meditative practice, something which both elements of the Zhuangzi and the whole of the Nei Yeh clearly contradict. That there are not prolific writings on Tao Jiao Lei Fa until the Song period is evidence less of the emergence of these practices, and more of the proliferation of writings on them. Still, as is often the case with writings, there is something of a solidifying and standardizing of views, something Hern Heng calls “orthodoxification:” a term which conceptualizes the reality quite accurately. Reiter notes, in his The Aspirations and Standards of Taoist Priests in the Early T´ang Period, that, “Taoists always were very expert at divination. They healed illness and exorcised baleful influences, using amulets and other ritual devices. The Taoist activists seem to make use of a rather secret personal way of life, of prayer and meditation. There is, of course, the need for a protracted and rather complicated education that may

lead to the career as a priest (tao-shih 道士 ), and again there is some secrecy about the actual reality of this career.”[1] This too must not be glossed over, as the purpose of Thunder Magic in Taoism, at the very least, since the emergence of the T’ien Shi, is quite like the purpose of all advanced meditation and alchemy: both to harmonize with the Tao and to heal, to benefit others.

The Emergence of Taoist Thunder Magic In Chinese thought, thunder (lei) is discussed as the power behind damage from lightening (dian) strikes. It is thus not enough to conceive of these ideas as “thunder” or “lightening” but “the power of thunder,” the forces which give rise to the phenomenon of thunder. “The Chinese have long appreciated the power of thunder,” we read, Sima Qian (145-86 BCE) “observed that thunder animates the cosmos just as the bell and drum initiate the symphony.”[2] The Encyclopedia of Taoism, edited by Fabrizio Pregadio, says the following of “Leifa,” in the entry under the same name:

This influential class of exorcist ritual became part of many of the new Taoist ritual systems from the twelfth century onward. At its core is a repertoire of administrative, judicial, and meditative methods that it makes available to adepts interested in harnessing the vitalizing and

punitive powers of thunder on a more regular and consistent basis in their ritual practice. Incorporating local gods and practices into a grand scheme laid out in liturgies and scriptures, and often including compounding the ‘inner elixir’ (neidan), the Thunder Rites were part of the transformation of Taoism that took pace between the tenth and fourteenth centuries.[3]

The term Thunder Magic has, since the Sung era, become a comprehensive general term for a variety of rituals that later flourished and were labeled the Ch’ing Wei ( 清微 ) in the 14th century. These were known specifically for being exorcistic in nature, which is not at all unlike Taoist rites that predated them, going back to the T’ien Shi and Zhang Dao-Ling ( 張道陵 ) (34 – 156 CE). Thunder Magic became part of the general Taoist religious culture without being specifically or explicitly termed “Thunder Magic.” Similarly, it was not yet a set of practices extrapolated from the grander array of Taoist practices as a separate collection of rituals or rites to be distinguished from normative Taoist practice. One might argue that the scholars of Taoism are right, and that these practices quickly integrated themselves thoroughly into the mainstream body of esoteric Taoist ritual from localized shamanistic practices, or one might counter such a claim that Taoism itself is thought to have emerged shamanistically – even by scholars – and that evidence for it in

localized shamanistic tradition is not evidence of its late emergence and integration into Tao Jiao, but instead, to be expected due to Taoism’s origins in Chinese shamanism. This then would argue that Thunder Magic was there all along, as a component of Taoist esoteria, and that it is accordingly no surprise why in some traditions Zhang, Dao-Ling is himself associated with the Thunder Deities, of which we will see more in this work. In Taiwan today, we see a counter-example from the consensus of the practice’s synonymous nature with Taoist ritual itself. Here then the practice has been extrapolated and “does not exclude the conscious continuation of Thunder Magic by individual priests or specialists who may claim to have family traditions reaching back to Taoists of the Sung period.”[4] The translation “magic” for the Chinese word fa ( 法 ) is the formulation that Reiter and others prefer, however, “Thunder Rituals” would also be a good name translating lei fa( 雷法 ).[5] More to the point, the term here for fa ( 法 ) refers to “Dharma” or “Destiny” or “Natural Law.” This ambiguous, multifarious term cannot simply be summed up in one English equivalent. To understand what is meant then by Fa, we must understand the term Dharma( धर्म ) itself in Sanskrit as not only having this common meaning of “law” and “Natural Law” but also “Nature” and “Virtue” as Hern Heng has explained in his Virtue and the Way: Cultivating Flood-Like Qi, is

the more appropriate rendering of the Chinese “de”, which we see in the Daodejing and the common Martial Arts expression “Wu De.” It further also means “sect,” in Sanskrit, and duty, righteousness, and religion. It is therefore, while a common scholarly use and frame of reference to say “lei fa” means “Thunder Magic,” wholly inappropriate to consider any of these terms alone to be a sufficient translation. The term “magic” too, must be understood here in the Chinese and Taoist sense. “Magic” is not something that steps outside of the Natural Order of things, and interrupts science, it is instead a wielding of scientific law (fa), in a way that gives the “fa-shi” the ability to control natural processes in a way that otherwise might be out of one’s grasp. “Magic,” in this sense, is not “supernatural,” but natural, bound by science, and mastered through methodologies that conform to the limitations of the natural world. We may therefore understand lei fa to be “The Natural Law of Thunder acquired through mastery of scientific natural law, and religious-riteconforming to Nature.” To keep it simple, and with this understanding in mind, we will simply say “Thunder Magic,” with the understanding that such words are insufficient. Scholars determine that Thunder Magic emerged in the Northern Sung-period based on traditions of interpreting and handling natural phenomena. This, they note, has always been a fundamental concern and

focus in Taoism, in spite of the common Western misconceptions that Taoism is about “just being” with no steering intentionality. There have always been antique specific rituals, which focused on harnessing the destructive force of thunder and lightning, employed in remote periods of Chinese history. We read, for instance, that the scholar Wang Ch’ung ( 王 充 ) in the Han-period disputes in his Lun-Heng the existence of a divinity called “Thunder Lord” (Lei Gong, 雷公 ), saying that thunders are simply fire (huo 火 ).[6] We do know that the Thunder Lord (Lei Gong, 雷公 ) along with the divinities of wind, rain, and agriculture, had a designated place on the outer altar of the state pantheon during the Eastern Han period (Hou Hanshu 97.3106). As well, in the ritual innovations of Emperor Tang Xuanzong (r. 712-756), the divinity of Thunder, was referred to as Thunder Master (Lei Shi), and was promoted to the second level of the three-tier state sacrificial system. This would indicate much more antiquity to the practices and centrality of Thunder Magic in advanced Taoist practice, than most scholars commonly assume. While we do not know the exact form of the ancient varieties of these rituals as they then occurred, the statement by Wang Ch’ung seems to demonstrate that in long-past eras a spirit or divine Thunder Lord was an object for religious veneration, and was seen as central to the acquisition of

