《上清三尊谱录》

This section first explains the function of the Register of the Three Honored Ones, then describes in detail the appearance of the first transmission master, the Dao Lord of Upper Mystery and True Clarity, and guides the one who receives the Dao in how to visualize and pay reverence.

The Perfected One says: In cultivating the scriptures of Shangqing, Lingbao, the Three Sovereigns, the Five Marchmounts, and the Five Thousand Characters, one must visualize and revere these three honored ones. This is the method that first manifested through Jinming. Among the celestial beings of the ten directions, if any cultivate according to the method transmitted by my teacher Jinming, they can attain illumination together with me in the Jade Realm. One may begin from here to copy the charts and registers of the divine perfected; what precedes this should not be copied at will, lest one incur offense thereby.

The first transmission master is the Dao Lord of Upper Mystery and True Clarity, who is none other than the Primordial Supreme August Elder. His ritual surname is “悾,” which the Perfected One says is read as “Wu”; his ritual personal name is “懀,” read as “Yan Shiyin”; his ritual style name is “挘,” read as “Guanwuguan.”

The Dao Lord is one zhang and eight chi in height. His bodily form is golden, and his body is transparent within and without, like the seven treasures. A round radiance of five colors shines about his neck. He wears a jade crown of flowing brilliance, a flying-heaven robe of ninefold light, and over it a treasure robe of streaming radiance that is naturally seamless. He bears pearls of the sun and moon and a jade ribbon blazing like thunder-fire. A canopy made of the seven treasures covers him above. His feet tread the bright empyrean of the Three Heavens, and he sits upright upon a five-colored lion throne. Around him, thirty thousand jade lads and jade maidens, together with many perfected beings, attend before the Dao Lord. On all four sides are arrayed the host of Zhenyuan Yang; all wear robes of flying-heaven bright light and sit upon spirit-flower seats that arise of themselves.

The true form of the Dao Lord ever abides in the Palace of the Golden Image above Shangqing, in the Township of Eight Brilliances of the Prefecture of Jade Heaven. The Perfected One says: When celestial beings of the ten directions receive the methods of the Dao, they should visualize the teacher as fully endowed with the form described above. In this way one may connect upward with the unsurpassed realm; divine light shines downward upon one’s own person, and the perfected will descend. One should then bow three times within the heart.

After the visualization is complete, one forms a vow in the heart and offers this invocation:

May the Limitless Supreme Mysterious Perfected, the Celestial Worthy of Primordial Beginning, grant that my kindred through successive generations, both living and dead, may ride the feather-bright flying chariots, be delivered altogether from the ten kinds of suffering and the eight kinds of calamity, and ascend to the unsurpassed halls of blessing in the flying heavens of the ten directions, there to enjoy felicity and joy and to wander freely at ease through the groves of the seven treasures. May all living beings under Heaven receive salvation, and may every entanglement and doubt be wholly dispelled. On the day I attain the Dao (the Way), I too shall ascend into the formless realm.

The second ordination master is the Primordial Supreme Mysterious Elder, that is, the Most High Perfected King of the Exalted Nine Heavens. His ritual surname is Kong; the Perfected (Zhenren) explains that it is pronounced “xuwu” (void non-being). His ritual personal name is Yi, pronounced “shang guan ci.” His ritual style name is Ping, pronounced “yun fan ling.” This Perfected stands one zhang and eight chi in height. His whole body shines with golden light and jeweled radiance; his form is luminously transparent, like the vermilion sun, and a nine-colored wheel of light encircles his neck. On his head he wears a jade crown of golden blossoms and flowing brilliance. He is dressed in a three-colored robe of flying brocade and draped in a spontaneously perfected precious mantle made of cloud-bright, phoenix-hued flying gauze. At his waist are the morning-radiance sun-bells and the twin-pearl bright moons, and he wears a jade ribbon of spirit-gold (Shen) and brilliant light. Above his head floats a flying-cloud canopy of the seven treasures; his feet tread the bright rose-clouds of the nine heavens; and he sits upon a nine-colored lion throne. Thirty thousand jade lads and jade maidens stand in attendance to his left and right, before him and behind him. The Perfected constantly burns hundred-blend compound incense, and the smoke transforms into flowing five-colored cloud-blossoms that attend before the Dao. On all four sides are arrayed countless perfected immortals, clad in flying-heaven robes of the seven treasures and seated together upon spontaneously generated lotus thrones of seven colors.

