Got a Real-World Weapon, Armor or Tactics Question? Mk. XXVII

[Clistenes]

I too am very interested in this chi question. If I were to write a fantasy setting, it wouldn't make sense for Europeans to not be copying the whacky chi powers of East Asia, were they so powerful.

I'm sure there's something there for Hermetic theory/Gnostic thought, but I don't know enough about either of them to say for sure.


I've been reading some... I think it was called Xianxia, where everyone cultivates chi for superpowers. Demon beasts, disembodied masters and alchemical pills... They really use these ideas over and over again, so I'm wondering where it's all from, and if Europe has any equivalents... but I think it's the wrong thread.


I had my own question i really wanted to ask while this thread was locked... but it's been locked for so long that I forgot!

Those ideas come from what is called "Practical Taoism". Taoism (probably) started as a life phylosophy... it was all about how you perceived the universe and lived your life. However, it got mixed with religious ideas, theories about how the human body worked, alchemical and medical attempts to prolong life... and eventually it developed into a group of sects based around the teachings of supposed immortal elders. Said sects gained a lot of power, becoming close to being the official imperial religion (they have been compared to Christianism during the late Roman Empire), before Confucianism gained the ideologic battle and became the mainstream political doctrine, while traditional chinese religion and Buddhism recovered influence in the religious front...

Those Taoist sects revered divinized sages, but what they offered to its adherents were a set of practices that supposedly helped the followers to prolong their lives, and if they were good enough, become divine spirits after death, of even living gods before death.

At the beginning those sects were focused on the creation of secret pills and elixirs that allowed followers to achieve longevity and immortality, but at later stages they shifted to meditative practices, breathing exercises, sexual techniques, special diets, magical rites and physical exercises, and they (mostly) changed from powerful religious-political movements into private esoteric practices that educated people discreetly practiced at home (well, martial artists, physicians, priests, exorcists... etc., tended to be quite public about it, since it helped their credibility...).