Língbǎo zìrán jiǔtiān shēngshén sānbǎo dàyǒu jīnshū 靈寶自然九天生神三寶大有金書
Golden Writing from the Dàyǒu [Palace] of the Three Treasures, on the Spontaneous Life-Spirits of the Nine Heavens of the Língbǎo Tradition
Anonymous late-fourth-century Língbǎo 靈寶 cosmogonic-and-stanza scripture, nine folios, preserved in the Zhèngtǒng Dàozàng 正統道藏 (DZ 0165 / CT 165 = TC 165), 洞真部 譜錄類
About the work
A nine-folio Língbǎo 靈寶 scripture forming part of the original Língbǎo corpus, identical with [[KR5a0319|DZ 318 Dòngxuán língbǎo zìrán jiǔtiān shēngshén zhāngjīng]] 1a–9b — where the present title appears as a subtitle — except that the present text omits the Stanzas of the Nine Heavens (8a–9b) and the two hymns of Tàijí zhēnrén 太極真人 found in DZ 318. The text introduces the Three Treasures (sānbǎo 三寶): Tiānbǎo jūn 天寶君 (the supreme deity of the Dàdòng 大洞 = Dòngzhēn 洞真 = Shàngqīng 上清 canon, born of the Hùndòng tàiwú yuán gāoshàng yùhuáng 混洞太无元高上玉皇 qì in the year Lóngmò 龍漠, dwelling at the Gāoshàng dàyǒu yùqīng gōng 高上大有玉清宮); Língbǎo jūn 靈寶君 (the supreme deity of the Dòngxuán 洞玄 canon, born of the Chìhùn tàiwú yuán shàng yùxū 赤混太无元上玉虚 qì at Lónghàn kāitú 龍漢開圖, dwelling at the Shàngqīng xuándū èrjīng qībǎo zǐwēi gōng 上清玄都二京七寳紫微宮); and Shénbǎo jūn 神寶君 (the supreme deity of the Dòngshén 洞神 canon, born of the Míngjì xuántōng yuán shàng yùxū 冥寂玄通元上玉虚 qì in the year Chìmíng 赤明, dwelling at the Sānhuáng dòngshén tàiqīng tàijí gōng 三皇洞神太清太極宮). These three Treasures are the personifications of the three primordial qì (sānyuán qì 三元氣 = xuán 玄, yuán 元, shǐ 始) that govern the Three Caverns (sāndòng 三洞) and structure both the cosmos and the human body. The scripture closes with three “Stanzas” — the Shǐqīng qīngwēi tiānbǎo zhāng 始青清微天寳章, the Yuánbái yúyú língbǎo zhāng 元白禹餘靈寳章, and the Xuánhuáng tàichì shénbǎo zhāng 玄黄太赤神寳章 — five-character verses that are to be recited a prescribed number of times for the production of bodily and cosmic effects (one recitation reaching the Nine Heavens, two evoking respectful response from Heaven and Earth, and so on through nine, hundred, thousand, and ten-thousand recitations, the last yielding flight to the immortal realms).
Prefaces
No formal preface; the text begins directly with the cosmogonic section on the Three Treasures and their divine ancestors (the “Three Patriarch-qì” sān bǎo zhàngrén 三寳丈人), introducing the doctrine that the Three Treasures emerged in the successive cosmic eras of Lóngmò 龍漠, Lónghàn 龍漢, and Chìmíng 赤明, and that their nine qì (3 × 3) precipitated as Heaven, Earth, and the human realm. A frame-narrative beginning at 4b–5a presents the dialogue between Yuánshǐ tiānzūn 元始天尊 and the Fēitiān dàshèng wújí shénwáng 飛天大聖無極神王, in which the latter, foreseeing the apocalypse of the imminent jiǎshēn 甲申 year (when “the great river will rinse off pollution and the ten-thousand calamities will fill the heavens”), implores the Tiānzūn to release the great teaching to redeem the Seed-People; the Tiānzūn’s response licenses the transmission of the Stanzas.
Abstract
Hans-Hermann Schmidt, in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004) 1:222 (§1.B.3, Língbǎo), dates the text to ca. 400. The present text and [[KR5a0319|DZ 318 Dòngxuán língbǎo zìrán jiǔtiān shēngshén zhāngjīng]] correspond to number 5 of the original Língbǎo corpus as reconstructed by Ōfuchi Ninji 大淵忍爾 (“On Ku Ling Pao Ching” 47). DZ 318 — the fuller version including the Stanzas of the Nine Heavens — is “one of the most fundamental texts of the Língbǎo corpus, its present version having been slightly altered as a result of later additions.” In Yúnjí qīqiān 雲笈七籤 16.1a, Sānbǎo dàyǒu jīnshū 三寶大有金書 figures as an alternative title for the whole Jiǔtiān shēngshén zhāngjīng; an Yuán commentary ([[KR5a0399|DZ 398 Dòngxuán língbǎo zìrán jiǔtiān shēngshén zhāng jīngzhù]] 1.1b), however, applies the title only to that part of the Jiǔtiān shēngshén zhāngjīng describing the genesis and propagation of the nine stanzas — i.e., precisely to the present text. The frontmatter brackets composition notBefore 380 / notAfter 420 (the conventional dating of the original Língbǎo corpus to the late-Eastern-Jìn period, just before its propagation by Lù Xiūjìng 陸修靜).
Translations and research
No full translation of this excerpt-version. For the full Jiǔtiān shēngshén zhāngjīng see Suzanne Cahill, “Sublimation in Medieval China: The Case of the Mysterious Woman of the Nine Heavens,” Journal of Chinese Religions 16 (1988): 91–102; and the older but still useful Gauchet, “Un livre taoïque, le Cheng-chen king,” Journal asiatique (1949): 271–303. Standard scholarly entry: Hans-Hermann Schmidt, “Lingbao ziran jiutian shengshen sanbao dayou jinshu,” in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 1 §1.B.3, 222 — and the article on the parent text DZ 318 at TC 1:222 (§1.B.3, Schipper). On the Língbǎo corpus and its formation see Stephen R. Bokenkamp, “Sources of the Ling-pao Scriptures,” in Michel Strickmann ed., Tantric and Taoist Studies in Honour of R. A. Stein (Brussels: Institut Belge des Hautes Études Chinoises, 1983), 2:434–486; Kobayashi Masayoshi 小林正美, “Kyūten shōshin shōkyō no keisei to Sandō setsu” 九天生神章經の形成と三洞說, Tōhō shūkyō 東方宗教 70 (1987): 1–22.
Links
- Kanseki Repository KR5a0166
- Schipper & Verellen, The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 1 §1.B.3, 222.