Towards the Body of Androgyny: A Feminist Perspective on Daoist Philosophy of Yinyang and Cultivational Practices

Abstract

This paper re-examines Daoist philosophy and practice through a feminist lens, arguing that Daoist cosmology articulates a dynamic ontology of gender grounded in cixiongtongti (雌雄同體, “the body of androgyny”). Drawing on classical and religious texts—including the Daodejing, Zhuangzi, Taishang Laojun Zhongjing, Santian Neijie Jing, and later alchemical writings—it demonstrates how Daoism envisions embodiment as a site of coexistence where masculine and feminine forces mutually generate and transform. Rather than privileging “feminine” values or reversing patriarchal hierarchies, Daoist yinyang metaphysics dissolves the binary itself, redefining equality as interdependence within difference. The study situates Daoism in dialogue with feminist and ecofeminist theories, acknowledging shared anti-dualist impulses while highlighting Daoism’s distinct cosmological grounding in the circulation of qi. Through analysis of textual metaphors and inner-alchemical practices such as male pregnancy and female transformation, the paper shows that Daoist cultivation performatively realizes male-female-co-existence (nannü gongsheng 男女共生) as both a philosophical and embodied principle. In doing so, it reveals Daoist thought as a vital resource for reimagining embodiment beyond essentialism—offering a non-hierarchical, pluralistic model of gender that integrates cosmology, corporeality, and spiritual practice.

1. Introduction

In recent decades, Daoism has attracted growing attention in feminist and ecofeminist scholarship, often celebrated as a “yin-centered” philosophy that privileges receptivity, softness, and harmony with nature (Wang 2016, pp. 205–10; Ma 2016, pp. 229–48; J. Liu 2022, pp. 276–92; Zou and Chen 2023, pp. 1–3; Tan 2024, pp. 235–50). Within this framework, Daoism has sometimes been interpreted as a proto-ecofeminist tradition, understood to elevate feminine-coded values in contrast to the patriarchal hierarchies associated with Confucianism. While such readings have opened fruitful dialogues between Daoist thought and feminist theory, they risk oversimplifying the conceptual richness of Daoist cosmology and reinscribing precisely the binary oppositions they seek to dismantle. For instance, Lin Ma asserts that Daoism “is not only a philosophy of the feminine, but also, and more importantly, a philosophy in the feminine” (Ma 2016, p. 246). This interpretation no doubt amplifies the parallels between Daoism and feminist theory, but also risks the simplification and appropriation of the Dao. In addition, its presumption seems to somewhat essentialize gender, attributing certain qualities (e.g., yin) as inherently feminine and others (e.g., yang) as inherently masculine. These readings unintentionally impose certain gender traits on a philosophical system that resists fixed distinctions, instead grounding identity in relational transformation.

This paper proposes a different approach to Daoism’s relationship with gender and embodiment. We argue that Daoist philosophy articulates an ontology in which masculinity and femininity are not opposing or mutually exclusive categories but interdependent potentials within a single, dynamic body. Central to this re-reading is the Daoist notion of “the body of androgyny”, or using the Chinese term more precisely, cixiongtongti (雌雄同體, masculinity-femininity-in-same-body), which gestures toward a vision of embodiment where differentiation and integration coexist without hierarchy.1 Rather than privileging one pole over the other—whether masculine over feminine, yang over yin, or culture over nature—Daoist thought imagines a world where balance arises through continuous circulation, mutual generation, and transformation. In this framework, the body becomes a microcosm of the cosmos, animated by shifting configurations of yin and yang rather than constrained by static anatomical or social definitions.

Reframing Daoism through this lens has significant implications for feminist theory. It challenges patriarchal models that naturalize male dominance by rooting it in cosmological principles, while also complicating ecofeminist readings that celebrate Daoism primarily as a celebration of femininity (e.g., ci 雌 receptivity) or “nature.” Daoist thought, we argue, offers a more radical alternative: it envisions equality not as sameness but as coexistence, a condition in which difference is generative rather than divisive. This perspective resonates with certain currents in contemporary feminist and queer theory, yet Daoism grounds these insights in a distinct metaphysical logic. Whereas many Western feminist frameworks begin from human-centered constructions of gender, Daoism situates embodiment within broader cosmic processes, framing identity as the outcome of interdependent transformations between complementary forces.

By centering the concept of the androgynous body, this paper aims to illuminate the unique contributions of Daoist thought to ongoing feminist debates on embodiment and difference. Rather than assimilating Daoism into existing theoretical paradigms, we approach its texts and practices on their own terms, allowing their metaphysical commitments to reshape prevailing assumptions about gender ontology. Through this approach, we seek to move beyond interpretations that reduce Daoism to a symbolic inversion of patriarchy or a proto-ecofeminist celebration of yin. Instead, we highlight its potential to offer an alternative philosophical model in which embodiment is plural, dynamic, and integrative.

The textual corpus examined in this paper—Daodejing, Zhuangzi, and Taishang Laojun Zhongjing 太上老君中經 (DZ 1168, LZZJ afterwards)—was selected according to both chronological and conceptual criteria.2 Chronologically, these texts span the formative, classical, and religious stages of Daoist thought, allowing a diachronic examination of how early philosophical notions of yinyang and embodiment evolve into more systematized religious cosmologies and practices. Ideologically, each text represents a key articulation of the ontology of coexistence and androgyny. The Daodejing and Zhuangzi articulate the foundational view of transformation and non-duality at the philosophical level, while the LZZJ provides the earliest extant religious anatomy of the androgynous body. Santian neijie jing (三天内解經 DZ 1205, STNJJ afterwards) is very possibly the earliest scripture inside the Daoist Canon (daozang 道藏) that describes the mythological birth of Laozi and to some extent also foreshadows the upcoming alchemical treatises. Choices of texts representing the alchemical tradition such as the anthology of Daoist rituals and personal practices in two versions of Shangqing lingbao dafa (上清靈寶大法 DZ 1221 and DZ 1223) and the widely influential Xiwangmu nüxiu zhengtu shize 西王母女修正途十則 extend this ontology into performative practice.

The concept of cixiongtongti is thus operationalized through two interrelated dimensions: (a) textual-metaphorical—examining bodily imagery (e.g., paired organs, internal deities, and yin–yang symmetry) that reflects coexistent gender polarities; and (b) ritual-practical—analyzing cultivational techniques (e.g., male pregnancy, female transformation) that enact and embody this ontology. By tracing how these two levels converge, the paper verifies cixiongtongti not as an imposed interpretive category but as a recurring Daoist strategy of conceptualizing the body as a site of cosmological integration.

