Tàishàng shēngxuán xiāozāi hùmìng miàojīng 太上昇玄消災護命妙經
Marvellous Scripture of the Most High Ascent to Mystery, Averting Calamity and Protecting Life
anonymous early-Táng two-folio short doctrinal scripture, attested in Dūnhuáng manuscripts of the seventh–eighth century and widely transmitted through the Sòng; preserved in the Zhèngtǒng Dàozàng 正統道藏 (DZ 0019 / CT 19), 洞真部 本文類
About the work
A compact two-folio scripture on the paradoxical non-duality of emptiness and phenomenal appearance. From the Wǔmíng gōng 五明宮 (“Palace of the Fivefold Brightness”) in the Seven-Jewel Forest (Qībǎo lín 七寶林), Yuánshǐ tiānzūn 元始天尊 emits a ray of light illumining the misery of all beings submerged in the Àihé 愛河 (“River of Attachment”) and the Yùhǎi 慾海 (“Sea of Desire”). He exhorts them to grasp the scripture’s central doctrinal claim: zhī kōng bù zhēn, zhī sè bù xiàng 知空不眞、知色不相 — “Those who know that vacuity is not unreal and that perceptible reality is not mere appearance are enlightened, and have even begun to penetrate the marvellous sounds.” The scripture closes with the promise that a host of protective gods will attend those who recite it — the text thus coupling a sophisticated doctrinal statement with a classically prophylactic liturgical function.
Prefaces
No prefaces in the source Daozang recension. An imperial preface composed by Sòng emperor Zhēnzōng 真宗 (r. 997–1022) is, however, preserved in the Yúnjí qīqiān 雲笈七籤 122.16a–b — not in our DZ text. The Daozang recension omits it, presenting the scripture bare of surrounding apparatus.
Abstract
The scripture is anonymous and undated in the received text. John Lagerwey, in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004) 1:554 (§2.B.7.a.3, “Short Doctrinal and Prophylactic Texts”), dates it to the first century of the Táng on the basis of its language and argumentation, and notes two undated Dūnhuáng manuscripts of the text catalogued by Ōfuchi Ninji, Tonkō Dōkyō: Mokurokuhen 敦煌道經：目錄篇 (Fukubu shoten, 1978), at pp. 315–316. The frontmatter accordingly brackets the composition notBefore 618 (opening of the Táng) / notAfter 712 (an upper bound encompassing the presumed Dūnhuáng-manuscript transmission), with dynasty 唐.
The scripture has enjoyed an unusually long and distinguished afterlife. Dù Guāngtíng 杜光庭 (850–933) records a gǎnyìng miracle associated with its recitation (see Franciscus Verellen, “Evidential Miracles in Support of Taoism: The Inversion of a Buddhist Apologetic Tradition in Late Tang China,” T’oung Pao 78, 1992, 237). The Sòng emperor Zhēnzōng’s preface in YJQQ 122 and his patronage of the scripture’s recitation formalised its official standing; its recitation formed part of the celebration of the Huánglù zhāi 黃籙齋 during the Sòng (cf. [[KR5a0508|DZ 508 Wúshàng huánglù dàzhāi lìchéng yí 無上黃籙大齋立成儀]] 12.2a and [[KR5a1224|DZ 1224 Dàomén dìngzhì 道門定制]] 5.6a). Three extant commentaries attest the scripture’s continuing scholarly attention: [[KR5a0101|DZ 101 Tàishàng shēngxuán xiāozāi hùmìng miàojīng zhù 太上昇玄消災護命妙經註]] by Lǐ Dàochún 李道純 (late Sòng–early Yuán); [[KR5a0100|DZ 100 Tàishàng shēngxuán xiāozāi shuō hùmìng miàojīng 太上昇玄消災說護命妙經]] by Wáng Jiè 王玠 (Yuán); and [[KR5a0312|DZ 312 Tàishàng shēngxuán xiāozāi hùmìng miàojīng sòng 太上昇玄消災護命妙經頌]] by Zhāng Bó 張伯.
No author is attributed; no persons are listed in the catalog meta.
Translations and research
A partial study and discussion is in Franciscus Verellen, “Evidential Miracles in Support of Taoism,” T’oung Pao 78 (1992), 217–263, esp. 237, treating Dù Guāngtíng’s Sòng recension of the scripture’s efficacy-miracle. Livia Kohn, The Taoist Experience: An Anthology (SUNY Press, 1993), treats the short doctrinal-prophylactic Táng Daoist scripture corpus more generally, providing context for DZ 19. Standard scholarly entry: John Lagerwey, “Taishang shengxuan xiaozai huming miaojing,” in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 1 §2.B.7.a.3, 554.
Other points of interest
The scripture’s doctrinal couplet zhī kōng bù zhēn, zhī sè bù xiàng has become a classic locus of the Táng Daoist-Buddhist doctrinal conversation on the non-duality of emptiness and form — a Daoist reply, in compact scriptural form, to the Mādhyamika doctrine of śūnyatā that was then being re-translated and re-expounded under the Xuánzàng 玄奘 and Yì Xíng 義行 schools. The scripture’s unusual editorial career — short enough to be a single-folio devotional charm, dense enough to carry three substantial commentaries, and distinguished enough to attract an imperial preface — makes it one of the most-cited short Táng Daoist scriptures of the Sòng and Yuán.
Links
- Kanseki Repository KR5a0019
- Schipper & Verellen, The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 1 §2.B.7.a.3, 554 — DZ 19 entry (John Lagerwey).