《历世真仙体道通鉴续编》

The Supplement to the Comprehensive Mirror of the Lives of Immortals through the Ages Who Realized the Dao is a Daoist biographical work recounting the lives of perfected immortals who attained the Dao in successive eras. Its table of contents lists the figures included in five volumes: Volume One features Wang Jia and Ma Yu; Volume Two, Tan Chuduan, Liu Chuxuan, and Qiu Chuji; Volume Three, Wang Chuyi, Hao Datong, He Dejin, and others; Volume Four, Sa Shoujian, Zhao Mayi, Liu Juzhong, and others; and Volume Five, Zhang Daoqing, Xie Shouhao, Ancestor Yuanjun, Master of Fire Wang Zhenjun, and others.

The text that follows repeats the names of several figures from the table of contents, along with their volume markers, and then proceeds to Volume One, beginning its account of Wang Jia.

Wang Chongyang, one of the founders of the Quanzhen (Complete Perfection) tradition, was named Jia, styled Zhiming, and known as Chongyangzi. He was from Xianyang in Jingzhao. Later, he moved to Liujiang Village on Mount Zhongnan. His mother once dreamed of an omen, then became pregnant; she gave birth to him after twenty-four months. He was born on the twenty-second day of the twelfth month in the second year of Zhenghe under Emperor Huizong of the Song.

Wang Chongyang was unusual from childhood. When grown, he was tall and powerfully built, with a handsome beard and mustache. He was generous in spirit, valued loyalty, and paid little heed to minor conventions. At twenty, he studied for the civil service examinations, entered the student register, and took pleasure in writing. His ideas came swiftly. He was first named Zhongfu and styled Yunqing; only after entering the Dao did he adopt the name by which he is now known.

In the eighth year of Tianhui under Emperor Taizong of the Jin, the Jin court made Liu Yu a king and established the state of Qi. It was also the fourth year of Jianyan under the Southern Song. Liu Yu ruled the lands south of the Yellow River and had no time to attend to the Qin region. Famine struck the area year after year, and people even resorted to eating one another. In the vicinity of Xianyang and Liquan, only Wang Chongyang’s family was relatively well off. His grandfather gave their surplus grain to the famine victims, but those who lived far away and had not received relief began arriving in large numbers to seize grain. More than three hundred neighboring households also took the opportunity to plunder them, leaving the family stripped of all its wealth.

The authorities sent troops to seize those who had taken the grain and prepared to punish them according to the law. Wang Chongyang said, “My neighbors have suffered famine and are picking up whatever they can find along the road. I cannot bear to drive them to their deaths.” The authorities considered him generous and kind, so they released everyone and dropped the matter. The people all admired his virtue.

In the fourth year of Zhenglong under the Jin ruler Hailing, Wang Chongyang suddenly remarked, “At forty, Confucius could discern what was right; at forty, Mencius was unmoved by external things. Yet I am still accomplishing nothing. Am I not foolish?” After that, his conduct became less restrained, and his relatives all grew to dislike him. He behaved as though he were mad all day, but no one understood why. Wang Chongyang accepted this judgment and did not defend himself. In the Guanzhong region, a madman was called a “haifeng,” so he took to calling himself “Haifeng.”

In the sixth month of that year, Wang Chongyang became drunk in Ganhe Town and met two men with unbound hair, dressed in felt robes. They looked alike in age and appearance. Finding this strange, he followed them and earnestly begged them for guidance. The two men spoke slowly: “This one can be taught.” They then passed on to him the formulas for cultivating the True—the essentials for training body and mind and attaining the Dao. Wang Chongyang was forty-eight at the time. Thus, in his poem about meeting his teachers, he wrote: “Only at forty-eight did I first meet my master; once the formulas were transmitted, my practice began to bear fruit.”

The person he encountered was probably an incarnation of Lü Xianweng, known as Master Chunyang, from the Tang dynasty—that is, Lü Dongbin. In the Mid-Autumn Festival of the fifth year, the master met the man again at Liquan and immediately went forward to pay his respects. People nearby laughed at him: “He’s called ‘Madman’—a name then used for people whose behavior seemed strange. How could he recognize a true immortal?” The man invited the master to drink. When the master asked where he came from, what his surname was, and how old he was, the man replied that he was from Puzhou and was twenty-two years old, but did not reveal his surname.

The man left him five pieces of secret instruction, telling him to read them and then burn them. He also urged him: “Set out at once for the Eastern Sea and seek out Tan the Horse Catcher.” Soon afterward, the man suddenly vanished. The master then left his wife and studies behind, sent his second daughter to live with her maternal relatives, and resolutely set off.

He begged for food around Langshe and Zhongnan, behaving like a madman so that no one could fathom his intentions. Later, at Nanshi Village, he built another hermitage. Beside it he raised an earthen mound several feet high, and dug a grave more than a zhang deep beneath it. He called himself “Living Dead” and also took the name “Xinggan.” In front of the grave he hung a square tablet inscribed “Spirit Tablet of Wang the Madman.” He also planted a crabapple tree and a pear tree at each of the hermitage’s four corners. He Gong, who lived there with him, found this strange and asked why. The master said, “I hope that in time the teachings from all four directions will gather in one place, just as these trees have been planted here.”

Three years later, he moved to a place in the water north of Liujiang. In ordinary conversation, he spoke only of matters that transcended the world. The villagers had always taken him for a madman and so did not understand his intentions. Sometimes he would travel with a wine jar, singing as he drank. People who had little sense of propriety would often follow him and ask for wine. He always gave it to them gladly and never refused.

Once, as he was returning from Ganhe with wine, someone called out, “Madman, would you share some of that wine with me?” The master gave it to him. The man drank it all in one gulp, then asked the master to fetch water from Ganhe for him to drink. This was probably what it looked like when an immortal got drunk. The man asked the master, “Do you know Liu Haichan?” The master replied, “How could I know him? I’ve only seen him in a portrait.”

After leaving with a smile, the master never drank wine again. When people invited him to drink, he drank only water; when others got drunk, he pretended to be drunk as well.

One night, not long afterward, the master set fire to his hermitage with his own hands. The villagers rushed over in alarm to put out the fire, but he danced and sang: “For all these years, I lived in Liujia with diligence. Day after day I toiled in the hermitage, entangled in worldly affairs. Suddenly, the true fire burst into life, so I burned down the hermitage and returned to the Supreme Dao. I urge you all not to grieve; another destiny awaits me. Only ashes remain, and I will not return. On the road to Penglai, you will know for yourselves how to come and go.”

When someone asked why he had done this, he replied, “In three years, someone will come to repair this place.” Then he packed his belongings and set off.

At Gan River, the master once wrote a poem: “In a quiet moment, I raise my head toward the vast meeting of water and sky. Even catching a whale’s cast-off shell is no mark of a hero.”

On the hall wall at Zisheng Palace on Zhongnan Mountain, he also wrote: “The Master Chongyang of Zhongnan Mountain left the hills of Difei and Jingzhao, passed through Lantian and Huayue, entered Nanjing, and traveled among the islands. There he met a dear friend who knew him well, and together they went to Penglai and Yingzhou to fulfill their pledge to pay homage to their teacher.”

He once painted a portrait of himself and inscribed it: “Where have I come from, and where am I going? My feet have not moved for an instant; turning back, I can awaken.” He also painted a picture of a pine tree and a crane, which he entrusted to his disciple Master Shi in Liquan for safekeeping.

Before setting off, he bade farewell to his fellow Daoists. Each gave him a poem to convey unspoken feelings, though no one understood them at the time. Carrying an iron pot, he begged for food along the way, saying, “I have a destined connection in the east.” He traveled out through the pass and reached Dengzhou. Returning to a Daoist temple that night, he wrote on the wall a poem he had composed in Shaanxi: “I leave the village of streams, bamboo, and hills on Zhongnan Mountain. I have no children at home, nor grandchildren. I travel three thousand li in search of dear friends who know me, to lead them through the gate of immortality.”

At dawn the next morning, he brushed off his robe and set out. On the wall he wrote the same poem again: “I leave the village of streams, bamboo, and hills on Zhongnan Mountain. I have no children at home, nor grandchildren. I travel three thousand li in search of dear friends who know me, to lead them through the gate of immortality.”

In the seventh year of the Dading era under Emperor Shizong, in the seventh month, the Master arrived in Ninghai and went straight to visit the Confucian scholar Fan Mingshu at his home. At the time, Fan Mingshu and Ma Yifu, a local man, had invited the Master to stay at a private residence. As time passed, they came to respect him more deeply and grew closer to one another.

At first, Ma Yifu dreamed that a crane emerged from the ground in the southern garden of his home. After the Master arrived, he joined Ma in choosing a site for a hermitage. Pointing to the place where the crane had appeared in the dream, the Master named it “Complete Perfection.” The name “Complete Perfection” began from that time.

The Master wanted to encourage Ma Yifu to travel west in search of the Dao, but Ma’s considerable wealth kept him from setting out, and his wife, Lady Sun, was especially reluctant. In the tenth month of winter, the Master moved into a small hermitage room and agreed with Ma to eat only one meal a day and practice behind closed doors for one hundred days. He gave Ma and his wife pears, taro, and chestnuts, allotting a fixed number of each. Whenever he gave them food, the Master wrote a poem, composed lyrics, or sang a hymn; Ma responded each time with poems and lyrics of his own. The Master also used accounts of miraculous events to explain the consequences of sin and virtue, warning them to reflect.

When the hundred days were over and the hermitage doors opened, Ma began to let go of worldly attachments. He changed his clothes and appearance and served the Master as a disciple. The Master gave him the name Yu, the courtesy name Xuanbao, and the religious title Master Danyang.

Earlier, while the Master was staying at Ma Yifu’s home, Tan Yu came to see him, suffering from a chronic illness that had lasted for years. The Master initially refused to accept him as a disciple, but Tan persisted in asking and stayed at the hermitage. When his condition later improved, he left his wife and followed the Master in cultivating the Dao. The Master gave him the name Chuduan, the courtesy name Yitongzheng, and the religious title Master Changzhen.

Later, the lord who lived on Mount Niuxian heard that the Master had arrived and came to pay his respects. During their conversation, the lord heard an explanation about pears and gained insight. He then followed the Master as a disciple. Later, he lived in Cloud Radiance Grotto on Mount Tiecha. The Master assigned him the name Chu Yi and the religious title Master Sanyangzi.

At that time, a fortune-teller named Hao Sheng, well versed in the Classic of Changes, told fortunes for people in the marketplace. The Master entered his divination stall and sat with his back to him. Hao Sheng asked him to turn around, and the Master replied, “Why don’t you turn around?” Hao Sheng was astonished by this. When the Master left, Hao Sheng followed him to the Temple for Worshipping the Origin. The Master gave him two lyrics conveying a deeper meaning. Deeply moved, Hao Sheng finally understood and bowed to the Master as a disciple.

Later, he came to Misty Cloud Cave, where his master gave him the name Rilin and the Daoist title Tranquil Master. He also gave him a robe without a lining to wear. Before long, the master moved with Ma Gang and the others to Mount Kunyi. When he went out, he followed his master to the Chaoyuan Temple. The master taught him two poems to express his heartfelt intentions. Deeply moved, he finally came to a great realization and paid homage to the master as a disciple.

Later, the master moved with the group to Mount Kunji. When they first arrived, he pointed to a spot on the mountain and said, “There is a Misty Cloud Cave here, where my ancestors practiced the Dao.” He had people clear the cave, and the rotted implements and the Jade Pool Well were still inside. Later, as the group gathered stones on the ridge, a huge boulder was on the verge of crashing down directly toward their hermitage. The master shouted sharply for it to stop, and the boulder stood upright, motionless. The woodcutters on the mountain saw this and were greatly astonished.

At the time, Master Qiu was nineteen. Though he had entered the Dao, he did not yet know whom to follow, so he wandered around the Kunlun Mountains. Hearing that the master was staying at the Complete Perfection Hermitage, he went to see him during the communal meal. The master recognized that he would achieve great things in the future, gave him a poem, and bestowed on him the name Chuji, the courtesy name Tongmi, and the title Master Changchun. From then on, disciples gradually gathered around the master. He tempered them with scolding and blows from a staff, and many gradually left. Only Ma, Tan, and Qiu remained unwavering to the end.

In the eighth year, in the eighth month, the master moved from Misty Cloud to the Jiangshi Hermitage in Wendeng. In the ninth month, he took up residence at the Su Zai Hermitage north of the county seat. In the ninth year, in the fourth month, Zhou Botong of Ninghai invited the master to come. The Golden Lotus Hall was then built, and the Golden Lotus Society was founded. The local well water had been salty and bitter, but after the master recited an incantation, it became sweet and refreshing. Not long afterward, one night the surroundings suddenly grew as bright as day. People thought a fire had broken out and hurried to investigate, only to see light accompanying the master as he walked.

The master once instructed Ma Gang’s wife, Sun. Her Daoist name was Not Two, and her title was Pure and Tranquil Hermit. The master also showed her a painting depicting scenes of Heaven. On the fifth day of the fifth month, he told Not Two to burn her vow document and gave her a poem.

Later, he established the Seven Treasures Association in Wendeng, the Three Luminaries Association in Fuchuan, and then the Jade Radiance Association in Dengzhou.

Someone asked him about visiting Penglai Pavilion and viewing the sea. He said that suddenly a great wind arose, and everyone saw the master ride the wind into the sea. After a while, he leapt out of the water again, but his hairpin crown had fallen off. Before long, it was floating across the surface to shore.

There was a man named Jie who had always delighted in doing good. After arriving in Dengzhou, he established the Jade Radiance Association. He earnestly asked to leave home and become a Daoist, and his resolve was firm, but the master never agreed. After Jie had left, the master said to those around him, “Two people now want to build a great hall here. One has already laid the foundation and gathered all the timber. Though he has not yet found any craftsmen, they will come of their own accord. Why? Because the materials are ready, and the work can begin. The other points to the place where he wants to lay the foundation, but the ground there is uneven and full of hollows. He has not gathered a single craftsman, and when they see it, they leave.”

When the master was at Yinxia, Zhang Dezhao had a son who was clever and bright, only sixteen years old. Zhang sent him into the mountains to study. Because the boy already had deep affinity, the master gave him poems and paintings on several occasions, repeatedly offering him guidance. Later, the boy left the mountains to visit his parents and never returned. The master wrote to Zhang Dezhao and entrusted him with some practical words as well. The boy understood and cherished the master’s teachings, and had long had an affinity for becoming an immortal, but he could not rouse himself amid worldly life.

When the master guided people, he always examined their aptitude and the depth of their affinity. For this reason, he called Zhang Dezhao’s son “Young Zhang” and never addressed him by name. Though he urged him in many ways, in the end he could not guide him into the Dao. Jie, by contrast, repeatedly and earnestly asked to leave home, but the master still would not accept him. This is how the master handled these two matters.

He established the Equality Association in Laizhou. From then on, people near and far were drawn to it, and more than a thousand joined.

The general meaning of the proclamation for the “Five Assemblies” was this: Equality is the foundation of Dao and De, the source of purity and stillness, and the basis of Jade Radiance and Golden Lotus. It is also the origin of all light and treasure. It can broadly save living beings and relieve the people’s suffering, so that everyone may bring forth the vitality within and no longer stray onto paths of darkness and evil.

Jade Radiance is the source of Qi, while Golden Lotus is the foundation of Shen. Shen arises from Qi, and Qi nourishes Shen. When Shen and Qi unite, one may hope to cultivate into an immortal. This requires genuine practice and virtue. Focusing the mind and settling one’s intention, keeping to one’s original nature without distraction, nurturing the heart and spirit, and firmly preserving primordial Qi are the work of cultivation. Practicing benevolence and accumulating virtue, helping the poor and relieving suffering, putting others before oneself, and holding no selfish regard toward any thing are the practice of virtue.

