by Livia Kohn
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dressed to the disciples of a certain Jueyuan tan (Altar of the Source of Awakening) or Diyi kaihua tan (First Altar of Opening Transformations; see later), the names given to an altar of Jiang Yupu (Zhongli’s Pref. 5a; Su’s Pref. 6b). The following discussion, however, is based on his version as contained in the Quanshu zhengzong because it has more prefaces to clearly reflect Jiang’s religious background than the Daozang jiyao.
Jiang Yupu’s and Chen Mou’s versions of the text share remarkable features that differentiate them from Shao Zhilin’s. They no longer contain the prefaces written in the names of Jingming disciples; they preserve Tu Yu’an’s preface but omit or change important references to the Jingming lineage. For example, the passage cited earlier, which describes how Pan Yi’an informs Tu about Lüzu’s descents to Zhou Yehe’s altar, is eliminated completely; Tu Yu’an’s “disciples of the successor to the Jingming lineage” is changed to “disciples of the successor to the Jinhua lineage.” Similarly, the prefaces written in spirit-writing by various immortals are preserved in both of Chen’s and Jiang’s versions, but all references to the Bailong jingshe, Piling, and all indications of a connection with the Jingming lineage are no longer present.
If one assumes that the text used in Chen Mou’s version originally preceded Jiang’s, one can claim that Jiang followed his predecessor in rejecting the traces of the Jingming lineage. However, as Esposito has pointed out (1998b, 10), Chen’s and Jiang’s versions differ in that the former still follows the Jingming lineage, preserving an appendix very similar to the Jingming yuanliu found in Shao Zhilin’s version. On the other hand, Jiang’s version clearly denies the exclusive relationship between the Jingming lineage and the Jinhua zongzhi. In his in-troductory remarks to the Quanshu zhengzong, he asserts: The Jinhua zongzhi is an independent transmission from a direct successor to the Tianxian [celestial immortals]; it is not a scripture only of the Jingming school like the Zongjiao lu and others. ( Quanshu zhengzong, “Fanli” 2a)
Here, he emphasizes the close relationship between the text and the celestial immortals, that is, the Tianxian lineage. This is described in more detail by Zhiqiu (= Fan Ao, a disciple of Jiang Yupu) in a postscript of this version of the Jinhua zongzhi:
I believe that when Lord Fuyou [Lüzu] named the Tianxian lineage, a phrase of the verse must have been transmitted. When I asked Huijue about this, he told me modestly, “Once I heard that there was [a verse composed of] twenty characters which goes:
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In complete silence without existence,
You and the Former Heaven will be unified;
The original yang is back to its proper position,
When you walk alone into the Jade Castle of the Immortal.”
He also told me: “Our Lord Fuyou is the founder of the Tianxian, and Hongjiao enshi [Liu Shouyuan] is his second. You must remember this with respect.” ( Quanshu zhengzong 2.67b–68a) Huijue is one of Jiang Yupu’s pseudonyms found in the Quanshu zhengzong and Daozang jiyao.5 This shows that the Tianxian lineage worshiped Lüzu as their first master immortal and Hongjiao enshi (or Liu Shouyuan; Quanshu zhengzong, Pref. 40a) as the second, and that Jiang held a responsible position in the lineage because he taught Zhiqiu their secret verse. According to the same postscript, the teaching of the Jinhua zongzhi could never be properly clarified without transmission of the Tianxian lineage. He says:
The Jinhua zongzhi contains many expressions on the subtle teaching of the Dao, but only a few people could acquire the central teaching of the school. This will never be clarified without the transmission of the Tianxian. There is no one who can show this wonderful text but the founder of the Tianxian. This has been transmitted to this world only by Lord Fuyou. ( Quanshu zhengzong 2.67a)
It is obvious here that the text was now appropriated by the Tianxian lineage.6 However, despite their negative attitude toward its original editors, the new line undeniably held highly similar beliefs in Lüzu and was also a spirit-writing cult venerating the immortal.
