The Complete Record of a Peddler

This is a complete account of the merchant gods of the Tang, Song, and Yuan dynasties. It offers meticulous descriptions of the contributions made by the founding masters of every trade in China, and of how they were deified by emperors.

Through the merchant gods' study of the classics, the book weaves in the author's works The Original Meaning of the Forgotten Classic and The Art of Commerce. These texts are much like the founding doctrines of the various schools of thought, and are sure to open a new door for Chinese people in business. They may even become a bedside book for merchants.

In contrast to the Western way of thinking represented by the once-popular genre of success literature, this is a guide to business from a Chinese perspective, and a radical challenge to Western ideas of success.

Back then, Wu Zetian was moved to tears by the Supreme God of Upright Commerce, Taiyuan, who offered up his own head to honor his word.

Four years later, the Great Emperor Who Leads the Merchant Immortals fell to his death from a cliff while gathering wintergreen. Wu Zetian was overcome with grief, and deeply shaken by the hardships merchants faced.

Only then did she first enshrine the father and son as the Gods of Peddlers. Later generations saw Emperor Taizong of Song rename them the Gods of Commerce. After enshrining them, Wu Zetian immediately established the Register of Peddler Gods, prayed to the Great Emperor Shennong, and entrusted the father and son with its charge: to guide merchants from the sixty-four regions, each representing a different local product, on their path to godhood.

It took six hundred years to complete this work of guiding them to godhood. The resolve of the merchant gods and merchant immortals was so steadfast that the people, gods, and ghosts of the Three Realms, and the followers of Daoism, Buddhism, and Confucianism, all admired them deeply.