The History of China - #271 - Mongol 9: The Immortal

Episode Date: June 1, 2024

As he feels the inevitable passage of time take its toll on his body and soul, Genghis Khan looks for answers - about how to extend his rule and his life, perhaps even how to gain life everlasting. Thus, when word reaches him on the eve of his Khwarazmian campaign of a Daoist Immortal living in the mountains of Shandong, he will seek this master out in order to gain his wisdom. But this supposed immortal isn't quite what he claims to be... Time Period Covered: ca. 1219-1224 CE Major Figures: Genghis Khan (Temüjin) Master Changchun, Leader of the Daoist Quanzhen Sect (Qiu Chuji) Temuge-otchigin, Hearthkeeper of Mongolia Liu Wen, alchemist, arrow-maker, caravan-leader Yelu Chu Chi, brother of the Governor of Samarkand, translator for the Great Khan Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Hello, and welcome to the History of China. Mongol 9, the Immortal. Imagination clings to apotheosis. Those who inherit the powerful dead image, them, cling. Hero to his people. Curse, except in imagination, to everyone else. The dream I dreamed was not denied me. It was not, in the mind, denied me.

From The Fourth Hour of the Night by Frank Bedard The Great Khan was triumphant, beyond any doubt or question. Though far from the first time in his life, Temujin of Clan Borjigin, the poor trapper born on the edge of the world, abandoned by his own people, enslaved by his cousins, had once again ridden headlong against insurmountable odds, and emerged not just intact, but undeniably victorious against all who stood against him. The Khwarazmian Empire lay a smoldering, depopulated ruin in his wake, and its potentate, the so-called Second Coming of Alexander the Great, Amir Muhammad II, penniless, broken, and finally dead on an island in the Caspian Sea.

Its treasures and artisans were his own. Its people now fodder for the invincible Mongol engine of war. Moreover, his lieutenants, the generals Subutai and Jeb, had gathered invaluable information about what lay beyond the western horizon, and the lands and people there, themselves ripe for the taking. Yet for Temujin, the great Khan of the Mongol nation, Genghis, even in the glow of victory stacked upon victory, worry and doubt, grief and loss as ever clung to his soul.

The war in Khwarazmia, while successful, had taken a terrible toll on the Mongol people and on Genghis personally. A relatively minor loss had been that of his favored son-in-law, Togachar, during the taking of Nishapur. The repayment for that slight against his bloodline had been overseen by the grief-stricken widow, the Khan's own daughter, who'd ordered and then overseen the utter annihilation of the city's population and their heads stacked into gruesome pyramidal mounds over a period of ten days. A far greater loss had befallen Genghis in 1221 outside of Bamiyan in Afghanistan,

when his favorite grandson Mudikon, second son of Chagatai, had been killed with an arrow from the besieged city's walls. Once again, Mongol vengeance had raised the city and the countryside for miles in every direction into a lifeless ruin. Yet for Genghis, the loss of one so close to him, so suddenly, when he'd done everything in his power to keep his beloved family safe from harm, was a blow that seemed to have shattered any illusions of invincibility that even decades of unbroken victories might have instilled in him. The Great Khan was no longer a vibrant young warrior of the steppe. He had been nearly 45 when he'd been proclaimed the Kayan of the Mongols, and he was now approaching 60. By any measure in the 13th century, he'd grown old, but for a life lived as his had been, he was positively ancient. And day by day,

he'd begun to feel the creeping drain of time's passage in his body and in his soul, what the Mongols called nasandargdargdaks, or the inevitable triumph of age over body. There was still so much left to do for his people and for his nation, so many works and conquests still incomplete, yet he could feel his own time growing short. His sons were at each other's throats, so much so that his eldest, Jochi, had been ignoring his summons, claiming illness, and retreated far to the west to brood. Recently, he had taken a fall from his horse while hunting boar, something that could happen to even the best of riders from time to time, yet he'd been far slower to recover from his injuries, relatively minor though they were, than he would have liked. Though his intellect was as keen and ferocious as ever, his body had been ground down

like an arrowhead sharpened too many times. He would not, the realization grew in his mind, be here forever. Genghis had taken great care in the course of his life's work to create something that would be both an extension of his will and yet be durable enough to extend beyond his own life. He'd learned of and seen firsthand many powerful men and kingdoms disintegrate the moment that his leader was removed. Had not Charismia itself just proved a potent example of that? He had forgone the ancient traditions of the steppe, putting aside blood ties in order to promote those best qualified for the tasks at hand, even if they were outsiders or unborn. He had ordered the creation of a written language,

one that he would never learn himself, to better preserve and propagate his edicts and the great Yasa laws to every corner of his dominion. Within his ever-expanding borders, he had overseen the construction of infrastructural projects the likes of which few civilizations had accomplished even after centuries, express mail systems, passports, military protection for trade caravans, and the care and updating of the oases and caravanserais that already dotted the Silk Road's winding routes through Central Asia. He had taken to heart the lessons of those ancient civilizations neighboring his own, that to endure on the order of not just years or decades, but of centuries and millennia, stability and rule of law must reign within the realm. An empire could be won with the horse and bow, but it could not be governed on it.

