Pathway to Japanese Literature

I. Rohan and the Way of Immortals

"The Problem of ‘East and West’ is said to be humanity’s greatest challenge."
"When considering this problem from the standpoint of an Easterner, the ancient Chinese thought of immortals has recently come to be regarded as an element that cannot be overlooked."

Perhaps it’s my age.

The direct cause lay in having read a small portion of Mr. Rohan’s works on immortals.
Among these works, I was profoundly drawn to *Senjo Sandokai* (The Immortal Scripture’s Kinship of the Three), and thus felt compelled to chronicle my own nostalgia for the ancient East, primarily through introducing this text.
However, *Senjo Sandokai* itself being a commentary on Wei Boyang’s *Zhouyi Cantongqi*, providing a commentary on a commentary seemed rather peculiar.
Should it have come under specialists’ scrutiny in Chinese thought, they would likely have dismissed it as laughable with a single word, but for young people who had never been properly taught even middle school-level Chinese classics, it might have proven a somewhat rare and intriguing read.

When seeking to understand the broader concept of the Way of Immortals in China, what cannot be overlooked is the Elixir Way (Dan Dao). While Mr. Koda Rohan held an interest in China’s Way of Immortals in general, he appears to have had a particularly deep interest in the Elixir Way (Dan Dao). Among Mr. Rohan’s research on the Elixir Way (Dan Dao) and China’s Way of Immortals in general, the most exhaustive study remains the aforementioned *Senjo Sandokai*. This paper was written in Showa 16—that is, during Mr. Rohan’s final years—and spanned roughly one hundred pages, constituting both an extensive work and a monumental effort.

*Senjo Sandokai*, in short, was a textual criticism and commentary on *Zhouyi Cantongqi* (*The Kinship of the Three*), authored by Wei Boyang of the Later Han Dynasty.
The composition of this *Zhouyi Cantongqi* was estimated to have occurred around 145 CE.
In Japan’s context, this was several decades even before the time of Queen Himiko.
In other words, this book had been created still several decades earlier than the era confirmed to be when the Japanese people were living as uncivilized people.
It was a book from such an ancient era that later became the progenitor of Elixir Way texts—the main orthodoxy of the Chinese Way of Immortals.
Therefore, its content reached the pinnacle of abstruseness, being a work that lay almost entirely beyond comprehension for the modern mind.

After all, a book from such an ancient era could not possibly have survived to this day in its original, complete form.
In fact, as the original text had long been lost, the oldest among existing versions of the *Cantongqi* was Peng Xiao’s annotated *Cantongqi* from the Five Dynasties period.
Even this version came eight hundred years after Wei Boyang.
To advance textual criticism back to the Later Han era based on such texts and attempt to provide commentary on them would naturally be a tremendous labor.
That was what Mr. Koda Rohan masterfully accomplished.
And he not only provided commentary on the *Zhouyi Cantongqi* but also extensively discussed the broader ancient Chinese immortal thought that formed the background of the Elixir Way.

When viewing ancient Chinese paintings, when it came to landscapes, they were almost always adorned with either immortals or recluses.
In figure paintings as well, immortals or immortal-like figures were extremely numerous.
The thought of immortals had permeated all social classes in China to such an extent that ancient Chinese thought could not be discussed without considering it.

This uniquely Chinese Way of Immortals developed from the thought of Laozi that germinated in the distant Spring and Autumn and Warring States period, with Zhuangzi’s teachings later added to it.
Within this philosophy, phrases such as “the valley spirit never dies” became distorted at the hands of Fangshi occult practitioners during the eras of Emperor Qin Shi Huang and Emperor Wu of Han, blazing forth as Daoist techniques centered on divine marvels and anomalies.
And after an exceedingly long span of years, those divine marvels and magical arts ultimately evolved into the introspective Elixir Way.

The course of events during this period was exceedingly complex and multifaceted, and there was a lack of appropriate, accessible literature.
However, thanks to Mr. Koda Rohan’s painstaking work, we could now come to know the developmental history of this bizarre yet singular immortal thought of ancient China’s with relative ease.

II. Ancient Chinese Alchemy

The *Zhouyi Cantongqi* is the foundational text of Dan Dao (the Elixir Way), but this “dan” originally referred to red sand—that is, naturally occurring cinnabar. Cinnabar refers to a composite of mercury sulfide, and the ancient Chinese people held this cinnabar in the highest regard. There are stories of kings’ corpses being soaked in cinnabar, though this was likely intended as a preservative. From an artistic standpoint, the red beauty of cinnabar was greatly cherished throughout successive eras.

However, more than this, it was the chemical changes demonstrated by cinnabar that most profoundly captured ancient people’s attention. “When red cinnabar is calcined, it becomes mercury with a white gleam; smelt this mercury and it returns to cinnabar. Moreover, mercury suddenly dissolves gold, yet when coated onto other substances and heated, it vanishes without trace”—from this alchemical perspective, the elixir was treasured as something that astonished those attuned to spiritual wonders. Merely burning cinnabar—that is, mercury sulfide—does not yield white mercury. When burned in air to become mercury oxide and then calcined on charcoal, it is reduced to yield mercury. Even if white mercury is burned, it does not become cinnabar. When sulfur bloom is mixed with mercury and refined, it becomes mercury sulfide; however, this appears black in color. When alkali is added to this black mercury sulfide and heated in warm water, it suddenly transforms into red cinnabar—that is, a composite of mercury sulfide.

That such chemical transformations were already known in ancient China prior to Emperor Jimmu’s reign remains astonishing, while how such alchemy emerged during that era continues to elude explanation.
Yet it was only natural that ancient people harbored this primal awe toward such metamorphoses.
From this sense of mystery emerged the elixir’s transcendence beyond the mundane—intertwined with humanity’s raw yearning to enter the immortal realm of eternal life—giving birth to terms like immortal elixir (*xiandan*), divine elixir (*shendan*), golden elixir (*jindan*), refined elixir (*liandan*), ingested elixir (*fudan*), and nourishing elixir (*erdan*).

Immortal elixirs (*xiandan*) and divine elixirs (*shendan*) were used in the sense of miraculous medicinal substances or were interpreted as the path to obtaining divine techniques for immortality through use.
The golden elixir (*jindan*) is traditionally said to have been received by Laozi from Yuanjun, but could also be interpreted as symbolizing the immortal life of gold or as a method for refining gold through amalgamation.
Immortality and gold were two manifestations of human desire that likely remained undifferentiated in ancient minds.
The same phenomenon appeared in Western medieval alchemy.
Ingesting and consuming elixirs (*fudan erdan*) referred to the method of taking fully formed alchemical substances—the most rudimentary approach.
Yet there remained stories of those who died instantly upon swallowing a completed elixir.
To actually drink mercury would be unendurable.