The true-form image of the Lord of the Dao ever abides in the Golden Orchid Palace of Highest Clarity (Shangqing), in the Bureau of the Taiji (Supreme Ultimate), Opening-Brightness Township, Communion-with-the-Perfected Village. The Perfected says: “When the visualization of the revered master’s entire form is complete, the light of Shen (spirit) will shine down upon your body.” One then bows three times in the heart.

When the visualization of the perfected immortals is finished, one forms a vow in the heart and offers this prayer:

May the Unsurpassed Supreme Celestial Worthy (the highest Celestial Worthy venerated in Daoism) widely bestow boundless compassion and universally open vast, measureless gateways of the teaching, so as to bring relief to heaven and earth in the ten directions, that emperors and rulers of states may receive Great Peace, the nation may long remain secure, and all officials and common people alike may be blessed.

We further pray that this may extend down to the living and the dead of a certain person through successive generations, that they may all rise through the void to the Nine Heavens and come before the Limitless Dao (the Way) of the Mysterious Capital (the immortal realm of which Daoism speaks). All under heaven who bear resentment and all who are close shall be equal without distinction, and every sinful karma and every grievance shall be dissolved. May so-and-so and the others, on the day they attain the Dao, ascend into the realm of the formless.

The Perfected One, the third Salvation Master (a master who guides others in cultivating the Dao and in deliverance), says: “At this time, the candidate (the one receiving deliverance) should make a vow toward all living beings under heaven: May all who bear resentment and all who are close be treated as equals; may every sinful karma and every grievance be dissolved; and may we, on the day we attain the Dao, ascend into the realm of the formless.”

The third ordination master (dushi), named Jinming Qizhen, the Seven Perfected of Golden Brilliance, is the revered teacher who now manifests to transmit the teachings and confer ordination upon people. “Ordination master” refers to the teacher who leads practitioners to receive the methods and enter the Dao.

His ritual surname, written “Yu Zhenren,” is pronounced in its orthodox reading as “Xu Xuan Miao”; his ritual taboo-name, written “Zhuan Zhenren,” is pronounced “Yan Shi Ming”; and his ritual style-name, written “Yong Zhenren,” is pronounced “Xi Shang Wu.” The scripture states that this Perfected One stands one zhang and eight chi in height, manifesting a golden precious radiance whose light shines throughout the ten directions. Upon his neck is a seven-jeweled wheel of sacred marks. He wears a jade crown flashing with golden light and transforming without end, a robe of cloud-brocade that streams with light of itself, and a precious cape as crystalline as flying frost that spontaneously emits great radiance. At his waist hang bells symbolizing the light of sun and moon, and he wears a jade ribbon like flowing gold and flying lightning. Above his head is a nine-colored precious canopy of bright light; beneath his feet are the Jade Perfection, the flying auroras of the Nine Heavens, and the Three Florescences; and he sits upon a throne of brocade clouds and dragon mist. Thirty thousand jade lads and jade maidens attend him on every side.

The Perfected One constantly burns the hundred-blend compounded “return-to-life” numinous incense. As its fragrance spreads, it transforms into blossoms like nine-colored flowing clouds that attend in service before the Dao. On all four sides are arrayed the countless assemblies of the utmost perfected of the ten directions, all wearing the robes of the flying heavens and seated upon naturally generated thrones of return-to-life numinous flowers.

The scenic vision of the true form of Jinming constantly dwells in the Upper Palace of Cinnabar Numen, the Divine Bureau of Opening Clarity, and the Golden Wheel of the Upper Scene in the Township of the Nine Perfected, within the Jade Realm of Cavern Brilliance and Golden Marks of the Most High Nine Heavens of Jade Perfection in the Supreme Clarity (Shangqing).

The Perfected One says: “I manifest for a time in the world as the master who transmits the methods of the Dao, the teacher who instructs celestial beings and the people of the world.” Once the practitioner has visualized the master’s form as complete in every detail, they then visualize divine light shining down upon themselves from above, and bow three times within the mind.

When the visualization of the master is finished, one makes a vow and prayer in the heart: “May the Three Worthies open the way and deliver the ancestors of every generation of me, so-and-so, so that they may forever ascend to the blessed lands, their bodies receiving radiant marks of excellence, enduring age after age and kalpa after kalpa. May all fellow practitioners who dwell in seclusion among mountains and forests, cultivating and studying the true Dao, attain the Dao and become perfected.”