There were also the “Petition for the Golden Lotus Assembly,” the “Petition for Opening Illumination,” the “Petition to the Three Lights,” the “Petition for Jade Radiance,” the “Rules of the Equality Assembly,” and several poems. Since there was too much material, they are not all included here.

The master later traveled back and forth through Dengzhou, Laizhou, and the Ninghai area, leaving poems of farewell whenever he departed. In the ninth month, he set out west with Ma, Tan, and Qiu. When they passed through Dengzhou, the prefect, Heshilie Miao, treated him with the respect due a master. As they parted, the prefect asked when they would meet again. The master replied, “Nanjing.” Later, when the master passed away and became an immortal, Heshilie Miao happened to be appointed deputy military governor of Nanjing.

The master also pointed to the painted bridge outside Wangxian Gate and told the local people, “One day, this bridge will surely collapse.” Twelve years later, the prefect He Bangyan judged that the bridge was too high and steep for carts and horses to cross easily, and ordered it rebuilt. The master’s foreknowledge of future events was often like this.

When he reached Ye City, the master met Liu Gong again. Liu had just come with his mother to pay his respects. At their first meeting, the master took an immediate liking to him and urged him to become a monk; his mother gladly agreed. The master gave him the name Chuxuan and the title Master of Long Life. Liu then began traveling with him. By this time, the four known as Ma, Tan, Liu, and Qiu had all gathered under the master’s guidance.

Thus, “The Song of the Bamboo Staff” says: “I made a special journey to the sea to seek out a trusted friend. Who could be worthy of my confidence? Last night, in a dream, I saw several rainbows, four of which could leap.” These lines hint in advance at what happened later. The related poems and the full account of events are recorded in this biography.

When the master arrived in Nanjing, he lodged for a time at the Wang family’s inn. Meng Zongxian became his friend. Meng had once served as assistant prefect of Shan Prefecture, but returned to his hometown to observe mourning after his mother died. Du Ge, who went by the title “Master Divine Wind,” had predicted that Meng would take first place in the imperial examinations four times. When each prediction came true, Meng regarded him as an immortal.

One day, Du Ge suddenly said to Meng, “The Marshal has arrived. I should go pay my respects.” Meng had a young servant discreetly follow him. Du Ge went straight to the Wang family’s inn, knelt on one knee, and paid his respects. The master was lying down reading and paid him no attention at all. Meng had always held Du Ge in high regard, so he was greatly surprised to hear this. Du Ge went a second time, and only then did the master glance at him. On his third visit, the master smiled and looked at him. Du Ge left, leaping with delight.

Meng then went in person to pay his respects to the master. The master continued reading and did not return the greeting. When Meng asked what book he was reading, the master did not answer. Meng stepped closer and saw that it was the Collection of Music Lyrics (Yuezhang ji). He asked, “Is this the complete collection?” The master replied, “There is only one volume.” Meng said he had the complete collection at home and could bring it for him to read, then sent it over.

Ever since arriving in the capital, the master had sent Ma Gang and three others out to beg for money. They would buy a carp weighing a full catty, then cook and eat it; if it weighed less than a catty, they would not eat it. Meng found this puzzling. He thought to himself: “It is already unusual for a Daoist to read the Collection of Music Lyrics. Why is he so particular about eating a fish weighing a full catty?”

Some time later, Meng asked whether the master had finished reading the Collection of Music Lyrics. The master did not answer; he simply handed back the volume Meng had lent him. When Meng looked through it, he found that the blank spaces between the lines of every piece had been filled with matching lyrics. He could not help exclaiming, “These are lyrics written by an immortal!”

After returning, he bathed and changed his clothes, then burned incense and sought instruction from his master, becoming more respectful with each passing day. From then on, the master stopped eating fish, for he knew that Ma Gang had been transformed from a great carp, and used this to hint at the reason.

The master ordered Ma Gang to summon a craftsman to make a wind-powered cart for one person. When it was finished, the master said, “Lately, smoke from the fire has made me unable to see. Have someone light a lamp and look around the room.” Ma Gang immediately understood what the master meant.

Later, the master bought four carp himself, threaded a rope through them, and dragged them back to their lodging. He cooked them with two jin of mutton, then hid the food for more than a month, until both the fish and the mutton had spoiled and begun to stink. The master told his disciples to eat it. At the time, everyone abstained from meat and fish, and no one dared to eat. The master asked them one by one, and they all said they dared not. Only Ma Gang kowtowed and said, “If you tell me to eat, Master, your disciple will eat.” The master rebuked him: “You cannot keep the precepts yourself, and now you want to use my name as an excuse?” He then gave him a brimming bowl. The master added, “Once we reach west of the pass, you won’t be given food like this.”

For several mornings, the master first had Ma Gang eat mutton and fish, then sent him to buy wine. He also bought steamed dates and honey, shaped them into pellets, and ate them himself. The master asked Ma Gang, “Do you understand now?” Ma Gang still failed to grasp the meaning, so the master instructed him more sternly, sometimes cursing him and sometimes beating him, day and night. “One day, you will understand,” he said. Ma Gang bowed in gratitude: “I have no way to repay your compassionate instruction, Master.” The master replied, “Cultivation is the repayment.”

Only after they reached west of the pass did Ma Gang understand that everything the master had done in the capital had been subtle instruction. In the twelfth lunar month, the master trained Ma Gang and the others rigorously, testing them again and again. Whatever they did, even a single word or gesture, drew a reprimand. Since Ma Gang and the others had collected a good deal of money and goods by begging, the master used them to buy firewood and charcoal, then burned it fiercely in the small room where they slept. The room was cramped, so the master sent Ma Gang and Tan Chuduan inside, while Liu Chuxuan, Qiu Chuji, and the others stayed outside.

He warned everyone that he could not endure heat within or severe cold without. Chuxuan (Tan Chuduan) could not bear it and left. The master seated the three disciples beside his bed and said, “Danyang (Ma Danyang) has attained the Dao, and Changzhen (Tan Chuduan) has understood its principles. I have nothing left to worry about. As for the practices Ch’uji (Qiu Chuji) has learned, he should follow the arrangements made by Danyang, Chuxuan, and Changzhen; they will take charge.” Then he looked at Ch’uji and said, “This child will hold an extraordinary position in the future and will surely greatly spread our religious teaching.”

As soon as the first month began, the master took leave of everyone, saying, “Now I can fulfill my appointment with the perfected master.” Ma Gang and the others asked him to leave final instructions. The master replied, “I once wrote an inscription on the wall of Daoist Lü’s hermitage in Luan Village, Jingzhao.” He then improvised a verse:

“On Mount Difei, I am Master Chongyang,

known to people as Wang Haifeng.

The years stretched long while I was here; once I depart,

let me go east or west as I please.

I keep company with clouds and flowing waters,

and take empty space as my neighbor.

My one numinous, true nature endures forever,

unlike the thoughts that fill the minds of ordinary people.”

He again urged everyone not to weep, then passed away. They burst into loud sobs, and the master suddenly opened his eyes and said, “Why make such a fuss?” He then instructed Ma Gang to oversee the funeral arrangements, adding, “If you go to the region west of the pass, teach and guide the people of my hometown.” He also entrusted Ma Gang with several secret words and told him not to pass them on lightly. Ma Gang bowed twice and accepted the charge.

The master then said to Tan Chuduan and the others, “Your future prospects all lie in the hands of Master Ma.” He next wrote a poem titled “Kin Beyond the World”:

“One younger brother, one nephew, and two sons—

with me, five of us cultivate together.

We form true kin beyond the dusty world,

leaving behind our fleshly bodies,

joined only temporarily in this world.

All around us, we plant a scene of purity,

and pass the purple numinous fungus from one to another,

a symbol of the wondrous things gained through the Dao.

Together, you will attend the gathering at Golden Flower Mountain;

I will go first to Penglai to pay my respects to the master.”

Having finished writing, he passed away peacefully at the age of fifty-eight. It was the fourth day of the first month in the tenth year of the Dading era (1170).

Youzhi said to everyone, “As I am a disciple, I should oversee the funeral.” He made the offerings with care each day and never slackened, even when the coffin was moved westward. He also said to his son, “The five of us have received the rites of our former master…”

You Zhi said to the assembled people, “Since I am the master’s disciple, I should preside over the funeral rites.” From then on, he made offerings with care every day, never neglecting his duties until the coffin was moved westward. He told the master’s son, “The five of us once received instruction from Master Wang Chongyang. I was one of them.”

Later, Ma Gang and the others went to Luancun in Jingzhao to look for the hermitage where Daoist Lü had lived. There they found a poem composed by Daoist Lü. They also exchanged poems with Yu Chan and Li Lingyang on Mount Zhongnan. At the time, the master was in Nanjing and had sent poems to these two men, including the line, “First one departed; the other three went with him.” When they met Master Shi of Liquan, he brought out an old chart whose contents matched these events. Together, they then repaired the hermitage where the master had once lived.

While he was alive, the master had never been held in esteem by the people of his native region. Only after Ma Gang arrived in Qin did they begin to regret this. Later, Ma Gang and the others went to Nanjing, retrieved the master’s coffin, and returned to bury him at Liujiang. They built a hut and kept watch over the tomb for three years, then each went his own way in accordance with his aspirations.

Ma Gang carried on the master’s teachings. Later, Tan, Liu, Qiu, and others succeeded him as leaders of the religious community. Quanzhen scholars regard Zhongli Quan, Lü Dongbin, and Liu Haichan as the “Three Patriarchs,” and honor the master as their founding patriarch. In the first month of the ji-si year, the sixth year of the Zhiyuan era under the Great Yuan (1269), the court posthumously bestowed on the master the title “Perfected Lord Chongyang of Quanzhen’s Opening and Transformation.” His writings, The Collections of Concealment from the World, Before and After Attaining Quanzhen, have been handed down.

A discussion of the way of ministers says: In antiquity there were emperors. When the Emperor’s Way declined, there came the sage-kings; when the Way of the sage-kings declined, there came the kings; and when the Way of the kings declined, there came the hegemonic rulers. When even the way of hegemony could no longer sustain the world, this was a misfortune for the Dao. The Quanzhen (Complete Perfection) tradition arose—truly a remarkable event, outstanding in the Central Plain. As worldly customs grew ever more shallow, it turned instead to honoring the Great Dao of simplicity and purity. In the face of stubborn, coarse ways, it taught people to look up to the Dao of Wuwei (non-action). One founding master proclaimed it, and seven perfected ones successively answered his call. What a flourishing and glorious movement! Today, our state’s power is no match for that of the Five Hu peoples, and its virtue falls short of the Tuoba clan. The fortunes of the state are in decline and indeed seem difficult to sustain. Yet Heaven has revealed to people the teaching of Xuanyuan—the teaching of Laozi and the Daoist Way—spreading its blessings among all beings and ensuring that the Great Dao would not be lost but would endure to this day. This is precisely the achievement of the Quanzhen tradition.

The Daode Jing says: “The Great Dao flows everywhere, spreading far and wide. All things depend on it to grow, yet it does not turn them away. When its work is done, it does not claim the credit. It cherishes and nurtures all things, yet does not rule them; therefore it is always without desire and seems small. All things return to it, yet it does not rule them; therefore it may also be called great. The sage never claims greatness, and so is able to accomplish greatness.” Is this not speaking of the Quanzhen tradition?

Ma Yu

The Master Ma was originally named Congyi, with the courtesy name Yifu. He was also once named Gong, with the courtesy name Xuanbao. He later changed his name and took the religious name Danyangzi. He was a descendant of Ma Yuan, the Han dynasty general who campaigned against the southern peoples, and his ancestral home was Fufeng. During the turmoil of the Five Dynasties period, his family moved to Ninghai, where they had pursued Confucian learning for generations.

His grandfather, Ma Jue, courtesy name Xinsou, was deeply filial and well versed in the Five Classics. His father, Ma Shiyang, courtesy name Xixian, was handsome, calm in temperament, measured in his conduct, and known for his filial piety and righteousness. When he was young, a guest hurriedly left, forgetting an oilcloth-wrapped garment in the house. His father examined it and found a considerable quantity of gold inside. He reported this truthfully to his own father and, following his instructions, put it away until its owner returned. Ten days later, the guest came back, and his grandfather returned the belongings to him.

The guest thanked them, saying, “I am Lü Xian, and I live in Yougu Village. People make their living through pottery, and I was taking two yi of gold to the market to buy food for a purification rite. Just then, a tax inspector pressed me and chased after me. Thanks to your help, I escaped. I would like to give you half the gold in return.” His father politely declined. Lü Xian said, “Sir, you have the noble spirit of Huang Xiang. One day, a man of lofty character will emerge from your family.” Later, his father went to Yougu Village to look for him, but no one named Lü lived there. Only then did he realize that the encounter had been extraordinary.

His father had five sons, named Ren, Yi, Li, Zhi, and Xin after the virtues of benevolence, righteousness, propriety, wisdom, and trustworthiness. Their family was therefore known at the time as the “Five Constant Virtues Ma family.” Master Ma was the second son. While his mother was pregnant, she dreamed that Magu, a Daoist immortal, gave her a pill of elixir. She swallowed it, awoke, and immediately gave birth to Master Ma. He was born on the twentieth day of the fifth month in the first year of the Tianhui era of Jin Taizong’s reign. As a child, he often spoke of “riding clouds and mounting a crane.” When he grew up, he studied Confucian learning but had no interest in the civil service examinations or an official career. His father valued his talents and put him in charge of the family’s stores. He was generous and fair in his dealings, and became known for caring little for wealth and delighting in giving it away.

After meeting his teacher, Li Wumeng sensed that he was extraordinary and praised him, saying, “His forehead is like three mountains, and his arms hang down past his knees. He is truly born for the great immortal Dao.” He went on to admire his appearance: “He is upright and imposing, with a round face and long ears, long eyebrows, handsome eyes, a straight nose, and a square mouth. His features are well formed, and a divine light shines from the crown of his head. Yifu has already received an immortal’s prediction; in the future, he will live in the splendid immortal realm of the lotus.”

Before long, Yifu completed his practice of the alchemical Dao. Lord Zhongxian Sun gave his daughter in marriage to him, and they had three sons, named Tingzhen, Tingrui, and Tinggui.

Yifu once sat for a supplementary examination at the prefectural school. One night, he dreamed of two men dressed in brown. One had white patches on both shoulders. Weeping, he said to Yifu, “There are more than a hundred thousand of us, and our lives are in your hands.” Then he left. Yifu followed them into the enclosure of the butcher Liu Qing and saw these words written on a wall: “We are the hundred thousand born in the year of Jihai. More than half of us were killed in the year of Xinsi. If this butcher has no compassion, in the years to come our hides and fur will often be used to wipe cart axles.” When Yifu awoke, he heard the butcher’s voice. He went outside and saw Liu Qing’s youngest son, A’er, tying up two sheep. One had white hair on its shoulder and had already been killed. Yifu then understood that “Jihai” in the dream referred to the year the sheep were born, while “Xinsi” was the year Liu Qing slaughtered them.

Yifu suspected the dream foretold misfortune, so he asked the diviner Sun Ziyuan to predict how long he would live. Sun Ziyuan said, “You will not live past forty-nine.” Deeply shaken, Yifu said, “Can life and death truly lie beyond human control? I want to seek out a person of the Dao and learn the art of long life and enduring vision.” After that, whenever he played chess with guests, he would often mutter to himself, “If I don’t make a mistake with this move, I’ll be able to live forever.”