The term "Returned Elixir" held significant meaning in the Elixir Way.
It was said that “through refining elixir upon elixir and completing the tremendous labor of ninefold cycling, what emerged was none other than the Great Returned Elixir—the supreme immortal elixir.”
The true meaning lay in reaching the state where life and death became one through accumulated spiritual cultivation.
In this sense, the Returned Elixir of Dan practitioners resembled the Buddhist concept of Nirvana, though a vulgar interpretation—that of refining an elixir of immortality—had also been practiced.

Regarding the alchemy of cinnabar and gold, the oldest extant literature is found in the term *Huangye Bianhua* (Yellow Smelting Transformation). During the reign of Emperor Cheng of Han (several years BCE), this phrase appeared in the memorials of Gu Yong—who denounced supernatural matters with forthright language. Huangye referred to smelting gold through transformations of cinnabar; during this period, dan remained an object of alchemical pursuit. The character *dan* (丹), originally denoting red sand itself, evolved to signify more spiritual concepts like immortal elixirs (*xiandan*) and divine elixirs (*shendan*). Mr. Koda Rohan asserted that Wei Boyang’s *Cantongqi* likely first employed this usage through its line: “Though sesame may prolong life, the Returned Elixir can enter the mouth.” As previously noted, textual criticism has authenticated this *Zhouyi Cantongqi* as emerging around 145 CE, immediately preceding Emperor Huan’s reign in the Later Han Dynasty.

The Elixir Way known to us today began with the *Zhouyi Cantongqi*—that is, with Wei Boyang.
Therefore, its origin was the Later Han period.
However, its essence was not widely accepted until much later, during the Northern Song period.
The long era spanning from Wei Boyang’s time—that is, the late Later Han period—through the Six Dynasties, Jin, Northern and Southern Dynasties, Sui, and Tang, spanning over eight hundred years, was still a time when thoughts of divine marvels and anomalies from the Qin and Former Han periods remained deeply ingrained in people’s minds.
Thus, the Elixir Way also tended to develop in physical aspects such as ingesting and consuming elixirs.
In other words, such practices were often viewed as a type of technique for gathering divine fungi and lingzhi mushrooms.
Within the Elixir Way, this type of physical aspect was termed the External Elixir.
In contrast, the essence of the *Zhouyi Cantongqi* lay in introspective spiritual cultivation; this aspect was termed the Internal Elixir.

III. The True Meaning of the Elixir Way

The essence of the Elixir Way lies in Wei Boyang’s Internal Elixir, yet its foundational text, the *Zhouyi Cantongqi*, remains an impenetrably difficult work for us today.
Even Mr. Koda Rohan’s commentary proves far from easy to savor in depth.

To comprehend the Elixir Way even in a partial manner, one must first possess a foundational understanding of ancient Chinese immortal thought and Daoism that predates the *Cantongqi*.
This immortal thought constitutes an extraordinarily unique primitive religion, its origins tracing back to Laozi’s philosophy in 500 BCE.
The philosophies of Laozi and Zhuangzi, the Way of Immortals, and Daoism are often conflated. Or rather, they tend to be perceived as one and the same.
However, Laozi and Zhuangzi’s thought is philosophy, not religion.
Even if Zhuangzi mentions the divine beings of Miaogu, he does not expound on techniques for physical immortality or the like.

What later generations call Daoism is indeed a religion, but this was first propounded by Zhang Daoling in the mid-Later Han Dynasty—seven hundred years after Laozi.
In 142 CE, Zhang Daoling arose in Shu and established what would become Daoism by claiming to have received Laozi’s divine revelation and teachings.
Interestingly, Wei Boyang’s authorship of the *Cantongqi* and his establishment as the progenitor of the Elixir Way are also estimated to have occurred around 145 CE.
Almost simultaneously, Zhang in the northwest established Daoism and Wei in the southeast established the Elixir Way, each founding heterodox teachings beyond the Zhou-Kong tradition.

The Way of Immortals reached its zenith before Zhang founded Daoism.
The Fangshi practitioners' quest to obtain elixirs of immortality by seeking out immortals across various regions flourished from the era of the Qin Emperor and Han Wu Emperor—occurring four hundred years before Zhang Daoling's time.
In this manner, though Daoism emerged later, due to religious policy measures that incorporated Laozi, Zhuangzi, Liezi, and even Mozi into its own fold, by later ages both the Elixir Way and the Way of Immortals—in short, all religions apart from Confucianism and Buddhism—came to be subsumed within Daoism.
However, Daoism, the Way of Immortals, and the Elixir Way were fundamentally distinct in their origins.

The Elixir Way too had initially been a primitive belief that sprouted within the Way of Immortals.
That is to say, it was an External Elixir that aimed to enter the immortal realm of eternal life through gathering divine fungi and lingzhi mushrooms while refining elixirs.
It was Wei Boyang who dispelled this delusion, teaching that the formation of elixirs did not mean attaining physical immortality but rather realizing a mental state transcending life and death.
This was none other than the Internal Elixir.
The path of the Internal Elixir—comparable to enlightenment in Zen Buddhism and embracing faith in Christianity—constituted the way to attain the state of great awakening.

The *Zhouyi Cantongqi* is a text that expounds the path to realizing this state of great awakening through the secret profundities of attainment-transmigration. Since it inherently records matters difficult to articulate and explain, its extreme abstruseness becomes unavoidable. Even with Zen Buddhism—relatively familiar to us—books explaining enlightenment’s path make no sense when read ordinarily. How much more inaccessible must this secret text of attainment-transmigration remain—adorned as it is with ancient China’s strange immortal thought—to us modern people as a matter of course. With explanation being fundamentally impossible, there remains no path but to convey these wondrous techniques through analogies and metaphorical language: “For example: ‘This wondrous technique does not deceive when examined with care.’ It endures through ten thousand generations. It must be contemplated with luminous clarity. Like blazing through the River of Stars, like converging luminously upon the sea of waters—ponder this with utmost diligence until it ripens; contemplate its cyclical ascent and descent. After a thousand cycles of resplendent refinement in harmonious order, not even ten thousand repetitions may reveal its essence. Deities may inform someone, and their spirit will suddenly awaken.” It proceeds thus: “If one traces the threads by probing their ends, they will surely attain its gateway.”

In this manner, Dan Dao—the orthodox tradition of China’s Way of Immortals—ultimately expounded a path to realizing religion’s essence through great enlightenment or entering faith.
Now then, were the Returned Elixir—the pinnacle of Dan Dao—Buddhist Nirvana, and Christianity’s profession of faith all the same? They differed markedly from one another.
At least in their hues, there existed a clear distinction.
Among these, the Returned Elixir of Dan practitioners in particular possessed remarkably distinctive coloration.
Therein lay connections to those uncanny forms seen in Shang and early Zhou bronzeware.
The elusive, dreamlike immortal thought of ancient Chinese people formed the foundational tone of this Elixir Way.
To explicate this through modern language—or more precisely, through a modern consciousness—proved exceedingly difficult.

