Língbǎo zhòngzhēn dānjué 靈寶眾真丹訣
Instructions of the Língbǎo Perfected on the Elixirs
About the work
A sixteen-folio compilation of eleven alchemical recipes with a preface on their efficacy against illnesses caused by “winds” (fēng 風). The original title of the collection was Língbǎo huánhún dānfāng 靈寶還魂丹方 (“Língbǎo Recipes of the Elixirs for Returning the Hún Soul”), preserved in the Dàozàng edition as the name of the first recipe (1a–5b).
Prefaces
The text is headed by an authorial preface on the efficacy of the elixirs against fēng-caused illnesses; no separate author’s name is given and no transmission colophon is preserved.
Abstract
Dated by Pregadio (Schipper & Verellen, Taoist Canon 1: 381, DZ 419) to before 1020, and most probably to the Táng (618–907). The work circulated under its original title Língbǎo huánhún dānfāng and, so titled, is partially included in Yúnjí qīqiān 雲笈七籤 76.1a–13b — corresponding respectively to 1a–5b, 7a–10a, and 13a–16b of the Dàozàng text — and is listed in Bìshū shěng xù biàndào sìkù quēshū mù 2.36a (cf. VDL 171–172). The inclusion in the Yúnjí qīqiān shows that the work was compiled before 1020; the use of the dàliáng 大量 and dàfēn 大分 weight measures indicates that it is not earlier than the Táng.
Three of the recipes — at 7a–8a and 15a–16b — are also found in DZ 918 Zhū jiā shénpǐn dānfǎ 諸家神品丹法 3.10a–11b, 6.7a–8a, and 6.8b–9a respectively. The last recipe in the Yúnjí qīqiān version (76.14a–b) does not appear in the Dàozàng text.
Translations and research
- Pregadio, Fabrizio. Great Clarity: Daoism and Alchemy in Early Medieval China. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2006.
- Schipper, Kristofer, and Franciscus Verellen, eds. The Taoist Canon: A Historical Companion to the Daozang. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004, 1:381 (DZ 419).