Yuánshǐ tiānzūn shuō shēngtiān dédào jīng 元始天尊說生天得道經
Scripture Spoken by Yuánshǐ Tiānzūn on Rising to Heaven and Attaining the Way
anonymous short Táng dàshèng 大乘 Daoist scripture in two folios, preserved in the Zhèngtǒng Dàozàng 正統道藏 (DZ 0024 / CT 24), 洞真部 本文類
About the work
A compact two-folio Daoist scripture pronounced by Yuánshǐ tiānzūn 元始天尊, composed in the standard dàshèng 大乘 (“Greater Vehicle”) style of Mahāyāna-Daoist Táng scripture. The text functions as a short summary of the central inner-cultivation practices of the ShàngqīngLíngbǎo tradition: the circulation of the Tàihé zhēnqì 太和眞氣 (“Harmonious True-Breath”) and the practice of nèiguān 內觀 (“interior vision / inner contemplation”), together supplying the adept with the means of ascending (shēngtiān 升天) to the heavens and attaining the Dào. The text closes with the standard efficacy-promise: those who recite the scripture will be protected by the gods of the Three Realms and delivered from the postmortem fate of hungry-ghosts.
Prefaces
No prefaces in the source. Both folios carry only the text proper between opening and closing title-lines.
Abstract
The scripture is anonymous and undated. Its recitation is already attested in an inscription dated 980 (Jīnshí cuìbiān 金石萃編 125.19b; see Piet van der Loon, Taoist Books in the Libraries of the Sung Period, Ithaca Press, 1984, p. 100 for the Bìshū shěng 秘書省 Sòng-state-library listing). This fixes the terminus ante quem at 980, while the Táng style and vocabulary place the composition within the seventh-through-tenth centuries. John Lagerwey, in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004) 1:556–557 (§2.B.7.a.3), assigns the text to the Táng. The frontmatter brackets composition notBefore 618 (opening of the Táng) / notAfter 980 (first documented recitation), with dynasty 唐.
The scripture enjoyed a distinguished Sòng liturgical career: its recitation is prescribed in the Sòng liturgical manuals of the Huánglù zhāi 黃籙齋 and related soul-salvation rites, e.g. [[KR5a0508|DZ 508 Wúshàng huánglù dàzhāi lìchéng yí 無上黃籙大齋立成儀]] 12.2b, [[KR5a1221|DZ 1221 Shàngqīng língbǎo dàfǎ 上清靈寶大法]] 55.31b, and [[KR5a1224|DZ 1224 Dàomén dìngzhì 道門定制]] 5.7b, where it is deployed as part of the funerary and soul-deliverance programme. No author is attributed.
Translations and research
No complete translation, but a partial study is in Livia Kohn’s Daoist Body Cultivation: Traditional Models and Contemporary Practices (Three Pines Press, 2006), treating the nèiguān tradition into which DZ 24 belongs. Standard scholarly entry: John Lagerwey, “Yuanshi tianzun shuo shengtian dedao jing,” in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 1 §2.B.7.a.3, 556–557. On nèiguān 內觀 and tàihé zhēnqì 太和眞氣 practice: Livia Kohn, Sitting in Oblivion: The Heart of Daoist Meditation (Three Pines, 2010).
Other points of interest
The scripture is one of the shortest and most-recited of the Táng dàshèng Daoist scriptures, forming — together with [[KR5a0019|DZ 19 Shēngxuán xiāozāi hùmìng miàojīng]] and [[KR5a0020|DZ 20 Sānguāng zhùlíng zīfú yánshòu miàojīng]] — the core of the Táng “short scripture for soul-deliverance” cluster that became foundational in the Sòng liturgical programme.
Links
- Kanseki Repository KR5a0024
- Schipper & Verellen, The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 1 §2.B.7.a.3, 556–557 — DZ 24 entry (John Lagerwey).