Thunder Power in and manifesting from the individual. The T’ang Taoist Chang Wan-Fu (fl. 711-713) tells us that “concerning the comprehensive rule over all divinities and demons in heaven and on earth, concerning the killing and subduing of demons (hsieh-mo 邪 魔 ), the beheading and the annihilation of bad spirits (yao-ching 妖精 ), the recruitment of divine forces (ling 靈 ) and the summoning of vital forces (qi, 氣 ), the realization of control and order for mountains and rivers, the cleansing of filthy atmospheres, the dispatch of petitions and the employment of spiritual agents in delivering messages, the direct communication with the immortals (shen-hsien 神 仙 ), there is just nothing that has any priority to [the methods and rituals of] Orthodoxy and Unity (Cheng-i 正一 ).”[7] This is an important distinction to be made between Mo ( 魔 ) and Mo ( 墨 ), perhaps on a cautionary level, that if the virtues of Mozi are not followed, we may fall victim to the spiritual leaching of Mo ( 魔 ) forces. The rites of lei fa, therefore, cannot be employed by any who have not yet sufficiently mastered their own qi, nor stored enough within themselves from fundamental sources. This cannot occur without the proper training of the mind, which is gained through silence-which-refines and focuses the yi, which guides the qi. To actually attempt to wield control over spiritual beings, to subdue dark beings, or to summon powerful beings, without having mastery over ones own qi, the concentration of the qi to the abdominal dan

t’ien, and the ability to hide the dan T’ien from spirits towards the ming meng, the practitioner is doomed to have their qi stolen from them incrementally. As well, if the de of the individual is not seen as pure, spiritual beings – even good ones – will deprive the individual of their excess qi, both to strengthen themselves and to thwart the progress of the unworthy. Only those who either have pure karma in this regard, or understand advanced rites to insulate themselves from such attacks, would ever be able to progress to the point where lei fa could be useful or even attainable to them. It is telling that Chang Wan-fu’s comments, mentioned above, seem to summarize the range of Thunder Magic which scholars associate with much later times. We thus see that, as I have formerly suggested, the practices of lei fa have always constituted a facet of Taoist esoteria. There are additional aspects of the ritual practice in Thunder Magic that classify such rituals as proper parts of Cheng-i Taoism. This would seem to indicate that there are multiple origins with roots in and connections to cults to local thunder deities (lei shen). One of the earliest and most enduring varieties of Thunder Magic is that which is concerned with the Five Thunder deities (wu lei) who were connected to the Jiangxi Zhengyi “Orthodox Unity” sect, and are associated with the aforementioned text, the Tao Fa Hui Yuan. Liu Young Guang (11341206) was well-known for relying on the rituals of Five Thunder deities,

which is unmistakably that of Taoist Thunder Magic universally. Another variety, emerging somewhat later, was known as the school of Lei Ting (Thunder Clap), or “Listening” as in Ting Jing which any good T’aijiquan practitioner will be familiar with. The Wang Xiao master Wang Wen-Qing (1093-1153) also was said to have played a significant role in the establishment and propagation of Taoist Thunder Magic amongst the Shen Xiao tradition throughout the 12th and 13th centuries in Guang Dong, Fu Jian, Zhe Jiang, and Jiang Xi. Thunder Magic was also part of the formative rise of the Pure Tenuity (Qing Wei) school, and the Jing Ming Tao school meaning “Pure and Bright Way” of the 13th and 14th centuries. We also see it employed in the Ling Bao Da Fa traditions. By the tenth century, however, whatever diverse forms of lei fa practices that existed in Taoism and shamanism seem to have coalesced into traditions centering on various revealed methods meant to help practitioners deal with groups of thunder deities, and thunder energy itself, for the purposes of advanced qi cultivation and absorption.

Cosmic Versus Personified Thunder Deities The primary difference between varieties of lei fa are how they are conceptualized. There is a fundamental point which I wish to make here: it doesn’t matter. How can one say that it doesn’t matter? Because the

conceptualizations are means to an end. The end result is the qi itself, not the method of conceptualizing the energy and forces worked with. The Shan Hai Jing explains that in Taoist legend, thunder deities were represented as mythical creatures, if not – in some cases – monsters. Written records from the end of the first century BCE described the look of thunder gods, saying: “There were thunder gods (leis hen) in the thunder swamp who are of dragon bodies and human beads.”[8] The fourth-century Record of An Inquest Into the Spirit-Realm, however, describes belief in Fufeng (near Xi’an, southern Shaanxi province) that the thunder god resembled a monkey. [9]This iconography survived for a long time and speed far. The Journey to the West (Xiyou ji) completed by Wu Cheng’en (ca. 1500-1582), a native of the coastal province of Jingsu, often mocked this phenomenon the protagonist Monkey King being misidentified as the Lei Gong, or Thunder Lord, by confused villagers. This demonstrates, however, that the monkey was a well-known and accepted depiction of the Lei Gong in eastern China as well during Ming era. If other visualizations were so different, than clearly this indicates that the conceptualization itself is a moot point, and may in fact vary depending on certain variables of those conceptualizing. That is to say that essentially, this is a personification of something beyond the form the conceptualization appears bound by. We read the following, in the Daoist Ritual, State Religion, and Popular Practices:

Zhenwu Worship from Song to Ming (960-1644), which lends even further evidence to this conclusion:

The simian iconography, however, competed with other facets of thunder gods. The Extensive Records of the Taiping Era (Taiping guangji), a collection of pre-tenth-century anecdotes, devotes three entire chapter to thunder. One of the accounts relates that in Leizhou (Guangdong province) people drew images of thunder gods for worship, and the gods were portrayed as having pigs’ heads (Taiping guangji 394.8b). In the story of the battle of Chen Luanfeng with a thunder god, the latter was described as ‘resembling a bear-pig (xiongzhu) with hairy horns and dark-blue faithless wings.’ This description brings to mind brachyphylla, the species of bat with a pignosed hairy face and big pointed ears found in Central and South America. Could the brachyphylla by a rare chance have come to southern China and inspired the Cantonese depiction of the thunder god? Pig-headed thunder gods lingered on Daoist Thunder Rites as attested in the Daofa huiyang.[10]

