“Taoism is China’s only indigenous religion,” NMH Director Chang Yui-tan said. “At its core is a belief in deities, while medical knowledge and fortune telling on the issue of marriage are also involved.”
Of the items on display at the Spirited Away in Wu Dang: A Millennium of Taoist Artifacts exhibition, the 8,000-year-old Sun God Stone Statue is the oldest, said Wang Jichao, head of the exhibition department of the Hubei Provincial Museum, to whose permanent collection the piece belongs.
Another highlight is a collection of the oldest extant bamboo slips quoting Lao Tzu, which date to the Warring States Period (476-221 B.C.). The equivalent for Taoism of the Dead Sea Scrolls to the Hebrew Bible, the slips have never before left mainland China.
“The unearthing of these bamboo slips proves the existence of Lao Tzu the person and his thought,” Wang said, explaining the significance of the texts.
The most eye-catching piece, Wang averred, is the Bronze Crane with Antler, which was meant to serve as a medium connecting heaven, earth and people.
Taoism has been neglected as a research topic relative to Buddhism and Confucianism, two other major belief systems of ancient China, due to a greater emphasis being placed on palace artifacts.
The very existence of Lao Tzu had been questioned by many Chinese historians in the past. “The unearthing of these items will allow for a greater understanding of the early development of Taoism,” Wang said.
Taoism as a religion was first organized by Chang Tao-ling, who identified Lao Tzu as the faith’s main deity, in the year 142, during the reign of Eastern Han Emperor Shun (125-144). (SSC-MJH)
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