Let us present a passage from Mr. Koda Rohan’s commentary.
“By personally experiencing and mentally attesting to the state where spiritual consciousness and material substance remain undivided, one returns again to the realm where these very elements—employed daily—become immersed in life-and-death’s ceaseless cycle.”
“The Way of the Returned Elixir consists in embodying human life’s ultimate course—the immediate origin following it, and that place where ending circles back to beginning anew.”
Such explanations defy comprehension through textual analysis alone.
There exists no method but to savor them through a hundred contemplative readings.
Understanding demands explanation.
Explanation must inevitably incorporate logic’s forms in their broadest sense.
Before matters like life-and-death’s essential unity, logic stands utterly powerless.
That mental state can only be realized through a mode of cognition complementary to analysis and logic—through enlightenment or intuitive apprehension—with no alternative path remaining.

IV. Ancient Immortal Thought

To discern the essence of the Elixir Way required glimpsing ancient Chinese immortal thought spanning seven hundred years from the Spring and Autumn period through the Later Han Dynasty—the intellectual milieu preceding Wei Boyang.
This period corresponded naturally to prehistoric times in our country.
The arrival of bronze and iron implements from the continent was estimated to have occurred during the early Later Han Dynasty; consequently, the ancient Chinese thought discussed hereafter aligned temporally with our country’s Jōmon and Yayoi cultural eras.

Given that this concerned such an ancient era, even in China, detailed documents did not survive.
If the Seven Wei Texts—the apocryphal commentaries on the *Yi*, *Shi*, *Shu*, *Chunqiu*, *Li*, *Yue*, and *Xiaojing* compiled during the Former Han—had survived, they would have been ideal sources. However, since all were burned during the Sui Dynasty, only scattered fragments cited in miscellaneous texts could be glimpsed.
Even attempting textual criticism proved futile, as there were scarcely any materials available.
However, Mr. Koda Rohan advanced this arduous textual criticism using the titles of immortal texts listed in the *Hanshu* Yiwenzhi as his clues.
That resembled the work of paleontologists who attempt to reconstruct images of ancient organisms using slight striations left on rock masses as clues.

While only the titles remained in the *Hanshu* Yiwenzhi, those divine migration texts themselves had now all been lost, leaving nothing behind. However, by carefully examining those titles while thoroughly contemplating passages in which Wei Boyang rejected earlier immortal thought within the *Zhouyi Cantongqi*, the memories of that ancient people—now lost—gradually began to take shape.

For example, within the *Yiwenzhi*, there was recorded a text titled *Taiyi Zazi Huangye* in Thirty-One Volumes.
As previously mentioned, Huangye here referred to the smelting of gold using cinnabar.
Taiyi originated when Miu Ji of Jiyin petitioned Emperor Wu of Han to establish its worship, becoming revered as the supreme celestial deity.
Later, works such as *Taiyi Bingfa* (Military Methods of Taiyi) and *Taiyi Yinyang* (Yin-Yang of Taiyi) appeared, and the enduring legacy of Shangdi thought centered on Taiyi in China became rooted in this foundation.
Thus it became clear that this text likely expounded on alchemy and elixir ingestion under the guise of Taiyi.
Mr. Koda Rohan proceeded with his textual criticism of the era’s thought by analyzing titles such as *Fuxi Zazi Dao* in Twenty Chapters, *Huangdi Qibo Anmo* in Ten Volumes, and *Huangdi Zazi Zhijun* in Eighteen Volumes, employing this methodological approach.
In this endeavor, Mr. Koda Rohan’s erudition—forged through his mastery of countless volumes—served as a formidable weapon.

Now, there was one thing we had to consider: China at that time lacked what we would call religion.
Buddhism was transmitted to China around the middle of the Later Han Dynasty.
Zhang Daoling’s Daoism and Wei Boyang’s Elixir Way are both religions; however, their establishment occurred nearly a century after Buddhism’s official transmission to China, and the ancient Way of Immortals prior to Zhang and Wei could not be called a religion.
In other words, during that era when ancient immortal thought most spectacularly manifested its wonders in China, there existed only the teachings of Zhou and Confucius.
The teachings of Zhou and Confucius are not a religion in the sense that they do not address life and death, but rather a moral doctrine.
In such an era without religion, it was perfectly natural that Emperor Shi Huangdi dispatched Xu Fu to Penglai Island to seek the elixir of immortality (circa 220 BCE), and that Emperor Wu sent fangshi across various states in pursuit of immortals (133 BCE).
During this era, the Han Chinese—who unified Yu Territory (China proper)—formed the world’s largest nation-state.
In the West, this was the era of Rome and Carthage at war; as a unified nation-state, China stood as the world’s largest and most powerful country.
In a mighty nation of an era devoid of science or religion, its rulers frantically pursuing arts of immortality—this seemed precisely the sort of scenario that would unfold.
In such an environment, even the remarkable endeavors of peculiar individuals like fangshi were naturally induced.
“Divine Sovereigns conveyed oracles, Hearth Demons manifested their visages, and hypnotic-like uncanny phenomena intermingled—”
—their arrival being but the natural course of things.

In the *Hanshu Yiwenzhi*, the Daoist school and Immortalist school are clearly distinguished; thus we can discern that these two were originally separate entities.
The Daoist school enshrined figures like Yi Yin, Taigong, Laozi, and Zhuangzi, manifested divine transformations and strange phenomena, and sought arts of immortality.
The Immortalist school, venerating Huangdi, Fuxi, Taiyi, and Shennong as ancestral patriarchs, narrated various divine wonders, devised methods for nurturing vitality through daoyin exercises and massage, researched mystical fungi and lingzhi efficacy, and expounded alchemical elixir techniques—thereby establishing foundations for what would later become the External Elixir path.
Yet these two schools maintained no strict division; both manifested illusionary arts through ritual worship, medicinal techniques, and shamanic practices—halting river currents with talismans, flying through air, ascending to heaven in daylight.

Such illusionary arts could easily be dismissed as mere hypnotism when viewed through our modern consciousness.
Yet that resolution remained merely verbal.
Even in modern times, there had been reported cases of individuals in uncontacted societies dying after violating taboos.
The treatment of illness stood separate from matters of life and death.
In biology too, ultimately it escaped beyond the mysterious veil called vitality.
In both ancient immortal thought and modern biology, the fundamental mystery of spirit itself had not changed in the slightest.

During the era of rampant illusionary arts spanning from the Spring and Autumn period through the Qin and Han dynasties, beyond these Daoist and Immortalist schools, various sorceries and superstitions—along with theories of divine wonders that might even be seen as embryonic forms of science—proliferated widely.
Among these were schools such as the Yin-Yang School, Five Phases School, Medical School, and Bedchamber Arts School.
Though all these would later become intermixed with the Daoist and Immortalist schools and ultimately absorbed into Daoism itself, at their time of emergence they each constituted distinct sects.

