This teaching descends as a sacred song, given in tenderness by the Holy Teacher, Ji Gong. He has taken a popular melody, The Long Road I Brave Beside You, and changed a single word — turning “brave” into “walk.” A song about charging out into the world together becomes a quiet vow: the long road, I walk it beside my disciples, step by step. Cultivation is thus framed as a homeward road of awakening — and the teacher is not waiting at the finish line but down on the road itself, walking it alongside those he loves. The altar verse first names cultivation’s true color: gratitude and the cherishing of every blessing, a welcome for Heaven’s love of all that lives, and a charge to guard the seed of goodness already planted within and let nothing of the world veil it over. The body of the song then exhorts the seeker — turn toward the Dao and win the Unborn, light a lamp in the long night, never belittle one’s own faint candle-flame (it is destined to merge into the light of sun and moon), receive the mandate with kindness and reverence, and use the false to cultivate the true; be serene about fortune, yet wholly responsible for one’s own conduct. The teaching opens at last into mission: embodying the four creative virtues of the Book of Changes to establish both oneself and others, carrying a boundless heart, and upholding a drowning world with the Dao. It closes where it began — teacher and disciple walk on together — resolving the opening vow of accompaniment into a settled fact: on the road home, no one walks alone.
鎮壇詩 Altar-Stabilizing Verse · recited
感恩惜福 修道本色
gǎn ēn xī fú · xiū dào běn sè
Gratitude, and the cherishing of every blessing — this is the true color of one who cultivates the Dao.To be grateful and to treasure every blessing — that is the truest mark of someone walking the path of the Dao.
Before any practice or doctrine, the cultivator’s native color is simple gratitude. 惜福 (xī fú), the cherishing of one’s blessings, carries an old conviction that a person’s allotment of good fortune is finite — squander it heedlessly and it runs dry early.
迎迓天賜 好生之德
yíng yà tiān cì · hào shēng zhī dé
Welcome what Heaven bestows: its love of all living things.Welcome with joy whatever Heaven gives you, for Heaven’s greatest virtue is its tender care for all that lives.
好生之德 (hào shēng zhī dé), Heaven’s love of all that lives, is a phrase from the Book of Documents that became the proverb Heaven has a love of life. Welcome what Heaven gives in that spirit.
明命仁種 勿為物遮
míng mìng rén zhǒng · wù wèi wù zhē
The luminous mandate has planted in you a seed of goodness — let nothing of the world veil it over.Heaven has already planted in you a seed of goodness — never let the world’s wants cover over that inner light.
The “luminous mandate” (明命, míng mìng) is the bright, heaven-given nature the Great Learning urges us to keep polished and unclouded. The seed of goodness is already planted in you; the only danger is that desire will bury it — so the warning is stern: let nothing of the world veil it over.
馳騁好鬥 枉歲月賒
chí chěng hào dòu · wǎng suì yuè shē
To gallop after desire, to love the fight, is only to squander your years on borrowed time.To chase endlessly after what you crave and to love picking fights only wastes the years you are only borrowing.
To chase after desire and to love contention is not living — it is spending years one does not actually own. 馳騁 (chí chěng), to gallop after, names the restless outward pursuit that squanders a life.
This altar-stabilizing round sets the frame in four tight couplets, naming what to guard and what to forsake. The cultivator’s native color, before any doctrine, is simple gratitude and the cherishing of every blessing — one’s allotment of good fortune is finite, and squandered heedlessly it runs dry early. Welcome what Heaven gives, for Heaven’s greatest virtue is its love of all living things, the phrase from the Book of Documents that became the proverb Heaven has a love of life. And guard the seed of goodness already planted within — the luminous mandate, the bright heaven-given nature the Great Learning urges us to keep unclouded. The warning is stern: let nothing of the world veil it over, for the seed is there and the only danger is that desire will bury it. The closing counter-image makes the cost plain — to gallop after craving and to love the fight is only to squander years one does not actually own.