One then visualizes the divine light shining upon one’s own body and bows three times within the mind. When the visualization is complete, one again makes a vow and prayer in the heart.

May the Three Venerables (the three exalted deities revered in Daoism) open the gate of deliverance and transformation, saving the ancestors of successive generations of so-and-so, so that they may forever ascend into a realm of blessing, their bodily forms manifesting a luminous appearance and abiding through age after age. May those fellow practitioners who dwell in seclusion amid mountains and forests, cultivating and studying the true Dao (the Way), all attain the Dao and become perfected; may the cloud-chariots and blue-green carriages (the cloud-chariots and azure carriages ridden by the immortals) swiftly descend. May so-and-so, on the day of attaining the Dao, ascend into the realm of the formless.

Preface: The Chapter of the Mysterious Response of Golden Radiance

The Perfected of the Void said: My master, Golden Radiance, in former times accorded with the cycle of Red Brilliance (an age in the Daoist doctrine of cosmic kalpas). At that time, together with the Exalted Sovereign Primordial Lord of the Nine Heavens on High…

The Perfected explains: The Primordial Lord is the title of the True King and Lord of the Dao of Jade Vacuity in the Nine Heavens; the place he governs is the Terrace of Luminous Perfection of the Nine Heavens.

And together with the Exalted Sovereign Lord Lao of the Nine Heavens…

The Perfected explains: Lord Lao is the Most High Lord Lao of Jade Vacuity on High. He is also called the Exalted Jade Emperor, and is sometimes also called the Lord of the Imperial One of Dongzhen (Cavern of Perfection, one of the Three Caverns). The place he governs is the Terrace of the Nine Empyreans of Upper Clarity.

Together they rode jade-wheeled chariots shaped like the sun and moon, roaming above the broad celestial river of the Great Primordial Luminous Empyrean, gazing all around beyond the vast and boundless heavens of the eight directions, and surveying throughout the transformations of mist and cloud of the Nine Primordials (the successive levels of the heavens). They then returned to the Brahma Heaven of the Vast and All-Pervading Cavern of Luofu.

The Perfected explains: The formal name of this heaven is the Upper Nine Vermilion Heaven of the Flying Heaven at the Southern Extremity of Jade Vacuity. It is the place governed by the Great Lord of the Dao, the Vacuous Sovereign of the Winged Sun of Jade Clarity.

They further arrived at the Jade Kingdom of Golden Radiance.

The Perfected explains: The Jade Kingdom of Golden Radiance is a collective designation for one region among the various heavens, and it is the place where the Vacuous Emperor of the Eight Extremes roams. Within it there is the Precious Pylon of the Golden Dawn of the Flowing Radiance of the Three Luminaries; inside the precious pylon, thirty thousand layers of naturally generated jade script encircle it. On all four sides of the palaces shines the jade radiance of flying dawn, its brilliance illuminating all around. This is also the palace in which the Vacuous Sovereign Lord resides, and the dwelling place of the jade perfected and the golden immortals.

They further arrived at the Jade Terrace of Cavern Radiance.

The Perfected (Zhenren) said: This numinous terrace is the Vermilion Mound Terrace in the southern skies above Jade Vacuity. It rises ten thousand ren high. Throughout the terrace flows exquisite precious light, flashing with mysterious radiance, bright as luminous pearls and fine jade. It stands firm and still, and is therefore called the Numinous Terrace. Naturally luminous and transparent, it illumines the void and reflects the innumerable heavens of the south. This is also the dwelling of the Most High Jade Sovereign Lord of Upper Brightness in Jade Clarity.

Within the Cavern of the Numinous Capital.

The Perfected said: “The Numinous Capital is the upper capital of the Great Lord of the Dao, the Void Sovereign of the Upper Prime in the Vermilion Heaven. There lie the Cavern-Heavens of the Three Primes, opening above to the realm of Great Stillness and descending below to the domain of the infinite. At the center they are governed by the Elder of the Primordial Qi (vital energy) of the Three Primes. Within the cavern-heavens flow naturally bright jade essence, vermilion clouds and phoenix-like colored light, radiance like the sun and moon, and morning mist that soars into the clouds. These luminous vapors constantly steam and rise among the Three Primes, a scene like blazing flowing fire. The Primordial One once refined the True Writ of Great Possession here, so this supremely mysterious numinous writ is still preserved to this day. It is therefore called a ‘cavern.’

