《古书隐楼藏书》Vol. 21

When every affair accords with the Dao and both left and right reach the source, one may then “return to mandate and revert to the root”—return to the root of life. Original true nature has no place or direction, no image, no color or form, no coming or going, no movement or stillness, no birth or death; void is its substance and spirit (Shen) is its function. Heaven and earth are nothing but what appears within true nature. Because the heart-mind does not understand, people live in obscurity. When the heart-mind is clear, one can see nature; with a clear heart and firm nature, one knows this nature has never come from anywhere and never goes anywhere—it simply is, as it always has been. Therefore those who study the Way must first gain a point of awakening, and only then can they put it into practice. If one only hunts for passages on paper and plucks phrases from the mouth, one will never truly attain it.

In praise: With neither coming nor going, how could there be birth and death? Deep as water, clear and ever bright—that is the beginning without beginning, the clarity of the Great Purity (Taiqing, the realm of utmost clarity and emptiness). It radiates boundless light and embodies the four virtues of origination, penetration, harmony, and correctness (yuan, heng, li, zhen).

Someone said: “I have heard that nature is divided into nature of temperament and original nature.”

In praise: With neither coming nor going, how could there be birth and death? Deep as water, clear and ever bright—that is the beginning without beginning, the clarity of the Great Purity. It radiates boundless light and embodies yuan, heng, li, and zhen.

Another said: “The distinction between temperament nature and original nature is already clear. Does the heart-mind’s failure to perceive also have a distinction? How can it be made clear?”

Dongran says: In the Shangshu (Classic of Documents), it speaks of the “human mind” (renxin) and the “mind of the Dao” (daoxin). Master Wang Yangming explained them with “already mixed with human artifice” and “not yet mixed with human artifice”—very clearly. Here, xin (mind/heart) is not the lump of flesh in the chest, but the mind that is empty, luminous, and unobscured (xuling bumei). It rules the whole body, so when this “sovereign ruler” (tianjun) is at peace, the limbs and every part obey its command.

The human mind is most quick to respond; from it come good and evil, and likewise becoming a sage, a worthy, an immortal, or a Buddha. An old saying runs: “Three dots like stars scattered, a horizontal hook like the slanting moon. From here one may go forth covered in fur, or become a Buddha—by one’s own choice.” It means this mind is hard to fathom in its changes: from it one may sink into beasthood, or become a Buddha.

When thoughts flash up and vanish, turn good or bad in an instant, and in a moment countless stray thoughts churn—those wandering thoughts are the human mind. The human mind is human desire, the seed of samsara (the cycle of birth and death). If, as thoughts rise and fall, one can see their good and evil and weigh right and wrong, hold steady in movement and stillness and in how one treats people and handles affairs, and tell righteousness from profit—what fits righteousness is Heavenly Principle (Tianli), what chases profit is human desire—then that Heavenly Principle is the mind of the Dao. Constantly keeping Heavenly Principle and stripping away human desire is the sages’ discipline of restraining the self and returning to ritual propriety (keji fuli).

If one can go further and keep the heart utterly empty and clear, without a speck of dust, without a single hanging attachment, always awake and aware; extinguishing only the restless, deluded mind, not the mind that watches and illumines; staying alert and unobscured, clarity always present in oneself, until spirit and will are like the divine—that is the real work of cultivating the Dao, by which one may become sage, worthy, immortal, or Buddha. If one will not examine righteousness and profit amid the affairs of life or distinguish right from wrong, and only tries to empty the mind…

One must not fixate on concrete things to split righteousness from profit or right from wrong, nor simply empty the mind and extinguish one’s nature—doing only that lands one in hollow stillness, which neither the immortals’ line nor Confucian teaching approves.

What is called the Heart of Heaven (tianxin) is the heart of heaven and earth, and also the root of the human heart and the heart of the Dao. Originally there is only one heart; there is no real divide into heavenly, human, and Dao. What ordinary people stir up is mostly private desire for gain, so it is called the human heart; what the worthy and the noble stir up is upright principle and duty, so it is called the heart of the Dao. If one does not cling to “this heart” and, when it moves, does not cling to what it produces either, one only feels heavenly principle flowing naturally—both alert and still (xingxing jiji)—as one with the heart of heaven and earth, taking the heart of the ten thousand things as one’s heart: that is the Heart of Heaven.

The Heart of Heaven is invisible in itself; it shows only through a person. When selfish desire does not block someone, the heart is empty, bright, and unobscured; whatever it sends forth at any moment is none other than the heart of heaven and earth. Hence the Book of Changes says: “On the hexagram Fu (Return), one may see the heart of heaven and earth.” Those who cultivate the Dao sweep away every hindrance—sound, color, wealth, and gain—and nurture the inner mind until it is utterly open, like a bright mirror. When yang returns at the depth of stillness (stillness at its limit and the first stir of yang), vital impulse moves; that movement is the Heart of Heaven appearing. Because people have a heart that fabricates, there is birth and death; heaven and earth operate with no deliberate heart, so they endure. If a person too can be without a clinging heart, they can know heaven and earth.

The encomium says: Heaven and humanity merge into one household; the ocean stretches vast and boundless. The lotus in the pond was always a rare flower from beyond the world. From nothing it transforms and operates; the subtlety is like splitting a melon to see the flesh. Under the moon at the third watch, a few plum blossoms open.

If someone asks: given that the learning of human nature and principle—the study of heart-and-mind and heavenly principle—is as we have described, what is the point of Buddhist seated meditation and of “investigating the huatou” (probing a single critical phrase)? In earlier times Master Yunqi Zhuhong (the Ming-dynasty monk Zhuhong) also widely opened Pure Land congregations (societies devoted to chanting the Buddha’s name) and taught people solely to practice nianfo, recitation of the Buddha’s name. Why do these two paths matter so much?

Hui Che said: Chan is samadhi (ding, concentration); investigating the huatou is prajna (hui, wisdom). For anyone living as a human being, whether or not they undertake formal cultivation, wisdom must come first and mere knowledge second, because knowledge is the work of shishen—the discriminating, acquired consciousness of everyday life.

Huiche said: Chan is samadhi; investigating the hua tou is prajna. For anyone living as a human being, whether they practice or not, wisdom comes first and mere knowledge second. Knowledge is only the activity of the discriminating, thinking mind (shishen); knowledge without wisdom is like the light of a firefly—not the light of the open sky—and cannot amount to much. Only with wisdom can one then enter Chan and study the Way: the meaning of every scripture becomes clear at a glance; when affairs arise and the ten thousand things respond, everything flows naturally from one’s own true nature, without failing to accord with principle. This is what is meant by having “another pair of eyes.”

The hua tou is the gateway for beginners entering the Way. A strike of the staff, a shout, a single phrase, or one abrupt cut-off (the Chan school often uses staff and shout to break ordinary thinking) so that the student awakens on the spot and sees through in the very words—that is called a Chan “turning point” (ji). Ji means the source from which movement arises. The teacher wants the student to turn inward from this, quietly observe where that movement comes from, and thereby verify and merge with the root of mind as the steps into the Way. Then the great Way stands forth without forced thinking and aligns with the center without strain. This is the sudden method of awakening nature in the Chan school.

Questions such as “Who is the one reciting the Buddha’s name?” or “What is your original face?” are meant to have the student hold fast to one such sentence and investigate it finely. What is there to investigate? Nothing other than breaking through one’s original face and recognizing one’s true nature. The student quietly investigates this one hua tou until there is nothing left to think; then the thought stops moving, and even “thinking about thinking” ceases. At that moment no thought arises; clarity and stillness prevail, yet one does not feel that one is in clarity and stillness. When the true pivot stirs, awakening suddenly breaks forth. In that very moment of awakening, one must recognize: what exactly is it that has been awakened to?

Who is the one capable of awakening? You must recognize reality in this way before you can see my original face from before I was born—it was always just like this. The “who” spoken of here is my true awakening (zhenjue). Once you have thoroughly passed this barrier, immediate sudden awakening is called poben (breaking through root delusion). Investigation that can break through the root counts as clearly knowing the nature-body (xingti, the body of original nature); only when the nature-body is clear does cultivation have a path to follow. As for sitting down to investigate, that is simply a method for settling your own mind. When the mind is settled, wisdom naturally arises, and suddenly there is awakening. From awakening comes clarity, and you penetrate through to my original true nature. This awakening and this clarity cannot be attained without wisdom—that is dual cultivation of ding and hui (samadhi and prajna cultivated together). Samadhi gives rise to prajna, and prajna in turn naturally settles back into samadhi. Sustained over a long time in this way, great samadhi and great prajna arise naturally; you suddenly enter wusheng (the unborn and undying) and never stray from it—this is what matters most. As for the “one stick, one shout” (yibang yihe, the Chan gate’s use of the staff and a sharp shout to startle the student awake), even when a practitioner suddenly awakens and gains insight without deliberate thinking, they must still apply themselves in seated meditation until it is long practiced and fully ripe, and only then attain great samadhi and great quiescence. To hold a single thought continuously as if for ten thousand years—how many people in past or present have done that? Those who “sit incense” today (zuo xiang, timed sitting in the Chan hall while incense burns) just sit in a daze, treating Chan and samadhi as book learning and clinging to the single word “ding” to cut off all thoughts. That is worshipping the “dead machine” (baisi ji, clinging to lifeless stillness). The ancients said: even after countless kalpas, one still ends in kongwang (empty void and annihilation). That is why Nanyue Mazu mocked the idea with “grinding a brick to make a mirror” (mozhuan zuo jing—a brick cannot become a mirror, just as dry sitting cannot make a Buddha).

The praise verse says: Only when you awaken to “who is it” can it be called awakening. Not a thread left hanging, the dwelling place unfathomably deep. Just like this—guard the Taipu (supreme simplicity, original plainness). Taipu is not dead, stiff simplicity; within it is like the music of Juntian (the celestial harmonies playing of themselves).

Someone asked: Then what about the principle of nianfo (reciting the Buddha’s name)? Do the six characters “Namu Amituofo” (Homage to Amitabha Buddha) hold some other subtle meaning?

Huiche said: The principle of nianfo is that our Buddha, out of compassion, specially opened this expedient gate (fangbian famen, a provisional teaching to guide beings)—the subtle teaching that universally gathers the three roots (sangen, superior, middling, and inferior capacities). For those of superior wisdom, one may speak in terms of nature and principle. As for those of middling capacity—what then is the meaning?

Huiche said: The principle of buddha-recitation (nianfo) is a skillful means (upaya)—a practice path suited to different capacities and easy to take up—that the Buddha, out of compassion, specially opened to universally guide beings of superior, middling, and inferior faculties toward subtle truth.

For those of superior wisdom, one may directly expound nature and principle (the mind’s nature and its underlying meaning). For those of middling capacity, one transmits the sutras so they recite with the mouth and reflect in the mind, follow the words to seek the meaning, and enter through understanding and awakening—this is the gradual method (jianfa, step-by-step cultivation). The sudden method (dunfa, immediate entry) can only deliver people of superior faculties; those below the middle rank cannot manage it. The gradual method is for delivering those of middling capacity. As for the dullest people, what then? That is precisely why this skillful means was opened. Moreover, many people fear difficulty and seek only ease, so they are taught exclusively to recite the buddha’s name.

If you hold fast to this single phrase of the buddha-name with undivided mind, at the hour of death you can be reborn in the Western Pure Land of Ultimate Bliss (Sukhavati, Amitabha’s pure land).

The hardest thing for a person to subdue is this very mind. Now, using this one phrase of the buddha-name to fix your thoughts, only the thought of recitation remains and the myriad idle thoughts find no gap to enter; naturally the divine light clears by itself and the true mechanism (the inherent luminous responsiveness of the mind) reveals itself. Over time you reach the point where not a single thought arises and clarity pervades alone—you feel there is no self, no others, no heaven and earth, no sun, moon, mountains, or rivers; you know only awareness and do not know a “me.” Only at this stage can it be called the true mechanism disclosed, and only then can it be called genuine buddha-recitation.

From this you obtain the samadhi of buddha-recitation (nianfo sanmei—a state of single-minded recitation in which thought is stilled and illuminating awareness is undivided), and naturally buddha-light descends to shine upon you, so accomplishment comes easily.

Formerly Patriarch Lü (Lü Dongbin) discussed buddha-recitation with Shi Tianji. There is a verse that says: “Sincere buddha-recitation is itself the elixir (dan); one hundred and eight beads turn in cycle. When recitation opens the wondrous aperture, spirit and wisdom connect; when recitation completes bodhi, sage and ordinary are resolved. The intent of recitation does not drift away like flowing water; the heart of recitation ever dwells among white clouds. When recitation is accomplished, its benefit transcends birth and death—this verse I leave for you now to contemplate.” The gist is: sincere recitation is itself the elixir; the rosary of one hundred and eight beads revolves in a loop; when recitation opens the mysterious opening, spirit and wisdom awaken; when recitation reaches bodhi, the distinction between sage and ordinary is finished; the meaning of recitation does not follow the stream away, and the mind of recitation constantly keeps company with clouds at rest; when recitation is complete, its profit surpasses birth and death—and this verse is left for your investigation today.

Only those who can grasp these words and practice accordingly understand the true purport of buddha-recitation. If the mouth chatters without cease while the mind has no stillness, buddha-thought and stray thought mix and cannot be pure and unified—confused and jumbled—there is ultimately no benefit. Even if you hold the buddha-name all day, it is the same as not reciting at all.

When the Buddha’s name stays on your mind yet you cannot truly settle in it, you might as well not recite at all. This method does not teach mind-nature, does not probe qi and spirit, and does not take up the question of nature and life; body and mind naturally merge into one, empty luminosity gathers into a single whole, temperament is transformed and spirit is stored and nourished, and one can soon reach the lotus realm—the Pure Land dimension. It is extremely easy and extremely simple: each step of practice brings its own measure of result. The worry is not failure to cultivate but failure to keep at it. Lasting effort becomes sincerity; sincerity becomes single-mindedness; then one naturally gains the samādhi of Buddha recitation—the mind fixed in one-pointed right absorption.

“Buddha” is awakening. “Recitation” (nian) is holding something in the heart, not merely chanting with the mouth. Buddha recitation is also called “cultivating the Pure Land”: “pure” means true purity; “land” (tu) sits at the center—here, the person’s zhonggong, the inner center from which thoughts arise. Every thought issues from the zhonggong; once thought stirs, that center is no longer pure. So reciting the Buddha’s name is purifying the mind; the Pure Land is making that center truly pure. When no dust veils the heart, great awakening appears; Buddha and self are one body.

