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"The Rootless Tree
Ci
(Poetry)" is an important Taoist text written by
the famous Taoist immortal Zhang
Sanfeng  (11th century A.D. - ?) who is also well known as
the founder of the inner school of Chinese martial arts and
Tai Chi
Chuan.
In the "Direct Discourse on Mysterious
Mechanism"  also written by Zhang
Sanfeng, there is a passage which I believe is
referring to these poems and thus naturally serve best as its
introduction:
"Once I have met a Guru, who gave me
personal instruction and exposed to me the two tidings (inner
and outer) of the reality of this Void. Not daring to
keep this private to myself, I risk the taboo to impart this,
and disclose all about the creation of heaven, man and earth
in one's physiology, the essence of the texts of the three
religions, drugs and its degree of heating of the fire, the
mating of the sun and moon, the degree of wax and wan, not in
jargons, but all by words of truth, so that the learner will
not mistake for the wrong path. Where this book
is, there are divine things guarding it. If those
non-predestinated or filthy guys see it, it is just those
lyrics for girls singing for a living in a tea
house."
Basically, comparing with what Zhang
Sanfeng has mentioned in his "Direct
Discourse on Mysterious Mechanism", we can divided these
24 poems into 3 sections:
1) The first 10 poems disclose the secret of the
foundation building practice, Zhuji  , or more specifically the method of
"Etherealize essence to prana" for the cultivation of the inner
elixir. This is mainly the process
starting from accumulating lead  , or pick lead flower  , up to the congealing of the "small reversion
elixir" or xiaohuan dan  , so called the process of "reverting
the jade fluid to the elixir"  . Full accomplishment in this will lead to the
attainment of the status of human immortals  .
2) The 11th to 18th poems are on reverting the
pre-heavenly prana collected from the first step to the reversion
elixir with seven homebound cycles  . This is basically the same subject
as discussed in Qinyuanchun by another famous Taoist
immortal Lu
Dongbin. The reader can refer to
my translation of Qinyuanchun and selected
commentaries for more understanding on this
section. Full accomplishment in this will lead to the
attainment of the status of terrestrial immortals  .
3) The last 6 poems are on the final step of
cultivating the "great reversion elixir" or dahuan
dan  at the upper field of the elixir. This is for
gaining the staus of celestial immortals  but is not covered in detail
here.
The importance of this Rootless Tree Ci
(Poetry) is mainly in the 1st section because there
are not many Taoist texts that actually talk about how to
accumulate lead or "Etherealize essence to prana". This is partly because of the
ancient immortals' belief that "heavenly
mechanism should not be disclosed"  and probably also because of the
taboo in talking about sex in ancient Chinese society. That is
why this has always been passed on through word of mouth from
the Guru to the disciple.
Unfortunately I have not been able to find a good
commentary on this. But the first section should be easy
enough to understand once the reader figure out what those
terms including flower, moon and the stamen represent. This is
more experiential than theoretical understanding.
However, please note that this is for man
only because of a different sexual physiology between
man and woman.
There is a saying that "Man conform with the Sun and
erect once a day; Woman conform with the moon and menstruate
once a month"     . Therefore man can make use of this natural instinct
to cultivate the elixir, but not for a woman. The Quanzhen
School, for example, primarily use the lively
midnight hour  for their practice.
Basically the primary mean of the inner
elixir approach of Chinese Alchemy is to reclaim
the essence lost by our sexual desires and turn them into
drugs for cultivating the elixir paving the way to immortality. Therefore there is a
common saying in Chinese Alchemy, "In accord to give birth
to man, reverse to be immortal"   . This also explains why Lu Dongbin
was famous as a ladies man and why the ancient immortals said
that we need to "Refine ourselves in the dusty world,
accumulate lead in household and in city"   .
Besides the Rootless Tree Ci
(Poetry), the reader can also refer to the "Elimination of Leak
Diagram"  in the Hui Ming Ching  (known to the West as
"The Book of Consciousness
and Life") for cross reference. [NB.
Please note that except for this diagram, the Hui Ming Ching
is not a good reference for Chinese Alchemy.]
In this translation, in order to achieve a metrical
structure being lyrics of a song, I have sacrificed my useful
emphasis in revealing the full meaning of the original Chinese
words, just giving its central meaning. And where necessary, I
have added notes to elaborate the other meanings.
Akrishi
2009/1/12
revised
External Links:
The
Rootless Tree (WukenShu), translated by Douglas Wile
(size: 305 KB) | 
