Yuanshi Tianzun Jidu Xuehu Zhenjing — A Lingbao Scripture of the Daoist Canon

This scripture belongs to the Daoist "salvation" (濟度) genre: a revelation spoken by the Celestial Worthy of Primordial Beginning and enacted by the Celestial Worthy of the Great Unity Who Saves from Suffering, addressed to the Blood Lake — a hell reserved, in Chinese religion, for women who died in or because of childbirth, understood to have polluted the earth and the water with birth-blood. It is preserved in the Daoist Canon in three scrolls, and midway through the text names itself by a longer title, the Scripture of the Ascension into Mystery for the Salvation and Deliverance from the Blood Lake, the Numinous Treasure (靈寶昇玄濟度血湖真經), placing it within the Lingbao (Numinous Treasure) revelatory tradition. Its date is not firmly established; its concerns — the Blood Lake, the underworld bureaucracy of Fengdu, the cult of the Great Unity Who Saves from Suffering — are most at home in the Song and Yuan periods, when Daoist funerary ritual for women who died in childbirth became a significant genre, but nothing in the text itself fixes an exact year.

The scripture moves between prose narrative, a cosmic hymn in twelve seven-character lines, two long incantations in a formulaic four-character "hidden language" (隱語) proper to Lingbao revelation, and a further stanza of neidan-flavored verse. The prose sections are the clearest; the two incantations are built from a specialized register of celestial diction — much of it evocative rather than fully lexical, the kind of language meant to be intoned rather than parsed — and this translation renders them as literally as the individual characters allow, phrase by phrase, without claiming to have recovered a single fixed sense for every line.

Translated for the Good Works Library directly from the classical Chinese of the Daoist Canon, printed in full below the translation. To our knowledge, this is the first complete published English translation of this scripture.

Translation

Scroll One

At that time the Celestial Worthy of Primordial Beginning was in the wondrous realm of the Nine Clarities, in the Precious Palace of the Three Primes, beneath the qian-wood grove of the Terrace That Governs the Kalpas, seated upon a wondrous throne of seven treasures. Together with the Most High Lord of the Dao, the Most High Lord Lao, the venerable elders of every rank, the imperial lords of the many heavens, the flying spirit-kings of the ten directions and the boundless realms, and the great demon-kings of the Five Emperors of the Three Worlds, the assembled immortals of the Three Worlds arrived all together, each mounted on carriages of the Eight Effulgences drawn by simurghs, chariots of jasper in the five colours, riding unicorns and plumed steeds, with phoenix canopies and dragon banners, coursing through the void on flying steps, chanting the cavern-verses, paying court and praising the Celestial Worthy, gathering the charts and registers entire, to draw forth and deliver the living and the dead. At that time the many imperial lords of the heavens, their queen-consorts, jade maidens, and wondrously fragrant heavenly women, in numerous throng, arranged their robes and caps in solemn order, advanced with composed and graceful step, burned incense and scattered flowers in obeisance, and stood in attendance with folded hands, chanting the songs of the immortals. At this the Celestial Worthy of Primordial Beginning and the Jade Emperor, the Honored Sovereign, released auspicious light of nine colours beyond measure, illuminating far and near alike, and within all that light manifested transformation-bodies numbering in the hundreds of thousands and millions of millions. The Most High Sovereigns of the Three Purities and the Jade Emperor, the Heavenly Sovereign, sat together upon a wondrous throne of nine dragons, a hundred treasures, and a thousand-petalled auspicious lotus, and likewise manifested within the light transformation-bodies beyond measure, in the hundreds of thousands and millions of millions. The Perfected of Wondrous Conduct arrayed themselves in ranks to attend upon the Most Honored One, and once more the auspicious light shone down upon the boundless worlds of the ten directions — above to the Encircling Round, below to the Wind-Spring, within and without the Iron Ring — all bright and translucent, alike in a light of nine-coloured lapis lazuli and crystal, the Three Worlds seen as one, all appearing before their eyes.

At this time the great Perfected of Compassion Who Save from Suffering, riding upon this auspicious light, ascended to the celestial gate, burned incense, scattered flowers, and knelt long upright with tablets in hand, addressing the Celestial Worthy: "Your unworthy servants, counted humbly among the immortal Perfected, whose office is salvation and deliverance, have suddenly beheld in the northeast a dense, roiling qi of black poison, surging up to strike the celestial palace, coiling and knotted, never dispersing. Its odour is fetid and foul, and the great assembly is startled and amazed. We beg only that the Celestial Worthy reveal to us what we have not yet heard, that we may awaken to the roots of sin and the causes and conditions from which they arise; that he bestow the great medicine of the Dharma to heal and save those sunk and drowning; that he shake forth the great Dharma-sound to open and instruct the ignorant; that he pour down the great Dharma-rain to bathe body and mind; that he spread the great Dharma-cloud to shelter and shade the multitude of beings; that he kindle the great Dharma-torch to light and illuminate the dark and benighted; that he open the great Dharma-gate to lead and draw forth the ten thousand kinds of being. Should we receive his compassionate pity, we shall bear his mysterious grace looking upward."

