Tàishàng dòngxuán língbǎo jìnggōng miàojīng 太上洞玄靈寶淨供妙經
Marvelous Scripture on the Pure Offering, of the Most High Cavern-Mystery Numinous Treasure
About the work
A ten-folio late-sixth- or early-seventh-century Daoist pǔdù 普度 scripture prescribing the Pure Offering (jìnggōng 淨供) — a large-scale ritual for the salvation of hungry souls — intended to supplement and in some measure replace the older Grand Offering (dàxiàn 大獻) of DZ 370 (KR5b0054). Transmitted in the Dàozàng in a composite juàn with DZ 374 and DZ 375 (KR5b0058, KR5b0059).
Prefaces
No prefaces in the source. The text opens directly with the revelation scene on Ruòyé shān 若耶山 and carries no author preface or transmission colophon.
Abstract
Dated by Lagerwey (Schipper & Verellen, Taoist Canon 2: 549, DZ 376) to the late sixth or early seventh century — a period identifiable by the style’s marked Buddhist influence, the frequent use of double negations (“neither birth nor death”; 7b), and the distinction between exhaustible (yǒujìn 有盡) and inexhaustible (wújìn 無盡) offerings (6a), all typical of Daoist texts of the Suí and early Táng.
The Pure Offering is framed as a revelation to Gě Xuán 葛玄 on the heights of Ruòyé shān by his three masters — the zhēnrén Yùluóqiáo 玉羅翹, Guāngmiàoyīn 光妙音, and Zhēndìngguāng 真定光 — who have already been named in DZ 346 Zhēnyī quànjiè fǎlún miàojīng (KR5b0030). Its purpose is to replace the Grand Offering of DZ 370 (10a). Whereas the Dàxiàn jīng prescribed recitation of the revealed scripture as the heart of the rite, the Jìnggōng 淨供 emphasises the performance of a day-long ritual culminating at noon in a gigantic offering — “as large as a mountain,” the text declares (3b, 9a) — for all hungry souls. Unlike the Dàxiàn jīng, the Pure Offering is to be made not only on the days of the Three Primordials but also on the five là 臘 festivals.
The scripture also insists more sharply than DZ 370 on the danger that the hungry souls pose for the well-being of the living, and develops the pious son’s double duty toward his natural and his “true parents” (zhēn fùmǔ 真父母). Correspondingly, it pays less attention than DZ 370 to the sufferings of the hungry souls themselves and to the karmic origins of their suffering.
Translations and research
- Teiser, Stephen F. The Ghost Festival in Medieval China. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988.
- Schipper, Kristofer, and Franciscus Verellen, eds. The Taoist Canon: A Historical Companion to the Daozang. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004, 2:549 (DZ 376).