The six syllables “Namo Amituo” (homage to Amitābha) likewise rest on a metaphor for original true nature. “Na mo”: “na” is south, the fire phase in the five phases—in a person, the heart; in the heart there is only consciousness (shenshi), so “no Buddha in the south” means this heart-mind itself is not yet Buddha. “A” is measureless, “mi” is pervading, “tuo” is round and full, radiantly bright—the appearance of original true nature’s light, one’s own subtle clear awareness.

“Nian” (mindfulness, or holding something in thought without forgetting) means to keep something in mind and not forget it. The point is to make clear: wandering thoughts are not the Buddha and are not the spiritual awareness that you and I originally possess. That spiritual awareness is the true nature that is measureless and boundless, filling the six directions (above, below, and the four quarters—the whole cosmos). Its form is perfectly round and full, shining with light, vast enough to embrace heaven and earth, yet its essence returns to emptiness. The Buddha is me, and I am the Buddha. While alive it is so—a round symbol (○, standing for perfect wholeness)—and at death it is the same; in life it does not increase, in death it does not decrease; nothing is brought at birth, nothing is taken at death. Taking “no birth and no death, no coming and no going” as ultimate is the teaching. So the Heart Sutra (Prajnaparamita Heart Sutra) says: “No birth, no death; no defilement, no purity; no increase, no decrease.” The difference lies only in awakening or not awakening, delusion or enlightenment. Constantly preserving this great awakening is how the wisest people practice nianfo (mindfulness of Buddha). If one only clings to the Buddha’s name without awakening to this root, that is what the foolish do—how can the two be compared?

“Zuoxiang canchan” (seated meditation with one stick of incense as the time limit, investigating Chan) belongs to the sudden teaching (the approach that stresses immediate enlightenment), a method of penetrating everywhere in one awakening. This began with Bodhidharma (Bodhidharma, first patriarch of Chan in China). Because later students in China did not understand mind-nature and did not grasp the essential aim of the Dharma, they clung to written words and fixed literal meanings and in the end could not awaken thoroughly—so this method of not relying on words was set up, so that people might see their nature on the spot. It was truly an expedient measure when there was no other choice. An ancient master said: “Chan without Pure Land (the practice of seeking rebirth in the Western Paradise)—nine out of ten take the wrong path. When yinjing (yin-realm appearances that arise after death or in deep concentration) appear before you, you suddenly follow them away. Chan with Pure Land is like an old tiger with horns. In this life you can be a teacher of others; in the future you can become a Buddha.” If practitioners train accordingly, what worry is there that the path will not be fulfilled?

Dong Lei listened and said with a smile: “Your words truly count as complete enlightenment and great awakening! But what exactly is the joy in the Land of Ultimate Bliss? It is said that one need not snap one’s fingers to reach the West—yet where is the West after all? As the saying goes, ‘When born, birth is settled; when going, one does not actually go somewhere’—can you offer me a pivot phrase to turn this around? From what you say, it is all still matters on this side. Do you know there are also matters on the other side? What does the so-called other shore mean? You may already understand what lies beneath the monk’s robe, but have you settled what lies beneath a woman’s skirt? Do you understand ‘The red wheel has pierces through all the land, yet no flower opens beneath the sea’?”

Huizhe said nothing and only stared at him with wide eyes.

Dong Lei said: In the past, the Vinaya master of Piling had already penetrated the principle of the shaduf (the water-lifting lever—a metaphor for the layer of truth he had earlier realized), yet he still lectured on “non-birth” (the Buddhist teaching that all dharmas are originally neither born nor destroyed). Why did he then go out again to seek the Way, head wrapped in a cloth turban and leaning on a staff, to take Master Shi Xinglin the Perfected (Shi Tai of the Southern Lineage of Daoism) as his teacher? Since the Sixth Patriarch Huineng had said, “Bodhi originally has no tree; the bright mirror is not a stand,” what Way was transmitted in the depth of the third watch of the night? Have you not seen what the Platform Sutra says: “Where there is feeling, one sows the seed; according to the ground, the fruit is born again. Where there is no feeling, there is no seed; where there is no nature, there is also no birth”? Your school speaks of non-birth; our school speaks of long life. If it is truly “non-being” yet can endure long, who or what is that? Heaven and earth’s greatest virtue is “to give life”; heaven and earth themselves are only one great mass within creation. Settling heaven and earth and nourishing the ten thousand things—this is the great virtue of creation and transformation. Great creating and great transforming never for a moment cease to generate and flourish; it is not that creation transforms from outside and produces the ten thousand things, but that the ten thousand things themselves create and transform themselves. Within this there must be one who presides over creation and transformation. Your school’s “non-birth” does not mean merely sitting in silent stillness. Only by abiding in constant non-being can there be constant generation; the “long life” our school speaks of is precisely this constant generation. Only when one realizes non-constancy (that nothing is eternally fixed and unchanged) can one stand shoulder to shoulder with the lord of creation and transformation. By what you have said, you have not yet reached the ultimate. Buddhism may not discourse on ming (the life aspect), yet ming is already within it; even the word “nature” (xing) cannot be grasped and fixed in speech, for there is still that which transcends nature and life. Birth is precisely non-birth; death is precisely non-death. The lotus throne of ultimate bliss—who can awaken to it?

The encomium says: Where there is birth, it is decisively birth; what is called “going forth” was never really going forth. Only when there is no Buddha is there birth; if you still posit something higher, who is it that goes? When even “non-being” is no more, its subtlety alone endures. When joy reaches the point of no joy, there is the great vessel of compassion (the ferry that carries all across).

Someone asked: “I have already understood the principles of the Xingzong path (the line that chiefly cultivates heart-and-nature). Could you also explain the teachings of Mingxue (the line focused on nurturing qi and extending life)? And what is meant by Jin Dan (Golden Elixir)?”

Dong Lei replied: “If we look back to antiquity, there were originally no such terms as Long Hu (Dragon and Tiger), Qian Qian (lead and mercury), or Jin Dan. Long Hu and Qian Qian were later metaphorical language in Neidan (internal alchemy) for yin and yang, water and fire, and essence and qi; Jin Dan refers to the fruit achieved through life-nurturing practice. Only after Wei Boyang wrote the Cantong qi and Zhang Pingshu (Zhang Boduan) wrote the Wuzhen pian did these names become widespread in the world. From then on, books on Jin Dan and life-nurturing became too numerous to count; true and false were hard to tell apart, and heterodox teachings spread. What is called ming (life) is the root of qi. Human life depends on qi: where there is qi there is life; where qi is gone there is death—hence when a person dies we say the breath is cut off; once qi is severed, life is also extinguished. The root of a person’s life is the ancestral Qi (yuanqi received from Heaven before birth). Once the body takes form, postnatal breathing arises. This ancestral Qi is that single point obtained from Heaven at the moment of the parents’ union, marvelously congealing together with the essence of the Two and Five (the refined power of yin-yang and the Five Phases); only then does human form coalesce. Without this point, there can be no embryo, for the Two and Five have not yet united and cannot congeal. This point is the principle a person receives from Heaven—it is also what Zhou Dunyi called Taiji (Supreme Ultimate). Receiving this point, the embryo itself establishes Taiji; Taiji then divides into yin and yang, yin and yang generate the Five Phases, and within the womb they grow and transform on their own, eventually becoming postnatal qi. At this stage the fetus in the mother’s belly breathes by borrowing the mother’s breath; qi enters and leaves through the navel. When the ten months are complete and the child is born, the umbilical cord is cut; that qi can no longer pass through the navel, and must instead go in and out through mouth and nose. This is what is called postnatal qi.”

The primordial Qi of prior-to-heaven (the original Qi that one receives from prior to heaven and that has not yet turned into the breath of respiration) is hidden in the ancestral palace (Zugong). Day by day it arises and becomes post-heaven qi, which is why there is a distinction between prior-to-heaven Qi and post-heaven qi. Prior-to-heaven Qi is stored in the ancestral palace and cannot be seen with the eyes; post-heaven qi passes in and out through the mouth and nose, so it can be noticed. Where is the ancestral palace? Below the heart and above the kidneys, in front of the spine and behind the navel—an empty, suspended cavity in the middle. This is where people receive life; it is also called the ancestral orifice (Zuqiao). This prior-to-heaven Qi is what is meant by Life (ming). With this orifice there is life; without it there is no life. Though this cavity sits in the body as its own Taiji (the undivided source before yin and yang), its qi still communicates with heaven and earth. If the seven orifices are sealed off, one is cut off from heaven and earth and the person dies. Those who cultivate Life therefore cultivate this ancestral orifice. That is the gist of the Life-cultivation teaching.

As for the Golden Elixir (in internal alchemy, the fruit of fully cultivated nature and life—not a pill taken from outside): jin is metal and dan is elixir; only when the two are united is it called Golden Elixir. When the Golden Elixir is complete, one returns to the Taiji. At birth one receives the bit heaven bestows and establishes a Taiji of one’s own—a small Taiji split off from the great Taiji, what is meant by “each thing has its own Taiji.” Completion of the Golden Elixir is return to that great Taiji. The Great Way of the Golden Elixir is not something to bandy about lightly.

The praise verse says: One yin and one yang, matching the numbers “three of heaven, two of earth.” The Five Phases here do not mean common metal; the principle of returning the elixir is just this. Three and two unite into one. The Taiji has no beginning. What is “without beginning”? Go ask Li Er (Laozi).

Hui Che listened, rose abruptly, and fell silent as something dawned on him. He kowtowed and bowed again and said, “Though I am not quick-witted, may I cultivate according to these words?”

Dong Lei said, “The Supreme Lord (the highest deity in Daoism) saves and transforms all beings, and the Way of Heaven delights in nurturing life. Anyone can take up this path—how much more so you? Even the simplest man or woman who practice it can at once enter the sacred realm; everything depends on how firmly one establishes resolve.”

The praise verse runs: “In every village, flowers bloom; on every tree, willows hang. Wherever the bright moon shines, there is the sanctuary of E Lü (the immortal E Lühua). Only by never wavering in resolve until death can one roam the Heavenly Domain (the abode of immortals). When Grand Ultimate Taiji (Taiji) looks down from above, nine refinings make one firm and unyielding.”

Hui Che said, “I wish to hear the details.”

Dong Lei said, “The meaning of the Golden Elixir is nothing more than a metaphor—the realm of Ziyang, where Taiji gazes downward and nine refinings forge what is firm and unyielding.”

Hui Che said, “I wish to hear the details.”

Dong Lei says: What is called the “Golden Elixir” is only a metaphor. The Purple Yang Perfected One (Zhang Boduan) said: “A person’s innate true nature is the Golden Elixir; the four greats of earth, water, fire, and wind are merely a temporary gathering into furnace and cauldron.” Here, “gold” is a metaphor for what endures through ten thousand kalpas without being destroyed; “elixir” (dan) takes the sense of roundness and freedom from lack. This gold is not the Metal of “Earth Four” within the Five Phases (Wuxing), but the Metal that can give birth to “Heaven One” Water—it exists before the Five Phases and belongs to the primordial (xiantian). Once Metal of Earth Four has entered the Five Phases, it is already post-heaven (houtian). This primordial Metal is purely a strand of empty, void primordial Qi (yuanqi), dwelling in the without-limit (wuji)—that is, in the flowing operation of the Supreme Ultimate (Taiji). Once the Supreme Ultimate divides and distinguishes, Heaven One Water appears first, then Earth Two Fire, then Heaven Three Wood, then Earth Four Metal, and lastly Heaven Five Earth. The “Heaven” and “Earth” here are Yin and Yang. Heaven One Water sits in the north, its number is one, and in the human being it corresponds to essence (Jing). Earth Two Fire sits in the south, its number is two, and in the human being it corresponds to spirit (Shen). Heaven Three Wood sits in the east, its number is three, and in the human being it corresponds to the hun soul. Earth Four Metal sits in the west, its number is four, and in the human being it corresponds to the po soul. Heaven Five Earth sits in the center, its number is five, and in the human being it corresponds to intention (yi). This is the generating numbers of the River Chart (Hetu)—the ancient diagram that expresses the Five Phases through numbers.

Among the Five Phases, Earth is most honored, so at the end of each of the four seasons there are eighteen days when Earth qi holds sway. Water is restrained when it meets Earth; Fire stops when it meets Earth; Metal can transform when it meets Earth; Wood can take root when it meets Earth—and within Water, Fire, Metal, and Wood there is Earth. Thus Heaven One generates Water, and with five it becomes Earth Six; Earth Two generates Fire, and with five it becomes Heaven Seven; Heaven Three generates Wood, and with five it becomes Earth Eight; Earth Four generates Metal, and with five it becomes Heaven Nine; Heaven Five generates Earth, and with five it becomes Earth Ten. This is the completing numbers of the River Chart.

One, two, three, four, and five are the numbers of generation; six, seven, eight, nine, and ten are the numbers of completion. Heaven has five numbers and earth has five numbers; the five directions pair with one another, each with its matching pair. The heavenly numbers sum to twenty-five, the earthly numbers to thirty, and the numbers of heaven and earth together make fifty-five. One and six are in the north, two and seven in the south, three and eight in the east, four and nine in the west, and five and ten in the center—thus the Hetu (River Chart), the ancient diagram that expresses the numbers of heaven-and-earth generation through counted dots, is the arithmetic of the Five Phases’ coming-into-being. Its image is circular; the body is empty and does not fix on solid form—it belongs to the pre-heaven (xiantian) realm.

After Taiji (the Supreme Ultimate) divides, it becomes yin and yang; yin and yang in turn give birth to the Five Phases. Yin and yang are heaven and earth. Heaven and earth, each with one generation and one completion, mutually root one another, and thus the image of the Hetu appears. To refine the Golden Elixir—the internal alchemists’ term for the fruit of practice that returns the post-heaven to the pre-heaven—one must take the pre-heaven primordial Qi (xiantian yi qi), that single point of innate energy, as the mother of the elixir. This pre-heaven primordial Qi is called “gold.”

Wuji (Non-Ultimate) and Taiji have many names; every thing has its own Taiji, yet in truth there is only one ultimate: the one root spreads into ten thousand forms, and the ten thousand forms all hold this one root. The human body is a small heaven-and-earth; as it is in the cosmos, so it is in the person. When one receives life, one comes from a single point within Taiji; in cultivation one must still return to that point in Taiji. Cultivating against the order of generation is the path of return, also called the Great Golden Elixir of nine returns and seven reversions—the elixir method of lead and mercury returning and of turning the post-heaven back to the pre-heaven. This is the supreme secret transmitted from the heart of the Supreme Lord (Taishang, Laozi): dual cultivation in which nature (xing) and life (ming) are never separated. Within that heaven-given single point, nature is present and life is present as well; therefore to cultivate nature is to cultivate life—it is the practical learning of fulfilling nature and completing destiny.

