Peng Xiao彭晓

Style & Daoist names

Xiuchuan, Zhenyizi, Peng Zhenyi

Period

Later Shu, Five Dynasties

Dates

? — 955

Role

Commentator on Alchemical ScripturesInternal Alchemy Masters

Birthplace

Yongkang (present-day Dujiangyan, Sichuan)

Places of activity

Mount Qingcheng

Life

Peng Xiao, courtesy name Xiuchuan, styled Zhenyizi, was a Daoist priest of the Later Shu during the Five Dynasties. A native of Yongkang, he served the Shu state as a Court Gentleman and Magistrate of Jintang, and was devoted to the Daoist arts, styling himself Zhenyizi. During the Guangzheng era of the Later Shu (around 947) he wrote the three-scroll Zhouyi cantong qi fenzhang tongzhen yi (周易参同契分章通真义, The Zhouyi Cantong Qi Divided into Chapters, with a Commentary Penetrating Its True Meaning), dividing the Zhouyi cantong qi into ninety chapters and providing a commentary, appended with the Mingjing tujue (明镜图诀, Instructions on the Chart of the Bright Mirror). This is the earliest complete surviving commentary on the Zhouyi cantong qi; it interprets the text with a purport combining internal and external alchemy, holding that "the cultivation of the elixir follows the same path as the creative transformations of Heaven and Earth," and it exerted great influence on Song-dynasty commentators such as Zhang Boduan, Zhu Xi, and Yu Yan, as well as serving as an important basis for establishing the text of the Zhouyi cantong qi. He also wrote the Huandan neixiang jinyaoshi (还丹内象金钥匙, The Golden Key to the Inner Images of the Reverted Elixir) and the Huolong shuihu lun (火龙水虎论, Treatise on the Fire Dragon and Water Tiger), among other works. He died in the second year of Xiande (955). Peng Xiao is a pivotal figure in the history of interpreting the Zhouyi cantong qi as it shifted from a text of external alchemy to one of internal alchemy.

Contributions & Influence

• Wrote the Zhouyi cantong qi fenzhang tongzhen yi, the earliest complete surviving commentary on the Zhouyi cantong qi
• Advanced the internal-alchemical interpretation of the Zhouyi cantong qi

Works

• Zhouyi Cantongqi Fenzhang Tongzhenyi (Chapter-Divided True Meaning of the Zhouyi Cantong qi)
• Zhouyi Cantongqi Dingqi Ge Mingjing Tu (Illustrated Bright Mirror to the Song of the Tripod in the Zhouyi Cantong qi)
• Huandan Neixiang Jin Yaoshi (Golden Key to the Inner Images of the Reverted Elixir)