The Efficacy of Talismanic Writing in Daoist Practice
Talismans—messages to deities or demons inscribed, often with esoteric graphs, on paper, cloth, wood, metal, or in the air—have been ubiquitous in Daoist liturgical practice since it arose in the late second century CE. This talk asks what makes talismanic writing efficacious. What makes the strange script of talismanic writing do what it purports to do—compel deities and demons to obey the will of a Daoist master to heed summons and carry out liturgical tasks such as apotropaic protection or exorcistic healing? This talk explores some foundational ideas about talismans and their efficacy in the major liturgical movements of the Song–Yuan period (c. 960–1368), ideas which are still informing Daoist practice in south China today.
David J. Mozina studies the roots of living Daoist and Buddhist ritual traditions in the liturgical vibrancy of the Song, Yuan, and early Ming periods (tenth–fifteenth centuries), and in the religious traditions of the late imperial period (sixteenth–nineteenth centuries). He is especially interested in phenomenological and semiotic approaches to ritual; in the relationship between ritual and material culture (i.e., talismans, liturgical implements, religious art); and in different ways of combining historical and ethnographic research.