The upper, middle, and lower three vehicles each have their own methods, yet they treat xing (nature) and ming (life/destiny) as two separate paths to cultivate—such approaches all belong to what are called side doors and crooked byways.

The encomium says: Fully realizing one’s nature and fulfilling one’s mandate (xing and ming) is the root of learning. Only Nishan (Confucius, whom Laozi once likened to a dragon) received such praise. In the paper curtain no one is present; at night the Yellow Bell (an ancient pitch standard, deep in tone) sounds long. Draped in rosy silk, gathering hibiscus.

Someone says: “The elixir books say: ‘In cultivating the Dao, nothing is more precious than jing, qi, and shen.’ The Xinyinjing (Heart Seal Scripture) says: ‘The supreme medicine has three grades: shen, qi, and jing.’ Hearing this teaching now, are jing, qi, and shen really of no use? Moreover, the original true nature can be awakened to by upper adepts; how can middle and lower adepts easily grasp it fully? Inborn ming (life/destiny), once a person is born, lies hidden in the ancestral palace (the place where the prenatal endowment resides); day by day it turns into postnatal stuff for ordinary use. If one suddenly tries to seek it now, how can it be obtained?”

Dong Lei said: Nature and life (xing and ming) are the root of the human being; jing, qi, and shen are what matter most in how a person lives and acts. Among the three treasures of the body, these three alone are the most precious—yet each also has an innate and an acquired aspect.

Innate jing is the “water” born of Tianyi (Unity of Heaven): pure principle without a fixed shape, held within qi (innate qi) and pervading the whole body. It arises at the turning of the hours between hai and zi, when the one yang returns—this is called primordial jing (yuan jing). The moment the mind stirs with a thought, it at once becomes acquired jing in visible form. Innate qi is the ancestral qi of the central palace within the body, called primordial qi (yuan qi). Day by day it transforms into acquired qi, circulating through and guarding the hundred vessels—it is not merely the breath of mouth and nose. Innate shen is the luminous spirit in the heart, called primordial spirit (yuan shen); once it engages knowing and thinking, it becomes the acquired spirit used for deliberation—the conscious spirit (shi shen). Cultivation therefore uses the acquired to return to the innate: it esteems the innate and does not esteem the acquired.

People in the world do not grasp this. They wrongly treat acquired jing and qi as supreme treasures and rush every day through the scramble for fame and gain: the seven emotions and six desires agitate them within, while sound, color, wealth, and profit entice them from without, so the heart never knows a moment’s stillness. Even the acquired is hard to preserve for long—how much more the innate? The Ziyang True Person (Zhang Boduan) once said: “Even if your intelligence surpasses that of Yan Hui or Min Ziqian, without meeting a true master, do not force yourself to guess.” Thus to learn the Dao one must receive the true master’s secret oral instructions; only then can one practice. The fear is that side paths and outer teachings will mislead the world, while students lack the eye to tell them apart—how then can they know whether a teacher is orthodox or deviant?

The encomium says: Do not brood and calculate; leave things to their natural course. Without clinging to images and forms, you can come to know the innate. At midnight, keep the heart empty and still, untroubled by the five strings’ stir; though the heart be like a cold, clear jade jar, you still need iron shoulders to bear it steadily.

Then someone asked: How can one actually go about taking someone as a teacher? And how are the deviant and the orthodox to be distinguished?

Dong Lei said: To distinguish a teacher, look first at his conduct. Conduct is the reality of the matter. Second, listen to his words. Words are the traces left by the mind. Often people speak better than they act; those whose conduct and speech do not match are the majority. One must examine closely those who are consistent in word and deed and honest and solid—only then may one take them as a teacher. Confucius said: “Listen to his words, and also observe his conduct.” He also said: “One who, by reviewing the old, can bring forth the new, may be a teacher.” In former times Master Wang Kunyang (Wang Changyue, styled Kunyang, a patriarch of the Quanzhen (Complete Perfection) Longmen lineage in the Qing dynasty) said: “If a disciple lacks a genuine heart set on leaving the world (transcending the mundane and devoting oneself to cultivation), the innate wisdom (Huixing, the wisdom one originally possesses) is obscured. Even if a true teacher appears, spirits will not let him be seen and will cover his Huixing; even if he sees the teacher, he cannot recognize him as true. If the heart is sincere and earnest and one diligently seeks a teacher, Heaven will not fail a person—a true teacher will come of himself.”

The encomium says: When the mind is sincere, what one sees is true; when the mind is stained with dust, what one sees is dust. It is like drawing a bow taut, or like the green of spring. What the reed slips and bamboo classics of old drew close to was only the work of creation (Zaohua). The seeking that does not deliberately seek—that is the marvelous seeking.

Someone asked: “I have heard that refining the elixir (neidan, internal alchemy) has three essentials—what are the three?”

Dong Lei explains: The so-called “Three Essentials” are the furnace and cauldron, the medicinal ingredients, and the firing process and timing. The furnace is the vessel in which fire is applied; the cauldron is the vessel in which the medicinal ingredients are stored. The medicinal ingredients are the innate primordial unified Qi (Qi that is originally present from birth, unified and undifferentiated) within my own body, together with Jing (essence), Shen (spirit), hun (ethereal soul), po (corporeal soul), and yi (intent). Innate primordial Qi is the mother of the Golden Elixir; one must let it penetrate the Three Passes (three barrier points along the inner spine in internal refinement) so that the blood and meridians throughout the body are opened and connected. Day after day one gathers this Qi as the medicinal ingredient, gathering Jing, Shen, hun, po, and yi in the Central Palace (the body’s central point), returning them to the furnace and cauldron and sealing them firmly. Gathering day by day and refining day by day, one keeps innate Jing from turning into postnatal, formed Jing, and further transforms it into Qi; transforms the Qi within Shen into Shen; transforms the Shen within the heart into emptiness. This is called refining and cooking, and within it the firing and timing are already implicit. Fire is the application of heat; timing (hou) is grasping the right moment. It is like cooking rice: if you only apply heat without watching the timing, you either undercook it or burn it to charcoal—so one must wait until it is exactly right. These three are the most crucial in elixir refinement, hence they are called the Three Essentials.

The encomium says: Returning from the postnatal to the innate, when gathering one turns to the left. The subtle point need not be sought deliberately; one need only be diligent without slack all day long. Neither too much nor too little; both seal firmly and stay single-minded. Like the sun rising, like the moon gradually reaching fullness.

Someone asked: “There is also what is called the Three Treasures—what are they?”

Thunder Cave Teaching states: The Three Treasures have two kinds of names—internal and external. The internal Three Treasures are Jing (essence), Qi (vital energy), and Shen (spirit); the external Three Treasures are the ears, eyes, and mouth. That human beings have life at all depends entirely on these Jing, Qi, and Shen. With Jing, Qi can be formed; with Qi, Shen can be formed. When Shen is strong, Qi is strong; when Qi is strong, Jing is ample; when Jing is ample, Shen becomes even more full. When a person’s spirit is abundant, they live long in health and illness finds it hard to enter; when spirit is weak, one easily catches chills and fevers. If one does not carefully nurture oneself, disease follows at once—hence they are called the internal Three Treasures.

Patriarch Lü (Lü Dongbin) said: “The Dantian (energy center) already holds treasure within; there is no need to seek the Dao elsewhere. Facing the outer world, the mind does not rise in thought—there is no need to ask further about Chan.” Among the three, guarding Jing comes first. The Huangting Jing (Yellow Court Scripture) says: “Immortals and Daoist masters are not otherwise miraculous—they are accomplished by accumulating Jing and gathering Qi.” Thus when Jing is spent even once, Shen and Qi are spent along with it. In youth, though Jing may leak, Shen and Qi are still vigorous and one does not feel weak. But for the elderly, or those whose root vitality is already depleted, after forty or fifty even a slight loss is felt the next day as weary spirit and timid Qi—that is proof. The Three Treasures used in profound internal practice (Neidan cultivation), however, are the Three Origins—the prenatal Yuan Jing, Yuan Qi, and Yuan Shen—not the postnatal Jing, Qi, and Shen. Even so, to seek the prenatal, one must still look within the postnatal; if one abandons the postnatal to hunt the prenatal, from where would one obtain it?

The external Three Treasures—ears, eyes, and mouth—mean that Shen leaks through the eyes, Jing through the ears, and Qi through the mouth. When the eyes do not wander, Hun (the ethereal soul) stays in the lungs; when the nose does not sniff at random, Po (the corporeal soul) stays in the liver; when the ears do not listen heedlessly, Jing stays in the kidneys; when the four limbs do not stir recklessly, Yi (intent) stays in the spleen—this is called harmonizing the Four Images. Long ago the Jade Maiden of the Nine Heavens’ Spirit Flight appeared in a dream to my friend and said: “The external Three Treasures should be turned inward and stored; the internal Three Treasures should be used sparingly and cherished—this is what matters most at the gate of entry.” The Cantong qi (Token of the Agreement) says: “The Three Treasures of ears, eyes, and mouth must be closed, not opened for leakage. The True Person hides deep in the abyss, drifting freely, guarding the center of the compass (the inner midpoint of the body).” Therefore these Three Treasures are what matter most on the path of cultivation.

The commentary says: The inner three treasures and the outer three treasures (externally, these usually mean the ears, eyes, and mouth; internally, they mean Jing, Qi, and Shen)—each is subtle and worth probing. Hold fast by “guizhong” (keeping to the center of body and mind), and nurture the haoran zhi qi (the expansive, upright vital breath) through equanimity. Returning from the post-heaven to the pre-heaven—this is the highest Dao. Therefore these three treasures are what matter most in cultivation. A bowl of jade nectar and golden fluid is not medicine pounded by the jade rabbit in the moon.

Someone asked: The meaning of furnace and cauldron has already been explained in detail; please still dissect the finer points so they are clear.

Dong Lei replied: What are called furnace and cauldron are the Huangting and the qi cavity within the zhonggong (central palace). Yellow is the correct color of the center; ting (court) is like the courtyard at the heart of a dwelling—it corresponds to the middle of the person, below the heart and above the kidneys. The qi cavity lies inside the navel, so the Huangting is likened to the cauldron and the qi cavity to the furnace. Shi Jianwu said: “Facing the navel gate in front and the kidneys behind, between them is a true golden cauldron.” Examined closely, the Huangting is within the qi cavity; it is not the acupoint below the heart that happens to be named Huangting. A person’s niwan (the upper dantian in the head) connects straight through to yongquan (the acupoint at the sole); the empty passage between them is called the huangdao (yellow path). Taking above and below as furnace and cauldron is not wrong either. But all of these are names without fixed substance—there is no real, fixed location; they only borrow labels to explain the principle. Furnace is cauldron, cauldron is furnace; Huangting is the qi cavity, the qi cavity is Huangting—they always refer to one and the same place. Only here can one receive xiantian zhi qi (pre-heaven vital energy), then refine according to huohou (the rhythm and “fire” of practice) so that the post-heaven becomes pre-heaven, returning to the root and restoring the source. The Zhonghe ji treats body and mind as furnace and cauldron; Ziyang (Zhang Boduan) in the Wuzhen pian treats qian and kun as furnace and cauldron—both are metaphors with inexhaustible meaning. One should enter deeply into them to know that the ancients spoke thus without error.

The eulogy says: Where vital force gathers, there is inherently a fixed orientation. The gist of the inner and outer Huangting (the central locus of cultivation within the body in Daoism)—this single scroll is enough to serve as an entrance. It has no physical form; its name is only provisionally given. Once you grasp its subtle principle, you should hold it in mind and not forget it for long.

Someone asked: Then how should one understand the principle of the yao (the innate resources relied upon in internal alchemical cultivation) and the methods of gathering them?

Dong Lei said: The yao is the innate primordial True One (xian tian zhen yi—the primordial qi that is originally one and undivided). This single scroll can serve as an entrance; it has no physical form, and its name is inherently provisional. Once you grasp its subtle principle, never forget it.

Dong Lei says: What is meant by “medicinal ingredients” is the pre-heaven True One Qi (the bit of pre-heaven true qi received at birth), together with jing, shen, hun, po, and yi. This pre-heaven True One Qi, when a person is born, comes from the utmost truth of Wuji (the undifferentiated source), and arises from the differentiation of Taiji (the Supreme Ultimate when the One first divides). The single point bestowed by Heaven enters the mother’s womb, congeals with the yin and yang of the parents, and becomes a human being. That point is the life-root given by Heaven—namely pre-heaven True One Qi, also called Taiyi-containing-true Qi.

After the fetal origin congeals, this point in the womb spontaneously establishes itself as Taiji; Taiji gives rise to yin and yang, and yin and yang in turn produce the Five Phases. The refined essence of yin-yang and the Five Phases congeals as jing, qi, and shen—so the pre-heaven is already hidden within the post-heaven. Its root always lies in the qi cavity at the navel; therefore the place of the “life cord” at the navel is called the ancestral aperture (the fundamental aperture for cultivation), like the root of a flower or the stem of a fruit.

By about fifteen or sixteen, post-heaven blood and qi are full, desire opens of itself, seeing beauty moves the heart, and at the slightest touch on the root, shen sways and true primordiality is broken; from then on pre-heaven qi is daily depleted. Yet every day at the juncture of hai and zi (roughly midnight), yin and yang within the body must meet; at each meeting, True One Qi is continually generated and turns into post-heaven jing, qi, and shen for daily use. The moment when yin and yang unite and true yang arises by itself is called the Living Zi Hour (the moment of yang arising within the body, not fixed to clock time); the true yang thus produced is pre-heaven One Qi.

At this time one gathers this qi, refines it according to the fire phases (the timing and degree of gentle nurturing), and does not let it turn into post-heaven; one also merges the body’s qi with jing, shen, hun, po, and yi into one household, transforming all into pre-heaven to replenish past loss. Day by day one gathers and day by day one replenishes, until fullness matches the state before the body was “broken”—this is called returning the elixir, returning to original true primordiality. When yang arises at midnight, in heaven it is the proper zi hour; in the person it is called the Living Zi Hour.

