Four Hundred Words on the Golden Elixir

by Fabrizio Pregadio

The Jindan sibai zi, or Four Hundred Words on the Golden Elixir, is attributed to Zhang Boduan, the well-known author of the Wuzhen pian (Awakening to Reality). The text is made of twenty poems, each containing four verses of five Chinese characters. It is translated here with the commentary by Peng Haogu (fl. 1586–99). His work is one of many examples showing that commentaries to Neidan texts not only offer explications of the original texts, but are Neidan works to all effects.

38 pages, Kindle Edition

Published January 1, 2019

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).