The concepts of Yin-Yang and the Five Phases were philosophies deeply rooted among the Han Chinese since the distant Zhou Dynasty.
The Yin-Yang School comprised two branches: one originally affiliated with the Calendar School that focused on astronomy and celestial phenomena, though its principal work involved astrology—divining auspicious and inauspicious signs through celestial alignments rather than direct astronomical observation.
Historical accounts abound with instances such as discerning Kongming's death by observing a general's star fall at Wuzhangyuan.
Astrology thrived not only in China but also in the West until relatively recent times.
This represented a universal human phenomenon prior to modern science's establishment.
In Japan, figures like Abe no Seimei who engaged deeply with astronomy belonged to a much later period; the first astrological observatory was built during Emperor Tenmu's reign.
Though Emperor Tenmu's era seems ancient by our standards, it still occurred a millennium after the period under discussion—during the early Tang Dynasty.
This Yin-Yang tradition demonstrated remarkable longevity, maintaining influence through the Tang period and likely transmitting its teachings to Japan.
The school's other branch developed military strategies based on yin-yang alternation principles, bearing scant relation to the later *Cantongqi*.

The Five Phases School was a faction that posited all phenomena in creation consisted of five elements—fire, water, metal, earth, and wood—and taught that all transformations in the cosmos and human life were governed by these phases’ mutual generation and destruction, along with permutations of yin and yang’s dual energies. Based on this primitive faith, it sought to resolve all problems of nature and human life. From this arose the sixty-four hexagrams, which have taken root even into modern times. To call them mere permutations would be to acknowledge their triviality. Yet even in an age as intellectually advanced as today’s, humanity continues repeating wars without ever learning—conflicts where both victors and vanquished suffer. Were we to classify all human behaviors today, their forms would likely number fewer than sixty-four. In that sense, we moderns cannot mock the thought of China’s formative period—the Spring and Autumn, Qin, and Han eras.

The Medical School, like today’s physicians, made treating illnesses through medicinal remedies its primary task—a matter requiring no detailed elaboration when discussing introspective problems.
The true issue lay with the Bedchamber Arts School.
The techniques of these arts dealt with male-female intercourse that held profound mystery for ancient people.
Initially limited to expounding temperance’s importance and indulgence’s grave harms, they came to speculate inversely—as lifespans diverged and fortunes fluctuated amid bewildering circumstances—"seeking interpretations of divine wonders and spectral phenomena within bedchamber secrets."
This belief system, resonating implicitly with ancient genital worship, ultimately developed into a philosophy where mastery of bedroom techniques could enable one to become an immortal.
This toxic influence unexpectedly took deep root over centuries, spreading even to our country where by the Heian period it spawned superstitions that various illnesses might be cured through sexual practices.
In both our nation and China, this concept of bedroom arts—the ideology of Yin practices—is said to persist even today.

V. Ancient Chinese Immortal Arts

When classified within intellectual history, ancient Chinese immortal thought could be categorized as outlined above.
However, in reality, these schools of thought soon after their emergence became thoroughly intermingled, coalescing into a single amorphous yet profoundly abstruse ideology that developed into what came to be known as Immortal Arts.
Therefore, regarding Immortal Arts when viewed holistically, it became necessary to first classify the various methods of attaining immortality from a technical perspective to comprehend this abstruse ancient Chinese ideology.

Among the Immortal Arts of this era, the most widespread and universal method was ritual worship.
This was by no means limited to ancient China; even today across various nations worldwide—though differing in form—it remains actively practiced.
It was a method of “piling earth to erect an altar; enshrining one’s chosen deity—be it Taiyi, Qingdi, Huangdi, or Laojun—as the principal object of worship; devoting oneself wholeheartedly to ritual observance at this single site; thereby seeking to attain immortality.”
As faith deepened, one eventually came to behold forms of mysterious entities—this being “the principle of form coalescing through concentrated thought.”
In such cases, when the principal deity manifested before worshippers, it was no possession by foxes or raccoon dogs but a true manifestation.
To call this a phantom dream was not incorrect.
Yet by that measure, even atomic bombs became phantom dreams.
The truth proclaimed by science revealed distinctions between reality and illusion only when annihilating individual perception.
For those viewing photographs of atomic explosions in newspapers, these were forms coalesced through thought.
For those who perished at Hiroshima and Nagasaki too, atomic bombs must have been phantom dreams—
The reason being that those who died could never come to know what transpired afterward.

Beyond these so-called universal methods of ritual worship, there existed various other techniques for attaining immortality—more intriguing and distinctive to the ancient Chinese. One of these was the Method of Traversing the Viscera. The Method of Traversing the Viscera involved closing one’s eyes and assuming a seated meditation-like posture, sequentially visualizing the viscera within one’s own body while praying for their vigorous and healthy functioning. For modern people—their stomachs perpetually taut as if hoisted upward, ceaselessly spinning their wheels through empty routines—this spiritual method might indeed have been worth recommending. The ancient Chinese might have initially understood it in this sense, but they gradually succumbed to a tendency to deify each internal organ individually, coming to pray that these deities’ divine mandates would descend upon their very beings. Although the names of each individual deity corresponding to specific internal organs have not been transmitted, it is known that the deity of the spleen was called Huangshang-jun. And through methods such as “ingesting Jupiter’s blue qi in spring to guide it into the liver, and absorbing Mars’ red qi in summer to channel it into the heart,” they elevated this technique into a fully realized Immortal Art.

Next came techniques known as Ritō (Treading the Dipper) and Yūho (Yu’s Steps).
Ritō referred to treading the constellation pattern of the Big Dipper.
That is, it constituted a ritual method where one learned and physically traced the seven-star formation of the Big Dipper through prescribed footwork.
The phenomenon that while all celestial bodies in the heavens moved ceaselessly, only Polaris maintained an eternally fixed position had long captivated ancient observers, giving rise to a philosophical view that regarded Polaris as a symbolic representation of immortality.
Consequently, it followed naturally that ritual methods emerged for praying to the Big Dipper to bestow eternal youth and prolonged life.
The term “Bugangsu” survives in records, with “gang” denoting the Tiangang star—a practice fundamentally akin to treading the Big Dipper constellation.

The techniques that developed from these practices became Yu’s Steps, and this “Yu’s Steps resembled the footwork of Benkei in the latter part of Kanjinchō”—so it was said. The belief that such footwork could manifest divine powers and spiritual abilities might have been incomprehensible to modern observers. Yet in the boundless wilderness of the Shina continent—where no lamps pierced the dark night—only the stars glittered. Under those stars, ancient Chinese people silently trod the Seven Dippers with measured steps. Through the dark fields, the north wind passed without a sound. Had one pictured that scene in mind, they might have understood why such footwork too could constitute an Immortal Art.