I am your teacher, the Holy Teacher Ji-Gong, bearing Φ’s command; arriving at the Buddha-hall, on entering I have already paid audience to the Sovereign Mother — and now I ask my disciples: is each of you well?I am your teacher, the Holy Teacher Ji-Gong, sent down at Φ’s command; I come to the hall, and as I enter I have already bowed before the Sovereign Mother — and now I ask you, my disciples: is each of you well?
This self-introduction is brief and ceremonial, yet it already carries the teaching’s warmth. The Holy Teacher names himself, names the command he bears, and observes the protocol of paying audience to the Sovereign Mother — the order of Heaven coming first, a precedence the hall does not transgress. But the register softens at once with the line that follows: having bowed before the Eternal Mother, he turns straight back to ask his disciples whether each of them is well (再 here meaning then, not again). The cosmic order is honored, but it never displaces the personal. In this tradition the descent of a teacher is always also a homecoming to people he loves, and that tenderness is the seedbed of all that the song will say.
The long road stretches on and on — I walk it beside my disciples, carrying a whole body of upright spirit and sincerity.The road ahead is long, and I walk it right beside you, bringing nothing but an upright spirit and a true heart.
The road’s first line is its title and its vow: the long road, walked beside you, carrying nothing but an upright spirit and a true heart. This is not a teacher waiting at the finish line, but one who has gotten down onto the road itself.
Seeking the original ones, searching for kindred spirits — the heart steady, unafraid though the road runs every way.Searching for the souls who belong to this path, and for the rare ones who truly understand — with a settled heart, unafraid no matter which way the road turns.
The work named here is a search. The “original ones” (原人, yuán rén) are the souls that came from the source and lost their way in the world — the ones to be found and brought home. The “kindred spirits” (知音, zhī yīn) reach back to the ancient story of Bo Ya and the one listener who could hear, in his playing, the very mountains and rivers in his heart — to find such a one is to be understood at the level of the Dao.
踏上還鄉的覺路 走了一程近一程
tà shàng huán xiāng de jué lù · zǒu le yì chéng jìn yì chéng
Set foot on the awakened road home, and each stage you walk brings it one stage nearer.Step onto the awakening road that leads back home, and every stretch you travel brings you that much closer.
The “road home” (還鄉, huán xiāng) is the image of returning to the root, the soul’s homecoming to its source; the “awakened road” (覺路, jué lù) is the path of enlightenment. Fused, they make cultivation a homeward journey where every honest step is real progress.
The scenes of this changing world, its warmth and its cold — better to turn toward the Dao and win the Unborn.The ups and downs of life, its kindness one day and coldness the next — better to turn to the Dao and reach the deathless source of all.
Against the world’s endless flux of warmth and cold, the teaching offers something that does not rise and fall: the Unborn (無生, wú shēng), the deathless reality that neither arises nor ceases. Better to turn toward the Dao and win it.
長夜中 點明燈
cháng yè zhōng · diǎn míng dēng
In the long night, light a bright lamp.In the long dark night, light a bright lamp.
在這漫漫的生死長夜裡，道就是那一盞照路的明燈。
For the dark stretch of the road, the Dao is the lamp: in the long night, light a bright lamp.
The affinity is rare beyond measure — the affinity of these Three Eras — sealed and affirmed into the One Buddha Vehicle, where the Three converge and return to One.The chance to be here now is rare beyond measure — the rare chance of this age — confirmed as the one path that carries everyone home, where the three separate ways all meet and become one.
“The affinity of these Three Eras” points to the conviction that this present age is a uniquely open moment of salvation, when the Dao is offered to ordinary people in ordinary homes. “Sealed into the One Buddha Vehicle, where the Three converge and return to One” borrows the Chan master’s mind-seal of certification and the Lotus Sutra’s teaching that the many vehicles were always, in truth, one.
Who am I? — who, as I originally am? — from self-nature, all things arise, all dharmas come to be.Who am I — who am I beneath everything, as I first truly was? From your own true nature, everything that exists comes into being.
Who am I? — who, as I originally am? is a question lifted straight from Chan meditation: not rhetorical, but a hook for the mind to bite on until thinking stops. The answer comes in the same breath — the true self is the pure, generative ground from which all things arise, the self-nature Huineng named when he exclaimed that it itself gives rise to all things.