In the seventh month of the seventh year of the Dading era under Emperor Shizong of the Jin dynasty, Yifu drank with Gao Jucai of Liaoyang and his fellow townsman Zhan Shi at Fan Mingshu’s Pavilion of Joyful Ageing. At the height of the celebration, he inscribed a poem: “Holding fast to the original Qi and concentrating the spirit—that is true skill. These days, even the lazy cannot hold fast to the One.” Here, “embracing the Origin and holding fast to the One” means preserving the original Qi and concentrating the spirit. It is a common expression in Daoist cultivation.

All day long, he held a wine cup and gave free expression to his feelings. Yet when he was drunk, someone was there to support him. Those around him could not understand what these words meant. On the day after the Zhongyuan Festival, Patriarch Chongyang (Wang Chongyang) came from Mount Zhongnan and went straight into the Pavilion for the Care of the Aged. Master Zhan asked, “You have come through the heat wearing a cloth robe and bamboo hat. Why put yourself to such trouble?” The patriarch replied, “I had long ago arranged to meet the Green Immortal, and have come especially to seek a kindred spirit.” After eating a melon, he ate even the stem end. When Master Zhan asked why, he said, “Sweetness comes precisely from bitterness.” Asked where he had come from, he answered, “I have traveled a thousand li, especially to support a drunkard.”

Master Zhan wondered to himself, “I once wrote the words ‘someone supports me when I am drunk.’ How could this gentleman know of them?” He then asked, “What is meant by the Dao?” The patriarch replied, “Beyond the Five Phases (the five basic elements that make up all things), and before one’s parents had given birth to one.” Ming Shu said, “These ten words alone express the most profound principles completely. Who but an immortal could speak such words?” The two sat down and talked, finding themselves entirely in accord. Master Zhan then invited the patriarch to his private residence and honored him as his teacher.

At first, Master Zhan had dreamed of a crane rising from the earth. Now, at the spot in the South Garden where the crane had appeared, he built a hermitage and named it “Complete Perfection.” The patriarch very much wanted to take Master Zhan west on a long journey, but family obligations held him back, and for a time he found it hard to leave them decisively. The patriarch therefore explained in detail the benefits of leaving home and the burdens of remaining in one’s native place, helping him resolve his doubts. From then on, the bond between Master Zhan and the patriarch deepened, and they often discussed the principles of the Dao.

In early October of that year, the patriarch ordered Master Zhan to lock the hermitage gate and eat only one meal a day. It was the depth of winter, and wind and snow poured in from every side. The hermitage contained only brushes, ink, paper, an inkstone, a pillow and mat, plain clothes, and straw sandals. Yet his body and mind were at ease, as though he were surrounded by the gentle warmth of a spring breeze. Those who understood cultivation said that people who attain the Dao possess the wondrous ability to warm cold valleys until they feel like spring.

While the hermitage was locked, the patriarch once gave Master Zhan a pear to eat. Every six days, he also gave him six taros and six chestnuts. On the eleventh day of that month, the patriarch cut a pear in half and had Master Zhan and his wife share it. After that, taros and chestnuts were given every six days, and pears every ten days, according to a fixed schedule.

Every six days, the master rewarded him with six taro roots and six chestnuts. On the eleventh day of that month, he split a pear in half so that the husband and wife could eat it together. After that, the rewards of taro and chestnuts came every six days, and pears every ten days, becoming a fixed arrangement. The quantities of taro and chestnuts remained the same as at the beginning, while the number of pears increased by one every ten days. By the ninetieth day, the cumulative number of pears was fifty-five. Each time he handed them out, he used verse to convey hidden meanings, and the master immediately replied in verse.

The commentator explained: “Taro” (yu) and “encounter” (yu) sound alike, as do “pear” (li) and “separation” (li). Having them meet was a way of arranging for the husband and wife to part. “Dividing” also carries the meaning of continuous diminishment. Fifty-five is the number formed by joining the odd and even numbers of Heaven and Earth. The purpose was to make him leave his kin and home village, and ultimately reach a state of separation from everything.

In a dream, the master also used the character “ten” to warn him: he had broken ten precepts and would suffer punishment in prison. On the eleventh day of the first month in the eighth year, the master unlocked his chains and said, “In three or four days you will set out. Come back with me.” Soon afterward, however, a strange misfortune befell him: injuries caused by the chains left him suffering from a wind illness that lasted a hundred days. He therefore handed his property over to Tingzhen and the others, gave Sun the letter of separation, and went into the city to beg.

Because he had sung in a dream, “Burn it white, refine it yellow: this is the formula for long life and deathlessness,” the master bestowed on him the name he bears now. He also dreamed that he followed the master into a mountain. At dawn, the master called out, “Mountain Cave,” and made this his childhood name.

In the second month, he stayed with the master at Yanxia Cave in Kunjian. Suddenly he developed an unbearable headache, and the master sent someone to the household to seek medical help. One day, the master said to his disciples, “Ma Gong is about to ruin his cultivation.” When they asked how he knew, he replied, “Last night I dreamed he was drinking wine.” He sent someone to inquire and learned that the medicine had been prepared with wine as an ingredient; without realizing it, Ma Gong had drunk too much, worsening his illness. The messenger reported, “Ma Gong is near death.” The master clapped his hands and said, “I traveled three thousand li to seek this dear friend. Can I really let him come to such a pass?” His illness had arisen because his faith was not firm enough; a single application of ritual water would cure him.

The Patriarch left these true words: “For ordinary people who cultivate the Dao (the Way), the first requirement is to follow these twelve words: give up alcohol, sex, wealth, anger, social entanglements, greed, attachment, distracting thoughts, sorrow, and worry. After that, there is nothing more to say. If you do not cultivate in this way, then even if you refine a spiritual elixir, you still cannot attain release in nature and life.”

In the eighth month, the Patriarch stayed at Jiang Shian’s hermitage in Wendeng and warned his disciples in advance: “When Ma Gong arrives, do not admit him.” On the first day of the ninth month, Ma Gong indeed arrived. The Patriarch sent word: “If we meet now, we will not meet again later; if you want us to meet again later, then do not meet me now.” Ma Gong asked to meet again in the future, so he took up residence at the Su family’s hermitage north of the county seat.

At the beginning of the tenth month, the Patriarch ordered Ma Gong to burn his vow document and gave him a poem: “You laid down the golden hook a year ago; only now have you swallowed the fragrant bait, letting the fishing line draw you along. When you reach Mount Yujing, you will transform like a great roc, following me on the wind as we rise into the sky and enter the celestial grotto—the immortal realm.”

On the fifth day of the fifth month, at the Golden Lotus Hall, the Patriarch ordered Sun to burn his vow document and move to another hermitage. On the eleventh day, the Patriarch summoned Ma Gong to Fan Mingshu’s home and composed a parting poem for him, but Ma Gong refused to accept it. At times, the Patriarch allowed him a brief audience, then drove him away afterward. Only later, in Nanjing, was Ma Gong finally able to stay with the Patriarch.

The Patriarch wanted Ma Gong to solicit alms and donations in Ninghai. Ma Gong declined, saying he had vowed never to return to his hometown. The Patriarch grew angry and beat him from night until dawn. Later, the Patriarch and his party traveled west and reached Bianliang, where they stayed for a long time at an inn belonging to the Wang family. The Patriarch put Ma Gong and the others through especially severe trials, scolding and beating them; they could never predict whether circumstances would favor them or go against them. Even the routines of daily food and lodging were used to reveal the essentials of becoming an immortal.

As the year drew to a close, the Patriarch took leave of everyone, saying, “Now I can go and answer the summons of my master, the perfected immortal.” Ma Gong asked him to leave a verse, and the Patriarch replied, “I have already written it in Guanzhong.” In the first month of the tenth year, on the fourth day, the Patriarch settled his final affairs and died. Ma Gong and the others then solicited alms and donations, carried the Patriarch’s remains to Jingzhao, and buried them at Liujiang in accordance with his final instructions.

The master continued to make the old hermitage of the Patriarch his center, living in the surrounding area. He wore his hair in three topknots and observed mourning for three years. The phrase “three topknots” was a homophone for “three auspicious signs” and also for the Patriarch’s personal name. Out of respect for the Patriarch, the master wore his name on his head, and so often called himself “the mountain lad of Three Topknots.”

Once, on a moonlit night at the Zhenwu Temple in Qindu, the master and Qiu, Liu, and Tan each spoke of their aspirations. The master said, “The nation is poor”; Tan said, “The tide is right”; Liu said, “The nation has purpose”; and Qiu said, “The nation is at ease.” Although the master and the others all came from under the tutelage of Patriarch Chongyang, the Patriarch had once spoken of “one younger brother and one nephew.” For this reason, the master was specially addressed as “Master Uncle.”

In the fifteenth year, the master’s younger brother Yunfu sent him a letter, asking him to attend the ceremony for their parents’ burial. The master replied: “You are burying their remains; I am delivering their spirits. Though what we do is different, our wish to repay their kindness is the same.” He then wrote a ci poem titled “Refining the Elixir in the Cinnabar Field” in response.

The master once wrote “Ten Exhortations and a Hundred Things Not to Do.” One day, he showed it to the others and said, “This did not come from my own ideas; these, too, are the Patriarch’s words. I only arranged them into this song.”

The master also asked his disciples, “How many double-hours are there in a day and a night?” They replied, “Twelve.” He said, “In those twelve double-hours, the Way of Heaven moves, turning and bringing change into being. Is there ever a moment when it stops?” They answered, “No.” The master said, “Those who cultivate the Dao must follow the Way of Heaven, keeping the transformations within themselves in continuous motion. Throughout all twelve double-hours, they must remain always clear and still, without giving rise to a single distracting thought. As the days and years accumulate, when their practice reaches completion, they can become immortals.”

In the eighteenth year, the master died at Huating. Liu Zhaoxin, Li Dacheng, and more than ten others had not yet awakened to the Dao. The master then composed a poem: “The brocade-scaled fish will not be caught; I cast my jeweled rod aside and go.” Later, Li Dacheng finally awakened. He bowed to the master as a disciple, and the master bestowed on him the Daoist name Lingyangzi.

When the master lived at Huayang Pavilion, a Chinese pear tree outside the courtyard wall had long been dead.

On the fourth day of the fourth month, the Master drew water from beside the courtyard wall and used it to water the tree. Soon afterward, his disciple Yao Xuan brought the Genealogy of Perfected Pure Yang and asked the Master to punctuate it, marking the sentences and pauses. Only then did they learn that Perfected Pure Yang had been born on the fourteenth day of the fourth month, beneath this very tree. The Master said, “I was born on the twentieth day of the fifth month. By that day, this tree will have grown leaves.”

Dasheng privately said to others, “The summer solstice is near. How could this tree possibly flourish again?” The Master composed a verse for the Genealogy of Perfected Pure Yang: “Thirty-six above in heaven, thirty-six below on earth; heaven and earth enter the precious vessel, and the seventy-two seasonal periods are complete.” When Li asked the Master to explain its meaning, he said, “These are hidden words. How could they be understood so easily? When the day of their fulfillment arrives, their meaning will become clear of its own accord.” On the twentieth day of the fifth month, the tree was indeed covered with green leaves. Only then did everyone understand: thirty-six days had passed between the fourteenth day of the fourth month and the twentieth day of the fifth; when heaven and earth joined, there were seventy-two seasonal periods. Dasheng therefore wrote Record of the Remarkable Tree.

The Daoist fellow practitioner Cui of Zhiyang read this account and thought it exaggerated. In the fourth month, he transplanted two clumps of bamboo and a pine tree to the Quanzhen Hermitage. Because the season was unsuitable for transplanting, the pine and bamboo leaves turned yellow and gradually withered. Cui asked the Master, “Can these pines and bamboo still survive?” The Master replied in verse: “Outside the window there is not only noble, emerald bamboo; before the hermitage, too, we shall gladly see the green pine, honored as a high official.” Then the Master asked his disciple Yu Zhiyi to remove the yellow leaves and water the plants with water used for washing his face. In less than ten days, the pines and bamboo had flourished again.

The Master led his disciples westward toward Mount Kongtong. They passed through Tingchuan, where officials, scholars, and common people came in great numbers to seek his guidance. The crowds kept arriving, each afraid of being left behind. Moved by their sincerity, the Master patiently instructed them again and again, never growing tired. Many who had long been reckless and arrogant changed their thoughts and conduct, and came to feel ashamed of doing wrong.

On the twenty-fourth day of the eighth month, …

The Master went to Chang’an to pray for rain and once composed a poem that said, “When will the fields be fully moistened? Five times five makes only twenty-five.” The next day, ample rain fell.

In the twenty-first year, while the Master was in Jingzhao, in the area of present-day Xi’an, he asked his disciple Lai Lingyu, “What do people in Guanzhong call it when they take old clothes apart and wash them clean?” Lai Lingyu replied, “They call it ‘taking apart and washing.’” The Master said, “The religious tradition in the east has grown worn and corrupt over time. I will take it apart, wash it, and set it in order.”

In less than ten days, the authorities issued a document announcing the matter. Daoist communities throughout western Shaanxi were alarmed and unsettled. Only Changchun said to his disciple Dasheng, “Our Daoist teaching is going to spread eastward. Although my name is included in the official document, I cannot leave Guanzhong. If I do, the religious tradition here will be ruined.”

After the Master left Guanzhong, people of all ages turned out to welcome and see him off wherever he went, in an unbroken stream. When he reached Jinan, a man named Han Tao, whose courtesy name was Qingfu, admired the character of Shao Yaofu, the Northern Song Neo-Confucian Shao Yong, and called his home “Garden of Contentment.” He invited the Master to visit and asked him for a saying to guide him. The Master said, “The Dao takes having no mind as its essence and forgetting words as its function. It takes gentleness and weakness as its root, and stillness and purity as its foundation. Eat in moderation, put aside distracting thoughts, sit quietly and regulate your breathing, and sleep peacefully to nurture Qi. When the mind and spirit do not chase after things outside, your nature will become settled; when the body is not wearied, Jing and Qi can be preserved; when the spirit is not disturbed, the Neidan can coalesce. Then, in emptiness and stillness, dispel desires and bring the spirit to complete peace. Even without leaving your gate, you can comprehend the wondrous Dao.”

After listening, Han Tao thanked him, saying, “The Great Dao is undivided and unformed; originally, there was nothing to ask or seek instruction about. Now that I have heard these words of ultimate truth, I have finally found the way in.”

In the twelfth month of the twenty-second year, the Master taught the Dao and guided people to deliverance in Wendeng. In Langya, Yu Gong, son-in-law of the fisherman Tan, and others burned fishing nets. The Master then summoned the wind, making it cease and dispersing the wind and snow. A mirage appeared in response.

A scholar-official brought out Su Dongpo’s poem “Mirage at Sea” to praise it, and the Master responded with a poem of his own.

The well at the Golden Lotus Hall had once been both salty and bitter. When the Master came to the well, its water turned sweet as wine. The people of the prefecture called it “numinous liquid,” and built a pavilion and erected a stele to record this extraordinary event.

When the Master was staying at Seven Treasures Hermitage in Wendeng, his disciples dug a well. At a depth of nine feet, a large stone blocked their way. The Master then wrote these lines about an immortal in a cave: “To dig a well, you must go two feet deeper; clear spring water will naturally gush forth, perfectly echoing this elegant verse.” The disciples dug another foot and eight inches, and spring water burst out.

