What is a meridian
no grand theories please!
In this episode we look at the idea of meridians and what they might mean.
My position is that meridians are not energetic pathways for the most part and are subject to individual fields of study including Chinese Medicine, Daoism, Qigong and Martial Arts. We can trace the origin of the context of meridians to early Chinese Medicine texts and models and see their gradual evolution including how they eventually came to be featured in Daoist practice around the time of Ghengis Khan. I just want to say that I’m against the idea of grand narrative in these arts since this form of reasoning tends to be a defense of a personal opinion rather than a good faith discussion of what the truth may be. We should always be open to the possibility that other people are right and we might be wrong, but at the same time, we should talk about what we think might be the case in order to contribute to the evolving discussion and hopefully arrive somewhere wonderful in the future.
Behind the paywall today is most of the “fire timing classic” a Wu Liu school document contained in the Heavenly Immortal Direct Verification Discussion, a major tome of that style of Neidan. I translated most of the document in 2023 and it takes up about 34 pages on my word processor, so if you are interested in knowing about the school that really got the ball rolling on using Chinese Medicine meridians to discuss inner practice, this might be a good one to read. If you aren’t subscribed already and want to check it out, why not consider getting a subscription. It is about the price of a trip to starbucks and so much better for you!!