The Huang Cheng 黄澄

Huang Cheng was a native of Pilin (now part of Jiangsu Province) in the late Northern Song Dynasty.

He served as a Taoist priest at Xiantaiguan Temple in Danyang. In the early years of the Chongning era (1102-1106), he was ordered by imperial decree to rename Yuchenguan Temple to Chongyu Wanshougong Palace and took up the post of abbot there.

Shortly after, Emperor Huizong summoned him to the imperial capital (Kaifeng, the capital of the Northern Song Dynasty) with a sealed imperial edict, and appointed him abbot of Jingshan Shenxiao Wanshougong Palace. He was successively awarded the titles of Taisu Dafu (Grand Master of Supreme Simplicity), Chongsujingyi Xiansheng (Mr. Pure, Quiet and Unified), and also held the positions of Yutang Gaoshi (Distinguished Scholar of the Jade Hall), Zuo Youjie Dudaolu (Chief Taoist Administrator of the Left and Right Districts), and concurrently managed Taoist affairs. He was granted a fief of 1,200 households and awarded a purple-gold square talisman.

During Emperor Huizong’s reign, the Taoist scriptural transmission systems of the "Three Mountains" were respectively: Longhu Zhengyi (Zhengyi School of Longhu Mountain), Gezao Lingbao (Lingbao School of Gezao Mountain), and Maoshan Dadong (Dadong School of Maoshan Mountain). Each school originally inherited only its own ancestral doctrines. Huang Cheng submitted a petition to unify these three scriptural transmission systems, and the emperor approved his request.

Since then, the Longhu and Gezao schools gained the right to pass down the complete doctrines of the Shangqing (Supreme Purity) tradition. Later, Huang Cheng retired from official duties and returned to the mountains, where he passed away at the East Hut of Yuchenguan Temple on Maoshan Mountain.

(Source: Mao Shan Zhi (Records of Maoshan Mountain), Volume 16)