One day, the Master said to his disciples, “Today, an unusual happy event will take place.” He then sang and danced, delighting in himself. Before long, someone arrived to report that Immortal Maiden Sun had passed away in Henan Prefecture on the last day of the twelfth month of the renyin year.

The Master once explained the “inner cosmos”—the cultivation idea that the human body corresponds to Heaven and Earth—to his disciples: if a person can remain clear and still, the Qi of Heaven and Earth will gather within the body. Above the chest and diaphragm is “Heaven”; below them is “Earth.” When Heaven’s Qi descends and Earth’s Qi rises, meeting and harmonizing above and below, Qi naturally forms a flowing, rounded cycle.

The Master also taught the “four bodily modes,” methods of cultivation for walking, standing, sitting, and lying down: when walking, place your feet on level ground; when standing, let your mind and spirit settle in the Great Void; when sitting, regulate the breath at the tip of the nose; when lying down, keep your attention on the “pearl” within the abdomen, a term in Neidan cultivation for the place where Jing and Qi gather.

The Master also wrote a number of couplets: “Flames rise within water, and the three Elixirs thereby coalesce; a lotus blooms within fire, and one’s original nature thereby reaches completion. Men who study the Dao must not cling to the ‘self-image’—attachment to the self; resolute seekers who cultivate the Real must free themselves from the entanglements of worldly feeling. A stone maiden plays the flute, and phoenixes dance; a clay ox enters the sea, and dragon and tiger harmonize. The exquisite Jade Matriarch strikes the dragon horn; the clear-minded, untrammeled Golden Youth rides astride the tiger’s back.” There were many more verses of this kind, all describing the states of cultivation within the bodies of Dao practitioners.

The Master returned to the coast. The First Patriarch had once established five assemblies, and after arriving in the region, the Master resumed teaching and spreading their message. When he came to Ninghai, he spoke one day to Liu Qingju, a butcher, about a dream he had had: “By my reckoning, over the past twenty-odd years, you have killed enough animals to satisfy your allotted measure of life. If you do not change…”

If this way of making a living is not abandoned, one will surely fall into the Avici Hell. Outside the city, Qing burned all the tools used for slaughtering livestock and killing fish.

In the fourth month of the twenty-third year, the Master planned to travel to Gaozhuang in Zhiyang. On the way, more than a hundred people from the surrounding area told him, “From morning until noon, a mirage kept appearing without vanishing. Though we have occasionally seen one before, it is rare to see it so early in the morning. Now that the Master has come here, such a strange sight has appeared.” Local fishermen Ju Fu, Guo Heng, Le Zhou, and others gathered of their own accord, without waiting for anyone to urge them, and took their nets to Sang Island to burn them. After noon, a vision appeared of a dragon-drawn carriage and a crane-borne palanquin, with banners, ceremonial attendants, and a carriage canopy adorned with feathers. Eminent scholars took up their brushes to record the event, compiling the Collection of Miraculous Responses to the Mirage.

On the day of the Lower Origin (the fifteenth day of the tenth lunar month), Wenshan held a Nine Netherlands Offering, a Daoist purification ritual praying for and delivering the beings of the netherworld. That night, the Master heard a voice announce from the sky, “Perfected Chongyang (Wang Chongyang) has arrived.” The next afternoon, the Patriarch appeared wearing a blue headcloth and white robe, seated on the back of a white tortoise. The tortoise rested on emerald lotus leaves, its tail swaying. Those gathered cried out in joy, prostrating themselves and bowing to the ground. The Patriarch then turned and departed toward the southeast.

On the last day of the ninth month, the Master sat quietly burning incense at the Three Teachings Hall north of the city with the Buddhist monk Lüshi and the scholar Fan Shouqing. Wang, a Daoist master from Yongzhou, arrived with a qin and played it. At sunset, villagers gathered from all around. The Master wrote Song of Returning to the Mountain:

“One who can practice Wuwei (non-action) can do anything; one who can know all things is yet as if knowing nothing. Who, understanding this Great Dao, would not wish to follow it? Yet how many truly put the Great Dao into practice—and how many know it? The wind sighs; leaves drift down. Geese cry as they fly south. Alas, in this world the days and months hasten us on; old and near death, we remain greedy and deluded. The world fills us with sorrow, as though the soul would take flight and the heart and spirit break apart. The turmoil of this world is hard to bring to an end. Better to return to the green mountains while there is still time. At night, the bright moon shines over the green mountains; at dawn, it slips from view. When hungry, feast on rosy clouds; when thirsty, drink from the stream. Far from the world of dust, we are beyond the world’s knowing.”

His mind knew nothing and undertook nothing. Once the mind had been extinguished, what could it still do? Suddenly, two more flowers rose into the heavenly court. He ascended to the Three Palaces, the celestial palaces of Daoist teaching, and journeyed through the Purple Tenuity, the residence of the Heavenly Emperor and, by extension, the celestial realm.

Not long afterward, he took up his brush and wrote “Praise on Leaving the Body.” Its meaning was: “How exalted are those who attain the Dao and ascend to truehood, their path ahead leading into the azure heavens. Qilin follow behind the crimson banners, while phoenixes beat their vermilion wings. Bells on the phoenix chariots ring, jade pendants chime against one another; they tread the empty air and step up into the clouds. Transcendent, they receive the true celestial mandate and at last ascend to Yuchen, the immortal realm of Daoist tradition.” Through these words, he expressed his intention to return to the true and become an immortal.

In the twelfth month, on the founding master’s birthday, the master held a Zhaijiao purification ritual at Youxian Temple in Laiyang. He repeatedly gazed up at the clouds. When his disciple Cao Suo asked why, he said, “The founding master has come with my uncle-master He. I should go to Penglai and Yingzhou, the fabled islands of the immortals.” Yu Zhiyi said, “The great work is not yet complete. Please remain among the living for a while longer.” The master replied, “I shall depart with dignity and become a carefree immortal.” He then called Liu Zhenyi and instructed him: “If you wish to become immortals, you must accumulate merit and practice good deeds. Even when faced with a thousand demonic obstacles and ten thousand hardships, never slacken or retreat. Only then will you be worthy to understand my words. With my eyes open, I can see; with them closed, I can see as well. What I see does not depend on my eyes; it is perfectly clear in my heart. So there is nothing I cannot see.”

They spoke until nearly the second watch of the night, when suddenly wind and rain arose and a crash of thunder shook the prefectural city. The master lay on his right side, resting his head on his arm, and passed away. It was the twenty-second day of that month.

That night, the master knocked at the door of Guo Fuzhong, the wine inspector. Guo had never believed in such things, but came out to greet him. The master asked for brush and ink and wrote this verse: “I lived for eighty-one years, yet no one in the world truly knew me. With a single peal of thunder, I swept away with the wind.” When he had finished, he took his leave. Guo Fuzhong tried earnestly to detain him, but he walked straight away.

He also left a verse on the wall of Liu Xi’s home: “When the Three Yangs converge, cultivation is complete. Riding the wind and driving the wind-steed, one has already become an immortal. I urge you to subdue the dragon and tiger within your heart—the image in Daoist Neidan practice for Yin-Yang and desire within the body—and you too may naturally have the chance to ascend to heaven.” Not long afterward, news came that the master had died. Only then did Guo Fuzhong understand that the one he had seen was the master’s Yang Shen, the spirit-body spoken of by practitioners.

To subdue the dragons and tigers within the heart is to have hope of attaining the Dao, becoming an immortal, and ascending to Heaven. A short while later, someone said that the master had died. Only then did people understand that what they had seen earlier was the master’s Yang Shen—the spiritual consciousness that a cultivator manifests outside the physical body. After seven days, the master’s body still showed no change in appearance, so he was buried at Youxian.

At first, the master lived at Shuhua Hermitage on Kun Jian’s Mount Zijin. Beside the hermitage stood dozens of great pine trees. Their branches and leaves turned white and remained that way for half a year without turning green again. The master sighed, “The pines have turned white; perhaps it is because of me.”

In the first month of the twenty-fourth year, Changsheng presided over a Zhaijiao purification ritual in Changyang. Between the hours of the Snake and the Horse on the eighteenth day, the presented scholar Xu Shaozu and others saw auspicious clouds, luan birds, and cranes appear in the sky, shifting in form and dancing without pause. Their spectacle was beyond description. Chongyang, dressed in a red Daoist robe and wearing a cloud crown, and Danyang, with three topknots and dressed in plain clothes, appeared amid the clouds. After a short while, they departed. The people then had a stele carved to record the event.

In the twenty-fifth year, local people suspected that disciples from Shaanxi had stolen the master’s remains. Liu, the magistrate of Laiyang County, therefore opened the coffin and inspected it. The body looked just as it had in life. They dressed the master in robes from Jinyu Hall and buried him again.

The master’s surviving poems, including the collections Gradual Awakening, Gold and Jade, Picking Out the Subtle, The Three Treasures, Traveling to Spread the Teaching, and Complete Fulfillment, have been handed down to the present day. In the first month of the sixth year of Zhiyuan in the Great Yuan dynasty, the court posthumously bestowed on the master the title “Perfected One of Danyang, Embracing Unity and Practicing Wuwei.”

End of Volume One of A Continuing Record of the Bodies and Paths of Immortals Through the Ages.

A Continuing Record of the Bodies and Paths of Immortals Through the Ages, Volume Two: Tan Chuduan.

The master was originally named Yu, with the courtesy name Boyu. Later, his name was changed to Chu Duan, his courtesy name to Tongzheng, and his religious name to Changzhenzi; these were bestowed on him by the Patriarch. His family had lived in Ninghai for generations. He was born on the first day of the third month in the first year of the Tianhui era of Emperor Taizong of the Jin. From birth, his bone structure was unusual.

When he was six, he accidentally fell into a well. His family rushed to rescue him and found him sitting unharmed on the surface of the water. After they pulled him out, he had suffered no injury. On another occasion, a fire broke out where he lived, and a massive beam broke in front of his bed while he was fast asleep. When others woke him, he remained calm. From these events, people knew he was exceptional.

After beginning his studies, he showed a strong memory and quick understanding, surpassing nearly all his peers. At ten, he began learning to write poetry. One day, a relative pointed to grapes growing on a wooden trellis and asked him to compose a poem. He wrote: “One day I climb the Green Dragon trellis; everyone who sees me looks up.” People praised his poise and graceful manner.

As he grew older, the master was generous in spirit and unconcerned with small formalities. He was known for his filial devotion and sense of justice. He read widely in the classics and histories and was skilled in cursive and clerical script. Once, after drinking, he went out into the snow and contracted wind paralysis, an illness caused by pathogenic wind that brings numbness and difficulty moving the limbs. He knew the illness might not be cured by medicine, so in secret he recited the Beidou Jing, a Daoist scripture honoring the Lords of the Northern Dipper, and prayed to be spared.

In a dream, he saw the Great Emperor standing across the sky and flew toward him to draw near. But when he saw the star lords seated upon the Great Emperor, he bowed from below. Then he suddenly awoke, and from that moment his resolve to enter the Daoist path became firm. In the seventh year of the Dading era of Emperor Shizong of the Jin, he heard that the Patriarch was at Ma Danyang’s home. He went there at once and asked to be accepted as a disciple.

The Patriarch let him stay overnight at the hermitage. It was the depths of winter, and the master slept on a bed of seaweed, so cold he could barely endure it. The Patriarch stretched out his feet for him to hold and warm himself. After a while, the master was drenched in sweat, as if surrounded by the steam of rice cooking. At dawn, the Patriarch washed his face with water left over from washing his hands, and the illness he had suffered from for a long time suddenly disappeared. From then on, he resolved to serve the Patriarch sincerely and wholeheartedly for the rest of his life.

Later, Yan saw that her master was not returning home and, finding this strange, pressed him for an explanation. Her master then left her. The Patriarch praised him for his decisiveness and courage, taught him a secret method, and gave him the religious name by which he is now known. The Patriarch also presented him with a poem containing the words “Da Zhen Tan Yu,” making his approval unmistakable.

In the eighth year, the master followed the Patriarch into seclusion among the mountain forests and clouds of Kunyu. In the ninth year, he followed the Patriarch to Yanzhen Abbey on Mount Lu in Huang County. The abbey held traces of the place where Perfected Lord Lu had appeared in the world. The master wrote a poem on the west wall of the Jade Emperor Hall: “The distant immortal carriage has gone, never to return; phoenix-glue and crane-drawn chariot break through banks of cloud.” The lines describe an immortal procession departing into the distance, never to come back, riding phoenixes and cranes through the clouds.

That winter, the master accompanied the Patriarch on a journey through Liang. In the spring of the tenth year, the Patriarch died at the Wang family inn. The master and Danyang, along with others, carried the Patriarch’s body on their backs and buried him in Liujang Village on Mount Zhongnan. They observed the mourning period there for three years. In the fourteenth year, the master traveled east again and reached Chaoyuan Palace in Luoyang. He wrote: “After the purple edict summoned the perfected teacher home, who, I wonder, will succeed the immortal of the Great Luo?” Chaoyuan Palace was where Huang Langranzi attained the Dao and became an immortal, so the master thought of him as he passed through.

In Xiuwu there was a man named Zhang Bage whose manner seemed mad and foolish, though those who knew him believed he possessed the Dao. One day, he shouted in the marketplace, “The one who is coming is Master Tan, chief steward of the immortals.” Later, the master stayed at the hermitage within the Lord of the Prefecture’s Temple in Xinxiang, then went to Huojia County, and soon afterward lodged at an inn by the north gate of Weizhou.

One night, Wen Liu, the temple official at the Lord of the Prefecture’s Temple in Xinxiang, suddenly saw a light flickering in the hermitage. He quietly went in to investigate and found the master sitting alone, facing the firelight. Wen Liu approached and bowed. The master gave a slight acknowledgment but left without speaking. Wen Liu waited a long time, but when the master did not return, he went to look and could not discover where he had gone. He hurriedly summoned the Daoist assembly and reported what had happened.

The crowd sent Zhu Si to question Wei. The master of the Wei household said, “Since the master himself came here, he has never left.” Zhu Si returned and told everyone. Only then did they realize that the figure they had seen earlier was actually his Yang Spirit (the spirit-consciousness that, according to Daoism, can leave the body and move about after cultivation has reached fruition).

In the fifteenth year, while the master was begging for food in Erzu Town, Cizhou, a ruffian asked him, “Where have you come from?” Then he punched the master in the mouth, making him bleed and breaking his teeth, but the master’s expression did not change. He spat the broken teeth into his hand and danced his way back to his lodgings. Everyone who saw this was furious and wanted to take the matter to the authorities on his behalf. The master only said, “I thank him for his compassionate instruction.” At the time, Danyang was in Guanzhong. When he heard what had happened, he praised the master, saying, “That one punch has wiped away a lifetime of karmic obstacles.” The master’s way of regarding events had reached such a level.

In the sixteenth year, the master arrived at Baijiatan in Luozhou. A farmer had been ill for several months, and none of the treatments he tried had worked. In a dream, he met a tall, imposing Daoist who gave him a red pill. After taking it, the farmer recovered at once. The next day, when he saw the master, he exclaimed in surprise, “You are the master who gave me the medicine in my dream!” He wanted to offer him something in return, but the master refused and went on his way.

The master once made Cunjin Pills with Wang Silang of Junzhou. The pills allotted to the master always worked when used to treat illness; those allotted to Wang Silang worked only four or five times out of ten. After the two exchanged their pills, the results remained just as before. From this, they realized that what made the pills effective was not only the medicine itself, but also Daoist Qi and spiritual power.