At this the Celestial Worthy, resting his hand upon the armrest, lofty and remote, refining the real in the blue emptiness, gathered his spirit in distant contemplation, grieved for and pitied all living beings, and opened wide the Dharma-gate of compassion. He decreed that the Greatly Compassionate and Benevolent One of the Eastern Extremity, the World of Eternal Joy — the Celestial Worthy Who Seeks Out the Voice and Saves from Suffering, the Great Unity — should open the secret repository of the Three Primes, the cinnabar tablets of the jasper tower, and bring forth the Three Primes' Golden Writ of the Brahma-qi of Great Conduct, the true text of salvation and deliverance, and the pattern of translation and release; and he charged the numinous officers of the Azure Mystery Who Save the Living and Deliver the Dead, and their talisman-clerks in their hundred millions upon millions, to go down into the dark paths, to seek out the voice, to save and draw forth the souls who receive deliverance, and to raise them up to be born in the heavenly halls.

The Celestial Worthy spoke further, saying: "The many scriptures of the Three Caverns and the precious Brahma-writs of the myriad heavens knot themselves from emptiness into seal-script, gather qi into text, filling and spanning the hollow of space, spread over the surface of the mysterious void; each has become a canon, spanning past and present alike. All the ten thousand things are born of me; the ten thousand spirits are transformed by me. It is only because the living beings of the lower world are themselves benighted that they meet with suffering and calamity, and I must save them; and so once more, for the sake of all beings, I set forth plainly their causes and conditions. Passing from kalpa to kalpa, casting off one body and taking on another, in the bodies they take they are disloyal and unfilial, without benevolence and without righteousness, without compassion and without reverence, without yielding and without humility; they are proud and heedless of the true and real, they slight and despise the great Dao, they slander and revile the scriptures, they defame the good, they harm creatures and injure life, they are greedy and insatiable, given over to the seven emotions and the six desires, to the three karmas and the ten entanglements, building up the roots of sin and knotting together every evil deed — done by themselves and suffered by themselves, as surely as an echo answers a sound. Though one spoke of it to the end of a kalpa, it could not be exhausted. To state the essentials briefly: all persons at their birth draw alike upon the one qi, but once born and reared, their span of life is bound to the Three Primes, and their longevity or early death, their fortune or misfortune, their wealth or poverty, their rank or lowliness, their manifold sin and merit, their virtue and their death and life, each follow the root of their predestined lot; all have their recompense, and following the force of their karma, it is never in the least mistaken or displaced.

"Now among the living beings of the lower world, men and women alike, in their lifetimes some meet with the violence of the king's law, struck by calamity unjustly, by the soldier's blade, by execution, by the shackles and cangue of prison, by carbuncle and tumour and festering poison, streaming with pus and blood, cast away by other men, unable to obtain life, unable to obtain death, consumed by their own grief and vexation, with no way to be released — and their load of sin and karma grows only heavier, so that they fall again into the Blood Lake, with never a day of release, taking this as their due recompense. All of this comes from living beings' deluded thoughts and greedy attachments, their failure to know the true and real, their clinging to right and wrong; they pile up sin upon sin, giving free rein to their hearts and minds, and there is nothing they do that is not transgression; they do not see the light of compassion, and have no way to awaken to it.

"Consider further: endowed at birth with the finest essence of the Five Phases, made the most spiritual of the ten thousand things, one who attains birth as a man startles heaven and shakes earth, and even honour cannot surpass it; yet only because of greed and craving and desire, losing their original truth, in a single wayward thought they descend to be born in a woman's form — the body of the Five Turbidities, leaking and impure — matched as husband and wife, yin and yang knotted together, and so conceived as a foetus; enemies and creditors from past lives, repaying one another in turn. For this reason birth and childbirth bring every manner of danger and difficulty: whether in the flowing of the monthly courses, in the washing of soiled garments, or in the bearing of sons and daughters, blood defiles the earth spirits, and the fouled water is poured into streams, rivers, ponds, and wells, so that people draw water to drink and to cook, all unknowing, and offer it to the spirits, giving offense to the Three Lights. Some, by mistakenly taking poisonous medicine, injure the child and cause miscarriage; some, having too many sons and daughters, deliberately drown them, so that enmity and vengeance are repaid, and demons attack one another in requital. Some cause the child to die in the womb, or the mother to die after giving birth; some cause both mother and child to perish, their very lives destroyed. Some meet with execution, unable to escape death by the soldier's blade. Some fall ill, infected by an evil ghost, and die an unnatural and violent death — and all such as these enter after death into the Blood Lake hell of Fengdu, there to undergo every suffering in full; for it is by the accumulation of blood that the lake is formed, and it is by taking illusory conditions as real that the hell comes to exist. You, moved by your great vow, wish to save beings from this suffering; I shall therefore expound for you the true and undivided Dharma-gate, for the salvation and deliverance of those in danger and distress."

