Ledger/Records of Merits and Demerits

Definition

Originally, Ledgers/Records of Merits and Demerits referred to ledgers in which Daoist priests registered their good and evil doings every day in order to spur and examine themselves. Later, when they became popular among the people, they referred generally to a type of moralistic storybook which gave grades to characters according to their degree of good or evil conduct, in order to give concrete instructions to the practice of doing good works and guard against evil.

Practice

This type of moralistic storybook lists the Ledger/Record of Merits (Good Deeds) and the Ledger/Record of Demerits (Bad Deeds) respectively, and marks them with positive and negative numbers. Those who pursue it examine themselves every evening, compare their conduct of the day with the relevant item, give themselves positive marks for their good conduct and negative marks for their evil conduct, and record only their marks in the ledger, instead of the actual conduct. At the end of each month, they make a small calculation on a piece of paper, and bind the paper in a book. They follow such practice each month, and at the end of the year make a general calculation of merits and demerits. Then the merits and demerits are balanced, and the merits or demerits accumulated are shifted to the next month or year, in the hope that the followers would engage in diligent cultivation incessantly.

Origin and development

In attempting to explain the Daoist practice of recording merits, demerits, kindness and evil, we should begin with the idea of merit and demerit. The Chinese idea of merit and demerit came into existence quite long ago. The Book of Changes (Yi Jing) says, "the family having accumulated merit will certainly have surplus happiness while the family having accumulated demerit will certainly have surplus misfortune". Daoism and popular beliesf hold that spirits such as the Spirit of Heaven, the Spirit of the Earth, the Kitchen Spirit and the Controller of Destinies supervise human kindness and evil and give deserved rewards and punishments. The Book of Supreme Peace of the later Han dynasty contains the argument of exhorting people to do good works and avoid evil, and the Ledger/Record of Merits and Demerits is also related to the "Heavenly Certificates" mentioned in the Book of Supreme Peace. The third scroll "Response to Laymen" and the six scroll "Subtle Guidelines" of the Inner Book of the Master Who Embraces Simplicity (Bao Pu Zi) by Ge Hong of the Jin dynasty records substantial materials on the idea of merit and demerit. "Response to Laymen" says that one should accumulate 1,200 merits to become a Heavenly Immortal (Tian Xian) and 300 merits to become an Earthly Immortal (Di Xian). The idea of calculating human misfortune and good fortune, long life and short life by the accumulation, increase and decrease of one's good works and evil doings, merits and demerits is also seen in The Great Collection of Daoist Rituals by Du Guangting of the Five Dynasties, in which "The Two Books of Good and Evil" and "The Two Ledgers/Records of Merit and Demerit" are recorded in scrolls 73 and 81. "Ledger" indicates a standard. The good and evil, merit and demerit of words and actions become the standard according to which blessings are bestowed or misfortune befall. This way of calculating merits and demerits developed into the moralistic storybooks of the Ledgers of Merits and Demerits after the Song dynasty. Therefore, one may well say that the Ledger of Merits and Demerits mixes together the ideas of the Three Doctrines, namely the accumulation of good and elimination of evil of Daoism, the ethics and morals of Confucianism, and the karma of Buddhism.

The oldest extant Ledger of Merits and Demerits is the Ledger of Merits and Demerits of the Immortal Sovereign of Supreme Subtlety, which was published in 1171 (included in the Commandments subsection of the Pervasive Perfection in the Daoist Canon - Dao Zang). It is a ledger of the personal records of good and evil of the Daoist priests of the Pure Brightness sect. In the Selections from the Daoist Canon, one finds the Ledger of Merits and Demerits to Admonish the World and the Ledger of Merits and Demerits of the Ten Commandments, which were the Ledgers of Merits and Demerits compiled in Patriarch Lu's name. Later, after being popularized by Yuan Huang (1533-1606), Zhu Hong (1535-1615) and the like, the Ledgers of Merit and Demerit came in vogue during the period from the 17th century to the middle of the 18th century, when a variety of Ledgers of Merits and Demerits were compiled, including not only ones rich in Daoist flavor, but also Buddhist "Ledgers of Good Deeds and Demerits" (with Zhu Hong's Records of Self-knowledge as the representative work), and Ledgers of Merits and Demerits related with popular morals (such as the Corpus of Ledgers of Merits and Demerits). After the 17th century, not only Daoist priests but also scholars, people worshiping and observing Buddhist commandments, and the populace began to gradually pursue Ledgers of Merits and Demerits. Moreover, there emerged the Ledger of Merits and Demerits for Officials, the Ledger of Merits and Demerits for Ignorant Children and the Ledger of Merits and Demerits for Women, which were aimed at specific objects of admonishment. The Ledger of Merits and Demerits of Patriarch Lu Chunyang, Immortal Sovereign of Supreme Subtlety, published in 1734 during the Qing dynasty.

The significance of the circulation

The Ledger/Record of Merits and Demerits is a book instructing the moral practice of Daoist priests, who record the good and evil of their conduct in a book of marks just as shopkeepers keep accounts in their account books. Some scholars hold that this style of keeping moral accounts is related to the prosperity of Chinese commercial bookkeeping, so they call it "Moral Book-keeping". A Japanese scholar comments on it, saying, "The emergence of the Ledger of Merits and Demerits indicates that the Chinese realized they could change their destiny and alter good or ill luck with their own hands. This is an epoch-making achievement in their cultural life."