In the seventeenth year, the master passed through Gaotang County. Wu Liu, the owner of a teahouse, warmly welcomed Daoist travelers, so the master gave him the two characters “Tortoise and Snake” to hang in his shop. At first, Wu Liu did not know that this master was Tan Shizhen. One day, a fire broke out next door and spread to many places, but Wu Liu’s teahouse alone was left untouched. Everyone who witnessed this…

Some people joined the character “two” with the Fire-Averting Talisman of Perfect Yang Immortal (a talisman said to ward off fire). It is said that Perfect Yang Immortal once inscribed a sign at a tavern in Boxing County. Later, when a fire broke out in the county, the tavern alone escaped destruction. People at the time therefore called the inscription a Fire-Averting Talisman.

When the master went to Yicun to beg for food, he passed a ferry crossing and saw that the boatman had just finished building a new boat and was trying to launch it. Even with everyone pulling together, they could not move it. The master stepped forward to help, and the boat slid smoothly into the water with a single push. From then on, whenever monks or Daoist priests needed to cross, the boatmen were willing to lend a hand.

The master traveled east and reached a place north of Yangwu County. One night, he rose and saw that the Big Dipper seemed to be shifting positions in turn. The stars were as large as cartwheels. He hurriedly called the Daoist assembly to look. By then, the stars had shrunk to the size of parrot eggs, yet they continued to sway. Only after a long while did they return to their original appearance. From that time on, the master recited the sacred names—the names by which the deities are honored—with even greater care.

Shi Kongmu of Qimen Town in Weizhou asked the master why he recited the sacred names. The master said that everyone should recite them too, because that year would bring a great flood. The people did not understand his words. That year, the Yellow River rose in a great flood, and many people drowned.

In the twentieth year, the master traveled west again and reached Xili Hermitage in Tongzhou. His disciples asked him to write an inscription in his own hand. He often wrote the two characters “Tortoise and Snake,” his brushwork forceful and vigorous, the forms of the characters coiling like dragons and snakes. He wrote these same two characters for many of those who asked him for calligraphy. This seemed to foretell the date of his return, but people at the time did not understand. Only when the master passed away on the first day of the fourth month in the Yisi year did they grasp what it meant.

In the twenty-first year, while at Chunyang Cave in Huayin, the master developed a sore on his head and said, “Am I about to die?” No one knew how to answer. After a while, he added, “I will not die just yet. I will die when the sore reaches my foot.” Then he said to those around him, “Six years to refine away the fire of ignorance and delusion within; ten years to cultivate the Bone-Transforming Elixir. In the clear, still, and empty chamber, there are no attachments. I already know that I have leapt beyond the pass of life and death.” He also said, “For ten full years, I learned to seem foolish and simple, living at ease and wandering wherever I pleased. If you ask how a madman cultivates, it is when his face is covered in dust, his hair is unkempt, and the fire in his heart has gone out.”

Later, the master went to the east side of Chaoyuan Palace in Luoyang, found several mu of vacant land, and built a hermitage where he lived. In the twenty-fifth year, he dreamed of the two Perfected Ones, Chongyang and Danyang. They told him the date on which he would ascend to immortality.

He found several mu of vacant land east of Chaoyuan Palace in Luoyang and built a small hermitage there. In the twenty-fifth year, he dreamed of Chongyang (Wang Chongyang, founder of the Daoist Quanzhen school) and Danyang (Ma Danyang, a Quanzhen Daoist). They told him the date on which he would ascend to immortality and leave the world. He then asked his disciples to make arrangements for his affairs in advance. Just then, a sore appeared on his body, so he wrote this poem:

“At the meeting of Heaven and Earth, a peal of thunder sounds, bursting forth into myriad rays of numinous light. The dragon meets the sudden thunder and sheds its mortal form anew. Subtle radiance shines out, while golden light streams from the crown of the head as it ascends. One’s nature—the human nature and spiritual essence—hurries to the Jade Pool, where it may accompany Danyang. Thus the true and wondrous principle of Changzhen, an honorific Daoist title, is made clear: it wells forth through Wuwei (non-action), and the Yang spirit—the spiritual form attained through cultivation, said to be able to leave the body—returns alone.”

After writing this, he folded his arm beneath his head as a pillow and died peacefully. In the first month of the jisi year, the sixth year of the Zhiyuan era under the Yuan dynasty (1269), he was posthumously honored as “Perfected Changzhen, Cloud and Water, Enriched by De.” His Earlier Collection of Water and Clouds and Later Collection of Water and Clouds have been passed down.

Liu Chuxuan

The Master’s given name was Chuxuan, his courtesy name was Tongmiao, and “Changsheng” (Long Life) was his religious name. He was born on the twelfth day of the seventh month in the seventh year of the Huangtong era under Jin Xizong, at Wuchenzhuang in Donglai. For nine generations, his family had passed down a tradition of honoring parents and loving one’s siblings. During the Taiping Xingguo era of Emperor Taizong of Song, the court commended the family and exempted its home district and county from all forms of corvée. His grandparents, too, followed the example of their ancestors, caring for relatives and friends and helping those in poverty.

One night, Chuxuan’s mother, Lady Wang, dreamed of an old man dressed in white. He told her to go southwest and pointed to a jade tree. The tree had four branches, each bearing a golden leaf. The old man asked her to pluck one and said, “You will surely give birth to an extraordinary person.” As she reached for it, the golden leaf fell into her hand by itself. She saw a golden cicada fly up and then return to her mouth. After that, the old man vanished. Thirteen months later, Chuxuan was born. That night, two streams of purple Qi stretched across his family’s home from Mount Taiji.

Chuxuan lost his father when he was young and became known for his devotion to his mother. She, too, aspired to withdraw from the world and cultivate the Dao. Mount Taiji lay about two li south of Wuguan. On its southern side was a place called “Valley of the Daoist,” said to be where Zheng Daozhao, governor of Guangzhou, attained the Dao. Chuxuan often spent time there. When he was around twenty, his mother wanted to arrange a marriage for him. But he had long aspired to seek the Dao, and in the end he refused.

In the spring of the ninth year of the Dading era under Jin Shizong, he found two eulogies on a neighbor’s wall, in a spot that people were unlikely to notice. The ink was still wet. The final line read: “Wuguan is an immortal place for nurturing one’s nature and cultivating the Dao; one should become a person who lives forever.”

In the ninth month of that same year, the Patriarch came east with his disciples Danyang and Changzhen. Chuxuan and his mother went together to pay their respects. On seeing Chuxuan, the Patriarch asked, “Do you understand the meaning of those words on the wall?”

The master said nothing. The four looked at one another and smiled. This was the subtle meaning of “the Dao is present in a single glance”: no words were needed; a look was enough to grasp the meaning of the Dao. The Patriarch left the master this poem:

“Returning from fishing, I see the turtle once more;

I already know you are destined to join the ranks of the immortals.

At the sound of the wu-lang call, I know what is in your heart;

You leap beyond the ten thousand-fathom waves.”

The Patriarch then bestowed a religious name on the master.

Not long afterward, the master traveled through Liang with the Patriarch, accompanied by three disciples: Ma, Tan, and Qiu. One day, the Patriarch showed the four of them a poem containing the line, “I shall first pay my respects to the master at Penglai.” It also said, “The words I leave at my passing are already in the home of the Daoist Lü in Luan Village, Chang’an.” Ten years later, the Patriarch attained immortality and passed away. The master and the other three disciples accompanied his coffin back to Mount Zhongnan for burial, then built a hut beside the tomb and kept vigil there for three years. When the term was over, each was free to choose where to go.

Later, the master and Changzhen traveled east to Luoyang. Changzhen stayed at Chaoyuan Abbey, while the master lived at the Temple of the God of the Soil in the city and remained silent for three years. Soon afterward, he moved to Yunxi Cave in the northeast of the city. The number of disciples who came to follow him grew day by day. Suddenly, the master pointed to the ground and said, “There are three wells here.” The others dug more than two zhang down and found springs beneath them. When someone asked how he had known, he replied, “In a former life, I lived here.”

Twenty years later, the master pointed to the Feng family’s garden on the right side of the hermitage and said, “This is where I will be buried after my death.” Another forty years passed. The pine trees in the garden began to die one after another, and its waters flowed westward. The land should have been impossible to sell, yet in the end it was purchased. The master had a stone stele carved in the garden and buried underground, saying, “When this garden prospers, the stele will be raised.”

The following year, the master traveled east to Laizhou. Later, Perfected Changchun journeyed west and passed through Yunxi. The master’s disciples told him of the words their teacher had left behind. Some time later, in the second year of Da’an under the Eastern Sea Commandery Marquis, the authorities received a plaque inscribed “Changsheng Abbey.” By the third year of Xingding under Emperor Xuanzong, forty years had passed since the master made those predictions. The Feng family sold the garden to Cai Qingchen, who bought it for one hundred taels of silver. Cai then invited the master’s disciple Yulifeng to oversee the Daoist abbey. The authorities cut down the pines and catalpas to build watchtowers for the city’s defense. They also constructed a cloud bridge and diverted water past the abbey’s west side to protect the city. By then, everything the master had predicted had come to pass.

After reaching Laizhou, the master built a hermitage and lived there. Twenty-two years later, he moved to Wuguan.

Daoist influence flourished, and the number of people coming from all directions to receive instruction grew steadily. The Master then wrote commentaries on such classics as the Daode Jing, the Huangting Jing, and the Qingjing Jing. That year, Danyang came from Guanzhong, and the Master dressed in full ceremonial attire to meet him. Danyang reproached him for being so concerned with outward display. The Master explained, “I have heard that a person who cultivates the Way spends ten thousand taels of gold every day.” Danyang replied, “Even if one spends ten thousand taels of gold each day, one should wear coarse cloth and eat plain food.” Danyang eventually recommended that the Master preside over a Zhaijiao purification ritual in Laizhou.

On the twenty-second day of the twelfth month in the twenty-third year, Danyang passed away—an event Daoists call “ascending to immortality.” The following January, Jiang Shoujing invited the Master to preside over a Zhaijiao rite in Changyang. Between the hour of the Snake and the hour of the Horse on the eighteenth day, Hu Zhang, Xu Shaozu, and others suddenly saw auspicious cranes circling in the sky. The Patriarch appeared with them above the colored clouds, wearing a cloud crown and crimson robes; Danyang wore his hair in three topknots. On the fifteenth day of the fourth month, during a Zhaijiao rite in Dengzhou, a mirage appeared over Zhudao Island.

After Danyang’s death, the Master and Yuyang jointly oversaw the funeral arrangements and guarded the tomb for a hundred days. Only then did they send the disciples Zhang Shunzhen and others to Luoyang with a letter asking Changzhen to lead the religious community. One day, the Master said to Zhang Shunzhen, “The affairs of the religious community do not rest with me.” He also said that Danyang had been able to “roam among the immortals,” while he himself had been able to “pay homage to the Origin.” Later, he mentioned in a letter that he would return, and entrusted the leadership of the religious community to another.

That May, a drought struck, and the prefect of Dengzhou asked the Master to pray for rain. A mirage appeared over Zhudao Island once again. The next day, Danyang appeared to the northwest of Yingxian Bridge, and abundant rain fell that same day. After this, the Master succeeded Changzhen and led the religious community.

In the second year of the Mingchang era under Emperor Zhangzong, the imperial son-in-law was appointed to govern Laizhou. He saw that many people were taking refuge in Daoism, but thought the Master looked no different from an ordinary person. Doubting him, he ordered Wei Si Le Wujie to have the Master arrested and imprisoned.

Before long, people in the city saw the master speaking with fellow Daoists south of the city, just as he usually did. Zheng, the jailer, and Wang, the clerk, saw him too. Thinking the master had escaped from prison, they hurried to investigate, only to find him sleeping soundly in his cell. The two were greatly astonished and reported everything they had seen. The master was released at once.

Later, Wen Dihan Mingwei of Weizhou came to visit the master and stayed for three days. The master said to him, “You should return at once. Your hermitage is about to be destroyed.” When Wen returned, he found the hermitage intact, but people told him that he had died of illness.

In the winter of the second year of the Cheng’an era, the master was summoned to the palace and stayed for a time at Tianchang Abbey. The emperor asked him about the subtle principles of the Dao, and all the master’s answers accorded with the emperor’s wishes. Officials and commoners who met him all held him in reverence. The Ministry of Rites bestowed plaques bearing the names Lingxu, Taiwei, Longxiang, Jixian, and Miaozhen on five Daoist temples. In the third month of the following year, the master received an imperial order to return to the mountain, where he undertook extensive construction at Lingxu Temple.

Hao Liuxian and Gao Mingyuan feared the master’s strictness and secretly plotted to deal with him later. The master had Hao Mingqing tell them, “I have not truly attained the Dao, and I am quick-tempered. You should go elsewhere to seek a master and fellow Daoists.” The two looked at each other and said, “The master actually knows what we were plotting in our hearts.” They then admitted their fault and apologized to him.

Barefoot Liu fell ill and did not recover for a month, so he came to ask the master to let him die sooner. The master raised his staff and said, “In the past, you committed a wrong against the Dao that lasted a year. In worldly reckoning, good deeds can offset wrongdoing, but in the reckoning of the underworld, good and bad deeds each receive their own recompense. Your past transgression can be offset by a year’s worth of good deeds. Now that you have met me, a month’s worth of good deeds will suffice.” Liu therefore made a vow, and his illness immediately vanished.

In the second year of the Taihe era, the master presided over a Daoist purification ritual (Zhaijiao) in Binzhou. In the middle of the first month, after the snow had stopped, the water in the moat of the old city froze again. Patterns appeared in the ice, resembling flowers of fine jade and jade trees, numbering in the thousands. Coral-like forms were especially abundant, while there were about two thousand patterns shaped like apricot blossoms. The ice patterns lying crosswise like little branches were too numerous to count. Those who watched all said, “If an ordinary person could be sincere…”

The tree lay with countless branches spread across it. Everyone who saw it said, “If an ordinary person, with nothing more than utmost sincerity, can move Heaven and Earth and commune with spirits and gods, how much more so a person of the Dao? Such a response is only to be expected.”

Liu Zhaoyi, Assistant Commissioner of the Eastern Capital’s Office of the Left-Behind Administration, and Liu Shilu, Military Commissioner of the Dinghai Army, remained close to the Daoist master after leaving office and enjoyed a warm relationship with him. In the first month of the third year, the two officials asked the master to treat them as disciples. He declined, saying, “You are both eminent statesmen of this age, and have shown me deep care and respect. But I am about to depart, and am not worthy to be your friend.” He then composed this verse: “At the height of one’s glory, what is better than sweeping one’s sleeves and returning home? Now I too must follow in the footsteps of those before me; turning back, I seek the realm of Xiyi.” The verse meant that when one is flourishing and prominent, it is better to sweep one’s sleeves and withdraw; now he too would follow those who came before, turning back toward Xiyi—the Daoist realm that is subtle, unseen, and beyond perception. The two officials were deeply saddened when they read it.

On the twenty-eighth of that month, Prince Zi invited the master to preside over a jiao ritual, a Daoist altar ceremony to worship the gods, pray for blessings, and avert calamity, and asked when he would fulfill the invitation. The master replied, “Eight days from now.” On the sixth day of the second month, the master attained immortality—the Daoist term for the death of one who has realized the Dao. It was exactly the eighth day. Grief-stricken, Liu Shilu wrote this poem in his memory: “Only in my later years was I fortunate enough to draw near to you. Sitting face to face, we forgot our outward forms and the distinction between host and guest. Day after day I hoped you would come, keeping the main hall empty in expectation; then suddenly I heard you had gone to the Immortals, and all mourned you. Hearing the stream, I remember your eloquence, broad and flowing like the Buddha’s tongue; seeing the mountain’s hues, I think of your serene presence. From now on, who will visit these mountain forests? In Lingxu Abbey, silence and loneliness prevail; even the deep spring seems shut away.”