The hidden language of the great Dharma of the Three Caverns, the Brahma-qi of all the heavens, for salvation and deliverance:

Beholding awareness, lush and flowing; great brightness, purple numen.
Nine spirits ferry the soul; opening wide the jade-true.
Ah, resplendent, glowing and glowing; flying through heaven, the sound streams on.
Wheel of light, the constant sovereign; all numina nourished and arrived.
Vast and open, the Great Existence; auspicious clouds open the numinous.
The seven luminaries shine down demons; calm and still, spreading forth glory.
Emptiness and nonbeing, the highest head; the record of heaven fills the throne-hall.
Four sighs nurture forms; washed brightness, essence soaring.
Blazing bright, cavern of yang; floating light, the jade hall.
Seven numina sing their songs; world-origin, the purple hall.
Arrayed blossoms scatter light; shining bright, the jade chamber.
The eight effulgences gather the beasts; harmonious qi gathers in essence.
Nine capitals, lofty and lush; flying to birth, ascending numina.
Constellations arrayed in a quiet realm; fragrance nurtures the wheel of emptiness.
Watering and nourishing the yellow blossom; deep waters turn the mysterious brightness.
The spirits fittingly open the expanse; winding onward, ascending the court.
The great plan, floating light; true stillness transforms the origin.
Winding and subtle, plain and distant; jade bridge, clarified mist.
Still and towering, knotted at the corners; light arrayed, sevenfold entwined.
Flourishing and coiled, the jade repository; flowing brilliance, ninefold mystery.
Silent and still, empty and distant; flying blossoms brush the carriage.
Dawn's overflow, the recorded registers; the great waste, stretching onward.
Ah, the mound, nine crossings; six dragons dance at the shaft.
Dense mist, floating gauze; purple essence, fragrant abyss.
Chaos and vapor, great nurture; nine workings transform into heaven.
Covering forms, deep virtue; the primal river sinks its essence.
Nurturing blossoms, bright as a summit; light of dawn, distant clouds.
The great measure oversees all; flourishing joy, the forbidden heaven.
Purple emptiness stands its summit; the measure of kalpas meets before us.
Azure clouds diminish the Brahma-realm; far, far, wandering the origin.
Six transformations turn the measure; cutting off and ending evil transgression.
Vast, crowning the mysterious waste; ten thousand crossings, becoming immortal.

At this time the great sages of all the heavens, the Perfected of Wondrous Conduct, and the boundless true rulers of the Three Worlds and the ten directions gathered like clouds beneath the throne of the Celestial Worthy of Primordial Beginning; hearing the Dharma-sound, they awoke to their true nature, and each made obeisance, receiving the teaching in faith and upholding it.

Scroll Two

At that time the Celestial Worthy of Primordial Beginning sat suspended in the void upon a throne borne by a lion of the five colours, with jade youths and jade maidens, ten thousand million heavenly Perfected, arrayed about him as attendants and guards. He addressed the assembled immortal Perfected of Wondrous Conduct, saying: "In the northeast, in the quarter of ren and gui, there lies a great wasteland, a dark and boundless sea, its waters foul and rank, without measure or limit. Within it stands a great mountain, reaching up above to the blue firmament and down below to the Wind-Spring, called the Fengdu Mountain of the Northern Yin. Its circuit is ten thousand li, and it is the lord of the qi of yin, the pivot and mechanism of the Nine Earths. Within it are ranged the many hells, which examine and punish the sins of the men of the world, and to it belong likewise the flying birds and running beasts, the creatures born of womb, egg, moisture, and transformation, the scaled and armoured, the feathered, all that moves or grows, flies or dives.

"Within it there is one hell, at the bottom of the great sea of the Northern Yin, called the Blood Lake — enclosed by narrow crags and a ring of iron great and small, without interval, dark and chill. This hell is further divided into four lesser hells, called the Blood Pool, the Blood Basin, the Blood Mountain, and the Blood Sea. The four hells communicate with one another, and there is a spirit who governs them, called the Great Spirit of the Blood Lake, dwelling at the bottom of the boundless waters; the water flows above him, and its stench rises to strike heaven. All the women of the world who die of birth-blood are, without exception, those who in past lives were enemies of mother and child, bound to one another by grudges and harm, and in this present life each repays the other in turn: silent in the dark of night, wailing beneath the blackness, their whole bodies fouled with blood, their stench striking heaven, beaten without number by hammers of gold and staves of iron, hungering and feeding on fierce fire, thirsting and drinking from the Blood Pool, dying ten thousand deaths and living ten thousand lives, without rest by day or night, dwelling always in darkness, never seeing the light. Though they should meet with a talisman or register of good merit, their transgression is only slightly reduced, and they cannot win release; and even when release is won, they are reborn transformed into another kind of being, so that a filial child, though he possess spirit-power, still cannot save and draw them forth.

