Neidan

We have been lied to about what real Pythagorean harmonics alchemy is. The lie started with Philolaus who wrote a book, even though he was not a real practitioner of the Pythagorean training, requiring five years of silence meditation as incubation. The lies in this book were then spread by Plato and Archytas and powerful lies they were! They created Western civilization which has enabled very fancy materialistic technology, at great expense to ecology and social justice around the world. Aristotle critiqued the lies spread by Plato but Aristotle did not know the real truth of Pythagorean philosophy. By then, as Dr. Peter Kingsley has pointed out, it was too late.

In fact the secret of Pythagorean alchemy was known in ancient Egypt since 2/3 was the sacred fraction there, as well as in ancient Sumeria and ancient Dravidian culture and ancient Chinese culture – going back to the original human culture, the San Bushmen from at least 70,000 years ago! Just as Pythagoras means "snake-master" so too did the San Bushmen teach that N/om as snake energy is sacred and the ancient Greeks knew this was the reproductive life force energy that is ionized into the cerebrospinal fluid. For example ejaculation is mainly lecithin and lecithin is what myelinates the neurons so that more electromagnetic charge can be stored up in the body.

And so the One was also known as the Counter-Fire that exists in the Underworld and as the pan pipes blow this creates the One as the Fire and light of the Universe. So the Pan Pipes were the original Harmonia "breathing" that feeds the spirit light energy. Or in other words the secret, as Empedocles taught, is to visualize the fire underneath the water in the body – to reverse the Tetraktys based on the complementary opposites of the Perfect Fifth and Perfect Fourth – so that more Air or Aion energy (ionized Snake kundalini) energy is created, called Qi or Prana by the ancients in China and India.

Meditation teachers will often insist that students “sit through” the pain of numb or sore legs. While I am not suggesting whether or not you should do this, after some research and experimentation I have found that the following acupressure points help to relieve soreness in my legs and bring the feeling back when they’ve gone “frozen” from prolonged sitting. These points are also indicated in Traditional Chinese Medicine for pain and numbness in the legs.

The sequence below may be especially useful at the beginning of a meditation session if you are experiencing discomfort while adjusting to a new cross-legged sitting posture. Though I do not recommend unnecessarily fidgeting around with acupressure points during meditation, these points can be very helpful as a last resort before breaking posture in certain situations.

Estudio del contenido y la estructura del texto "padre de todos los libros de alquimia de China". No existe traducción al castellano de este tratado imprescindible para comprender los fundamentos de la alquimia china. Este estudio se coloca bajo licencia Creative Commons. Si vas a usarlo de algún modo, por favor, cita la fuente. © Jordi Vilà i Oliveras (2007)

Awakening to Reality (Wuzhen pian) is one of the most important and best-known Taoist alchemical texts. Written in the eleventh century, it describes in a poetical form, and in a typically cryptic and allusive language, several facets of Neidan, or internal alchemy. This book presents the first part of the text, consisting of sixteen poems, which contain a concise but comprehensive exposition of Neidan. In addition to notes that intend to clarify the meaning of the more obscure points, the book also contains selections from a commentary dating from the late eighteenth century, which is distinguished by the use of a lucid and plain language.

This anthology presents complete or partial translations of sixteen important works belonging to the Taoist tradition of Neidan, or Internal Alchemy. While the selections are far from covering the whole field of Neidan—a virtually impossible task, given its width and variety—they are representative of its main lineages and branches. Texts have been selected in this perspective and are arranged chronologically, in order to provide an overview not only of Neidan, but also of the history of its discourses and practices. Four of the sixteen texts are integrally translated. Six texts and two commentaries are translated here (entirely or partially) for the first time into English. The book is concluded by several tables and by an index of the main terms.