Reiter chronicles the history of the evolution of the employment of Thunder Deity visualization in Lei Fa, in the following lengthy quote that warrants full

replication:

The growth of Zhenwu’s cult in Daoism was closely related to the Thunder Rites that quietly developed in the mid-eighth century and flourished by the early twelfth century. The liturgical manuals of the Thunder Rites often instruct the practitioners to transform themselves into divinities in order to swiftly dispatch the violent macho thunder deities, and Zhenwu was one of the recommended choices. Assuming the identity of a god arguably increased the perceived efficacy of the ritual. However, the conventional interpretation for such identitychange was divine possession, and Daoist adepts could not accept this interoperation. They regarded divine possession as a crude practice, good only for their assistant or village spirit mediums. To create a replacement, Daoists, probably inspired by Tantricism, turned to cunxiang or visualization-mediation, the core practice of Doaism, and generated the method of “transformation into the divinity through internal refinement” or bianshen neilian. Grounded in the classical Daoist belief of a fluid metamorphosis through meditation, bianshen neilian imparted visualization exercises from the old Supreme Clarity school and adapted the classical Heavenly Master incantation of metamorphosis. Yet, more importantly, this meditation technique was

constructed around a framework combining correlative cosmology with the idea of growing an inner-infant to ritually replace the adept’s physical body. This framework is characteristically inner alchemy. Thus, the liturgical break-through of ‘transformation into the divinity’ as is would not have been possible without the progress of selfcultivation techniques in inner alchemy methodology in the tenth century. The praxis and intellectual development within Daoism is foundation of the liturgical evolution.

Thus, we find that “‘transforming’ oneself into the divinity via bianshen,” a method we will discuss later in more depth, “required intensive meditation and created an intimate relationship between the impersonating practitioner and the impersonated god, a relationship not unlike that between the divine lineage patriarchs and the initiated practitioners in Tantrism.” What this means is that in Lei Fa there is something of a master-disciple relationship between Thunder Deity and the practitioner. Sometimes, lineages will speak of how there can be only one person to advance through these ranks. This is somewhat true, but often exaggerated. In the Mo Pai Nei Kung system, for instance, it is discussed that only one person in a given generation can attain Yin-Yang Kung. This is incorrect. What is true, however, is that a Xien Shen master may chose to only have a spiritual relationship with so many living

individuals in a given generation. Usually this is one, or possibly two per lineage. What is not accounted for in this, however, is that Thunder Dieties are not limited those lines in which Xien Shen merge with Thunder Deities, and are invoked as Thunder Deities.[11] One example of a point of confusion and contention even amongst practitioners of the same system, can be found in the following quote from a fellow student of the current headmaster of the Mo Pai Nei Kung system, who I will call “Shifu Y.” He said, “the yin energy that you gather is in fact spirit energy; you are actually drawing in spirits into your hui yin to do your bidding. It is a form of sorcery even though John does not know this.” This, I clarified to him, is partly true. In Lei Fa, we do gather qi into the organs in a certain way that will not be explained in here, as this is not the place for lengthy esoteric instruction, and only a fool would assume that such things would be taught, and taught correctly, in a book which they could simply purchase for on the Internet. As I do not take any of my students or readers as fools, I am quite certain that no one reading this has ever thought or expected such a ridiculous thing, and I have tried to make that clear from the outset. What I will explain, however, is that those energies gathered into the organs are gathered in such a way that in many – even most – Lei Fa lineages, these energies are gathered through the entry of spirits which hold the authority over the Wu Lei Five Thunders. More on this will be alluded to regarding this

in the section on Bian Shen Nei Lian meditation. With regards to the Wu Lei “Five Thunders,” Reiter notes the further variation of conceptualizations between how the Thunder Powers are conceptualized by diverse lineages of Lei Fa. I present this as evidence that my fellow student under Shifu Y is both right and wrong. Shifu John is not wrong in how he views the energies cosmically. This is fundamentally correct. At higher levels, however – levels which are beyond my personal experience – it is traditional to command the energies as entities.

The Five Thunders ritual systems… belong to a vast body of ritual theories and practices in Daoism known as leifa or Thunder Rites that surfaced in the early twelfth century. Facilitated by complex meditative methods as well as invocations, talismans, and mudras (symbolic hand gestures), the Thunder Rites were developed to harness the thunder force to serve the Way. Interpretations of the thunder force, even among Daoists, varied widely from the pure cosmic qi to violent spirits of half-man half-beast monsters, and everything in between (Skar 1996-7: 178; Reiter 2007). The bottom line is that they embodied the vigor of thunder and could be domesticated through Daoist divine bureaucratic system.[12]

As we have seen previously, “the conventional interpretation for such identity-change” as Bian Shen Nei Lian, “was divine possession,” and that Taoist “adepts could not accept this interoperation,” as they “regarded divine possession as a crude practice, good only for their assistant or village spirit mediums,” we must then look at a lower example of such medium-possession in this context, for the purpose of juxtaposing this lower practice – and observing its volatility and limitations – with Bian Shen Nei Lian, which constitutes the core of Lei Fa practice.

A Taoist priest named Zhao Zujian is recounted in the Record of the Listener that Zhao practiced an exorcism method and meditation known as “Five Thunders.” His young assistant was utilized as a medium during exorcisms. During one such event, the Record accounts that the late tenth-century Taoist master Tan Zixiao had taken possession of Zhao’s assistant to teach him further Thunder Magic. He asked Zhao what he had learned thus far, and Zhao replied “Only the four talismans that were transmitted to this world by Zhenwu.” (Yijianzhi yi 5.831-832; Davis 2001: 80-82). This dates the post-Tang Taoism as associating Thunder Rites with Zhenwu as a foundational and authoritative source.