"In the Eastern World of Eternal Joy there is the Greatly Compassionate and Benevolent One, the Great Unity, the Celestial Worthy Who Saves from Suffering. Long ago, at the beginning of the kalpa, he made his great vow, and his transformation-bodies are as numerous as the sands of the Ganges; he responds to every being according to its voice. In heaven he is called the Blessed Spirit of the Great Unity; in the world he is called the Greatly Compassionate and Benevolent One; in the hells he is called the Sovereign Lord of the Shining Sun; among the outer paths that he gathers in and subdues he is called the Bright King the Lion; in the watery realms he is called the Sovereign Lord of the Cavern Abyss. 'You are my qi, and I am your root; what you know, I know.' This is the essence of the Nine Yangs, spiritual beyond spiritual: at times he dwells in the celestial palaces, at times he descends into the human world, at times he dwells in the hells, at times he gathers in the host of demons; at times he becomes an immortal youth or jade maiden, at times a sovereign lord or a sage, at times a Celestial Worthy or a Daoist priest, at times an August Personage or Lord Lao, at times a Court Officer of Heavenly Healing — his spirit-powers are beyond measure, his merit and conduct beyond limit, seeking out the voice to save from suffering, responding to all things according to the moment. You may all raise your voices and chant the name of the Great Unity, and let the immortal officials chant it together, and he will of himself respond and manifest his body." Thereupon the assembled immortal Perfected together raised their voices and chanted the name of the Celestial Worthy of the Great Unity Who Saves from Suffering, and pictured to themselves the Celestial Worthy riding upon auspicious clouds of the five colours and a nine-headed lion, releasing the auspicious light of a hundred treasures, floating through the void until he arrived beneath the assembly of the Celestial Worthy of Primordial Beginning, where he bowed his head in obeisance and reverently received the precepts.

Then the Celestial Worthy of Primordial Beginning said: "I behold the women among the living beings of the realm of desire, who have made every manner of sinful karma, whose bodies fall into the Blood Lake to suffer and sink there, passing through kalpas beyond counting, with never a day of release. I now open the jasper casket, the precious treasury, and bring forth the writ of pardon in golden registers. You may carry it down to the world below, and proclaim it to the Three Worlds and the ten directions, to the Three Officials and the Nine Bureaus, to the Twelve River-Sources, and to the Nine Darknesses and the Blood Lake hell, pardoning and drawing forth the sinning souls, that they may take their leave of the long night and behold the light." Thereupon the Celestial Worthy of the Great Unity Who Saves from Suffering, in great compassion and great mercy, universally succouring and universally delivering, was attended and escorted in his Dharma-carriage by the Perfected Who Compassionately Save from Suffering, the Perfected of Great Compassion and Great Kindness, the eighty-one spirits of the Great Unity, the mighty warriors of the Celestial Retainers, the Court Officers of the Azure Mystery, the Yellow-Sashed Page, and the Spirit-Kings the Jade Maidens. The Celestial Worthy released auspicious light in the hundred millions; in his left hand he held a precious vase of lapis lazuli, in his right he grasped a branch of blue-green feathers; mounted on a throne of golden lotus and kingfisher leaves borne by a nine-headed lion, he rode through the void and departed. He decreed and charged the Great Spirit of the Nine Phoenixes Who Breaks Defilement, the Great Spirit Who Cleanses the Courtyard, the Great Spirit Who Severs Debts of Unrighteousness, the Great Spirit of the True Essence and Fiery Eyes, the Great Spirit of Thundering Drums and Rolling Eyes, the Great Spirit Who Restores the Whole Body, and the Great Spirit Who Resolves Grudges and Releases Debts, to cleanse and sweep clear the Blood Lake, to break apart its defilement, to proclaim below the talisman-mandate of Primordial Beginning, and, by the bent mercy of the Primordial Sovereign, to save and deliver the sinning souls of those who died in childbirth, raising them up at once. At this the Northern Sovereign of Fengdu, together with all the ghost-officials, the ox-headed gaolers, the awesome spirit-kings who hold them in check, the great demons of the Three Worlds, the nine hundred million ghost-kings, and the Great Spirit of the Blood Lake, all obeyed the decree, pardoning and drawing forth the sinning souls; the black registers of the Nine Darknesses were all at once burned to ashes; the Blood Lake was cleansed and swept clear, transformed into a treasure-pool; the hammers of gold and staves of iron were transformed into lotus-blossoms; and the drinking of blood and eating of filth were transformed into sweet dew. All the sinning souls, once they awoke to their original truth, rode upon the light and were carried across, all attaining birth in heaven; and the officials of the hidden world in the hells all gave rise to good thoughts, and together, borne upon that gracious power, realized the Dao and became Perfected. And they offered up this hymn, saying:

We bow our heads to the Way beyond being, empty and supreme,
to the greatly compassionate Sovereign who saves from suffering.
His spirit-light, a hundred million-fold, lights up the murk between,
spreading everywhere the cloud of mercy, moistening with Dharma-rain.

The narrow crags, the dark and cold, the hell without interval,
the Blood Lake, Blood Sea, Blood Pool, and Blood Basin —
the jade registers grant great pardon to all the sinning souls,
releasing them from their sinking and drowning, from the suffering of ten thousand kalpas.

Refining the form, delivering the life from the Bureau of the Lost Tombs,
awakening to the Way, ascending to the Perfected, through every wondrous gate.
Towering, towering, his merit and virtue past all thought or telling —
forever he serves all living beings as their compassionate father.