Yet for all of that, he still had his doubts and his worries. His great work still remained incomplete, and he either needed to find a way to ensure its continuance after he was gone, or to buy himself more time to see the task through to the end. As he taught each of his children in their youths, there's no good in anything until it's finished. In his decades of travels and conquests, Genghis, though himself an avowed Tangri shamanist to the very end, had encountered a number of other cults and faiths, many of which seemed to hold out hope of what he dreamed, life everlasting, immortality,

all the time that he needed to perfect his masterwork. As with many of his kinsmen, though Genghis believed with all his heart in the divinity and power of the animistic spirits of the earth, water, and sky above, that did not preclude the possibility, or his openness to, adding new and different powerful spirits to his pantheon. Holy men of all sects had long fascinated men of the steppe in general, and Genghis in particular,

since they claimed to possess knowledge and powers beyond that of mortal men. Yet time and again, when he had invited these various clerics, priests, monks, and imams to discuss their faiths, he had been annoyed to find that they almost always resulted in such discussions quickly dissolving into petty bickerings between parties over what seemed to the Khan, minor doctrinal differences. Genghis dreamed of a universal faith for his universal empire, one in which all of his subject people could, even if they might not agree with certain aspects of other faithful, still live together harmoniously and in accordance with the Yasa. Though some of the Mongols had become friendly toward or even adherents of Islam and Nestorian Christianity, and indeed the Great Khan was himself very interested in the stories he'd heard about the Pope of Rome,

who he'd heard tell was more than 200 years old, even so, Genghis found himself particularly drawn toward the Chinese traditional religion of Taoism, and in particular an especially stringent sect called Chuan Zhen, or the Way of Complete Perfection. Taoism held a special place in the hearts of many Mongols of Genghis's ilk, since as a philosophy it, much like Tangriism, focused on nature and the spirits, and a veneration for the departed ancestors. Founded in 1159, several years before Temujin's own birth, the creator of the Tranchen sect, a monk named Wang Chongyang, had broken away from the central doctrinal structures that had, in his view, polluted the true way with gaudiness, worldliness, and needless hierarchy.

From MacLynn, Traditional Taoism had degenerated into a kind of organized religion, with its own hierarchy, and even a kind of pope. Catholic in more senses than one, it found room for spells, charms, talismans, and provincial witch doctors. Wang wished to purge it of all these accretions. To an extent, Chuanzheng can be construed as Daoism leavened by Buddhism, complete with asceticism and celibacy. End quote. Wang relocated from Shanxi to the mountains of Shandong, and then changed his name to Zhe, and began to preach his own version of the Daoist gospel,

quickly attracting many followers likewise disaffected by the indolence and worldliness of the more mainstream Chinese faiths. Yet such unity, as with many cults, would not long survive Zhe's death in 1169, and it would break into seven major branches, one for each of Zhe's primary disciples, the so-called Magnificent Seven. These were the Meeting the Immortals sect, the Southern Void, Mount Sui-O, Mount Yu, Mount Da, Charity and Stillness, and the Dragon Gate sects, respectively. Of these splintered groups, it was the final, Dragon Gate, founded by the monk Qiu Chuji, that would make the biggest mark on Daoism in China, and ultimately beyond. Like his master before him, and common to many Daoist monks,

Qiu changed his own name to Changchun Zi, meaning Master of Eternal Spring. Though of a relatively murky background, there are several discrepancies in his early biography, some of such nature as that he might have been illiterate until his teens, that it seems possible that such confusions may well have been deliberately placed by him or his disciples. Regardless, wrapping himself in the pretense of unworldliness and pure asceticism, Changchun nevertheless, quote, was a clever politician who knew how to network and cozy up to the powerful, getting official backing for his White Cloud Temple in Beijing, or as it was called then, Chengdu, and then slightly later, Yanjing.

In 1187, the Jin Emperor, Shizong, summoned him to preach at his court and demanded his presence at his deathbed two years later. End quote. Chengchun's claim to fame was a dogma supposedly of his own devising, though MacLynn points out that there was a profound intellectual dishonesty in such claims of originality. His three doctrines, true to name,

drew on aspects of Zuzi Confucianism, Chan Buddhism from the Boddha Dharma, and all underpinned by the teachings of the great Taoist immortal Lao Tzu himself, whom Changchun insultingly and achronologically claimed that Buddha was merely a reincarnation of. Fused to this unwieldy trinity of belief systems, Changchun grafted yet more eclectic ideas to broaden his sex appeal to the masses. Quote, First, he stressed the contrast arrived at independently in the West by Enlightenment thinkers like Rousseau and Herzen, but also stem all the way back to the dawn of

Confucianism itself. Continuing the quote, Then he emphasized the salient role of alchemy, a spiritual quest sometimes allegorically described in terms of laboratories, or, as with the Taoists, the life-giving power of jade, cinnabar, pearl, and mother of pearl. End quote. This facet had, of course, been a long-standing holy grail for no small number of Chinese Taoists and emperors across time, since it promised to produce a liquid gold elixir of life that could ward off death indefinitely. Changchun himself was not a great believer in the ingestion of chemicals and homeopathic medicinal cures like blowing powdered cinnabar up the nose or swallowing tinctures, a practice known as external or bodily alchemy, or waidan.

