Intial Truth’s Preceptual Statutes (excerpt)
天尊曰：三皈依戒者，天地之樞紐，神仙之根基，發行之初門，建心之元兆。運氣含靈，冥真入理，包羅有象，朕形无外。持之者，天地神明慶快，心智耳目開張，萬物敬畏，六腑和樂，眾真衛護羣生，父母長世不遺，人身交泰。
The heavenly worthies said: ‘The precepts of the three refuges are the pivot of the heavens and earth, the foundation of spirit immortality, the initial gateway for developing one’s practice, and the primordial starting point for establishing one’s mind. They circulate qi in those who contain the divine, coincide with the truth, and [enable people] to enter the [heavenly] principle. They encompass and enmesh all that possesses a physical appearance, and no phenomenon or physical substance is beyond [its scope]. The spirit lights of the heavens and earth will celebrate in delight the upholders [of these precepts]. Wisdom will open up and expand in the minds [of upholders of the precepts], and [the acuity of] their eyes and ears [will be sharpened]. In awe, the ten thousand beings will revere them. The six fu-viscera [of the upholders] will be joyous in their [state of] harmony. The myriads of Realized [Ones] will protect and keep safe this group of students . Their fathers and mothers will live long lives and will never be abandoned. And the bodies [of the upholders] will be at peace, [their yin and yang] intermingling. [1]
-from Wang Kunyang, Intial Truth’s Preceptual Statutes, appearing in ‘The Dragon Gate’s Core Methods’ (Purple Cloud Press, forthcoming). If you want to be informed about this release, sign up at: www.purplecloudinstitute.com/register
[1] In this sentence the word ‘intermingling’ [jiao 交] specifically refers to yang reaching down and yin reaching up to coalesce, as in the ‘Peace’ [tai 泰] hexagram ䷊, #11 in the King Wen sequence. This hexagram is depicted with the earth trigram ☷ [kun 坤] above and the heaven trigram ☰ [qian 乾] below. Thus, what may at first seem negative as an upside-down world is in fact positive since the yin above is descending and the yang below ascending, resulting in an interaction between the heavens and earth. To illustrate this point, the ‘Obstruction’ [pi/fou 否] hexagram ䷋, #12 is the opposite of this, with heaven above and earth below, in which case the yang ascends further while the yin descends, causing the two to drift away from each other without any interaction between them. As a result of this separation, things become stagnant in the centre.
Image: Canonization Scroll of Li Zhong, Unidentified artist
17th century, illustrating the investiture of a local god into the Daoist pantheon (Metmuseum)
