Abstract

This dissertation deals with the development of Daoism during the Six Dynasties through an analysis of texts belonging to the Celestial Master and Highest Clarity movements of this period contained in the Daoist Canon . ;Chapter one provides a general outline of the establishment of Daoism as a large-scale, organized religion during the Liu-Song dynasty by detailing the major aspects of the Celestial Master movement defined in the "Great Highest Scripture on the Inner Explanations of the Three Heavens" and other related texts which attempted to reform the movement began by Zhang Daoling in the Han dynasty into a religion which could gain the support of the imperial court. ;Chapter two contains an analysis of one of the central Highest Clarity scriptures, the "Genuine Scripture of the Eight Unadorned" . The chapter begins with a study of the two principle texts in the Daoist Canon which represent this scripture, concluding that they contain later modifications of the scripture which reflect developments in the Highest Clarity scriptures after the period of the initial revelations. The chapter then reconstructs the contents of the original scripture based on a comparative analysis of these two texts with other commentaries on the scripture from the Six Dynasties. Finally, two commentaries written from within the Celestial Master movement are studied in order to determine some aspects of the relationship between this movement and the Highest Clarity scriptures. ;Chapter three examines the early expansion of the Shangqing scriptures through a study of the scriptures classified under the heading of the "way of the Great Highest" in a scriptural catalogue contained in one version of the "Genuine Scripture of the Eight Unadorned". It is proposed that the scriptures of this category represent a new movement in the Highest Clarity scriptures surrounding the "teachings of Jade Clarity", in particular the "Hidden Book of Jade Clarity" . ;Chapter four describes the further development of the Highest Clarity scriptures during the later Six Dynasties through a study of the "three caverns" and "three wonders" theories