Huìzhēn jí 會真集
Anthology on Gathering Truth
by 王吉昌 (撰, hào Chāorán zǐ 超然子, active early thirteenth century); prefaced by 楊志樸 (序, zìhào Yúnxī xiánlǎo 雲溪閑老)
About the work
A five-juan Quánzhēn 全真 nèidān 內丹 anthology, preserved in the Zhèngtǒng Dàozàng 正統道藏 (DZ 0247 / CT 247 = TC 246), 洞真部 方法類. The work collects the output of Wáng Jíchāng 王吉昌 (hào Chāorán zǐ 超然子), a Quánzhēn master active ca. 1220–1240, known also as the author of [[KR5a0313|DZ 313 Shēngtiān jīng sòngjiě]]. The first juan introduces the basic cosmology through diagrams and commentary and expounds the principle of diāndǎo 顛倒 (reversal), central to nèidān, followed by alchemical procedures keyed to the five phases, trigrams, and cyclical numbers; juan 2 through 5 are lyric poems (cí 詞) set to various tunes, with juan 2 and 3 topically arranged while juan 4 and 5 are independent, freer compositions. Wáng quotes Zhāng Bóduān 張伯端 repeatedly and alludes to Wáng Chóngyáng 王重陽 only once (3.16a). In contrast to his pupil Liú Zhìyuán’s 劉志淵 [[KR5a0249|DZ 248 Qǐzhēn jí]], the present collection puts the systematic technical exposition first; yet the lyrical dàoqíng 道情 register (“Daoist feelings” focused on the misery of the world and the bliss of immortality) comes out strongly in the opening cí of juan 4.
Prefaces
Preface by Yáng Zhìpú 楊志樸 (Yúnxī xiánlǎo 雲溪閑老, “Idle Elder of Cloud-Stream”), “Night One” (夜六): “The Yì is broad and is great; it has no body. It begins from a single qì — that is, the Way. The Yì has three senses: bù yì 不易 (unchanging), biàn yì 變易 (transforming), jiǎn yì 簡易 (simple). Unchanging is to stand alone and not be altered; transforming is to go in the order of the four seasons; simple is that Heaven and Earth are plain and direct. The six lines: the inner trigram is called zhēn 貞, the three talents — heaven, earth, man — as the fixed body; when doubled it is called huǐ 悔 — because good fortune and ill, regret and hardship, arise from motion. The lower two lines are earth, the middle two are man, the upper two are heaven; upper and lower are without seat; the second and fifth are properly the realm of human affairs, and hence we speak of ‘seeing the dragon, the dragon in flight, the sight profiting a great man.’ The third and fourth are the stations of heaven and earth and do not speak of dragons; they are addressed in human terms as ‘gentleman,’ that is, the mutual interpenetration of heaven and man… After the creation of the sixty-four hexagrams, their distribution through the three hundred and eighty-four lines maps onto the year — by and large, they correspond to month, season, day, and hour, and one day goes through twelve hexagrams. Man, the most numinous of the myriad things, by his nature and destiny shares one body with Heaven and Earth. Only the sage knows: the wise see in the sage his wisdom, the kindly see in him his kindness. Those able to set this in motion within their own bodies are called men who nourish the Way. Later generations have classed the teaching in three: the Yì is the true mystery; Lǎozǐ is the empty mystery; Zhuāngzǐ is the conversational mystery. The wording differs, but at the root they converge in the mystery — not the understanding of the common man, only the divine immortals can manage it. Last spring, at the Qīngyì Qīngshén Temple, I came to know the gentleman Wáng Jíchāng, titled Chāorán zǐ 超然子; speaking with him, his words came like pearls and jade, his breath like smoke and flame; he mixed the Three Mysteries in conversation and gave rise to deep discussion — alas, we parted so quickly, the two ducks flew west, the seasons turned star and frost, and old I have not forgotten him morning or night. Now two of his disciples have come to Yúnxī 雲溪: one a Táng-style scribe, Liáng Zhèn 梁振; one from Nánliáng 南梁. They brought with them the text of their master’s Huìzhēn wénjí 會真文集, requesting me to write a prefatory piece. I read it from beginning to end; the speeches match the conversation of last spring; the charts and verses all come out of the breast; the potter’s wheel at work within the ancestral-mass, the bellows and forge within the heart: ‘seven-eight, nine-six’ old and young, water-fire-wood-metal-earth in mutual generation — just as Wáng Zǐjìn is said to have ‘inverted the five phases and shifted the eight trigrams.’ Were this circulated throughout the world, those who study the Way would be as men carrying a lamp into a dark chamber. I honour the two immortal sons for their filial broadcasting of their master’s excellence. I dare not decline; I have briefly prefaced the truth of it at the head of the scroll. Wèinán Yúnxī xiánlǎo Yáng Zhìpú prefaced.”
Abstract
Vincent Goossaert, in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004) 2:1166–1167 (§3.B.9, The Quánzhēn Order), identifies Wáng Jíchāng’s period of activity from the funerary steles of two of his pupils, the Quánzhēn masters Lǐ Zhìmíng 李志明 (1200–1266) and Shèn Zhìzhēn 申志真 (1210–1284) — see [[KR5a0973|DZ 973 Gānshuǐ xiānyuán lù]] 6.22a and 8.26a. Yáng Zhìpú’s short undated preface records that Wáng’s mastery of nèidān was such as to attract immortals. Within the Quánzhēn anthology tradition, the Huìzhēn jí displays the most systematic and technical exposition; its companion-piece is [[KR5a0249|DZ 248 Qǐzhēn jí]] by Wáng’s pupil Liú Zhìyuán. The frontmatter brackets composition ca. 1220–1240.
Translations and research
No full translation. Standard scholarly entry: Vincent Goossaert, “Huizhen ji,” in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 2 §3.B.9, 1166–1167. On nèidān in Quánzhēn Hénán–Shānxī: Pierre Marsone, Wang Chongyang et la fondation du Quanzhen (Paris 2010); Vincent Goossaert, La création du taoïsme moderne (EHESS dissertation, 1997).
Links
- Kanseki Repository KR5a0248
- Schipper & Verellen, The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 2 §3.B.9, 1166–1167.