Jīn dān sì bǎi zì 金丹四百字
Four Hundred Words on the Golden Elixir
by 張伯端 (Zhāng Bóduān, zì Píngshū 平叔, hào Zǐyáng zhēnrén 紫陽真人; c. 984–1082) — the founding patriarch of the Sòng inner-alchemical Nán zōng (Southern Lineage)
The classical short jīndān poem of Zhāng Bóduān: 400 characters of densely-packed inner-alchemical instruction in 4-character verse, regarded as the most condensed canonical statement of southern-school inner-alchemy after his magnum opus Wù zhēn piān 悟真篇. Pagination begins at sheet 50a, indicating continuous foliation with preceding Wù zhēn piān materials in the woodblock printing — likely placed after the Wù zhēn piān recension, which precedes it.
Prefaces
Self-preface (Zhāng Bóduān). A long programmatic preface laying out the entire jīndān doctrine: “Seven returns and nine reverts of the golden-liquid great elixir — seven is the fire-number, nine is the metal-number; using fire to refine metal, returning-to-root and reverting-to-origin, this is called jīndān. Using body-and-heart I divide upper-and-lower crescent-moon; using spirit-and-pneuma I differentiate winter-and-summer two-solstices; using form-and-spirit I align kǎn and lí… The east hún’s wood, the west pò’s metal, the south shén’s fire, the north jīng’s water, the centre yì’s earth — this is gathering the Five Phases. Containing the eye-light, congealing the ear-rhyme, regulating the nose-breath, sealing the tongue-pneuma — this is harmonising the Four Forms. — When the eye does not see and the hún dwells in the liver, the ear does not hear and the jīng dwells in the kidney, the tongue does not voice and the shén dwells in the heart, the nose does not smell and the pò dwells in the lung, the four limbs do not move and the yì dwells in the spleen — therefore named the Five Pneumas Returning to the Source. Refining jīng to transform into qì, refining qì to transform into shén, refining shén to transform into xū — therefore named the Three Flowers Gathering at the Crown…” The preface continues with the standard southern-school operational sequence (gathering pre-cosmic primal pneuma; zhōutiān huǒ hòu; cleansing in mǎo and yǒu; etc.) and ends with the description of the zhēn jìngjiè (true scenic-realm) of the achieved adept.
Abstract
The Jīn dān sì bǎi zì is one of the foundational canonical texts of the Southern lineage (Nán zōng) of Daoist inner alchemy. Composition is c. 1075–1085 (Zhāng Bóduān’s mature decade, after the Wù zhēn piān of 1075). The text is preserved as DZ 1081 Zǐ yáng zhēn rén jīn dān sì bǎi zì, with multiple later commentaries; the present DZJY recension preserves the canonical text without commentary.
For the broader Zhāng Bóduān tradition see 張伯端 and the secondary literature on the Wù zhēn piān (Cleary’s Understanding Reality, Crowe’s translation, etc.).
Translations and research
- Cleary, Thomas. Understanding Reality: A Taoist Alchemical Classic. Hawai’i 1987.
- Davis, Tenney L., and Chao Yün-ts’ung. “Four Hundred Word Chin Tan of Chang Po-tuan.” Proc. Amer. Acad. Arts and Sci. 73 (1939): 371–76. — first English translation of the Sì bǎi zì.
- Pregadio, Fabrizio. The Way of the Golden Elixir. Mountain View: Golden Elixir Press, 2012.
Links
- Kanseki Repository KR5i0058
- Author: 張伯端.