The Way of the Golden Elixir

by Fabrizio Pregadio

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.

Genres: Taoism, Religion, Nonfiction

72 pages, Unknown Binding

First published January 1, 2014

About the author

Fabrizio Pregadio has taught at different universities in Italy, Germany, the United States, and Canada. He is the author of Great Clarity Daoism and Alchemy in Early Medieval China (Stanford University Press, 2006) and the editor of The Encyclopedia of Taoism (Routledge, 2008).

In addition to his scholarly activities, he publishes translations of original texts on Taoism and Taoist Internal Alchemy (Neidan) addressed to a wider audience. These translations, all published by Golden Elixir Press, include the The Seal of the Unity of the Three (Cantong qi); the Awakening to Reality (Wuzhen pian); the Commentary on the Mirror for Compounding the Medicine (Ruyao jing); and Cultivating the Tao , a work by the eminent Taoist master, Liu Yiming (1734-1821).

Reviews

[Mathew]

A fantastic and well cited collection of difficult to find information relating to both internal and external alchemy. The PDF is also filled with hyperlinks to even more information on the publisher's website.

[a hooded figure from your friendly neighbourhood dog park]

this is a pretty good chronological reference list for Taoist texts, but it's very far removed from what I'm trying to do - follow the evolution from Taoist Alchemy to its webnovel version. Onwards we go...