Qiu Xuanqing丘玄清

Style & Daoist names

Qiu Yuanjing, sobriquet Yungu

Period

Late Yuan–Early Ming

Dates

1327 — 1393

School

Quanzhen (Complete Perfection) Daoism, Sanfeng Lineage

Role

Daoshi (Daoist Priest)Minister of the Court of Imperial Sacrificesdisciple of Zhang Sanfeng

Birthplace

Fuping (present-day Fuping, Shaanxi)

Places of activity

Wudang Mountains

Life

Qiu Xuanqing was a native of Fuping in Shaanxi, a Quanzhen Daoist priest of the late Yuan and early Ming who studied under Zhang Sanfeng on Mount Wudang — one of the few disciples of Zhang Sanfeng documented in surviving sources — and later served as abbot of the Wulong Palace on Mount Wudang. During the Hongwu reign he was summoned to Nanjing for his renowned virtue, and Emperor Hongwu, impressed by his ability to pray for rain, appointed him Investigating Censor and later promoted him to Chief Minister of the Court of Imperial Sacrifices, in charge of the sacrifices at the ancestral temples — making him one of the few Daoist priests to hold high office at court in the early Ming. He died in the twenty-sixth year of the Hongwu reign (1393). Qiu Xuanqing's activities are recorded in the Gazetteer of Mount Taihe, the Great Marchmount, and his relationship with Zhang Sanfeng offers an important clue to the rise of Wudang Daoism in the early Ming, forming part of the historical background to the Yongle Emperor's search for Zhang Sanfeng and his great reconstruction of Wudang. His epitaph and biographical materials show that Zhang Sanfeng was indeed active on Mount Wudang in the late Yuan and early Ming and had disciples, a point often cited as evidence that Zhang Sanfeng was a genuine historical figure.

Contributions & Influence

• As a disciple of Zhang Sanfeng, he carried on the Wudang Daoist tradition
• As a Daoist priest who rose to Chief Minister of the Court of Imperial Sacrifices, he represents early Ming Daoist participation in court politics
• As abbot of the Wulong Palace on Mount Wudang, he represents Wudang Daoism before the Yongle Emperor's great reconstruction of the mountain