Instead, he was more a proponent of internal spiritual alchemy, or neidan. Rather than snorting mercury, that spiritual re-education and rejuvenation through focus and meditation could lead to longevity, not so much for the body, but for the spirit. Most of these details were lost in transmission, however, and Changchun seemed little interested in disabusing the credulous who simply heard, the master knows the secret of eternal life, in their simplified notion. After all, whatever pays the bills. Thus it was when the Mongols swept across northern China, and then swept away the Zhechengjin

dynasty. Stories and reports of a Taoist master who had achieved the secret of immortality were rife among the populace. It appears that one of the physicians that fell into Mongol service after the fall of Zhang Du, a man named Liu Wen, who apparently also moonlighted as an arrow maker, of all things, knew of these tales, his new master's interest in the mysteries of longevity, and saw in both of those the chance to ingratiate himself to the new regime. Thus he sent a letter to the great Khan, along with several others of the learned from the north, which alerted Genghis to this supposed immortal in their midst, and the possibility that such

secrets might be bestowed on one so great as him. Changchun's disciple wrote to the Khan in 1219, for instance, He sat with the rigidity of a corpse, stood with the stiffness of a tree, moved as swift as lightning, and walked like a whirlwind. There seemed to be no book he had not read. To him, life and death seemed a succession as inevitable as cold and heat, and neither of them occupied in his heart so much as the space of a mustard seed or spike of grass. Deeply intrigued by the prospect, apparently, of sitting with the rigidity of a corpse,

Genghis Khan, though already well into planning his assault on Khwarazmia, wrote to the eminent master Changcun himself in 1219 and requested that the Immortal One visit him and impart his sacred wisdom. In a long, winding letter that Genghis dictated to his Chinese scribes, he made Changcun an offer that he couldn't refuse. Quote, Evan has grown weary of the excessive pride and extravagant luxury in China and has abandoned her. But I, living in the barbaric north of the wilderness, have no inordinate passions. I wear the same clothes and eat the same food as the cowherds and horseherders. We make the same sacrifices and we share the same riches. I look upon the nation as a newborn child

and I care for my soldiers as if they were my brothers. Do not think of the extent of the sandy desert. Have pity on me, and communicate to me the means of preserving life. End quote. In spite of the fact that he resided in his Mongol-sanctioned White Cloud Temple, in the Mongol-controlled city of Yanjing, and thus was in no position to demur, Changchun, ever the complainer and prima donna, went ahead and did so anyways. The round trip, he whined, would take at least three years,

during which he'd be unable to teach his worthy disciples. He required many and lengthy stops to rest from the arduous journey, which he was, at length, willing to finally accept, at least as far as going to Mongolia. Only to find, much to his further consternation, that the great Khan who had requested his presence was no longer even in Mongolia, but had vacated to the Hindu Kush, and was pushing ever westward, even further away. Even so, and in spite of his incessant carping about the sheer inconvenience of it all, I mean, what else could Changchun do in the end but accept Genghis's invitation? Thus, in the spring of 1220, he sent his reply to the Khan,

grudgingly accepting the necessity for extensive traveling, but underlining the message that he was paying Genghis a very special favor. He went so far as to boast that he had likewise been extended an invitation by the Song Emperor in Hangzhou, who was, after all, much closer and much more convenient, but had turned it down only because it was so obvious to Changchun that Heaven had chosen Genghis to bear the mandate of rule, and not, you know, because he was completely surrounded by servants of the Khan. This would, it would prove, only be the beginning of Changchun's constant whining and complaining about his predicament, ultimately dragging out what he'd expected to be a three-year journey into more than four.

The party set out from Beijing in February of 1220, accompanied by a bevy of harem girls bound for the Khan's Ger on campaign, or, as put somewhat more delicately by Weatherford, quote, young Chinese women entertainers recruited to lift troops' morale on the front battle lines, end quote. When he learned of this, Changchun complained bitterly, arguing that having women such as them travel along with one such as him would besmirch the sanctity of his office. After forcing the caravan to halt at Dexing City, much back and forth ensued as Chongchun insisted in clarifying the situation with the Great Khan directly, via messages, which of course ate up a lot of time going and coming. As such, he was successful in delaying his party from setting out again from

De Xing from the midwinter of 1220 all the way until March 1221. Genghis, bending over backwards to accommodate his honored guest's demands that he not see things which arouse desire, duly had the harem girls separated and sent on via separate caravan so as to not pollute the Great Sage's own journey with their sinful feminine wiles. Genghis's reply letter was, in fact, a testament to the Khan's own ability to lay on the charm offensive when he deemed it beneficial, and to exploit the psychological weak points of even those he was trying to be friendly towards in the service of getting exactly what he wanted from them. Writing that Chongchuan simply must journey onward, please, since, as the great sage more perfect than even the very founder of Taoism, there simply was no one else to whom the great Khan could turn for help.

