Zhang Enpu

Zhang Enpu (1904-1969), who had the courtesy name Heqin, the literary name Ruiling and the pedigree name Daosheng, was the 63rd generation Celestial Master( 天師 Tianshi ) of the Orthodox Oneness sect ( 正一派 Zhengyi Pai ). He was born in his ancestral home, Mt. Longhu. He practised both Confucianism and Daoism, and mastered Talismans and Registers ( 符籙 Fulu ), Fasting and Ritual Offerings ( 齋醮 Zhaijiao ), and Daoist Magic Skills ( 道法 Daofa ). In 1924, he succeeded his father as the head of the Celestial Master sect ( 天師道 Tianshi Dao ). In 1929, when the national revolutionary activities pounded at Mt. Longhu, the estate, the silver and copper seals granted by emperors through the ages, and the jade seal and sword handed down by the Celestial Masters for generations were confiscated. Zhang Enpu himself was put in jail by the Farmers' Association of Jiangxi province. After the coup d'etat of April 12th 1927, he was freed by Zhu Peide. Chiang Kai-shek sent people to Mt. Longhu to maintain the Celestial Masters' Mansion ( 天師府 Tianshi Fu ) and the Temple of Highest Clarity ( 上清宮 Shangqing Gong ). During the agrarian revolution in the Soviet districts of Jiangxi in 1930, he escaped to Shanghai, where he held the "Great Ritual Offering for All-Embracing Heaven" ( 羅天大醮 Luotian Dajiao ). In 1934, together with the eminent Buddhist monk Taixu, he held the "Great National Ritual of Praying for Rain and Eliminating Calamities" ( 全國祈雨消災大會 Quanguo Qiyu Xiaozai Dahui ). During the War of Resistance Against Japan, he returned to Mt. Longhu in Jiangxi. In the winter of 1946, he convened the major Daoist figures of Shanghai, and proposed to found the "Shanghai Daoist Society" ( 上海市道教會 Shanghaishi Daojiaohui ). He suggested founding local Daoist societies and then founding a national Daoist society directed by him. In 1947, he founded the Shanghai Daoist Society whose president was Li Lishan, and printed and published A Plan to Rejuvenate Daoism ( 復興道教計劃書 Fuxing Daojiao Jihuashu ) which had been drafted by Chen Yingning. At the end of 1948, he left for Taiwan by way of Singapore with his family, and arrived in Taiwan in December 1949. He settled in the Temple of Enlightened Cultivation ( 覺修宮 Juexiu Gong ) in Taibei. In 1950, he set up the Taiwan Office of the Mansion of Celestial Masters Descended from the Han Dynasty ( 嗣漢天師府 Sihan Tianshi Fu ), and in the same year, founded the Taibei Daoist Society ( 台北道教會 Taibei Daojiaohui ) and the Daoist Society of Taiwan Province. In 1957, he called together people related with Daoism who came from mainland China to organize the Lay Daoists' Society ( 道教居士會 Daojiao Jushihui ) as a complement to the Daoist Society of Taiwan Province ( 台灣省道教會 Taiwansheng Daojiaohui ). In 1964, he extensively visited the Malay Archipelago. In July 1968, when the Daoist society of the Republic of China ( 中華民國道教會 Zhonghua Minguo Daojiaohui ) was founded in Taiwan, he was elected its first chairman of the executive council. In 1969, he visited the Philippines to enhance Daoist teachings. Finally he fell ill from constant overwork, and passed away at his residence in Beitou, Taibei on December 25th the same year. zh:張恩溥