Lónghǔ shǒujiàn tú 龍虎手鑑圖
Diagram of the Hand-Mirror of the Dragon and the Tiger
Anonymous Táng-or-Sòng nèidān 內丹 chart-text, five folios, preserved in the Zhèngtǒng Dàozàng 正統道藏 (DZ 0153 / CT 153 = TC 153), 洞真部 靈圖類
About the work
A short, anonymous five-folio nèidān 內丹 (“inner alchemy”) commentary built around a single diagram opening the text — a cosmic compass that correlates the eight trigrams of the Yìjīng 易經 with the denary cycle of the calendar. Texts in the centre and around the perimeter of the diagram use alchemical equivalences to refer to the fusion of mercury with iron through the agency of fire. The treatise is preserved in the Zhèngtǒng Dàozàng 正統道藏 (DZ 0153 / CT 153 = TC 153), 洞真部 靈圖類. The work belongs to the Zhōuyì cāntóng qì 周易參同契 commentarial tradition: its first part takes brief glosses from the opening of the Cāntóng qì (mentioning Wèi Bóyáng 魏伯陽, the traditional author, and Xú Cóngshì 徐從事, said to be responsible for its transmission; cf. [[KR5c1005|DZ 1005 Zhōuyì cāntóng qì fāhuī]] 9.15b–21a and Fukui Kojun, “Chōeki Sandōkei,” 23–24), and its concluding section consists of short heptasyllabic verses, each titled with a two-character alchemical term and explaining it; these verses recall those in [[KR5c1003|DZ 1003 Zhōuyì cāntóng qì dǐngqì gēmíng jīng tú]] by Péng Xiǎo 彭曉 (fl. 947), but are simpler in form.
Prefaces
No preface in the source.
Abstract
There is no indication of authorship and no preface. Pauline Bentley Koffler, in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004) 2:706 (§3.A.1, Philosophy / Commentaries on the Cāntóng qì), identifies the work as a brief Cāntóng-qì-derived treatise, but does not commit to a specific date. The simpler verse form than Péng Xiǎo’s (DZ 1003) and the absence of nèidān technical innovations beyond the Cāntóng qì framework suggest a Late Táng to Northern Sòng date; the catalog meta dates it to the Táng. The frontmatter brackets composition notBefore 700 / notAfter 1100 to encompass the Late Táng – Northern Sòng Cāntóng qì commentarial milieu.
Translations and research
No full translation. Standard scholarly entry: Pauline Bentley Koffler, “Longhu shoujian tu,” in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 2 §3.A.1, 706. On the Cāntóng qì commentarial corpus see Fabrizio Pregadio, The Seal of the Unity of the Three: A Study and Translation of the Cantong qi (Mountain View: Golden Elixir Press, 2011); Fukui Kojun 福井康順, “Chōeki Sandōkei kō” 周易參同契考, Tōyō shisō kenkyū 1 (1937): 23–24.
Links
- Kanseki Repository KR5a0154
- Schipper & Verellen, The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 2 §3.A.1, 706.