Genghis's reply continued, quote, Now that your cloud-girded chariot has issued forth from the realm ethereal, the white cranes that draw it will carry you pleasantly through the realms of India. Bodhidharma, when he came to the east, by spiritual communication revealed the imprint of his heart. Lao Tzu, when he traveled in the west, perfected his Tao by converting Central Asia. The way before you, both by land and water, is indeed long, but I trust the comforts I shall provide will not make it seem long. End quote.

Genghis Khan, conqueror of nations, destroyer of enemies, punishment of God, and buttering-upper of monks. But it didn't end there. As word spread of the Great Khan's impending audience with an actual Taoist immortal to gain the secret of eternal life, other members of the Borjigin clan stumbled over themselves to get in on the action. Word arrived from the Mongol heartland along the Keralan River that Genghis's youngest brother, Temügg Ötjgin, the hearthkeeper and guardian of the homeland, that he too demanded a meeting with the immortal sage Changchun.

When attempts to forestall the Mongol lord's demands were met with even sterner commands of obedience immediately, the caravan had no choice but to divert due north and meet with the hearthkeeper. They would arrive at last at the end of April 1221, where Temügg, in an effort to assert dominance, forced the monk to wait for six whole days, citing that a wedding feast had just occurred before admitting Changchun to his demanded audience. Temügg evidently had little of the diplomatic subtlety of his eldest brother, and curtly demanded that Changchun immediately divulge the secret of immortality to him. After first demurring that he'd need to

meditate on it, when the Mongol lord persisted, Changchun improvised, vamping an explanation that it would be improper to reveal such information to anyone, even the Ochigin, before first having divulged it to the great Khan himself. To this, Temügg had no counter and was forced to assent, thereafter doing a 180 from his initial brusque and impatient temperament. Likely because he knew that his actions would surely be reflected in the report that this monk would ultimately make to his brother, Temügg then sent the caravan on with a suite of lavish parting gifts of tens of wagons and hundreds of horses and oxen on the 10th of May. As the caravan made its way ever westward, Changchun was delighted to record on the 23rd a solar eclipse shortly before the crests of the first great peaks came into view.

In virtually all other matters and observations, however, his recordings reveal a man far too old and set in his ways to appreciate much of anything new. From Weatherford, quote, Whatever he encountered merely reinforced conclusions he'd reached years earlier or matched long-held prejudices, and he frequently complained about everything from the cost of wheat in the desert to the poor quality of roads. He made the prosaic observations of a tired old man who commented on the weather and the landscape more out of boredom than from interest." The old monk's only real interests

seemed to have been wine, the soft cotton fabrics that he was introduced to along the way, fresh fruits, and his own deeds and actions, no matter how trifling. By mid-August, they had arrived and made a brief stop at the black city of Kalgan, and though Changchun pressed for another extensive layover in the city, he was informed that Genghis had given strict instructions that the caravan should not be delayed any further. Thus, they pressed on over the Altai Mountains. By September, they had reached the Tien Shan Range, and after a difficult and dangerous crossing, arrived at last at Balasagun at the end of October, the now defunct former capital of the Kirakatai nation.

They turned then southwest, following the mountain lines and then the Sir Darya River, reaching Tashkent on November 22nd before arriving at Samarkand on the 3rd of December, to be greeted by enthusiastic crowds. Though the caravan master, Liu Wen, was anxious to heed the Khan's instructions and press on, he was informed that the passes through the Hindu Kush range were at current impassable thanks to banditry blocking all traffic that the Mongols had yet to sort out. Therefore, and much to the exhausted Changchun's relief, further travel was deferred until the coming spring. Two years prior, Sanarkand had been one of the jewels of the world, a city of perhaps as many as 150,000 to 200,000 people, but it was now a shell of its former self.

MacLynn writes that its estimated population as of the new year 1222 was in the range of only 20,000 to 25,000. As is typical of any area given over to disrepair, brigands had moved into the less well-patrolled sections of the city, including districts uncomfortably close to the emir's former palace. This is what the governor insisted when he tried to convince Changchun that the palace was unsuitable for him to lodge in, but the ever-prickly monk would have none of it, replying, This is the same guy who had, while riding in the desert, laughed derisively at his Mongol guardians, who were afraid of riding in the dark lest they be attacked by demons,

and had smugly informed them that demons would always turn and flee from men of pure heart. The governor of Zamarkand would be far from the only Mongol official Changchun would alienate and disillusion during his extended stay there. Relative of the governor and future key advisor to Ogedei Khan, the Gitan minister Yela Chuzai, tried to befriend the monk and attempted to use his inroads with the great Khan Genghis to bring about substantive change to the Mongol style of rule, to make, in effect, a kinder, gentler Mongol empire rather than all punishment of God. From McLean, quote, It transpired that Chang had no interest in using his influence to bring Genghis round to a less savage way of governing, but was concerned only to convert the Khan to his own narrow and blinkered version of alchemical Taoism. Conversation with Chang, moreover, revealed the sage's utter and total

ignorance of Buddhism, which did not prevent him from uttering ex-cathedral remarks about that religion." The greatest disappointment in their discussions, however, was when Ye Lu caught Chongchun out in an outright lie. The monk claimed that the Jian emperor, Shizong, after having followed Chongchun's strict advice and prescriptions when they'd met in 1188, had completely recovered his physical strength and health and become well. Ye Lu did not need to be some eminent scholar of ancient Chinese history, although he was, to know that falsehood exactly for what it was, because pretty much everyone knew that Jin Shizong had died that same year, 1188. Quote,