扶乩運動是影響明清以來道教信仰的一大因素，它以扶乩這種神啟活動為道教信仰活動的中心，促成了大量道教經本的撰著、編修、成書、發行。這種信仰形式也影響了清代道教醫書的撰寫、編纂和刊刻，為清代以來的醫學發展帶來了重要的影響與貢獻。本文以《醫道還元》這一部現今應用於中國24所中醫藥大學教學系統的道教醫書為例，揭示了清代道教扶乩信仰與道教醫書的著作、編修及流通之間的關係。通過有關這部醫書的成書與流通的細節，可以看到清代的儒家知識分子以道教扶乩信仰為中心的救世理想。他們以編修醫書為法，展開了拯救末劫的活動。而通過扶乩產生的神明訓示是推動清代醫書撰寫、編纂、註釋、刊刻和流通的重要因素。《醫道還元》的案例有助於了解道教扶乩信仰在全真、正一兩大正統道派以外作為「教外別傳」的情況。

Yidao huanyuan 醫道還元 is a text that demonstrates the interconnection and inter-relations between theories of neidan 內丹 and those of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). It has been identified as a Daoist medical text by TCM professionals and presented as such to students of the five-year medical degree programme in mainland China. Despite its influences on the medical field, the textual, historical and religious contexts of this scripture such as its authorship and various editions remain mostly unknown. Based on a comprehensive study of the various editions of Yidao huanyuan, this paper aims to resolve such issues and fill in the research gap, by understanding the historical, social and medical backgrounds, religious beliefs, and spirit-writing cult involved in its publication.
Through a detailed study of the earliest edition of Yidao huanyuan and related materials found, this paper will reveal the connection between the first appeared edition and the spirit-writing believes of its editors. They were a group of elites with official governmental titles in the Qing court, who not only edited and compiled the text, but also devoted themselves to funding and preserving the printing boards. The case of Yidao huanyuan revealed the fact that disciples of the spirit-writing movement would devote themselves to their religion in many ways. One of those was to edit Confucian, Buddhist, Daoist and medical texts that were demanded by the society at that time. This was especially true for the elite from the upper social class. They might not, on a superficial level, present themselves as a Daoist disciple or a member of a spirit-writing cult, or act in the name of their Daoist belief or a Daoist temple. However, by revealing their editing details and objectives, it was obvious that the religiosity behind their works was no different from that embedded in the spirit-writing movement. Daoist medical texts such as Yidao huanyuan had initially been a product of Daoist spirit-writing movement. They have impacted the development of TCM, though most medical scholarship has ignored this fact. The edited works of the elite could be identified as an extension of the spirit-writing movement in Qing
Daoism.

Chinese alchemy has a history of more than two thousand years, recorded from the 2nd century BCE to the present day. Its two main branches — Waidan (External Alchemy) and Neidan (Internal Alchemy) — share in part their doctrinal foundations but differ in the respective practices.

This PDF outlines the main stages of development of the Chinese alchemical tradition, and the analogies and differences among doctrines and practices of its main branches and lineages.

CONTENTS
Introduction
1. Origins of Waidan
2. The Taiqing (Great Clarity) Tradition
3. Taoist Meditation and the Origins of Neidan
4. The Cantong qi (Seal of the Unity of the Three)
5. Waidan After the Cantong qi
6. Main Neidan Lineages and Masters
7. Neidan: General Perspectives
8. The Internal Elixir and the View of the Human Being
9. The Practice of the Internal Elixir