There was also something called the Method of the Five Emperors and Six Jia.
Six Jia refers to the six Jia days such as Jiazi, Jiaxu, and Jiashen.
On this day, by contemplating that the Ten True Jade Maidens of the Five Emperors descended from the Celestial Palace to enter their bodies and visualizing assimilation with those immortal forms, practitioners sought to attain immortality.
Terms such as “Qionggong Wudi Neisi Shangfa” (Jade Palace Five Emperors Inner Contemplation Superior Method) and “Lingfei Liujia Neisi Tongling Shangfa” (Numinous Flight Six Jia Inner Contemplation Spirit-Communing Superior Method) remain extant, but all were either identical to or closely resembled this Method of the Five Emperors and Six Jia.
In the realm of written characters, characters themselves fulfilled one role among the Immortal Arts.

Finally, let us mention the method of fetal breathing.
Human nerves are divided into voluntary and involuntary, but precisely intermediate between them lies the respiratory function.
Breathing is ordinarily placed outside human will but can at times also be controlled by human volition.
There exists a text called the *Taixi Jing* that describes breathing techniques.
This was an ordinary and unremarkable text.
In truth, breathing was best when it remained unremarkable and free from disturbances of *qi*.
However, among the Immortal Arts, there existed a sect that forcibly altered breathing techniques into abnormal states, seeking to attain immortality through this method.
In our country as well, there existed in ancient times what was called *Okīnaga no Jutsu* (the Art of Prolonged Breath), and in modern times there have been various deep-breathing techniques; ultimately, these all connected back to ancient Chinese immortal thought.

When considering such ancient Chinese thought, one must never forget the era’s antiquity.
Even ancient people’s conceptions of things like calendars prove exceedingly difficult for our modern consciousness to concretely reconstruct.
It belongs to far too remote a past.
In our country’s case, even by Queen Himiko’s era—which lagged seven hundred years behind the period under discussion—people still knew nothing of calendars and lived primitive lives, simply tilling fields in spring and reaping in autumn.

In that vast and eerie landscape of the Shina continent’s loess region, for the ancient people who—after enduring a long nomadic existence—had finally transitioned to an agricultural way of life, the calendar was an object of profound reverence. Agriculture was governed by the calendar, and a delay of several days in the planting period often significantly affected the harvest. For ancient people, whose very survival hinged on the success or failure of their crops, the calendar was an object of reverence above all else.

The reverence for this calendar simultaneously instilled awe at the workings governing the movements of sun, moon, and stars—a wonder that then deepened into a sense of mystery. And within the ever-shifting instability of fortune and misfortune in human life, the mind seeking principles became intertwined with these phenomena. In ancient minds wholly detached from scientific thinking, this did not develop into what we today call the pursuit of natural laws. Directly connected to primitive people’s simple yet intense desires, it underwent abnormal fermentation into notions of divine metamorphoses and strange phenomena.

VI. *Zhouyi Cantongqi* and Esoteric Thought

The *Zhouyi Cantongqi* was completed during Emperor Huan’s reign in the Later Han Dynasty around 145 CE—an era that paradoxically marked both the zenith and decadence of ancient Immortal practices.
Daoist adepts, Yin-Yang cosmologists, Five Phases theorists, medical practitioners, and chamber arts specialists intermingled in chaotic profusion—manifesting uncanny phenomena among themselves, summoning hearth spirits, and conjuring phantom beings to display every manner of divine marvel.
Doubtful immortals and esoteric texts flooded the intellectual landscape.

These sorcery-like wonders naturally degenerated into minor esoteric sects before ultimately descending to the depravities of Yin Path practices.
At its extreme fringe emerged methods that rejected sleep itself—denouncing it as mental turbidity—while proclaiming that “entering the realm where waking and dreaming become one, where life and death are pierced through” would grant immortality.
Practitioners would exhaust themselves into stuporous trances, mistaking this collapse for transcendent attainment.
Wei Boyang composed the *Zhouyi Cantongqi* out of compassion for those lost in such heterodox paths—seeking to transmit the true Way of Immortals distinct from vulgar techniques.
Through this text, Wei denounced all deviant Immortal Arts of his age, clarifying that true immortality lay in spiritually unifying life and death’s dichotomy—not through physical longevity sought by sorcerous means.
Thus did the *Zhouyi Cantongqi* become the foundational scripture of Internal Elixir practice.

Such a book had no chance of being accepted by the world of its time.
Despite being a sacred text, it was swallowed into the tempestuous sea of supernatural wonders, leaving not even its title recorded in Later Han bibliographies.
The name *Zhouyi Cantongqi* first appears in *Shenxian Zhuan* (Biographies of Divine Immortals), compiled by Ge Hong of the Jin Dynasty.
Even there, it merely states: "Wei Boyang composed the *Zhouyi Cantongqi Wuxing Xianglei* in three volumes."
It merely offers an exceedingly brief note: "While its theory belongs to the *Zhouyi*, in reality it borrows hexagram symbols to discuss the intent of creating the elixir, and so forth."
Until the publication of Ge Hong’s *Shenxian Zhuan*—that is, during the 150 to 160 years from Emperor Huan of Han to Emperor Yuan of Jin—the *Zhouyi Cantongqi* had barely maintained its existence as nothing more than an obscure and strange text.

Admittedly, there were aspects of the *Zhouyi Cantongqi* that rendered its classification as an obscure and esoteric text somewhat unavoidable.
This stemmed from both its extreme abstruseness and the complete absence of the author’s name.
The discovery that extant editions derived from Wei Boyang’s authorship involved an intriguing episode.
It hinged on sixteen phrases appearing at the text’s conclusion: “委時去害、依托丘山、循遊寥廓、与鬼為隣、……” [Wei shi qu hai, yituo qiushan, xunyou liaokuo, yu gui wei lin...].
Though seemingly nonsensical at first reading, these lines constituted a character cipher.
Scholars of antiquity had already discerned that combining the components of 委 and 鬼 produced the surname 魏 (Wei).
Advancing this analysis, Koda Rohan demonstrated how these sixteen phrases concealed the four-character phrase “魏伯陽造” (Authored by Wei Boyang).
The particulars had already been outlined by Dr. Takeuchi in the monthly bulletin accompanying the *Complete Works of Rohan*.

This heterodox text by Master Wei—who had even concealed his signature within character riddles—continued to be unjustly dismissed as an obscure work long after Ge Hong’s era.
Even the *Suishu*’s Treatise on Classics and Documents contained no record of it, and it was not until the *Jiutangshu*’s Treatise on Classics and Documents that it was first listed among the Five Phases School.
Moreover, its classification under the Five Phases School was erroneous—the *Zhouyi Cantongqi* was by no means a text of that school, but rather one that denounced it.
Even when considering this, it became abundantly clear that the *Zhouyi Cantongqi* had still not been valued in any meaningful way even by the Tang era.

