Tales of the Taoist Immortals (13 page)

They also found a letter on a table. On the envelope was written, “An Invitation to the Immortal Ko from the Celestial Lords.” It was then that they realized Ko Hsüan had ascended to immortality.

K
O
H
SÜAN
lived during the period of the Three Kingdoms (220–265
CE
). He collected and edited the Ling-pao (Sacred Spirit) Scriptures, which are the earliest texts of the Taoist canon.

23

The People’s Protector

Mah Ku

Mah Ku was the daughter of Mah Chiu, the mayor of a small town. One year, Mah Chiu was put in charge of building the city wall. Hoping to get a bonus for completing the project ahead of schedule, he made the townspeople work day and night.

Chiu called the citizens together and told them, “The city wall must be completed before winter. You are only allowed to rest during the time before the first rooster crow and sunrise.”

The people murmured among themselves and said,
“This is autumn. How can we finish the wall before winter?” So they elected a spokesperson to appeal to the mayor. “We had a drought this summer. If we don’t harvest the crops that are left, we’ll starve in winter,” said the representative.

Mah Chiu replied, “I have no time for this nonsense,” and ordered the man to be flogged. When the governor of the region sent the people supplies of grain and salt, Mah Chiu sold them on the black market and pocketed the money.

Day after day, the people labored. Men, women, and even children were forced out of their homes to work on the city wall.

When Mah Ku tried to persuade her father to give the people more time to rest, she was told, “Don’t bother in my affairs or I’ll lock you in your room.”

Mah Ku was an extraordinary woman. From the time she was a child, she could imitate the calls of every animal and bird. She could jump up walls, walk on rafters, and climb trees. She was so silent and stealthy that she often gave the impression of being in several places at once.

Seeing the people of her town dying from hunger and exhaustion, Mah Ku decided to help them. One night, she crept out of her father’s mansion and climbed to the top of the house. There she imitated a rooster’s crow. Then, quietly and quickly, she climbed onto another roof and crowed again. Soon all the roosters in the town were crowing. Although it was only midnight, the guards, hearing the sounds, allowed the people to return home. This went on for weeks until one morning Mah Chiu discovered that work on the city wall was way behind schedule.

He questioned the guards who said, “We followed your orders strictly and only let the people go when the roosters
crowed.” That night Mah Chiu stayed up to see what was going on. At midnight, he heard a rooster’s cry from the roof of his house. Then he heard another one from a neighboring rooftop.

When Mah Ku returned to her room in the early hours of the morning, her father was there waiting for her.

Mah Chiu seized his daughter by the arm and said, “You have destroyed my chance of getting rich. Now, you’re going to pay for it.” Chiu tied his daughter to the bedpost and went to get a whip, but when he returned to the room, Mah Ku had disappeared.

Chiu and his guards searched the town and the surrounding countryside but could not find Mah Ku.

Not long after Mah Ku’s escape, one of Mah Chiu’s guards informed the governor that Chiu was stealing government supplies and selling them on the black market. Mah Chiu was arrested and sent to work in the imperial mines for the rest of his life.

While fleeing from her father, Mah Ku met an immortal who taught her the arts of magic and immortality. After she completed her apprenticeship, she returned to her village. There, on a stone bridge in front of a crowd of people, she flew up to the sky. The people of her town named that bridge Immortal’s Bridge, in honor of the young woman’s courage and integrity.

There is no information as to when Mah Ku lived.

24

Lady of the Great Mysteries

T’ai-hsüan Nü

T’ai-hsüan Nü was married to a man who did not love her. Soon after she gave birth to a son, her husband died.

One day, T’ai-hsüan Nü met a diviner in the marketplace who told her, “You and your son will not live long.” When she heard this, she did not panic. Calmly and methodically, she began to study and practice the arts of immortality. After a few years, she stopped aging. When her son had a family of his own, she retreated to the mountains, built a hut, and began to gather minerals to make the elixir of immortality

As her cultivation progressed, T’ai-hsüan Nü was able to sleep on the ice in winter and not be chilled, enter the water and not get wet, sit in a fire and not be burned, and be at different places at the same time.

Once, T’ai-hsüan Nü met two young men who were pulling a wagon on a mountain road. Inside the wagon was an old man covered with blankets. She overheard one of the young men say, “The snow has blocked the passes. If we don’t get our father to the doctor by sunset, he’ll die.” She pointed at the snowdrifts, and the snow melted immediately, leaving the path clear.

Another time, she saw a man and a woman running from a group of bandits. She pointed toward the side of a mountain, and immediately a rock slide blocked the trail behind the couple, allowing them to escape.

Yet another time, when she saw a wildfire threatening a village, she blew at the flames and the fire disappeared. At a wave of her hand, the burned trees and grasses returned to life.

T’ai-hsüan Nü’s reputation as a master of magic and the arts of immortality increased as more and more people witnessed her abilities. Many young women began to approach her, asking to be her students. Soon, she had gathered together a group of apprentices.

One day, T’ai-hsüan Nü and her students were collecting minerals and herbs in the mountains. At dusk, the apprentices began to whisper among themselves, “The sun is about to set. How can we make it home in the dark?”

Hearing their remarks, T’ai-hsüan Nü struck a rock wall with her walking stick. Immediately, the wall opened to reveal a large, dry cave. Inside the cave were beds, tables, and chairs. In one corner was a bundle of firewood, and in another a pot of soup and herbs was cooking over a stove.

T’ai-hsüan Nü lived to be over two hundred years old. Her complexion was always that of a young woman and her hair was smooth and black. One day, her students heard children’s voices coming from their teacher’s room. When they pushed open the door, they saw T’ai-hsüan Nü flying up to the sky accompanied by a group of immortals.

There is no information as to when and where T’ai-hsüan Nü lived.

25

The Woman Who Flew on a Toad

T’ang Kuang-chen

T’ang Kuang-chen was ill all the time when she was a child. After she married, the illnesses got worse: she bled constantly and was plagued with a variety of infections.

One night, Kuang-chen dreamed that a Taoist gave her some medicine, which she took. When she awoke the next morning, she found that her health problems had disappeared. At that moment, she decided she wanted to study and practice the Taoist arts for the rest of her life.

She packed up a small bundle of belongings, said farewell to her husband and mother, and went into the mountains.
While wandering in the forest, Kuang-chen met the female immortal Ho Hsien-ku, who taught her magic and the arts of immortality.

When T’ang Kuang-chen had completed her apprenticeship with Immortal Ho, she decided to return home to see her mother. On the way back to her village, she stopped at a town and found lodgings with a family by the name of Kuo.

While Kuang-chen was having dinner with her hosts, she heard someone call her name. She excused herself, went outside, and found three old men standing on a cloud. Immediately she summoned a giant toad, stepped onto its back, and flew to meet the three immortals. Delighted, the three old men took her on a tour of the famous mountains and lakes.