Introduction: The most common association we as modern people have with the word " alchemy " is probably the image of our medieval ancestors in a smoky dungeon struggling to transform lead into gold. Certainly this aspect (called ​ chrysopoeia ​) has been a significant part of all traditions of alchemy, but probably an overemphasized one. Alchemy was primarily the (pre)scientific discipline of transmuting substances into one another, and was therefore based (in the European traditions) upon an Aristotelian worldview where the four elements constituted all substances, meaning these could be transmuted if one only knew how. The form of alchemy I would like to explore in this paper however is an internal one, and is based on a different worldview altogether. The Chinese tradition of internal alchemy (​ neidan ​) was preserved largely within the indigenous tradition of Daoism, which I will explicate in the first chapter. For starters the question I would like to pose is the following. ​ To what extent does the cosmological view of the body differ between the (first stage of) internal alchemy practice of the Longmen tradition and that of the Zhengyi Dao tradition?​ For the sake of brevity I will limit myself to the first stage of the practice of internal alchemy, also because this first stage reveals the most about the implicit worldview of this alchemical tradition, specifically about what the human body is, and how it relates to nature. In order to narrow the subject down even more I have chosen two modern exponents of internal alchemy, each coming from their own tradition, so this discussion stays relevant to the emergence of modern western spirituality as it draws from eastern traditions such as Daoism. First I will establish a base in Chinese/Daoist cosmology or worldview, and then the different " bodies " that this cosmology distinguishes, namely cosmic, national, social, and personal. The personal body being the place where internal alchemy occurs. Then I will look at these two traditions, and their interpretation of the process, to see to what extent these differ in view and method.

"Originally written for Chinese readers, this book provides a clear description of the Taoist practice of Internal Alchemy, or Neidan. The author outlines the stages of the alchemical practice and clarifies several relevant terms and notions, including Essence, Breath, and Spirit; the Cinnabar Fields; the "Fire Times"; and the Embryo. The book is based on the system of the Wuzhen pian (Awakening to Reality), one of the main sources of Internal Alchemy, and contains about two hundred quotations from original Taoist texts.

Wang Mu (1908-92) received the Longmen ordination in his youth. He taught Internal Alchemy (Neidan) and was held in high regard by both Taoist practitioners and scholars. He served as a board member of the China Taoist Association and was for some time in charge of its research activities. He is known outside China mainly for his annotated edition of the Wuzhen pian (Awakening to Reality), the text at the basis of the outline of Internal Alchemy that he provides in the present book.

Originally published as "Wuzhen pian danfa yaozhi" 「悟真篇」丹法要旨"

"Under an allusive poetical language and thick layers of images and symbols, The Seal of the Unity of the Three (Cantong qi) hides the exposition of the teachings that gave birth to Taoist Internal Alchemy, or Neidan.
          Traditionally attributed to Wei Boyang and dated to about 150 CE, The Seal of the Unity of the Three is concerned with three major subjects — Taoism (the way of "non-doing"), Cosmology (the system of the Book of Changes), and Alchemy — and joins them to one another into a unique doctrine. The charm of its verses, the depth of its discourse, and its enigmatic language inspired a large number of commentaries and other works, and attracted the attention not only of Taoist masters and adepts, but also of philosophers, cosmologists, and poets.
          In addition to a complete translation, this book contains a detailed introduction to the history and the teachings of The Seal of the Unity of the Three, explanations of each of its sections, and notes on its verses. Also included are several tables and pictures, an index of main subjects, and the complete Chinese text."

This book contains a complete translation of one of the main works by the eminent Taoist master Liu Yiming (1734-1821). Divided into 26 short chapters, Cultivating the Tao is at the same time a comprehensive overview of the basic principles of Taoism and an introduction to Taoist Internal Alchemy, or Neidan, written by one of the greatest representatives of this tradition.
          Liu Yiming was an 11th-generation master of the Longmen (Dragon Gate) lineage. Having recovered from severe illness in his youth, he undertook extended traveling that led him to meet his two main masters. In 1780, he visited the Qiyun mountains, in the present-day Gansu province, and settled there. He devoted the second half of his life to teaching and writing. His works mainly consist of writings on Neidan and of commentaries on major Neidan scriptures.
          Few other masters have illustrated the relation between Taoism and Internal Alchemy as clearly as Liu Yiming does in this book. Grafting Internal Alchemy into the teachings of the Book of the Way and Its Virtue (Daode jing) and of the later Taoist tradition, he shows how the way of the Golden Elixir can lead to the highest state of realization according to the Taoist principles.