The path of Internal Elixir advocated in the *Zhouyi Cantongqi* suddenly gained prominence only with the advent of the Song Dynasty.
The long span of eight hundred years from Wei Boyang’s time until the Five Dynasties period remained the smoldering twilight of ancient immortal thought.

For over six hundred years prior to Wei Boyang—that is, from the Spring and Autumn and Warring States period through the late Later Han Dynasty—this immortal thought had served as a breeding ground for all manner of divine wonders and sorcery.
These harmful effects and lingering poisons had already become markedly apparent in Wei Boyang’s time.
In Wei Boyang’s vehement tone as he denounces all heretical paths of immortals, one could clearly discern the circumstances of that era.
To later generations it might appear as nothing more than a succession of comedies, but for those ancients once dazzled by the eerie beauty of divine wonders and sorcery, escaping that realm proved exceedingly difficult.
Even after Wei Boyang, those embers continued to burn for eight hundred years.
Strictly speaking, eminent figures such as Yu Fan of the Three Kingdoms; Ge Hong of Jin, known as the Immortal Baopuzi; Tao Hongjing of the Northern and Southern Dynasties—who mastered the Dao of Five Phases and Wind Angles along with the arts of Grand Unity and Dunjia; and Lü Dongbin, the Tang Dynasty immortal—all these erudite individuals endowed with extraordinary spiritual prowess—remained aligned with the physical dimension of the Way of Immortals.
Within the Elixir Way, External Elixir practices still predominated, while Internal Elixir barely maintained a tenuous existence.

However, even ideas of the supernatural and monstrous that had been so deeply ingrained across all strata of ancient Chinese society had, after over a thousand years, somewhat subsided.
From the late Tang through the Five Dynasties period, among learned individuals, people who finally awakened from that delusion began to emerge.
Another example is Zhenyizi Peng Xiao, a Five Dynasties-period Daoist, who authored the *Zhouyi Cantongqi Fen Zhang Tongyi* in the 10th year of Guangzheng (947 CE) under Meng Shu.
And this remains the oldest among the various editions of the *Cantongqi* that have been passed down to this day.
Having remained buried for eight hundred years since its initial composition before resurfacing—even in China, this must be a rare occurrence.
Unfortunately, this book was fragmented by annotators’ intentions and, through prolonged copying, had lost the authenticity of its original form.
However, Yu Yan of the late Song Dynasty collated the various editions existing at the time to produce the single-volume *Zhouyi Cantongqi Shiyi*—a far superior edition.
Koda Rohan also provided his commentary primarily based on this *Shiyi*.

Beyond these，numerous editions of *Cantongqi* were published from the Song to Ming dynasties，but none of them were considered superior editions．
“Yang Shen of the Ming Dynasty claimed to have dug up the ground in a remote southern village and obtained it from a stone casket．”
He produced what purported to be a complete ancient-text *Cantongqi*，but as this scholar was a habitual forger of pseudo-antique texts，Koda Rohan did not credit it．
Among Chinese scholars，there were quite a few who produced commentaries based on this book．
The claim of having dug up the ground and obtained it from a stone casket is a story quintessentially characteristic of old China．

Koda Rohan’s first textual criticism concerned the origins of this *Zhouyi Cantongqi*. According to Peng Xiao’s account, Wei Boyang obtained something called the *Ancient Dragon-Tiger Classic*, comprehended its profound principles, and by borrowing from the *Zhouyi*, composed this *Cantongqi*. However, the extant text known as the *Ancient Dragon-Tiger Classic* appeared to be a later forgery. After conducting a meticulous comparative analysis of the *Zhouyi Cantongqi* and the *Dragon-Tiger Classic*, Koda Rohan dismissed the latter as a later forgery created under the influence of the *Zhouyi Cantongqi*. He esteemed Wei Boyang as one who forged antiquity through his own efforts. In an era when the world surged torrentially toward the path of External Elixir, Wei alone advocated the profound orthodox path of Internal Elixir.

What profoundly colored Wei Boyang’s thought was the philosophy of mysterious profundity.
While both might be termed mystical, the External Elixir—centered on divine transformations and illusions—possessed the demonic beauty of magic, whereas the arcana of Internal Elixir contained a philosophy of mysterious profundity that transcended rational thought.
That this path of Internal Elixir came to be embraced by the profoundly introspective school known as Song Learning carried unexpectedly significant implications in its influence.
The Eastern philosophy of mysterious profundity—which originated with Song Learning and long exerted influence across China and our nation—owed much to the arcana of Wei Boyang’s Internal Elixir; the fact that its ripples extended even to the philosophical thought of our nation’s Kamakura period remained a point worthy of attention.

The *Zhouyi Cantongqi* suddenly asserted its authority when Zhu Xi, the great Confucian scholar of the Song Dynasty, compiled his *Zhouyi Cantongqi Kaoyi* (Investigations of Discrepancies in the Zhouyi Cantongqi). Thereafter, from the Song through Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties, numerous commentaries and critiques emerged, sustaining its vitality into the modern era. Zhu Xi was an avid reader of the *Zhouyi Cantongqi*, and records in the *Zhu Xi Nianpu* show that in the third year of Qingyuan (1197 CE), he lodged at Hanshan Temple with Cai Yuanding and discussed the text through the night. Yet even before Zhu Xi compiled his *Kaoyi*, the *Zhouyi Cantongqi* had already cast a profound shadow over Song Learning through subtle influences. This occurred as the text's Internal Elixir philosophy played a crucial role in reflecting the primordial mysteries of the Hetu and Luoshu Diagrams into Song Learning. The *Zhouyi Cantongqi*'s conceptual essence thus facilitated the introduction of abstruse philosophies—including the Hetu-Luoshu theories, Taiji Diagram Theory, and Xiantian Diagram—into Song Learning, ultimately flowing into Zhu Xi's doctrines of quiet sitting and reverential composure. Though Zhu Xi remained an orthodox Confucian scholar in the Zhou-Kong tradition, his engagement with the Way of Immortals merely exemplified his vast erudition. His practice of quiet sitting derived from the *Great Learning*'s principles of mental rectification and sincerity, along with Confucius's concept of prayer—not from Buddhist or Daoist sources. Nevertheless, Song Learning's intensely introspective nature unconsciously resonated with Internal Elixir's philosophy of mysterious profundity, "embracing wooded rocks and clouded fields to naturally form a single stream's vista."

VII. Commentary on the *Cantongqi*

With this，a provisional explanation of the *Zhouyi Cantongqi*’s historical background and its position in intellectual history had been provided.
Then what kind of book was the *Cantongqi* itself?