It did not take Ye Lu long to conclude that Chang was an unregenerate charlatan. End quote. Still, he dared not call the old man out too harshly, because he well understood that Genghis was thoroughly ensorcelled by the man, and would be unlikely to deal kindly with any who attempted to bring him low, however well-meaning. Instead, he for the most part held his tongue, even once the monk had departed, saying at the time only, quote, I behaved politely in his presence, but thought little of the man, end quote. Later, when several of Changchun's disciples,

apparently badly misreading the tenor of their brief relationship, suggested that Ye Lu should become one of the monk's lay disciples himself, Chuzai wrote to his brother in private, remarking, quote, In my youth I practiced Confucianism. When I grew older, I embraced Buddhism. Why should I descend from lofty trees to enter into such a dark valley? End quote. History isn't black and white, yet too often it's presented as such. Grey History, The French Revolution is a long-form history podcast dedicated to exploring

the ambiguities and nuances of the past. By contrasting both the experiences of contemporaries and the conclusions of historians, Grey History dives into the detail and unpacks one of the most important and disputed events in human history. From a revolution based on hope and liberty to its descent into the infamous reign of terror, there's plenty to discuss and plenty of grey to explore. One can't understand the modern world without understanding the French Revolution.

So if you're looking for your next long-form, binge-worthy history podcast, one recommended by universities and loved by enthusiasts, then check out Grey History, The French Revolution today. Or simply search for The French Revolution. March of 1222, before Chagatai and his tumens had sufficiently cleared and repaired the roads through the Kush Range, and Genghis sent word that he was ready at long last to meet with the monk Changchun. Interestingly, Chagatai also sent word that he would like the monk to pay him a visit, but this time, unlike Temug, Changchun flatly turned him down under the

rather inexplicable rationale that there were no vegetables or rice south of the Amudarya River. I don't know, go figure. The final leg of the journey was a veritable promenade of a who's who of Genghis's empire west of the Tien Shan Mountains. Not just the governor of Zamarkand and a host of the Khanate's other high officials, but no less than Genghis's own Nohor companion, Bo'ochi, was dispatched with his elite cadre to provide an honor guard to the caravan through the Kush. At last, and after some 27 months of travel, Changchun arrived at the Great Khan's camp at Parwan, just north of Kabul, on the 15th of May. On this final approach, as the caravan had wended its way through the destruction that had once been Kabul,

one of Changchun's disciples wrote forebodingly, It was late spring, heading into summer, the off-season for the Mongol war machine, which as ever preferred when it could to fight in the colder months of autumn and winter. The summer, therefore, was for games and frivolity, for the eating of peaches and almonds which were just coming into season in the area, and of education and philosophical discussions. This was exactly what the Great Khan wanted from the Taoist monk.

Quote, Driven by his own growing sense of despair over human nature and his own mortality, Genghis hoped to find some ultimate truth or primary principle to guide him and his empire. End quote. Monk Changchun wasted no time in presenting himself before the great Khan, and Genghis, likewise well aware that the monk had traveled for so long to meet with him, and when he'd already turned down other kings' invitations at that, showed the highest of compliments, thereafter showered him in praise and adulation. When the monk's simple reply was returned via translators that it was simply the will of heaven that he come, the Khan's delight only grew. Trying and failing to contain

his excitement at the prospect, Genghis asked very quickly that the monk present him with the fabled elixir of life. To this, what could Changchun do but answer frankly and honestly? He replied that he did have several methods through which life might be expanded and health better maintained, but if Genghis dreamt that he possessed some formula that would grant him immortality, he had no such tincture nor the secret to it. Though undoubtedly disappointed by such an admission, Genghis nevertheless claimed that he respected the monk's answer and was pleased by his frankness, and then set him up with his own special tent and scheduled regular seminars between himself and the monk

so that he could learn his secrets. In one of these meetings, he would honor him with the title of Xian, or Immortal Spirit. This was done probably far less out of any real spiritual awe at the man than the long-held practice of the Khan of feeling out and setting his counterparts at ease by lavishly complimenting them. Weatherford points out that the Mongol equivalent to the Chinese title of immortal, Tangri Mongke Kun, had last been used by the treacherous shaman Tab Tangri,

and there was no doubt Genghis well remembered the exact moment Heaven had abandoned him to die of a snapped spine back on the Mongolian steppe. Next, Genghis asked the monk of the reports that he'd heard that he himself was indeed immortal and more than 300 years old. To this, Changchun again demurred, lying that he did not know his own age. Among the Mongols, it was common to not know or much care about the specific year of one's birth or their own age. Even Genghis himself, we are forced to make just educated approximations of his actual birth date. But for a Chinese holy man and scholar, someone who by profession and training needs must be deeply instructed in the movements of the heavenly bodies and the zodiac, and whose livelihood involved reading divine

fortunes based on the position of the stars during their own birth, to not know his own age? It was impossible, inconceivable. Yellow Chuzai, who was translating between the Khan and the monk, would later write of the exchange, quote, he falsely stated that he did not know his age. How can an intelligent person not know his age? End quote. Dingus, however, though he certainly also understood that the monk was not being forthright, was far more tolerant of such evasiveness, instead simply teasing him and agreeing, in a private jest of sorts, to call him the immortal one. Oh, you don't know your own age? Well, I guess you must be immortal.

