Page 473 - The Encyclopedia of Taoism v1_A-L

434 THE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF TAOISM A-L

Clearly, these records are difficult to reconcile, if only because they have
Can active over perhaps 500 years. This has led some scholars to conjecture
that different historical figures adopted the name of Can Ji as a token of
numinous power and that these anecdotes may therefore refer to separate
people. Another approach has been to claim that the real CanJi lived during
the second century and was simply very old when executed by Sun Ce. The
references to earlier activities have thus been interpreted as attempts to grant
a spuriously ancient history to the Taipingjing.

Benjamin PENNY
W Campany 2002, 30I-3; Kandel 1979; Maeda Shigeki 1985a; Mansvelt Beck
1980; Fukui K6jun 1958, 62-71
* Taipingjing; HAGIOGRAPHY

Ganshui xianyuan lu

Accounts of the Immortals Who Appeared [After the Revelation]
at Canshui

This large ten-juan collection of inscriptions (CT 973) related to the history of
*Quanzhen was compiled by *Li Daoqian (1219-96) and bears a postface dated
1289. The title alludes to Canhe itiilJ (Shaanxi, west of Xi'an), where *Wang
Zhe first met the immortals in II59. The author was abbot of the Chongyang
gong ~Il3Ji'§ (Palace of Double Yang), the monastery built on Wang's grave
not far from Canhe, and was especially knowledgeable about the many sites
of Quanzhen's holy history in the Zhongnan~:t wJ area. The Ganshui xianyuan
lu is not limited to those places, however, but is representative of the order's
development throughout northern China. The work opens with the canoniza-
tion decree of I269, which awarded prestigious titles to Quanzhen's founders
and immortal ancestors, but the inscriptions roughly span the years 1220-80
and are concerned with the history of Quanzhen from Wang's predication
onward.
The collection is a tribute to the importance of *EPIGRAPHY as an expression
of Quanzhen self-identity. The order made sure that all its major monasteries
had foundation stelae and all its important masters had funerary inscriptions.
This is evident from several inscriptions composed long after their recorded
events and explicitly written to fill a gap. This systematic approach is reflected
in the structure of the book: j. 1 and 2 include nine memorial inscriptions for