In Permaculture the TLUD stove is a well-known documented energy saving cooking and heating device also called the "Chinese gasifier" and it appears to have originated from the ancient Kang bed-stove design, documented to at least 5200 years ago in China. Neidan Daoist alchemy can also be traced to similar ancient origins in China and amazingly it relies on the SAME mechanical principles as a transduction of physical energy into heat and light and force. The ancient Kang bed-stove energy is called "Dragon's Breath" which is also another name for the alchemical Neidan Qi energy of the Universe in Daoism.

This article reveals how the Kang bed-stove using a Bellows TLUD design and driven by the ancient water wheel power - is a direct parallel explanation for Daoist Neidan alchemy training.

Daoist hagiographic works depict the so-called "immortals" (xianren) as extraordinary human beings endowed with several powers, the most important of which is the ability to reach a life span of indefinite length with their ordinary bodies. When we look at other sources belonging to the traditions that evolved during the history of Daoism, a different picture emerges. These sources show that adepts make use of the physical body in order to generate a new person (shen) that is not subject to death.

Among others, early Daoist works (ca. 2nd-6th centuries) describe two main ways to attain immortality. The first is by going through a "simulated death" followed by the refining of the physical body, which then serves as a support for adepts to continue their practices. The second way consists in generating an inner "embryo" that is unaffected by death, and is the seed of one's rebirth as an immortal.

Internal Alchemy (Neidan), which developed from ca. 700, inherited elements of both practices. The refining of the basic components of one's own person results in the generation, gestation, and delivery of an embryo. In certain traditions, the embryo is seen as one's "dharma-body" (fashen), the unmanifested body of Buddhahood, which is free of birth and death. Despite the differences of perspective, here again the ordinary body is seen a support used to generate the immortal body.

This paper surveys some of the main features of the view of the human body in Daoist Internal Alchemy (Neidan 內丹). The first sections discuss three different terms that refer to the body; the metaphors — cosmological, political, theological, natural, and alchemical — used to describe it; and the use of the body as a support for the system of correspondences that tie the human being to the cosmos. On this background, the development of Internal Alchemy is closely related to earlier Daoist meditation practices on the inner gods. The figure of the Red Child (the innermost deity of the human being), in particular, bears close analogies to the 􏰀"embryo"􏰁 that alchemists generate through their practices􏰃 The final sections are concerned with the two main alchemical charts of the human body and with the use of the Buddhist concept of 􏰀dharma-body (fashen 法身)􏰄􏰁 which some Neidan masters describe as the true immortal body.

The following list attempts to cover most translations of traditional neidan texts into Western languages. Each entry includes the Chinese name of the text in pinyin and literary Chinese, its English translation, and its location in Daoist collections based on the The Taoist Canon : A Historical Companion to the Daozang (2004) edited by Kristofer Schipper and Fransiscus Verellen and the Title Index to Daoist Collections (2002) by Louis Komjathy. These are followed by locations of translations in Western languages, mainly English, based on ”Daoist Texts in Translation” (2003) by Louis Komjathy, Chinese Alchemy - An Annotated Bibliography of Works in Western Languages (2009), ”Translations of Neidan Texts into Western Languages” (2019) and ”Chinese Alchemy [A Critical Bibliography]” (2019) by Fabrizio Pregadio, and my own research. The text is then described shortly in its original version, which may not always correspond to the translated text version. The short descriptions are based on The Taoist Canon : A Historical Companion to the Daozang, The Routledge Encyclopedia of Taoism (2008) edited by Fabrizio Pregadio, as well as corresponding articles, studies and translations. Finally, the sources used are mentioned.

"The Thread of Dao: Unraveling Early Daoist Oral Traditions” explores the ancient medical and spiritual culture that blossomed into China’s most celebrated book of wisdom: "The Classic of Dao and Virtue (Dao De Jing, circa 500 BC)."

