A Record of the Assembled Immortals and Gathered Perfected of the Western Hills Shi Jianwu’s Daoist Classic on Internal Alchemy and the Cultivation of the Breath R B ICHARD ERTSCHINGER Foreword by Master Zhongxian Wu C ONTENTS Foreword: The Immortals’ Messages by Master Zhongxian Wu A Short Note on Reading the Text Introduction The Knowledge 1. Knowing the Path 2. Knowing the Method 3. Knowing the Individual 4. Knowing the Timing 5. Knowing the Materials The Sustaining 6. Sustaining Life 7. Sustaining the Body 8. Sustaining the Breath 9. Sustaining the Heart 10. Sustaining Longevity The Rebuilding 11. Rebuilding Within 12. Rebuilding the Breath 13. Rebuilding the Fluid-essences 14. Rebuilding a Surplus 15. Rebuilding Depletion The Verification 16. The True Water and Fire 17. The True Dragon and Tiger 18. The True Medicinal Elixir 19. The True Lead and Mercury 20. The True Yin and Yang The Refinement 21. Refining the Method, You Walk the Path 22. Refining the Body, You Transform the Breath 23. With a Refined Breath, You Can Fashion the Spirit 24. With a Refined Spirit, You Can Join on the Path 25. On the Refined Path, You May Walk in the Divine Glossary Foreword T I M HE MMORTALS’ ESSAGES Master Zhongxian Wu Shi JianWu 施肩吾 (780–861 ), who is also CE known by his Daoist names, XiZhenZi 棲真子 and HuaYangZhenRen 華陽真人, was a famous Daoist scholar, prolific author and cultivation practitioner from the Tang 唐 Dynasty. An astounding number of his poems were showcased in QuanTangShi 全唐詩 (Complete Tang Poems). Commissioned by the Qing Emperor himself, the QuanTangShi is the largest compilation of Tang poetry to date. Whilst most of the poets represented in this publication had only a few works chosen, this anthology memorialised 197 of Shi JianWu’s poems. An exceptional human being, Shi JianWu passed up opportunities for the great power and wealth enjoyed by the highest- ranking government officials of the time, becoming one of the rare exceptions of Chinese history – a person who prioritised his personal cultivation above all else. Of all the Daoist classics, I personally believe his work, XiShanQunXianHuiZhenJi 西山群仙會真記 (A True Record of the Assembled Immortals of the Western Hills), is amongst the best practical texts on internal alchemy and Qigong cultivation. In the original preface, HuaYangZhenRen states that he deliberately wrote this book in five volumes in order to represent the numerological energy of WuXing 五行 (Five Elements). Each volume contains five chapters, which together represent one pure YangQi 炁 of each of the Five Elements (in other words, in five there is one). He also asserts that whilst ‘everyone’ knows WuXing and the related birth and controlling principles, only a rare few know how to apply these principles to enter the Dao 道. Whilst ‘everyone’ also knows the three DanTian 丹田 and their associations with the Three Layers of JingQiShen 精炁神, scarcely any know how to circulate them through the three DanTian in order to attain the Dao. From my experience in the Qigong and Daoist cultivation world, I am astonished how little has changed in the last 1200 years! The teachings of this book are a true treasure trove for the Daoist practitioner. Drawing from cryptic messages of old Daoist masters, the CanTongQi 參同契 (reputed as the king of internal alchemy classics), and the ZhongLu DanFa 鐘呂丹法 (the internal alchemy techniques of Daoist immortals ZhongLiQuan 鐘離權 and LuDongBing 呂洞賓), Shi JianWu particularly emphasises the key inner cultivation methods of WuXing and the three DanTian. By doing so, he reminds us of the most essential (and most often overlooked) elements of the Daoist cultivation tradition and modern Qigong practices. I welcome the birth of the English version of this important internal alchemy classic with enthusiasm! Guided by Richard Bertschinger’s expert translation and annotations, I hope many people will gain great benefits from this vital work. A S N HORT OTE ON R T EADING THE EXT There are two distinct ways of reading these dense spiritual texts: one is quicker, to let the strange words and passages wash over you – without too much thinking what they mean; the other is slower, letting the significance of each phrase resonate in the brain, sparking involvement and depth of feeling. Both are fine, and both okay. Think of it as approaching a banquet – some dishes to be savoured, others consumed with their accompanying sauces and condiments easing their passage. You are literally ‘munching meaning’. Here is a summary of the highlights. The first section explains the historical context of this remarkable method of softening the breath. Chapter 1 explains the One Path, the Dao, and is fairly self- explanatory. Chapter 2 tells us that it all hinges on ‘acting naturally’. Simply marry together both forms of breathing, the True Yin and Proper