This study is primarily a work of philosophical interpretation grounded in textual analysis (i.e., a qualitative hermeneutic procedure that combines philological exegesis, thematic coding of gendered imagery, and cross-textual verification of embodied practices). It combines close philological reading of Daoist primary sources with a conceptual reconstruction of their underlying ontology of gender. The research path proceeds from metaphysical premise to embodied practice: beginning with early philosophical formulations of yin–yang relations in the Daodejing and Zhuangzi, moving to cosmological articulations of the androgynous body in the LZZJ, and culminating in ritual and alchemical enactments of these principles in later texts such as the STNJJ and Shangqing lingbao dafa. This diachronic movement from classical philosophy to religious practice demonstrates how Daoist gender ontology is expressed both discursively and performatively. Analytically, the paper integrates three complementary lenses—(1) hermeneutic interpretation of key metaphysical passages, (2) symbolic–bodily analysis of internal cosmology and corporeal deities, and (3) ritual–practical contextualization of inner alchemical techniques—to show how cixiongtongti operates as a coherent ontology linking cosmology, body, and cultivation. Through this multi-level framework, the paper positions Daoist androgyny as a dynamic model of coexistence and transformation rather than as a purely symbolic trope.

Methodologically, this study follows a stepwise procedure that combines close philological reading with philosophical reconstruction. Textual metaphors related to gender and embodiment are first identified through recurrent imagery—such as internal pairings, bodily symmetries, and the coexistence of deities within a single form. These metaphors are then correlated with ritual and alchemical instructions to verify their performative realization in practice. The analytical weight is distributed according to both historical sequence and conceptual relevance: classical texts such as the Daodejing and Zhuangzi provide the ontological foundation, while religious and alchemical scriptures like the LZZJ and Shangqing lingbao dafa demonstrate its embodied enactment. This integrated approach allows philosophical interpretation and textual analysis to function as complementary dimensions of a single methodological framework.

The remainder of this paper develops this argument in three stages. First, we revisit Daoist yinyang metaphysics to challenge essentialist mappings of yin and yang onto female and male identities, showing how Daoist thought conceives these forces as relational and interdependent rather than oppositional. Second, we examine Daoist religious texts such as LZZJ that envision the body as a microcosmic site where masculine and feminine dimensions coexist, elaborating the philosophical significance of cixiongtongti within the broader Daoist worldview. Finally, we turn to Daoist cultivational practices, especially the implications of the body of the Laozi in the STNJJ and the inner alchemy tradition, demonstrating how techniques of internal transformation performatively enact this androgynous ontology and dissolve fixed boundaries between male and female embodiment. Together, these sections reveal that Daoism does not merely offer an alternative symbolic vocabulary for feminist theory but contributes a distinctive philosophical resource for reimagining embodiment, difference, and equality.

2. Daoist Dynamic Yinyang Metaphysics: Neither Male-Centered Nor Nature-Centered

Scholarly discussions of Daoist relationship to feminism often begin by situating the tradition in contrast to Confucianism, which has long been associated with patriarchal hierarchies and restrictive gender norms. In previous understandings, Confucianism’s ideas of “men are superior and women are inferior” (nanzunnübei 男尊女卑), females’ chastity (shoujie 守節), and the restriction of women to the domestic sphere have led scholars to view the history of Confucianism as a history of disciplining Chinese women. When Chinese philosophy encounters contemporary gender issues, Confucianism, burdened by its historical legacy, is unable to offer corresponding solutions. In contrast, Daoism, which coexisted alongside it, can serve as a valuable complement. Daoism is frequently interpreted as “yin-centered,” a philosophy said to valorize qualities culturally coded as feminine, such as rou (柔 softness), ci, xia (下below), and ziran (自然 spontaneity). For this reason, some researchers celebrate Daoism as a natural ally of feminist theory, framing it as a proto-ecofeminist worldview that symbolically elevates the feminine principle and seeks harmony between humans and the natural world (e.g., Dai 2022, pp. 136–49; Nelson 2017, pp. 4–14; Ma 2016, pp. 229–48). While this interpretive tradition has generated valuable dialogues between Daoism and contemporary feminist thought, it risks reducing Daoist cosmology to a symbolic language of gender inversion and thereby oversimplifies its philosophical depth. The widespread assumption that yin equals to a cluster of feminine concepts and yang to masculine concepts projects a fixed binary onto a system that is inherently dynamic, relational, and resistant to rigid categorization.

In Daoist metaphysics, yin and yang do not represent essential qualities but describe positions within a continuous process of differentiation and transformation (Zhang 2019). As Daodejing chapter 42 articulates: “The Dao produced One; One produced Two; Two produced Three; Three produced all things. All things carry yin and embrace yang; they achieve harmony by blending these vital energies” (道生一，一生二，二生三，三生萬物。萬物負陰而抱陽，沖氣以為和). The text underscores that the cosmos is generated not through conflict but through reciprocal interaction. Yin and yang coexist within all things; they are not external labels imposed from without but simultaneous expressions of an underlying unity. Neither term implies superiority, permanence, or fixed identity. Rather than describing inherent essences of gender or personality, yin and yang articulate relational patterns of movement, transformation, and resonance. To “carry yin” and “embrace yang” is to occupy both positions concurrently, revealing the insufficiency of readings that map these categories directly onto women and men, feminine and masculine.

The Zhuangzi further illustrates this dynamic non-binarity through its notion of “fei yin fei yang” (非陰非陽, neither yin nor yang), portraying human existence as suspended between cosmic forces without being reducible to either. In the chapter “Knowledge Rambled North” (Zhibeiyou 知北遊), the text describes a person “dwelling between heaven and earth” who is “temporarily human” but ultimately returns to an origin beyond yin and yang. Here, bodily form and gendered distinctions are incidental rather than constitutive; the Daoist self emerges not from fixed identity categories but from participation in the larger rhythms of the cosmos. In another passage, “Great and Most Honored Master” (Dazongshi 大宗師) emphasizes that “yin and yang are more to a person than his or her parents” (陰陽於人，不翅於父母), presenting yinyang forces as more fundamental to embodied existence than biological origins. In these instances, yin and yang are revealed as cosmic processes rather than personal attributes, suggesting that attempts to treat yin as equivalent to women/female/femininity or yang to men/male/masculinity mistake symbolic correspondences for metaphysical structure.

From this perspective, it becomes problematic to amplify the sameness between Daoism and ecofeminism. In fact, early ecofeminist scholarship has often been criticized for its tendency to essentialize “woman” as closer to nature, such a reading overlooks the more nuanced developments within ecofeminism itself. Thinkers such as Plumwood (1993, 2002) and Merchant (1980) already sought to dismantle the logic of domination by reimagining relational ontologies between human and nonhuman. Daoist thought shares this anti-dualist impulse, yet it articulates it through different cosmological grammar. Where ecofeminism begins from the ethical revaluation of the feminine against patriarchal binaries, Daoism dissolves the binary at a cosmological level through yinyang’s co-generative transformation. The two thus converge in their critique of hierarchy, but diverge in metaphysical scope: Daoism grounds relationality in the ontological circulation of qi, rather than in gendered categories of moral repair. Our argument should therefore be read both a rejection to and an extension of its non-dualist project into a Daoist framework of coexistence and transformation.