The master lived to the age of fifty-six. In the first month of the sixth year of the Zhiyuan era of the Great Yuan, the year Jisi, the court posthumously bestowed on him the title “Perfected One of Long Life, Who Assists Transformation and Illuminates De.” His collected works, including The Immortal Collection of Great Void and Ease, Banyang, Great Accomplishment, Great Harmony, Divine Light, and Recorded Sayings of Utmost Truth, have been transmitted to later generations.

Qiu Chuji, whose courtesy name was Tongmi and whose religious name was Changchunzi, was from Qixia in Dengzhou. His family had been distinguished for generations. In the sixth year of the Dading era under Emperor Xizong of Jin (as the original text states), he had just turned nineteen when he moved to Kunjianshan. The following year, on hearing that Patriarch Wang Chongyang was staying at the Quanzhen Hermitage in Ninghai, he went to become his disciple. Wang Chongyang gave him a poem: “Fine golden scales play in emerald streams; they find the fragrant bait and swallow the hook as well. I slowly draw in the fishing line and bring you to Penglai, where you will be free forever.” The poem shows how highly Wang Chongyang regarded him.

In the spring of the eighth year of the Dading era, Qiu Chuji followed Wang Chongyang to live at Yanxia; in autumn and winter, they stayed at Wendeng. In the ninth year, he and three fellow disciples—Danyang, Changzhen, and Changsheng—accompanied their patriarch on a journey through the Liang region. Wang Chongyang taught them day and night, giving Qiu Chuji particular care and attention. Before long, Wang Chongyang “transformed and ascended,” the Daoist expression for passing away. The four disciples guarded his coffin and buried their patriarch on Mount Zhongnan. After keeping watch at his grave for three years, they each chose where to go. Qiu Chuji lived at Panxi for six years and at Longmen for seven, cultivating body and mind. He put the teachings he had received from his master into songs and poems, and his reputation spread far and wide. Later, the military commander of Jingzhao, Lord Jiagu, invited him with due courtesy. Qiu Chuji then returned to Mount Zhongnan to spread the teachings of the Quanzhen school.

In the twenty-eighth year of the Dading era, Emperor Shizong summoned Qiu Chuji and asked him about the highest principles of the Dao. Qiu Chuji first explained the essentials of prolonging life and preserving one’s vitality, then spoke of how difficult it is to sustain one’s achievements and hold on to one’s position. He added, “After attaining wealth and status, people naturally become arrogant and indulgent. One should therefore carefully and diligently restrain oneself. If one can persist in this practice, the path to becoming an immortal is not far away. Deception, strange tricks, illusions, and uncanny marvels are not the Dao I teach.” Emperor Shizong approved of and adopted his advice, and arranged for him to stay on the west side of Wanning Palace so that he could consult him at any time.

In the fifth month, Emperor Shizong summoned him to Changsong Island; in the seventh month, he summoned him again. Qiu Chuji expounded the principles of the Dao and presented the musical composition “The First of the Jade Terrace.” At the emperor’s command, he also composed five works. The next day, Emperor Shizong presented him with peaches from the imperial Shanglin Garden.

The next day, the emperor presented the Master with peaches from the Imperial Shanglin Garden. For more than ten years, the Master had not consumed tea or fruit, but since these had been bestowed by the emperor, he took a bite. In the eighth month, by imperial command, the Master returned to Mount Zhongnan. He was awarded one hundred thousand coins, but declined the gift.

In the twenty-ninth year, Emperor Shizong died. On the road, the Master encountered the funeral procession and composed a poem in mourning. In the first year of the Mingchang era under Emperor Zhangzong, the Master returned to Bingxia and undertook extensive construction of a Daoist palace. The emperor named it “Great Void.”

In the tenth month of the third year of Mingchang, the Master presided over a Zhaijiao ritual at Zhiyang. Suddenly, he saw several riders coming from the west through the dust. Everyone was startled, thinking they were couriers from a post station carrying official documents. A while later, the riders vanished without a sound into the dust. Three days afterward, more than ten people in front of the altar became drunk from drinking wine; only then did they realize that the riders in the dust had been divine beings.

In the ninth month of the fifth year of Mingchang, the Master presided over a Zhaijiao ritual at Fushan. Just as he was about to invite the deities, he heard a thunderous sound from the Gate of Heaven. Red light beneath the Northern Dipper illuminated heaven and earth, making even the smallest details clearly visible.

In the seventh year of Taihe, the Noble Consort donated a complete collection of Daoist scriptures and sent it by post station to Bingxia, entrusting it to the Marquis of Bohai Commandery. After the era name changed to Daan, the Master wrote Record of Learning to Become an Immortal. In the second year of Daan, he wrote Record of the Opening of Heaven.

In the fourth year of the Zhenyou era under Emperor Xuanzong, the Master was staying in Dengzhou. The emperor ordered Wang Tingyu, military supervisor of Buping, to carry an edict summoning him back to the capital. The Master said, “I act in accordance with the principles of Heaven. If Heaven’s will directs me to act, I dare not defy it.”

In the year Jimao—the third year of the Xingding era under Emperor Xuanzong of Jin and the twelfth year of Jiading under the Southern Song—the Master was staying at Haotian Temple in Laizhou. By then, the Qi and Lu region had fallen into the hands of Song forces. In the eighth month of autumn, the Song court sent an envoy to summon the Master and ordered the senior master Peng Yifu to lead the palace guards to escort him. But the Master did not set out. The prefect thought this strange, and the Master said, “You people cannot understand whether I will go or stay. I fear that later, when you want me to remain, you will no longer be able to keep me.”

In the fifth month of that year, Emperor Taizu Shengwu of the Yuan sent his attendant Liu Zhonglu from the Naiman kingdom to invite the Perfected Changchun to appear at court. The decree said, in essence:

“Within seven years, I accomplished my great undertaking, and now I have brought all under Heaven into unity. To the south, our realm adjoins the Southern Song; to the north, it reaches the Uyghurs. The Eastern Xia, the Western Rong, and all the other peoples have submitted and offer their support. I bear the heavy responsibilities of state, and worry that I may neglect some part of government. We build boats and make oars to cross rivers; we seek worthy people and choose capable assistants to bring peace to the realm. Since taking the throne, I have devoted myself to the many affairs of state, yet have not found a worthy person to assist in governing.

“I have heard that you have realized the true Dao, follow its principles, possess wide learning and deep understanding, embrace the way of emptiness, and are distinguished in De. You embody the bearing of an ancient gentleman and the integrity of a person of high cultivation. I now learn that you are still living in seclusion in your old home in Shandong, and I deeply admire you. Yet mountains and rivers lie between us, and I have been unable to come in person to welcome you; this is a breach of courtesy. I am willing to set aside my dignity and await you with respect. I will fast and bathe, and send a trusted court official with a simple, light carriage and horses. I will spare no effort to travel thousands of miles and respectfully ask you to make the journey here for a time. Do not be deterred by the distance or the desert roads. Please advise me on the affairs of government and the people in our age, or guide me in ways to care for body and mind, so that I may have the chance to hear your teaching in person. A little guidance from you—even a single sentence—would be enough to benefit me.”

In the eighth month, Liu Zhonglu reached the region of Yan. Hearing that the Perfected Changchun was in Laizhou, he enlisted the help of Hao Yan and Jiang Yuan from the Yizhou Pacification Office, who offered to accompany him with twenty cavalrymen. When they reached Yizhou, the local commander Zhang Lin provided four more horses. On the way, at Weizhou, Yin Gong of Qinghe joined the party. In the twelfth month, Liu Zhonglu and his companions arrived in Donglai and conveyed the emperor’s summons. The Perfected Changchun readily agreed to go.

In the first month of the Gengchen year, the Perfected Changchun asked which of his disciples could accompany him and selected eighteen. In the second month, they entered the region of Yan, where the provincial official Shimo Gong arranged for them to stay at Yuxu Abbey.

Zhonglu first sent someone on a swift horse to deliver the memorial, and Master Qiu also submitted a formal report about the matter. In the fourth month, Master Qiu held a Zhaijiao (purification ritual) at the Taiji Palace and ascended the Baoxuan Hall to transmit the precepts. As the ritual booklets were burned, a crane flew in from the northwest. One booklet rose into the air, and five cranes circled and wheeled above it.

The next day, Master Qiu traveled north. At Juyong Pass, he encountered a band of robbers. They all bowed with their foreheads to the ground and withdrew, saying, “Do not disturb the Master.”

In the fifth month, Master Qiu arrived at Dexing and stayed at Longyang Monastery. On the day of the Mid-Autumn Festival, he held a Zhaijiao and transmitted the precepts in the afternoon. Everyone sat outdoors, and the weather was extremely hot. Before long, clouds gathered above them in the shape of a round canopy, then dispersed after a while. The monastery’s well had originally held enough water for only a hundred people, but now its water seemed inexhaustible.

In the eighth month, Grand Preceptor Yilie Gong invited Master Qiu to stay at Chaoyuan Monastery in Xuande. Yilie Gong had a sacred hall and an ancestral hall built, and wanted to have their walls painted. It was already the tenth month, and the painters declined, citing the cold weather. Master Qiu refused to accept this, saying, “The music of Zou could bring spring back even in the depth of winter. Surely the spirits of sages can offer their aid as well.” When the work was completed, it had indeed faced no hindrance from severe cold.

That month, Hela Hui brought a memorial to the capital. The emperor issued an edict, saying: “Perfected Person Qiu: I have read your memorial. Among those summoned to come, only your Dao cultivation surpasses that of all others, and your De and reputation have spread far and wide. I ordered my ministers to receive you with the highest honors and sent messengers on swift horses to search throughout the realm. Now the moment and the wish have come together, and Heaven’s arrangement has not gone against the will of humankind. Twice, the two courts issued repeated edicts, yet you did not set out. This time, I sent only one messenger to invite you, and you were willing to come. You said that Heaven had given you a sign, and so you came to submit yourself; you did not fear the assaults of wind and frost, and willingly crossed mountains and rivers. Now that I have received your memorial, I am overjoyed and relieved beyond words. Your expectations concerning military and state affairs are not something I can decide; but your devotion to the pursuit of the Dao and De is truly worthy of respect.”

Although the journey was far, I felt that paying my respects to the Master was not far away. So I wrote back to express my feelings. In this late-summer heat, I hope the Master has been well. I am sending this letter by a messenger, and have only a moment to write, so I cannot say more.

Another imperial edict said, “Zhonglu, do not let the Realized Man go hungry or suffer hardship. You may support him and bring him along slowly.” This shows how deeply the Realized Man was respected.

In the second month of the xinsi year, fellow Daoists gathered in the western suburbs to bid farewell to the Realized Man. Some even clung to his horse’s head and wept, saying, “Master, you are going tens of thousands of li away. When will we be able to serve you respectfully again as we have in the past?” The Master replied, “I will return in three years.”

On the first day of the fifth month, the party reached the Luju River. A solar eclipse occurred that day. In the seventh month, they reached Mount Abuhan. Zhenhai came to pay his respects and said that towering mountains and vast marshes lay ahead. The terrain was low and sunken, and carts could not pass. So the Master left nine disciples, including Song Dao’an, to establish Bingxia Abbey, and continued onward on a light horse with Zhao Xujing and the others.

On the Mid-Autumn Festival, they reached the White Bone Plain at Mount Jin. People said the skies there were perpetually gloomy and that mountain spirits and demons haunted the place. Travelers had to smear blood on their horses’ heads to ward off evil. The Master laughed and said, “Why should those who cultivate the Dao worry about such things?” They passed through, and in the end saw no strange occurrence at all.

When they reached the Yin Mountains, several hundred people came to pay their respects, including officials, scholars, commoners, and followers of both Buddhism and Daoism. The Master asked about the origins of local customs. They replied, “In the third year of Jinglong, Yang He served as the Grand Protector and governed well. His benevolence has endured to this day, and we still benefit from it.”

In the eleventh month, the party arrived north of the great city of Samarkand. Grand Preceptor Duke Yilie and members of the Mongol army welcomed them with wine and laid on a lavish banquet in a great tent, so the party stopped to stay. The Grand Preceptor said that food was scarce in the lands of the Uyghurs and that there were many bandits, so he feared some unforeseen trouble might occur. The Master replied, “A Daoist follows circumstances and lives at ease. Even with a sword at his head, he has nothing to fear. Since the bandits have not yet appeared, why worry in advance?”

The master said, “Those who cultivate the Dao follow their nature and spend their days at ease. Even with a blade at their throat, they have nothing to fear. Why worry before the bandits have even arrived? Besides, good and evil each follow their own course, and in the end they will not harm one another.” The others then settled their minds.

In winter, the master stayed at the newly built official residence in Duanshi. In the first ten days of the third month of the Renwu year, Ali Xian came to the imperial encampment to convey the emperor’s orders to Zhonglu and Zhenhai: the two of them were to escort the Perfected One, while the myriarch Bolu led a thousand armored soldiers as his guard. The party passed through Tiemen and reached the imperial lodging, where they settled in the guest quarters and awaited an audience.

The emperor welcomed the master, saying, “Other countries summoned you, but you did not answer their calls. Now you have traveled ten thousand li to come here. I greatly admire you.” The master replied, “I am a man of the mountains and countryside. I set out in response to the imperial command; this was Heaven’s will.” Respecting the master’s sincerity and plainness, the emperor arranged two tents for him near the residences of the imperial officials.

Their meeting was set for the fourteenth day of the fourth month. As the appointed date drew near, word came that bandits had been sighted in the mountains. The emperor planned to go there in person, but later chose the fifteenth day of the tenth month as an auspicious date instead. The master asked to return to his former guest quarters. The emperor said, “Wouldn’t making the journey back again be tiring?” The master replied, “I can return in about twenty days.” The emperor added, “There is no escort.” Three days later, the emperor ordered the envoy Yang Agou to lead more than a thousand Uighur horsemen and escort the master back by another route.

In the fifth month, the master reached Samarkand. The officials welcomed him into the guest quarters; that day was the Dragon Boat Festival. The quarters stood on the northern cliff, overlooking a clear stream more than ten zhang below. The stream flowed down from the snowy mountains and was bitterly cold. In the heat of midsummer, the master sat by the windows to catch the breeze, and at night he slept on the rooftop terrace. In the scorching heat of the sixth month, he went to bathe in the stream. Though he was in a distant foreign land, the master remained so calm and content.

There were few guests at the residence, and the master often found pleasure in reading the scriptures. He wrote a poem: “Northward, I crossed the Yin Mountains, traveling more than ten thousand li; westward, I passed through Dashi, where I stayed for half a year. In these remote and barren lands, the customs are coarse, and it is difficult to speak of the Way. Better to settle down with my books in a quiet, secluded dwelling.”

In the seventh month, the master sent Ali Xian to the imperial encampment with a memorial asking when their discussion of the Dao would take place. On the seventh day of the eighth month, the emperor’s reply arrived.

On the eighth, the Master set out, and the Grand Preceptor escorted him for several dozen li. On the twenty-second, Tian Zhenhai came to meet him. When they reached the imperial lodge, the Emperor sent Tian Zhenhai to ask, “Would you like to see the Master now, or rest for a while first?” The Master replied, “It is my wish to go in and pay my respects.” After meeting the Emperor, he was given some food, including cheese. When he had finished eating, he took his leave. The Emperor asked, “Would it be all right for the Master to come here for a meal each day?” The Master said, “I am a man who cultivates the Dao in the mountains and wilderness; I prefer only quiet places.” The Emperor then told him to make whatever arrangements he pleased.

