Xiūzhēn shíshū jīndān dàchéng jí 修真十書金丹大成集
Ten Books on the Cultivation of Truth: Collected Works on the Great Accomplishment of the Elixir
by 蕭廷芝 (撰, zì Yuánruì 元瑞, hào Zǐxū liǎozhēnzǐ 紫虛了眞子, fl. 1260)
About the work
Five juan (juan 9–13 of the comprehensive Xiūzhēn shíshū 修真十書), preserved in the Zhèngtǒng Dàozàng 正統道藏 (DZ 0263b / CT 263b, juan 9–13 = TC 262 part 2), 洞真部 方法類. The author Xiāo Tíngzhī 蕭廷芝 (zì Yuánruì, hào Zǐxū liǎozhēnzǐ), a native of Fúzhōu 福州 (Fújiàn) and disciple of Péng Sì 彭耜 (one of Bái Yùchán’s most prominent followers), here assembles a wide-ranging compendium of Southern-lineage nèidān 內丹 thought that became a key reference work for the late Sòng and Yuán. The title-page calls Xiāo Zǐxū Liǎozhēnzǐ Xiāo Tíngzhī Yuánruì shù 紫虛了眞子蕭廷芝元瑞述. Juan 9 (= Xiūzhēn shíshū 9) opens with a Wújí tú shuō 無極圖說 — Xiāo’s commentary on the Tàijí tú 太極圖 of Zhōu Dūnyí 周敦頤 in alchemical register — followed by diagrams illustrating the interaction of qì 氣 and jīng 精 in the nèidān process, their circulation, and the rules of fire-phasing (9.1a–7b), then three poems and a treatise on the cyclically transformed elixir. Juan 10 is wholly devoted to the Jīndān wèndá 金丹問答 (“Questions and Answers on the Elixir”), a lexicon of nèidān terms in yǔlù 語錄 (recorded conversations) form; it is also reproduced in [[KR5a0570|DZ 570 Yǎngshēng bìlù]] 19a–32b and in the collection Jīndān jíwén 金丹集問 by Hú Wénhuàn 胡文煥 (fl. 1596) in Gézhì cóngshū 格致叢書. Juan 11 and 12 contain nèidān-themed regular and cí 詞 poetry; the cí of 12.7a–12b are reproduced (without attribution) in juan 7 and 8 of [[KR5c1100|DZ 1100 Mínghè yúyīn]]. Juan 13 contains a commentary on the Cuīgōng rǔyào jīng 崔公入藥鏡 (cf. [[KR5c0135|DZ 135 Cuīgōng rǔyào jīng zhùjiě]], where Xiāo’s gloss is quoted extensively) and one on Lǚ Dòngbīn’s 呂洞賓 cí-lyric Qìnyuánchūn 沁園春 (cf. [[KR5c0136|DZ 136 Lǚ Chúnyáng zhēnrén Qìnyuánchūn dāncí zhùjiě]]).
Prefaces
No preface in the source. The juan opens directly with the title-page and the Wújí tú shuō 無極圖說.
Abstract
Farzeen Baldrian-Hussein, in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004) 2:840 (§3.A.4, Nèidān and Yǎngshēng), establishes that Xiāo Tíngzhī was a disciple of Péng Sì 彭耜, one of Bái Yùchán’s most famous followers — an attribution attested by Xiāo’s preface dated 1260 to [[KR5c0687|DZ 687 Dàodé zhēnjīng sānjiě]] (preface 8a). Another source (the Quán Sòng cí 全宋詞 4.2777) confirms that Xiāo bore two zì: Yuánruì 元瑞 and Tiānlái 天賴. The Jīndān dàchéng jí is quoted frequently in [[KR5c1005|DZ 1005 Zhōuyì cāntóng qì fāhuī]] (e.g., 3.3b, 5.18b, 6.2b); since the Fāhuī itself has a preface dated 1284, the second half of the thirteenth century is the latest possible date for the present collection. The frontmatter accordingly brackets composition 1255–1284, with Xiāo’s fl. 1260 datable preface to Dàodé sānjiě providing a secure anchor in the middle of the bracket. The compilation captures the late-Southern-lineage nèidān synthesis in the generation after Bái Yùchán, integrating Zhōu Dūnyí’s Tàijí tú, the Cuīgōng rǔyào lexicon, the Cāntóng qì fire-phasing tradition, and Lǚ Dòngbīn’s lyric inheritance into a single anthology that was to remain influential through the Yuán and into the Míng.
Translations and research
No full translation. Standard scholarly entry: Farzeen Baldrian-Hussein, “Jindan dacheng ji,” in Schipper & Verellen eds., The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 2 §3.A.4, 840. On Xiāo Tíngzhī and Péng Sì within the Southern Lineage: Lowell Skar, “Golden Elixir Alchemy: The Formation of the Southern Lineage and the Transformation of Medieval China” (PhD dissertation, University of Pennsylvania 2003); Judith Boltz, A Survey of Taoist Literature: Tenth to Seventeenth Centuries (Berkeley 1987); on the Cuīgōng rǔyào commentary tradition: Catherine Despeux, Taoïsme et corps humain: Le Xiuzhen tu (Paris: Guy Trédaniel, 1994).
Links
- Kanseki Repository KR5a0265
- Schipper & Verellen, The Taoist Canon (2004), Vol. 2 §3.A.4, 840.