Ge Chaofu葛巢甫

Style & Daoist names

Grandnephew of Ge Xuan

Period

Eastern Jin

Dates

? — ?

School

Lingbao (Numinous Treasure) School

Role

Daoshi (Daoist Priest)Composer of ScripturesFounder of the Lingbao School

Birthplace

Danyang Jurong (present-day Jurong, Jiangsu)

Places of activity

Mount Gezao

Life

Ge Chaofu, a member of the Ge clan of Jurong, Danyang, in the late Eastern Jin, was a great-nephew of Ge Hong and a descendant of Ge Xuan's line. His activities are recorded chiefly in the "Narrative Preface" (Xulu) of Tao Hongjing's Zhengao (Declarations of the Perfected): "Ge Chaofu fabricated the Lingbao [scriptures], and their teaching spread widely," indicating that around the Longan era (397–401) he compiled a body of scriptures presented as sermons of the Celestial Worthy of Primordial Beginning transmitted through the mediation of Ge Xuan — the corpus later known as the "Ancient Lingbao Scriptures." These scriptures claimed descent from two lineages, the Old Scriptures of the Primordial Beginning and the New Scriptures of the Immortal Duke (Ge Xuan), and combined Shangqing visualization practice, the Buddhist concepts of kalpa-cycles and rebirth, and Celestial Master ritual protocols to create a new doctrine of universal salvation and the attainment of immortality for all — the Wondrous Scripture of the Upper Chapters on Limitless Salvation (Duren jing) being its representative text. Ge Chaofu's scripture-compilation transformed the Ge clan's immortality tradition from individual cultivation into a scriptural system with implications of universal salvation, directly giving rise to the Lingbao School and profoundly influencing Lu Xiujing's Three Caverns classification and the whole of Southern Dynasties Daoism. Almost nothing is recorded of his birth, death, or specific activities; scholars have relied chiefly on the Zhengao and the Dunhuang manuscript Catalogue of Lingbao Scriptures to date his scripture-compiling activity.

Contributions & Influence

• Compiled the Ancient Lingbao Scriptures around the Longan era, laying the foundation for the scriptural system of the Lingbao School
• Introduced the concepts of kalpa-cycles, universal salvation, and retreat rites (zhaifa), transforming the landscape of Daoist soteriology
• Transformed the Ge clan's immortality tradition into a scriptural tradition of universal scope
• Provided Lu Xiujing with the direct material for his compilation of the Three Caverns scriptures

Works

• (Composed) the Wondrous Scripture of the Upper Chapters on Limitless Salvation (Duren Jing)
• (Composed) the Taishang Dongxuan Lingbao scriptures (the corpus of ancient Lingbao scriptures)

Legends

The Lingbao scriptures claim to have been transmitted by the Celestial Worthy of Primordial Beginning to the Great Lord of the Dao (Taishang Daojun), and then handed down through Ge Xuan — a sacred transmission lineage recounted by the scriptures themselves, not historical fact.