Lingbao Rites of Ultimate Salvation 上清灵宝济度大成全书

Compiled by Zhou Side of the Ming Dynasty.

It consists of forty volumes. Zhou Side served as the abbot of Dade Guan in the imperial capital during the Xuande reign of the Ming Dynasty. He held numerous Golden Register Rituals for the imperial court and was conferred the title of High Scholar of Upholding Harmony, Nourishing Simplicity and Honoring the Teaching.

Lingbao Rites of Ultimate Salvation

According to his own preface, Zhou Side studied under Qiu Yue'an, who held in high regard the ritual texts of The Lingbao Sect compiled by Ning Quanzhen, Lin Lingzhen and other masters in the Song and Yuan dynasties. Zhou immersed himself in these texts for more than twenty years, and later sought teachings from Wu Dajie, the Left Master of Ritual Practice at the Taoist Registration Department, and Yang Zhenzong, the Supervisor of that time. "I thus obtained the authentic collections, interspersed my own insights, supplemented the lost content, corrected the errors, incorporated ritual scriptures, supplemented them with Taoist Talismans and chapters, and compiled them into a complete forty-volume work" — and this book was thus created.

A great number of Lingbao fasting ritual norms were accumulated in the Song Dynasty. Ning Quanzhen, Jin Yunzhong and other scholars each had their own Lingbao Great Rites circulating in the world. Lin Lingzhen compiled the Lingbao Teachings for Salvation and Transcendence Golden Book, a lineage passed down by Ning Quanzhen, which amounted to as many as three hundred and twenty volumes. In addition, there was the anonymous Lingbao Jade Mirror in forty volumes. Building on the works of his predecessors, Zhou Side collated a concise forty-volume version.

The book is divided into the following sections: Hymns and Recitations for Application, Document Drafting and Ritual Initiation, Worshipping Immortals and Audience with the Emperor, Ascending the Altar and Reciting Scriptures, Hymns and Prayers for the Lamp Ritual, Summoning Souls, Bathing and Feeding, Refinement and Rebirth, Spreading the Dharma for Universal Benefit, Ritual Completion and Thanksgiving Offerings, Essentials of Ascending the Altar, Immortal Ritual Norms and Systems, Talismans and Chapters in Accordance with the Way, Issuing Talismans and Scriptures, Spiritual Streamers and Precious Canopies, Ready-Made Official Documents, Ritual and Document Formats, Regulations for Memorials and Notes, Rankings of True Immortals, and Essential Notes on Fasting and Rituals. Each section is further divided into several subsections of varying categories. Except for Essential Notes on Fasting and Rituals, which discourses on the principles and precautions of Lingbao fasting rituals, all other sections detail the practice methods, systems, rules, talismans, document formats and other elements of fasting and ritual ceremonies.

This book was not included in The Daozang, nor was it collected in various Taoist series of the Ming and Qing dynasties. Its surviving editions have been extremely rare since modern times. It is said that before the discovery of the copy preserved in the Shanghai Library, only two copies were generally believed to exist — one in the Library of Princeton University in the United States, and the other in the National Central Library in Taipei. The copy from the Shanghai Library was later included in the Ritual Norms category of Taoist Scriptures Outside the Daozang.