ABSTRACT
D aoist biographies can be seen to have the purpose of advertising the religion to outsiders. This is outlined in the Shenxian zhuan preface, which
explains the need for this collection of "Biographies of Immortals" by referring to the question of whether, in the past, there really were human beings who had become immortals. The preface then explains that knowledge of people who had turned into immortals is rare because they lived in seclusion and did not share the habits of their generation. Not one in a thousand, it claims, is known to the outside world. l From this one may conclude that the main purpose of Daoist biographies was to document the transformation of men or women into immortals; in Judith Boltz's2 terms, their purpose was mainly commemorative. She adds the adjective "didactic", but they are clearly preparatory or introductory in nature. As Benjamin Penny has pointed out/ Daoist hagiography while telling its readers or listeners that they can become immortals does not go into detail regarding how this is to be achieved. Recipes, techniques and the other nitty-gritty aspects of everyday religious practice are left to another, no doubt more esoteric or interior, set of scriptures.