While it is true that Daoist texts often valorize qualities associated with nature, stillness, and receptivity, these traits are not inherently coded as feminine. Daoist ziran differs sharply from the modern ecofeminist category of “nature,” which frequently serves as a counterpoint to “culture” in oppositional Western frameworks. In Daoist thought, ziran is not a discrete substance set apart from humanity but a relational mode of becoming that encompasses humans, non-humans, deities, and cosmic forces alike. As the Daodejing explains: “Human beings follow the earth; the earth follows heaven; heaven follows the Dao; and the Dao follows ziran” (人法地，地法天，天法道，道法自然). Here, ziran functions as the generative principle that binds heaven, earth, and humanity into a single, interwoven process, undermining dualisms between human and non-human, culture and nature, masculine and feminine. Thus, while Daoism shares with ecofeminism a critique of domination and a reverence for interdependence, its underlying logic of integration cannot be collapsed into ecofeminist resistance of binaries of oppression and resistance.3

The implications for feminist theory are significant. If yin and yang are not essentialized as women/female/feminine and men/male/masculine, then Daoist thought neither replicates patriarchal hierarchies nor simply reverses them by privileging “feminine” values. Instead, Daoist yinyang cosmology provides a framework for understanding embodiment, identity, and difference beyond hierarchical oppositions. In this vision, yin may occupy a lower or more hidden position in specific contexts, but this positionality carries no value judgment; the “low” is not inferior but necessary for balance and transformation. As the Daodejing notes, “The highest good is like water” (上善若水), valorizing qualities associated with yielding and descent not because they are “feminine,” but because they enable life to flow and flourish.4 In the same way, yang may dominate temporarily, but its prominence depends on yin’s simultaneous presence and cannot persist without it. Hierarchy dissolves when yin and yang are understood as co-creative and mutually constitutive, embodying difference without domination.

At the same time, Daoist thought diverges from feminist frameworks that ground liberation in the abolition of difference. The Daoist conception of harmony does not seek to neutralize yin and yang into sameness but to sustain their dynamic interdependence. This model, which we describe as “equality without erasure,” avoids both patriarchal domination and the homogenizing tendencies sometimes found in liberal feminist discourse. In Daoism, coexistence emerges not through negating difference but by recognizing that difference is the condition for interconnection. As Robin Wang observes, yinyang relations encompass multiple dimensions—maodun (矛盾, contradiction and opposition), xiangyi (相依, interdependence), huhan (互含 mutual inclusion), jiaogan (交感, resonance), hubu (互補, complementarity), and zhuanhua (轉化, transformation) (Wang 2012, pp. 8–12).5 This complexity exceeds simple gendered readings and positions Daoist metaphysics as a resource for thinking about relationality, embodiment, and identity in ways that resist reduction to binary frameworks.

This understanding also helps explain why Daoism cannot be straightforwardly categorized as “feminist” in the sense of advancing a direct political project aimed at women’s liberation. Ancient Daoist texts neither name patriarchy explicitly nor advocate social reforms along modern feminist lines. However, their metaphysical orientation destabilizes many of the assumptions underlying patriarchal structures by refusing to naturalize gender hierarchies or confine bodies to fixed categories. Daoism’s vision of the cosmos imagines a world where yin and yang circulate freely, where no position is inherently superior, and where transformation, fluidity, and coexistence are primary. By decentering human exceptionalism and resisting rigid identity boundaries, Daoist thought opens a conceptual space for reimagining gender and embodiment beyond dominance, opposition, and essentialization.

This dynamic reading of yinyang also establishes the foundation for understanding the Daoist conception of the body. If yin and yang are not metaphors of fixed gendered essences but interdependent forces, then the body itself cannot be understood as exclusively “male” or “female.” Instead, the body emerges as a site of androgynous potential, where masculine and feminine energies coexist, circulate, and transform. Daoist texts consistently depict the body not as a stable biological fact but as a microcosm of cosmic processes, integrating deities, organs, energies, and celestial patterns into a single living system. In this framework, embodiment is always plural, layered, and open-ended, offering a cosmological foundation for later Daoist practices that enact the fluidity of gender in lived experience. This reconceptualization of the body as an androgynous, dynamic field links Daoist metaphysics directly to the cultivational techniques explored in the next section, where Daoist religious texts reveal in vivid detail how internal practices enact this relational ontology through bodily transformation, gender plasticity, and the co-presence of multiple identities within a single form.

By clarifying the dynamic nature of yinyang and disentangling it from essentialist readings, this section establishes a conceptual framework for reinterpreting Daoism as neither patriarchal nor “yin-centered,” neither reducible to ecofeminist logics nor confined to symbolic inversions of gender. Instead, Daoism offers a distinctive philosophical model that treats differentiation as the condition for harmony and interdependence as the basis for equality. This relational ontology not only disrupts fixed binaries of masculine and feminine but also grounds a broader understanding of embodiment, identity, and coexistence, preparing the way for the exploration of androgyny as a central feature of Daoist body theory.

3. Androgyny (Cixiongtongti 雌雄同體): Differentiation and Bodily Formation

If Daoist cosmology grounds yin and yang as relational forces rather than fixed essences, then the human body, as a microcosm of the Daoist cosmos, cannot be understood as exclusively “male” or “female.” Instead, Daoist thought imagines the body as a site of dynamic androgyny, where masculine and feminine dimensions are co-present, interdependent, and mutually generative. This conceptualization moves beyond symbolic associations of yin with women/female/feminine and yang with men/male/masculine and instead positions the human form as an integrated system in which these forces circulate symmetrically, sustaining life and transformation. Within this framework, embodiment is not a static identity but an open process, a continuous enactment of cosmic rhythms within the material and spiritual layers of the self.

In Daoist religious texts, particularly the LZZJ, a Daoist canon that can be tentatively dated to the later Han (25–220 C.E.) (Schipper 2004, pp. 92–94), provide some of the clearest articulations of this vision.6 Thematically, it is a body-cosmology manual that describes the same set of pantheons while presiding over earthly affairs also residing in human bodies as corporeal deities. The text of LZZJ is interpreted along the lines of practical guidelines of immortality practices (Schipper 2002; Shen 2018, p. 133). Indeed, such interpretations are valid and well rooted in every possible dimension, but they undermine the concrete and tangible realness of the system LZZJ sets out. Premodern China, be it the early China or the late imperial China, is an enchanted world. For inhabitants then, their worldview is structured according to the model of the assemblage and dissipation of qi 氣 (Goldin 2006). Supernatural beings such as ghosts and gods, related miraculous events such as ascension to heaven, for them, are as real as germs, viruses, immunity and metabolism to us. Therefore, there is no doubt that LZZJ wishes to offer a path to immortality, but at the same, it also reveals how human body is arranged, construed, and received at the time of its composition. Its bodily conceptions, however fantastical for us, represent the advanced human knowledge at that time and may then occupy similar position as biology today.

