The general appearances of Chinese gods lead us to think of them as sober imperial bureaucrats. They mostly look like middle aged men dressed in official-looking robes, spending their time reading formal petitions and responding by giving stern orders to their underlings. Although several of the most popular deities are female, gender immediately raises problems for the bureaucratic image of some important deities as governing elites tend to favor a religious practice that, in proving the connection of the state to the divine, legitimizes the state’s efforts to preserve itself. Women, as well as men who are viewed to be rebels or misfits, tends to be excluded from the sites and definitions of power. An example of this is the worship of Tu’er Shen, the god of homosexuality, that was mostly surpressed if not abandoned completely – particularly when in the Qing dynasty (1636–1912), Zhu Gui, a grain tax circuit official of Fujian in 1765, attempted to standardize the morality of the people by prohibiting “licentious cults”. There is, therefore, not a lot of diversity within the divine pantheon in Chinese mythology.

However, the immortals are a different story. The Xiangzhou region of Guangxi, China, has only a few temples to bureaucratic-looking deities. They worship three Taoist hermits who bore little similarities or relationship to the “official” hierarchy of gods. The art of the Jin tombs of the 12th and 13th centuries depicts a group of eight Taoist immortals in wall murals and sculptures – the most of which is a mural in the Yongle Gong (“Eternal Joy Temple”) at Ruicheng. Pa hsien (“the eight Immortals”), are often depicted either together as a group or alone to give more homage to that specific figure. All these indicate that the immortals were also very influential, perhaps as influential as the deities themselves. Additionally, the immortals have very little to do with bureaucracy and are considered to be a very diverse lot.

Immortals and Immortality According to Ancient Chinese Belief

The concept of immortals in China could be dated in a period prior to the birth of religious Taoism. Xian (“Immortals”) are beings who ascended to Immortality through Taoist cultivation practices. They have magical powers, can fly freely through the air, and have a close connection to the Tao and the natural world. Some tales about Immortals, such as tales about the Xi wangmu (Queen Mother of the West), Huangdi (the Yellow Emperor) or Penglai Zhangren (the Elder of Penglai), were very popular in the stories of the Warring States period (c. 481 BCE – 403 BCE) and led to the transformation from mythical stories to the early tales of immortals.

Before we continue with our study, it is important to make the distinction between “immortals” as we know them in the west and the ancient Chinese concept of the same word. In the Taoist legends of the immortals, a man or a woman can be transformed into an immortal through cultivation whereas elements of a deity in the ancient Greek mythical stories were predetermined. A Taoist immortal, therefore, started their life as an ordinary mortal who worked hard to achieve immortality as opposed to being born from a divine parent. In Taoism, individuals, as seen in the case of pa hsien, achieve immortality through individual cultivation and virtues. While there are deities and other immortals who can help them achieve this, the main bulk of the responsibility rests on the individual themselves. An immortal represents freedom from all restrictions of governments and considered to be the embodiment of the human pursuit for freedom and equality. Pa hsien specifically reflects the egalitarianism that anyone regardless of background, age, gender identity can attain immortality.

Who are the Eight Immortals and How do We Recognize Them?

Pa hsien are eight regular folks who have attained immortality. They are defeated general Han Chung-li, failed scholar Lu Tung-pin, the man who walks with an iron crutch – Li Tieh-kuai, imperial borther-in-law Ts’ao Kuo-chiu, the woman who was said to have been born with six hairs on her head – Ho Hsien-ku, runaway musician Han Hsiang-tzu, the eccentric elder Chang Kuo-lao and Lan Tsai-ho who favors dressing as a woman or in gender-ambiguous clothing. Each of them has a special symbol which represents the characteristic of the immortal and is usually used to identify each one of them. Han Chung-li is symbolized by the twin knots on his hair. Lu Tung-pin wears a Taoist cap and carries a double-blade sword. Li T’ieh-kuai, with one leg crippled, uses an iron crutch and carries a big bag of medicines on his back. Ts’ao Kuo-chiu wears an official robe and holds a scepter – a symbol of government official in his time. Ho Hsien-ku holds a bamboo ladle held in her hand. Chang Kuo-lao is depicted as an old man riding a donkey. Lan Ts’ai-ho the sexually ambiguous immortal is always barefoot, and his symbol is his musical boards. Han Hsiang-tzu is depicted as a handsome young man who holds a flower basket. From their depictions alone, the Eight Immortals represents a cross section of the human society; the scholar (Lu Tung-pin), royalty and social elites (Ts’ao Kuo-chiu and Han Chung-li), the elderly (Chang Kuo-lao), the rebels (Han Hsiang-tzu), the disabled (Li Tieh-kuai), women (Ho Hsien-ku) and sexual minority (Lan Tsai-ho).

The legend of the Eight Immortals as a group is a relatively recent one at the time of the Song dynasty (960–1279 CE). But some, if not all, of the group to have been individually celebrated as Immortals in the previous Taoist legends.

