Five Supremes

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The Five Supremes in the Genesis picture from the Feast of the Immortal Peaches, A Taoism Guidance Book.
The Five Supremes in the Genesis picture from the Feast of the Immortal Peaches, A Taoism Guidance Book.

Five Supremes, the Five Elders or the Five Olds (五老) were five beings transformed or transmogrified from the Xuanxuan Shangren (玄玄上人) made up of Chi Jingzi (赤精子), Shui Jingzi (水精子), Mu Gong (木公), Jing Mu (金母), Huang Lao (黃老), at the center and four cardinal points of the compass.

Jing Mu and 'Mu Gong were responsible for the creation of all lives by breathing qi into an incubator ding. A male and female child were born from this breath of life. The excess qi escaped and became other forms of lives on earth.

The Five Supremes also correspond to the Wu xing or the Five Elements in Taoism, and had once reincarnated as the heads of the five religions on earth in a bid to reclaim yuanling, the original beings from the realm of the living back to heaven.

[edit] References

  • Passage extracted from Chapter Four of Tiantang Yiuji...即是「玄玄上人」,又稱「元始天王」。因位居至上…。又為萬物之始祖,...故化三清…..,再化五老 (Xuanxuan Shangren manifested into the Five Supremes):東華木公、西華金母、南華火精、北華水精、中華黃老,五老既成,而五行 (Wu Xing) 全,重濁之氣下降,丑會地闢生。....玄玄上人為造化天地,用心默運真,五方定位,世界成形,無人可立,而三才不貫,故命五老運化原靈下種,五老受命後 (The Five Supremes were authorized by Xuanxuan Shangren to create living beings from Yuanling),共推金母、木公,主持原靈孕化之事。…原由無極 (Wuji) 元始一動而生太極 (Taichi),太極含兩儀(two aspects) 陰陽 (yin and yang),而化三才四象(Four Realms) 五行(Wu xing)…….五老孕化原靈,各運真,故人生而五臟全(Wuxing correspond to five organs in human),五氣盛(Wu xing correspond to five Qi),此乃五老之功。世界各地人種膚色不一,五方現五色(Human in five geographies were of different colours)﹕東方人青色、西方人白色、南方人紅色、北方人黑色、中央人黃色。其顏色正如置泥土在爐中燒磚,火候不同,而生青白黃紅黑色。原靈下凡,初而本性純樸,樹葉遮身,心如原始,不知所以,故生而死,死而歸天。但原靈種子,入土既久,變質變種(Yuanling mutated their purities after living on earth),中古之世,性靈濁重,有者已不能死而歸天,濁重之氣下沉,故地獄自此成矣。五老在天,傷心欲絕,共議收回之策,在不得已之下,五老親自下凡,分形降世投胎五方,各為五教教主 (The Five Supremes descended to earth as the heads of the five religions),傳教授徒,期"普度收原" The five religions were meant to reclaim Yuanling from the realm of the living),然教主去世,教徒又多離經叛道,致使原靈分散道心 (Yuanling were further distracted from the religions after the departure of the heads of five religions)....

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