Yang, and it is then possible to form an inner Medicine. Chapter 3 explains how to secure this elixial (‘health-giving’) method – essentially not to make too much of it, but to remain peacefully and inwardly content without striving. Chapter 4 speaks of timing this action, along with the turning over of the natural world – the crux of the affair. This is our task – to silently join ‘in fit accord’ with Yin and Yang, smelting out the True Yin and Yang in the body. This chapter contains the first mention of ‘sustaining’ – that is, sustaining the Yin and Yang of all life. Chapter 5 continues to elaborate on the same theme – extracting the True Yin and Yang breaths. The second section describes further ‘the sustaining’. This means sustaining the True Yin and Yang. Chapter 6 explains sustaining life through the quiet withdrawal of the body, and the physical senses. The Zhouyi Cantong Qi concludes: ‘the ear, the eye and mouth, these three jewels, block and stop them up, do not let them gape.’1 Chapters 7 and 8 continue the same theme. Chapter 9 emphasises ‘uncluttering the heart’. The final chapter, Chapter 10, points us towards our ultimate goal – ‘walking in the divine’. The next section is on rebuilding – that is, rebuilding our physical health, fluid-essences, vital breaths, spirit, etc. Chapter 11 is specifically on rebuilding the body’s internal form, and sustaining its five main internal breaths. Chapters 12, 13 and 14 are also on rebuilding and strengthening the five internal organs (zang). In Chapter 15 an additional method is given, using the sound, and voicing certain common words, or sounds, under the breath – the ‘method of the Six Character Breaths’ – meaning there is sound for each of the main organs. These activities further strengthen the breath. The penultimate section does no more than verify this remarkable technique. Chapters 16–19 elaborate previously described practices, giving the detail. They describe especial ‘alchemic happenings’ in the body, the merging of the True Yin (fluid) and Proper Yang (breath), forming a state of so-called ‘perfection’. Chapter 20 identifies the end of the quest, a quiet and gentle form of ‘foetal breath’, as if we were still a foetus in our mother’s tummy, breathing out as our mother breathes out and breathing in as she breathes in. This is the highest achievement we are able to attain in this ‘dusty world’. It fits and fortifies us with its Great Simplicity. The last section in the book is on refining the technique. It is achieved through making quiet and settled times during the day to work on the breath. This should be practised at regular intervals, times set aside for just being with the practice. Good luck! 1 See Chapter 25 in my translation of this foundation text, The Secret of Everlasting Life (Singing Dragon, 2012). I NTRODUCTION As I sit back and think about this old text on internal alchemy, I experience afresh the wonder I felt when first deciphering its characters, crouched in a field on the edge of Exmoor, alone on one of my weekend hikes. I remember the astonishment I felt at its clear exposition of Daoist meditation practice and its denigration of unorthodox techniques; its philosophical pairing of sun and moon, the organic duo, the rhythm of Yin and the Yang; the exquisite imagery and simple instruction; the intricate diagrams (of my own creation), illustrating traditional Chinese medicine and an almost arcane approach to the health arts: a picture of the interpenetration of macrocosm and microcosm, the True Breath, Five Elements, water and fire, the human and divine, and much more besides. Its roots go back to the philosophy of the Dao. ‘Dao’ can be variously translated as ‘Way’ or ‘Path’, and is described well in the seminal Tao-te Ching, foundation text of the Daoists, a motley crew of hermits, proto-chemists, recuperative physicians and great naturalists born in China around 200 BCE to 200 CE. Crouched as I was in that Exmoor field, I pored over the characters, and immediately on getting home retreated to my study to complete the translation. It was finished in a few weeks – and needed little revision. Surrounded by the gentle hills of the West Country, there was an undeniable affinity with those seers of Western China. In my copy of old Zhuangzi,1 a section on the ‘hearts of the ancients’ explains how the sincerity and integrity of the one searching for meaning in these texts may reveal a true affinity of souls, how the hearts of the ancient and the present may easily and graciously become one. This small book is dated around 820 CE, the heyday of Mahayana Buddhism in China, and was written by the Daoist practitioner Shi Jianwu (780–861 CE). He was a prominent figure in the ancient and by then thoroughly tangled so- called Zhong-Lu (鍾呂) tradition of internal alchemy (neidan), or self-