Gāoshàng Yùhuáng mǎnyuàn bǎochàn 高上玉皇滿願寶懺
Precious Litany That Moves the Jade Emperor on High to Fulfill Wishes
Anonymous Yuán-period Qīngwēi-school bǎochàn 寶懺 in ten juǎn, preserved in the Zhèngtǒng Dàozàng 正統道藏 (DZ 0194 / CT 194 = TC 194), 洞真部 威儀類.
About the work
A ten-juǎn litany containing ten litanies of requests or prayers addressed to the Jade Emperor, with a structure paralleling and extending [[KR5a0194|DZ 193 Yùhuáng yòuzuì xīfú bǎochàn]]. Each juǎn takes up a particular votive intention — the chúzuì 除罪 chapter (juan 4) “elimination of guilt” being one of those Reiter singles out as paradigmatic — and pairs an incense-and-light invocation with the recitation of the names of Yùhuáng’s pantheon. The work begins with an extensive presentation of the “relevant pantheon,” headed by Yuánshǐ tiānzūn 元始天尊, who is labeled “Leader of the Doctrine, who preaches the scriptures.” Practical instructions for the recitations — kneel, concentrate the mind, dispatch a memorial including the names of all participants — precede the recital of the litany proper, addressing Yùhuáng dà tiānzūn xuánqiónggāo shàngdì 玉皇大天尊玄穹高上帝.
Prefaces
No preface in the source. The first juǎn opens with a heading “xùjiào 序教 / chànyí 懴儀” (“the teaching introduced; the litany ritual”) that frames the work as a structured liturgical sequence rather than a narrative preface.
Abstract
Florian C. Reiter, in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004) 2:1099–1100 (§3.B.7, The Qīngwēi School), describes the work as “ten litanies conveying requests or prayers addressed to the Jade Emperor. The text also introduces the names of the ancestors of the Qīngwēi 清微 school and representatives of the other Daoist groups; they are all members of the pantheon to which the envisaged religious performance is to be directed. This internal evidence points to the fourteenth century as the most likely period for the composition of the text.” The presentation of the pantheon at the beginning is headed by Yuánshǐ tiānzūn, identified as the doctrinal master who preaches the scriptures. The various wishes and vows are stated in the titles of the ten chapters of the work — for example, Chúzuì 除罪 (“The Elimination of Guilt”; juan 4); the pious intentions formulated in the text and the very name of the main deity connect this text closely with [[KR5a0194|DZ 193 Yùhuáng yòuzuì xīfú bǎochàn]]. The Qīngwēi affiliation is signalled by the inclusion of the school’s patriarchs in the pantheon (1.1b–2a, 2.1b), parallel to [[KR5a0223|DZ 223 Qīngwēi yuánjiàng dàfǎ]], the most comprehensive Qīngwēi ritual collection. The frontmatter brackets the work to 1300–1400 in line with Reiter’s reading of the internal pantheon.
Translations and research
No full translation. Standard scholarly entry: Florian C. Reiter, “Gaoshang yuhuang manyuan baochan,” in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 2 §3.B.7, 1099–1100. On the Yùhuáng cult and its scriptures: Suzanne Cahill, “Taoism at the Sung Court: The Heavenly Text Affair of 1008,” Bulletin of Sung-Yüan Studies 16 (1980): 23–44; Florian C. Reiter, Grundelemente und Tendenzen des religiösen Taoismus (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner, 1988), 45–50; on the Qīngwēi school more broadly, [[KR5a0172|DZ 171 Qīngwēi xiānpǔ]] and the literature there cited.
Links
- Kanseki Repository KR5a0195
- Schipper & Verellen, The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 2 §3.B.7, 1099–1100.