When these seminars at last commenced, for several months passed between the initial meeting and the subsequent discussions, owing to Genghis being forced to deal with the ongoing guerrilla insurgency from the Khwarezmians still holed up in the mountains, Changtun's lessons about how to extend life and improve his health were centered, of course, around his own particularly stringent form of ascetic Taoism. His major theme was that in order to attain perfection, humans must nurture the part of themselves that was heavenly by rejecting the part of themselves that was earthly. He spoke first about a very grave threat to the purity of spirit, and that threat was fine food and sights. People, quote, must do without pleasant sights and sounds, and get their pleasure only out of purity and quiet. They must reject luscious tastes, and use foods that are fresh and light as their only delicacy.

If the eye sees pleasant sights, if the mouth enjoys pleasant tastes, or the natural state is perturbed by emotions, then the original spirit is scattered and lost. End quote. If anyone remembered at this point that his very first action upon arriving at Genghis's camp had been to complain about the quality of the food on his journey, they were a little too polite to bring it up now. Turning then to his next topic, Changcun outlined an even greater threat to the purity of the spirit than food, which was sex. The true Taoist, he intoned, quote, must above all abstain from lust. A licentious life wastes the fine particles of the soul and leads to a considerable loss of the original spirit. End quote. Such sentiment would, of course, be later echoed by Brigadier General Jack D. Ripper in Dr. Strangelove when he warned,

I first became aware of it, Mandrake, During the physical act of love. Yes, a profound sense of fatigue. Feeling of emptiness followed. Luckily, I was able to interpret these feelings correctly. Loss of essence. I can assure you it has not recurred, Mandrake.

Women sense my power, and they seek the life essence. I do not avoid women, Mandrake, but I do deny them my essence. At this point, he addressed the Khan directly, warning him that even a common man could be sapped of his precious bodily fluids, that is, he could scatter his spirit, by having too much sex with even his one and only wife. A great one such as the Khan, therefore, was at substantially greater risk, since he was being depleted on the regular of his essence by entire legions of harem girls.

He continued by urging that the Khan should sleep alone for an entire month, since, quote, Taking medicine for a thousand days does less good than to lie alone for a single night, end quote. To this, Genghis did not say no, but he replied that it would be very difficult for a dog as old as him, and so set in his own ways, to learn such a new trick. Little of this made much of any sense to the assembled Mongols who had gathered to hear this immortal's wisdom. He spoke of men and women in the Taoist sense of yin and yang, which did mesh with the Mongols' own understanding of duality between the sexes.

Changchun said that men were of the yin, of fire, air, and action, while women were of the yang, earth, water, and repose. Yet the monk bafflingly spoke in such terms of the purity of the yin and the uncleanliness of the yang, and this was totally at odds with the Mongol understanding. Earth and water were heavier than air and fire, sure, but they were not impure, they were not unclean. Both were as pure a substance as fire or air, and just like fire and air could only be made impure through human action or intent. Thus, to them, the union of male and female seemed perfectly natural in the physical as well as spiritual sense. The prohibition on hunting and vigorous exercise, too, struck a sour note, since both were, after all, the traditional pursuits of

Mongol men, something neither the Khan nor his followers could well abandon, especially in the case of Genghis, as it would cause his own men to lose respect for him. Yet out of deference to the monk, and the fact that he still smarted from the injury he'd taken when falling from his mount on his last hunt, Genghis would refrain from hunting for two further months. Monk Changchun's final admonition was that, in order to appease heaven and be granted true longevity, the true sovereign should… stop taxing the Taoist clergy. That one would, in the end, be the only one of Changchun's prescriptions that Genghis would agree to.

On November 5th, Genghis personally accompanied the monk back to Samarkand, where Changchun was lodged in his own quarters within the city, while the great Khan no doubt kept to his palatial gur. In spite of the fact that many, most, of the monk's points of advice were anathema to Genghis or his Mongol's preferred way of life, the aged Khan seems to have been taken and had a deep and abiding interest in keeping Changchun around, possibly indefinitely. This was much to Changchun's chagrin, since he was fairly desperate by this point to return to his enclave in Beijing and back to his hermetic lifestyle among his most devoted acolytes, rather than these stinking unwashed barbarians. Nevertheless, Genghis insisted that Changchun accompany him northward,

