Still from the video “Wudang Mountain, My second home” · YouTube · DaoistGate internal martial arts · rights pending
武當
Wudang lineage and school
Where Master Zhou’s training comes from, as the two sister sites and his own posts tell it.
A Wudang Daoist priest
Both sites describe Xuan Yun Zhou as a Wudang priest (Wudang Daoist priest).
He is a Wudang Daoist priest. His lineage:
- Wudang Longmen (龍門派, Dragon Gate), 24th generation.
Jagged peaks, low cloud and fading light, with a small figure in a dark coat at the edge of the frame. This comes from a set of pictures his site uploaded in March 2025, the month of the journey to Yunnan and Wudang; the picture does not say who is shown. Afterward he wrote that cameras capture images, but cannot hold emotions.
Source: daoistgate.com · rights pending
The Wudang-trained story
His Wudang training, as told in his biography:
Daoist Xuan Yun Zhou (born Zhou Hongliang) was born in a small village in Henan Province, central China. At the age of thirteen, he was sent by his parents to Mount Wudang, where he began studying Taiji, Kung Fu, and Qigong—disciplines that would later become central to his life's work and teaching.
He trained at the Martial Arts Academy of the Daoist Association at Zixiao Palace (Purple Cloud Palace), where he was initiated into the Wudang Longmen (Dragon Gate) lineage, becoming a 24th-generation successor. At seventeen, he underwent formal Daoist ordination and became a Daoist priest, devoting himself to the study of Daoist philosophy, spiritual cultivation, and religious practice.
Although many practitioners who study martial arts on Mount Wudang develop connections with the Daoist tradition, Xuan Yun Zhou's path was distinctive. He spent many years living and training full-time within the mountain's monasteries, immersed in the traditional monastic way of life, and completed the formal rites of Daoist ordination.
TBD — pending Master Zhou’s confirmation. His biography is on his story page. Where our sources differ or say nothing, the point is marked TBD there.
Gilded figures in the dimness of a shrine hall, the wood darkened by incense and years. His site files this picture with those of Wudang, where the 2025 journey ended with four days at Purple Cloud Temple, Golden Summit and Nanyang Palace. Light enters slowly, as it does in such rooms.
Source: daoistgate.com · rights pending
Teachers named on the sites
Li Guang Fu 李光富
Recognized master and mentor, a formally recognized disciple relationship stated on daoistgate.com.
Wang Guang De 王廣德
Abbot who wrote the letter of introduction when he asked to enter the temple, as told in his own post.
Daoist Gate and the school
He founded the Daoist Gate School and the Xuan Ju center, and the Daoist Gate Center opened in New Hampshire in 2018 under his guidance. Teacher training has been held there each spring and autumn since 2021, and a teacher-certification system is being built.
What he teaches: Tai Chi, Xingyi, Bagua, Qigong and Neidan (inner alchemy), as the sites describe them.
Sources: daoistgate.com
The grounds of Daoist Gate Center, the center he founded, where the Wudang training takes place in person.
The main house at the center, seen from the yard. Licence plates are blurred for privacy.
Photo: Tatiana Beltran
A picnic table and a deck at the center, beneath maples in autumn colour.
Photo: Tatiana Beltran
The grounds
A large tree in autumn colour at the edge of the field, beside the gravel yard.
Photo: Tatiana Beltran
Trees and a ring of boulders where the drive bends toward the woods.
Photo: Tatiana Beltran