When Perfected who have attained the Dao ascend in flight, none fail first to reach the Cavern-Heaven of Vermilion Mound in the south. There they refine and transform the corpse-qi within the body and receive anew a luminous form, so that the golden bodily appearance grows still purer and more lustrous, precious light solemnly adorns the whole body, the wondrous form is thereby completed, and the body becomes as bright and blazing as the vermilion sun. Only then can they ride the void and float aloft, ascending above wondrous stillness. Their radiance and majestic bearing illuminate the four quarters and spread through the ten directions. This may be called attaining a body of lasting existence; cultivation is thereby brought to completion.”

In the first year of Xuanyuan, the jiawu year, at the wu hour on the first day of the first month, all together followed the Three Venerables of the Primordial Beginning of Great Light and received the True Writ of the Red Book of the Five Elders of the Primordial Beginning of the Dongxuan Lingbao (scripture of the Cavern of Mystery, Numinous Treasure).

The Perfected says: The reign titles, dates, and months referred to here all belong to the reckoning of years within the Chiming kalpa. The Three Venerables of Supreme Radiance and Primordial Beginning are the three venerable deities Yuangao, Xuhuang, and Yuanshi. By the first year of Shanghuang, five kalpas had already passed.

At that time the Three Venerables descended, received the rite, and ascended the Jade Treasure Ever-Bright Altar.

The Perfected says: The Jade Treasure Altar stands at the center of the Vermilion Heaven. There golden liquid, jade essence (Jing), and the radiance of the sun and moon flow forth of themselves, congeal into true treasures, and form this altar. The altar has nine tiers, corresponding to the Nine Heavens; it rises nine thousand ren, and its light shines upon the ten directions. It was here that Jinming ascended the altar, and Xuanying likewise received his charge and carried out his office before the Celestial Worthy of Primordial Beginning.

The True Sovereigns of the Nine Heavens, the Unsurpassed Heavenly Kings of the Three Heavens, and the Five Elders of Primordial Beginning were charged with overseeing, examining, and admonishing those who swore the vow; the Three Officials of Heaven, Earth, and Water served as witnesses to the covenant. The assembly looked only to the true Dao (Dao, the Way).

The Perfected says: “Look only to the true Dao” means that, where the mysterious sages manifest in response, a subtle teaching arises. The Dao of the Great Vehicle guides and receives living beings; its grace is universal and inexhaustible, and through it reaches all six paths of rebirth. With a heart of great compassion it widely relieves the ten directions. The treasury of the teaching is pure, empty, and luminous, untouched by worldly desire, clear as a wondrous mirror.

This is not a matter to be set beside ordinary people. One directly establishes the vow, so that the gate of the teaching attains a state of radiant grandeur. Its light shines throughout the Four Images; the realm is settled, limpid, and still. It cannot be measured by ordinary principles, nor imagined through ordinary benevolence and wisdom.

The ten directions shine as one.

The Perfected says: At that time heaven and earth in the ten directions all responded with auspicious signs, and the seven treasures fell like rain. The celestial beings of the ten directions all received blessing; the hidden and the manifest rejoiced together for more than nine thousand years, as if the sun and moon had ceased their course.

The Nine Heavens bear witness together.

The Perfected says: This means that the True Sovereigns of the Nine Heavens and the Unsurpassed Heavenly Kings of the Three Heavens jointly attest to it here.

This is in order to select those who accord with the true Dao.

The Perfected says: This shows that, even before the timely moment has begun to turn, those able to accord with the methods of the Dao must be chosen. Unless one possesses the endowment of golden bones and jade viscera, one cannot receive this teaching.

At the end of the original text, the wording “Unless one is named in the registers, it is said: namely, the True Sovereigns and True Kings bear witness to it here,” together with the final few sentences, appears disordered or incomplete, so only the general sense can be rendered from the context.

The Perfected One said: The time to which this teaching refers has not yet arrived, so a person’s spiritual capacity must be examined according to the methods of the Dao (the Way). Unless one possesses “golden bones and a jade storehouse”—a metaphor for exceptional capacity suited to cultivation—one cannot receive the transmission; nor can one obtain it if one’s name has not been entered in the Celestial Emperor’s registers and the mysterious charts.

