Do you know the three Taoist fairy mountains named after people? The last fairy mountain is very regrettable!

Do you know the three Taoist fairy mountains named after people? 

Taoism is a native religion in China. As one of the three pillars of traditional Chinese culture, Taoism has had a huge impact on the daily lives and values of Chinese people. Even some famous mountains and great rivers are named after the names or surnames of Taoist immortals. Among these fairy mountains, the most famous ones are the following three.

First is Mount Huangshan. Mount Huangshan is not yellow, and it is not even close to yellow. This can be proved from the original name of Mount Huangshan, Yishan. "Yi" means black. In fact, the peaks and rocks of Mount Huangshan are indeed bluish-black. Then why is it still called Mount Huangshan?

The "yellow" in Mount Huangshan is not actually a color reference but represents the Yellow Emperor. Legend has it that the Yellow Emperor collected herbs and refined elixirs on Yishan. After the elixir was completed, he ascended to heaven. When the Yellow Emperor ascended, a divine dragon descended from the sky, and the Yellow Emperor rode on the dragon and left. When the ministers under the Yellow Emperor saw this, they all climbed onto the dragon's back. However, those officials with lower statuses, because they were too far away, by the time they ran over, the dragon had already flown up. These people had to hold onto the dragon's beard. The dragon's beard couldn't bear the weight and broke and fell off. These poor minor officials all fell to their deaths. This is the origin of the idiom "clinging to the powerful and the influential." Later generations renamed Yishan as Mount Huangshan to commemorate the Yellow Emperor.

The famous Taoist mountain Maoshan not far from Mount Huangshan was also renamed because of Taoist priests. Maoshan was originally called Juqu Mountain, also known as Difei Mountain, and it is one of the Taoist blessed lands. The reason why Juqu Mountain was renamed Maoshan is that the Three Lords of Mao practiced on Juqu Mountain. The Three Lords of Mao are three immortals revered in Taoism: Mao Ying, Mao Gu, and Mao Zhong. After the three brothers achieved success in cultivation, the Supreme Lord Laozi ordered the envoys of the Five Emperors to hold festival batons and confer the honor of nine gifts. He appointed Mao Ying as the True Lord of Destiny Control, Mao Gu as the True Lord of Fixing Records, and Mao Zhong as the True Lord of Protecting Life. Fortune, prosperity, and longevity are what Chinese people pay the most attention to. Since the Three Lords of Mao are in charge of these functions, ordinary people naturally sincerely believe in them. So the people at the foot of Juqu Mountain built temples to worship the Three Lords of Mao. Under the protection of the Three Lords of Mao, the local area had favorable weather, without disasters such as floods, droughts, diseases, locust plagues. Therefore, people at that time called Juqu Mountain Maoshan.

Later, Maoshan became the base of the Shangqing Sect. Tao Hongjing, the ninth patriarch of the Shangqing Sect, preached in Maoshan for a long time. Due to Tao Hongjing's huge influence, later generations used the term Maoshan Sect to refer to the Shangqing Sect. Maoshan Taoists once became synonymous with Taoists.

There is also a famous mountain that is also named after the name of a Taoist immortal. This is Mount Lushan. The "Nanshan" in Tao Yuanming's poem "Picking chrysanthemums under the eastern fence, leisurely looking at Nanshan" is Mount Lushan. Mount Lushan was originally called Nanzhang Mountain. The name of Mount Lushan comes from the Taoist immortal Kuang Su. Legend has it that the seven brothers of Kuang Su built huts on Mount Lushan for cultivation and repeatedly refused the emperor's invitations to leave the mountain. Later, when people found their thatched huts again, they found no trace of people. It turned out that the brothers of Kuang Su had already achieved success in cultivation and left. Since then, people have renamed Nanzhang Mountain as Mount Lushan.

Mount Lushan was also a Taoist holy land before and was the eighth small cave heaven and forty-seventh blessed land in Taoism. Ge Hong, a famous Taoist priest in the Eastern Jin Dynasty, once refined elixirs here. Lu Xiujing, a three-cave mage, preached in Mount Lushan for seven years, making Taoism flourish on Mount Lushan. Nowadays, there are naturally sporadic existences of Taoism. However, its momentum is far inferior to that of Buddhism. The Jianji Temple, the largest Taoist temple in the Southern Dynasties, has returned to simplicity and silence, while the Donglin Temple, the ancestral court of Pure Land Buddhism, has a prosperous incense. As time passes and the world changes.

Most famous mountains are occupied by monks. There are only a few famous mountains where Taoism is extremely prosperous, such as Maoshan, Longhu Mountain, and Wudang Mountain. Maoshan is named after people. Longhu Mountain is named because when Zhang Tianshi refined elixirs, there were dragons and tigers guarding him. As for Wudang, it comes from the saying in Taoism that "only Zhenwu is worthy of it." When we travel to these famous mountains and appreciate their beautiful scenery, will we think of the Taoist cultural connotations behind them?

People use it every day without realizing it. This is "Tao."