At this time the great Perfected of Compassion Who Save from Suffering, in accordance with the sacred word they had received, proclaimed and carried out the decree, opening light into the long night, saving and drawing forth those on the dark paths; all who were bathed in this gracious favour together crossed over into Ultimate Bliss.

Scroll Three

At that time the Celestial Worthy of Primordial Beginning addressed all the great sages, the Perfected of Wondrous Conduct, saying: "The living beings of the lower world, in bodies of the Five Turbidities, do not recognize the causes and conditions of sin and merit; they are greedy and attached to lust and desire. Some, born in a woman's form, bear sons and daughters and meet with violent misfortune; some are born with strange illness and die before their allotted years, turning and turning through the cycle of rebirth without any awareness of it themselves. Tell all living beings: if they can give rise to a good heart, honour the Three Treasures, not kill and not harm, not envy and not be jealous, not commit lust and not steal, not be greedy and not covet, not hate and [not bear ill will] — upholding the precepts and stilling the heart — and if they can uphold this scripture, then by its merit there shall come the ten heavenly good spirits, the spirit-kings who protect the Dharma, the sacred mothers who guard the chambers of the Nine Heavens, the great spirits who oversee birth, and immortal Perfected sages beyond number, all coming to guard and protect them."

The Celestial Worthy said: "The Dao gives birth to the One; the One gives birth to the Two; the Two gives birth to the Three; the Three give birth to the ten thousand things. They carry yin on their backs and embrace yang, and in the dim and misty blending of the two there is a thing. Within that dim and misty blending there is a thing, and its name does not depart from it; all things return to it, yet in the end it does not call itself great. Looked at, it is not enough to be seen; listened for, it is not enough to be heard; used, it is not enough to be used up." When the assembly heard this scripture expounded, each of them understood the Dao and contemplated the mind, and in gladness of spirit awoke to it in silence. At that time the Celestial Worthy of the Great Unity Who Saves from Suffering, the sovereigns of all the heavens, and the great Perfected of Compassion Who Save from Suffering, upholding the awesome light of Primordial Beginning, proclaimed and issued the talisman-mandate of the Three Primes, announcing it universally to the world of the Northern Yin, to the long night of the Nine Darknesses, to the dark and chill without interval, and within the narrow crags of the Blood Lake and all the great hells, saving and gathering in living beings, so that all attained deliverance and crossing-over.

The Celestial Worthy spoke again to the assembled Perfected, saying: "What I have now expounded is none other than the Scripture of the Ascension into Mystery for the Salvation and Deliverance from the Blood Lake, the Numinous Treasure — long kept secret in the hidden repository of the Three Heavens in the Upper Palace of the Purple Tenuity, sealed by covenant with the Perfected, transmitted but once in forty thousand kalpas. Now, as this kalpa-cycle draws to its close, it is fitting that the great Dharma take visible form, and so it may be transmitted down into the human world, circulated and chanted. Should there be men or women able to cultivate it as the Dharma prescribes, it shall bring benefit to gods and men alike, and they shall obtain blessing beyond measure." Thereupon he once more proclaimed the secret Brahma-writ, the precious numinous text of the Three Primes:

One qi forms the Perfected; the Two Modes set the void in motion.
The Five Numina continue what was broken off; the Seven Luminaries sustain what has declined.
Turning the celestial net, treading upon the void, flying in step through the cloud-palace.
The embryo has its beginning; through a hundred million kalpas it has no end.
The golden citadel bears the substance; the jade cavern congeals the spirit.
The true qi is nourished within, and by it the Perfected is formed.
Above it enters the Great Void; below it reaches the springs of darkness.
In the cloud-palace, the precious chamber, within it dwells the true soul.
Going out and in by the land of blessing, circling round the gate of birth.
Chewing on the numinous mushroom, rinsing the mouth at the golden spring.
Sweet dew flows like a river, pouring down upon the elixir field.
Purple clouds gleam at dawn; the three qi congeal into mist.
In the chamber of jasper he is transformed into an immortal, seated at ease upon a golden lotus.
His true appearance eclipses the sun; the dust of kalpas becomes his years.

At that time the Celestial Worthy once more addressed all the immortal Perfected, saying: "How long is a human life? Easily born and easily extinguished, like the spark struck from a stone, it cannot long endure; like a floating bubble, how could it ever be firm? Birth, old age, sickness, and death encroach upon one another day and night; change and dissolution never cease, and in a moment all is scattered and destroyed. You should forget through the eye, and then its light overflows without limit; efface through the ear, and then the awareness of mind remains forever deep. When both faculties are alike forgotten, pure and whole, complete and entire, one joins with the Great Square; dim and misty, one joins with what has no counterpart — and what I uphold shall endure together with heaven and earth, for as long as they last." Thereupon the assembled immortals, hearing the Celestial Worthy expound the ferry and bridge by which men are delivered, and its merit past all thought or telling, each bowed their heads in obeisance and thanks, receiving the teaching in faith and upholding it.