The Ancient History of the Eight Immortals – Historical Problems and the Rise of the Group through Drama

So far, the studies that have been done on pa hsien tend to be biographical and narrative rather than historical as they tend to look at the lives and deeds of the eight figures but do not treat them as a solid group or attempt to trace the legend’s origin. However, stories of each of these figures can be found in the mythological anthologies by Chinese authors of different periods or dynasties. Actual historical records of these figures also exist as official dynastic histories contain some references to the individual immortals. However, such references are relatively few. Of the eight only Chang Kuo-lao was given a biographical record in the Old Book of Tang. The names of Han Chung-li and Lu Tung-pin were mentioned in the biography of Ch’en T’uan in the Sung shih (“”History of the Sung”). However, the rest of the group are not mentioned in any of the official histories of China.

The term pa hsien (“Eight Immortals”) was no mentioned in any of these works, whether historical or mythological, which indicates that they were not considered a group until later. Intriguingly, among the literary works throughout the ages in China, the first kind of Iiterature in which the term pa hsien is mentioned, also where the eight figures are treated as an entity, is the dramas of the Yuan dynasty (1271–1368 CE).

Tsa-chu or the Yuan drama is a form of literature which covers the entire period of the Yuan dynasty and the early Ming era. At least six plays can be found which relates to pa hsien and all six of these plays are centered on Lu Tung-pin, one of the Eight Immortals. In these plays Lu Tung-pin is a hero with supernatural powers which he uses to transform human beings, demons, tree-spirits and others into Taoist immortals. In another Yuan play called Huang liang meng (“The Dream of the Yellow Millet”), Han Chung-li is the designated hero although Lu Tung-pin is also involved. In this story, Han Chung-li is sent to convince Lu Tung-pin of the emptiness of human life and the happiness of the life of immortals.

At the time of the introduction of the eight immortals as a group, there was always one member of the group that was subject to change. Although seven of the eight figures had been given a permanent place in the group, the eighth place had been a matter of choice by the Yuan authors between Hsu Sheng-weng (possibly referring to Divine Elder Hsu, Master of Piercing Harmony and Vacant Tranquility), Chang Ssu-lang and the woman Ho Hsien-ku, until finally Ho Hsien-ku secured a permanent position and became the only woman in the group. The competition between these three figures (or, rather, the Yuan playwrights’ indecisiveness in regards to these three figures) persisted for a period covering roughly two hundred years from 1260 CE to 1450 CE.

The fact that the term pa hsien is nowhere to be found in the Taoist documents points to the conscious intention of the playwrights in creating such a group. This would have been related to the social condition of the Yuan dynasty. The main feature that the eight figures have in common is the fact that they were all ordinary people of different dynasties in Chinese history. Ts’ao Kuo-chiu may be considered an exception as he was said to be the brother-in-law of the emperor and thus may be considered a nobility. Because the eight figures were common folks, most of them would never have had a chance to enjoy fame or wealth in their lives. By including people such as an elderly man, a disabled person, a woman and a transgender, the playwrights would have aimed to represent those people who were, in their opinion, usually looked down upon and despised by the society. The fact that these figures were included in the group proves the playwrights’ intention to show that even common folks can and did achieve immortality.

Why was there a need for the show of eight ordinary folks achieving immortality? The playwrights were simply reacting to the social changes in the Yuan dynasty as it was the first foreign dynasty to rule all of China. Throughout the Yuan era, most of the playwrights, being part of the common folks, never had the chance to enjoy any form or privilege. In fact, most of them suffered the humiliation and oppression of the Mongol conquerors who had no use of them as, although some managed to master the Chinese language, most of them preferred to communicate in their native language. Therefore, by choosing these “ordinary” people the playwrights would have been trying to find hope through their art form.

 
Another interesting phenomenon is the dominant leadership of Lu Tung-pin among the eight immortals in the Yuan plays. This was also not a coincidence. In the Yuan era, Taoism was immensely among the Chinese people leading to the establishment of several influential Taoist sects in North China. All of these sects revered Lu Tung-pin as their patriarch. Another possible reason for this preference towards Lu Tung-pin is that he was a scholar who failed twice in his attempt to pass the imperial examinations to become a palace official. This unfortunate fate resembled many of the scholars of the Yuan era as, during the first eighty years of the dynasty, the Mongols had abolished the examination system and put their own people in the ranks. As a result of this, the only way a scholar could enter into the life of honor and prominence through official positions in the empire had been denied by the ruling court of Yuan which were filled by Mongols. To add insult to injury, the policy of the Mongols which divided the citizenship into four social classes, putting themselves at the top while the Chinese occupied the lowest tier, had made the life of previously revered class of scholars humiliating even if they had given up on their intention to pursue an official position. Many of these scholars turned their attention to writing plays and, through these plays, they chose Lu Tung-pin as their hero as he had not only conquered his own failures and fate, but also achieved a higher ideal of a life as an immortal. The playwrights of Yuan would have seen a new hope an comfort in the figure of Lu Tung-pin. One of the greatest things that came out of the Yuan period was literature and drama, through which the Chinese spread and popularize their legends, and in the process, keeping those legends relevant.