In this scripture, the human body is mapped as a living cosmos inhabited by deities who govern its functions and connect it to celestial patterns. The section of the Third Immortal of the LZZJ reads:

東王父者，青陽之元炁也，萬神之先也。衣五色珠衣，冠三縫，一云三縫之冠。上有太清雲曜五色，治於東方，下在蓬萊山。姓無爲，字君鮮，一云君解。人亦有之，在頭上頂巔，左有王子喬，右有赤松子，治在左目中，戲在頭上。其精氣上爲日，名曰伏羲。太清鄉，東明里。西王母，字偃昌，在目爲日月，左目爲日，右目爲月。目中童子字英明，王父在左目，王母在右目，童子在中央，兩目等也。

(DZ 1168 Taishang laojun zhongjing, 1.2a2–2b7)

King Father of the East (東王父), the primordial qi of the qingyang (青陽) and progenitor of the ten thousand spirits. He is robed in a five-coloured pearl garment and crowned with a triple-seamed diadem (or, alternatively, a “threefold-stitched crown”). Above him, there are the radiant five-hued clouds of the Great Clarity (Taiqing 太清). He reigns over the East and dwells beneath Mount Penglai (蓬萊山). His surname is Wuwei (無爲, “Non-Action”) and the given name Junxian (君鮮, some texts record Junjie 君解). He equally resides within the human body, at the top of the head, flanked by Wang Ziqiao (王子喬) to his left and Chi Songzi (赤松子lit. Master of Red Pine) to his right. His parish is in the left eye, but he plays on the head. His essence, [when it] ascends to [the heaven], will form the sun, named Fu Xi (伏羲), his celestial abode being the Village of Great Clarity (Taiqing Xiang 太清鄉) in the Hamlet of Eastern Radiance (Dongming Li 東明里). The Queen Mother of the West (西王母), style name Yanchang (偃昌). She manifests in the eyes as the sun and the moon. The left eye is the sun, the right eye the moon. There is a boy between the eyes named Yingming (英明, lit. Luminous Brilliance). The King Father [of the East] is in the left eye, the Queen Mother [of the West] in the right, and the boy in the center—thus equalizing (deng 等) the two eyes.

The central character here is certainly the King Father of the East, but even in his own section, he is also presented along with Queen Mother of the West. This arrangement seems to suggest that both deities are mutually dependent and stand complementarily as a united group. Both the Queen Mother and the King father reign in the eyes. The Queen Mother’s parish is in the right eye, whereas the King Father’s parish in the left eye. The wording of deng 等may refer to the distance from each eye to the center, but nevertheless it emphasizes the fundamental equalness between the Queen Mother and the King Father. They are concurrently present and both simultaneously functioning. These symmetrical placements do not establish oppositional hierarchies but instead reveal the body as a field of integrated polarity, where masculinity and femininity coexist rather than compete.

LZZJ furthers this notion of androgyny and co-existence in the following sections as well. The fourth section, though nominally it is dedicated to the Queen Mother, is also occasioned with mentions of the King Father.

夫人兩乳者，萬神之精氣，陰陽之津汋也。左乳下有日，右乳下有月，王父王母之宅也

(ibid., 1.3a5–3a7)

The human’s two breasts are the myriad spirits’ refined qi and the vital fluids of Yin and Yang. The sun dwells beneath the left breast, the moon beneath the right. [They are] the sacred abodes of the King Father and Queen Mother.

In this excerpt, the description is directed to a general pronoun ren 人, which, translated into gender terms, can refer to either male or female. It entails that the abode of the King Father is (beneath) the left breast and the abode of Queen Mother is (beneath) the right breast. Again, the two breasts are also gendered in line with the gendered eyes: the left breast as the symbol of masculinity and the right breast femininity. Even yin and yang are treated as gendered representatives, they are actually still manifestations of two cosmic forces within the human body. The cited paragraph actually shows both yin and yang are simultaneously present. It is only through this co-existence, as LZZJ suggests, the refined qi and the vital fluids can come home to the human body, and thus, human bodies become human bodies under the principle of androgyny and co-existence.

While the text structures the breasts as paired manifestations of yin and yang, this symmetry should not be mistaken for the disappearance of the feminine.7 The breasts remain primary symbols of nourishment, cyclicity, and vitality—attributes long associated with the maternal. The LZZJ positions the cosmic Father and Mother within them precisely because they embody sustaining creativity. In Daoist body cosmology, androgyny is not achieved through neutralization but through the intensification of such feminine capacities until they transcend biological sex. The feminine thus constitutes the very medium through which cixiongtongti—the coexistence of differentiated yet harmonized energies—is realized

The kidney is also a perfect example of the body of androgyny.

日月者，天之司徒、司空公也。主司天子人君之罪過，使太白辰星下治華陰、恒山。人亦有之，兩腎是也。左腎男，衣皂衣，右腎女，衣白衣，長九分，思之亦長三寸，爲日月之精，虚無之炁，人之根也

(ibid., 1.6a1–6a5)

The sun and moon are Heaven’s Ministers of Masses and Minister of Works. They oversee the transgressions of sovereigns and rulers, dispatching the White Star [Venus] and the Water Star [Mercury] below to govern below Huayin and Mount Heng. Likewise, humans embody this in the form of the two kidneys. The left kidney is male, clad in black robes; the right kidney is female, robed in white. Each measures nine fen (分) in length, yet in contemplation (si zhi 思之), they extend to three cun (寸). They are the essence of the sun and moon, the qi of emptiness and non-being, and the root of humans.

Accordingly, the direct residence of the sun and moon is actually in the kidney. This organ is viewed as the spring of life for all humans. Yet, at this root, two kidneys are also differently gendered. The left kidney is gendered as male, site of masculinity; the right kidney is termed as female, place of femininity.

Crucially, the LZZJ does not prescribe different practices or statuses based on the practitioner’s biological sex. Its instructions apply equally to men and women, as expressed in the phrase nannü ge santong (男女各三通, male and female each three times), affirming the universality of the body’s internal configuration regardless of external distinctions (ibid., 1.10a3). This absence of gender exclusivity indicates that the Daoist body is conceptualized not as an anatomically determined structure but as an energetically organized system. Within this framework, the division between masculine and feminine is neither ontological nor absolute but relational and situational—an aspect of the body’s capacity to differentiate without fragmenting.

