Yùlù dàzhāi dìèrrì wǔcháo yí 玉籙大齋第二日午朝儀
Noon-Audience Liturgy of the Second Day of the Great Jade-Register Fast
About the work
Fifth of the eight-part Yùlù dàzhāi programme (DZ 505 a–h). The noon audience of day 2 stands at the geometric centre of the three-day, nine-audience fast — the zhōngyuán 中元 of the zhōngrì 中日 — and is correspondingly identified in the Yùlù liturgical theology with the apex of the salvific deliverance, the moment at which the merit of all preceding huí is consolidated and offered up.
Abstract
Following the standard noon framework (fālú, declaration of ritual rank, three niǎnxiāng), the body of this fascicle carries the central three huí (4–6) of the nine-fold zhuǎnjīng sequence introduced at the morning audience (KR5b0204). The cosmological orientation is to the four corners — northeast, southeast, southwest, northwest — completing with the morning’s three a six-direction grid; the final ninth huí (the central column) is reserved for the evening audience (KR5b0206). The huíxiàng of this audience is the most expansive of the cycle, dedicating the cumulative merit not only to the named beneficiary but to all sānjiè 三界 sentient beings.
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: 1004–1006 (DZ 505, entry by John Lagerwey).