Nine Elixirs : methods

The Nine Elixirs, which is translated below in Chapter 9, is one of the few extant sources to give details on the entire ritual sequence of the alchemical practice, from the ceremony of transmission to the ingestion of the elixirs. It consists of three main parts, respectively concerned with (i) an introduction about the revelation of the scripture, the benefits of the alchemical medicines, and various ritual rules (2) the methods for making two preliminary compounds, called Mysterious and Yellow (xuanhuang) and Mud of the Six-and-One (liuyi ni) and (3) the methods and properties of the Nine Elixirs, which are nine separate preparations—an adept is not required to make and ingest all of them, but only one—related to each other by the main phases of their compounding and by the benefits that they grant. ... 

In the Inner Chapters, Ge Hong provides an extended summary of the introduction, followed by descriptions of the properties of each elixir. Both correspond to the received version of the Scripture " Ge Hong s synopsis is quoted in four works in the Daoist Canon, testifying to the prestige that the Nine Elixirs enjoyed also beyond the waidan adepts. This prestige is also attested by the existence of other texts based on the Nine Elixirs, which include two works in poetry, a short piece entitled Explanations ( Jue, possibly derived from a lost third recension of the scripture) concerned with the first of the Nine Elixirs, and especially the Secret Written Instructions on the Elixirs of the Nine Tripods ( Jiuding dan yin wenjue ), which provides valuable details on all nine methods. 

To receive the methods of the Nine Elixirs, the disciple throws golden figurines of a man and a fish into an east-flowing stream as tokens of his oath (shi) The same rite is performed to receive the method of the Golden Liquor ... 

A similar recipe for the Pellet for Expelling the Demons is found in Sun Simiao s anthology of Taiqing methods, the Essential Instructions from the Scripture of the Elixirs of Great Clarity. The corresponding talisman is not reproduced either in the commentary to the Scripture of Great Clarity or in Sun Simiao s work, but is found in the commentary to the Nine Elixirs (see Fig. z) together with a third similar recipe for the Pellet. ... 

Both methods quoted above are also found in the commentary to the Nine Elixirs, which calls them Method for Making the Chamber to Sublimate the Elixirs ( Feidan zuowu fa ) and Method for Making the Stove ( Zuozao fa ), respectively. The author of the commentary, however, adds that these were old methods. By his time, he says, it was enough to eliminate the contaminated soil, build a mound of clean loam, and bury a talisman under the crucible. 

Divine Mud (shenni). In the methods of the Nine Elixirs, this mud is made of alum (fanshi), Turkestan salt (rongyan), lake salt (luxian), arsenolite yu-shi), oyster shells (muli), red clay (chishi zhi), and talc (huashi). The seven ingredients are pounded, heated for nine days and nights in an iron vessel, pounded again, sieved, and then soaked in a Flowery Pond (huachi). The crucible is luted first with this mud, then with the mud of Mysterious and Yellow, and finally is left to dry in the sun for ten daysd ... 

According to the received text of the Nine Elixirs, the main steps of each method are the following. The ingredients (see Table 4) are placed in an earthenware crucible, which is closed with another overturned crucible." The vessel is luted with the Mud of the Six-and-One and a mud of Mysterious and Yellow after it has dried, it is placed on the fire. At the end of the required number of days it is left to cool and is then opened. The elixir is collected with a chicken feather and is added to other substances. In some instances, it is said to be ready in other instances, it must be placed in the crucible and heated again. If the essence of the ingredients does not coagulate under the upper part of the crucible, the entire process should be repeated. 

The following descriptions of each method are based on the directions given in the Scripture of the Nine Elixirs, the Secret Instructions, and the Scripture of the Liquid Pearl. 

As remarked in the note by the editor of the Nine Elixirs, the methods for liquefying realgar and cinnabar are found in the Sanshiliu shuifa (Methods of the Thirty-six Aqueous Solutions CT 930, ib-2a and 2b trans. Ts ao, Ho, and Needham, An Early Mediaeval Chinese Alchemical Text on Aqueous Solutions, 125-26). Both are quoted in the Jiudan jingjue, S.qa-b. The Secret Instructions, 20.7b 9a, gives the method... 

The name of this elixir can also be rendered as Cinnabar Flower, where flower denotes the sublimate and cinnabar is its color as said below, the elixir sometimes will be of a vivid scarlet color like cinnabar. The Taiqing jinye shendan jing, i.iyb-ihb, describes a similar method where cinnabar is refined with realgar and orpiment as the Mysterious and Yellow does in the methods of the Nine Elixirs, these two minerals incorporate Yin and Yang in the crucible. For another translation of this section of the Nine Elixirs see Ware, Alchemy, Medicine and Religion in the China of a.d. 320, 78-79. 

As is suggested by a sentence below, where the crucible is called red earthenware crucible of the Mysterious and Yellow, the vessel should also be luted with a layer of the quicksilver-lead compound. The same is stated further on in a reference to the method of the First Elixir (1.14a). The direction to cover the cinnabar with lake salt instead is not given in the other texts on the Nine Elixirs. 

The sentence in brackets, which is missing in the received version of the Nine Elixirs, is found in the Explanations of the Liquid Pearl, 1.5a. The omission in the Nine Elixirs is certainly due to a copying error the text says here that heating takes thirty-six days, and adds below that if the whole process has to be repeated, it would require seventy-two days altogether. The summary in the Baopu zi, 4.74, also has thirty-six days. On the heating method in the Taiqing texts see pp. 105-7. 

As is made clear in the Secret Instructions, 20.iia-i3b, the section on the Second Elixir consists of three parts that concern the Divine Tally, the Yellow Essence, and the Reverted Elixir of the Divine Tally, respectively. A fourth method, mentioned and very concisely described in the Secret Instructions, 20.i3b-i4a, does not correspond to any of those found in the texts on the Nine Elixirs. The current text of the Baopu zi, 4.75, states that this elixir is called Divine Elixir shendan) or Divine Tally. Three texts that quote Ge Hong s summary of the Nine Elixirs, however, have only Divine Tally see Jiudan jingjue, 2.2a, Shen-xian jinzhuo jing = Baopu zi shenxian jinzhuo jing CT 917), 3.1a, and Yunji qiqian (Seven Lots from the Bookcase of the Clouds CT 1032), 67.7b. 

The method referred to by the editor of the Nine Elixirs is described in the Liquid Pearl, i.i6a. 

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