Sun Xuanqing孙玄清

Style & Daoist names

Style name Jinshan, and Mountain Recluse of Sea and Peak, Styled Ziyang, Patriarch of the Jinshan Lineage

Period

Ming

Dates

1517 — 1569

School

Quanzhen (Complete Perfection) Daoism, Longmen (Dragon Gate) Lineage of Quanzhen, Jinshan Lineage of Quanzhen

Role

Longmen Daoist priestFounder of the Jinshan Lineage

Birthplace

Shouguang (present-day Shouguang, Shandong)

Places of activity

Mount Lao (Laoshan), Taiqing Palace, Laoshan

Life

Sun Xuanqing, a native of Shouguang, Shandong, was a Ming-dynasty Quanzhen Daoist priest of Mount Lao, of the fourth (some sources say fifth) generation of the Longmen lineage, and founder of the Jinshan lineage. As a young man he entered Daoism because of an eye ailment, first residing at Minghsia Cave on Mount Lao, then studying under Li Xiantuo at Mount Tiecha, and afterward traveling to study at Huangshi Palace and the White Cloud Temple, where he received the transmission of Longmen. In the thirty-seventh year of the Jiajing reign (1558) he was summoned to the capital, where he prayed for rain with efficacy, and was granted the title "Perfected Ziyang, Left Chief Instructor and State-Protecting Celestial Master" (according to one account); on returning to Mount Lao he founded the "Jinshan lineage" of his own, a branch of the Longmen lineage, centered on the Taiqing Palace and Minghsia Cave of Mount Lao, and transmitted down to the present, its generation-name poem still in use among Quanzhen Daoists of the Jiaodong region. According to stele inscriptions, Sun Xuanqing's dates are 1517–1569.

Contributions & Influence

• Founded the Jinshan lineage, a branch of Longmen, as the main line of Quanzhen Daoism on Mount Lao
• Revived Daoism on Mount Lao, laying the foundation for the transmission centered on the Taiqing Palace and Minghsia Cave
• Traveled to the capital during the Jiajing reign to pray for rain, bringing court attention to Daoism on Mount Lao

Legends

Tradition holds that after entering Daoism because of an eye ailment, he was cured through arduous cultivation on Mount Lao; this is a legendary account.