Occulting the Dao: Daoist Inner Alchemy, French Spiritism, and Vietnamese Colonial Modernity in Caodai Translingual Practice

Abstract

This article takes the case of the Vietnamese Cao Dai religion to examine how Asian religious leaders and translators, in a context of colonial modernity, invested a European language with their own cosmologies and discourses, building both a national identity and an alternative spiritual universalism. Studies of translation in colonial contexts have tended to focus on the processes and impact of translating European texts and ideas into the languages of the colonized. This article discusses the inverse process, examining how Caodai textual production used French spiritist language and tropes to occult its Chinese roots, translating Daoist cosmology into a universalist and anti-colonial spiritual discourse rooted in Vietnamese nationalism. These shifts are examined through a close examination of translingual practices in the production and translation of the core esoteric scripture of Caodaism, theĐại Thừa Chơn Giáo 大乘真教(The True Teachings of the Great Vehicle), rendered in its 1950 Vietnamese-French edition asThe Bible of the Great Cycle of Esotericism.This study demonstrates how colonial religious institutions and networks of circulation in Asia stimulate the emergence of new movements and textual practices that mimic, invert, jumble, and transcend the cosmologies of both the Chinese imperium and the European colonial regime.

The Cao Đài Deathscape: Reimagining Death, Funerals, and Salvation in Contemporary Vietnam

“…This belief is intensified among the "esoteric" branches, who place an emphasis on personal, spiritual cultivation through Daoist inner alchemy and meditation, with the aim of refining the hồn (魂 hún) and phách (魄 pò) souls on the path to immortality (tiên 仙 xiān). The Chiếu Minh or Chiếu Minh Tam Thanh Vô Vi (照明三清無為 Zhàomíng sānqīng wúwéi; literally, Radiant Light of Noninterference of the Three Purities), is the leading "esoteric" branch of Caodaism, as the complement of the "exoteric missionazing" run by the Holy See of Tây Ninh (Jammes and Palmer 2018). Dying with the left eye open--which is mostly claimed by Chiếu Minh members--can be interpreted as a visual proof to consolidate the spiritual authority of the small, esoteric Chiếu Minh branch over the dominant Holy See of Tây Ninh.…”

Printing Cosmopolitanism, Challenging Orthodoxies: Cao Đài Journals in Twentieth Century Vietnam

“…While these two approaches are described in theological terms in Cao Đài scriptures as complementary and mutually reinforcing, they correspond to divisions and tensions within the Cao Đài religion, as it evolved from a small group of elite cultivators into a proselytising religion of universal salvation that rapidly attracted millions of followers. While 'exotericism' (ngoại giáo công truyền; wàijiào gōng chuán 外敎公傳) was claimed by the Holy See of Tây Ninh to be its responsibility-in developing social activity and "universal salvation" (phổ độ; pǔdù 普度)-the Chiếu Minh branch was described by this same Holy See as the 'esoteric' side (nội giáo vô vi tâm truyền, nèijiào wúwéi xīn chuán 內教無為心傳; literally, "heart-to-heart transmission through non-interference") of the Cao Đài religion (Jammes and Palmer 2018). 16 From the 1920s until today, the Holy See of Tây Ninh instrumentalises this original schismatic division by claiming the monopoly of proselytism and social action, as well as by presenting itself as the sole possessor of the 'exoteric knowledge' (thế pháp; tǐ fǎ 體法; the 'Law of the Life').…”