We thus see a remarkable similarity between this Thunder Deified Xien Shen master and the Mo Pai Xien Shifu “M”, which some lower-ranking students, who did not know any better, have even mistakenly termed a “demon.” Such beings are immensely powerful, former human beings, who have passed on, and even seemingly amplified their power through death of the physical body. These are true masters of Lei Fa, prior to their own physical bodies’ death and decay, and are true “Immortals” or “Xien Shen.” We should not be surprised at their ability or willingness to take advantage of the weak who present themselves before them. Here then we see medium-possession as a cautionary tale in a sense, as the master himself is not possessed, and the medium is simply used as a tool by both the Xien Shen, and the physical disciple. The only person in this equation who gets no benefit is the medium. Indeed, such individuals will find their Qi continuously sapped, as will those who practice in defiance and irreverence towards such Thunder Masters. It has come to my attention that some students of Mo Pai in fact made the mistake of challenging Xien Shifu May, and following this audacity, they found themselves afflicted with hauntings, while others suffered health problems. Any of such students should contact me immediately about how to reverently remedy this problem and pay respects to the offended teacher.

The Primordial Origins of Tao Jiao Lei Fa According to the

Authoritative Text of the Tao Fa Hui Yuan While scholars dispute and debate the origin of Lei Fa rites in human society, Tao Jiao itself is very clear that the origins are from the Yu Ch’ing Chen Wang, the “Perfected King of Jade Purification,” who himself was taught these rites from the Ling Fei, the Dong Miao Yu Nu “Jade Girl” who was ordered from the Primordial Yuan Shi Shang Di, the “Master Primordial Original God,” to teach this advanced system of transcending the processes of the karmic (she yin) cycle of the physical world. The methods taught permeated throughout various lineages like tributaries, but all of them were from one source. Each lineage with Lei Fa knowledge would safe-guard them to make sure that the wicked did not use them to control the physical world for nefarious aims. As a result, lineage after lineage died off, with those remaining often thinking that they were alone the gate-keepers of this knowledge. In the beginning, there was a time when human beings walked with more refinement and knowledge, because of the imparting of this knowledge. We know very little about this time, but we read from the Zhuangzi that it was a time far more ancient than his, when the True Human Beings, breathed through their feet, and could sit submerged under water in meditation. It was a time that even the ancients from our perspective were in awe of, as they looked back and tried to regrasp the Tao.

In that time, Lei Fa and Nei Kung cultivation were one and the same, because cultivation was a process that – as we cannot conceive socially – was natural to the human condition. Today, in lineages of Lei Fa, whether the famous Mo Pai lineage, or any other – many years and decades must be spent in preparation for Lei Fa. One can selectively engage in Lei Fa practices for the writing of Fu amulets, or for exorcisms, but for cultivation of Lei Fa power and energy within their physical-spiritual bodies? For this they must undergo years – decades – of proper training. This is how lineages such as Mo Pai emerged, even if these lineages lost the knowledge of their origins amongst modern day practitioners. For these purposes, moral, philosophical imperatives – such as those taught by Mozi – were infused within the ethics of the lines, for the sake of proper karma and self-refinement: indeed also to fill the body with “flood-like qi,” as described in my previous works on Mo Pai. The Tao Fa Hui Yuan says that one should fear that their Lei Fa methods are ineffective, and should seek to fortify them through correct ritual (zheng fa), and moral correctness, merits, and by seeking to save the life of any creature (sheng ling) they come in contact with; they should seek to correct the problems in the world – in the “nine dark regions” – which seven generations had put in disarray. They should do this by righting wrongs, and fighting injustice, as well as abolishing all blood sacrifice which claims the lives of “thousands of lives in hundreds of kalpas.” For this reason, lineages

like Mo Pai made the teachings of the teacher Mozi – already appropriated in Taoist veneration by some lines – central to instruction. Without this moral focus, progress in even the preliminary levels of instructor would be difficult, and, as the Tao Fa Hui Yuan says, “hard to achieve.” The Tao Fa Hui Yuan further makes it clear that over time, the Lei Fa rites became impotent in the hands of those who had not undergone the appropriate self-refinement and cultivation.

All who strive for perfection, yearn for the Tao but do not discuss the essential mysteries, they will have their outer form recede, deteriorate and decay. If they do not use the fu shui water amulet, their efforts will not reach up to the San T’ien, If they do not rinse their mouth with Jing Hua, refined essences, their spiritual forces will not be pure and satisfied. In such a case they will not be able to help anyone in illness or distress, and the success of the Tao will be very difficult for them to achieve.

That is, when the cultivation and inner-alchemy which we know as Nei Kung became estranged from human society and normative practice, the rites of Lei Fa would not work on their own. They needed, as it were, to be “powered up” by the practitioner, who had – over the course of human history – lost

that inner power and cultivation, yet sought to use the chueh mudras, mantras, and chu as magic spells in that way that we today think of “magic”: something that works on its own; “like magic,” we foolishly say.

Absorbing Qi In Tao Jiao Lei Fa “Thunder Magic” Meditation The chief deities invoked in Thunder Magic lineages are often Lei Gong and his consort, the Great Mother Lei Mu. They are aided by the generals Tainyou yuanshuai and Tainpeng yuanshuai and the four together control Thunder and Lightning. Scholars postulate that the primary purpose of Thunder Magic is to seek intervention when the weather is detrimental to human survival, whether deprived of precipitation, or plagued by an excess giving rise to flooding. Spiritually and meditatively, however, Thunder Magic is in fact for spiritual protection, exorcism of demons and nefarious ghosts, as well as – and most importantly – healing, and otherwise correcting the problems in the world, created by the seven generations in the nine regions of darkness. First and foremost, however, the practitioner must generate sufficient amount of energy, chueh (mudras) and – in some lineages – amulets are used to channel the energy to control the weather. Thus, it is appropriate to first discuss the foundational levels of cultivating Qi in the Dan T’ien for Thunder Magic to be used effectively, as in the higher levels of

