入藥鏡

Rù yào jìng 入藥鏡

The Mirror for Entering [the Realm of] Medicine

base text: by 崔希範 (Cuī Xīfàn, late-Táng Daoist alchemist); commentary by 王道淵 (Wáng Dàoyuān, hào 混然子 Húnránzǐ, YuánMíng); preface by 李攀龍 (Lǐ Pānlóng — likely the Wànlì poet, 1514–1570, OR a homonymous Daoist of the same name)

The classical short alchemical poem of Cuī Xīfàn — 82 lines of 4-character verse comprising the most-celebrated short Daoist jīn dān (golden-elixir) text of the late-Táng / early-Sòng — here reprinted in the DZJY with Wáng Dàoyuān’s YuánMíng commentary (gloss every four lines) and prefaced by a Lǐ Pānlóng of Jǐnán Yúlín 濟南于鱗 — almost certainly the Wàn-lì-era poet (1514–1570) who used the zì Yúlín 于鱗.

Prefaces

Preface (Lǐ Pānlóng). “I have all my life misled myself wandering in immortal-prescriptions, vague-and-distant in seeking the mystery-purport — Buddhist lamps and Daoist canons all I set aside as I went after the trail. After seventy years of pacing about, attending to current schools, I was still confused-by-lineage and stuck-on-doctrine — like a man who does not recognise the body’s holes and sockets and yet wishes to follow a path into the inner room — that is to chariot a wagon to sea! How hard! In recent years, looking up and looking down at the great work, swallowing-and-spitting the Six Pneumas, motion-and-stillness forgetting region, having-and-not-having forgetting hole, I obtained from a stranger a transmission of the mystery-formula, and at one stroke swept away my dimness — no falling into directional positions, no passing through zǐwǔ, no entering metal-stone-grass-tree or sex-battle and the various side-confusions — by stealth I have followed it, calling it most-simple, most-easy. Though I cannot yet speak the Most-High’s intent of non-life, the gate of long-life is now in straight pursuit of the inner halls. — On a leisure day from the trunk I drew out this volume and read it idly through; my reading-rectifying lines were dispersed and not opposed, as if at one with what I had earlier heard, and I wished to entrust it for the broadening of determined men… Jǐnán Yúlín Lǐ Pānlóng prefaced.”

Preface (Wáng Dàoyuān). “The study of immortals — how can it be heard by the common man and the vulgar fellow? It must be the great-root, great-vessel, decided-and-resolute zhàngfū and bright-eyed lofty shì. — What is it the student does? Outwardly, he exhausts the principle of Heaven-Earth’s施-of-transformations; inwardly, he illumines the mechanism of body-heart’s working… The study of immortals is no more than refining nature-and-life, returning to the root and the source. Cǎi xiān tiān yī qì wéi dān mǔ, yùn hòu tiān zhī qì yǐ xíng huǒ hòu (taking the pre-cosmic single pneuma as the elixir-mother, transporting the post-cosmic pneuma to perform the fire-phasing). With the fire refining the xìng, the metal-spirit is unbreakable; with the fire refining the mìng, the Way’s pneuma is long-preserved. The dark turbid body is exchanged for the pure-yáng body; spirit transforms freely, response responds without limit — is it not wondrous? — Today’s immortal-students are confused-confused-many; when one debates with them, each holds an obstinate one-sided view, not consonant with the master’s orthodox-transmitted Way. Looking at Cuī gōng’s Rù yào jìng of 82 lines, its words spare but its meaning exhausted, threading through the bone-and-marrow of the various elixir-scriptures. I am not ashamed of my bamboo-tube view, and have added a footnote-pillar at every four lines, exposing the mystery-mechanism to be the eyes-and-pupils of men-and-heaven. Later students of like aim, attend with all your heart in chanting and repeating: there is the wonder of spirit-tuition mind-realisation. — Nánchāng Xiūjiāng Húnránzǐ Wáng Dàoyuān prefaced.”

Abstract

The classical short Cuī Xīfàn alchemical poem with the standard YuánMíng commentary of Wáng Dàoyuān, here paired with a personal-experience yǎngshēng preface attributed to the Wàn-lì-era literatus Lǐ Pānlóng. The base text is dated to the late Táng (Cuī Xīfàn is the canonical author; cf. Schipper-Verellen on DZ 134, Cuī gōng rù yào jìng zhù jiě); Wáng Dàoyuān’s commentary is mid-14th-century (cf. 王道淵); Lǐ Pānlóng’s preface, if authentic, is c. 1560s. The DZJY composite recension is thus a layered YuánMíng Rù yào jìng. The 1809 DZJY incorporated this composite, possibly with light Qīng editing.

The Lǐ Pānlóng attribution merits caution: the well-known gǔ wén poet of that name was a high official with no known Daoist commentary corpus. The preface’s autobiographical tone (a 70-year-old yǎngshēng practitioner who has consulted “异人” and obtained a secret formula) does not match Lǐ Pānlóng’s known biography (he died age 56). The preface is more likely either a later misattribution or a homonymous Daoist of the same name and zì; the matter is unsettled.

Translations and research

• Pregadio, Fabrizio. Cultivating the Tao: Taoism and Internal Alchemy. Mountain View: Golden Elixir Press, 2013. — includes a translation of the Rù yào jìng.
• Schipper-Verellen, The Taoist Canon II, on DZ 134 (Cuī gōng rù yào jìng zhù jiě with various commentaries).

Links

• Kanseki Repository KR5i0039
• Commentator: 王道淵; preface: 李攀龍 (attribution uncertain).