At this moment the external kidneys (the male external genitals as named in Neidan and Chinese medicine) will inevitably become erect—only then has the true Zi hour truly arrived. The person is then no different from one who has not yet lost virginity; this is called returning the elixir (huandan)—bringing back one’s original true primordial yuan (pre-heaven true Qi). At midnight when Yang qi first stirs, in heaven and earth it is the orthodox Zi hour (midnight Zi), while in the person it is called the living Zi hour (the moment when one’s own Yang qi naturally activates—not a fixed clock time). When the external kidneys must rise, only then is the orthodox Zi hour present. Yet once desire stirs, Yang qi is bound to rise; once it has risen it is hard to check, and release through depletion is unavoidable. Even if nothing leaks from the outer aperture, the sovereign fire, common fire, and minister fire (the three kinds of inner fire spoken of in Neidan) flare up together, and pre-heaven immediately turns into post-heaven—already useless. Hence the True Person of Purple Yang (Zhang Boduan) said: “When you see it, you must not use it; when you use it, you must not see it.” Wu Chongxu (Wu Shouyang) said: “You must distinguish whether the water source is clear or turbid. What is clear may be used; what is turbid may not.” What is “clear”? True Yang arises of itself while the thought does not move. If a thought moves first and then Yang arises, that is turbid. Clear and turbid hinge only on whether the thought moves or not.

When beginners first begin to practice, their thought originally does not move; suddenly true Yang arises of itself and the external kidneys must rise. But as soon as they rise, the thought also abruptly follows—and the true Yang that had arisen at once becomes post-heaven. Therefore for cultivators, reining in the thought is the first essential. The four characters “restrain anger and block desire” (cheng fen zhi yu) are the great pivot of nature and life. In youth, repair is still relatively easy; around fifty it already feels much harder, and for the elderly it costs even more effort. Patriarch Zhongli (Zhongli Quan) said: “Do not wait until old age when lead and mercury are scarce.” (Lead and mercury are Neidan terms for the medicinal essences that can be refined.) That saying is entirely right. Youth has its eases and difficulties, and old age has its eases and difficulties too. The ease of youth lies in strong spirit and ease of progress in gongfu; the difficulty lies in blazing desire-fire and how hard it is to preserve essence.

Practice for the elderly has both advantages and difficulties. Young people find it easy because their spirit is vigorous and progress comes quickly; the difficulty is that desire-fire runs strong and essence is hard to preserve. The elderly find it easy because desire has already waned and desire-fire has subsided; the difficulty is that vital energy declines and progress is harder to sustain. Those who aspire to this path should reflect on this carefully.

What is called “fetching” or “taking” in Neidan is the language of refining the inner elixir—gathering the body’s medicinal substances and vital qi. In truth it means not deliberately fetching yet naturally obtaining, not deliberately taking yet naturally receiving. The ancients said: fetch the medicinal substance amid non-movement; apply the firing within non-action (Wuwei). One need only keep the mind utterly clear and still, gathered and unmoving. In the logic of Yin-Yang, stillness at its extreme gives rise to movement, and movement at its extreme returns to stillness. When sitting in stillness reaches the utmost quiet, true Yang arises on its own; then use stillness to settle it. Once it has arisen, continue to hold the spirit in concentration—the mind not clinging anywhere—until emptiness and stillness are complete. Day after day in this way, it is generated day by day and accumulated day by day, gradually filling and overflowing. When qi fills the Dantian (the lower abdominal center of inner refinement), the lower body grows warm; then with a light intention push it backward and gather it into Weilü (the gate at the base of the spine). When true qi is ample, it will naturally pierce straight through the Three Passes (Weilü, Jiaji, and Yuzhen); sometimes they open gradually, pass by pass. Only when the Three Passes are open may one apply the firing—that is, circulate and refine inner qi according to proper measure.

The praise verse says: from non-being, being; stillness at its extreme, then movement. At the moment of first arising, hold fast in gathered stillness. Push past the three carriages (sheep, deer, and ox carriages—images of qi ascending the spine and passing each gate), and only then does primordial qi run through. In applying the firing, always take non-action (Wuwei) as the guiding principle.

Neidan scriptures also speak of “gold in water” and “lead in the water country.” This is asking: what do these two refer to? Both are Neidan terms—not the gold and lead of the mundane world, but the medicinal substance and true lead that arise in the still water of deep quiet.

Dong Lei said: “Gold in water” is the same as “lead in the water realm”—and lead also belongs to the category of metal. The human heart belongs to fire, the kidneys to water; within the heart is spirit (Shen), which belongs to fire; within the kidneys is essence (Jing), which belongs to water. Though the kidneys are where essence is stored, there is no ready-made essence sitting there to begin with. It is only when a single thought stirs and desiring fire arises that the sovereign fire, minister fire, and common fire—the fire ruled by the heart, the assisting fire, and the fire of the whole body—all press and scorch together. The body becomes hot throughout; vaporized by this steaming, qi turns into water, gathers in the kidney domain, bursts through the Yang Pass (the gate where essence leaks outward), and flows out through the outer orifice—thus becoming the seminal fluid of lust. If thoughts can remain unstirred and desiring fire never arise, then when the moment comes, the true Qi (the subtle primordial qi of the pre-heaven realm) that is generated is the pre-heaven primordial unity Qi—what is called gold in water. At that time it is called the “Heavenly Mechanism” (Tianji). It is not something the kidneys produce on their own; it comes from emptiness and is issued through the kidneys. Because it emerges from within the kidneys, it is named gold in water, also called lead in the water realm.

The human heart is solid on the outside and empty within, and it belongs to fire; it is likened to the Li trigram—Li is yang outside and yin inside. The kidneys are empty on the outside and solid within, and belong to water; they are likened to the Kan trigram—Kan is yin outside and yang inside. Kan and Li are precisely the forms taken when the original hexagram bodies of Qian and Kun were broken apart. Qian is three yang lines; Kun is three yin lines. When the middle line of Qian moves and enters Kun, and the middle line of Kun enters Qian within, Qian becomes Li and Kun becomes Kan. Therefore alchemists (practitioners of Neidan, internal alchemy) take the one Qi from the kidneys and draw it upward into the heart—like lifting the middle stroke of Kan and placing it into the Li palace (the seat of the heart)—which is called extracting Kan to fill Li. The Qian trigram belongs to metal; the Kan trigram belongs to water, and the middle line of Kan is exactly the middle line of Qian—hence the name gold in water.

Commentary says: Thought in itself is not thought; vitality arises only at the moment it should arise. When it flows on without ceasing, that is the essence of Tianyi (the primordial qi from which “Heaven gives birth to Water”). At this point Kan (Water) and Li (Fire) exchange places—without scent or sound. The mind stays plain and still, and one turns toward the Jade Capital (the celestial realm in Daoist cosmology).

Someone asked: Once one has taken this primordial Qi (yuanqi before Heaven and Earth were divided) as the “medicine,” how should one handle the firing process (regulating intention and breath in cultivation)?

Dong Lei said: The firing process is likewise a natural firing process; one need only apply it lightly. The ancients said: “True fire has no fixed hours; the great medicine is not measured by weight.” Still, older methods used thirty-six tally sticks for the Qian (Heaven) hexagram and twenty-four for the Kun (Earth) hexagram, counting by the breath—this is what is called refining.

Commentary says: What is the firing process? It is simply letting nature take its course. There is watching when there is nothing to watch, and the medicine is not counted by amount. Qian and Kun may have their tally numbers, which can serve as a rule for practice; yet such old methods are ultimately inferior to chonghe (a heart-mind empty and harmonized with the natural flow).

Someone asked: Why use tally sticks? And how is the breath applied?

Dong Lei said: The method of refining is what is called the firing process. The ancients treated it with utmost seriousness, because the hidden mechanism within is most secret. The alchemical classics ask: “How do the sages apply the method?”

Dong Lei says: The method of refining is called huohou—the timing and control of “fire.” The ancients treated it with utmost care, because the hidden mechanism within it is the most secret of all. Alchemical scriptures say: “Sages transmit only the medicine, not the fire; since antiquity, few have truly grasped huohou.” When the medicine appears, the fire appears with it; you must have the medicine before you can apply the fire. Practicing huohou without medicine is like using water and fire to boil an empty pot. Fire is medicine, and medicine is fire; when fire arises, medicine arises. Patriarch Bai (Bai Yuchan) said: “Using fire to refine the medicine and form the elixir is using Shen (spirit) to command Qi and accomplish the Dao.” If you rush into huohou before the medicine has formed, that fire is not true fire—it only wears out mouth and nose in vain.

One exhalation and one inhalation make one xi (breath/rest). The rise and fall of true Qi in the body is also called one xi. “Xi” means rest. When you can rest, the mind settles; at the utmost of settling you enter into nothingness, and from nothingness you return to the root of unceasing generation. The ancients rested when night fell, in order to preserve and nourish the vital impulse. Master Shao (Shao Yong) said: After the winter solstice is exhalation, after the summer solstice is inhalation—that is the breath of a year. Within a day, after midnight (zi) is exhalation, after noon (wu) is inhalation. One exhalation and one inhalation is one xi; xi is also nourishment. When breathing never stops, the vital impulse never stops, and transformation has no end.

Thus a single breath in and out matters enormously: on inhalation, the Qi of heaven and earth gathers into me; on exhalation, my Qi returns to heaven and earth. The Yin Fu Jing (Scripture of the Hidden Accord) says: “Heaven and earth steal from the ten thousand things, the ten thousand things steal from humans, humans steal from the ten thousand things; when the three kinds of stealing each obtain what is fitting, the three powers—heaven, earth, and humanity—are at peace.” These three “stealings” steal from one another; the key lies in the mouth and nose. Once you understand this, heaven, earth, and the ten thousand things can all be taken and nourished for your use.

Once you grasp the essential teaching, you can draw upon heaven, earth, and the myriad things for your own use; without the secret knack, your refined qi will instead be taken by heaven, earth, and the myriad things. As for the so-called “firing process”—the method of regulating the circulation and transformation of true qi within the body—it means letting the body’s true qi rise and fall on its own. It is not a matter of manipulating breath through mouth and nose; breathing is only borrowed as a trigger. At the beginning, before the Three Passes (Weilü at the base of the spine, Jiaji at the mid-spine, and Yuzhen at the occiput) are open, one has no choice but to start from this expedient, so one must first use it to regulate the breath. When the Three Passes are connected and the natural mechanism of true qi rising and falling appears, that is what is called the firing process.

What is meant by breathing is this: on one exhalation, breath leaves the body through mouth and nose, and the true qi within descends from the chest to the navel center; on one inhalation, breath enters from outside through mouth and nose, and the true qi within ascends from Weilü along the spine to the crown. Attend to the interior of the body—do not fix attention on mouth and nose. Rest the mind on the breath and listen to it with the ear. Master Sima said: “Exhale finely; inhale in an unbroken thread.” Always keep the breath neither coarse nor urgent, neither fast nor slow; adjust it until it is even and calm, so that even the ear cannot hear it. When the mind is still, breathing naturally evens out; when the breath is even, spirit naturally gathers. This is mind and breath depending on each other—breath regulated, mind settled.

When breathing has been adjusted until it seems almost absent, lightly fix spiritual awareness on the lower Dantian (the locus where inner qi gathers below the navel). Then spirit naturally concentrates and qi naturally gathers, and the whole body feels warm. Patriarch Bai (Bai Yuchan) said: “Long ago I received from my holy master the true oral formula in person: simply concentrate the spirit and enter the qi cavity (where true qi collects).” The alchemical classics also say: “In regulating breath, regulate the true breath; in refining spirit, refine the unforced primordial spirit (yuanshen).” That is exactly this. Day by day true qi accumulates and grows fuller; when it is sufficient, it naturally bursts through the Three Passes in one surge.

Once the Three Passes (san guan)—Weilu, Jiaji, and Yuzhen, the three barrier points along the Governing Vessel (dumai)—are opened through, true qi (zhen qi) will naturally rise and descend. Within that rising and falling, count using the stalk numbers of the Qian hexagram, thirty-six, and of the Kun hexagram, twenty-four.

The method is to rotate the fingers through the twelve two-hour periods (shichen). When the first yang begins to stir, place the count at zi and tally the breaths of qi’s natural ascent and descent: one rise and one fall together make one breath-cycle (xi); stop when you reach thirty-six cycles. Move the count to chou and again count thirty-six cycles; at yin, likewise thirty-six. When you reach mao, stop counting breaths, rest the mind in empty stillness, and the circulation will cease on its own—this is called moyu (Bathing). After a brief pause the circulation starts again; then count at chen for thirty-six cycles, and at si for thirty-six—this is called jin yang huo (advancing yang fire). “Advancing” means the spirit-intention (shen yi) guards the Kun abdomen (the belly where the lower dantian lies), while awareness rests on the crown.

At wu, switch to counting twenty-four cycles; at wei and shen, twenty-four each as well. At you, stop counting again; the mind still rests in empty stillness until the circulation stops by itself—again moyu (Bathing). After a short pause, when circulation resumes, count at xu for twenty-four cycles and at hai for twenty-four, then add five more cycles to complete the full circuit number of three hundred sixty-five degrees. The segment counted in twenty-four-cycle units is called tui yin fu (withdrawing the yin talisman). “Withdrawing” means awareness returns to the Kun abdomen while the spirit broods over it like incubating an egg. This is the firing schedule (huohou) of the xiao zhou tian (Small Heavenly Circuit).

When the circuit count is complete, fix the spirit in the qi cavity (qixue), guarding it in silence—make it as empty and as still as possible, gradually placing the mind in a state of having nothing at all, until you naturally enter a unified, tranquil stillness. Then qi transforms into spirit (shen), and spirit transforms into emptiness (xu).

In practice, this amounts to condensing one’s Original Spirit (yuanshen) into one unity, establishing the ying'e—the inner-alchemical base that guards vital qi and forms the immortal embryo—so that the spirit body (fashen) may be realized. That is only the ancients’ way of putting it; it must not be frozen into a rigid rule. Once the mind clings to counting, effort becomes forced; when effort is forced, the “fire” runs too strong and the person grows restless. To practice like that risks the defect of excessive fire burning away essence (jing). Better to hold to eight words alone: “heart and breath mutually rely; stillness, emptiness, and concentrated illumination” (xin xi xiang yi, ji xu ning zhao). Then spirit gathers of itself, qi collects, the whole body is pervaded with harmonious flow—and the path is safer.

The encomium says: Heaven and earth open and close, and breathing does the same. Rather than tangle yourself in such fuss, first become quiet. Heart and breath in mutual reliance—stillness and emptiness are the subtle core. Keep up concentrated contemplation and illumination, and the state of pervading harmony will arrive on its own.

He asked again: Alchemical writings say, “The moon’s fullness hinges on the secret oral instructions (koujue); the wonder of the zi hour (when yang qi first stirs) lies in transmission heart to heart (xin chuan).” What does that mean?

