LI SHAO-CHN

flourished 2nd century BC, , China Pinyin Li Shaojun noted Chinese Taoist who was responsible for much of the mystical content of popular Taoist thought. Li was not only the first known Taoist alchemist but also the first to make the practice of certain hygienic exercises a part of Taoist rites. He was also the first to claim that the ultimate goal of the Taoist was to achieve the status of hsien, or a kind of immortal sage. Gaining the confidence of the great Han emperor Wu Ti in 133 BC, Li persuaded him that immortality could be achieved by eating from a cinnabar vessel that had been transmuted into gold. When that occurred, Li said, one would suddenly see the famous sages on P'eng-lai, the legendary isles of immortality. If one performed the proper rituals while gazing on these hsien, one would never die. According to Li, the first step in the transmutation of cinnabar involved prayers to Tsao Chn, the Furnace Prince. These prayers became an established part of Taoist ritual, and shortly after Li's death Tsao Chn came to be considered the first of the great Taoist divinities; Li was thus responsible for making the worship of a specific divine figure a part of Taoist ritual. So great was his influence that Li was able to persuade the usually realistic Wu Ti that Li was several centuries old, having discovered the secret of immortality long before Wu's time. Even after Li's death the emperor's faith in Li was unshaken; he declared that Li had merely transformed himself into another state, departing his old body.