Tàishàng dòngzhēn níngshén xiūxíng jīng jué 太上洞真凝神修行經訣
Instructions from the Book of Practising Concentration of the Spirit in the Canon of the Cavern of Truth of the Most High
Anonymous late-Sòng or early-Yuán nèidān poem, copied in the same Dàozàng fascicle as [[KR5a0139|DZ 138 Xuéxiān biànzhēn jué]].
About the work
A four-folio anonymous nèidān 內丹 (“inner alchemy”) poem in seven-character verse, preserved in the Zhèngtǒng Dàozàng 正統道藏 (DZ 0139 / CT 139 = TC 139), 洞真部 玉訣類. The poem is an abridged version of [[KR5a0270|DZ 270 Pòmí zhèngdào gē]] 破迷正道歌 (“Song for Smashing Delusion and Setting Right the Way”), which is itself attributed to Zhōnglí Quán 鍾離權. The verses unfold the standard inner-alchemy programme — the rejection of “side gates” (傍門), the distinction of xiāntiān 先天 from hòutiān 後天 qì, the “lifting and reducing” (抽添) of yīnyáng fire-phases, the union of kǎn 坎 and lí 離 in the central crucible, the formation of the elixir as a shǔ zhū 黍珠 (“millet pearl”), and a nine-year “facing the wall” (面壁九年) culminating in the final ascent of the perfected immortal.
Prefaces
No preface in the source; the text opens directly with the poem.
Abstract
According to Farzeen Baldrian-Hussein in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004) 2:817 (§3.A.4, Nèidān and Yǎngshēng), the present text is an abridged recension of [[KR5a0270|DZ 270 Pòmí zhèngdào gē]], whose verses Zhōnglí Quán is reputed to have composed. The poem is unattributed and undated, but its lexicon — its hostility to “three-thousand-six-hundred side methods” (三千六百傍門法), its alignment with the “Wùzhēn piān group” 悟真篇 of nèidān affiliated with Zhāng Bóduān 張伯端 and the early Southern Lineage, its insistence on xiāntiān zhī qì 先天之氣 as the operative substrate of the work — locates it firmly within the late-Sòng / early-Yuán nèidān milieu. The frontmatter brackets composition notBefore 1200 / notAfter 1280.
Translations and research
No full translation. Standard scholarly entry: Farzeen Baldrian-Hussein, “Taishang dongzhen ningshen xiuxing jingjue,” in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 2 §3.A.4, 817. On the Pòmí zhèngdào gē tradition see Isabelle Robinet, Introduction à l’alchimie intérieure taoïste (Paris: Cerf, 1995).
Links
- Kanseki Repository KR5a0140
- Schipper & Verellen, The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 2 §3.A.4, 817.