Moreover, this internal organization of the body underscores two critical insights. First, it reveals that Daoism does not regard masculinity and femininity as natural properties assigned to particular bodies but as forces continuously changing within all bodies. Second, it demonstrates that androgyny, as envisioned here, is not the erasure of difference but the harmonious co-presence of multiple, differentiated potentials within a unified form. Such an understanding challenges modern frameworks that locate gender exclusively in external anatomy or social categorization. Instead, the Daoist model positions embodiment as inherently plural and layered, with identity emerging from the interplay of dynamic energies rather than from fixed biological or cultural definitions.

The feminist significance of this model lies precisely in its refusal to naturalize hierarchical difference. Whereas patriarchal systems often derive authority from associating masculine traits with superiority and feminine traits with subordination, Daoist body theory denies any stable grounding for such oppositions. Even when yin and yang are symbolically associated with feminine and masculine dimensions, their mutual embeddedness ensures that no trait can exist independently, let alone dominate. Furthermore, by positing the body as inherently androgynous, Daoism resists attempts to locate agency, virtue, or spiritual capacity within binary gendered terms. The practitioner’s path toward transformation and transcendence is open equally to all, rooted in an internal landscape where difference is generative rather than divisive.

This orientation towards androgyny also carries cosmological implications. The Daoist body mirrors the larger universe, where yin and yang continuously differentiate and recombine without final resolution into fixed states. The androgynous body is thus not an exception but the microcosmic reflection of cosmic processes: a living embodiment of the Dao’s generative capacity. Just as the cosmos thrives through the circulation of opposing-yet-integrated forces, so too does the human form sustain itself by maintaining balance within multiplicity. This correspondence reinforces Daoism’s rejection of dualistic thinking, situating embodiment within a broader framework of ontological interconnection that encompasses deities, celestial movements, vital energies, and human physiology.

4. After Androgyny: Transcending Male–Female Body Boundaries

If Daoist cosmology establishes the body as inherently androgynous—a site where yin and yang circulate symmetrically, generating multiplicity without hierarchy—Daoist cultivational practices extend this vision into lived experience. Through techniques of visualization, breathwork, energy circulation, and internal transformation, these practices enact the body’s latent plurality and reveal its capacity to transcend fixed categories of sex and gender. Rather than treating embodiment as a biologically determined fact, Daoist traditions frame it as a dynamic, performative process in which masculine and feminine potentials are activated, recombined, and reconfigured. In this way, cultivation does not simply mirror Daoist cosmology but realizes it materially, making visible the principle of androgyny within the practitioner’s own form. This section, after analyses of male pregnancy in both the myth of Laozi 老子and the inner alchemy (neidan 內丹), and the relatively later addition of female inner alchemy (nüdan 女丹), will present that what Daoist androgyny truly implies is a transformative and plastic body that on the one hand, enables traditionally female experience in a physically male body, and on the other hand, allows liminal male transformations in a physically female body.

In fact, according to Schipper (1993, p. 129), male pregnancy is a recurring motif in Daoism. According to the STNJJ, arguably a text of the Heavenly Master tradition during the fifth century, the commonly received Laozi actually is the result of double pregnancies.8 His second pregnancy is actually a self-pregnancy, in other words, a male pregnancy. In this scripture, Laozi is viewed as an avatar of Laojun 老君, who is present throughout historical periods but under different names and in different figures (DZ 1205 Santian neijie jing, 1.2b-3a). The first birth, in essence, is of theological nature. It takes place between the Jade Maiden of Mysterious Wonder Xuanmiao Yunü 玄妙玉女and the Laozi. The Yunü is the aggregation of three different qi, and in her body, the chaotic qi forms the body of Laozi. The second birth is perhaps of practical value. It enables this theological Laozi to blend in with the historical Laozi. This presentation also firmly introduces the theme of male pregnancy into practices of Daoism.

至殷武丁時，又反胎於李母。在胎中誦經八十一年，剖左腋而生，生而白首，又號爲老子。今世人有三台經者，是老子於胎中所誦者也。反胎於李母者，自以空虚身化作李母之形，還以自胞，非實有李母也。世人不知，謂老子託胎於李母，其實不然也

(ibid., 3b5–4a1)

By the time of King Wu Ding of the Shang dynasty, [Laozi] once again returned to the womb of Mother Li. While in the womb, he recited scriptures for eighty-one years, then was born through her left armpit, emerging with white hair—hence he was again called ‘Laozi’ (the Old Master). The Santai jing (三台經) that exists in the world today is what Laozi recited while in the womb. As for his “returning to the womb of Mother Li”, it was actually his own formless, empty body transforming into the appearance of Mother Li, then re-entering the womb—there was no real Mother Li. Ordinary people do not understand this and believe that Laozi was conceived within an actual Mother Li, but this is not the case.

This account dramatizes two critical insights. First, it demonstrates that for Daoist traditions, pregnancy is not restricted to bodies socially or biologically classified as female. Instead, gestation is imagined as a spiritual capacity latent within all practitioners, made possible through alignment with the cosmic rhythms of yin and yang. Second, it signals that boundaries between “male” and “female” bodies are not ontological divides but flexible configurations subject to transformation. In Laozi’s case, the body’s potential for pregnancy emerges not from fixed anatomy but from its participation in the dynamic processes that generate life across the cosmos. Moreover, there is real allusion to the carriage itself: eighty-one years in the womb. In this sense, the second birth resembles a true case of male pregnancy. Laozi, generally understood as occupying a biologically male body, turns into a feminine mother. Admittedly, the female experience of carriage is cleansed; nauseas, pains and physical damages that would accompany the pregnancy are kept outside the picture. Yet still, it creates the theme where the biologically male body is also fundamentally open to impregnation and female experience. Such a deployment is not a neutralization of the feminine but an affirmation that the creative principle of the Dao is expressed through female corporeality. When male adepts symbolically “become pregnant,” they are not appropriating or displacing the feminine; they are reenacting, within their own bodies, the cosmic potency epitomized by the maternal. The goal is not to erase sexual difference but to internalize its power—to recognize that the feminine principle of gestation (yun 孕) and nourishment (yang 養) is constitutive of all bodies. The self-pregnant Laozi firmly inscribes a transformative and fluid body of androgyny into the Daoist tradition.

