The Seal of the Unity of the Three — Vol. 2 - The Golden Elixir

Appendix 1
The Three Books of the Cantong qi *
Despite the large number of differences found in individual redactions
and editions, the textual shape of the Cantong qi is defined by two
main features:
(1) In all redactions until the one edited by Chen Zhixu in ca. 1330,
and in most of the later ones, the Cantong qi is divided into three
main parts, or “Books” (pian). 1
(2) The last part, or Book 3, contains three distinct compositions,
which in certain redactions are followed by an additional
“postface.”
Speculations about the authorship of the three main parts, and of the
individual compositions in the final part, abound in both commentaries
and modern studies, where they are variously attributed to Wei
Boyang 魏 伯 陽 , Xu Congshi 徐 景 休 , or Chunyu Shutong 淳 于 叔 通 ,
according to the different views about the authorship of the text.
Whoever stands behind these names, it may be safely assumed that the
text found in Books 1 and 2 (corresponding to sections 1–42 and 43–
74) and the additional compositions found in Book 3 (sections 75–88)
originated separately from one another.
*
A shorter version of this appendix is found in The Seal, vol. 1, Introduction,
§ 4.
1
To give one example of different textual arrangements, Peng Xiao
deems the Cantong qi to consist of five parts (pian), respectively corresponding
to sections 1–42, 43–74, 75–81, 83–88, and 82. His redaction, however,
retains the basic three-part arrangement because sections 75–81 (“Epilogue”),
83–88 (“The Five Categories”), and 82 (“Song of the Tripod”) are included in
the third chapter (juan), except for the Daozang edition where section 82 is
printed as a separate work.
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