HistoryDonation of the Daoist Canon – Daozang
Bīng dòng sān chǐ, fēi yí rì zhī hán 冰冻三尺,非一日之寒 (Three feet of ice do not form in a single day), or achieving satisfactory results requires time and patience, as the Chinese proverb says.
The story of the Daozang in Slovenia began in 2017. Grandmaster Zhou Jinfu (太師爺 周金富) organized a meeting on 28 September of that year at Baiyunguan Temple, the headquarters of the Chinese Taoist Association in Beijing. The meeting was attended by the then Secretary General of the Chinese Taoist Association, Ms Feng He, Mr Wang Tongjiang from the editorial department of the Chinese Taoist Association, Grandmaster Zhou Jinfu, Darija Mavrič Čeh, MA (Yuan Weixin), and Jure Čeh (Yuan Weiqi).
The meeting took place in a pleasant atmosphere over good tea. They asked us what value we, on behalf of Slovenia, saw in our possible cooperation, what kind of support we expected from them, and what the reasons for these expectations were. At the time, I told them that what mattered most to us was to obtain the fundamental Daoist literature, the so-called Daoist Canon, or Daozang. This would make these texts accessible in Slovenia and open up possibilities for scholarly research and gradual translation into Slovenian.
What is the Daozang?
The texts most often translated into foreign languages, such as the Daode jing 道德经 (Classic of the Way and Its Power), Zhuangzi, Liezi, and Qingjing jing, are only a small part of an extensive collection of Daoist sacred texts or classics. The first canon was compiled by Daoists and scholars around the year 400. The fourth collection, compiled in 1445 during the Ming dynasty, comprised 5,300 scrolls. The most recent collection, supported by the so-called 国家出版基金项目 (National Publishing Fund Project) and titled 中华道经精要 (Essentials of Chinese Daoist Scriptures), consists of 99 books published in December 2021 under the patronage of the Chinese Taoist Association and by a broad editorial board led by the Venerable Li Guangfu, President of the Chinese Taoist Association and the World Federation of Daoism.
The Daozang is divided into the so-called Three Caverns (sandong) 三洞
- (Dongzhen) 洞真部: Texts of the Highest Clarity (Shangqing) tradition. This section of texts deals primarily with meditation and presents teachings of the highest level.
- (Dongxuan) 洞玄部: Texts of the Numinous Treasure (Lingbao) tradition. This section of texts deals primarily with ritual and presents teachings of the middle level.
- (Dongshen) 洞神部: Texts of the Three Sovereigns (Sanhuang) tradition. This section of texts deals primarily with exorcisms and presents teachings of the lower level.
Each of the so-called caverns consists of 12 chapters. In addition to the fundamental texts, four supplements are also included:
- Great Mystery (Taixuan) 太玄部: Based on the Daode jing.
- Great Peace (Taiping) 太平部: Based on the Taiping jing.
- Great Clarity (Taiqing) 太清部: Based on the Taiqing jing and other alchemical texts.
- Orthodox Unity (Zhengyi) 正一(正乙)部: Based on the tradition of the Way of the Celestial Masters (Tianshi Dao).
The COVID period halted all our efforts, but already in 2023 a basic support framework was created for more suitable mutual cooperation. Since the establishment of the World Federation of Daoism, at least the selected temples outside China that had signed sister agreements could expect greater support for our efforts.
At the headquarters of the Chinese Taoist Association in Beijing, we met again on 15 September 2024 and looked for an appropriate way to obtain the latest version of the Daozang. The collection, especially in cooperation with the Department of Asian Studies at the University of Ljubljana, would make it possible for students to gradually access the material for BA and MA theses, doctoral dissertations, and direct translation into Slovenian. In this way, all interested Slovenian readers would gain broader access to Daoist teachings and wisdom.
After nine years of persistent efforts, on 15 August 2025 Abbot Song Chongdao of Chongdao Gong, with whom we have signed a sister agreement on mutual cooperation, surprised and delighted us with the complete Daozang collection, which he had obtained for the Slovenian Daoist Temple of Supreme Harmony from an anonymous donor.
Already in August, Darija and I brought the first 23 books to Slovenia, and in November, after the Second Session of the First Council of the World Federation of Daoism, the remaining 76 books as well. We stamped them all, entered them into the list of books in the SDT library, and placed them on the bookshelves.
Slovenia is thus one of the few countries that possesses the complete collection of the latest expanded version of the Daozang from 2021.
Yuan Wei Qi
