Nányuè jiǔ zhēnrén zhuàn 南嶽九真人傳
Biographies of the Nine Perfected of the Southern Peak edited by 廖侁
About the work
A short late-Northern-Sòng compilation in one juàn (7 folios) gathering nine succinct hagiographies of zhēnrén who attained the Way on Héngshān 衡山 (Nányuè 南嶽) between Jìn Tàishǐ 1 (265) and Liáng Tiānjiān 11 (512). It is bound in the same fascicle (DZ 452, fasc. 201) as Lǐ Chōngzhāo’s 李沖昭 Nányuè xiǎolù 南嶽小錄 (DZ 453 / KR5b0137). The frontmatter line of the Hánfēnlóu witness reads 二傳同卷, “two zhuàn in one juàn,” confirming the joint format. Listed as anonymous in the Tōngzhì “Yìwén lüè” 5.9a; the Daoist editor named in the editor’s note is the otherwise obscure 廖侁 Liào Shēn (titled 奉議郎致仕騎都尉賜緋魚袋, “retired Gentleman for Court Discussion, Cavalry Commander, with the privilege of the crimson fish-pouch”; preserved in the source as 廖僥, a recognised typesetting slip for 廖侁).
Prefaces
Editor’s note by Liào Shēn 廖侁 (1a–2b). Liào opens by characterising the nine zhēnrén of Nányuè as cult-figures actively engaged in protecting the people, then reports an anecdote of the present dynasty: the Privy Council Commissioner Sūn Miǎn 孫沔 (zì Yuánzhī 元之, ca. 996–1066/7), while serving in Chángshā, dreamed of an old man surnamed Wáng with eight companions, complaining that their land-holdings had been encroached upon by a neighbouring monastery; after a subsequent visit to the Jiǔxiān shítán 九仙石壇 he recognised the figure of Wáng Língyú 王靈與 as the dream-figure and ordered the local magistrate to recover the lost ground for the cult. The note then recounts Liào’s commission proper: the Daoist Ōuyáng Dàolóng 歐陽道隆, in whose family a manuscript of the Nányuè jiǔxiān zhuàn 南嶽九仙傳 had been transmitted, asked Liào to write a preface so the text could be printed alongside Ōuyáng’s earlier private printings of the Dùrén jīng, Dàodé jīng, and Jiǔyōu jīng. Liào states that he abridged eleven repetitive passages, corrected thirty-one stylistic errors, and resolved four discrepancies in the dates of ascension by reference to the old steles. The note ends with parenetic remarks to Ōuyáng on the necessity of zhì, qín, and jiǔ (志/勤/久) on the path. The mention of Sūn Miǎn (d. 1066/7) is the key date marker: the text must be of the late Northern Sòng, after Sūn’s tenure in Chángshā but before the dynasty’s fall in 1127.
Abstract
Schipper & Verellen (Taoist Canon 2: 905; entry by Hans-Hermann Schmidt) confirm the late-Northern-Sòng dating on the strength of the Sūn Miǎn anecdote and the Tōngzhì listing as anonymous. The body of the text gives the following nine biographies (each a few lines long):
- Chén Xìngmíng 陳興明 of Yǐngchuān, who met two perfected on Tiānzhùfēng and received the Míngjìng xuánzhēn 明鏡玄真 method; ascended at the Yuányánggōng on Jìn Tàishǐ 1.3.1 (265).
- Shī Cún 施存 (style Húfú xiānshēng 胡浮先生), pupil of Huánglúzǐ 黃盧子; received the Sānhuáng nèiwén; rode a white leopard at Mt. Héng’s western peak; ascended Jìn Yǒngkāng 1.4.7 (300).
- Yǐn Dàoquán 尹道全 of Tiānshuǐ; received the Wǔdì liùjiǎ zuǒyòu língfēi talismans; ascended Jìn Yǒngjiā 9.1.9 (315 — note that Yǒngjiā only ran six years to 313, so the year-name is anachronistic; presumably a recension error for an early Yǒngjiā or successor era).
- Xú Língqī 徐靈期 of the LiúSòng; author of a Héngshān jì (cited here at 4b–5a, including the famous XiàYǔ stele on Tiānzhùfēng); ascended Yuánhuī 2.9.9 (474).
- Chén Huìdù 陳慧度, alchemist of the Yùqīngguàn; ascended Jìn Yǒngmíng 2.5.13 — note that the Yǒngmíng era is Qí, not Jìn (484); a textual slip preserved by Liào.
- Zhāng Tánrào 張曇要, recipient of the Nèiyǎng yuánhé mòcháo dàdì method; ascended Qí Yánxīng 1.7.13 (494).
- Zhāng Shǐzhēn 張始珍 of Nányáng; received the Míngjìng method from a numinous transmitter, traced to Chángsānggōngzǐ; ascended Liáng Tiānjiān 3.11.13 (504).
- Wáng Língyú 王靈輿 of Jiǔjiāng; ascended Liáng Tiānjiān 11.7.13 (512). This is the figure of Sūn Miǎn’s dream.
- Dèng Yùzhī 鄧郁之, friend of Xú Língqī; received imperial Liáng patronage to build three monasteries on Mt. Yuèlù; ascended on Liáng Tiānjiān 11.12.30 (513), met by the eight previously-ascended zhēnrén and rising with them. The text closes with a Táng Xiántōng (860–874) imperial decree, requested by the Héngzhōu prefect Zhāng Dí 張覿, conferring the title Zǐgàifēng jiǔxiān shítán on the cult site.
The work’s value lies less in the original biographical material — much of it patently legendary, with anachronistic era-names and Daoist scriptural conceits transposed onto historical zhēnrén — than in its preservation of an early-Sòng textual tradition that would otherwise be lost (note especially the citation of Xú Língqī’s Héngshān jì, an important early gazetteer source). Together with KR5b0137 Nányuè xiǎolù it forms the principal Daoist documentary basis for the Tang-Song Nanyue cult.
Translations and research
- Schipper, Kristofer, and Franciscus Verellen, eds. The Taoist Canon: A Historical Companion to the Daozang. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004. 2: 905 (DZ 452, entry by Hans-Hermann Schmidt).
- Robson, James. Power of Place: The Religious Landscape of the Southern Sacred Peak (Nanyue 南嶽) in Medieval China. Harvard East Asian Monographs 316. Cambridge MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2009. — the principal scholarly study of the Nányuè cult, with extensive reference to this text.
Other points of interest
The slip 廖僥 for 廖侁 in the editor’s signature is preserved here as in the source. The Tōngzhì “Yìwén lüè” 5.9a transcribes the work as anonymous, indicating that even by the early Southern Song the editor’s identity was not stable in the print tradition.