Colophon

This Good Works Translation was prepared for the Daoist shelf of the Good Works Library. The English was translated independently from the classical Chinese text printed below. The scripture's three prose sections (the three scrolls' narrative frames) are rendered as prose; its one clearly metrical hymn, in twelve seven-character half-lines, is kept as verse in matching line-breaks; and its two formulaic four-character "hidden language" incantations, and the closing neidan-flavored stanza, are likewise kept as short lines, each rendering one four-character phrase-pair of the source.

Before the claim below was written, a translation-status check was performed: Komjathy's bibliography of Daoist texts in Western translation and a 2023 update of the same list were searched by Chinese title, pinyin, and known variant titles, and returned no entry for this scripture. Two web searches were run — for the Chinese title with "English translation," and for a plausible pinyin/English rendering with "translation" — which surfaced the Chinese Wikisource and Chinese Text Project transcriptions of the source, catalogue descriptions of the text in Chinese, and (unrelated to this scripture) the Buddhist apocryphon known in English as the Blood Bowl Sutra (血盆經), a different text of related theme but distinct authorship and canon. No English translation of this Daoist scripture, in whole or in part, was found. To our knowledge, this is the first complete published English translation of the Yuanshi Tianzun Jidu Xuehu Zhenjing. We state this as the limit of our knowledge, not as a certainty.

A note on hard passages. The two "hidden language" incantations (隱語) use a specialized, largely formulaic celestial diction found across Lingbao revelation literature; several of its rarer characters carry no single settled gloss, and the translation renders each phrase as literally and plainly as the individual characters support, without smoothing over its opacity. In Scroll Three, the source's precept list contains a short phrase, 不憎不女自, that does not parse as clean classical Chinese in the witness consulted; it is rendered with an editorial bracket rather than invented content. The term 失陵府, in the Scroll Two hymn, is rendered "the Bureau of the Lost Tombs" as its most literal sense, though the exact underworld office it names is not independently confirmed. The epithet 太一救苦天尊 follows the Good Works Library's house glossary ("the Great Unity, Celestial Worthy Who Saves from Suffering"); 元始天尊 and 太上老君 follow the glossary's and the exemplar's established renderings.

Prepared for the Good Work Library by the Tianmu Anglican Church with AI-assisted translation and editorial work.

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Source Text: 元始天尊濟度血湖真經

Classical Chinese text of the Daoist Canon, in the Chinese Wikisource transcription. Presented complete for reference, study, and verification alongside the English translation above.

元始天尊濟度血湖真經卷上

爾時元始天尊在九清妙境三元寶宮、御劫仞台中騫木林下，升七寶妙座，與太上道君、太上老君、諸君丈人、諸天帝君、十方無極飛天神王、三界五帝大魔王，三界群仙一時同至，皆駕八景鸞輿，五色瓊輦，麟馭羽騎，鳳葆龍旅，遊空飛步，吟詠洞章，朝贊天尊，總校圖錄，拔度生死。時有諸天帝君、王妃、玉女、妙香天女等衆，嚴整衣冠，從容雅步，燒香散華作禮，端拱侍立，歌詠仙章。是時元始天尊、玉皇尊帝，放無量九色祥光，遍照遐邇，於諸光中化現百千萬億。三清上帝、玉皇天帝俱坐九龍百寶千葉瑞蓮妙座，複於光中化現無量百千萬億。妙行真人列班上侍至尊，複以祥光下照十方無極世界，上至圓羅，下及風泉，鐵圍內外，瑩然朗徹，俱同九色瑠璃水晶之光，三界一視，俱在目前。

是時慈悲救苦諸大真人，乘斯祥光，上詣天闕，燒香散華，端簡長跪，上白天尊言：賤臣忝列仙真，職惟濟度，忽見東北方乃有鬱勃黑毒之氣，上沖天宮，盤結不散，其氣腥惡臭穢，大衆驚異。惟願天尊示以未聞，得悟罪根因緣所起，施大法藥，醫救沈淪，震大法音，開迪愚昧，注大法雨，灌沐身心，布大法雲，覆蔭群品，然大法炬，照燭幽昏，開大法門，級引萬類。如蒙慈愍，仰荷玄恩。
是時天尊撫幾高抗，空碧煉真，凝神遐想，哀愍衆生，廣啓慈悲法門，敕命東極長樂世界大慈仁者、太一尋聲救苦天尊，開三元秘藏丹簡瓊樓，出示大行梵炁三元金書，救度真文，遷拔之格，告命青玄救生拔死靈官、符吏億萬萬衆，下往幽途，尋聲救拔受度魂儀上生天堂。