Mo Pai Nei Kung. The first thing to be concerned with in preliminary meditation, in order to prepare the body for the long journey towards being able to make use of Lei Fa, is that when attempting meditation is the physical stance you assume before beginning. The Japanese kneeling stance of seiza made popular by Aikijiujitsu, Aikido and Zen, will produce different results from meditation in full lotus or half lotus postures utilized in this type of Nei Kung. You should not sit in any other way while doing this type of meditation. As well, don’t believe the hype that it does not matter how you sit. Full lotus is much better for pooling the Qi in the Dan Tien. It will pool in half lotus, if the correct methods are used with your hands, but it will not pool as much as full lotus. You should only start with half lotus if you can’t do full lotus. You should only start with crossing your legs if you cannot do half lotus, but you should start getting used to half lotus at least. You will not complete level one if you do not. Don’t deceive yourself. The first way of sitting, is simply cross-legged (San Pan). This way is acceptable if you know the correct hand mudras. The next best way is half lotus (Tan Pan), for men with the right foot on top of the left and for women vice versa. Either way is acceptable for either sex, but men will typically sit with right foot on top of left. You may, however, rotate from one position to the next for prolonged meditation sessions. Sitting with right foot on left leg

is said to increase the absorption of yang qi, while left on right leg will increase the absorption of yin qi. Which you chose will depend on your desired outcome. If you are too hot outside of the Dan T’ien (for instance if your feces is too hard, or if you acquire digestive pains from too much yang energy in the Spleen/Pancreas), then you might chose to absorb more yin, which seems to attract slower as it gravitates towards the yang building in the Dan Tien. The last way, which is the best, is the full lotus position (Shuang Pan). It is said that the efficiency of the full lotus is almost double that of the half-lotus. There are two ways to position the feet in full lotus, just like in half lotus and the same situation applies here as was described for half lotus.

The First Level In the first level you build an immense amount of yang qi, in the abdominal Dan Tien, known as the “hara” in Japanese traditions. You will literally feel the Dan T’ien before long and will know exactly where it is located within you, because you will feel it. This is what we are doing in this level. There are some other very important – essential – details you need to know to do this, and these can be taught to students, but this practice is common to other systems as well. Various powerful Nei Kung lineages all start from this level of building the foundation, and filling the Dan T’ien with qi.

The practice at this level will also cause the “alpha state” physically, and the pineal gland excretes melatonin, bringing great peace, and potentially slowing down aging, (though this is not a goal). In time it will function to heal illness. What we call here “actual meditation,” is similar to the state between wake and sleep, but do not presume that it is as simple as meditating in this state. Though this might help at some times, it can also backfire and cause the mind to wander more than in other states. In his book Nei Kung, Kosta Danaos said many good things, and plenty which could be disputed as well. One thing that stood out to me was a quote on the matter of concentration in relation to Nei Kung. In it, he said:

I am often asked how to meditate. Regrettably, the answer is always the same: I really cannot tell you how to go about it. One of the earliest things I learned from John Change was that each of us has to find his or her own way into meditation, that there is no general method suitable for all. Through the grace of the universal spirit, we are all individuals – each of us must find an individual path.[13]

That is to say that meditation is not really our goal here. Our goal, instead, is pure concentration on a single-pointedness. We must breathe as instructed and focus with unwavering concentration, as instructed. We must do this for

as long as we can, for as many times as we can. This will not make sense at first. You will think you are doing this, yet I assure you that you will not be for at least months of regular practice. This is what Kosta’s reference to John’s words, above, is talking about. How you find your way to concentration, which he calls here “how to meditate,” is an individual matter, and one that you cannot be instructed upon. Understand then that meditation is not enough, we must concentrate either with a Zen mind, or focus upon a single point in meditation (indeed, Zen is a single-pointedness). It is to this end that mantra is employed in so many traditions. John explained the first level to Kostas: “Say this is the dantien, right? First it is empty; then we fill it with yang chi. At this level we engage solely in sitting meditation. The Nei Kung at this level is not as much difficult in terms of technique as it is in terms of intention, focus and having a teacher to tell you what the signs of appropriate progress are. You will need to devote at least an hour a day to meditating every single day, no matter how late it gets, no matter how busy you are. You need to realize that you will be doing this for several years; think approximately 4.5 years or 1,620 hours at 3 minutes of “actual” meditation, on average, per hour of meditation every day. This will equal 81 hours of “actual” meditation. Do not confuse this with 81 straightforward hours of sitting for meditation. It will take 1,620 at least. For some it will take even

longer. This is just to pass Level 1, but even this level is beyond what most teachers of most Nei Jia schools attain in their whole careers! If you expect to complete Level 1 sooner than this then you will almost certainly be disappointed. It can happen before then, but more often than not, people take about this long, if they are diligent.

The Second Level (2a) In the Second Level, which is really of no concern to a person at level one, for many years, you pack the yang qi in the lower Dan T’ien and then add more until it has expanded to the size of about a golf ball... Kostas asked John: “and for Level Two… we compress the yang chi in our dantien, correct?” John explained Level 2, or what the Mo Pai school calls “2a” in Indonesia, saying “for Level Two, we compress the yang qi and actually introduce twice as much intro the same area. We make it hard, so to speak.” He explained to Kostas that “You must be sexually abstinent to complete this training.” This is partially correct. From a traditional approach to sex, a man must be sexually abstinent to complete this training. He may, however, engage in what is called “fang zhong” (“sexual hygiene”). For those who wish to know more about this, Tao Fang Zhong Shu: Learning Taoist Sexual Alchemy, A Pre-Requisite For Sexually-Active Mo Pai Nei Kung

Practitioners. But unless one is very skilled and does not spill a drop of jing, then abstinence is a must. At this level, one must be extremely careful with their health. What makes Nei Kung a Nei Dan practice, is that it is internal, essentially, as an exercise. But the qi itself is internal within the body, focusing all to the core of the body itself. All excess yang qi is gathered and condensed to the Dan Tien. If the qi is deficient in any way, it will drain the body and tax the organs. This is why no jing can be lost to accomplish this. To understand how to properly deal with the potential pitfalls of practice at this level, one should obtain Overcoming Sickness with Nei Kung: Why do so many Mo Pai practitioners get seriously ill? What you can do to prevent, or correct this. I would highly recommend these two books that I have written, whether you intend to practice Mo Pai, or another method of Nei Kung. Some have tried to suggest that the next level is the “real” Level 2, and that this – 2a – is merely supplemental to fill the Dan Tien. This level he described is perfectly fine if one wants to number it that way. But this does not change the fact that the “second” level (whether called “2” or “2a” or “supplemental to 2”) is the secondary packing-to-the-Dan T’ien level that John was describing above to Kostas. This is a standing exercise that involves movement. It is a type of Nei Kung practice that we find in many different lineages. It is done in some lineages hard, and in some soft. I have personally

learned this same exercise from two different lineages besides Mo Pai. In all cases, the goal is the same: to fill the abdominal Dan T’ien to the point that it is absolutely as full as it can possibly get, before then mobilizing it.