Dong Lei explains: The full moon spoken of here means that yang qi is already sufficient and the bright sunlight has reached completion. As for the moon in the sky, from the third day of the lunar month a faint yang sign appears in the geng direction (west)—this is the first stir of one yang. By the eighth day, the eastern half is filled with yang light; the bright hun and the dark po each occupy half—this is two yang arising, called the first quarter. By the fifteenth, all three yang are complete, sunlight is abundant, and the moon is full. From the sixteenth, one yin begins to form and the moon gradually wanes. By the twenty-third, only the western half still holds sunlight; within the po, the hun too is left at half—this is two yin arising, called the last quarter. By the thirtieth, all three yin are fully present, the hun is entirely hidden, and the moon is completely dark. The moon’s substance belongs to yin; it does not shine by itself and must borrow the sun’s hun to show brightness. The sun is yang shen; the moon is yin jing. Only yang can give birth to light; yin in itself has no light. So the moon must rely on the sun’s illumination to have light. This is what is meant by “at the first quarter, half a pound of metal; at the last quarter, eight ounces of water”: the metal and water of the two quarters—here lie the medicinals used in cultivation, and here too lies the principle of mastering fire and timing.

In the human body, true jing belongs to yin, like the moon; true shen belongs to yang, like the sun. Jing and shen must be threaded through by qi. Refining jing into qi means refining away the yin aspect of jing until it becomes purely yang qi. Refining qi into shen means letting qi entirely transform into shen. Refining shen to return to emptiness (lian shen huan xu) means even this shen is dissolved, and one merges with the Great Void—the vast, empty cosmic ground. Therefore, when true yang has just arisen, it is like the moon appearing in the geng direction; when qi penetrates the jiaji (the pass in the middle of the back), it is like the first quarter; when qi reaches the crown, it is like the full moon; after qi reaches the niwan (the dantian within the head), it inevitably descends—just as on the sixteenth day one yin begins to form.

When Qi descends to the Jiang Palace (the region of the heart), it is like the moon at the last quarter (around the twenty-third day of the lunar month, when the moon turns from full toward waning); when it descends further into the Qi cavity (the area of the lower Dantian), it is like the dark moon on the thirtieth day (when the moon is hidden from view). At this stage of “darkness,” sun and moon join as one jade disc (sun and moon unite like a single bi, Yin and Yang merging), and Hun (the Yang aspect of spirit) and Po (the Yin aspect of spirit) meet and become one.

The moon becomes full because it has received sufficient sunlight. The moon must pass the fifteenth day before it is full; hence this aligns with the Luoshu (the number diagram said to have emerged from the Luo River): nine at the head, one at the feet, three on the left, seven on the right, two and four at the two shoulders, six and eight at the two feet. One in the north and nine in the south, with five in the central palace—in all, fifteen from due north to due south; three in the east and seven in the west, with five in the center—fifteen from due east to due west; two in the southwest and eight in the northeast, with five in the center—fifteen from northeast to southwest; six in the northwest and four in the southeast, with five in the center—fifteen from northwest to southeast. Remove the five of the central palace: one in the north, eight in the northeast, and six in the northwest sum to fifteen; nine in the south, four in the southeast, and two in the southwest also make fifteen; three in the east, together with four in the southeast and eight in the northeast, yield fifteen; seven in the west, together with two in the southwest and six in the northwest, likewise make fifteen. Crossing vertically and horizontally, nowhere is it not fifteen.

Three is the beginning of generation; five is the end of the generating numbers; ten is the end of the completing numbers. The principle of generation and completion is that three and five combine to obtain fifteen. Ten, hundred, thousand, and ten thousand ultimately reduce to one. As one Qi circulates, it inherently contains these numbers of generation and completion. The Hetu (the number diagram said to have emerged from the Yellow River) and the Luoshu are inner and outer to each other.

In the Hetu (River Chart)—traditionally an ancient numerological diagram associated with the Yellow River—celestial number one (Water) pairs with celestial number nine (Metal) to make ten; celestial three (Wood) with celestial seven (Fire) to make ten; terrestrial two (Fire) with terrestrial eight (Wood) to make ten; terrestrial four (Metal) with terrestrial six (Water) to make ten. At the center lie five and ten. In sum, one, three, five, seven, and nine are celestial numbers; two, four, six, eight, and ten are terrestrial numbers. The celestial numbers total twenty-five, the terrestrial thirty, and heaven and earth together fifty-five—the Hetu thus contains the full count of heaven and earth.

The Hetu’s pairings one–six, two–seven, three–eight, four–nine, and five–ten, and the Luoshu (Luo Document—traditionally associated with the Luo River)’s opposing pairs one–nine, two–eight, three–seven, and four–six, are inner and outer to each other. So within the generating numbers of the Hetu, the complementary layout of the Luoshu is already implied. The Qing Nang Jing Zhuan (commentary transmission on the feng shui classic Qing Nang Jing) says: “Both the Hetu and the Luoshu establish the central pole by means of this ‘fifteen.’”

Although the Hetu has the Four Images (sixiang), in the pre-heaven (xiantian) phase it is only yang ascending and yin descending—above and below have just separated—and one cannot yet speak of the four directions. Only after the central five fixes the middle pole do the four quarters become clearly bounded, each holding its proper place. With the four cardinal directions—east, south, west, and north—established, the four diagonal quarters (northeast, southeast, southwest, northwest) fall between them, and the eight directions are then complete. This is how the pattern of heaven and earth naturally appears; therefore the Hetu and Luoshu are the source of principle (li), qi, image (xiang), and number (shu).

One, two, three, four, and five belong to heaven; six, seven, eight, nine, and ten belong to earth. Heaven and earth each have five numbers; the two fives combine into ten, and ten together with the central five again yields fifteen—this is the meaning of “fifteen.” How can students fail to grasp establishing the central pole through the five at the center?

What is meant by “the hour of zi” (shi zhi zi) is the living zi hour within the body. The zi hour at midnight is the fixed zi hour—the set midnight period; when the moment is not tied to the clock but follows the first stir of yang qi in the body, that is called the living zi hour.

The so-called “living zi hour” is a moment no one else can detect—only you know it inwardly. That is why it is said that its subtlety lies in heart-to-heart transmission: once the heart of Heaven is clear to you, the heart passes that understanding outward.

The encomium says: Yin and Yang rise and fall in their turning; within that subtlety the inner elixir (Neidan) forms. New moon and full moon generate each other, with the fifteenth as the thread that starts it. That Qi is lively and alert; it can only be felt within your own heart. Heaven and the human being meet and join; in time, fulfillment becomes whole and round.

Huiche asked: What the old master spoke of—is that on this side, or on that side? Or is there a further mystery on that side?

Donglei replied: What we have just discussed is all about returning the elixir, and it still belongs on this side. If you take the methods of the three vehicles as your measure, it already counts as reaching that side. But what celestial immortals cultivate is the unsurpassed supreme path; on that side there is a further, primordial subtlety of Heaven’s mechanism. Unless someone has bright virtue and truly accumulates sincerity and keeps at it for a long time, you should not speak of it to them. To let it out lightly only invites doubt. If the heart is not light, nimble, empty, and still, Heavenly principle and desire will inevitably clash; once principle is dim and desire strong, one slips into heterodox teaching. The blind leading the blind misleads those who come after—can the harm be called small?

The encomium says: Cultivate nature and preserve life so principle and desire no longer fight. For celestial immortals too, the crux lies in illuminating bright virtue. The body of the Dao is deep and fine, rooted in natural clarity and stillness. This side and that side meet in wonder and gather into one.

Huiche then withdrew respectfully and observed the six monthly fast days and the five precepts (not killing, not stealing, not committing sexual misconduct, not lying, and not drinking alcohol). After seventy-five days, on an auspicious morning at the winter solstice in mid-winter, he swept the courtyard steps, bathed, burned incense, and invited Master Lei to ascend again to the Hall of Reading the Changes (the hall where the Yijing was recited). The rites were carried out with full solemnity, and he cut his flesh to draw blood and swore an oath toward heaven. That day, auspicious winds blew widely and auspicious clouds covered the sky. Huiche stepped forward in the manner of a disciple, knelt long, and requested: “Formerly I awakened to my original face and cultivated both samadhi and wisdom, thinking that the Dao was found precisely there. Having respectfully heard the teaching on returning the elixir (Neidan, internal alchemy), my confusion was suddenly cleared; having also heard of the supreme supreme Way of the celestial immortal, whose celestial mechanism is profound and subtle and cannot be compared with the three vehicles (the three teachings), I beg the master, in compassion, to grant me deliverance and instruction.”

Dong Lei said: "Ah! To encounter someone worthy of transmission yet fail to transmit is to lose the Heavenly Treasure (the Great Way cherished by Heaven); to transmit to one unworthy of receiving it is to suffer infernal torment (punishment in the underworld). To speak when one should speak is to miss the person; to speak when one should not is to speak wrongly. The wise neither miss the person nor speak amiss. I understand now—you are fit to be taught. Come, I shall tell you. The Golden Elixir and the Returning Elixir are fundamentally the same elixir; never has there been a case of completing the Golden Elixir in one stroke without first accomplishing the Returning Elixir. This is the meaning of 'to climb high, begin from the low; to travel far, start from the near.' In general, no superior method fails to proceed first through refining Jing (essence) into Qi (vital energy), then refining Qi into Shen (spirit), and finally refining Shen to return to Emptiness; the final step is to once again establish the furnace and cauldron (using body and mind as the vessel of cultivation), reestablish Qian and Kun (realigning Yin and Yang), and devote oneself solely to refining Xing (nature) until refining emptiness to unite with the Dao. This is cultivating life first, then cultivating nature. Only our Heavenly Immortal (the highest rank in Daoist cultivation) lineage proceeds directly through cultivating nature; once Xing is complete, life naturally follows. This is the learning of completing nature and determining life—it is the approach of directly cultivating the upper pass while simultaneously encompassing the middle and lower passes (the three gates from bottom to top in the human body), corresponding to what Zhuangzi called 'forgetting attachment to spirit and transcending life and death.' Its profundity differs from the Three Vehicles (the lower, middle, and upper methods): using the Great Void as furnace and cauldron, the Three Treasures (Jing, Qi, Shen) as medicine, the Heart of Heaven as master of creation, and the Mysterious Pass as the gateway of overall control—unified as one without distinction. This is what the Discourse on Dispelling Doubts states: take concentrating spirit and gathering Qi as guarding the fortress, take forgetting artifice and cutting off thought as life and death, take samadhi and wisdom as water and fire, take action and cessation as advance and retreat, take clarity, stillness, and naturalness as application, take harmonious Qi steaming and washing as bathing, take years, months, days, and hours as fire timing, take becoming unified as union, and take shattering the void as completion (final accomplishment). Master Qiongguan said: 'The Way of the Heavenly Immortal is like a pearl in a crystal dish—turning smoothly, lively and agile; how could it be trapped by Yin-Yang within the Five Phases (Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, Water)? One must leap beyond Heaven and Earth to be called one who has attained the Dao.' This method is simple; transmitted heart to heart, it is easily accomplished. Other superior methods discuss hexagram lines and calculate weights and measures—the methods are complex and difficult; miss by a hair's breadth and error stretches a thousand miles, hence the saying 'the slightest deviation prevents the elixir from forming.' I transmit this to you orally; you must comprehend it with your heart."

The encomium says: This principle is subtle to the utmost, yet in practice it is utterly plain. Cultivate until even emptiness is shattered—until you no longer cling even to the state of “emptiness”—and only then have you reached the summit. Fine as a hair’s breadth, all is simply thus; dwell in reverent stillness yourself, without rising thought. It is passed heart to heart and mouth to mouth—most precious and most hidden.

Huiche asked: “What is the difference between the supreme supreme vehicle and the three vehicles?”

Master Lei answered: “The difference lies in ‘that’ and ‘this,’ there and here. Here takes essence, qi, and spirit as the three yuan; there takes heaven, earth, and human as the three yuan. The three yuan of heaven, earth, and human embrace all that is large and enter all that is fine; the three yuan of essence, qi, and spirit speak only of the single human body. Yuan essence, yuan qi, and yuan spirit are what this body originally has, so they are called ‘I’ and belong here; heaven yuan, earth yuan, and human yuan are not what this body originally has, so they are called ‘that’ and belong there. Among the three vehicles, some divide that and this by nature and life, some by pre-heaven and post-heaven, taking the nature school as here and the life school as there. We of the celestial immortal lineage do not divide that and this; we only seek one principle running through.”

The encomium says: Heaven, earth, and human as three yuan are the gateway into the Way. Not dividing that and this—only this is most noble. One principle running through embraces heaven and earth. Marvelous—the supreme realm; the utmost Dao is here.

Huiche asked: “What is most essential?”

Master Lei answered: “Opening the xuan guan (mysterious pass) is the first essential matter. The xuan guan is the great gate of the whole body. If the great gate is not opened, how can you enter the hall and inner chamber, gather the three yuan, and use them as the material for your own cultivation?”

The encomium says: Xuan Guan, Xuan Guan—the place where countless subtleties gather. Whether you open it or close it, it is all bestowed by the Celestial Emperor. The fragrance before your eyes is not true fragrance; the crescent moon is not truly bent. To know its original face, you must return to Mount Lu (meaning: do not stop at outer appearances; recognize it within yourself).

Hui Che asked: “In general, those who refine the Golden Elixir (Neidan) take opening the Three Passes as the first essential matter. Now you also say the Xuan Guan is most essential. How do the Xuan Guan and the Three Passes differ?”

The Thunder Master answered: “The Three Passes have a front-and-back order. The three passes on the back are Weilu, Jiaji, and Yuzhen, called the front three passes; the three passes on the front are Niwan (crown), Jianggong (heart region), and the lower Dantian, called the back three passes. The elixir classics say: ‘Front three-three, back three-three—gather them up and carry them on one shoulder.’ The front three passes lie along the spine and govern the Du meridian; the back three passes lie on the chest and govern the Ren meridian. Once Ren and Du are connected, the hundred meridians throughout the body are all open. When front and back three passes open at once, it is like shouldering a carrying pole—hence ‘once shouldered’ (yidan dan).

However, Ren and Du are only the red and black paths. Elixir books say: in the middle of the body, behind the navel and before Weilu, there is an aperture called Guanyuan. Cultivation enters the lower yellow from here, then ascends along the yellow path through the middle yellow and upper yellow. Elixir books call this path the ‘immortal way.’ It is the yellow path traversed together by the three pre-heaven treasures (yuan jing, yuan qi, yuan shen)—also called yellow within—and is truly where the immortal way converges. Hence the Yijing says ‘through the yellow within, principle penetrates; the correct position occupies the body.’ Here is precisely where a person establishes life and roots the self, sharing one source with heaven-and-earth’s great simplicity. What Laozi called the ‘gate of the dark female (xuan pin zhi men),’ also named ‘root of heaven and earth’—that gate is Guanyuan; it is the portal where yin and yang enter and exit, so it is also called guan (pass). What is called mysteriously unfathomable—and all mystery arises here—is also where the Taiji (Supreme Ultimate) of this body stands as the pole. No one is not born from here; how could one not return through cultivation here?

