Includes bibliographical references (pages 373-416).

Antecedents in the history of Chinese sacred texts -- An early model: the bureaucracy of salvation in a fifteenth-century text, the Huang-chi pao-ch�uan -- Wu-wei sect scriptures by Lo Ch'ing -- The Chiu-lien pao-ch�uan of 1523 -- Themes in later sixteenth-century Pao-ch�uan -- "Precious volumes" from the seventeenth century -- The dragon-flower scripture (Lung-hua ching) -- Concluding comments -- Appendixes.

"Precious volumes," or pao-chuan, were produced by popular religious sects in the Ming and Ch'ing dynasties. These scriptures were believed to have been divinely revealed to sect leaders and contain teachings and ritual instructions that provide valuable information about a lively and widespread religious tradition outside the mainstream religious systems of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism. Proscribed by the Chinese state and largely neglected until now, they testify to the imagination and devotion of popular religious leaders. This book, the most detailed and comprehensive study of early pao-chuan in any language, studies 34 examples of this literature from the Ming and Ch'ing dynasties in order to understand the origins and development of this textual tradition.

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