The *Cantongqi*，like other ancient texts of the Han Dynasty，was not prose but rather poetry，with nearly its entire text composed in classical verse forms of four-character and five-character lines.
Regarding its title，Rohan-sensei remarked that a plain interpretation—“[The text] borrows the *Zhouyi* to expound the Elixir Way，and because both sides correspond and harmonize like matching tally slips，it was thus named”—in fact captured its essence more accurately.

In a word, this book explained the path of attaining the Elixir Way by comparing it to the patterns of change and fluctuation in the *Zhouyi*.
The art of the Returned Elixir had already been profoundly abstruse—Wei Zi himself having stated it “should be transmitted orally; difficult to convey through writing”—and furthermore, the *Zhouyi* employed as metaphor remained far removed from modern sensibilities.
This was because the current knowledge of the *Zhouyi* in circulation stemmed from the commentaries by the great genius Wang Bi, who had thoroughly eradicated all previous theories that predated him.
However, since Wei Boyang predated Wang Bi, to comprehend the metaphors cited in this text, one could not rely on the *Zhouyi* as commonly understood today but had to instead be familiar with Yi theories such as those of Jing Fang from the Han Dynasty.

Furthermore, this book makes abundant use of unique terminology.
To understand books on electrical science, one must be thoroughly familiar with meanings of terms such as inductance and capacitance.
In precisely this manner, to read this work one must first achieve full comprehension of Elixir Way terminology—this being absolutely essential.
For instance: while mercury denotes literal quicksilver and lead signifies metallic ore through their written characters within Elixir Way doctrine mercury simultaneously represents spiritual function's foundation—the brain—while lead embodies reproductive function's primordial basis.
Just as mercury and lead form an inseparable amalgam that subsequently unfolds again into mercury and lead alike does humanity consist of spiritual function fused indistinguishably with reproductive function—life itself emerging precisely where this unity differentiates through unfolding.
This does not constitute modern analysis partitioning human spirit into discrete spiritual/carnal aspects.
Rather it signifies that an indivisible amalgam forms life's foundational root.
Such language—synthesizing metaphor with literal truth through philosophical resonance—characterizes Elixir practitioners' discourse.
Even glimpsing these fragments makes clear that beyond Koda Rohan-sensei one finds scant hope for meaningful *Cantongqi* exegesis.

The system of the *Zhouyi* began with Heaven and Earth (Qian and Kun) and concluded with an exposition on water and fire.
"Heaven, earth, and humanity all existed through the workings of water and fire—Kan, which seemed to exist yet did not, and Li, which seemed not to exist yet did," stated the text.
Among the sixty-four hexagrams of the *Yi*, these—Qian, Kun, Kan, and Li—were regarded as especially vital, that is to say, the Four Pillars.
In modern terms, Qian and Kun—that is, Heaven and Earth—were the principles governing space, while Kan and Li—that is, Emptiness and Substance—could be said to be the principles governing existence.
In the profound depths of the principle governing the flux of all phenomena lay concealed, beyond this, the issues of continuity and time.
The *Zhouyi Cantongqi* expounded this principle through the statement “Once the operations of Heaven-Earth and Yin-Yang ceased not, when years, months, days, and hours concluded, they immediately recommenced anew”—that is to say, through the cyclical interaction of the sun and moon.
For the year, it was the boundary between old and new; for the month, the interval between the last day and the first; for the day, the moment immediately past midnight—all were subtle and profound points where yin reached its extremity and turned to yang.
It was precisely at this inception of yin-yang interaction that "Zhen came and received the tally."
The statement “When the appointed time arrived, Heaven and Earth coupled their essences; sun and moon mutually grasped and sustained” meant that if one directed awareness to the subtle juncture of the initial interaction between human Primordial Spirit and Mysterious Qi, they might attain enlightenment and find the means to forge the elixir.

The moment forming the boundary between *misoka* and *sakudan* constituted a single point dividing continuous "time."
The final instant of *misoka* and the true commencement of *sakudan* formed a mathematical continuity.
That we name this singular point in continuous time *misoka* and *saku* stemmed from its being where transformation transpired.
This transformation arose through an abrupt leap permitting no intervening hair's breadth.
Which is to say: within continuity there existed a leap.
This spiritual activity bore striking resemblance to the sudden enlightenment frequently extolled when expounding insights during later ages as Zen Buddhism flourished.
The rationale for saying "later ages" lay in Bodhidharma's arrival in China occurring several centuries after Wei Boyang.

As an example of such a leap-like transformation, Dr. Sakuma presented the perception of reversible figures in his psychological studies of Zen—a truly apt analogy.
One of the most common reversible figures was the hidden image puzzle, but in skillfully crafted ones, no matter how hard one searched, one could hardly find anything.
However, by some chance, a rabbit would suddenly be found within the thicket of grass.
Once it became visible, it manifested whenever one looked, making the fact that it had remained unseen until then seem almost strange.
The spiritual activity at that moment of sudden discovery was a leap within continuity.
When this leap occurred, the whole transformed in an instant, and a completely different scene manifested.
Whether in Zen’s sudden enlightenment or the Dan practitioners’ Returned Elixir, all paths of attainment arose from spiritual activity that closely resembled this leap or transformation.
To interpret the *Zhouyi Cantongqi* as a work that borrowed the *Zhouyi* to raise questions of space, time, continuity, and existence—using these as material to expound a path toward complete spiritual transformation—would likely be the most comprehensible interpretation for modern readers.

The above constituted the main thesis, but with this alone, the crucial matter of what cultivation practices should be employed to attain the realm of the Returned Elixir from the *Zhouyi*’s metaphors remained entirely unclear.
Therefore, the *Zhouyi Cantongqi* proceeded to explain in detail the art of attainment and progression.
As Wei Boyang’s Internal Elixir strongly rejected methods such as ingesting elixirs along with various contemplation techniques and talismanic incantations, it listed “accurately observing nature and skillfully conforming to it” as the foremost principle of cultivation.
This was a remarkably intriguing point—the very same method as modern natural science had been prioritized.
Next came its admonition: “When planting millet, use foxtail millet; when covering a hen, employ its own egg—assist nature through affinity, for things are easily shaped when their kindred forms are nurtured,” thereby warning against expecting a kite chick to hatch from a chicken’s egg.
In this regard, it stood entirely opposed to divine transformations and supernatural phenomena while remaining consistent with modern science.
Though things called Golden Elixirs and Immortal Medicines existed, Wei Boyang taught these were neither external nor alien substances—one must realize all divine fungi and numinous mushrooms resided within one’s own body.
“Man exists within Nature,” he declared, “and Nature realizes itself through man.”
“Apprehend eternal Nature within oneself,” he continued, “and discern one’s numinous essence within Nature.”
The path to transcending life and death opened precisely where one grasped that self and Nature were two sides of a single sheet of paper.

