Western Lineage of Internal Alchemy (Xipai)内丹西派
- Also known as
- Western Lineage (Xipai), Li Hanxu School, Yuanqiao Neipian School
- Type
- School
- Period
- Qing
- Founded
- During the Daoguang era of the Qing (c. 1840s), Li Xiyue
- Founder
- Li Xiyue
- Derived from
- Zhong–Lü Internal Alchemy Tradition
- Region
- The area around Leshan and Mount Emei, Sichuan
- Status
- Extant — As a lineage of internal-alchemical learning, it continues to be transmitted among popular and overseas communities of internal-alchemy practitioners, though it has no formal religious organization or temple institution.
Overview
The Western Lineage of Internal Alchemy (Xipai) was founded by Li Xiyue (1806–1856), a native of Leshan in Sichuan during the Qing dynasty, and takes its name from its location in western Shu, in contrast to Lu Xixing's Dongpai in the Jiangnan region of the Ming. Li Xiyue, originally named Yuanzhi and styled Pingquan, self-styled Hanxu and Yuanjiao Waishi, claimed to have met Lü Dongbin and Zhang Sanfeng in person on Mount Emei and received elixir methods from them; he wrote the Secret Purport of the Three Vehicles, Talks on the Aperture of the Dao, Nine Stages of Refining the Mind, and Annotated Commentary on the Thirteen Classics of the Most High, and compiled the Complete Works of Zhang Sanfeng, venerating Zhang Sanfeng as his founding patriarch and tracing his own lineage back through the 'Yinxian (Hidden Immortals) Lineage' — Laozi, Yin Xi, Mayi, Chen Tuan, Huolong, and Zhang Sanfeng. The alchemical method of Xipai holds together 'clarity, stillness, and naturalness' with dual cultivation of yin and yang, propounding theories such as the 'pre-celestial and post-celestial, the two pneumas, the three vehicles,' and the 'nine stages of refining the mind,' advancing through the mind-methods of 'gathering the mind, nourishing the mind, and refining the mind' in successive stages; compared with Dongpai it places greater emphasis on entering through mind and nature, with finely elaborated and systematic terminology. Li Xiyue's disciples included Wu Tianzhi, and later figures such as Wang Dongting (author of the Recorded Sayings on Elixir Instructions of the Mountain Man Tizhen) and Xu Haiyin; transmitters identifying with Xipai persisted from the Republican era into the present. Xipai's compilation of the Complete Works of Zhang Sanfeng also shaped later understanding of Wudang Daoism. Together with Dongpai, the Central Lineage, the Wu-Liu School, and others, Xipai forms one of the main theoretical lineages of Ming–Qing internal-alchemical scholarship.
Core Doctrine
It venerates Patriarch Lü and Zhang Sanfeng, taking clarity, stillness, and non-action as its substance and dual cultivation of yin and yang as its function; it holds the 'pre-celestial true and unified qi' to be the great medicine, and sets out the 'three vehicles' (a metaphor for circulation and transport) and the sequence of 'nine stages of refining the mind'; it stresses that 'the mind is sovereign,' with the dual cultivation of nature and life governed by the refinement of the mind, and holds that the way of the elixir accords with Confucian and Buddhist principles. Xipai's terminology is dense and elaborate, and it is regarded as one of the great syntheses of Qing-dynasty internal-alchemical theory.
Practice & Ritual
Quiet sitting to concentrate the spirit, mind and breath held together, gathering the mind and refining the self, gathering the medicine and refining the elixir, transport by the 'three vehicles,' and gentle nurturing to shed the mortal frame; commentary and lecturing on the classics and spirit-writing revelation were also early features of the school. Xipai also placed emphasis on master–disciple dialogue and the compilation of recorded sayings; late-Qing and early-Republican texts such as Wang Dongting's Recorded Sayings on Elixir Instructions of the Mountain Man Tizhen record its methods of practice. Its techniques are still transmitted among contemporary practitioners of internal alchemy.
Transmission
Claimed transmission of methods from Lü Dongbin and Zhang Sanfeng → Li Xiyue → Wu Tianzhi and others → Wang Dongting → Republican-era transmitters such as Xu Haiyin and Wei Yao → transmission under the Xipai name continuing into the present. Together with Dongpai, the Central Lineage, the Wu-Liu School, and others, Xipai forms one of the main theoretical lineages of Ming–Qing internal-alchemical scholarship, and its theory of the 'nine stages of refining the mind' has had considerable influence on contemporary internal-alchemical research.