On the twenty-seventh, the Master took his leave. The Emperor again asked, “Would it be all right for the Master to come here for a meal each day?” The Master replied as before, “I am a man who cultivates the Dao in the mountains and wilderness; I prefer only quiet places.” The Emperor again told him to make whatever arrangements he pleased. That day, the imperial carriage headed north on its return journey. Along the way, the Emperor repeatedly bestowed on the Master grape wine, melons, fruit, tea, and other things.

In the ninth month, the Master crossed the water by way of the Hang Bridge and traveled north, reporting that the agreed date for their meeting was drawing near. The Emperor summoned the Grand Master Ahai. On the night of the fifteenth of that month, the Emperor lit torches in the courtyard and cleared the place of honor to welcome the Master. Grand Master Ahai and Ali Xian entered to attend them, and the Emperor asked the Master about the utmost Dao.

The Master said, “The Dao gives rise to Heaven and Earth. The sun, moon, and stars, the spirits and ghosts, and all things are born from the Dao. People know only that Heaven is vast, but do not know that the Dao is vaster still. The light and clear Qi rises to become Heaven. Heaven belongs to Yang and is associated with Fire. The heavy and turbid Qi gathers to form Earth. Earth belongs to Yin and is associated with Water. Human beings live between Heaven and Earth, bearing Yin on their backs and embracing Yang. Thus, those who study the Dao understand the methods of cultivation: they cast off extravagance, put aside desire, preserve their Jing and Qi, gather their Shen, and devote themselves to cultivating Yang. In this way, Yin recedes and Yang becomes abundant; they can ascend to Heaven and become immortals, just as flames leap upward.

“Foolish people take wine for drink, grow accustomed to reckless indulgence, and give free rein to their feelings and desires, depleting their Jing and Qi and harming their Shen. In this way, Yang weakens and Yin grows strong; they sink beneath the earth and become ghosts, just as water flows downward. Cultivating the truth is like pushing a stone up a mountain: the higher the mountain, the harder it is to advance. The slightest mistake can undo all the effort that came before. Because cultivating the truth is so difficult, almost no one in the world is willing to undertake it. Those who cultivate the Dao refine the truth and train the mind, allowing nothing to occupy their thoughts. Their mind is like the boundless void, or like a still surface of water.”

When the wind over the water dies down, the surface becomes calm and clear, and everything is reflected in it and appears distinctly. When the wind rises, the water churns and grows murky. How could it still reflect anything?

Human nature is originally calm and clear, like still water. But the eyes crave beautiful sights, the ears delight in sounds, the tongue covets flavors, and the mind clings to all kinds of affairs. These desires arise one after another and take turns, like waves stirred up by the wind.

At the beginning, it is very difficult for a Dao practitioner to cultivate the mind. After years of practice and deepening effort, desires gradually diminish; diminishing them again and again, one eventually reaches Wuwei (non-action, a natural state of neither acting recklessly nor forcing things). A Dao practitioner need only attend to their own person, yet cultivating the mind is already difficult. How much harder must it be for the Son of Heaven, who rules the realm and handles many affairs of state each day, to cultivate the mind? If one can restrain sexual desire and reduce distracting thoughts, one can receive Heaven’s protection. How much more so if one observes the precepts in full?

In ancient times, men married to continue their line, but once an heir was established, they gave up desire. Thus, by the age of forty Confucius was no longer confused by things, and by the age of forty Mencius was no longer inwardly shaken. This is because after a person passes forty, Qi (vital energy) and blood gradually decline. Your Majesty is already advanced in years and should cultivate De (Virtue) and care for the body in pursuit of longevity.

This can be explained by considering the use of medicine and the principle of living alone. Medicine comes from plants, while vital essence is like marrow. To give up marrow in order to replenish oneself with herbs is like putting gold in a bag and then trading it for iron. In time, the gold is used up, and only iron remains in the bag. What benefit is there in that? How is taking medicine to seek long life any different? Food, housing, precious objects, and wealth should all be kept within one’s means and used in moderation, without excess.

The countries beyond the four seas are indeed rich in produce and have many rare treasures. Yet they cannot compare with the Central Plains, where Heaven’s teachings in the scriptures have been passed down, and methods for governing the state and nurturing the body are complete. The Central Plains has also repeatedly seen extraordinary people cultivate the Dao, attain immortality, and ascend to Heaven. Although Shandong and Hebei abound in produce, they cannot compare with the Central Plains’ complete scriptural teachings and comprehensive arts of governing the state and nurturing the body; extraordinary people there, too, have repeatedly attained the Dao and ascended to Heaven.

Shandong and Hebei are prosperous regions of the realm, rich in fine spices, vegetables, fish, silk, and hemp cloth, with enough to supply all parts of the country. Since ancient times, people have regarded these lands as strategically important, and rulers of successive dynasties have therefore valued them highly. Today, the entire region belongs to Your Majesty, but warfare has followed warfare, and the people have scattered. Stability has yet to return. Your Majesty should appoint honest and capable officials to plan and govern the region, and reduce taxes as circumstances allow. This would ensure that the army and the state have sufficient cloth and silk, while helping the people restore their livelihoods sooner and recover in peace. It is a measure that serves two purposes at once, and may also be called a way of praying for blessings. If the appointed officials are unworthy, they will bring harm instead of benefit.

When the Jin first gained control of the realm, they rose to power in the east and at first knew little of the customs and ways of life in the Central Plains. They therefore enfeoffed Liu Yu at Dongping and had him administer the region for eight years before taking it over themselves. This too was a sound policy for laying the foundations of a dynasty. I, a man from the wilderness, have merely set out the main points briefly. Whether to accept them rests entirely with Your Majesty. The emperor was pleased to hear this and ordered an attendant to record the words. This is their general meaning; a fuller account appears in the Qinghui Record.

The next day, the emperor asked about the thunderclap. The man replied: “I have heard that the people of this region observe certain customs: in summer they do not bathe in rivers, soil their clothes, or make felt rugs; and when fungi grow in the fields, people are forbidden to gather them. They do this because they revere Heaven’s majesty. Yet this is not the most fundamental way to honor Heaven. I have heard that among the three thousand offenses, none is graver than being unfilial. I now hear that the people here still do not know how to show filial respect to their parents. Your Majesty should instruct and admonish them.”

The emperor summoned the Crown Prince, the princes, and the ministers, and told them what this master had said both earlier and more recently. He said, “Heaven has sent an immortal to tell Me these things. You must all keep them firmly in mind.” From then on, the title “immortal” began to circulate.

The Journey to the West records that on the first day of the tenth month, a petition was submitted requesting permission to return to his former residence. On the seventh day of the second month in the guǐwèi year, he took leave to attend court. The emperor said, “Wait another three or five days. There are some points in what the Daoist master said a few days ago that I still do not understand. Once I have grasped them, I will let you leave.” The emperor went hunting on the eastern mountain and shot a large wild boar, but his mount stumbled and could not be controlled. The boar stood nearby, not daring to approach. When attendants brought another horse, the emperor stopped the hunt.

After hearing of this, the Master went to the palace to offer counsel: “Heaven cherishes life. Your Majesty is now advanced in years and should hunt less often. Your fall from the horse was a warning from Heaven, while the wild boar’s refusal to approach was Heaven’s protection of you.” The Emperor replied, “The boar merely stood nearby; it did not dare come closer.” His attendants brought him a horse, and the hunt came to an end.

From then on, the Emperor paid closer heed to the Master’s words. “I have reflected on this seriously,” he said. “Riding and archery are pursuits I have practiced all my life. Although I cannot give them up entirely at once, I will keep the Immortal’s counsel in mind.” After that, he went hunting less often.

On the seventh day of the third month, the Master again entered the palace to take his leave, and the Emperor granted permission. The gifts he bestowed on the Master were exceedingly generous, but the Master declined them all. The Emperor then issued an edict expressing his respect and encouragement, treated him with courtesy, and sent him on his way. He ordered Ali Xian to escort the Master eastward. Those who came to see him off wept as they said goodbye.

The Master and his party reached Mount Abuhan and then passed through Bingxia Monastery. In the middle of the fifth month, the Master stopped eating and drank only broth. The others asked, “What illness has afflicted you, Master?” He replied, “My illness is beyond your understanding. It is the work of sages and worthies, who are testing me.” That night, Yin Qinghe dreamed that someone said to him, “You need not worry about the Master’s illness. Once he reaches the Han lands, he will recover naturally.”

At the end of the sixth month, the party arrived in Fengzhou. Commissioner Yu, an official assigned to carry out government affairs, invited the Master to stay at his home and provided him with nourishing broth and medicine. The Master immediately ate a hearty meal and thereafter returned to normal. The others said to one another, “Qinghe’s dream has come true.”

When they reached Yunzhong, Ali Xian planned to go to Shandong to pacify and counsel the local people, and asked Yin Qinghe to accompany the Master. The Master said, “Heaven’s intent is still unclear. What use would it be to go?” Ali Xian bowed twice and pleaded, “If the king comes with a great army, the people may be slaughtered.” The Master replied, “Even if we cannot save them, making the effort to help is better than sitting by and doing nothing.” He therefore agreed to the request.

In the eighth month, the Master arrived in Xuande and stayed at Chaoyuan Abbey in the prefecture. Officials and generals from the prefectures and governments of the northern river region sent letters and memorials one after another, inviting him; many people wrote. The Master replied, “The royal house has not yet been brought to stability. The Daoist tradition should first be allowed to flourish. The time has come to establish an altar and guide people to salvation; there is no limit to the work that can be spread.” The commanders and officials of the prefecture all sincerely turned to the Master, regretting only that he could not be in many places at once to meet everyone’s hopes.

On the first day of the second month in the jia-shen year, the Master was staying at Qiuyang Abbey on Mount Jinsan. Shimo Xiande, an official of the Yanjing Branch Secretariat, and Liu Zhonglu, a deputy commissioner, each submitted a memorial earnestly requesting that the Master reside at Taiji Palace. He agreed, and so traveled there by way of Juyong Pass. Earlier, when the Master left Wuchuan, people had asked when he would return. He said he would be back in three years, and now events had unfolded just as he had said.

That month, Helaci came from the place where the emperor was encamped and conveyed the imperial command: “An immortal has come to the lands of the Han. Any city I possess where he wishes to live may be his.” The officials said, “The Master has already agreed to reside at Taiji Palace. Please do not discuss any other place.” After this, followers of Daoism gathered in great numbers, and the Daoist tradition grew ever more prosperous. Eight fellowships were established: the Fellowship of Equality, the Fellowship of Eternal Spring, the Lingbao Fellowship, the Fellowship of Long Life, the Fellowship of Illuminated Truth, the Fellowship of Peace, the Fellowship for Dispelling Calamity, and the Fellowship of Ten Thousand Lotuses. More and more people sought Daoist names, and the Master often taught them through songs and poetic hymns.

At times the Master would also visit his old home. Beneath the pines on Qionghua, he would sit quietly with five or six attendants. Sometimes he composed poems; sometimes he exchanged poems with others. Even as the sun set, he would remain there, sitting at ease and forgetting to return.

In the spring of the yi-you year, the Master broke off a branch of pear blossoms and gave it to Zhang Quhua, the lay devotee Ningxuan. Lord Zhang treasured the gift and placed the branch in a vase, where he tended it. By autumn, the branch had borne twenty-four fruits, no different from those growing on a tree. People of the time regarded this as an auspicious sign. Zhang Quhua was the father of Chengming. The intention the Master conveyed through this act was profoundly subtle.

At Yanxiang Abbey there was a withered locust tree. The master tapped it with his staff and said, “This tree will come back to life.” Later, the locust tree indeed flourished with leaves and branches, growing better than all the other locust trees.

In early September, Wang Ji, the Pacification Commissioner, believed that the Star of Yinghuo (the ancient name for Mars) had intruded upon the Tail Mansion (a named stellar region), foretelling disaster in the land of Yan. He therefore planned to hold a jiao ritual, a Daoist rite of prayer and supplication, to avert calamity. When he asked how much it would cost, the master said, “I cannot bear to see even a single object deprived of its proper place. How much more so the people of Yan! In recent years, they have suffered greatly from conscription and forced labor, and both the government and the people are in dire straits. I will cover this occasion’s expenses from the abbey’s communal resources. The officials need only observe the fast and wait to perform the rites.” On the night the ritual ended, Wang Ji congratulated him joyfully: “Yinghuo has already retreated by several she (ancient divisions between stellar mansions). We need worry no longer. The master’s De moves Heaven and Earth—how swiftly it has taken effect!” The master replied, “What De do I have? Prayers to avert calamity have been performed since ancient times. One need only fear that they are not carried out with sufficient sincerity.”

In the fifth month of the Bingxu year, the capital suffered a severe drought, and the provincial administration asked the master to preside over a jiao ritual. Thereafter, rain fell in abundance, just as the day on which the immortals were said to bring rain arrived. Many distinguished ministers and learned Confucian scholars wrote poems in celebration. In the fifth month of the Dinghai year, the capital was again stricken by drought. The Daoist community gathered in the capital asked the master to hold a jiao ritual. The master said calmly, “I have been considering the ritual, and you have happened to propose it as well. This is what is meant by good things arising in unison.” He added, “On the first day, we will perform a jiao ritual to pray for rain; on the second, a jiao ritual to celebrate the rain. If it rains within three days, it will be auspicious rain brought by the ritual. If it rains after three days, it will not be attributed to the ritual.” Someone said, “Heaven’s intent is hard to fathom. If the master says this publicly and rain does not fall in time, will he not invite criticism?” The master replied, “This is not something you can understand.” Later, events unfolded just as the master had said.

That same month, the disciple Wang Zhiming returned from Qinzhou with an imperial decree: Taiji Palace was to be renamed Changchun Palace, Qionghua Island was to be renamed Wan’an Palace, and the master was granted a tiger tally, a credential for commanding troops or conducting official business. All matters concerning Daoism were entrusted to the Immortals. In the sixth month, the master … Later, events unfolded just as the master had said.

That month, the disciple Wang Zhiming returned from Qinzhou bearing the emperor’s decree: Taiji Palace was to be renamed Changchun Palace, and Qionghua Island was to be renamed Wan’an Palace. The emperor also bestowed a tiger tally on the Daoist community, a token used to convey orders and mobilize personnel. All Daoist affairs were placed under the charge of the Immortals.

In the sixth month, the master did not go out. The following day, thunder and rain raged. Someone reported that the southern bank of Taiye Pond had collapsed and its waters were flowing into East Lake. A tremendous rumble could be heard for dozens of miles. All the fish and turtles in the pond had fled, and the pond soon dried up; the mountain to the north had also collapsed. At first the master said nothing. After a long while, he smiled and said, “The mountain has collapsed and the pond has dried up. Must I go with them, too?”

On the fourth day of the seventh month, the master said to his disciples, “Danyang once foretold this of me. He said that after I died, the religious community would flourish greatly; places throughout the land would often become centers of Daoist prosperity, and every Daoist monastery would receive encouragement and an official designation from the court. He also said I would preside over a great monastery, and that messengers bearing tallies and riding by relay would come to manage religious affairs. This is precisely the time to retire and rest, now that my work is accomplished and my name has become well known. Danyang’s words have now all come true. I can depart without regret.” Danyang was the Daoist name of Ma Yu, a disciple of Wang Chongyang.

On the ninth day, messengers bearing tallies and riding by relay came to manage religious affairs. The master said that this was the time to retire and rest, now that his work was accomplished and his name had become well known. Danyang’s words had all come true, and he could depart without regret.