是時天尊又曰：三洞衆經，萬天寶梵結空爲篆，聚炁成文，彌綸空洞之中，羅絡虛玄之表，具有成典，亘越古今。夫萬物吾生，萬靈吾化，良由下界衆生，本身自昧，遭苦遭厄，吾須救之，重爲衆生顯說因緣，從劫舍身受身，受身不忠不孝，不仁不義，不慈不敬，不讓不謙，傲忽正真，輕慢大道，訾毀經典，誹謗善良，害物傷生，貪婪無厭，七情六欲，三業十纏，營造罪根，結諸惡業，自作自受，猶響應聲。終劫說之，亦難窮盡。略舉其要：夫人之稟生，同資一氣，及乎誕育，命系三元，壽夭吉凶，富貴貧賤，種種罪福，善德生死，各逐宿命根元，悉有報應，隨其業力，永不差移。凡有下界衆生男子女人，在世之時，或遭王法，橫惡所加，兵刑刎戮，牢獄枷鎖，癰疽癤毒，膿血淋漓，人所棄擲，求生不得，求死不得，憂惱自煎，無由解脫，罪業愈重，複墮血湖，永無出期，以爲果報，皆由衆生妄想貪著，不識正真，執系是非，積諸罪業，任心運意，何莫非愆，不睹慈光，無由曉悟。況之降衷，稟五行之秀，爲萬物之靈，得生男子，驚天駭地，貴亦難勝，只緣貪婪愛欲，迷失本真，一念既差，降生女質，五濁形漏，匹配夫妻，陰陽結聚，以爲胎孕，冤家債主，互相償報。是故生産有諸厄難，或月水流行，洗浣汙衣，或育男女，血汙地神，汙水傾注溪河池井，世人不知不覺汲水飲食，供獻神明，冒觸三光。或誤服毒藥，損子墮胎，或男女數多，故行溺死，冤仇報對，魔鬼相攻。或致子死腹中，母亡産後，或母子俱亡，至傷性命。或遭刑戮，兵解難逃。或疾染惡鬼，橫傷非命，死入酆都血湖地獄，備受諸苦，由積血以成湖，認幻緣而有獄。汝以弘願欲救斯苦，吾爲演說真一不二法門，濟度厄難。

三洞大法諸天救拔梵炁隱語：

觀覺鬱繿，太明紫靈。九神度魂，開闢玉真。阿奕煒煒，飛天流音。輪景帝常，都靈頤臻。豁落大有，慶雲啓靈。七耀輝魔，恬懀敷榮。虛無上首，天紀彌宸。四吁育象，濯曜騰精。煥赫洞陽，浮景玉堂。七靈謠歌，世元紫堂。羅英散景，耀明玉房。八景總獸，韶炁攝精。九都騫鬱，飛生上靈。宿羅靜境，馥育空輪。灌沃黃華，霐運玄明。神宜開廓，延宛升庭。大猷浮景，真定化元。蜓宛素眇，玉梁澄煙。蕭峙結隅，景羅七纏。秀盤玉府，流輝九玄。寂然虛邈，飛華拂軿。晨濫錄籍，太漠由延。阿丘九度，六龍儛轅。蓊靄浮羅，紫精馥淵。溟涬太育，九機化乾。覆形厚德，元河淪精。育英明陀，景晨眇雲。大仞總監，秀樂禁天。紫虛陀立，劫量交前。碧霞損梵，眇眇遊元。六變運量，馘絕惡愆。恢冠玄漠，萬度成仙。

是時諸天大聖、妙行真人、三界十方無鞅真宰，雲集元始座下，聞聽法音，開悟正性，各各作禮信受奉行。

元始天尊濟度血湖真經卷中

爾時元始天尊懸坐空浮五色獅子之座，玉童玉女，萬億天真，羅列侍衛。而告妙行諸仙真人曰：東北方壬癸之地，有大荒溟渤，海水腥穢，無邊莫測，中有大山，上參碧落，下入風泉，名曰北陰酆都羅山。週迴萬里，是陰氣之主，九地樞機焉。分列諸獄，考罰世人罪惡，及飛禽走獸、胎卵濕化、鱗甲羽毛、動植飛濳，咸皆隸焉。中有一獄，在北陰大海之底，名曰血湖，硤石大小鐵圍，無間溟泠，地獄又分四子獄：曰血池、血盆、血山、血海。四獄相通，有神主之號，曰血湖大神，在於無極水底，水流其上，臭氣衝天。凡世間產死血屍女人，皆是宿世母子仇讎，冤家纏害，乃至今生一一還報，寂寂於冥夜之中，號號於黑暗之下，渾身血汙，臭穢觸天，金槌鐵杖，亂考無數，飢餐猛火，渴飲血池，萬死萬生，不捨晝夜，常居黑暗，不睹光明，雖遇符簡善功，罪過小減，不能出離，雖得出離，化生異類，子須有神力，不能救拔。此東方長樂世界，有大慈仁者太一救苦天尊，昔在劫初，發弘誓願，化身如恆河沙數，物隨聲應，在天呼為太一福神，在世呼為大慈仁者，在地獄呼為日耀帝君，在外道攝邪呼為獅子明王，在水府呼為洞淵帝君，汝是吾之炁，吾是汝之根，汝知吾知。此是九陽之精，甚靈甚靈，或居天宮，或降人間，或居地獄，或攝群邪，或為仙童玉女，或為帝君聖人，或為天尊道士、或為皇人老君，或為天醫功曹，神通無量，功行無窮，尋聲救苦，應物隨機。汝等可舉聲唱太一之名，使仙官齊詠，自然應化現身。於是諸仙真人齊聲稱詠太一救苦天尊之名，想見天尊乘五色祥雲、九頭獅子，放百寶瑞光，浮空而至元始會下，稽首作禮，遵稟受戒。