It opens deliverance for countless beings and long serves as a bridge by which the worlds of the ten directions may reach the blessed lands.

The Perfected One said: Without the destiny-texts transmitted from the Nine Heavens—documents handed down from the celestial realms—the Lingbao Jing (scriptures) would not descend with their teaching to save people amid the calamities of the final age. The teaching therefore brings universal relief to beings of the ten directions, so that all may escape the disasters of water and fire and receive measureless salvation. It does not discriminate between good and evil: whoever takes refuge in the methods of the Dao and practices them can be ferried to the blessed lands. This is also done so that those methods may be passed on to people of later generations who have a karmic affinity. Were it not for the merit of the Lingbao teaching, how could this be accomplished?

One may say that, meeting precisely the worthy kalpa—an age suited to cultivation—the Lingbao teaching descends into the world. Disordered arts and vain, deviant ways then disperse of themselves, and only this orthodox teaching flourishes. From this it can be known that the Lingbao teaching saves beings without measure and bestows its benefit universally upon all.

The compassionate teaching benefits the ten directions. Ever holding a heart of great compassion, its grace extends throughout the Three Realms—the heavens, the human world, and the realm of the shades—broadly benefiting beings without obstruction. With wisdom it illumines beings and helps celestial beings and humans bring the various proper practices to completion, settling mind and Shen (spirit) and turning them toward stillness. It teaches all to cultivate the joy of quiescence, to cut off the karma created by ignorance—delusion and obscurity—and, thought by thought, to return to emptiness and stillness. This venerable Jing therefore sets forth the wondrous purport of the thirty-six scriptures and, through the various conditions of “emptiness” and “existence,” explains how the knots of affliction and delusion appear, while also revealing the unfinished retribution of suffering and the root of birth and death that beings have yet to sever.

The scripture further opens the gate of good deeds and cultivation of the Dao, enabling beings to understand rightly that offense and blessing each have their causes and effects. It urges people to observe the Ten Precepts, take refuge in the Ten Good Deeds, and practice according to the precepts, thereby teaching and gathering in deluded beings so that they may awaken to the supreme realm of stillness and leave the Three Paths—the three evil destinies of hell, hungry ghosts, and animals. In this way even enemies and kin can be saved alike, without distinction. Were it not for the merit of the Lingbao teaching, how else could these things be done?

The Perfected of the Void (Xuwu Zhenren) said: What is called the correct Dharma is to meet the teaching of the correct Dao (the Way) with right awakening, so that deluded beings come to their senses and set out upon the correct path. The wondrous principle of the Dao is far-reaching and profoundly subtle. It is truly not something that ordinary people of benevolence and wisdom can discuss in full, and still less does one dare to conjecture about it merely by the private reckoning of body and mind.

The Three Worthies (Sanzun, the three venerated deities honored in Daoism) circulate and manifest with the ages and the turns of the kalpas, and there is nowhere they are not fully present. They appear in response to the kalpas, sometimes emerging into the world and sometimes dwelling in seclusion. Of all these wondrous transformations, if they themselves did not come to respond and transform, who else could undertake them? Their divine manifestation reaches the realm of sagely wisdom; it is the embodiment of the numinous brightness of the Jade Heavens, and it serves to make plain the source of the Great Dao. The nature of the Dharma is deep and subtle, and therefore it transcends the Nine Clarities (Jiuqing, the higher celestial realms spoken of in Daoism). Before Heaven and Earth had yet opened, it had already penetrated the myriad ways, and it appears in response as conditions arise.

This merit shines upon the Four Images (Sixiang, the four basic symbols that constitute the order of Heaven and Earth), lighting the dark chaos as a crimson sun does; Heaven and Earth, the Two Instruments, are thereby established and set in motion. Numinous charts and images then appear within the Eight Convergences (Bahui, the realms of numinous gathering spoken of in Daoism) and manifest within the Great Abyss, so that beings in every quarter may clearly awaken. Once dark obsession has been dispelled, and beings sunk in slumber have widely awakened, the sages accordingly establish a teaching in words and clarify the principle through speech.

