Xuánzhū xīnjìng zhù 玄珠心鏡註
Annotated Mind-Mirror of the Mysterious Pearl by 衡嶽真子 (註)
About the work
A single-juǎn Daoist commentary on the Xuánzhū xīnjìng 玄珠心鏡 (“Mind-Mirror of the Mysterious Pearl”), an inner-alchemical and cúnyī 存一 (preserving the One) treatise of the Xuánzhū 玄珠 cycle. The commentator 衡嶽真子 (Héngyuè zhēnzǐ, “Perfected Master of Mount Héng”) expounds the parent verses with extensive cross-reference to the Lǎojūn xīshēng jīng 老君西昇經 and the Lǎojūn nèiguān jīng 老君內觀經.
Abstract
The work opens with the Shǒuyī shī 守一詩 (“Poem on Preserving the One”): “Dé yī zhī yuán 得一之元” (“Attaining the source of the One”). The commentary follows: “Fú yán yī zhě, shì wúxíng tiāndì zhī shǐ qì, shēnghuà zhī xuányuán…” 夫言一者，是無形天地之始氣，生化之玄元 (“To speak of the One: it is the formless inception-qì of Heaven and Earth, the mysterious source of generation-and-transformation; the Old Master forced upon it the name ‘Way’”). The treatment is theological: the yī (One) is the hùndùn 混沌 unpartitioned state, yǎoyǎo míngmíng 窈窈㝠㝠 (“vast-and-dim, dark-and-obscure”), embracing yin and exhaling yang, manifesting the three luminaries (sun, moon, stars).
Subsequent verses and commentaries take up the standard cúnyī topics: the Xīshēng jīng’s narrative of Lǎojūn instructing Yǐn Xǐ at the Pass; the Nèiguān jīng’s formulation “dào bù kě jiàn, yánshēng yǐ míng zhī; shēng bù kě cháng, yòng dào yǐ shǒu zhī; shēng dào ruò hé yī, jí shénxiān cháng [shēng]” 道不可見，延生以明之；生不可長，用道以守之；生道若合一，即神仙長[生] (“the Way cannot be seen, the prolongation of life manifests it; life cannot be made long, the use of the Way preserves it; if life and Way are made One, then it is the immortal’s long life”).
Schipper & Verellen (Taoist Canon 2: 770, John Lagerwey) place the commentary in the Five-Dynasties period and identify it as one of the two competing commentary lineages on the Xuánzhū xīnjìng (the other being KR5b0280 by 王損之 / 長孫滋).
Translations and research
- Schipper, Kristofer, and Franciscus Verellen, eds. The Taoist Canon: A Historical Companion to the Daozang. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004. Vol. 2: 770 (DZ 574, John Lagerwey).
- Pregadio, Fabrizio, ed. The Encyclopedia of Taoism. London: Routledge, 2008.