The Third Level (2b) At what Kosta (and thus everyone discussing Mo Pai outside of the East), calls the Third Level you have to do exercises to cause the cords holding the Dan T’ien in place to break. When you do this you will see a bulge from the Dan T’ien pressing outward very concretely once you succeed. This is not unique to the Mo Pai lineage either. Here again I remind you that these are scientific levels, they are not magical spells, nor are they anything other than very systematic procedures. There is one lineage that I have learned a version of this level from, that is different only in that it is done standing in this other lineage. In Mo Pai, this level is done sitting. If you do this in this manner, for about this long then this and that will happen. That is how it works. There is a teacher in the US who was a Korean martial arts teacher in Greece for a while who I believe Kostas makes reference to. His name is Master Lee and he was very public about doing this. He liked to freak out folks by having them feel the hard mass and making it move around. Not limited to such anecdotal examples, the Lingshujing and also the Taozang discuss freeing the actual Dan T’ien physically. If you find

these passages I will discuss them with you. John explained this third level by simply saying to Kostas that “In Level Three we make the Dan T’ien mobile. We can make it move” in any direction. “We move it in these four directions at first, like an X; after that we can make the dantien move anywhere,” he explained, saying further that “It is a solid lump of hardened yang qi” which one “can tap into and use at will.” At this point, the individual is differentiated from other practitioners of different lineages of Nei Kung. This is not because other lineages do not mobilize the Dan Tien. This is, instead, because a significant amount of time is spent not just “building the foundation” in Mo Pai, but filling the Dan T’ien to the point that it cannot be filled any further. Thus, when the next level transpires, and Yin and Yang are fused, a much more powerful “cell” will be created. Other systems that do work on merging Yin and Yang, do so sometimes in more indirect ways. Because they do this, they start to get minor results, in a quicker manner than Mo Pai. It took John almost two decades to get to Yin Yang Kung. Compare this with some systems where you can start “using” qi emission after only a few years. Why the discrepancy? The reason is that many lineages will start using qi as soon as any amount is built up. This is like someone who gets a descent job and starts spending all the money right away. They never save up anything, because

they are so used to being poor that they cannot bear to live frugally and save. Mo Pai is a much more patient approach. Instead of building a little, performing exercises to allow us to utilize the little that we have stored, and using this accumulated qi after a few years, Mo Pai Nei Kung is only getting started after a few years. The reason is that if we fill the Dan T’ien as much as possible, then when we combine Yin and Yang, we will have a very powerful battery cell right from the “start” then (even if this takes two decades to produce). In that way, once we proceed from there, we can do much more impressive things than those practitioners of systems who start working with energy emission when one has not built very much up, by comparison. But because we are working with much higher energy than most other systems, when we combine Yin and Yang, there is more potential danger, and the need for the T’ien Ming to advance to Yin-Yang Kung.

The Fourth Level (Level 3) At the Fourth Level, the yin qi that has gathered near the Hui Yin perineum and the yang qi in the Dan T’ien meet the yin qi through extreme concentration, holding, and pressure. This is discussed in great length as well in Dummo tradition. They call it the fusion of the Red and White Tig Le in the Central Channel. Many Taoist works also discuss this fusion of Yin and Yang. This is not even remotely limited to the Mo Pai tradition, though it is

commonly thought to be, by Mo Pai students. The only difference in systems that fuse Yin and Yang is how Mo Pai Nei Kung focuses on building, and building and building, and filling and filling and filling before progressing to this level. In this way, this level is much more substantial: we are fusing two very tangible things, not merely ephemeral energies. Even this, however, is not different from all systems, as there are others which also do the same. Most Western Taoists are just starting to learn about such esoteric lineages. We read in Kostas’s Magus of Java book, on Mo Pai, that “When we are finished with Level Three,” John explained, “we send our yang down to the hui yin. There it gathers as much yin as we have sent down yang.” This is what makes methods of Nei Kung that attain Yin-Yang Kung unique. It is not, however, unique to the methodology of Mo Pai. This practice is very intensive, but “After a time, maybe even months or years, yin and yang rise together.” Kostas reports John saying, in relation to the above drawing, that “The white circle is the yang, the black the yin. They float around inside the body, and the pain is incredible, constant, unbelievable.” This refers specifically to the practice of the fourth level. This is not to say that the Dan T’ien and the Hui Yin Qi simply migrate throughout the body, but that they are connected in the abdominal region and must be fused together. Yin and Yang energy can surge through the body at this point, but not the Dan T’ien

itself. That is not what John was saying. John continued, “Only if you have the discipline to ignore it can you control them and put their power inside your Dan Tien. At that point, they become squeezed together and take this shape, like the Tai Chi” or “Yin Yang” symbol. “If you are successful,” John said to Kostas, “by forcing the two together, you also force them to react. Remember, they are not like electrical poles; they do not attract each other, but repel.” It is not that these forces “repel” but that they each have their natural places to pool in the body, and these natural places are being pulled into meeting. They are like a very strong man who wants to be left to himself to train and get powerful, and a very strong, independent woman who wants to be left alone and pursue her career. These two are forced into an arranged marriage – arranged by your yi – and they do not like it one bit. This does not mean that they are not attracted to one another, but they want – ultimately – to be in their natural places. Only once fused do they “accept” the marriage and thus become functional. Before that, when you pull them together, they do not accept this. Kostas asked about what happens “if you are not successful?” To which, John said, “Then you will probably die. There is no point in doing this type of training unless you are ready to die for it.” This is true, but the reality is that not only is it highly unlikely that you will get to this level, it is unlikely that you will have the qi to succeed at combining Yin and Yang.