Therefore in supreme returning elixir, one must first gather pre-heaven primordial Qi (xian tian yi qi), starting from Guanyuan, ascending in reverse to Kunlun (the crown), then descending to Jianggong, falling into the Dantian, entering the qi cavity—first warming by fire phases, then continuing with the water phase: this is called cooking and refining. So the celestial immortal lineage’s method, from start to finish, never strays outside the Xuan Guan—how could it be only the first step of advancement?”

The eulogy says: Rest in the place that is rightfully yours, and let the Yellow Center—the harmonizing Qi at the human body’s center—run clear and in good order. In truth there is no real end, and no real beginning either. Where practice starts and where it finishes never step outside this one principle. Join with Dasu, the primordial plain source, and you may keep company on high with the Yellow Emperor and Laozi.

Huiche asked: If one opens the Pass Gate (xuanguan)—the portal through which pre-heaven Qi enters and leaves—must one still open the Three Passes (often tailgate, spine-gate, and jade pillow)?

Lei Shi said: Once the Pass Gate is open, the Three Passes need not be opened. After the Three Passes are cleared, cultivating emptiness and stillness means pressing inward from outside, seeking emptiness from without. When the Pass Gate opens, emptiness wells up naturally from within. Seeking emptiness from outside can be genuine or false: when genuine, inside and outside are one; when false, the outside looks empty while the inside stays solid. To empty the inside as well is extremely laborious—you must cultivate until you truly forget the self. Only inner emptiness has real use. Thus, once the Pass Gate opens, the body is like a translucent gauze shell; every pore opens, and the true mechanism of ascent and descent finds its own path—you need not rely on the Three Passes. If one clears the Three Passes first, one must still wait until the Pass Gate opens before one can gather the Three Origins: Jing (essence), Qi (vital energy), and Shen (spirit).

The eulogy says: Once you have grasped the principle of the Pass Gate, what are the Three Passes worth? The Three Passes always have form; the One Origin has no bottom. Using the formless to gather the formed is like the carp of Kunlun gaining transformation. Subtle upon subtle—set forth in words, it is truly fine.

Huiche said: I hope you will explain in detail the secret of opening the Pass Gate.

Lei Shi said: At the beginning, the fault is an unsettled mind and restless spirit. If spirit gathers and Qi settles, and you stand in what is before the pre-heaven, you enter the Mystery. Subtle upon subtle—set forth in words, it is truly fine.

Huiche said: I hope you will explain in detail the secret of opening the Pass Gate.

Master Lei said: For those just starting out, the hardest part is only that the mind will not settle and the spirit will not grow still. If you can gather the spirit and quiet the qi, and take your footing in “before the pre-heaven” (the source before anything has yet arisen), the Pass (xuanguan—the inner gate where pre-heaven and post-heaven meet in neidan practice) is easy to open. The earlier masters said: “Gongfu begins from no-thought (wunian).” So there are several oral formulas for how to begin.

One is: Let all entanglements drop away, and body and self naturally become still and empty. This is the oral formula by which earlier masters entered through “undifferentiated transformation” (hunhua—the place of no fixed distinctions). Yet people are caught in bustle all day; the mind knows no moment of peace, like a pot of boiling water—how can one seek emptiness and stillness? Without a place to apply effort, how can one cultivate? You should first use your own mind to illuminate the “source of mind”; then the body grows still and the spirit grows empty. This source of mind is not the fleshy heart in the chest (the physical organ) but a still, empty, and numinous awareness. Then guard it with “neither clinging nor leaving” (buji buli)—neither holding fast nor drifting away—so that the mind does not lodge in any fixed place. Guarding thus, you often feel an empty hollowness within, nothing staining it, only a sense of gathered stillness; hold the spirit in that stillness. Then the mind has a master and is no longer pulled about. The Diamond Sutra’s “One should produce a mind that abides nowhere” (ying wu suo zhu er sheng qi xin)—the mind does not rest on any thing, yet clear knowing remains—is exactly this meaning.

Another is: Constantly tend this mind, withdraw and store it in the “aperture at the spine” (jiaji zhi qiao—the cultivation locus between the shoulder blades on the back), and guard it without leaving. The wayward mind naturally disperses, stray thoughts fade, the restless mind is subdued, and wandering ideas cease. In time, the “true breath” (zhenxi—the inner respiration that arises in deepest stillness) appears; going further, even breath becomes nothing one can grasp; breath returns to nothingness, and the root of life (mingji) is firm. This is the fine method of the Book of Changes’ “keeping to the back” (gen bei—Gen hexagram’s teaching of stopping at the back, unmoved by outer desire).

There is also: Visualize and hold “mountain root” (shangen—the point at the upper bridge of the nose, between the eyebrows). At the beginning of human life the nose forms first, hence it is called “ancestor’s nose” (bizu). Mountain root lies above the nose, between the eyebrows, and connects with the “ancestral aperture” (zuxiao—the original aperture that opens to the pre-heaven). The ancestral aperture can draw the creative power of heaven and earth (duo tiandi zaohua—absorbing pre-heaven vitality from the cosmos), so in holding mountain root you must neither forget nor force (wu wang wu zhu—do not forget it, do not push it). Let it be as if there and as if not. After long practice you feel empty stillness and fixity; mountain root and ancestral aperture seem to merge into one place; still guard with stillness, then dissolve through forgetting, and continue in this way for a long time.

Once you settle body and mind in a state of unknowing and non-knowing, so that this bit of luminous awareness also sinks into undifferentiated stillness, you enter the true realm of the Mysterious Aperture—the hidden pivot where nature and life meet in internal alchemy (Neidan). This step hinges entirely on a single turn of mind: turn toward the immortal and you lean toward immortality; turn toward the mundane and you fall back into the mundane. That is simply how resonance works.

In that deep stillness you may suddenly feel boundlessness—as if stars and moon were mirrored on the sea and the moon’s image rested on the waves, or as if ten thousand acres of flat water were covered with lush plants. Such visions are beyond words; this is the Mysterious Pass (the aperture that suddenly opens in practice) opening. Yet the moment thought moves and you cling, the Pass vanishes at once. Therefore you can only use stillness to watch stillness.

When this gate opens, you share one breath with Great Simplicity (the primordial undivided vital breath before the cosmos took form). Heaven, earth, and humanity—the three powers; above, below, and the four directions—the six directions—are not something you deliberately “contain,” yet nothing is left out; it is simply one vast Great Void. When the right moment arrives within it, spirit misses nothing; true and false appearances may follow one after another, so you may only be aware—never attached.

The Four Hundred Words on the Golden Elixir says: this aperture is no ordinary hole; heaven and earth together form it. It is called the cavity of spirit and qi; within it are the essences of Kan and Li (Water and Fire, yin and yang). That is precisely this single Mysterious Pass. Here the furnace and cauldron are set; here the “medicinal” materials (the body’s own essence, qi, and spirit as cultivation resources—not anything taken from outside) are gathered; here firing and timing are managed; until the elixir forms and sagehood is complete, nothing is accomplished elsewhere.

Whether you let heart and breath rely on each other or settle spirit in empty stillness, you must hold it as if present yet absent, neither clinging nor estranged. In the end it comes down to releasing body and mind, quieting thoughts and observing—then spirit naturally gathers and qi settles. Practitioners should first take “no-thought” as the main thread, with sincerity and constancy—why worry that you cannot enter?

The encomium says: The form is still; spirit is empty and luminous; the ten thousand concerns are let go. Sincerity without break—what difference between dawn and dark? Suddenly it is as if a cave gate opens; the ten thousand things transform with creation itself. Having awakened, remain in stillness; then you enter the realm where the Infant and the Crimson Maiden meet (in Neidan, the meeting of original spirit and true qi).

Hui Che said: As explained earlier, one may take the Huangting (the central vital point in the body) and the qi acupoints as the furnace and cauldron (the place where Neidan is cultivated), or take body and mind as furnace and cauldron, or take Qian and Kun (the yin and yang of Heaven and Earth) as furnace and cauldron; now one takes the Great Void (boundless empty space) as furnace and cauldron. The subtle meaning here is deep and hard to fathom—please explain it further.

Suddenly it is as if everything opens and clears, and the ten thousand things change with it. Though one has awakened, the mind stays still and quiet; from this one enters the way of the Infant and the Lead Maiden (pure yang and pure yin in Neidan).

The Infant means the Infant’s Breath: a speck of primordial yang essence stored in the southwest, on the diagonal between the front of the womb and behind the navel, paired with the front of the womb. Breath is the mother of qi, qi is the child of breath; the two naturally join and cannot be split apart. Infant Breath is the qi mother carrying the gestation.

The Embryonic Immortal is a type of Neidan practitioner who relies chiefly on true breath. True breath is that speck of true essence in the embryo—essence turns into qi, qi turns into essence, and all ordinary breathing is gathered here. True essence in the southwest is the ground of Li (☲, Fire); it is primordial breath, the place of what is called “the True.”

When primordial true essence is still, there is “constant stillness”; when it moves, there is “the valley spirit does not die” (holding to stillness and softness so embryonic breath endures). Embryonic breath—what is meant by “carrying a pregnancy”—is Kan and Li joining (Water and Fire nurturing each other), gestating without being born, like ten months in the womb. Li is female and is called the Lead Maiden; Kan (☵, Water) is male and is called the Infant. The two stand in the southwest—but this southwest is the direction of non-form: no mouth outside, no hands inside, yet sharing life with Heaven and Earth and moving with creation. Whoever attains this may become an immortal.

The Lead Maiden is the Lead Maiden’s Breath. The Lead Maiden is the mother of true breath; true breath is the child of the Lead Maiden. The two naturally unite and cannot be separated. Lead Maiden Breath is the mother of qi carrying the gestation.

The Lead Maiden is the mother of true breath. True breath is that speck of true essence in the embryo—essence becomes qi, qi becomes essence, and all breathing is contained in it. True essence in the northeast is the ground of Kan (☵, Water); it is primordial breath, the place of what is called “the True.”

When primordial true essence is still, there is “constant stillness”; when it moves, there is “the valley spirit does not die.” Embryonic breath—what is meant by “carrying a pregnancy”—is Kan and Li joining, gestating without being born, like ten months in the womb. Kan is male and is called the Infant; Li is female and is called the Lead Maiden. The two stand in the northeast—but this northeast is the direction of non-form: no mouth outside, no hands inside, yet sharing life with Heaven and Earth and moving with creation. Whoever attains this may become an immortal.

Infant Breath and Lead Maiden Breath naturally join in the Great Void as furnace and cauldron, gestating without being born, like ten months in the womb. In the Great Void there is no mouth outside and no hands inside, yet one shares life with Heaven and Earth and moves with creation. Whoever attains this may become an immortal.

Thus the Great Void as furnace and cauldron is the highest realm of Neidan. In the Great Void there is no mouth outside and no hands inside, yet one shares life with Heaven and Earth and moves with creation. Whoever attains this may become an immortal.

Master Lei said: When you truly understand the two words "body" and "mind," you have read ten thousand volumes of books. The body here is not the flesh-and-blood body but the Dharma body (the true body attained through cultivation); the mind here is not ordinary thought but the heavenly heart (the original mind in accord with the Way). The Dharma body seems formless yet truly exists; the heavenly heart seems to have a mind yet does not cling to mind. Only one who deeply penetrates creation and clearly sees the subtle can truly know this.

Huangting (the Middle Dantian in Neidan) lies above the qi acupoint, with upper and lower in communication. Within the qi acupoint there is also the primordial-qi acupoint. The qi acupoint is where post-heaven true qi is stored; the primordial-qi acupoint is where pre-heaven primordial qi is received—what is called the Pass (the crucial gate where nature and life meet). Qian is Heaven and yang; Kun is Earth and yin. In the human body the upper half is yang and the lower half yin. The Book of Changes says "Qian is the head, Kun is the belly," because nature rests in Niwan (the crown) and life dwells within the navel. Thus true nature belongs to Qian and true life to Kun; Qian and Kun are true nature and true life.

Because Qian and Kun can interact and yin and yang can be reversed in use, true life is hidden within nature and true nature is contained within life—hence the image of the "cauldron and furnace of Qian and Kun." Taking the Great Void as cauldron and furnace is because the Great Void embraces the six directions; heaven, earth, and the myriad things are all within it. My Pass is of the same substance as the Great Void; I take heaven and earth as heart and emptiness as function. The Great Void of heaven and earth is the cauldron; my Great Void is the furnace—so the Great Void is borrowed as cauldron and furnace. The cauldron is a vessel for holding things; the furnace is a vessel for holding fire. Both merely indicate where the medicine and the firing are placed—why insist on which is furnace and which is cauldron?

The encomium says: The Dharma body is without yet truly is; the heavenly heart is with yet truly is not. Qian and Kun reversed—the meeting is entirely in oneself. Nature and life depend on each other; using the Great Void as cauldron and furnace to refine, one may stand in the same rank as the sages.

Huiche asked: "What is the essential meaning of what is called 'medicine'?"

Master Lei said: What is meant by “medicinal ingredients”? In lower-grade elixir methods, tears, saliva, essence, fluids, sweat, blood, and bodily liquids are taken as the ingredients; in middle-grade methods, essence, qi, and spirit are taken as the ingredients; in superior methods, essence, spirit, soul, corporeal soul, and intent are taken as the ingredients, with the pre-heaven single Qi (that one breath before the ten thousand things were divided) as the elixir mother (the root source from which the elixir coalesces). All of these still belong to the matter of returning the elixir and do not step outside the dharmic sphere on this side (the range of ordinary elixir practice). Only the method of our Celestial Immortal lineage takes Taiji (Supreme Ultimate) as the elixir mother and the Three Origins as the medicinal ingredients: the elixir mother is used to form the elixir, and the ingredients are used for nursing and nourishing (warming and sustaining the formed elixir as one would suckle an infant).

Yuan means “origin” in the large sense. The qi of the three powers (Heaven, Earth, and Humanity) is pure, clear, and unmixed, vast yet mysteriously transformative—that is the yuan of Qian, the yuan of Kun, and the yuan of Humanity. Qian is Heaven, also called the celestial yuan; Kun is Earth, also called the terrestrial yuan. The yuan of Heaven, Earth, and Humanity are all gestated within the Great Void (vast empty space), and this yuan is born in the heart. Heaven’s heart is in Earth, Earth’s heart is in Heaven, and the heart of Heaven and Earth is entrusted to the human person—hence the human being is the most precious among the three powers; if Heaven and Earth had no human beings, they could not show themselves as Heaven and Earth. Human yuan is dispersed throughout Heaven and Earth and hidden within the Great Void. Therefore my ancestor Master of the Great Void said: “Human yuan pervades the great thousand worlds; the Three Origins are commanded by a single mind.” Thus one must gather the medicinal ingredients within the Great Void and apply huohou (the timing of firing in cultivation) within the Xuan Guan (mysterious pass, the pivotal point where spiritual opportunity stirs in inner refinement).

