Sergey M. Georgievskiy about Taoism

Abstract

The article is a research of the contribution of the famous Russian sinologist Sergey M. Georgievskiy (1851–1893) in the study of Taoism. The following works by Georgievskiy are considered: “Principles of Chinese Life”, “The Im­portance of Studying China”, “Mythical Views and Myths of the Chinese”. Georgievskiy’s first major work, “Principles of Chinese Life” (St. Petersburg, 1888), is mainly devoted to Confucianism and its significance for Chinese so­ciety and culture, however, in this essay, the author also pays some attention to Taoism – both the ancient school of Lao-tzu and later Taoist religion. Particu­lar attention in this article is paid to last major work by Georgievskiy, since it contains the most information related to the Taoist religion. The work “Mythical Views and Myths of the Chinese” (1892) is also interesting in theoretical terms; here Georgievskiy draws a distinction between “myths” as such and “mythical views”. As for Taoism and its significance for understanding of Chinese mytho­logy and culture in general, in his work Georgievskiy points to the most impor­tant process in the history of religions in China – the process of interchange be­tween Taoism as the organized religion and the folk religion of the Chinese. In his works, Georgievskiy made his contribution to Russian Daology, in particu­lar, he proposed a periodization of history of Taoism, and also gave a typology of Taoist “immortals” (xian, xianren). Most importantly, his works placed Daologi­cal knowledge in the broader context of Chinese history, culture and mythology