Sāntiān yìsuǐ 三天易髓
Quintessence of the Changes of the Three Heavens
by 李道純 (撰, hào Yíngchánzǐ 瑩蟾子, d. 1306); revised by 王玠 (校正, hào Hùnránzǐ 混然子)
About the work
A one-juan composite Quánzhēn 全真 nèidān 內丹 work by Lǐ Dàochún 李道純 (d. 1306), preserved in the Zhèngtǒng Dàozàng 正統道藏 (DZ 0250 / CT 250 = TC 249), 洞真部 方法類. The title — Quintessence of the Changes of the Three Heavens — refers to Lǐ’s reading of the Yìjīng 易經 as encoding the alchemical procedure that Confucians call Tàijí 太極, Buddhists Yuánjué 圓覺 (Perfect Awakening), and Daoists Jīndān 金丹 (Golden Elixir). The text comprises three distinct items: (1) an alchemical Huǒfú zhízhǐ 火符直指 (“Direct Pointers to Fire-Phases”), a set of fifteen rhymed quatrains keyed to the lines and statements of the Qián 乾 and Kūn 坤 hexagrams (“hidden dragon, do not act”; “the dragon appears in the field”; etc.), each given an alchemical gloss, followed by a numbered set of nine quatrains under the headings Xiàshǒu 下手, Ān lú 安爐, Cǎi yào 採藥, Xíng gōng 行功, Chí yíng 持盈, Wēn yǎng 温養, Tiáo shén 調神, Tuō tāi 脱胎, Liǎo dāng 了當; (2) a Xīnjīng zhízhǐ 心經直指, Lǐ’s commentary on the Hṛdaya-sūtra (Heart Sutra), composed at the request of his disciple Jì’ān 濟菴; and (3) a Yīnfú jīng 陰符經 in extracts with a brief prose commentary alternating Daoist and Buddhist readings of the same passage. The unifying thesis is the sānjiào héyī 三教合一 doctrine: that the ultimate teaching is one across the Three Teachings, only the names differ. The text was revised by Wáng Jiè 王玠 (Hùnránzǐ 混然子, fl. mid-fourteenth century).
Prefaces
No preface in the source. The text opens directly with its title-couplet “Sāntiān yìsuǐ — by Yíngchánzǐ Lǐ Qīng[ān] composed; Hùnránzǐ revised.”
Abstract
Catherine Despeux, in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004) 2:1175–1176 (§3.B.9, The Quánzhēn Order), observes that the author mentions this work in his preface (dated 1290) to [[KR5c0085|DZ 699 Dàodé huìyuán]]: the Sāntiān yìsuǐ must therefore antedate that date. The work comprises three distinct texts: an alchemical treatise itself sub-divided into two parts — first a collection of sayings from the Zhōuyì 周易 with rhymed commentary keyed to the line-statements of Qián and Kūn (treating what the Confucians call the Tàijí); second a set of nine quatrains on the nine phases of the alchemical process (concluding “this is what Daoists call Jīndān”). The other two are a commentary on the Xīnjīng 心經 (Hṛdaya-sūtra), written at the request of his disciple Jì’ān, and a commentary on [[KR5a0031|DZ 31 Huángdì yīnfú jīng]] in alternating Daoist and Buddhist register. The frontmatter brackets composition ca. 1280–1290, before the Dàodé huìyuán was completed. The reviser, Wáng Jiè 王玠 (Hùnránzǐ, zì Dàoyuán 道淵), was a Yuán Quánzhēn commentator known also from DZ 101 and several other late Yuán nèidān works; his revision must postdate Lǐ Dàochún’s death by some decades.
Translations and research
No full translation. Standard scholarly entry: Catherine Despeux, “Santian yisui,” in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 2 §3.B.9, 1175–1176. Pierre Marsone, “Li Daochun et la synthèse des courants de l’alchimie intérieure,” in Matériaux pour l’étude de la religion chinoise (2000). On Lǐ Dàochún’s Yìjīng-based alchemical hermeneutics: Isabelle Robinet, Introduction à l’alchimie intérieure taoïste (Cerf, 1995); Despeux, Taoïsme et corps humain (Paris 1994).
Links
- Kanseki Repository KR5a0251
- Schipper & Verellen, The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 2 §3.B.9, 1175–1176.