in turns ignoring, or going out of his way to accommodate the monk's increasingly prickly cries of protest that all this journeying was just too much for him, all the while promising that it was only temporary, and that in due time he would send him back to China as he so desired. It has all the makings of an epic battle of wills in its way. Would the monk be allowed to go, or would he be compelled to stay? Perhaps, likely, it was because of that ongoing mental tug-of-war that when a blizzard destroyed the Mongol floating bridge over the Sirdaria,

and Genghis asked the monk what caused such natural disasters, Changchun replied in a particularly harsh manner, quote, Aiming straight at the jugular of the traditional folkways, he replied that the way to avoid the wrath of heaven was to give up silly taboos about water and forbidding bathing. Warming to his theme, he told Genghis of 3,000 different sins, the worst of which was the ill-treatment of parents, and he had seen too much of this among the Mongols. Changchun seems to have been baiting Genghis to grow annoyed at his dismissal of some of the tenets of Mongol belief and culture, and to at last therefore dismiss him from his presence once and for all.

For anyone else, it probably would have been more than sufficient, and likely they'd not only have been dismissed, but punished for such arrogance and insolence against their lord and master. But of course, it was not so for Changchun. Either out of genuine deference for his special holy guest, or more likely, at least in my view, because Genghis realized the old monk's ploy and simply refused to rise to the bait, the great Khan agreed with him.

At once, he turned to his attendant scribe and ordered that such wisdom be taken down and added to the Yasa Codex of Law. This mental game of cat and mouse would continue into March of 1223, when Chong Tuan insisted that he had promised his disciples that he would be gone no more than three years, and he therefore must absolutely depart from Genghis's most esteemed company and back to his White Cloud Temple in Beijing. Not a problem, came the Khan's reply. I am turning eastward as well. We can continue our travels together as you head for home. Changchun insisted, though, that he needed to travel at his own pace. But the Khan replied that first he wanted to gather all his sons together in one place so that the monk could teach them all of the secrets of the Tao before he at last departed for home.

Undoubtedly miserable at such a prospect, what could Changchun do but acquiesce? It would therefore be another full month until at last, apparently tired of tormenting the monk, Genghis Khan released him from his side. As a parting gift, Genghis proclaimed that Changchun's sect would be fully exempt from taxation and corvy labor duties, and that Changchun himself would be made the imperial director of religious affairs across China. It would be a decision that his ministers, in particular, would later come to regret. In marked contrast to his halting, snail's-paced voyage out to the Khan, Changchun's return trip was like hitting the warp drive. Wherever thronging crowds gathered to cheer on the triumphant monk and request that he pause his journey to administer them his spiritual guidance, the monk brusquely declined,

on the grounds that karma and fate decreed that he could not tarry in getting back home. It had taken him more than two years to go from Beijing to Kabul. He made the return trip in less than nine months, arriving back at Beijing in January of 1224. Six months later, yet another message arrived from Genghis to the eminent monk, striking a tone that MacLynn writes, quote, comes close to meeting the epithet pathetic, end quote. It read, quote, Since you went away, I've not once forgotten you for a single day. I hope you do not forget me.

I wish your disciples to recite the scriptures continually on my behalf and to pray for my longevity. End quote. Genghis went on to express his most pious hopes that Changchun had been on his return journey extolling the virtues of the Great Khan to the masses of China and reconciling those he met along the way to Mongolian rule. He concluded that the monk was free to live anywhere he so desired within the empire, and that all bills would be paid for by the Khan himself. As noted,

Changchun hadn't done so much as mutter the great Khan's name under his breath during his race across the countryside back to Beijing, and certainly had never entertained the notion of extolling the virtues of the Khanate or its ruler. Nor is there any record that the monk ever even replied to Genghis's letter. That's right, Changchun straight up ghosted Genghis Khan. And why not? He'd gotten more than he could have ever hoped from his long journey and stay with the emperor of the world. He'd been able to essentially tell the guy off to his face and call him a filthy unwashed miscreant and then be thanked for it. Not only thanked, but given tax exemption and religious authority over all of China. Possibly the greatest favor bestowed on him was that the Great Khan had assented, when asked, to bestow upon Changchun the Golden Tiger Garig, the coveted Mongol passport.

Quote, An oval disc, also called a paidza, by Marco Polo in his writings, worn on a cord which gave the bearer the right to use the Mongolian military system of posts and horses. It was like an all-purpose credit card that never had to be paid. The bearer of a gherig could demand virtually any type of goods and services without paying for them or even offering a rationale for needing them. Normally, only high-ranking officials received a gherig, because it conferred tremendous prestige and power on the bearer. The front stated that the bearer had the blessing from heaven and from Genghis Khan, while the back carried a warning that whoever disobeyed the order of the bearer

shall be guilty and die. And the gifts just kept rolling in. A little later on, Genghis made it known that he wished for all religions in his empire, much like Changchun's sect, to be made exempt from taxes and labor conscription. However, he left the actual writing of the document to Changchun alone, and then affixed his imperial seal to it without even bothering to have read it or have it read to him. The monk had cleverly written the law in such a way that it made only his branch of Taoism exempt and indeed went further, providing Changchun and his followers the quote-unquote legal cover they needed to begin a campaign of religious persecution against the Buddhist, Confucian, and rival Taoist temples all across the land. By the time the Khanate's high official, Ye Lechou Tsai, actually returned to China and saw the results of this little switcheroo by Changchun,

coincidentally in 1227, the same year the eminent charlatan monk died, he was very angry at this deception, but was far too late to do anything about it. Quote, There had been a mass conversion to Tranchen Taoism by people wishing to avoid taxation, and Genghis's noble attempt to introduce religious toleration throughout his realm had ended in fiasco. End quote. Until the end of his life, he'd used his precious Gerig to become a petty tyrant over the whole of Jin and Mongol China. In spite of this victory for his sect,