Jiang Yupu’s Altar
Jiang Yupu’s engagement in spirit-writing is more than obvious. In one preface attributed to Liu Shouyuan, he was ordered by Lüzu and Liu to compile this anthology ( Quanshu zhengzong, Pref. 38b). As a matter of fact, the Quanshu zhengzong is an anthology compiled at Jiang Yupu’s altar, where they revered Lüzu and Liu Shouyang as their principal deities. Regrettably, despite the numerous messages from the immortal, there is only little information on the organization and history of the cult. Still, a few glimpses can be gained. According to Jiang’s preface, Lüzu says:
There are places inspired with my spirit-writing, and there are no phrases that have not been transmitted [in those places.] Here, at the
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Original Altar of the Source of Awakening, you [Jiang et al.] have compiled the old characters as previously transmitted separately, put them together with some additions, and recorded them. . . . This is the authentic proof [of enlightenment] that has been transmitted from era to era for thousands and hundreds of years at thousands and hundreds of altars. Now I name it “the orthodox lineage” [ zhengzong]. ( Quanshu zhengzong, Author’s Pref., 33b–34b)
Attributed to Lüzu, this preface was addressed to Jiang Yupu and his cooperators.7 It shows that the Quanshu zhengzong was thought to contain the essence of Lüzu’s teachings transmitted to innumerable altars in the past, and it was compiled at an altar called “Original Altar of the Source of Awakening” ( Jueyuan bentan), also known by various other, similar names,8 which was considered the main and central site of all of Lüzu’s transmissions anywhere. Also, according to some documents in the Quanshu zhengzong, Lüzu had opened seven
“Awakening” altars, among which this one was regarded as the highest. This is why it is often called the “first” altar.9
The origin of the Altar of Awakening is as vague as that of the Tianxian lineage. A tantalizing, if detailed, description of its history is found in Enwu’s postscript to the Quanshu zhengzong. The text says:
[Among the many altars in the world], the seven [altars of] Awakening are most prominent. At the capital, in the best location, the Altar has widely opened up and provided instruction to numerous followers.
There were six founders who all received a decree [from Lüzu] to enlighten the world and came to supervise the Altar. Previous supervisers included Guangji zhenjun and my master Huang, Xianyou zhenjun. In the winter of the wuwu year [1798], the great altar was rebuilt, when, by the decree [of Lüzu], Hongjiao zhenjun held the teaching and opened the secret to the people. ( Quanshu zhengzong, “Juanshou” 62a) In spite of the vagueness caused by an utter lack of context, this description implies that Jiang’s Altar of Awakening was located in Beijing. It also shows that it was after 1798, the year it was rebuilt, that Liu Shouyuan began to exercise power over the cult. As we have seen, he, in his role as the immortal Liu, was believed to be the second founder of the Tianxian lineage, which therefore should have begun around 1798.
Min Yide’s Version
Min Yide was a priest of the Longmen lineage, the largest branch of the Quanzhen school under the Qing.10 He criticizes Jiang Yupu’s ver-
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sion of the Jinhua zongzhi in the Daozang jiyao as spurious and contrasts it with the originality of a version transmitted through the Longmen lineage on Mount Jin’gai ever since 1688. He says:
The text appeared in the wuchen year of the Kangxi era [1688] and was transmitted in the hermitage of Longqiao on Mount Jin’gai. A wise man of the past, Tao Shi’an, printed it. During the Jiaqing era [1796–1820], the vice director Jiang Yuanting [Yupu] obtained a false text by mistake and included it in his Daozang jiyao.
Later, he received our text in Zhejiang. He hoped to substitute it for the false one, but the wood blocks were in Beijing. When [someone tried to] get them back [from there], the vice director a
lso went back to the capital, where he passed away. Thus, the project [of substitution] was interrupted and left incomplete. In spite of that, how could my heart forget it even for one moment?
Recently, when I went to Moling [Nanjing], I found a popular copy of the text which was a little different from Tao’s edition [Tao Shi’an’s text]. It had one or two more sections than Jiang’s. The latter seems to have derived from Tao’s version, but some parts must have been added and some removed. Words are different from person to person. Here, I will emend and revise it [Jiang’s edition] solely on the basis of that by Tao. ( Gu shuyinlou cangshu 5; Jinhua zongzhi 3a) Tao Shi’an (d. 1692) was a Longmen priest who lived on Mount Jin’gai from 1645 onward. Min Yide asserts that the original Jinhua zongzhi first appeared on his mountain and was edited by Tao Shi’an.
In his commentary to the text, he further asserts that it was created by means of spirit-writing, giving a description that he attribtues to Tao Shi’an. He says:
Having come to this part, the phoenix pen stopped all of a sudden. Although it was before the new moon, a great light that was neither the sun nor the moon unexpectedly began to shine, and nothing could hide beneath the light. The air was filled with an unusual fragrance; in the sky you could hear the solemn sound of music of heaven. After a few moments, the phoenix began to move at last to write: This was the comment of the light by Amitabha. . . . Now, in the mountain library on Mount Jin’gai, Yan [Lüzu] has preached the essential doctrines of the Golden Florescence of Great Unity in the emptiness of Former Heaven.