Possibly, as Schipper famously argues (Schipper 1993, p. 129), this image of pregnant Laozi popularizes, if not inspires, diverse methods of the neidan.9 The central requirement of neidan is to form and nurture an embryo within the body by refining vital energies (jing 精), circulating breath (qi 氣), and stabilizing spirit (shen 神). These processes culminate in the symbolic gestation of a new, perfected self—an “immortal embryo” that is nurtured internally before being “born” into a higher state of existence. For male adepts, this technique requires inhabiting an experience conventionally coded as female, enacting pregnancy within their own bodies as an essential stage of spiritual attainment. In Jin Yunzhong’s 金允中 anthology of Daoist rituals and cultivational practices, Shangqing lingbao dafa 上清靈寶大法 (“Great Lingbao Method of the Shangqing Heaven”, DZ 1223), this practice revolving around nurturing the embryo is explicitly mentioned.10

仰惟元始祖炁，無形無名，劫運之初，不可髣髴。玄綱旣肇，二象分形，天禀此炁以爲天，地禀此炁以爲地，人禀此炁以爲人，以至動者、植者，立性卑形，莫非祖炁化生也。然人分此一炁而生，未免失此一炁而死，豈非情欲汨其内，勢利役其外，不知本源，不徹正理，神昏氣耗，不覺大限之臨，而終至迷亂無依，斯爲下鬼矣。今焉採祖炁而鍊結聖胎於身中，聖胎就而身外生身也。此一條大槩乃採鍊身中之祖炁，古書有其目而訣法未降，不可以意料而爲之説

(DZ 1223 Shangqing lingbao dafa, 5a4–5b4)

[We] reverently contemplate the Primal Ancestral Qi (元始祖炁)—formless and nameless, existing before the kalpas (cosmic cycles), beyond all comparison. When the Mystic Order (xuangang玄綱) first manifested, the Two Modes (erxiang二象, Yin and Yang) divided. Heaven received this Qi and became Heaven; Earth received this Qi and became Earth; humans received this Qi and became human. All things—moving and rooted, each with their nature and form—are born from the transformations of this Ancestral Qi. Yet though humans are endowed with this Qi at birth, they inevitably lose it at death. Is this not because inner passions cloud their spirit, and worldly pursuits enslave them externally? Ignorant of their origin and blind to the true principle, their spirit dims and their Qi dissipates. Unaware of life’s impermanence, they descend into confusion, becoming lost souls in the end. Now, the method lies in gathering this Ancestral Qi to refine and form a Sacred Embryo (shengtai 聖胎) within the body. Once the Sacred Embryo is perfected, a transcendent body emerges beyond the physical form. This path speaks of refining the Ancestral Qi within oneself. Ancient texts mention it, but the oral instructions (juefa 訣法) have not been fully transmitted. it cannot be grasped through speculation or explained arbitrarily.

Here, the Primal Ancestral Qi (元始祖炁) is the foundational energy that structures reality, from the macrocosm of Heaven and Earth to the microcosm of human existence. At its core, this passage offers worldview in which all forms—animate and inanimate—are temporary manifestations of this singular Qi. The text also warns the dissipation of Qi through worldly attachments and advocates its restoration through alchemical practice (refining the Sacred Embryo). Essentially, this process of forming the sacred embryo underscores a soteriological framework where liberation from mortality is achieved by returning to one’s primordial, undifferentiated state.

The philosophical implications of this practice are profound. Rather than associating pregnancy exclusively with biological reproduction, Daoist traditions reconceptualize gestation as a metaphysical process of transformation: the generation of a new mode of being from within. By guiding male practitioners to embody pregnancy, inner alchemy dismantles the naturalized alignment between gendered bodies and reproductive capacities. Pregnancy here is neither symbolic nor metaphorical; it involves concrete bodily techniques—regulating breath, cultivating warmth in the lower abdomen, and circulating refined energies—yet its meaning transcends biological determinism, presenting gestation as a shared potential of the human form. The fact that this path to transcendence demands that masculine bodies temporarily adopt a traditionally “feminine” mode of embodiment further underscores the Daoist rejection of rigid gender roles.

師曰：聖胎九轉，金之成數，形難隱諱，金光玉華，照耀一身。所謂金容玉貌，瓊肌瑶醴，沐溉一身，嘘呵萬物，立生金玉。吹炁成金，唾地成寶，百光千彩，映絡内外，皆由五行成用，金玉發胎，聖胎分形也

(DZ 1221 Shangqing lingbao dafa, 4.19b6–20a1)

The Master said: “The sacred embryo undergoes nine transmutations, corresponding to the complete number of Metal. Its form is difficult to conceal or disguise; golden light and jade radiance illuminate the whole body. This is what is called a ‘golden countenance and jade-like appearance,’ a body of alabaster skin nourished by celestial nectar, which bathes and irrigates the entire being, exhaling and inspiring to vivify the myriad things, establishing life in gold and jade. By blowing forth one’s vital breath, gold is produced; by spitting upon the ground, treasures are formed. Hundreds of rays and thousands of hues interweave and shine within and without—all arise through the operative efficacy of the Five Phases. From the interaction of Metal and Jade, the sacred embryo is generated and its form divided.”

Similarly, in another Shangqing lingbao dafa, edited by Wang Qizhen王契真, the practice of forming the sacred embryo is discussed in further details.11 This passage extends the vision of sacred embryo formation beyond the invisible interior of the adept’s body, describing the process through rich visual and material imagery. The nine rotations (jiuzhuan 九轉) mark the completion of cyclical transmutation, corresponding to the full activation of the Five Phases (wuxing 五行). What begins as a formless condensation of primordial qi culminates in the emergence of a radiant androgynous form—“golden and jade,” a coupling of masculine solidity and feminine luminosity. The text’s repeated conjunction of “gold” (yang-associated, structured, exterior) and “jade” (yin-associated, fluid, interior) expresses cixiongtongti not as an abstract unity, but as a dynamic synthesis where differentiated energies continually give rise to one another. The shengtai 聖胎, therefore, is not merely a product of internal gestation but the material manifestation of balanced yin–yang integration—an embodied realization of the androgynous body. In this sense, Shangqing lingbao dafa transforms metaphysical complementarity into visible transfiguration: the adept’s body becomes both male and female, luminous and solid, generative and reflective.

This imagery also resonates with the Daoist valorization of feminine generativity, which contemporary scholarship increasingly recognizes as central to Daoist soteriology. Recent feminist readings of Daoist cultivation emphasize precisely this reciprocity of gendered forces as a model of non-hierarchical embodiment. The “golden light and jade radiance” may thus be understood as a textual dramatization of nannü gongsheng 男女共生, the co-creative coexistence of male and female energies. By making the sacred embryo the locus where the masculine and feminine fuse without erasure, the scripture provides one of the clearest ritual realizations of the Daoist ontology of cixiongtongti: difference becomes the very medium through which transcendence is achieved.