The Supreme Sage who establishes the teaching—the highest of sages—appears out of the lofty and distant clouds and roseate mists, and may be called the lord of instruction. He can answer the stimulus of beings and extend his teaching to the myriad things without obstruction. Thus he employs the power of wisdom to complete the work of instruction. The Dao is the venerable wondrous body that exhausts the hidden and minute and brings every kind of transformation to completion. Its wonder is transcendent and cannot be measured in words. If one traces it back to its source, it is as deep and vast as a shoreless sea, and altogether beyond comparison with speech or form.

The Dao is empty, still, and profoundly remote, and it is not subject to the ordinary principles and discussions of the Three Realms (Sanjie: the Realm of Desire, the Realm of Form, and the Formless Realm). Its merit surpasses every measure of number, and it abides in a region that intellect and consciousness cannot reach. In itself it is Wuwei (non-action) and without name, yet there is nothing it cannot accomplish. The “emptiness” of which it speaks is not a total absence of anything. It has no fixed form, and yet it can manifest the myriad things. Thus all dharmas gather from it, and there is no image that fails to meet with a response. It is not a rigid, vacant, and lifeless stillness; rather, there is no numinous thing that cannot enter into communion with it. It has neither ancestor nor patriarchal lord, nor is it absolute nothingness; within emptiness and stillness it can still respond to things and become manifest. It spreads through the ten directions and suffuses the deep, empty stillness. There is no affair it does not undertake, and all things and all affairs ultimately return to one and the same Great Dao. Therefore it can gather beings together and deliver them, dwelling above the myriad images and beyond the myriad affairs. Through hundreds of millions of kalpas and thousands of ages, it remains the silent realm in which the Supreme Perfected (Shangzhen) settle and repose their Shen (spirit).

The Great Dao is boundless and without limit, darkly deep and subtle. How could one point it out by form or by words, or speak of its wondrous realm? It is only that beings have long slept and gone astray: without a responding transformation they cannot awaken, and without teaching they cannot understand. Therefore my revered teacher, Jinming (a divine title of a Daoist perfected being), descended from the spirit heavens, guarded this kalpic turn, and sent down the orthodox teaching of the Dao. His appearance is like a lamp at dawn lighting the darkness, and like the wondrous mirror of the Jade Perfected shown forth for the first time. It enables both the divine perfected and ordinary beings to open into subtle awakening and to illumine the ten directions. Its light spreads through the Three Realms, rendering the Six Paths (Liudao, the six conditions of beings’ transmigration) peaceful and unobstructed, exalting the teaching of the various heavens and shedding glory upon the host of sages. He is not only a precious wondrous treasure within eternal vows, but also, over the long span, the root of the myriad dharmas.

Therefore, in the latter age of the kalpic cycle, he can forever rescue beings in the sea of suffering. Whenever living beings take refuge with sincere hearts, blessed recompense arises at once. The Six Perfections, the Four Equalities, and the Three Insights—terms used in Buddhist and Daoist texts to set forth the virtues and wisdom of salvation—shine together upon every quarter, enabling beings to penetrate divine and wondrous wisdom and to see clearly into both the obscure and the manifest realms, so that these are no longer cut off from one another. The Three Treasures (Sanbao: the Dao, the Jing (scripture/classic), the teacher, and the like, as honored in Daoism) flourish from this.

Jinbiao and Jinming received the mandate and undertook the charge; this is precisely the destined number of responding transformations within the Chiming Kalpa (a kalpic period spoken of in Daoism). Viewed from the wondrous body, there is from beginning to end no distinction. Examined closely, all of this is simply so of itself—why seek it by further questioning teachers and companions? At root the Dao is one; the manifestations of responding transformation are many. With my own wisdom I cannot exhaust the depth of the mysterious Great Dao. Having received Jinming’s command to collate the registers of the Three Worthies, how dare I offer a commentary merely from what is seen through a narrow tube? I now set these words down and leave them for later students and those of a shared aspiration.

Jinwu Gaoshang Tianbao Yuhuang (a venerable deity of the Daoist heavens) said: At that time, the exalted deities Taiwu Yutian Gaozu Xuhuang Daojun, Wushang Yuqing Xuwu Zhenren, Wushang Jiutian Zhangren, and the others—

Jinzhen (a venerable Daoist deity) said: These three Perfected were all disciples who cultivated the Jinming Shangmiao Ruji Dongjing.

