Highest Clarity Numinous Treasure Great Rites 上清灵宝大法

Compiled by Li Sicong, a Taoist priest during the reign of Emperor Renzong of the Northern Song Dynasty.

Consisting of nine volumes, it is included in the Taixuan Section of the The Daozang. Prefaced to the book are the author’s Memorial Presenting the Diagrams of Caves and Mountains and Petition for Presenting the Illustrations of Famous Mountains of Caves and Seas written in the first year of Huangzhe (1249). In these texts, the author requested to present six diagrams including the Jade Pure Jade Pivot Diagram, the Diagram of the Five Great Mountains in Caves, the Diagram of the Spiritual Waterways of Penglai and Fanghu, the Diagram of Blessed Lands in Famous Mountains, and the Diagram of the Golden Elixir of Reversion, as well as ten scrolls of the Reclining View Diagrams. He also stated that all these diagrams were "compiled into paintings with eulogies, poems and prefaces". In the existing version of the book in The Daozang, only the eulogies and prefaces remain, while the paintings are lost.

Highest Clarity Numinous Treasure Great Rites

Volumes Two to Six respectively describe the locations, scenery, and fairy traces of various celestial caves and blessed lands, water palaces in rivers, lakes and seas, and the Twenty-Eight Preceptories of Taoism. Volumes Seven to Eight recount the titles and official duties of the star gods such as the Sun, the Moon, the Five Planets, the Seven Mansions of the Big Dipper, and the Twenty-Eight Mansions of the Zodiac. The final ninth volume is The Thirty-Two Heavenly Emperors and Palace Gods of the Supreme Clarity, which separately elaborates on the titles and official duties of the celestial emperors and gods in the thirty-two heavens of the Three Realms.

The overall content of the book is roughly the same as Volumes 24 to 28 of Seven Bamboo Slips of the Cloud Satchel. It is an important historical material for the study of Taoist mythological realms and divine beliefs in the Northern Song Dynasty.