於是元始天尊曰：吾觀慾界衆生女人，造種種罪業，身墮血湖受苦沈淪，動經億劫，永無出期。吾今開琅函寶藏，出金籙赦文，卿可齎往下方，宣告三界十方、三官九署、十二河源、九幽血湖地獄，赦拔罪魂，得辭長夜，睹見光明。於是太一救苦天尊，大慈大悲普濟普度，時有慈悲救苦真人、大慈大惠真人、太一八十一神、天丁力士、青玄功曹、黃線童子、玉女神王，擁從法駕。天尊放百億瑞光，左手擎瑠璃寶瓶，右手執空青羽枝，乘九頭獅子金蓮翠葉之座，乘空而去，敕韶九鳳破穢大神、洗院大神、無義斷恩大神、正精火目大神、震雷鼓目大神、全形復體大神、解冤釋對大神，清蕩血湖，破除厭穢，告下元始符命，元皇曲赦救度產死罪魂，時刻昇遷。是時酆都北帝及諸鬼官、牛頭獄卒、威斂神王、三界大魔、九億鬼王、血湖大神，咸遵勅命，赦拔罪魂，九幽黑簿，一時焚燼，血湖清蕩，化為寶池，金槌鐵杖，變成蓮華，飲血食穢，化為甘露。一切罪魂，須悟本真，乘光超度，皆得生天，地獄冥官，皆發善念，同乘惠力，證道成真。而獻頌曰：

稽首虛無無上道，慈悲救苦大慈尊。神光百億照中昏，遍覆慈雲濡法雨。
硤石溟泠無間獄，血湖血海血池盆。玉籙大赦諸罪魂，解脫沈淪萬劫苦。
鍊形度命失陵府，悟道登真衆妙門。巍巍功德難思議，永為衆生作慈父。

是時慈悲救苦諸大真人，依稟聖言，宣通命令，開明長夜，救拔幽途，凡沐慈恩，同超極樂。

元始天尊濟度血湖真經卷下

爾時元始天尊告諸大聖妙行真人曰 ：下界衆生，五濁色身，不識因緣罪福，貪著淫慾，或為女身，生育男女，橫遭厄難，或生異疾，夭喪天年，展轉輪迴，不自知覺。告諸衆生，能發善心，恭敬三寶，不殺不害，不嫉不妬，不淫不盜，不貪不慾，不憎不女自，奉戒冥心，能持是經功德，即有十天善神、護法神王、九天衛房聖母、監生大神、與無量天真大聖，俱來衛護。

天尊言：道生一，一生二，二生三，三生萬物，負陰抱陽，恍恍惚惚，其中有物。其中有物，其名不去，萬物歸之終不為大，視之不足見，聽之不足聞，用之不足既矣。衆等聞說是經，各各會道觀心，怡神默悟。是時太一救苦天尊、諸天上帝、慈悲救苦諸大真人，承元始之威光，頒宣三元符命，普告北陰世界，九幽長夜，無間溟泠，硤石血湖諸大地獄之中，救領衆生，咸得超渡。

天尊復告衆真曰：吾今演說，即是《靈寶昇玄濟度血湖真經》，昔祕紫微上宮三天奧藏，盟真有禁，四萬劫一傳，今當劫運告終，大法宜形，斯可下傳人間，流通轉誦，其有男女若能如法修行，利益人天，獲福無量。於是重宣三元祕梵天寶靈書：

一炁成真，二儀運虛。五靈續絕，七曜扶衰。旋綱躡空，飛步雲宮。胚胎有始，億劫無終。金城孕質，玉洞凝神。真氣內養，以成真人。上入太虛，下通幽泉。雲宮寳室，中有真魂。出入福鄉，週旋生門。咀嚼靈芝，灌漱金泉。甘露川流，懸澍丹田。紫霞朝映，三炁凝煙。瓊室化仙，安座金蓮。真儀掩日，塵劫為年。

爾時天尊重告諸仙真人曰：人生幾何，易生易滅，如彼石火，不得長久，如彼浮漚，豈能堅固。生老病死，日夜相侵，變滅不常，須臾散壞，宜爾忘乎目，則光溢無極，泯乎耳，則心識常淵，兩機俱忘，淳淳全全，合乎大方，溟溟涬涬，合乎無倫，我之所維，與天地共為長久。於是諸仙衆等聞天尊演說度人津梁，功德不可思議，各各稽首禮謝，信受奉行。

Source Colophon

The Chinese text follows the Chinese Wikisource transcription of the Daoist Canon edition of this text (article 元始天尊濟度血湖真經, revision of 8 July 2017), inspected from a witness copy captured on 8 August 2026. Chinese Wikisource transcriptions are published under CC BY-SA 4.0 and the GFDL; the text itself is ancient and in the public domain. The wiki header and license templates have been removed; the text is otherwise complete and unaltered.

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