John explained that this is something that relies, to a great extent, on the will of Heaven and ones karma. Almost no one in the world gets to this level. So you must ask yourself, if you aspire to attain this level of achievement, why should Heaven will for you to progress to this level? How this is done in Mo Pai Nei Kung is something which very few people know. This is because most never commit the time to the previous level, the third level, which requires one to basically have no need to go to a job daily. For that level and for this, you will not be able to go to a “9 to 5” job and complete either of these levels. This means that if you are serious about Mo Pai, you will have to obtain a means of earning a living that will afford you a considerable amount of time. If you are at the first or second levels of Mo Pai right now, you should be strategizing financially for how you will do this in around 10 years. If you plan for this now, and are dedicated, Heaven will provide a way for you to complete the third and fourth levels. But for this reason, because of the immense dedication of time that these levels take, very few people will pass the third and four levels. If these levels are passed however, and indeed after the third level, when the abdominal Dan T’ien is more mobile than it is when previously and foundationally established, one can be said to approach the levels at which Lei Fa come in to play. Put bluntly, the famous Mo Pai system of Nei Kung involves Lei Fa at its higher levels. Many have heard or read about there

being an advanced level at which Thunder and Lightening are absorbed. Others have heard of the former headmaster of the Mo Pai school, John “Chang” using his backyard meditation chamber for contacting Xien Shen Shifu “M” in a manner that is hardly different itself from traditional Lei Fa rites that might vary with a local patron deity, or in the case of T’ien Shi fixation, Zhong, Dao-Ling. While I could say somewhat more on the relationship of Mo Pai Nei Kung to Tao Jiao Lei Fa, it is unnecessary, as it suffices to say that each high level I have learned about in Mo Pai (beyond the levels I have passed thus far and am engaged in currently), are completely paralleled in other Taoist lineages that I have learned at the feet of many great masters. The Mo Pai system, after these elusive foundational levels and Yin Yang Kung, are in large part concerned with Tao Jiao methods of immortality and birth of the “Golden Fetus” as well, as Lei Fa Thunder Magic. As the saying goes, “there is nothing new under the sun.”

The Practice of Thunder Magic Qi Absorption In Lei Fa, from a variety of lineages, we find one very common practice, aside from those involving Thunder Deities and Spirits, or the elevated Wu Lei meditation of “Five Thunders,” which will not be taught here. In the general practice of Thunder Absorption, the Taoist, traditionally a Taoist priest faces a thunderstorm, specifically potent if it is the first thunderstorm

of the spring season. The practitioner holds specific mudras and recites incantations, prayers or mantras in order to channel the energy of the Thunder into their body, through yi-guided Qi Kung. The Qi which the practitioner stores in this way, is later used and projected out as required to patients to cure them of various diseases, as in order to keep the Qi at appropriately high levels, there must always be a surplus pushing the body’s capacity further and further. This will require emission of Qi through beneficent acts, or through excess, overheating, overflow and detriment to the body, which must be avoided at all costs. For this reason, at sufficiently high levels of Taoist practice, healing is essentially a necessity of practice, to continue advancing. The practitioner can, eventually, learn to harness the power of the storm in a manner that can call up or end a thunderstorm. This usually occurs through meditative, prayer, visualization, mantra and mudras more than simple intent alone. The instructions for this are somewhat complex, and can best be described as a combination crossed between magical ritual and qi kung movements, breath-work and – most importantly for Tao Jiao Lei Fa – a particular “space” in time during the Qi Kung which can best be characterized as the Wuji point, when the real “magic” occurs, a point that is called simultaneously “void and united” (xu yi). In general, the practice of absorbing Thunder energy is not

significantly different from the Taoist practice of qi absorption from Nature: the sun, the moon, trees, water, or the Earth itself. The Thunder Qi, however, is of such a volatile and potent quality. Remember, we are not speaking of the Thunder sound, nor the Lightening strike, we are speaking of the energy itself that causes the Thunder: that is what is being absorbed. The body of the general Taoist novice, or curious experimenter, is simply not able to store energy like that. It is for that reason that even how the novice approaches Qi absorption with Lei Fa must be very different from how the adept approaches it.

Transformation Into the Deity Through Inner Refinement (Bian Shen Nei Lian) The more advanced variety of Thunder Magic involves Bian Shen Nei Lian: the transformation into the Lei Gong deity through Nei Lian, or “inner refinement.” Some have asked me before, after I described some of the methods of Lei Fa to them, “how is it then that Mo Pai Nei Kung is called ‘Qi Kung’ early on (the second and third foundational levels, for instance), but the fourth level and on are called ‘Nei Kung,’ while it is clear that Tao Jiao Lei Fa includes movements, breath-work, and the like?” My answer is simple: Not only is the Wuji space of actual “work” entirely inner work (Nei Kung), but, the Bian Shen Nei Lian is Nei Kung of the highest order.

In Bian Shen Nei Lian, the advanced master spiritually transforms himself into the Heavenly Lord Teng.[14] This is in order to adopt the divine capacity of the “god.” The resulting ritual action is not performed on behalf of the deity, to say it another way, “the deity is the performing agent.”[15] Reiter explains that “this is the crucial point, which generally is the very basis for any Thunder Magic rituals. In this case, the meditating priest creates out of his potentials the Heavenly Lord Teng. Here we have to make the point that the deity certainly does not come down from anywhere to possess the priest but is an innate spiritual potential.”[16] Wang Wen Ch’ing explains in the Tao Fa Hui Yuan that “regarding the Ling Wu Divine Self, if it is not Divine in nature, then what else would be capable of uniting with the Lei Sheen Thunder Deities?” Furthermore, if there is no response from the Lei Shen, it is “because the appeal was done without a proper mind.” The response of the Thunder Deities, therefore, is “Like an echo,” and just as when nothing is said in a true voice, no echo follows, so too “is there also no response at all” from the Thunder Deities in that case. In this way, he explains, “I am the Thunder Deity and the Thunder Deity is me. All the Divine responses are concurrent with me. There is no response that would not occur for matters of sympathy, compassion, profit and help.” That is to say that requests aligned with the beneficent nature of the Divine, are naturally echoed with a mind in proper focus of yi, and powered by sufficient

qi. An advanced example of such Nei Lian Nei Kung is that of the Wu Lei meditation. In this particular meditation, you must first be adept at quieting the mind, astral travel and interaction with spiritual beings (shen), which you will have certainly learned in your preceding years of Nei Kung development. “You concentrate and see yourself as this Divine General of the Five Thunders” whose “head touches the heaven,” while “he stands on the earth.”[17] This being is in fact paralleled throughout many world traditions. My student, Hern Heng has privately discussed with me advanced meditations in the Jewish tradition that deal similarly with this being, and the merging of the individual with him in latent potentia. While worth noting, a discussion of such correlations is beyond the scope of this discussion. Such extremely advanced, potentially dangerous – even lifethreatening – meditation, can only be engaged in after “your divine forces congeal” and you “sit quietly in meditation.” This refers not only to preceding the ritual, but for years – usually decades – prior. For this reason, Hern Heng explains, these instructions were only relayed in the Jewish after decades of preparation of the mind and body as well: just as in the tradition of Tao Jiao Lei Fa. To activate the Nei Lian meditation, however, you will have to concentrate “on the one most shining point in the Kidney Palace (shen-

