Journey to the West of the Perfected Changchun长春真人西游记

Also known as

Journey to the West (Li Zhichang)

Author / transmission

Li Zhichang

Period

Yuan · Li Zhichang (1193–1256) recorded Qiu Chuji's journey west in answer to Genghis Khan's summons, 1220–1224, completing the work around the twenty-second year of the reign of the Yuan Taizu (1228).

Canon division

Zhengyi Section

Collected in

Daoist Canon of the Zhengtong Era, Zhengyi Section

Category

Immortal Biographies

Fascicles

2 juan

Synopsis

Journey to the West of the Perfected Changchun is the first-hand record kept by Li Zhichang, a disciple of Qiu Chuji, of his master's journey in answer to a summons from Genghis Khan — from Laizhou in Shandong, through Yanjing, the Mongolian steppe, and the Altai Mountains, to Samarkand and on to the camp beneath the snow-capped Hindu Kush, where he had audience with Genghis Khan, and of his return journey to Yanjing. The first scroll records the mountains, rivers, climate, customs, and local products encountered en route, together with poems composed along the way; the second records three discussions of the Dao with Genghis Khan (“reverence for Heaven and love for the people as the foundation,” “purity of mind and the paring away of desire as essential”), his return east, and his charge over Daoist affairs throughout the realm, with Genghis Khan's edict appended. This work is a first-hand historical source for the study of thirteenth-century Central Asian geography, early Mongol history, and the flourishing of Quanzhen Daoism, and a celebrated work in the history of Daoism and of contact between China and the West. It was discovered in the Daoist Canon and championed by the Qing scholar Qian Daxin, and has since been translated into English by Arthur Waley and annotated in translation by Emil Bretschneider.

Key Ideas

• Qiu Chuji's journey west to have audience with Genghis Khan
• The exhortation to cease killing and to revere Heaven while loving the people
• A first-hand record of Central Asian geography and customs
• The beginning of the favor shown to Quanzhen Daoism by the Yuan court

Structure

Two scrolls: the first on the journey and its poems, the second on the discussions of the Dao, the return east, and the appended imperial edict.

Editions

• Edition in the Daoist Canon of the Zhengtong Era
• Wang Guowei, Annotated Journey to the West of the Perfected Changchun
• Dang Baohai (annot. and trans.), Journey to the West of the Perfected Changchun (Hebei People's Publishing House, 2001)
• Collated and annotated edition by Shang Yanbin and others

Commentaries

• Wang Guowei, Annotated Journey to the West of the Perfected Changchun

Translations

• Arthur Waley, The Travels of an Alchemist (1931)
• English translation by Emil Bretschneider (1888)

Full Text & Online Resources

• Wikipedia: Journey to the West of the Perfected Changchun
• Wikisource: Journey to the West of the Perfected Changchun

Related scriptures

Related figures