Mount Tiantai天台山
- Type
- Daoist Sacred Mountains
- Location
- China · Zhejiang · Tiantai, Taizhou · North of Tiantai County; the main peak, Huading, rises 1,098 meters
- Coordinates
- 29.25, 121.05 Map ↗
- School
- Shangqing (Highest Clarity) School, Southern Lineage of the Golden Elixir (Nanzong), Quanzhen (Complete Perfection) Daoism
- First built
- Three Kingdoms Wu (Ge Xuan transmitted the teaching here) · Sixth of the Ten Great Grotto-Heavens, the Shangqing Yuping Grotto-Heaven (some say at Mount Chicheng); Sima Chengzhen of the Tang resided at Tongbai Temple; Zhang Boduan of the Southern Song was the founding patriarch of the Southern Lineage
- Heritage status
- National Scenic Area (1988)Guoqing Temple, Major Historical and Cultural Site Protected at the National Level (2006) (Buddhist)
Overview
Mount Tiantai is a renowned mountain sacred to both Buddhism and Daoism: Guoqing Temple, the ancestral court of the Buddhist Tiantai school, stands alongside the Daoist Tongbai Palace. On the Daoist side, Ge Xuan of the Wu kingdom during the Three Kingdoms period compounded elixirs here, and from the Jin through the Tang eminent Daoists such as Xu Mai, Sima Chengzhen, Xu Lingfu, and Du Guangting all cultivated the Dao at Tiantai; Sima Chengzhen resided at the Tongbai Temple, where he wrote his works and was repeatedly summoned by Emperor Xuanzong. Within Mount Tiantai, Mount Chicheng is the sixth of the Ten Great Grotto-Heavens (the Shangqing Yuping Grotto-Heaven), Yujing Cave is counted among the Thirty-six Lesser Grotto-Heavens, and Mount Tiantai itself is listed among the Seventy-two Blessed Lands. Zhang Boduan (Perfected Ziyang) of the Northern Song was a native of Tiantai; he wrote Awakening to Reality and founded the Southern Lineage of the Golden Elixir, and the Tongbai Palace at Tiantai is honored as the ancestral court of the Southern Lineage. The principal Daoist sites include the Tongbai Palace, Yujing Cave, Qiongtai Immortal Valley, Mount Chicheng, and Zhang Boduan's native place; the original site of the Tongbai Palace was submerged by the Tongbai Reservoir in 1959, and the temple was rebuilt on a new site in the 2000s.
Highlights
- Tongbai Palace
- Yujing Cave, Mount Chicheng
- Qiongtai Immortal Valley
- Huading Peak
- Sites Associated with Perfected Ziyang