Wǔ piān líng wén 五篇靈文
Five Numinous Texts
base scripture: planchette-attributed to 呂洞賓 (Lǚ Dòngbīn / Chúnyáng zǔshī); commentary by 王重陽 (Wáng Chóngyáng zǔshī, 1113–1170, founder of Quánzhēn); recorded (錄) by 清虛道人 (Qīngxū dàorén)
The five canonical short texts (líng wén) of the Quánzhēn founding patriarch Wáng Chóngyáng’s commentary on a basal jīndān doctrine attributed in the tradition to a Lǚ Dòngbīn revelation. The five texts are sequentially structured: (i) on the xiān děng 仙等 (immortal-grades), (ii) on the tiānxīn yuánshén (heart-of-heaven and primal-spirit), (iii) on the sān bǎo (three treasures), (iv) on the xiāntiānyīqì (pre-cosmic single pneuma), and (v) on the xiūyǎng (cultivation-and-nourishment). The base text is each topical theme stated in a single line, on which Wáng Chóngyáng’s commentary unfolds at length.
Prefaces
Preface (Wáng Chóngyáng). “This text is the supreme treasure of the Golden Elixir; it is not to be transmitted but to the right person. Only one of the highest-root, highest-vessel, of great-virtue, who comes upon this book — is on the orthodox road of the cultivation-of-immortality.” The brief preface is followed by the chapter on the five grades of immortals: “Immortals are of five grades: the guǐ xiān (ghost-immortal) is not worth taking; the rén xiān (man-immortal) is not worth discussing. The dì xiān (earth-immortal) dwells in the world for long years; the shén xiān (spirit-immortal) emerges into having and enters into not-having, hidden-and-manifest unmeasurable, has a body outside the body, can double his body — this is what is called shén xiān. The tiān xiān (heavenly-immortal) is ranked above the shén xiān. The student of the Way must not be of the middle-or-lower kind; must study the supreme-vehicle’s true method, the supreme-most subtle Way, fathom-and-clarify Heaven-Earth-yīn-yáng, deeply penetrate the transformation of the Five Phases…”
Abstract
The foundational jīndān commentary of Quánzhēn — Wáng Chóngyáng’s basal short text on the cosmology, the xiān děng hierarchy, and the xìngmìng doctrine. Composition c. 1160–1170 (Wáng’s brief active period as a Daoist teacher between 1159 and his death in 1170). The transmission attribution to a Lǚzǔ revelation is conventional for the Quánzhēn line; the text functions as the base instructional manual through which Wáng received and re-distributed the inner-alchemy doctrine to the Seven Perfected.
The DZJY recension preserves the five texts intact, with the commentator-transcriber’s signature Qīngxū dàorén lù — Qīngxū dàorén being a stock Quánzhēn editorial hào; identification with a particular historical figure is unreliable.
Translations and research
- Eskildsen, Stephen. The Teachings and Practices of the Early Quanzhen Taoist Masters. SUNY 2004.
- Komjathy, Louis. The Way of Complete Perfection: A Quanzhen Daoist Anthology. SUNY 2013. — includes translation of related Quán-zhēn texts.
Links
- Kanseki Repository KR5i0062
- Commentator: 王重陽; revealer: 呂洞賓 (託名).