Yùqīng jīnsì qīnghuá bìwén jīnbǎo nèiliàn dānjué 玉清金笥青華祕文金寶內鍊丹訣
Alchemical Formula for the Inner Purification of the Gold Treasure: Secret Writings from the Golden Box of the Jade Purity [Heaven], Transmitted by the Immortal Qīnghuá
attributed (撰) to 張伯端 (Zhāng Bóduān 張伯端, 987–1082, zì Píngshū 平叔, hào Zǐyáng 紫陽)
About the work
A nèidān 內丹 treatise in three juàn, preserved in the Zhèngtǒng Dàozàng 正統道藏 (DZ 0240 / CT 240 = TC 239), 洞真部 方法類. The work is ascribed to Zhāng Bóduān 張伯端 (the founding patriarch of the Southern Lineage and author of the Wùzhēn piān 悟真篇), but it is in fact a Southern-Sòng pseudepigraph that draws his authority into a doctrinal program incorporating elements from the Northern-Sòng philosophical lexicon. The text unfolds in a series of titled discourses (lùn 論, shuō 說) and oral instructions (kǒujué 口訣, kǒujué zhōng kǒujué 口訣中口訣): “Xīn wéi jūn lùn 心爲君論” (the heart as sovereign), “Shén wéi zhǔ lùn 神爲主論” (the spirit as master), “Qì wéi yòng shuō 氣爲用說” (the qì as instrument), “Jīng cóng qì shuō 精從氣說” (the essence follows the qì), “Yì wéi méi shuō 意爲媒說” (the intention as matchmaker), “KǎnLí shuō 坎離說,” “Xiàshǒu gōngfu 下手工夫” (entry-level practice), “Jīngshén lùn 精神論,” “Huàndān shuō 幻丹說” (on the false elixir), “Zhuōdān fǎ 捉丹法” (the method for catching the elixir), “Shénshuǐ huāchí shuō 神水華池說,” and “Bǎiqiào shuō 百竅說” (on the hundred body-orifices).
Prefaces
The work opens with a biǎo zòu 表奏 (“memorial” to Heaven) framing the disclosure of the secret transmission, and a Jīndān tú lùn xù 金丹圖論序 (“Preface to the Diagram-Discourse on the Gold Elixir”). The memorial: “Without shrinking from the punishment of the thunderbolt-axe, I venture to make this lowly intrusion. Reflecting that I, Your servant, have lived in the world amid much trouble — that whenever I attempted anything I would stumble — and that I have just passed my thirtieth year, with a single affinity for the Great Way: thinking back, I see that the One Above caused my failures of yesterday for the sake of my successes today. Bound to repay this grace which has cost me everything, I now record it on my heart and set my virtue in the bone… I once received the Qīnghuá zhēnrén Yùqīng jīnsì chángshēng dùshì jīnbǎo nèiliàn dānjué 青華真人玉清金笥長生度世金寳內鍊丹訣 — a manual concise yet easy of practice, full and yet not promiscuous: in the body it sets the principal of yīn and yáng; in the hú 壺 it erects the pivot of the four images; the Three Centres are constantly maintained as the mechanism, the One Settled is never departed from in operation… Now I wish, after fasting and bathing and clear thought, to set forth diagrams and discourses, holding nothing back, that I may directly disclose the perfected mystery, and select those who can be entrusted with it for transmission, that the heart-lamp may continue to flow and be passed down for ten thousand generations…”
Abstract
Farzeen Baldrian-Hussein, in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004) 2:830 (§3.A.4, Nèidān and Yǎngshēng), shows that, although ascribed to Zhāng Bóduān, the text was collected and recorded by a disciple (cf. 2.5a). An introduction in the Dàoyán nèiwài quánshū 道言內外全書 (collected by Péng Hàogǔ 彭好古, preface 1597) — missing from the Daozang edition — identifies that disciple as Wáng Bāngshū 王邦叔 and states that the text was revealed to Zhāng Bóduān by Qīnghuá zhēnrén 青華真人, and transmitted by Zhāng to Wáng on Mount Luófú 羅浮山. The treatise is not listed in any pre-Yuán bibliographies. Bái Yùchán 白玉蟾 (early 13th century) mentions a “Yùqīng língpiān 玉清靈篇,” but in context that is plainly the Wùzhēn piān itself (cf. [[KR5c0263|DZ 263.1 Zázhù zhǐxuán piān]] in Xiūzhēn shíshū 4.8b). The text quotes the Rùyào jìng 入藥鏡 (a cí-poem popular in the Southern Sòng, cf. [[KR5a0135|DZ 135 Cuī gōng rùyào jìng zhùjiě]]); and refers to Zhāng Bóduān as Zhāng zǐ 張子 — an appellation in Sòng usage attached to the Confucian philosopher Zhāng Zǎi 張載 (1020–1076; cf. Zhāng Zǎi jí 307, 373) — and uses the latter’s signature philosophical terminology (notably qìzhī zhī xìng 氣質之性, the “nature of physical disposition,” opposed to xiāntiān zhī xìng 先天之性, the “nature of pre-Heaven”). These terminological features are further evidence that the author intended to link this spurious work with the prestige of a leading Northern-Sòng philosopher. The text presents nèidān theory using pseudo-philosophical terminology and a partial dialogue between Zhāng Bóduān and a disciple, with the main emphasis on the “circulation of the inner light.” The frontmatter brackets composition broadly within the twelfth century. The catalog meta gives no dating; an additional Dàozàngjíyào edition of the same text is preserved as Yùqīng jīnsì qīnghuá bìwén jīnbǎo nèiliàn dānfǎ 玉清金笥青華祕文金寶內鍊丹法 (DZJY JY174).
Translations and research
No full translation. Standard scholarly entry: Farzeen Baldrian-Hussein, “Yuqing jinsi qinghua biwen jinbao neilian danjue,” in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 2 §3.A.4, 830. Wáng Mù 王沐, Wùzhēn piān jiǎnjiě 悟真篇淺解 (Beijing: Zhōnghuá shūjú, 1990) discusses the text’s relation to Zhāng Bóduān’s authentic Wùzhēn piān. On the broader pseudepigraphic Wùzhēn tradition see Lowell Skar, “Golden Elixir Alchemy: The Formation of the Southern Lineage of Taoism and the Transformation of Medieval China” (Ph.D. diss., University of Pennsylvania, 2003).
Links
- Kanseki Repository KR5a0241
- Schipper & Verellen, The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 2 §3.A.4, 830.