Merge into the all-pervading light of sun and moon; do not mock the candle-flame, nor sigh that it is faint and scattered.Let your small light merge into the great light of sun and moon; never belittle your single candle-flame or sigh that it is faint and small.
Your light may look like a single guttering candle. Do not despise it: it is destined to join the all-pervading light of sun and moon. Do not belittle the candle-flame or sigh that it is faint and scattered.
With kindness and with reverence, receive the mandate; use the false to cultivate the true, and raise a noble bearing.With kindness and with reverence, take up what Heaven asks of you; use this passing body and world to cultivate what is real, and carry yourself with a noble spirit.
This is the way forward, named plainly: with kindness and reverence, take up what is asked of you, and use the false to cultivate the true (借假修真, jiè jiǎ xiū zhēn) — make use of this impermanent body, the only vessel you have, to cultivate what does not pass away.
Travel-worn, dusty with the road — how few take it in earnest; without cause, fate plays its tricks on us.Weary and dusty from the journey — how few really take it to heart; and for no reason at all, fate seems to toy with people.
人在紅塵中奔波勞碌、風塵僕僕，但真正肯認真修行的有幾個？以致無端地被造化、被命運所捉弄。
So many hurry through life travel-worn and exhausted, and so few take the one thing that matters in earnest — and so, as if for no reason, fate seems to toy with them.
不識菩提本根 累劫猶堪忍
bù shí pú tí běn gēn · lěi jié yóu kān rěn
Not knowing the root of awakening, through kalpa after kalpa one still must endure.Not recognizing the root of their own awakening, people go on enduring lifetime after lifetime of suffering.
The mechanism of the trouble is astonishingly small: a single movement of greed or anger ripples out through the whole of existence, throwing all Three Realms into clamor.
Do not blame Heaven and Earth for being without feeling — is the Dao realized through knowing, seeing, hearing?Don’t blame Heaven and Earth for being cold and uncaring — is the Dao ever realized just by what you read, see, and hear?
Do not blame an indifferent cosmos — the fault is not in Heaven and Earth. And the wrong road to realization is cut off with a question: is the Dao realized through knowing, seeing, hearing? As the Śūraṅgama Sutra warns, piling up knowledge on top of pure awareness is itself the root of delusion. The Dao is not a subject to be studied but a reality to be lived through.
窮達由命行修由身 當下即是無需卜問
qióng dá yóu mìng xíng xiū yóu shēn · dāng xià jí shì wú xū bǔ wèn
Adversity and success rest with destiny; cultivation and conduct rest with oneself — right here, it already is; there is no need to ask the oracles.Whether you fail or succeed in the world is up to destiny; how you cultivate yourself is entirely up to you — it is right here, right now, with no need to consult any oracle.
This is the old Confucian division of labor: how your outer life turns out is largely not in your hands, but your inner cultivation is entirely in your hands. Be serene about the first; be wholly responsible for the second — and do not defer it or look elsewhere, for it is right here, with no need to consult any oracle.
In effortless naturalness, the moment a self arises, fault is born; when the will is impure, the spirit will not gather.When you act with natural ease and no forcing, the moment a self-centered “I” creeps in, fault is born; and when your intent is divided, the spirit cannot settle.
In the clear, unforced state, it is the appearance of a grasping “I” that generates everything that goes wrong — the same insight named as no-self. And a mind divided by private motives, its will impure, cannot gather and concentrate the spirit.
The primordial Dao threads through; acquired virtue keeps its pace — origination, flourishing, benefit, steadfastness: establish yourself, and establish others.The original Dao runs through everything, and the virtue you build keeps step with it — beginning, growth, harvest, and steadfastness: lift yourself up, and lift others up with you.
The primordial Dao runs through everything, and the virtue built in this life moves in step with it. Origination, flourishing, benefit, steadfastness (元亨利貞, yuán hēng lì zhēn) are the four virtues of the creative principle in the Book of Changes, the cycle by which Heaven brings all things to be; the cultivator embodies that same generative power in order to establish self and others — the rule that one’s own standing is completed only by helping others stand.