Changchun spent the rest of his life in frustration at his inability to successfully convert the Great Khan to his branch of Taoism. Once back in Beijing, he would write a poem expressing his dissatisfaction at not having had more impact. It went, For ten thousand li, I rode on a government horse. It is three years since I parted from my friends. The weapons of war are still not at rest,

but the way and its workings I have had my chance to preach. On an autumn night, I spoke on the management of breath. This poem would later be answered by a Chinese critic of the Trenzhen sect and the great sage's inability to give any meaningful answers to even basic inquiries posed by the Khan or his retinue. It went, For himself, having allowed the monk to run along home, Genghis Khan spent time in and around Tashkent before continuing north, not back east as he'd teased Changchun with.

He summered in 1223 on the Kulanbashi Steppe, north of the Kyrgyz Mountains. By the following spring, his party had reached the Imiel River, and it was there that he would meet for the first time his two eldest grandsons by Toli, the six-year-old Hulagu and his eight-year-old elder brother, Kubilai. It was, in fact, an auspicious occasion for young Kubilai, as he had, while hunting, brought down his very first big game all on his own. As per Mongol custom signifying the arrival of manhood, Genghis pricked his grandson's middle fingers, drawing blood, and then smearing the fat of his kill, an antelope, together with it, signifying the spiritual union of the two. Kublai would remember fondly for the rest of his life

this special moment with his grandsire, the great Khan, Genghis. Genghis knew that he had gained little from his dalliance with the so-called Immortal One. No secret of everlasting life, not even more practical knowledge of how best to secure his legacy and empire once he was gone. Still, it hadn't been a total loss. His spiritual guidance had been quackery and nonsense, but that had never been the monk's only means of value. Just the fact that he'd shown up at all enhanced the Khan's prestige across much of China, even if he'd abused the privilege as Genghis surely suspected that he would. Even beyond China, the fact that one such as an ancient and venerable monk from the pinnacle of civilization itself, the Middle Kingdom, would journey for years to

the center of Asia just to meet with Genghis would inspire awe in his new Central Asian subjects. Moreover, the spies and informants that he knew were everywhere would surely report to the Khan's enemies that he'd received secret knowledge from an immortal sage. And since such knowledge had been given in very conspicuous and ostentatious secrecy, and all of it had been spoken in Chinese, which none but a very few of the Khan's servants and retainers in Afghanistan could speak at all, much less the archaic, arcane stream that poured from the monk's mouth, even if they managed to listen in, they could not possibly understand what secrets were being imparted. Perhaps Genghis had been given special powers, or even the Philosopher's Stone itself, information which would surely give his enemies pause when

thinking to stand against the Khanate. Later Muslim writers, such as Juzjani, would take frequent aim at the supposed evil powers conferred upon the great Khan by such dark magicians. Juzjani would write that Genghis was, quote, Adept in magic and deception, and some of the devils were his friends. Every now and again he used to fall into a trance, and in that state of insensibility, all sorts of things used to proceed from his tongue. A scribe would supposedly take all of the Khan's mutterings down, and once he had emerged from his trance, he would do as the scribe had written, which would invariably come to pass just as had been said. Genghis Khan was hardly a dark sorcerer, though he did spend much of his life very compellingly convincing his foes that he and

his army were, in fact, supernatural and invincible demons. In reality, he was an old man, well into his 60s, and he was above all else tired. He had spent six years waging war against the Khwarazmian Amir and his empire, and had paid a high price indeed for his victory. His son-in-law and grandson were dead, and his four sons, one and all, hated each other, to the point of threatening to shatter Genghis's empire into a self-destructive civil war before the Great Khan had even died. Yet one of them would need to be given the reins of the Khanate and the mantle of Great Khan, or Genghis knew his life's work would die with him. And so, next time, he will hammer that final issue of succession out and choose one of his sons to continue his work and his legacy,

because there is much left to be done. First and foremost, to finally mete out the justice and vengeance against the king who betrayed his word to the Khan. Emperor Xianzong, his traitorous General Asagambu, and the whole of Western Xia will pay the price for their betrayal. Thanks for listening. The Civil War and Reconstruction was a pivotal era in American history. When a war was fought to save the Union and to free the slaves. And when the work to rebuild the nation after that war was over turned into a struggle to guarantee liberty and justice for all Americans.

I'm Tracy. And I'm Rich. And we want to invite you to join us as we take an in-depth look at this pivotal era in American history. Look for The Civil War and Reconstruction wherever you find your podcasts.