Page 559 - The Encyclopedia of Taoism v1_A-L

H UGANG Z I 519

Hugangzi

also known as Huzi ~J11 and
Huqiu xiansheng ~J11Ji.:%j: (Master Huqiu)

Hugang zi is the appellation of an otherwise unknown alchemist (or per-
haps group of alchemists) associated with a corpus of *waidan writings that
developed during the late Six Dynasties and is now extant in fragments. The
commentary to the Scripture of the Nine Elixirs (*Jiudan jing) mentions him as
a disciple of *Zuo Ci and as the master of *Ge Xuan, who was *Ge Hong's
granduncle and belonged to the latter's line of family transmission of waidan
texts (Huangdi jiuding shendan jingjue Jt W 11 Rrl;;f$ fH~ 1fk:; CT 885, 3.6b and
7.Sa- b). Other sources relate Hugangzi to Wei Boyang ~fi3~ , the legendary
author of the *Zhouyi cantong qi (see, e.g., Danlun jue zhixin jian fj-lffiti1fk: i§' {,\
m; CT 935, 4a). Although these accounts have no historical basis, they sug-
gest, with other details, that the texts ascribed to Hugang zi were produced
in Jiangnan rI"i¥J.
The main source of fragments from this corpus is the commentary to the
Scripture of the Nine Elixirs. Passages quoted there make it possible to gather
details on the contents of five works: Fu xuanzhu jue {le K U: 1fk: (Instructions
for Fixing the Mysterious Pearl), Wujin fen tujue 1i ~;j?1 !i 1fk: (Illustrated In-
structions on the Powders of the Five Metals), Chu jinkuang tulu ill ~ ~ffi{ 11 ~
(Illustrated Account of the Extraction of Gold from Its Ores), Wanjinjue f;t
~1fk: (Instructions Worth a Thousand Pieces of Gold), and Heche jing fPJ]J[
~~ (Book of the River Chariot). In addition, various bibliographies ascribe to
Hugang zi several other works of which no further traces appear to exist.
After the anonymous texts summarized by Ge Hong inj. II of his *Baopu
zi, this remarkable body of writings included the earliest known waidan
works largely based on metals. Fragments dealing with the compounding
of lead and mercury are of special interest in light of the history of alchemy
in China, where these two metals progressively acquired importance owed
especially to the influence of the Can tong qi. Among various other methods,
the commentary to the Scripture of the Nine Elixirs preserves recipes for the
separate refining of mercury (n.6a- b) and lead (I2.3a), followed by a method
for their conjunction (II.7a- b; also in 12.3a- b). Moreover, Hugang zi's lineage
may be related to the composition of parts of the Can tong qi (see the materials
collected in Chen Guofu 1983, 68- 87), and one of the two Tang waidan com-