Xǔ tàishǐ zhēnjūn túzhuàn 許太史真君圖傳
Illustrated Life of the Grand Astrologer Xǔ, Perfected Lord
About the work
A two-juàn richly-illustrated hagiography of the great saint Xǔ Xùn 許遜 (“Xǔ tàishǐ zhēnjūn”), traditionally said to have ascended to Heaven in 291 CE. Xǔ Xùn and his companion Wú Měng 吳猛 were the central figures of the Way of Filial Piety (Xiàodào 孝道) movement that arose in the Táng and took mature shape in the Sòng-era cult centred on Xīshān 西山 near Nánchāng 南昌 (Jiāngxī).
Prefaces
No preface survives in the received text proper.
Abstract
Dated to the late Southern Sòng / Yuán period by Schipper (Schipper & Verellen, Taoist Canon 3: 899–900, DZ 440). Stories of Xǔ Xùn and Wú Měng became current during the early medieval period, amplified enormously during the Táng — giving rise to the Way of Filial Piety movement (cf. DZ 449 Xiàodào Wú Xǔ èr zhēnjūn zhuàn, KR5b0133) — and, toward the end of the Táng, the holy places connected to the cult (the temples on Xīshān near Nánchāng) became major pilgrimage centres. At the beginning of the thirteenth century, Bái Yùchán 白玉蟾 composed an extensive hagiography of Xǔ Xùn and the lesser saints of his lineage under the title Yùlóng jí 玉隆集 (preserved at DZ 263.31 Xiūzhēn shíshū). That work provided, with variants, the basis for the present illustrated hagiography.
The Túzhuàn combines vivid hagiographic narrative — Xǔ Xùn fighting mountain spirits, smelting the iron pillar at Nánchāng, the family’s corporate ascension — with finely drawn period illustrations. It is a principal source for the Sòng-era crystallisation of the Jìngmíng 淨明 (Pure-Perfect-Way) order that claimed Xǔ Xùn as its founding patriarch.
Translations and research
- Schipper, Kristofer. “Taoist Ritual and Local Cults of the T’ang Dynasty.” In Tantric and Taoist Studies in Honour of R. A. Stein, vol. 3, 812–834. Brussels: Institut belge des hautes études chinoises, 1985.
- Boltz, Judith M. A Survey of Taoist Literature, Tenth to Seventeenth Centuries. Berkeley: Institute of East Asian Studies, 1987, 70–78 (on the Xǔ Xùn hagiographic corpus).
- Akizuki Kan’ei 秋月觀暎. Chūgoku kinsei dōkyō no keisei: Jōmyōdō no kisoteki kenkyū 中國近世道教の形成：淨明道の基礎的研究. Tokyo: Sōbunsha, 1978.
- Schipper, Kristofer, and Franciscus Verellen, eds. The Taoist Canon: A Historical Companion to the Daozang. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004, 3:899–900 (DZ 440).