I resolved that I should practice and attain the result in order to change the eastern land into Sukhavati.
How wonderful! When my great wish was declared, the great fortune corresponded. When something begins, an omen comes before-hand. The light of the essence [Amitabha] reaches even from the fur-
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thest place. Now I could move Amitabha to bring down the radiant commentary of the primary essence that gives me infinite happiness and protection. ( Gu shuyinlou cangshu 5; Jinhua zongzhi 20a) According to this, the Buddha Amitabha suddenly interrupted Lüzu’s phoenix pen while it had descended to the mountain library on Mount Jin’gai and gave his radiant commentary. Following this revelation of this light, or radiance, Lüzu explained that it was an auspicious response from Amitabha to his resolution to change the eastern land into Sukhavati, the Pure Land paradise ( jingtu). The same event is also noted in Tao Shi’an’s commentary, inserted immediately after the previous passage. He comments:
On this occasion, many immortals assembled and gave verses [to praise Lüzu’s resolution.] Although it is impossible to describe the event in more detail, here is the outline of this important lesson. It was truly a meeting only once in eighty thousands kalpas. Who would have expected to have this at Longqiao? Those who have an opportunity to read this text should never lose their confidence. ( Gu shuyinlou cangshu 5; Jinhua zongzhi 20b)
Following this insertion, Min Yide explains why he put it there: This was what Shi’an wrote. Now, the text that Jiang [Yupu] has relied on belongs to the line of the Central Lineage. They appropriated the text [ Jinhua zongzhi] and tried to oppress the Northern Lineage. Thus they eliminated this [Tao Shi’an’s commentary]. The same things can be said about the most popular copies. Here, I make this supplemental comment [to attract the reader’s attention]. ( Gu shuyinlou cangshu 5; Jinhua zongshi 20b–21a)
Min Yide, therefore, alleges that some of the original commentary by Tao Shi’an was deliberately removed from Jiang’s version because the Central Lineage (of Jingming) tried to suppress the Northern one (of Longmen). His account, however, completely contradicts all evidence on the formation of the text in Piling. The problem, it appears, is largely on the side of Min Yide —a supposition supported by his preface to the Jinhua zongzhi. It says:
The founder, the Heavenly Worthy Lord Fuyou, resolute in his demand for salvation of the people, has a great wish to save the world. Thus he attained the profound teaching of the Great Unity of Former Heaven, Emptiness and Nonbeing, the Jinhua zongzhi, and expressed it in thirteen chapters as a basic teaching for saving the world. ( Gu shuyinlou cangshu 5; Jinhua zongshi 1ab)
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This account of Min Yide describes the original text of the Jinhua zongzhi as consisting of thirteen chapters, the same number as still found in the extant texts. As shown above, however, the text had twenty chapters before Shao Zhilin reduced it to thirteen in 1775. Following his reduction, all extant texts have had the same arrangement. On the other hand, it is quite possible that members of the Lüzu cult in Piling expanded the thirteen chapters to twenty. Yet if this had happened, Shao Zhilin would have known about the existence of a thirteen-chapter text and would probably have mentioned it, but he never refers to it, instead emphasizing that he reduced twenty chapters to thirteen. Then again, it is very strange that Min Yide himself did not use Tao Shi’an’s text, which, as he asserts, had been transmitted on Mount Jin’gai. In spite of his fierce criticism, what he included in his anthology was a revised version of Jiang Yupu’s text taken from the Daozang jiyao. It seems, therefore, that a text attributed to Tao Shi’an existed on Mount Jin’gai, which was in fact composed after the reduction of the Jinhua zongzhi to the edition in thirteen chapters, and that the originality of this text was fictitious, its revelation on Mount Jin’gai in 1688 being an imaginary story.