Instructions in the “art of the heart-mind” are said to have been transcribed and taught long before the time of Confucius, Lao Zi, and the Buddha, with the "Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine," the mythical stories of Zhuang Zi, and indigenous Chinese mindfulness traditions all sprouting from China’s longstanding “heart-mind techniques.”

Dan G. Reid translates all four “art of the heart-mind” texts traditionally attributed to the famous advisor, Guan Zi (720-645 BC), along with an early Daoist commentary, and accompanies these translations with his own commentary and textual contrasts based in various Daoist, Buddhist, Confucian, and ancient Chinese medical texts. Reid’s commentary serves to underline the links between early Chinese schools of thought, while highlighting their shared approaches to ”the art of the heart-mind,” nourishing internal energy, and restoring “spiritual intelligence.”

"This book contains four essays on Internal Alchemy by Isabelle Robinet, originally published in French and translated here for the first time into English. The essays are concerned with the alchemical principle of "inversion"; the devices used by the alchemists to "give form to the Formless by the word, and thus manifest the authentic and absolute Dao"; the symbolic function of numbers in Taoism and in Internal Alchemy; and the original meanings of the terms "External Elixir" (waidan) and "Internal Elixir" (neidan).

Isabelle Robinet (1932-2000) was one of the most important Western scholars of Taoism. Her work dealt with several major topics: the Laozi and the Zhuangzi with their commentaries; the Shangqing (Highest Clarity) school of Taoism; Neidan (Internal Alchemy); and Taoist thought and cosmology. Her publications in English include Taoist Meditation: The Mao-shan Tradition of Great Purity (1993) and Taoism: Growth of a Religion (1997)."

The Huming Jing (Scripture on Protecting Destiny-life-force, a.k.a  Shengxuan huming jing –  Scripture on Protecting Destiny-life-force and Ascending the Mysterious) is often mentioned adjacent to the Scripture on Clarity and Stillness (Qingjing Jing), one of the most important and recited Daoist scriptures, while being described as a Daoist version of the Buddhist Heart Sutra.
Included here is a commentary by Li Xiyue, founder of the Hidden Immortals Sect of Quanzhen.

The Cantong qi is the main text of Taoist Internal Alchemy (Neidan). In addition to Taoist masters and adepts, it has also attracted the attention of philosophers, cosmologists, poets, literati, calligraphers, philologists, and bibliophiles. Thirty-eight commentaries written through the end of the nineteenth century are extant, and dozens of texts found in the Taoist Canon and elsewhere are related to it. The present book is the most complete guide to this vast literature available in any language.
          The book is divided into two main parts. Part 1 contains a catalogue of extant and lost commentaries, essays, and related texts, listing altogether about 150 works with systematic details on their authors, editions, and reprints. Part 2 contains a survey of the textual tradition of the Cantong qi, focused on the composition and contents of about 40 major texts. A final index of authors, editors, titles, and editions facilitates the use of the book.""

This article is, to some extent, a continuation of thoughts expressed in a previous article in the Journal of Daoist Studies (Crowe 2010), where motion and stillness were examined as sources of continuity between the “three teachings” as imagined by Li Daochun and his disciples. The present article considers that continuity from a different vantage point, turning the focus on our characterization of the relationship between Ru 儒 (literati) daoxue 道學 (learning of the way) and jindan 金丹 (golden elixir) ways of cultivation. It is suggested here that common ground is found not by bridging two essentially and categorically differing groups, but rather by bringing to light shared perspectives on soteriological ends and on the framing of praxis intended to realize those ends.