Female practitioners, meanwhile, developed parallel but distinct techniques within female alchemy (nüdan 女丹), which emerged as a specialized branch of Daoist cultivation during the late imperial period (Despeux and Kohn 2003; Valussi 2008; X. Liu 2009; Esposito 2016). In the nüdan category, the women’s essence is taken as xue 血 (blood), whereas the men’s essence is jing 精 (semen). For the xue to beome qi that can be used to form the embryo, women need more careful efforts compared to the first stage in male alchemy (nandan 男丹, the usual internal alchemy). The center of qi in the female body is taken to be at the breast, hence, a lot of methods involve specific instructions on massaging the breasts. In the Xiwangmu nüxiu zhengtu shize 西王母女修正途十則 (9b), the sixth precept is devoted to the permitted practice on the breast.12

若曰女修正途第六則，題曰 “乳房”。蓋言乳房上通心肺之津液，下澈血海之真汁。煉得乳房如處女小兒形，便是女換男體。

The sixth principle of female cultivation is titled “The Breasts”. This teaches that the breasts connect above to the vital fluids of the heart and lungs, and below to the true essence of the “Sea of Blood” (xuehai 血海, uterus). When through refinement, the breasts take on the form of a young maiden’s or a child’s, this marks the transformation of the female body into a male one.13

This passage highlights the key role of the breasts in the female alchemy. It is a central hub that ensures the transportational channel inside the female body. Through targeted massage, breath regulation, and energy circulation, female adepts are instructed to “refine the breasts” until they return to the form of a maiden or child. These techniques exemplify the Daoist logic of embodied transformation: the coordinated movement of breath (xi 息), intention (yi 意), and internal qi facilitates the ascent and descent of vital substances between the heart, lungs, and the “Sea of Blood” (xuehai 血海). This cyclic flow activates the mutual generation of yin and yang energies, enabling transformation without severing the body’s feminine generative foundation. In this sense, breast cultivation does not negate femininity but mobilizes it as the energetic medium through which cixiongtongti—the coexistence of differentiated yet harmonized forces—is realized in practice.14 Symbolically, this regression signals a passage beyond reproductive difference, restoring the body to a primordial state in which masculine and feminine energies coexist without fixed roles. Bodies are not inherently male-gendered or female-gendered, but aggregations of transformative forces that can be driven either into the male end or the female end. In this sense, the fundamental model of nüdan is still this singular body of androgyny. Only with this departing premise, can women freely transform into men, albeit with numerous difficulties.

Yet this transformative process should not be mistaken as contradicting the Daoist ontology of cixiongtongti. The female adept’s passage from “female to male” does not signify a hierarchy between the two genders but actualizes the androgynous principle in lived practice. In Daoist cosmology, male and female are not ontological endpoints but alternating configurations of the same vital qi. The nüdan technique thus serves to restore the body to its primordial androgynous condition—a body in which yin and yang coexist dynamically rather than as opposites. While the outer imagery of “becoming male” may appear to privilege the masculine, its inner meaning lies in neutralizing sexual differentiation and returning to the unity of yuanqi 元炁, a process consistent with the metaphysics of cixiongtongti. From this perspective, nüdan re-enacts the cosmological integration already articulated in Daoist body theory: transformation between genders is not subordination, but a performative realization of the body’s inherent dual capacity.

Nevertheless, scholars have debated whether nüdan inadvertently reinforces gender hierarchies. Gong (2009, p. 114) and Valussi (2009), for example, cautions that its discourse sometimes privileges the “male body” as the norm for transcendence, thereby reproducing the symbolic dominance of yang. Yet, as Geng (2025) implies, it is also a meaningful corrective intervention within the male-dominated alchemical canon, asserting female agency through an alternative path toward immortality. The tension between these readings underscores the complex negotiation between hierarchy and transcendence in Daoist practice. Rather than erasing difference, nüdan dramatizes the paradox of Daoist androgyny—where liberation requires passing through, rather than abolishing, sexual distinction. In this sense, the female adept’s transformation embodies not submission to the masculine, but the return to a pre-dual state that transcends all hierarchies, fully aligning with the Daoist vision of cixiongtongti as coexistence without domination. Thus, even when nüdan practice speaks of “female-to-male transformation,” the process remains anchored in female corporeality. The transformation does not deny the womb, blood, or breast as feminine; it channels their energies toward a re-integration of yin and yang. The feminine here is not subsumed but universalized—its generative logic becomes the cosmological model for all bodies.

The complementary structure of neidan and nüdan practices further demonstrates how Daoist cultivation enacts nannü gongsheng as coexistence through differentiation. In neidan, the male adept reverses the direction of jing 精 and conceives the shengtai 聖胎 (sacred embryo) through the cyclical movement of breath and essence, transforming solidity into gestation. In nüdan, by contrast, the female adept refines xue 血 (blood) into qi 氣 through the oscillation between the breasts and the lower “Sea of Blood” (xuehai 血海), converting interior circulation into ascent. The two processes are thus inversely structured yet mutually illuminating: neidan internalizes the feminine potential of nurture, while nüdan exteriorizes the masculine potential of refinement. Both hinge on rhythmic alternation between containment and release, integration and differentiation, revealing the Daoist body as a living field where polarity generates harmony. This reciprocity makes visible the ontological foundation of cixiongtongti: neither male nor female represents completion alone; only their continuous interdependence sustains transformation.

It should be noted this masculinization entailed in the transformation of a nühuan nanti (女換男體) is not about erasing female identity or elevating masculinity as superior. Rather, it enacts the principle that the body’s configuration is plastic, capable of shifting across gendered expressions as part of a broader pursuit of energetic balance. By reorganizing the body’s internal flows, nüdan techniques affirm that no practitioner is bound by the limitations of their assigned anatomy. Masculine and feminine are not fixed traits but emergent states within a continuous field of transformation, accessible to all bodies regardless of social or biological categorization.

Together, these practices—Laozi’s self-pregnancy, male gestation in neidan, and female transformations in nüdan—reveal a coherent Daoist vision of embodiment that is both fluid and participatory. The body is neither passively shaped by external forces nor confined by internal essences; it is an active site where cosmic rhythms are enacted and reconfigured through intentional practice. Cultivation, in this sense, does not simply align the body with Daoist cosmology but performs it, making visible the androgynous nature of human existence. This performative dimension also reframes Daoist cultivation as a critique of naturalized hierarchies and essentialized difference. By assigning male practitioners the “feminine” experience of pregnancy and guiding female practitioners toward “masculine” configurations of energy, these techniques destabilize binary associations between gender, anatomy, and spiritual capacity. No body is inherently more suited to transformation; all bodies contain the potentials of both yin and yang, and mastery lies in learning to circulate and harmonize these forces rather than privileging one over the other. From this perspective, Daoist cultivation embodies an egalitarianism that operates not at the level of social prescription but at the level of ontology itself.