That day, the master ascended Baoxuan Hall and left this verse:

“Life and death are like morning and evening;

from the beginning, they have made no distinction.

Life is like an illusory shadow, like a bubble:

it arises and passes away, while the water flows on, calm and untroubled.

Where a faint light appears, the sun and moon move like the crow and hare;

when the mind is deep and still, it seems to hold seas and mountains.

With a wave of the hand, the eight directions of heaven and earth lie close at hand;

as Qi stirs and swells, the transformations of all things seem to turn like a mechanism.

The wild words I write at will become dust as soon as the brush touches paper.

I leave them to the world; let people hear and question them as they please.”

When he had finished writing, the master passed away. He was eighty years old. Liu Zhonglu, an official holding the rank of bianyi, sighed through his tears: “Since the Perfected One entered the court for an audience, ruler and ministers have been of one mind and deeply close. Even after he left the palace, the emperor continued to cherish him and never forgot him for a moment. Now the master has ascended to immortality; we must report this at once.” From then on, people came from all over to mourn. On arriving, they grieved as if they had lost a member of their own family.

On the first day of the third month in the Wuzi year, Qinghe proposed building a hall for the master at White Cloud Temple.

On the first day of the third month in the Wuzi year, Qinghe proposed building a hall for the Master at Baiyun Temple and set the date for his grand funeral as the ninth day of the seventh month. Rain fell for many days in June, and everyone feared it would delay the funeral. At the beginning of the seventh month, the skies suddenly cleared. When the coffin was opened, the Master’s face seemed still to hold a trace of life, and onlookers crowded together like a wall. Three days later, people placed the immortal’s remains in the hall. A rich, unusual fragrance filled the air and lingered for a long time. After the burial was complete, heavy rain fell from the sky.

Wang Ji, the Pacification Commissioner, attended the funeral, presided over the ceremony himself, and personally inscribed the hall’s name: “Chushun” (“Following the Natural Course”). In the first month of the sixth year of the Zhiyuan era, the court posthumously bestowed on the Master the title “Perfected One Who Expounds the Dao and Presides over the Teaching of Changchun.” The Master’s collected poems and writings, titled Collection of the Dao’s Resonant Voice from Fanxi, circulated among the people.

End of volume two of A Continuation of the Comprehensive Mirror of Perfected Immortals Through the Ages.

A Continuation of the Comprehensive Mirror of Perfected Immortals Through the Ages, volume three: Wang Chuyi

This Perfected One was named Chu Yi, with the courtesy name Yuyang, and came from Dongmu in Ninghai. On the night before the eighteenth day of the third month of the renxu year, the second year of the Huangtong era under Emperor Xizong of Jin (1142), his mother, Lady Zhou, dreamed that red clouds encircled her body. She awoke in alarm, and that day Chu Yi was born.

When Chu Yi had just turned seven, his breathing once stopped and he collapsed to the ground. After some time, he regained consciousness. His mother anxiously asked what had happened. He replied, “I only felt that I was sleeping very deeply. I knew nothing else.” From this, Chu Yi came to understand the principles of life and death.

One day, he happened to go into the mountains and met an old man sitting on a large stone. The old man said to him, “In the future, you will become renowned at the imperial court and become the leader of the Daoist tradition.” Having said this, the old man touched his head and sent him on his way. He also once heard someone in the sky ask, “Do you know who I am?” Chu Yi replied, “I do not.” The voice said, “I am the Lord of Xuanyan Palace.”

After this, Chu Yi often sang wildly and danced. In the depths of winter, he wore a single-layer garment and went barefoot, yet his complexion never changed. Suddenly, he composed and sang these verses: “Why contend for fame? Why chase profit? Better to cultivate the mind and nature early. Your own cultivation and realization determine your path ahead; if you do not act to make things happen, you will not be drawn along by all manner of things.”

When Chu Yi was twenty, someone urged him to discuss marriage. He only smiled and gave no reply. In the eighth year of the Dading era under Emperor Shizong of Jin (1168), he lived in a hermitage on Ox Immortal Mountain in Wendeng. When someone told him that the Patriarch had arrived, he went to the Quanzhen Hermitage and asked to become the Patriarch’s disciple. The Patriarch recognized him as a rare talent within the Daoist tradition and agreed to his request.

At the end of the second month, Chu Yi accompanied the Patriarch to Misty Clouds Cave on Kunyu Mountain. The Patriarch transmitted the Orthodox Teachings to him and bestowed upon him the name by which he is now known. His mother also went to pay her respects to the Patriarch and expressed her wish to learn the Dao. Knowing that his mother was chaste and upright, Chu Yi gave her the name Deqing and the title “Recluse Xuanying.”

In the fourth month of the ninth year of the Dading era (1169), Chu Yi was living on Iron Fork Mountain. The Patriarch and several others, including Danyang, set out from Wendeng, intending to return to Ninghai. On the way, they passed through Longquan.

At the time, the weather was hot. The Patriarch traveled with an umbrella, and Danyang and the others followed behind him. Suddenly, the umbrella rose into the air and flew from the hour of the Dragon until evening, finally coming down in front of the Patriarch’s hermitage. Longquan lies nearly two hundred li from Chashan. The name used today was found inside the umbrella handle; he was also called “Sanyangzi,” a name the Patriarch gave him. Later, there were seven men bearing such names, and the Master came after Ma, Tan, Liu, and Qiu. So the Patriarch said, “The bamboo of the umbrella, when brought together, corresponds exactly to the seven men.” This was said to accord with the number seven of the Golden Lotuses. The Patriarch also said, “When bamboo is joined to form the Golden Elixir, it rises out through the crown of the head, and five-colored rays pierce the clouds.”

In the ninth month, the Patriarch headed west, and the Master withdrew to Yun Guang Cave. He often went to the edge of a steep cliff, stood motionless on one raised foot, and remained there for days. People therefore called him the “Iron-Footed Immortal.” After nine years of cultivation, the Master’s mind became clear and penetrating. Thereafter, he traveled repeatedly between Qi and Lu.

In the autumn of the twenty-second year, the Master was living in Ninghai. Perfected Danyang came from Guanzhong, and the two lodged together in the Hall of the Golden Lotus. He spoke frankly to the Master: “The Patriarch Chongyang traveled thousands of li to guide and support us, yet we have nothing with which to repay him. Should we not feel ashamed? If those who have attained the Dao concern themselves only with their own welfare, their merit cannot benefit the people. Surely that is at odds with the purpose of universal salvation. If we truly wish to make our late master’s grace known, the best way is to reveal the wondrous responses of the Dao and thereby bring benefit to the people. You possess Daoist arts and talent, yet keep them hidden and seek only to perfect yourself. Surely that is not quite fitting?”

The Master replied, “The Dao itself makes no distinctions. Distinctions arise from whether one’s affinities have ripened and the time has come. You, sir, unite Dao and De in yourself. Your virtue has spread far and wide, inspiring admiration and respect throughout the land. There is no other reason for this: the Dao has flourished, and affinities have found their way forward. As for this poor Daoist, my affinities have not yet ripened, so for now I can only live freely and without restraint, moving among the world.” Perfected Danyang agreed with him.

In the twenty-seventh year, Emperor Shizong summoned the Master to court. All his replies met with the emperor’s approval.

He lived at Tiancang Abbey for a long time. Hearing that someone intended to poison him with wine, the emperor sent an envoy to investigate where the poisoned wine had come from. The envoy questioned him repeatedly, but he steadfastly refused to say, merely claiming that he was ill. When the emperor heard this, he admired him all the more. Later, he asked to return to the mountains to care for his parents, and the emperor agreed.

In the second month of the twenty-eighth year, the emperor again issued an edict summoning him to court. A Cultivating the True Abbey was built in the capital, and he was granted a plaque bearing the abbey’s name in gold calligraphy and ordered to live there. That same month, he presided over the Zhaijiao ritual for the Wanchun Festival. In the eighth month, he received an imperial order to return to the mountains. The emperor bestowed on him a great quantity of gold, silk, and other gifts, but he declined them. In the twelfth month, the emperor fell ill and sent an envoy to summon him to the palace. He said to the envoy, “Why have you come so late? I fear I may not have time to see His Majesty again.” The following spring, while in Zhuojun, he heard the decree announcing the emperor’s death. He firmly took his leave and returned east.

In the seventh month of the second year of the Cheng’an era under Emperor Zhangzong, the emperor summoned him to a private palace hall and asked about the art of nurturing life. He replied that one should nurture life by following nature, remaining quiet, and having few desires. The emperor then asked about the principles of nature and life. He said, “Neidan cultivation teaches that the mind directs Qi. These are all principles of following Wuwei and the natural course, and of turning the workings of creation. The Mysterious Origin and Supreme Dao—the fundamental principles of the Dao—need no deliberate action; things come to completion naturally.” The emperor said, “This is beyond my ability to assess.” He then asked him about governing the country and affairs at the frontier, and each of his replies accorded with the emperor’s wishes.

The emperor also asked, “Whatever people ask you, you seem to know the answer. Why is that?” He replied, “It is only by chance.” The emperor said, “Do not brush me off. I would like to hear the reason.” He said, “Even a bright mirror can reflect all things. How much more so the clear mirror of Heaven and Earth: there is no hidden depth it cannot examine, and no thing that can escape its sight. What is called the clear mirror of Heaven and Earth is the wondrous function of one’s own spiritual awareness.” The emperor exclaimed, “When clear and pure Qi dwells within, one’s bearing and intention become like those of a spirit. When desire is about to arise, its signs must appear beforehand. This is precisely what you mean.”

The following spring, he submitted a memorial saying that his mother was nearly ninety and asked to return to care for her. The emperor bestowed on him an abbey plaque and the title ‘Master Embodying the Mysterious,’ and treated him with generous gifts. In the third year, the year Guihai, when the emperor’s desire was about to arise, its signs must appear beforehand.

This was the gentleman people spoke of. The following spring, he submitted a memorial saying that his mother was nearly ninety and asking to return home to serve her. The emperor granted him a plaque for his monastery, bestowed on him the title “Great Master Who Embodies the Mystery,” and favored him with generous gifts and honors.

In the third year, Guihai, the emperor ordered him to preside over a Universal Heaven Zhaijiao rite at the Taiqing Palace in Bozhou, praying for blessings and averting calamities throughout the realm. He also conducted ordination ceremonies for more than a thousand people entering the Dao. It happened to be his birthday, and his disciples gathered to celebrate. His mother said, “At my age, how could I ever make the journey back?” He said that her allotted years might last until the seventh month of that autumn. His mother then spoke of not clinging to life and not fearing death. When the seventh month came, she fell ill, and he promptly made arrangements for her funeral. At the time of her death, people smelled a rich, unusual fragrance and heard the refined music of pipes and strings; after a while, both ceased.

The Beijing Surveillance Commissioner, Lord Bolumulu, formerly a vice minister, had long held his teachings in reverence and adopted “Revering the Dao” as his personal name. Whenever he met the master, he would sometimes be told the date rain would fall, and sometimes where they would meet in the future; each prediction came true. One day, Lord Bolumulu went to Shengshui and spoke to him earnestly: “In the past, I had only heard the names of the immortals. Since meeting you, every prayer of mine has received a favorable response, and you can even tell me beforehand about my journeys, my stays, and our meetings. I am deeply ashamed that I remain in the dusty world and cannot follow you as you travel through the clouds to cultivate the Dao. My wish has come to nothing, and I can only feel all the more despondent.”

In the seventh year, the Yuan consort donated a complete collection of the Daoist scriptures, which was sent by relay station to the Yuxu Monastery at Shengshui. In front of the water cave in the monastery stood a great stone, jutting out several yards at an angle, with a deep drop beneath it. Passersby were all unnerved. One day, the master summoned everyone and said, “This great stone ought to be moved.” They took up hammers and chisels and worked at it for several days. The master asked, “How is it going?” They replied, “We have removed only one hundredth of it.” The master smiled and said, “How could you possibly move it?” Then he went to the stone himself and struck it three times with a hammer. The sound was like thunder, reverberating through the valley, and the great stone immediately fell away. Everyone who witnessed it was astonished.

In the fourth year of the Zhenyou era, Wen Dihan Guishou, magistrate of Wendeng County, invited the master to reside at the county’s Tianbao Monastery.

On the twenty-third day of the fourth month of the following year, the master said to his disciples, “Strike the rock three times with the hammer.” The blows thundered through the valley. The rocks immediately came crashing down, and everyone who saw it was terrified.

In the fourth year of the Zhenyou era under the Jin, Wendi Han Guishou, magistrate of Wendeng County, invited the master to the county’s Tianbao Temple. On the twenty-third day of the fourth month of the following year, the master said to his disciples, “The assembled immortals have already summoned me.” He then bathed, changed his clothes, burned incense, and bowed toward the ten directions—the four quarters, above and below, meaning every direction—before taking leave of the world.

The master’s poems were collected in the Cloud Radiance Collection and passed down through the generations. In the first month of the sixth year of the Zhiyuan era, in the year jisi, the Great Yuan court posthumously honored him with the title “Perfected Person of Jade Yang, Embodying the Mystery and Widely Delivering Beings.”

Earlier, in the fifth month of the first year of the Mingchang era, Liu Zhi of Laiyang County came to seek the master’s advice because he had no children. The master said, “Your household is well off, and you value proper conduct and ritual. Your family line should not come to an end. Still, I must report this to Heaven.” On the fifteenth day of the sixth month, the master went to Liu Zhi’s home. Liu Zhi prepared wine for him, but the master said, “I have come especially to bring you a child. How can you serve me only ordinary wine?” He added, “The wine sealed away in the northwest corner of the storeroom is the good kind.” Liu Zhi went to look and indeed found a vessel of warmed wine. The master said, “Just as this wine was sent to you, so too will your child be sent.” He asked for paper, wrote a hymn, and added four characters at the end: “Four fours, answering the Real.”

On the fourteenth day of the fourth month of the following year, Liu Zhi’s son was born. Liu Zhi asked the master to name the child. “I have already named him,” the master replied. After a moment’s silence, Liu Zhi said, “Everyone can understand ‘four fours.’ Are the two characters ‘Answering the Real’ his name?” The master said, “He was born on the very day Pure Yang descended into the world. Is ‘Answering the Real’—responding to a true immortal and accordant with the true Dao—not a fitting name?” So the child was named Yingzhen, “Answering the Real.”

There are many other accounts of the master’s deeds during his time in the world. He once rebuked Chi Jin, curing an illness that had troubled him for years; rescued Pan Xin from the danger posed by violent men; lay in the snow and ice before Zhao Shi’s gate; and caused a parrot to sing again on Qiang Huang’s perch. In winter he played chess wearing only a single layer of clothing, and he could pour wine from a bottle with no bottom. When he transmitted the Dao, the valleys echoed with the sound; when he wrote Fulu (talismans and registers), spirits and ghosts appeared unseen, manifesting their efficacy. There are many such stories. They were all deeds the master left behind during his time in the world, and they have been recorded elsewhere, so they are not copied here one by one.

The master was named Datong, had the courtesy name Taigu, was from Ninghai, and bore the title Guangning. He was born on the third day of the first month in the third year of the Tianjuan era under Emperor Xizong of the Jin dynasty (1140). His family had served as officials for generations, and he was a cousin of Hao Chaolie. He lost his father in childhood and served his mother with great filial devotion. He once dreamed that a divine being taught him the hidden principles of the Zhouyi (Book of Changes). From then on, he became well versed in Yin-Yang, calendrical methods, and divination. He disliked worldly bustle and extravagance, loved quiet simplicity, and cultivated his De (virtue) in private.