F. Pregadio The Daoist master Liu Yiming (1734-1821) frequently mentions "superior virtue" and "inferior virtue" (shangde and xiade) in his works. In his view, these terms define two aspects, or degrees, of Neidan (Internal Alchemy), respectively focused on "non-doing" (wuwei) and "doing" (youwei), and concerned with the cultivation of Nature (xing) and Existence (ming). This article presents Liu Yiming's main writings on this subject and their background. Originally formulated in the Daode jing and first applied to alchemy in the Cantong qi, the distinction between the two types of "virtue" also reflects the history of the Neidan tradition and in particular the development of practices of self-cultivation that emphasize the "conjoined cultivation of Nature and Existence" (xingming shuangxiu).

Professor Noam Chomsky recently gave a youtube interview, at age 91, mentioning how, when asked, he does not have the time to meditate. The irony of his life as longevity and his lack of time presented itself as proof of what he called the focus of his career in cognitive studies: the study of the Inner Mind. And so just as Chomsky refers to the Pre-Socratic Heraclitus, then science needs to consider that possibly its logic thus far, based on symmetric commutative logic, has been wrong.

So now going back to Dr. Andrija Puharich's work, for life as ecology we need left-handed asymmetric resonance via the hidden momentum of light or as Puharich emphasizes – the delocalized proton magnetic moment with the electron (when water is split by ultrasound, creating a backwards precessional ELF subharmonic that is greatly amplified as anti-matter energy). So Dr. Bandyopadhyay has verified Puharich's claim about ultrasound as the "common frequency point" of resonating proteins in the body such that a quantum coherence occurs. But as the quantum biology founder, Professor Johnjoe McFadden, emphasizes, for quantum coherence to be amplified to a macroquantum level then some sort of secret [noncommutative] resonance of vibrations is the key.

Restoring the Lost Logos as the name for a section of my University of Minnesota Master's Thesis in 2000. I was approached to have the Master's Thesis published as a book by Charles Madden, a physicist focused on music theory. Only Madden did not understand my physics and as I studied his work I realized my error. I had confused the Taiji symbol of Daoism with "logistic" symmetric math and Madden points out that the Taiji can NOT be a fractal since it's not symmetric math.

So then I began discovering the noncommutative phase math or quantum algebra of Fields Medal math professor Alain Connes. Not till I saw his posted youtube lecture on music theory did I realize that indeed my own music theory philosophy of science as "restoring the Lost Logos" has been corroborated. This noncommutative definition of music theory is ONLY understood by Alain Connes because the music-math training by Western education is a deep psycho-physiological indoctrination in what math professor Luigi Borzacchini calls a "deep, pre-established disharmony" as a "cognitive bias" towards symmetric geometry.
So this new essay on "Restoring the Lost Logos" is based on my life long research into music as a meditation healing practice. Thanks

Fung Shan, a famous physician in late Ming and early Qing dynasty, was a Daoist with practical neidan experience. Through a brief study on his Daoist identity and his works, this paper aims to show the relationship between the medical ideas and neidan theories presented in the medical documents of this period.

The paranormal and noncommutativity are both considered strange and unobservable by science. Listening is now proven to be up to ten times faster than the linear operator of time-frequency resonance or Fourier Uncertainty. This deep listening enables noncommutative negentropic quantum coherence as the "Fundamental Frequency Force" or natural tuning of the Universe.

This bibliography intends to cover most works related to academic studies on neidan in Western languages published to date (2021). These include reference works, monographs, dissertations, translations, books, research articles, article collections, and some review articles and theses.

自東漢初年，黃老思想與養生之術相互連繫起來，黃老學說於各個發展階段的狀態與意義，便成為研究道教學者所關心的面向。特別是《周易參同契》運用漢《易》原理衍說丹道，吸收神仙方術的內容，讓哲學、科學與宗教互摻為一，更奠定了後世道教《易》學的基礎。無論從外丹或內丹的詮釋與分析，我們都可以清楚地看到，從元氣講變化修煉的理論形態，不僅只是兩種不同修煉方法的相互應用而已，其背後所蘊涵的，更是戰國秦漢以來黃老思想典型的轉移。而向來對於《參同契》內煉取向黃老「引內養性」之說的概念探討，大都侷限在道教史或思想史的區塊中，甚少有一整體勾勒。職是之故，本文擬由《參同契》相關的思想理論，觀察內丹學如何吸收黃老學說中的「氣」論，去轉化成其追求長生不死的丹道體系。