This vision aligns closely with the Daoist ideal of nannü gongsheng (男女共生 male-female co-existence), which rejects the necessity of hierarchical dualism without collapsing difference into sameness.15 In practice, nannü gongsheng is neither an abstraction nor an ethical imperative imposed from above; it is enacted through embodied techniques that reveal the interdependence of both the masculine and feminine within each practitioner. Cultivation becomes a process of inhabiting multiple states simultaneously, dissolving the rigid distinctions that underpin patriarchal systems while sustaining the diversity necessary for harmony. At the same time, these practices complicate ecofeminist interpretations of Daoism by demonstrating that the tradition does not simply elevate “feminine” principles such as yielding or receptivity in opposition to masculine dominance. Instead, Daoist cultivation requires practitioners to integrate both dimensions into a unified, interdependent whole. Male adepts must embrace traditionally “feminine” roles; female adepts adopt “masculine” techniques; and both are invited to experience the dissolution of boundaries between male and female embodiment. Rather than reversing hierarchies, Daoism transcends them, revealing that the true goal is not valorizing yin over yang or nature over culture but achieving balance through co-generative differentiation.

The interplay between neidan and nüdan thus concretely realizes the Daoist principle of nannü gongsheng. In both traditions, cultivation depends on the mutual activation of yin and yang within a single body: men must internalize the feminine potential of gestation and nurturing, while women must awaken the masculine potential of refinement and ascent. These reciprocal movements illustrate that difference is indispensable for completion; neither pole can attain transformation without the other. Texts such as the Shangqing lingbao dafa and Xiwangmu nüxiu zhengtu shize explicitly describe this balance through paired practices of gathering, nourishing, and refining qi. Rather than establishing opposition between male and female, these methods stage their coexistence as a dynamic process of mutual generation. In this sense, nannü gongsheng names the lived performance of cixiongtongti: an embodied equality achieved through differentiation, not through sameness. In fact, The ontological vision of cixiongtongti does not imply a mere oscillation between male and female states, nor a synthesis that erases their difference. Rather, it describes a mode of existence in which the polarity itself becomes fluid—each pole continually arising within and through the other. Daoist androgyny thus transcends the binary not by abolishing it but by rendering its boundaries permeable, allowing all forms of life to participate in a rhythm of mutual generation. In this respect, the Daoist body is not “male becoming female” or “female becoming male” per se, but the site of ceaseless exchange where the difference that divides is also what sustains coexistence.

By foregrounding embodiment as a site of transformation, Daoist cultivation offers critical resources for feminist thought. It challenges the assumption that biological sex determines spiritual capacity, destabilizes binary associations between anatomy and identity, and envisions gender as a spectrum of performative possibilities rather than a fixed set of roles. Moreover, it offers a model of embodied equality that avoids the pitfalls of liberal sameness while rejecting the dominance of one gendered configuration over another. In this way, Daoist practices extend the philosophical insights of yinyang cosmology into the domain of lived experience, making the androgynous body not only a conceptual possibility but a practical reality.

In revealing the body as a site where cosmic rhythms are materially enacted, Daoist cultivation thus bridges metaphysics and embodiment, philosophy and practice. It demonstrates that the Daoist vision of androgyny is not an abstract metaphor but a transformative orientation toward existence itself. Through techniques that reorganize bodily flows, dissolve rigid identities, and activate latent potentials, practitioners engage the body as a microcosmic Dao, continuously differentiated yet fundamentally whole. In doing so, Daoist traditions unsettle entrenched assumptions about sex, gender, and embodiment, offering instead a framework in which bodies are fluid, relational, and infinitely capable of becoming otherwise. In a broader philosophical sense, such a view of the body as dynamically transformative and energetically continuous also resonates with certain discussions in global feminist phenomenology and philosophy of embodiment, which similarly question fixed corporeal boundaries and emphasize lived material processes. Yet, the Daoist model remains distinctive in situating transformation not in social performativity but in the ontological circulation of qi, through which the body itself becomes a cosmological field of becoming.

5. Conclusions

This paper has re-examined Daoist philosophy and cultivational practices through a feminist lens, proposing the concept of “the body of androgyny” as a critical framework for understanding Daoist thought on gender and embodiment. Building upon feminist insights into embodiment and relational ontology, this study has explored how Daoist philosophy articulates an alternative vision of gender through the concept of cixiongtongti and its practical manifestations in neidan and nüdan. Rather than opposing feminist theory, the Daoist model extends its concern with non-hierarchical relationality into the cosmological dimension, where coexistence becomes the very condition of equality. As demonstrated through the practices of neidan and nüdan, this interdependence is materially enacted as nannü gongsheng—the coordinated coexistence of male and female energies whose reciprocal movement sustains transformation within the practitioner’s body. Our analysis unfolded in three steps. First, we revisited Daoist yinyang metaphysics to challenge essentialist interpretations that equate yin with “women” and yang with “men.” Drawing on classical texts such as the Daodejing and Zhuangzi, we showed that yin and yang function as relational and transformative forces rather than as stable essences, dissolving hierarchical oppositions and grounding identity in processes of mutual generation. Second, we turned to Daoist religious texts, particularly the LZZJ to explore how the human body is envisioned as a microcosm inhabited by masculine and feminine dimensions in balance. Through these mappings, Daoist thought imagines embodiment as inherently plural, integrating difference into a harmonized whole. Finally, we examined Daoist cultivational practices, including inner alchemy (neidan) and female alchemy (nüdan), to show how metaphors in cultivaltional methods such as male pregnancy and energy transformation performatively enact the body’s androgynous potential and dissolve fixed boundaries between male and female embodiment.

Taken together, these analyses reveal that Daoism contributes a distinctive ontology of gender grounded in the principle of nannü gongsheng. Rather than privileging one pole over the other or collapsing difference into sameness, Daoist thought imagines equality as the sustained interdependence of differentiated forces. Embodiment, in this framework, is not a fixed biological or social identity but a dynamic field of transformation, always plural and always becoming. This theoretical insight enriches ongoing feminist debates about embodiment and difference. While Daoist ideas resonate with contemporary feminist and queer theories that emphasize performativity, multiplicity, and fluidity, they do so through a cosmological logic distinct from Western frameworks. Daoism situates gender within broader patterns of cosmic interrelation, offering a model in which identity emerges through the circulation of complementary forces rather than through oppositional binaries. By approaching Daoism on its own terms, this paper highlights its potential to expand global feminist discourse and invites further dialogue between non-Western philosophies and contemporary theories of embodiment.

Taken together, these analyses reveal that Daoism contributes a distinctive ontology of gender grounded in the principle of nannü gongsheng—embodied in both textual cosmology and cultivational practice—where equality arises from the continual coexistence of differentiated forces. Thus, Daoism offers more than a critique of binary models of gender; it provides a positive alternative grounded in balance, reciprocity, and interdependence. Through its vision of the androgynous body, Daoist thought challenges us to rethink embodiment as dynamic, relational, and open-ended—a continuous process of becoming rather than a fixed state of being. Methodologically, this study demonstrates that the ontology of cixiongtongti can be verified across both textual metaphors and embodied practices, revealing a consistent Daoist vision of gender coexistence that evolves from philosophical speculation to ritual and alchemical enactment.