The predecessor of Maoshan Sect is the Shangqing Sect of Taoism. Tao Hongjing inherited the Shangqing Classics handed down by Yang and others, and carefully compiled more than 200 volumes of Taoist classics, such as the True Patent, the Secret Method of Ascending Truth, and the Map of True Spirit, which specifically described the early teachings and magical powers of the Shangqing School, and made the Shangqing Classics develop. Later, after decades of painstaking efforts by him and his disciples, the teaching theory and organization gradually improved. Later generations took Maoshan as their ancestral home and gradually developed into the later Maoshan School, which is also another name of Shangqing School with Maoshan as its development center.
Zhang Wanfu, a famous Shi Tian in Tang Dynasty, was born in Maoshan Sect, which mainly taught Shangqing Classics. However, incidentally, in the later Taoist history, Zhang Wanfu's position as a Taoist teacher was concealed by the increasingly prominent Shangqing school. For example, Liu Ruozhuo, a Taoist priest on the balcony, Yi Zhongji, a descendant of Baoguang in the south of Beijing, and San Ku An written in the sixth year of Xianping in the Northern Song Dynasty (1003). When recording the history of Daoqi, they said that on the first and third day, the mage Zhang Jun was punished by the old gentleman because "he was possessed for six days and held a ghost camp on the first day". Later, I experienced Kou, Lu and "Ruoyin Zhao, Pan, Mr., Mr., Sima, Mr., Mr. Zong, Mr. Niu, Ye Guyun, Ye Guang Lenger Tianshi, Mr. Xi and Mr. Li, all of whom were brilliant missionaries and all had seven-leaf Tumen", and pointed out that in the Tang Dynasty, "the three caves were carved pavilions, from right to big, with seven levels and 120 seals. In the prosperous Tang Dynasty, there were Shangqing Taoist priests such as Sima and Wu Yun, but there was no place for Zhang Wanfu. However, the genealogy of Tianshidao is followed by the characters of Shangqing School [1]. It is particularly noteworthy that the title of Seven Leaves Gate shows that, just as the Zen Buddhism in the North and the South competed for orthodoxy in the position of "seven generations living under one roof", there may have been such a situation in Taoism, in which the newly rising powerful sect rewrote history, and in the rewriting, the Shangqing Sect, which was very influential among the upper-class literati, gradually overshadowed the Shi Tian Sect, and Zhang Wanfu was gradually marginalized in the history of Taoism.
Of course, that was later. At that time, that is, during the Kaiyuan and Tianbao years, Zhang Wanfu was very famous and Taoism flourished. However, in the research works of modern Taoist history, this prosperity is often described as the prosperity of the Qing Dynasty [2]. Undoubtedly, the study of modern Taoist history is often restricted by ancient Taoist documents, which provide the center and boundary for rewriting history. After all, researchers can't fabricate Taoist history without literature. However, it should be noted that Taoist documents are often written by authors with certain prejudices and hobbies. Their deliberate prominence and disappearance, their intensive cultivation of some history and their deliberate disregard for some history often make the later Taoist history works have to organize the main clues of Taoist history with the number and proportion of documents preserved. The accumulated deviation is like the magnetic bias in physics, which makes Taoist history works always focus on some history and blur others, unlike birds without focus.
It should be said that Shangqing School really became one of the striking Taoist centers at that time. Since the early Tang Dynasty, Taoists centered on Maoshan Shangqing School have gradually occupied a certain position in the knowledge, thoughts and beliefs of the upper world. By the middle of the 8th century, although various Taoist figures were actually active in Chang 'an and Luoyang, the most influential among the upper intellectuals was the Shangqing school from Sima Cheng Town to Li Hanguang [1. Until Yan Zhenqing wrote an inscription for Li Hanguang in the Dali period, and Li Bo's "True Family" traced back to the history of this school in Zhenyuan period, some people said that this family was the main vein of Taoism, just like the torch of Buddhism, and the authenticity of Taoism traced back to Lu and Tao Hongjing, while Wang (580-667) and Pan (? A 682)[3], Sima Chengzhen (647-735)[4 1, Li Hanguang (683-769) [5], although this splendid genealogy, from now on, is likely to be constructed and imagined afterwards [6].
Real family is included in Seven Signs of Yun Qi, which is usually read by people who read Taoist literature, while Seven Signs of Yun Qi, which is called "Collection of Trails", is mainly based on the real family in the part about Taoist history. Therefore, the memory of the Taoist history of Kaiyuan and Tianbao in later generations often focuses on the history of Shangqing School. However, if we go back to that era to see Taoism, we can find that Taoism in the prosperous Tang Dynasty was not only the world of Shang Qing, but also far from covering all the doors [2]. After all, historical documents are not completely annihilated. Historical documents with different contents, historical records from different perspectives, and historical writing at different levels can provide us with some opportunities to reconstruct the Taoist style of that era, such as unconscious historical novels and unwritten inscriptions, which inadvertently left the Taoist landscape of Kaiyuan era [3], among which there were many most striking Taoists who did not belong to the Qing Dynasty during Kaiyuan and Tianbao years [8].
Maoshanzong mainly inherited the true sutra of Dadong in Qing Dynasty, and its practice methods were mainly meditation and chanting. And an alchemist. Master Tao Hongjing himself is an alchemist, and Liang Wudi once took his elixir. From Song Dynasty to Ming Dynasty, Maoshan School merged with other schools and ceased to exist. Hong Kong actor Ching-Ying Lam's zombie series movies have pushed the attention of Chinese fir tree to a new peak. It can be said that Mr. Ching-Ying Lam is the promoter and propagandist of Maoshan Road.