The Purple Yang True Person (Zhang Boduan) said: “The Dao arises from emptiness and produces one Qi; from one Qi, yin and yang are generated.” Emptiness is Wuji (Non-Ultimate). Wuji yet Taiji—when emptiness reaches its extreme it is Taiji; they are not two separate things. Taiji divides into the two modes, meaning one Qi transforms into yin-yang. Hence it is said, “Only when yin and yang together constitute the Dao; solitary yin or solitary yang is merely ‘alone.’” Yin-yang is the functioning of the Dao: yin-yang are born from the Dao, and the Dao in turn is completed through yin-yang. Once the first faint light appears (like the new moon just showing), each of the ten thousand things can align with the Dao. One who understands this has pierced the aperture of the Xuan Guan.

Patriarch Niwan (Patriarch Chen Nan of the Southern Lineage) said: “Within the twelve double-hours, that suddenly surging sign of opportunity is the pre-heaven qi; if a person can gather it in time, it is the supreme treasure.” If the student can truly empty to the utmost and settle in genuine stillness, pre-heaven single Qi will come from within emptiness. My master said: The pre-heaven referred to here is not only the pre-heaven within the body, but the ancestral qi of Taiji. The circulating qi of the three powers can be used for nursing and nourishing; once the ancestral qi of Taiji is obtained it can serve as elixir mother—these all belong to the great medicine. If in learning one does not recognize emptiness and stillness, and in seated meditation one never reaches the depth of oblivion (profound silence and absence of rising thoughts), there is absolutely no principle by which anything can be attained.

The praise verse says: Take “the Ultimate” (the utmost original source) as sovereign, and take “the Primordial” (innate primordial Qi) as nourishment. Though these two stand side by side, only human beings can receive them most fully and bring them to fruition. Impress this principle upon the heart, and hold it in stillness and emptiness. When emptiness reaches the point where even “emptiness” is no longer clung to, boundless scenes like showers of flowers appear.

Huiche asked: “What is meant by gathering? What is meant by the firing process?”

Master Lei said: As for gathering, following Patriarch Bai’s teaching, sitting upright in fixed meditation may be taken as gathering. Sit upright and enter absorption; when you reach the dim, silent, trance-like state, the original nature is clear and limpid, and a single thread of true mechanism reveals itself. This is what the Scripture of Purity and Stillness (Taishang Laojun’s Scripture of Constant Purity and Stillness) means: “If a person can constantly be pure and still, Heaven and Earth will turn toward him.” Therefore the method is simply to lead the mind toward emptiness and reach stillness, concentrate the spirit and wait. Let the sovereign of the heart be still and unmoving; when the moment comes, Shen will perceive it on its own—allow Qi to rise and fall by itself, without injecting the slightest intentional will. Only then does it accord with the work of Shen. In time, Shen and breath will naturally appear; body and mind will naturally fill and harmonize. Even when various signs arise, it is only a matter of not letting this heart cling to them. Intention should guard lightly, as one would guard an egg; gather that single point of mind into concentrated stillness and silence, and leave natural transformation to itself.

Thus the firing process is to follow nature. Refining is nothing other than Qi returning inward while Shen moves within—using Shen to steer Qi, that is all. The alchemical classics say: “True fire originally has no hour; the great medicine is not reckoned by weight.” They also say: “There is naturally true firing—simply settle Shen and breath and leave it to the natural.” Perfected One Ziyang (Zhang Boduan) said: The Celestial Worthy of Primordial Beginning gathers the medicinal substance every day, yet the more he gathers the more it is inexhaustible; the Most High Lord constantly applies the firing process, yet the more he applies it the more it never ends. Heaven and Earth also gather medicine every day; sun and moon also apply the firing process every moment—therefore they endure through countless kalpas without perishing. If the mechanism stops for even one instant, Heaven and Earth would collapse. To speak of the firing process in terms of year, month, day, and hour is precisely to show that the firing process is not measured by year, month, day, or hour.

However, before the Mysterious Pass (the key aperture where pre-heaven Qi stirs) has opened, and before practice has reached true emptiness and true stillness, one must not rush to speak of gathering. First wash body and mind utterly clean; only then can practice easily reach emptiness and stillness. At the same time one must nurture “easeful vitality” within emptiness and stillness: emptiness and stillness mean emptying the heart and stilling the nature; easeful vitality means keeping Qi lively and active. This layer of work applies not only in sitting meditation—in dealing with people and affairs one must also train the heart’s conduct until it is pure and mature, as Master Cheng (Cheng Yi) said: “Still when moving, still when at rest”—only then can movement and stillness be one, practice enter the natural, and this count as solid accomplishment on the great path. When one truly reaches the state where there is no inside or outside and no boundary, the Mysterious Pass is already open and the medicinal substance arises of itself. What arises thus is the true medicine; otherwise what is gathered is still post-heaven ordinary illusion—how can that be called medicine? Only when the aperture opens and the moment is ripe can the medicine be produced and gathered. With this medicine one transforms the ordinary body; only then can the ordinary be transformed away.

Glossary chant: Yuanshi (Primordial Beginning Celestial Worthy) gathers the medicine; Taishang (Supreme Venerable Lord) tends the furnace. This natural subtle operation makes Heaven and Earth one body with me. Movement and stillness were united from the first; the Wuji (the boundless origin) unfolds from here. Only by obtaining this supreme subtle method can one transform the ordinary body.

Huiche asked: Using ding and hui as water and fire—is that what our school means by ding and hui? What is meant by zuo and zhi as advance and retreat?

Master Lei said: Ding belongs to water, hui to fire. Ding is settling the heart; hui is deploying the spirit. When the heart has spirit, spirit belongs to fire. When mixed with discursive thought, it is the shishen (the acquired, discriminating mind)—called ordinary fire. When not attached to form and appearance, it is the yuanshen (the innate, original spirit)—true fire, called the light of hui. Thus using ding and using hui are two aspects of one principle: being able to settle heart-spirit and not cling to form and color is called hui-jue (awakening through wisdom). When the heart is settled and hui illuminates, that is awakening that also constantly illumines; using water to harmonize fire is illumination that also constantly awakens. The difference between Buddha and Dao lies only in whether the qi-movement is leisurely and lively—barely a hair’s breadth. What is called zuo and zhi is jin huo and tui fu (advance and retreat of the fire in cultivation)—not necessarily the technical “advance fire / retreat tally” of firing schedules alone. Exerting effort at this stage is jin huo; cultivating until blended forgetfulness is tui fu. When one truly reaches blended forgetfulness, the foundation of the path of blended transformation is established here. Jin huo and tui fu have their own mysterious celestial mechanism manifesting—they cannot be guessed at or discussed. When practice reaches that point, subtle awakening-illumination arises of itself.

Glossary chant: Ding and hui generate each other; awakening and illumination always remain clear. Water harmonizes fire, returning to Taiqing (the pure, supreme clarity). The foundation of blended transformation naturally lifts and supports. It cannot be conjectured; its subtlety is beyond naming.

Huiche asked: “Since ancient times, elixir scriptures have spoken of ‘Kan-Li union’ (Kan as water, Li as fire—meaning their mutual meeting, often standing for heart and kidneys or spirit and Qi coming together), and there is also talk of ‘Qian-Kun union’ (Qian as heaven, Kun as earth—the joining of the two poles of Yin-Yang). I wonder whether the Celestial Immortal school (the line that takes attainment of celestial immortality as its goal) has such a situation as well?”

Master Lei said: “Kan-Li union appears in the three vehicles of cultivation (three graded methods from shallow to deep), but that need not be taken as fixed doctrine. As for Qian-Kun union, my teacher said: When the practitioner becomes utterly empty and profoundly still, with a sincere inner heart, one naturally enters the great samadhi of frozen stillness. Suddenly the living force stirs; in an instant one feels empty clarity and brightness, light shining without limit. As soon as this awareness arises, one must quickly gather it in and at once sink back into silence. After a little while, a single point drops of itself into the Huangting (the vital center in internal alchemy). Only then is innate Qi restored, circulating naturally through the six directions of void (above, below, and the four quarters); one abides within it with nothing left but a single true intent, feeling the breath clear and spirit bright, body and mind harmoniously at ease—this is called the golden liquid returning elixir. In truth it has no form and no image; it is only empty spirit showing itself alone, Qian and Kun blended into one, completing one’s own Taiji (Supreme Ultimate), nothing more.”

The praise verse says: Taking the joining of Qian and Kun as union is sought through utmost sincerity. Entering frozen great samadhi, when the light appears one immediately gathers it in. Wait a moment longer and that point falls; innate Qi is restored and flows in circuit. Only the true intent remains—that is the finest realm of the golden liquid returning elixir.

Huiche asked again: “Generally speaking, cultivating the Dao must involve a Dao companion (a partner in practice)—what does that mean?”

Master Lei said: A Dao companion (daolü) is a fellow practitioner and friend on the path. Because each person’s endowment and temperament differ, progress in practice also differs; therefore one should discuss often, ask questions sincerely, and think things through together up close—everyone gains. If one cultivates alone and never seeks instruction, the ancients called this “dark practice” (mingxing)—groping in the dark—or “blind cultivation,” and results would be hard to achieve. The further practice advances, the more subtle it becomes; the more subtle it is, the more it must be explained clearly. A slight mistake can lead to a hundred wrong turns. At such a juncture one needs a clear teacher and worthy friends to point things out and analyze them, so one does not go astray and practice can improve day by day. Hence the Chan school has stick and shout (banghe)—teaching that jolts one awake—the Daoist gate relies on dianhua (teachers and companions clarifying the essential point), and Confucian learning especially values learning by observation and emulation. The Book of Changes (Yijing) says that the noble person reviews and practices together with friends. The Book of Rites (Liji) says that studying alone without friends leaves one narrow and uninformed. Though Confucius was the supreme sage, he still worried that learning would not be reviewed and practiced together; Zixia, a leading disciple at the Apricot Altar (xingtan, where Confucius taught), still, because he lived apart in solitude, could not hear others point out his faults. How could one do without Dao companions? Yet if one does not apply oneself in earnest practice and only meets with friends, talking abstruse subtleties and judging past and present all day long, it is nothing but lip service—what benefit is there for body, mind, and learning? Cultivation values companions, but it values self-discipline even more. Things gather by kind; people group by affinity—the decisive factor is oneself, not others.

The encomium says: Stone from another mountain can polish jade; friends assist one another and constantly offer sincere counsel. It is like gold refined in a furnace, or like someone holding a lamp in the dark. Long gathered beneath the star of virtue (dexing, the auspicious sign of the wise assembled together), one can rise above the dust of the world.

Hui Che asked: The ancients spoke of entering the enclosure for warm nurturing (ru yuan wen yang—gently nurturing the internal elixir in a quiet chamber) and nine years facing the wall (jiu nian mian bi—as in Bodhidharma’s long wall-gazing meditation). Is there really such a principle?

Master Lei said: This is the approach taken only when one first cultivates ming (life) and only afterward cultivates xing (nature). The reason is fear that if the heart-mind is not yet pure, work on ming will still have gaps and leaks.

Wu Yuanzi (Liu Yiming) said: What is meant by “nine years” is the sense of “nine returns”—turning back again and again until the practice rounds out completely. What is meant by “facing the wall” is not rigidly sitting with one’s face to a wall, but single-pointed will that does not scatter, gathering spirit and fixing it in place. One must allow not a thread of stray thought, as if a cliff ten thousand ren high stood before the eyes—nothing visible, the ten thousand dharmas all returning to emptiness—quietly nourishing the “infant” formed by inner refinement (the tiren, the embryonic spirit where essence, qi, and spirit congeal), letting it ripen little by little.

The prior master said: If this set of practices is deferred until after returning the elixir, forming the fetus, warming and nurturing, and completing the work, it looks safe on paper, yet among those who could spend such enormous effort without abandoning the path midway, how many have there ever been since antiquity? Better to follow the Supreme Ultimate Heart School (the superior Dao that takes the heart-mind as root): when xing is thoroughly clear, ming is thoroughly clear too; each degree of penetration is a degree of condensation—small gains piled day by day, month by month, year by year. If one step by step returns into emptiness until cultivation becomes utterly natural—wishing to leave, one leaves at once; wishing to dissolve, one dissolves at once—having reached the stage where even emptiness is shattered (even the clinging to emptiness is broken), coming and going are all free; why then must one seclude oneself and face a wall?

According to the teacher’s meaning, this is what Patriarch Bai meant by “birth is up to him, death is up to him”—provided one is master in one’s own house. When the work reaches utmost sincerity without ceasing (sincerity unbroken, not a gap in the effort), that is enough.

The encomium says: Once self-nature is clear, what need to face a wall? The Supreme Ultimate Heart School holds that ming is established from xing. Step by step one returns to emptiness; moment by moment one accumulates and penetrates. Let life and death come and go as they will—the subtle point is simply being able to be master oneself.

Huiche asked: The ancients all said that after great achievement one must split open the crown gate (the aperture at the crown of the head) and release the yang spirit (the pure yang yuanshen). Is the principle really so?

The Thunder Master said: This is what is called daoyin yuanyang (guiding the primordial yang). The methods of the Three Vehicles (lower, middle, and upper gates of practice) are all alike in this, yet one must allow it to go outward without truly going outward, and then proceed to lian shen huan xu (refining spirit and returning to emptiness), lian xu he dao (refining emptiness and merging with the Dao), and lian dao he ziran (refining the Dao and merging with naturalness). Hence the talk of setting up the luding (furnace and cauldron—the body and mind as the vessel of inner alchemy) anew and re-establishing qian and kun (Heaven and Earth). Thus the Ziyang zhenren (Zhang Boduan) said: “Light behind the neck is still an illusion; clouds under the feet do not yet make one an immortal.” Only when even emptiness is shattered does the work finish. This is the great matter of the final move.

If one practices in that way, one splits xing and ming (nature and life) into two paths of cultivation, and so adds this extra round of effort. The family method of our tianxian (celestial immortal) lineage starts straight from the xingzong (the gate that takes refining mind-nature as its entry) and, at each step of practice, returns a portion of emptiness, until there is no emptiness left to return—lian dao he ziran (refining the Dao and merging with naturalness)—and only then is it complete. One need not first form a yang shen (the purely yang spirit that can leave the body) and then smash that yang spirit.