kung).” Those who can mobilize the Dan T’ien understand what this means. “When the fire rises, you must know how to lead it to engulf your entire body before the preceding steps,” which are omitted from this instruction. This fire engulfing the body is literally the process of being overcome with oneness of the Thunder Deity which exists within the properly cultivated practitioner, in potentia. “You then must know the secret of concentration of breaths in the five core and the five directions, which must be mixed correctly to combine and shape a united aura of radiant shining in purples emanating from a golden color. You must then understand how to change this into the ying-erh infant, which is a process of achievement well beyond normal attainment. How then can a novice engage in such advanced forms of Thunder Magic? Beware of this when you hear anyone who cannot demonstrate remarkable feats on demand telling you that they “have attained the Thunder.” These charlatans do not even know what they are talking about. This is why Sa Shou Jian complained in his day that “business-minded behavior destroys the zheng fa” (proper lei fa magic rituals). In his Berlin Symposium on the Foundations of Daoist Ritual, Reiter notes “Independently made up Thunder schools mushroom and produce a hodgepodge of alleged Thunder rituals. They are without any basis, having embellished and fraudulent discourse.” For the person who can attain this in spiritual physicality, they can be

changed into the fiery creature which becomes the Divine General of the Five Thunders who you must bring out of and in yourself. The full explanation of these things is a secret transmitted orally, and is not for common consumption amongst the profane or the untrained and unprepared. Sa Shou Jian explains that the student “must not search anywhere else but search within his own body.” They can then “assemble (ju) the vital energies of the five elements and circulate them to become the Five Thunders.” He further explains, correctly, that “Thunder Magic (leifa) is the Tao of the Anterior Heaven,” or Xian T’ien Da Tao Zhi Fa, meaning to “summon Thunders, wind and rain. He further tells us that the spirit generals which one envisions are “the original divine force of the performing priest” (ziji yuan shen zhi jian) and “the Thunder divinities are within one’s own divine force (zai wo zhi shen),” for which reason he further uses the ambiguous phrase xingchi meaning “make go and maintain. This would seem to indicate that he is referring to the process as external ritual and internal self-cultivation both separately and simultaneously: confirming what students of Thunder traditions have already known.[18] To do correct and advanced forms of Thunder Magic involves mudras (chueh) such as the Lei chu mudra, in conjunction with meditative internal vision used with chou (spells) that must be spoken in certain sacred space that has been prepared for such ritual Thunder Magic. Fundamentally, Lei Fa also

makes use of the primordial Wu Lei Chueh mudras, known as Black Dragon, Red Horse, Blazing Fire and Prosperous Circuit, in order to control spiritual forces, behind the scenes of the physical world. Most important and key to all Lei Fa traditions is the Pu-kang pien-shen chou spell (Divine Spell for the Ritual Stages to transform into a Divine Being), and associated meditations and rites. The purpose of this chou spell is to summon several divine beings to arrive, such as Marshal Xin and Marshal Chang, as well as Lei-Kung TienMu, the Thunder Lord and the Mother of Lighting, and the Feng-Po Wind Earl, and Yu-Shih Rain Master, and also the Wu-Fang Man-Lei Savage Thunders of the Five Directions. How can you know about these things? I hear so much talk about young people claiming to know “Thunder” this and that. I myself am a lowly student in spite of my advanced years studying from many masters whose attainment far surpasses my own. I pass this information on about Thunder Magic for the benefit of a younger generation who is greatly misguided. All of this talk about Thunder Magic is very interesting on a scholarly level, but is it something which you can worry about practically when you cannot demonstrate basic Iron Skill yet? This is the equivalent of passing the first two foundational levels in the Mo Pai system, well before work with Lei Fa. So now you know about these things, and their relationship to Thunder Magic. Somewhat hesitantly, I am willing to discuss teaching beginner level

Thunder Meditation to my existing students. I cannot consider divulging the most advanced methods of Thunder Magic, as even though I have been passed these secrets from different traditions, it is not something that I practice beyond a certain point, due to it being something unsuitable for my own level of attainment (which is certainly higher than that of almost anyone reading this). This should tell you something. I do have considerable knowledge of various beginner to intermediate Lei Fa practices, but I am far more cautious about imparting these to students than I am about, for instance, the “Building the Foundation” first level of Mo Pai Nei Kung. Many realize that I teach this system to most people who ask me for an honorarium that I in turn donate. This is in part because with a bad heart, most will never get very far with Nei Kung, and will not be able to cause much of a problem for anyone. With Lei Fa things are different, as you are working with things that have power already. At the insistence of some of my students, I will consider teaching some aspects of Lei Fa. The prospective student should contact me at [email protected] for consideration.

[1] F.C.Reiter: The Aspirations and Standards of Taoist Priests in the Early T´ang Period, pp.133150, in: AAS 1 [2] Shiji 24, 1195-6

[3] The Encyclopedia of Toaism, edited by Fabrizio Pregadio, pp. 627 [4] ibid. [5] Conditions, 2 [6] Wang Ch’ung: Lun-heng 6, 23, 96-103, esp. pp. 100-101 (Lei-hsü p´ien). Shanghai 1974.

[7] TT 1241 Ch’uan-shou san-tung ching-chieh fa-lu lüeh-shuo 1.4a-4b, following the text Cheng-i fawen k´o-chieh p´in ( 正 一 法 文 科 戒 品 ). Concerning this text see, U.A.Cedzich, p. 458, in: K.Schipper and F.Verellen eds.: The Taoist Canon, A Historical Companion to the Daozang (henceforth Companion). 3 vols. Chicago 2004

[8] Shanhai Jing 13.1b [9] Soushen ji 12.5a [10] j. 90, ZHDZ 36.572; cited in Daoist Ritual, State Religion, and Popular Practices: Zhenwu Worship from Song to Ming (960-1644) (Routledge Studies in Taoism), 47-48 [11] Reiter, Conditions, 76 [12] Shin-Yi Chao, Daoist Ritual, State Religion, 47-8 [13] Kosta Danaos, Nei Kung p 121-122 [14] F.C. Reiter: “The Discourse on the Thunders” p 224, and TT 1220: 80.1a sq. [15] ibid. 33 [16] ibid. [17] ibid. 32 [18] DZ 1220: 67.14a