求仁而得仁無憾恨 報恩了愿扛大任
qiú rén ér dé rén wú hàn hèn · bào ēn liǎo yuàn káng dà rèn
Seek benevolence and attain it, with neither regret nor resentment; repay your debt of grace, fulfill your vows, shoulder the great charge.Seek goodness and you will reach it, with nothing to regret or resent; repay the kindness you owe, complete your vows, and take up the great responsibility.
Seek benevolence and attain it, with neither regret nor resentment echoes Confucius’s praise for the brothers who starved rather than betray their ideal: when you have realized the highest thing, the cost stops mattering. The charge follows in full — repay your debt of grace, fulfill your vows, shoulder the great responsibility.
Great kindness, great compassion, great joy, great relinquishing — when the world is drowning, reach out and uphold it with the Dao.Boundless kindness, compassion, joy, and selfless giving — when the whole world is drowning, reach out and lift it up with the Dao.
Great kindness, great compassion, great joy, great relinquishing are the Four Immeasurables, the four directions of a heart with no edges. The mission culminates in a line from Mencius: you save a drowning person with your hand, but you save a drowning age only by upholding the Dao. Personal liberation is not the end of the road — a drowning world is waiting.
踏上還鄉的覺路 走了一程近一程
tà shàng huán xiāng de jué lù · zǒu le yì chéng jìn yì chéng
Set foot on the awakened road home, and each stage you walk brings it one stage nearer.Step onto the awakening road that leads back home, and every stretch you travel brings you that much closer.
The scenes of this changing world, its warmth and its cold — better to turn toward the Dao and win the Unborn.The ups and downs of life, its kindness one day and coldness the next — better to turn to the Dao and reach the deathless source of all.
主旋律再現。世間滄桑炎涼看盡也不過如此，不如轉而向道，證取那不生不滅的無生境界。（參 B04）
長夜中 點明燈
cháng yè zhōng · diǎn míng dēng
In the long night, light a bright lamp.In the long dark night, light a bright lamp.
The affinity is rare beyond measure — the affinity of these Three Eras — sealed and affirmed into the One Buddha Vehicle, where the Three converge and return to One.The chance to be here now is rare beyond measure — the rare chance of this age — confirmed as the one path that carries everyone home, where the three separate ways all meet and become one.
Who am I? — who, as I originally am? — from self-nature, all things arise, all dharmas come to be.Who am I — who am I beneath everything, as I first truly was? From your own true nature, everything that exists comes into being.
Merge into the all-pervading light of sun and moon; do not mock the candle-flame, nor sigh that it is faint and scattered.Let your small light merge into the great light of sun and moon; never belittle your single candle-flame or sigh that it is faint and small.
With kindness and with reverence, receive the mandate; use the false to cultivate the true, and raise a noble bearing.With kindness and with reverence, take up what Heaven asks of you; use this passing body and world to cultivate what is real, and carry yourself with a noble spirit.
On the awakened road, teacher and disciple walk on together — the White Era opens the one all-pervading true teaching.On the road of awakening, teacher and disciple walk on side by side — this present era opens the one true teaching that runs through all things.
The song that began I walk it beside my disciples ends teacher and disciple walk on together — the vow has become a shared fact. And the last line names the larger gift of the age: in this era the single thread running through all the teachings — the one thread of which Confucius spoke — has been thrown open to everyone.
This main round is sung to the borrowed melody, and its whole emotional key rests on a single changed word. The original song’s verb 闖 means to brave, to barge through, to adventure out into the world together; the Holy Teacher swaps it for 行 — simply, to walk. The long road, I walk it beside my disciples. This is not a teacher waiting at the finish line, but one who has gotten down onto the road itself and walks it, step by step, at his disciples’ pace. The opening line is at once the song’s title and its vow, and the work it names is a search: to find the original ones — the souls that came from the source and lost their way — and the kindred spirits who can truly hear one another at the level of the Dao (the ancient story of Bo Ya and the one listener who heard the mountains and rivers in his playing). With such companions, the heart stays steady and the road, however it runs, holds no fear.