Why, then, would the Daoists around Min Yide fabricate such an imaginary transmission? Maybe they desired it, feeling the need for a direct transmission of the text to their own mountain. As Min notes in his commentary, Tao Shi’an’s description of Lüzu’s descent was removed from Jiang’s text in order to suppress the Longmen lineage —
which suggests that the descent of the immortal had something to do with this group. The same is also apparent in Min’s account of a meeting between the Longmen leader Wang Kunyang (Changyue) and Tao Jing’an. He says, again in attribution to Tao Shi’an:
In the autumn of the wuchen year of emperor Kangxi’s reign [1688], the precept master [Wang Kunyang] came down to the south and rested at the Zongyang gong. The hermit patriarch [Tao] Jing’an went to meet him. When he offered this text, the precept master treated him very politely, and after reading it with a bow, he said, “The heart of the Highest Lord’s transmission is fully expressed here.” ( Gu shuyinlou cangshu 5; Jinhua zongzhi 23b)
That is to say, in the very same year when the Jinhua zongzhi was supposedly revealed on Mount Jin’gai, Tao Jing’an met Wang Kunyang in Hangzhou and showed him the text. Tao Jing’an (1618–1673) was an uncle of Tao Shi’an, known as one of the founders of the Longmen lineage on Mount Jin’gai with the title “founding master of Mount Jin’gai”
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( Jin’gai xindeng 2.9a). On the other hand, Wang Kunyang was a leading Longmen patriarch at the Baiyun guan in Beijing, who, from 1656
onward, ordained thousands of people with the permission of the Qing court (see Chen 1988; 1990). He is considered the leading representative of the Quanzhen school in Qing times. His meeting with a master of Mount Jin’gai was, therefore, of great importance, because Wang was their master and a major leader of the great tradition of the Quanzhen.
The anecdote of Wang’s praising the Jinhua zongzhi as the perfect expression of the transmission of Lord Lao shows that the text was admitted as proof for the legitimacy of the Longmen lineage on Mount Jin’gai.
Although fictitious, the episode shows how important the text was.
At the same time, the Daoists on Mount Jin’gai were also con-cerend with losing proper contact with the great tradition. According to a note of Min Yide in his Huangji hepi xianjing (Immortals’
Scripture on the Creation of the Universe for Imperial Rulers), there were many restrictions on the transmission of precepts, not only because the government had banned all personal ordinations of Buddhists and Daoists, but also because of restr
aints in their own lineage.
To transmit the precepts, one had to possess lü (statutes, a code of transmission), shu (scriptures given with the precepts), and juan (a scroll with a lineage tree and an imperial edict). Being afraid to di-vulge the content to those not properly qualified, Daoists used to burn them when they could not find anyone deserving transmission. Consequently, as Min says,
three generations after the master of the precepts [Wang Kunyang], the way [of transmission] no longer existed. Today, during the Jiaqing era [1796–1820], when a precept transmission is held, Patriarch Qiu’s text [of the transmission] of the precepts is lost. What is being transmitted nowadays is what we learn from the Jingming zongjiao lu, which is not at all like the transmission of Patriarch Qiu. Earlier masters on the mountain [Mount Jin’gai] had burned the text to follow the rule.
Fortunately, the scripture survives in copies, but both scroll and code are lost. ( Gu shuyinlou cangshu 6; Huangji hepi xianjing 28ab) The direct transmission of the precepts from Wang Kunyang was of the greatest importance to Min Yide’s Longmen lineage. In spite of that, they had already lost the way of transmission at that time. In such a cornered situation, it must have been a great relief for them to possess a text praised by Wang himself as the direct transmission of the Highest Lord. The Longmen sect on Mount Jin’gai thus seems to have gained a guarantee of legitimacy from the spirit-writing of Lüzu.
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The revelation of the Jinhua zongzhi was not an exceptional event for Daoists living on Mount Jin’gai. According to Min Yide, the place had a long history as a holy site of Lüzu—sporting a bronze statue of the immortal that had been placed in the Song and being claimed as Lüzu’s fundamental altar, having seen the compilaton of his spirit-writings ( Jin’gai xindeng 2a, 9b, Shanlue fu). In addition, it is evident that Min Yide himself was deeply engaged in the spirit-writing activities of Lüzu. The Gu shuyinlou cangshu contains several texts providing direct instructions from Lüzu through spirit-writing, one entitled Sanni yishi shuoshu (Explaining the Cure of the World by the Three Saints), another called Du Lüzu sanni yishi shuoshu guankui (Narrow Insights into Lüzu’s Revelation of the Sanni yishi shuoshu). The former is said to be Lüzu’s a commentary on a celestial scripture that did not survive; the latter is a record of Min’s own self-cultivation practiced on the basis of Lüzu’s revelation. Here, Min directly asks Lüzu himself how to meditate properly and in response receives a detailed interpretation of the immortal’s teachings (see Gu shuyinlou cangshu 5; Yishi shuoshu guankui 25ab, 31a).