Each of them received the jade registers of the Three Worthies that the envoy of Jinming had transmitted in error. They then compiled these into a single scroll, the Miaopin Jinzhang Shangpian Yujing, and presented it before the Heavenly Worthy Jianyuan Yi. The Heavenly Worthy thereupon entrusted it to Sanbao Yuhuang to keep the record, and it was stored in the Upper Palace of the Precious Sovereign of Great Light, Streaming Brilliance, Golden Splendor, and Purple Radiance in the Jade Heaven of Great Non-Being. In each of the ten directions of the Jade Heaven there are thirty-six Jinchen jade lads. The Perfected constantly burn natural hundred-blend incense and reverse-birth spirit incense; as the fragrance spreads, it transforms into five-colored flowing clouds and flowers of the hundred treasures, and by these the lads attend and guard the Sanzun Pulu Yujing, the Jade Scripture (Jing) of the Registers of the Three Worthies.

Should those in the heavens of the ten directions who have attained the Dao (the Way) by cultivating the supreme Dao meet an age of bright prosperity and have the chance to obtain the Sanzun Pujing, they ought to revere and treasure it together with the Three Treasures. This is the register jade scripture of utmost perfection and supreme wonder, and the most genuine and most wondrous accomplishment of cultivation.

Jinzhen said: Those who receive and uphold this jade scripture should place it together with the wondrous scriptures of the Three Caverns (Sandong; the three great categories of Daoist scriptures), offering to them, revering them, and paying them homage. They must not be divulged or treated negligently, nor may the scriptures be allowed to contract defilement. The Jinchen jade lads who attend the scriptures will report your offenses to Tianbao; at that moment, the wind-knives will immediately arise upon your body.

Jinming said: Among those who cultivate the Dao (the Way), whoever is able to receive the Dao that I transmit should, according to the corresponding methods and ranks, reverently copy the “Jade Scripture of the Register of the Three Venerables” (the scripture that records and is offered in honor of the Three Venerables) which that person is to revere. Place the scripture in a multicolored brocade pouch and enshrine it together with the scriptures of the Three Caverns (Dongzhen, Dongxuan, and Dongshen; the collective designation for the classification of Daoist classics). If there is no place where the Three Caverns scriptures are offered, one may set aside a separate chamber and arrange them in the same manner as the offering of the Three Caverns scriptures, burning incense and paying homage each morning and evening.

In cultivation one must maintain reverence, not violate the regulations, and continually hold in visualization the act of paying court, without slackening for even a moment. When one thus reverently offers the scriptures of the Three Venerables, the Dao-eyes of the Three Venerables will long illumine you with their mysterious power; your mind will thereby enter into sympathetic communion with the ten directions and penetrate the realms of ultimate truth and profound, silent stillness. The flying perfected (perfected beings who ascend in flight) will descend, and you will be able to rise into the jade realm, enter the formless realm, attain lasting existence, and have your body manifest the quality of golden numinosity. At that time, jade lads (youths who attend immortals and perfected beings) will stand in attendance beside you, and the work of the Dao will be accomplished.

Jinzhen said: If you can honor this jade scripture with reverence, the great sage celestial deities of all goodness throughout the ten directions, together with the officials of the Three Realms, will all come to guard your gate and will regularly pay homage to the text of the scripture. The celestial perfected (perfected beings of the heavenly realm) will also descend three times each month to pay court to the Register of the Three Venerables. And with ghosts and spirits standing guard and celestial beings serving as attendants, how could one fail to practice this with reverence?

Jinming said: The Three Venerables are the Three Treasures. The mystery of the Dao is supreme and unsurpassed, incomparably venerable, without end, and cannot be measured by high or low; one may say that it reaches the realm of the Limitless. It must be treated with the utmost care. I therefore admonish you earnestly again and again, wishing that you may thereby preserve yourself and become a perfected being. If there were no mysterious response from the Three Venerables, in the realm of the utmost emptiness and stillness, who else could come to deliver and transform you?

Jinzhen says: This Jinming Jing (Scripture of Golden Radiance) has existed since immeasurable kalpas and is used to deliver and transform the heavens of the ten directions. What the scripture sets forth are the venerable deities of utmost truth and great sanctity. Were it not for the teaching of the Great Dao (the Way)—the turning of the dharma wheel—circulating in the world, people would hardly encounter such scriptural methods.