Now, the problem was this: unless one expounded on what state proved most suitable for correctly observing Nature and perceiving the harmony between self and external world, this too would end in empty discourse.
On this point, Wei Zi recommended “observing and verifying the patterns of yin-yang interaction within oneself and the manifestations of life-death cycles from beginning to end.”
The teaching “Block and seal the Three Treasures of ears, eyes, and mouth; do not let them flourish” remained words that stung a bit to hear even for us today, two thousand years later.
If one remained in constant turmoil with their body racing beyond the spirit all day long, it stood to reason that “turbid water could not reflect images nor a soiled mirror show complete forms.”
It was far from being a matter of the oneness of life and death.
Here, Wei Zi advocated “avoiding all external wandering of the spirit and purely contemplating the natural phenomena within oneself,” but herein lay a crucial problem.
By purely contemplating one’s own spirit, various passions and desires would extinguish themselves; however, this process contained none of the counteractive methods found in Hinayana teachings.
In Hinayana teachings, for instance, lust was counteracted through the Nine Phases Contemplation and Impurity Contemplation, while worldly desires were dismantled and eradicated using Illusion Contemplation or Causation Contemplation; however, the Elixir Way did not adopt such minor methods.
“The Elixir Way focuses solely on concentrating the spirit and gathering qi,”
Most succinctly, he advocated striving toward a complete spiritual leap-like transformation.
That such a doctrine had already emerged in a corner of China more than five hundred years before the arrival of Mahayana Buddhism was truly astonishing.

Taking a step further, Wei Zi taught that to achieve this gathering of qi and concentration of spirit, one must “relax the body and dwell in an empty chamber” and “entrust one’s will to return to emptiness, making each thought constant.”
This empty chamber would later become the Taoist practice room in subsequent eras.
A quiet and serene room that was neither too bright nor too dark—such as a studio with large windows only on the northern side—constituted the ideal empty chamber.
A Zen meditation room shared similarities with this configuration.
If one were to sit in this empty chamber, return their will to emptiness, and practice the Elixir Way’s cultivation, it might be said this resembled seated meditation.
However, as previously noted, since the *Zhouyi Cantongqi*’s compilation predated Bodhidharma’s arrival from the West by centuries, Zen meditation bore resemblance to Returned Elixir practices rather than vice versa.
The critical distinction lay in Zen teachings prioritizing stillness and concentration—qualities one might call purely yin in nature.
By contrast, Elixir Way cultivation emphasized ascetic discipline and ritual techniques, carrying a distinctly yang-oriented character.
Though their ultimate objectives aligned, Zen and the Elixir Way diverged markedly in their fundamental approaches.

Now, as practitioners relaxed their bodies to sit in the empty chamber, gathered qi, and concentrated their spirit—repeating these cultivations—harmonious energy welled up within them. They reached a mental state described as “lush as a spring marsh, fluid as thawing ice, flowing from head to feet before ultimately ascending anew,” arriving at a point where “naturally, qi yearned for the spirit and the spirit longed for qi; the two desired to unite like man and woman drawn together.”
The interaction between this spirit and qi connected to the subtlety where the last day turned to the first—where yin reached its extremity and yang arose.
When the fire in the ritual furnace was appropriately advanced at this moment, “the lead flew up to Qian Palace, and the mercury congealed to return to Spirit Abode,” whereupon one gained a sudden, clear vision.
This was called “having forged the Sacred Embryo.”
This scene could not, of course, be described; however, Wei Zi elaborated on this point in detail by invoking the Five Phases theory and the Hetu-Luoshu diagrams, so those who comprehended these diagrams could roughly perceive its general form.
Once one had forged the Sacred Embryo, by nurturing it, one could attain immortality.
That is to say, within the finite life of a human being, one could come to embody the infinite life of Nature.
“That is to say, speaking from the perspective of the conventional self, one obtains a body beyond the body.”
This body was a single origin.
Speaking from the perspective of the conventional self, one obtained a body within the body; the old body—like a cicada’s shell or serpent’s molt—was left to yield compliantly to the kalpic winds soon to depart.
"That which was called 'having already attained return to the single origin—how could life and death persist anywhere?' constituted the ultimate attainment of immortality."

Having thus explained the general outline of the *Zhouyi Cantongqi*, it remained truly wondrous that such profound doctrines had suddenly emerged in a corner of China during the Later Han Dynasty.
Neither in classics like the *Book of Documents* or *Book of Poetry*, nor among philosophers such as Laozi, Zhuangzi, Guanzi, or Mozi could any trace be found of what might constitute predecessors or embryonic forms of the *Zhouyi Cantongqi*.
Wei Zi stated, “I possess no innate knowledge from past lives; I came to realization through relying on a teacher,” while also declaring that “the six hundred chapters of the *Fire Record* share identical aims without divergence”—from which we might presume some foundational basis existed.
The text called *Ancient Dragon-Tiger Classic*, as noted earlier, was believed to be a later forgery.
Detecting an Indian scent in the name *Fire Record*, Koda Rohan speculated that ancient Brahmanism might have been transmitted via southern sea routes to Wu and Yue territories, where it fused with China’s indigenous concepts of Shangdi and Tian to birth the philosophy underlying this *Zhouyi Cantongqi*.
The Yogic path—a branch of Brahmanism—was said to bear striking resemblance to internal elixir cultivation methods.
Though academic verification lay beyond our scope here, it was considered certain that “from the very first use of the character *xian* (immortal) in China, Brahmanism’s shadow had been cast.”

As detailed in the essay “Mr. Rohan and the Way of Immortals” included in this volume, on the day before his death, Mr. Rohan experienced that brief respite often seen in critically ill patients, spoke at length with Bun-san, and finally asked, “Well, are you ready?”
When Bun-san answered, “Yes, very well,” he said, “Then, I’ll die now.”
That was the last; thereafter, his consciousness never returned.
In these final words of the master, one senses something akin to an ethnic nostalgia.
Yet it vanishes without trace when grasped.
The preceding essay *Mr. Rohan and the Way of Immortals* and this main text constitute, as it were, an explication of the master’s dying words: “Then, I’ll die now.”
Those final words leave a strange reverberation in our heartstrings.
For the blood of ancient Orientals still courses through our bodies even now.

Setting aside for now the supernatural external elixir-based Way of Immortals with its divine wonders and strange phenomena, it was not at all surprising that the philosophy of the *Zhouyi Cantongqi*—the essence of the Way of Immortals—had maintained its vitality even to this day.
This was because it did not conflict with modern science.
Rather, there were passages suggesting that scientists seeking to pioneer entirely new and unknown fields might gain some form of revelation should they closely study and deeply contemplate the *Zhouyi Cantongqi*.
Regarding *Zhouyi Cantongqi and Science*, discussion would be deferred to another occasion.
(March 1951)