A Study on the Daoist Texts of Sublimation Ritual in Song-Yuan Period

Song-Yuan Daoism witnessed a flourish in the production of Daoist texts, especially ritual texts, along with so-called "ritual movement". This thesis is a comprehensive study of the liturgical texts of sublimation ritual (liandu) compiled in Song-Yuan period collected in the Ming Daoist Canon.;Firstly, I try to trace the "pre-history" of "refinement of water and fire (shuihuo lian)" in the Shangqing and Lingbao texts of the Six Dynasties to shed some light on the connection between Song-Yuan liandu ritual and medieval Daoist tradition. Absorbing five sprouts (fu wuya ), as an important way of individual practice, has found its way into Song-Yuan Lingbao dada and Lingbao liandu ritual as well.;Secondly, through a detailed study of liandu texts in the Lingbao manuals, including their ritual programs and various talismans (fu), I unveil that Lingbao liandu ritual is composed of wuya lian, jiutian lian, in addition to the shuihuo lian, which has drawn most scholarly attention. Both ways of refinement are inherited from early Daoist tradition, one of which from absorbing five sprouts, and the other of which from Nine Heaven tradition. Divine Empyrean (shenxiao) Movement also has a significant influence on liandu ritual in the light of some sets of fu taken from Shenxiao texts and integration of nine empyrean of Shenxiao tradition as well.;Thirdly, we can identify a special kind of liandu ritual texts, which is characteristic of being a handbook for one to conduct a complete salvation ritual, including breaking the hell, summoning the souls, bathing, feeding and refining them, just by the master himself sitting in a chamber. We call them jilian texts.;Finally, some liandu ritual texts of new ritual movements will be studied. Despite of a totally different system of fu, they still share some basic ritual elements with Lingbao liandu riual, say, shuihuo lian. What else merits our attention is that they explain true water and true fire (zhen shuihuo) in terms of kan and li , which is typical of symbolistic system in the internal alchemy (neidan).