Tàishàng língbǎo tiānzūn shuō ráng zāi dù è jīng 太上靈寶天尊說禳災度厄經
Scripture for Averting Disaster and Delivering from Difficulty, Spoken by the Most High Heavenly Worthy of the Numinous Treasure
About the work
A short two-folio Daoist ritual text on averting and expiating misfortune, preached by the Língbǎo tiānzūn to an assembly of gods gathered in the Land of Chánlì 禪林. Transmitted in the Dàozàng in a composite juàn (sì jīng tóng juàn 四經同卷) with DZ 358, DZ 359, and DZ 360 (KR5b0042, KR5b0043, KR5b0044).
Prefaces
No prefaces in the source. The text opens directly with the revelation scene and carries no author preface or transmission colophon.
Abstract
Lagerwey (Schipper & Verellen, Taoist Canon 3: 991, DZ 357) treats the scripture as one of a cluster of Táng–Sòng short ritual-apotropaic texts grouped together in the canon. In it the Tiānzūn explains how lay people can avert any pending disaster by making confession before a statue of the Jade Emperor (Yùhuáng 玉皇) and then reciting the present text.
The presupposition of an imperial Jade-Emperor statuary cult — normalised only from the late Táng into the Sòng — and the tight formulaic structure suggest a composition in the mid- to late-imperial apotropaic stratum rather than in the early Língbǎo strata proper. Recitation of the scripture is itself framed as both the vehicle and the proof of repentance.
Translations and research
- Schipper, Kristofer, and Franciscus Verellen, eds. The Taoist Canon: A Historical Companion to the Daozang. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004, 3:991 (DZ 357).