This thesis concerns the state of the art of the Western language studies of Daoist internal alchemy (neidan). The research history and its approaches are evaluated from the perspective of study of religion, based mainly on research literature in English and French. Neidan studies is a subfield of Daoist studies, which takes Daoism as a multifaceted religious tradition. The study is a discourse-oriented, research-historical and meta-theoretical analysis. As its data it takes the Western language research literature of the field until today and in its entirety: articles, article collections, monographs, dissertations, bibliographies, and translations. The Chinese original sources are not covered, neither are the popular translations. The studies are analyzed through a conceptual framework based on the theoretical part.

The phases and approaches of neidan studies are conceived through a four-fold typology of research programs. Internal alchemy and its sources have been approached 1) as a part of the history of scientific thought from the 1930s to 1980s, 2) in the context of Chinese cultural history from the 1920s, 3) as discourse and doctrine from the 1970s, and 4) as religion in the context of multi-disciplinary studies since the 1990s. Instead of a paradigmatic hegemony, the research programs are interpreted as competing for the authority to speak about internal alchemy. However, the central disciplinary conventions have been those of the sinological tradition. Supplementing the four research programs, five conceptions or descriptions of neidan are distinguished. These cover the main positions taken within the research so far. Internal alchemy has been described as a) physiological alchemy, b) symbolical alchemy and a technique of enlightenment, c) as a synthesis of psycho-physiological techniques, d) as a range of esoteric doctrines and techniques, and e) as a field of variations of contemplative practice. These descriptions of the academic discourse reflect the traditional neidan discourse: they are situated on a continuum from body centered to spiritual or mind centered readings. They also vary from exclusive descriptions, which stress clarity, to more open descriptions, which cover widely the variations of the historical forms of neidan.

After the general typology of the field, three special themes are observed: sexual alchemy, female alchemy, and early Quanzhen alchemy. This delimits the relatively wide data. These thematic areas cover a substantial amount of the scholars and a representative historical take of the neidan tradition. However, in themselves they represent more the marginals of neidan than its mainstream. Focusing on debates and conflicts, a clearer picture is drawn of the approaches, interests, problems of the research and the differences of the research programs. Through the specific themes the state of the research field may be pictured more widely.

In addition to locating and identifying the research programs, conceptions of neidan, and the debates, this study answers questions on the coverage of the studies, how the studies have responded to the challenges of the postmodern critiques, and the future prospects of the field. Possible developments would include increase in reflexivity and the level of theoretical discussion, interaction between different disciplines  and comparative research both within and without neidan studies. The relation of neidan studies to the study of religion is discussed through the comparative concept of esotericism.

The Ruyao jing (Mirror for Compounding the Medicine) is one of the best-known texts of Taoist Internal Alchemy, or Neidan. Written in the 10th century and attributed to Cui Xifan, it describes the foundations of Internal Alchemy in 20 short poems of four verses. Because of its symbolic and cryptic language, it has been subjected to different and sometimes conflicting interpretations.
          This book contains the first complete translation of the Ruyao jing and of the commentary by Wang Jie, who lived in the 14th century. Wang Jie — also known as Wang Daoyuan and as Huanran zi (Master of the Inchoate) — was a second-generation disciple of the great Neidan master, Li Daochun. He explains each poem in light of his tradition, and his commentary is characterized by a strong connection between the doctrinal and the practical aspects of Neidan. The translator's notes provide details on the main technical terms and on the relation of this work to other important texts of Internal Alchemy, in particular the Cantong qi (Seal of the Unity of the Three) and the Wuzhen pian (Awakening to Reality).