This is nothing other than letting one’s hao ran zhi qi (vast, upright Qi) fill the cosmos and become one with the Great Void, with no distinction of going in or out. What is called greatest and most firm—nourished by uprightness without harm—then fills the space between Heaven and Earth. Therefore the supreme yicheng (single vehicle) gate is lian xing (refining the form); refining the form is refining Shen (spirit) and cultivating xing (nature), and cultivating nature is precisely cultivating ming (life). Emptiness is precisely subtle being, and subtle being is precisely emptiness. Thus when gathered it becomes form; when dispersed it becomes Qi; when both form and Shen reach subtlety, they unite with the Dao as one.

The encomium says: Cultivating nature is cultivating life; refining form is refining spirit. When form and spirit are both subtle, nature and life are fully accomplished. Why bother again with taiyang (embryonic nurturing), or banqueting in Yuchen (the jade palace of heaven)? This supreme subtle secret is he dao he zhen (merging with the Dao and realizing truth).

Huiche said: “This jindan dadao (great path of the Golden Elixir) is what comes after huandan (returning the elixir). Must one first complete huandan and only then cultivate jindan?”

The Thunder Master said: “It is not so. What is meant by Returning Elixir (huandan) is to restore the elixir root I already possess—the innate wellspring of vital energy in the human body. After one reaches fifteen or sixteen, the true primal essence (innate primordial foundation) has already been damaged, and spirit and vitality drain away day by day; therefore one must replenish until one returns to the state before that damage, when true primal essence was still intact at fifteen or sixteen, and recover the original face of the moment of birth. ‘Return’ means to go away and come back again—that is, to restore my original Taiji (Supreme Ultimate, the root of all things)—hence it is called Returning Elixir. The upper, middle, and lower vehicles (three levels of practice methods) all require first cultivating Returning Elixir, then advancing to Golden Elixir (the further stage of internal alchemy). The heart-to-heart transmission (mind-direct teaching) of the Most High (the supreme ancestor of Daoism): once the Mysterious Pass (xuanguan—the pivotal gate where innate primordial Qi stirs in inner refinement) is opened, one gathers and refines every day, nurtures with warmth at every moment, and at every instant returns to emptiness (huixu); then one can gradually make up what was lost. Day by day one accumulates and day by day one supplements; when supplementation is full, one fills again and again until it is more than sufficient—Returning Elixir lies here, and Golden Elixir lies here too. What is meant by fullness is not the acquired spirit and vitality of later life, but the single harmonious primal Qi (xianhe yiyi qi—the undivided pre-heaven vital breath). When the pre-heaven is sufficient, the post-heaven naturally grows stronger day by day; when the post-heaven is vigorous, the pre-heaven becomes all the more full. This bit of luminous awareness in human beings is originally endowed from the central Qi of Heaven and Earth; it runs through past and present and endures long. That central Qi is the ancestral Qi of Taiji (the source breath from which all things are generated)—the root of Heaven, Earth, and the myriad things. Taiji also has the Taiji of the whole and the Taiji of each thing: the Taiji of the whole is the one Taiji shared by Heaven, Earth, and all beings; the Taiji of each thing is the Taiji each single thing possesses on its own. Taiji is the combined name for principle (li) and Qi (vital energy). Principle is the ordering of Qi; Qi is the breath through which principle comes alive. Master Cheng (Song Neo-Confucian Cheng Yi and related thinkers) said: ‘To speak only of principle without Qi is incomplete; to speak only of Qi without principle is unclear; to split the two into separate tracks is wrong.’ Master Zhu (Zhu Xi) said: ‘Nature (xing) is principle; then life-destiny (ming) is Qi.’ Thus Taiji may be called principle, may be called Qi; may be called nature, may be called destiny. From the moment of parental union, when essence and breath meet, this point settles in the Huangting (the central region of the body, a key pass in internal alchemy) and establishes itself; Taiji then divides into Yin and Yang, and creation begins. Yin and Yang are spirit and vitality; in Heaven they appear as sun and moon. Patriarch Bai (Bai Yuchan) said: ‘Sun and moon side by side is “brightness” (ming); sun and moon above and below joined is “change” (yi); sun and moon overlaid is “elixir” (dan).’ If a person can nurture spirit and vitality until the two are one, nature and life naturally endure; when nature and life endure, the foundation of the elixir is forever firm. Returning Elixir is returning to the Taiji of each thing itself; Golden Elixir is returning to the Taiji that embraces the whole. Cultivating De (Virtue/Power) and nurturing life are fundamentally one matter. To exhaustively investigate principle and fully realize one’s nature, and thereby reach the ultimate of destiny—Golden Elixir is right there.”

The praise verse says: Nurturing virtue and nurturing the body are fundamentally one undertaking. The Returning Elixir (huandan—the elixir that restores one to the original root) and the Golden Elixir (jindan—the elixir formed through inner refinement)—can they bear two different meanings? The sagely learning of Confucianism and the lineage of the immortal way have always supported each other; if you wish to exhaust your nature and fulfill your mandate (jin xing zhi ming—fully actualize your nature and align with Heaven’s decree), why not turn to the Appended Remarks (Xici) of the Book of Changes (Yijing)?

Hui Che (the one who inquires into the Way) asked: “May I ask what ‘blended transformation’ (hunhua) means?”

Master Lei (the master who transmits the teaching) said: “The two characters hunhua are the subtle secret that runs through cultivation from beginning to end. The ancients said: ‘Forget the form to nurture qi, forget qi to nurture shen, forget shen to nurture emptiness (xu).’ Therefore when you first begin, you must set aside every attachment. When your practice reaches the point where you can let go, you gradually enter the stages of ‘forgetting’—this is the opening of hunhua. The knack is simply to regard body, mind, spirit, and qi together, inward and outward, gather them into one, then withdraw the contrivances of intentional effort; naturally you gradually enter the realm of transformation. When lively empty visions and signs appear, whether meeting, receiving, releasing, or gathering, you should examine each according to the present occasion and follow what is natural. Use stillness to receive, use ‘the One’ to dissolve, until forgetting reaches the point where there is nothing left to forget—then stop. This is the ultimate wonder of hunhua completed. A Buddhist scripture says: ‘Only this “One” is real; whatever is “two” is not real’—hence it is called the gate of non-duality (bu’er famen—the teaching that does not fall to either side).”

The praise verse says: The wonder of hunhua depends above all on the three forgettings (forgetting form, forgetting qi, forgetting shen). When forgetting reaches the point where there is nothing to forget, hold fast with a single field of silent illumination. Allow and follow what is natural, and you become akin to empty space. When cultivation is shattered to the finest degree and the work is complete, meeting is nothing but a smile.

Hui Che said: “The subtle principle within this—I hope you will explain it in greater detail!”

Master Lei said: “The aim of hunhua is hard to put into words. The Book of Changes says: ‘Align your virtue with Heaven and Earth, your clarity with sun and moon.’ A meeting—only a smile.”

Hui Che said: “The subtle principle within this—I hope you will explain it in greater detail!”

The Master of Thunder (the venerable teacher in this text) said: "The purpose of hunhua (the continuous blending and transformation of yin and yang) is difficult to express in words. The Book of Changes says: Virtue aligns with Heaven and Earth, clarity aligns with the sun and moon, order aligns with the four seasons, and good and bad fortune align with the spirits. Acting before Heaven's timing, Heaven does not oppose it; acting after Heaven's timing, one follows Heaven's timing. To achieve this is to come close to this purpose.

My teacher said: The practice transmitted heart-to-heart among celestial immortals (those who attain the state of heavenly immortality through cultivation) is to release all worldly attachments, so that the body naturally becomes still and empty. From the highest heaven to the deepest abyss, there is not a moment's interruption; perfect emptiness, stillness, clarity, and harmony; no distinction between inner and outer, no distinction between being and non-being; generation upon generation of transformation, all entrusted to suchness (ru ru — reality as it is, without discrimination); the wondrous function of returning to the source is nothing other than this.

If one's practice does not begin with releasing all worldly attachments, the six dusts (the six external conditions of form, sound, scent, taste, touch, and mental objects) will entice from without, and the six senses (eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind) will stir from within. Either the inner mind is stirred up, or one is moved by external conditions — how can body, mind, and intent find rest? When the heart-mind cannot settle, from where can practice begin? Therefore the Great Learning says: Only when one knows where to stop can one then be settled. To seek settlement, one must first understand where one should stop; to know where to stop, one must first understand where "the highest good" lies — only then does one know where to stop.

Master Cheng (Northern Song Neo-Confucian Cheng Yi and related thinkers) said: When the heart-mind has a master, it can remain unmoved. When the heart-mind has a master, the heart-mind is settled and the spirit is at peace. The way of learning has nothing else to it — simply to gather back the heart-mind that has wandered away.

When the breath is calm and thoughts do not arise, there is the inner vision of body and mind ascending into emptiness (this is the inner landscape of tranquil stillness). The original nature is silent, consciousness and perception are forgotten, and wherever light reaches, all is seen — thus the high heavens and the deep abyss are entirely within this single awareness. This is what the Doctrine of the Mean calls the state "before activation" (wei fa — before joy, anger, sorrow, and delight have arisen).

However, if this state is attained only in stillness, one may still lack mastery when movement arises; one must maintain it in both movement and stillness. Hence my teacher said there must not be a moment's interruption. The four words — emptiness, stillness, clarity, and harmony — must also be present as this wondrous state in both movement and stillness; only then is it true achievement and genuine learning. At this point, what distinction remains between inner and outer, being and non-being? Within it, the ceaseless transformations of Heaven's workings are all entrusted entirely to suchness — nothing more.

What is meant by "ruru" (suchness) is the absence of above and below, of movement and stillness, of fixed location, and of any distinction between inner and outer. The marvelous application of the celestial immortal (xian who has attained realization and dwells in heaven) is precisely this genuine achievement and real learning. Being thus, where could there be inner and outer? Where could there be being and non-being? Within it, the celestial mechanism (the pivot of creation and transformation) ceaselessly generates and transforms—all entrusted to this "ruru" alone. The marvelous application of the celestial immortal is nothing more than this.

Consider the Great Learning: from "bright virtue" (mingde) to "resting in supreme goodness," from "investigating things" (gewu) to "bringing peace to the world." The Doctrine of the Mean extends from "being watchful and cautious in what is unseen" to the utmost point of "heaven and earth in their proper positions, all things nourished," concluding with "the way of heaven, without sound or scent" (the nurturing operation of heaven, without sound or taste). In all of these, function and stillness are unified; the substance itself is the learning of cultivation as practice.

Later students are unwilling to apply themselves intimately to their own body and mind, reading only in a general, superficial way. Even those who can lecture and understand use the texts merely for composing essays and answering questions, with no connection to body and mind at all. Though they call it reading, they have not truly read. Others, upon seeing books of the Way-learning tradition, often dismiss them as impractical empty talk. How many are there who earnestly seek on the matter of nature and life (xingming)?

If one is willing to work genuinely on one's own body, mind, nature, and life, one will know that the real learning of the sages is the same achievement as that of the celestial immortal; penetrating the achievement of the celestial immortal, one will know that this is indeed the learning of the sages—not something to be compared with the "zi and wu" (midnight and noon, terms Neidan uses for firing times) and "lead and mercury" (Neidan's names for medicinal ingredients) spoken of in the Daoist school.

The Daoist school calls it the Golden Elixir (jindan); the Confucian school calls it the Supreme Ultimate (Taiji). What can create and transform is the Supreme Ultimate; the Supreme Ultimate originates from the Limitless (wuji). What carries out creation and transformation is Yin-Yang; Yin-Yang originates from the Supreme Ultimate. Heaven, earth, and the ten thousand things are all born of the Supreme Ultimate and Yin-Yang; the Supreme Ultimate in turn gives birth to the celestial pole (the pivot of heaven). What can create and transform is the Supreme Ultimate, which is originally the Limitless; what operates creation and transformation is Yin-Yang, which originates from the Supreme Ultimate.

Heaven and earth, human beings, and the myriad things—all alike are offspring of Taiji (the Supreme Ultimate before things are divided) and Yin-Yang. Taiji gives rise to heaven and earth; heaven and earth turn Yin and Yang, and thus the four seasons run their course and the hundred kinds of things grow. The human being is only one thing among the myriad things. Each thing establishes its own Taiji, and each person establishes his or her own Taiji—this is what is meant by “each thing is a Taiji in itself.” Taiji and Yin-Yang: every single thing possesses them, so within and beyond the six directions (above, below, and the four quarters—the whole cosmos), nothing but Taiji and Yin-Yang are at work. Since humans dwell within the six directions, inside and outside the body are likewise nothing but Yin and Yang.

Taiji is the root of unceasing life in the human being, and also the root of unceasing life in the myriad things. Taiji becomes Yin and Yang; Yin and Yang in turn revolve Taiji—the cycle has no end and the transforming has no limit; for millions upon millions of years it has always been so without change. The reason it can remain unchanged for millions upon millions of years is that within it there is a master. What is that master? It is the Heart of Heaven (tianxin). Humans receive the Qi of heaven and earth and take form; they likewise receive the heart of heaven and earth as their own heart. Having taken the heart of heaven and earth as one’s heart, one should apprehend that heart and carry it through in the ten thousand affairs. When my heart is fully realized, the heart of heaven and earth is realized along with it—then the human being can stand alongside heaven and earth and together form the three powers (sancai). The Doctrine of the Mean says: “When one fully develops one’s own nature, one can fully develop the nature of others; when one can fully develop the nature of others, one can fully develop the nature of things; when one can fully develop the nature of things, one can assist heaven and earth in their transforming and nourishing.” That humans can grasp the creative work of heaven and earth lies precisely here.

What is meant by “creative transformation” (zaohua) is unceasing generation without pause—being born and then transforming, transforming and then being born again, all entrusted to natural law, not something I can interfere with. One need only entrust this endless generating and transforming entirely to suchness (ruru), let the two Qi of heaven and earth mingle, and the myriad things will naturally be nurtured into harmony. Hence the Daoist adept Qu Pengtou said: “Do not fixate on being or non-being; what is real lies within being and non-being.” This is the practical teaching of fully realizing one’s nature and completing one’s destiny (jinxing mingming). My teacher also said: “Great enough to pervade the celestial realm, fine enough to enter a single speck of dust—place the mind in ‘the One’ and melt wholly into the rounded true substance.”

Nothing—from the vastness of the celestial realm down to the finest mote of dust—lies outside this one mind. When the mind can be settled in a single place, the work of hunhua (the mutual blending and transformation of Jing [essence], Qi [vital energy], and Shen [spirit]) is complete; from the heavens to the smallest particle, all is embraced within it. With the mind established in oneness, hunhua fully realizes true nature.