Preface to the Five Talismans of Lingbao太上灵宝五符序

Also known as

Lingbao wufu jing (Scripture of the Five Talismans of Lingbao), Five Talismans of Lingbao, Taishang Dongxuan Lingbao Wufu Xu (Preface to the Five Talismans of Lingbao)

Author / transmission

Anonymous

Period

Late Han to Eastern Jin · The core legend of the Five Talismans holds that they originated with Yu the Great and were obtained by King Helü of Wu; the text was already circulating by the end of the Han and is recorded in Ge Hong's Baopuzi. The received three-chapter text was composed roughly in the Eastern Jin, predating the Lingbao scriptural lineage produced by Ge Chaofu.

Canon division

Dongxuan section, Divine Talismans category

Collected in

Daoist Canon of the Zhengtong Era, Dongxuan Section, Shenfu Category

Category

Early Daoist Scriptures

Fascicles

3 juan

Synopsis

The Preface to the Five Talismans of Lingbao is the fountainhead text of the Lingbao scriptural lineage, and it is from this work that the name "Lingbao" (Numinous Treasure) derives. The book relates that Yu the Great obtained the "Five Talismans of Lingbao" while controlling the floods, and hid them at Baoshan in Lake Dongting, from which the Elder of Dragon Might later retrieved them at the request of King Helü of Wu. The received text's first chapter recounts the origin of the Five Talismans and the doctrine of Lingbao ingestion and wearing of talismans; the middle chapter records formulas for ingesting herbal medicines, cinnabar, the essences of sun and moon, and for circulating breath and swallowing mist; the final chapter contains the talismans of the Five Directions and Five Emperors together with methods for wearing talismans, summoning spirits, and subduing evil, appended with the "Method of Ingesting the Five Sprouts" (absorbing the qi of the five directions). This scripture preserves the ingestion and life-nourishing arts of the masters of methods of the Han and Wei and the cult of the Five Directions and Five Emperors, and is the key text marking the transition from Fangxian Dao to Lingbao scriptural teaching; its talismans of the Five Directions were absorbed and transformed in the late Eastern Jin by Ge Chaofu's Perfected Writs in Red Script of the Five Elders into the "Five Perfected Writs."

Key Ideas

• The Five Talismans of Lingbao and the Five Directions and Five Emperors
• Circulating breath, ingesting the Five Sprouts, and taking cinnabar and herbal medicines
• The legend of Yu and Baoshan
• The transition from the arts of the masters of methods to scriptural teaching

Structure

Three chapters: the first recounts the origin and methods, the second gives ingestion formulas, and the third contains the Five Talismans and their use.

Editions

• Daoist Canon of the Zhengtong Era edition
• Zhonghua Daozang, vol. 4

Translations

• Studied by Gil Raz in The Emergence of Daoism (2012)

Full Text & Online Resources

• Wikipedia: Lingbao School
• CTEXT search

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