Buddhism, War, and Nationalism

Chinese Monks in the Struggle Against Japanese Aggression 1931-1945

Xue Yu

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781135487393
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: World History
• Index: History

This thesis examines the doctrinal grounds and different approaches to working out this "new Buddhist tradition, " a startling contrast to the teachings of non-violence and compassion which have made Buddhism known as a religion of peace. In scores of articles as war approached in 1936-37, new monks searched and reinterpreted scripture, making controversial arguments for ideas like "compassionate killing" which would justify participating in war.

Chapter One
Changing Buddhism in Modern China

Buddhist Awakening

In The Buddhist Revival in China, Holmes Welch follows early Christian missionaries and uses the term “revival” to describe institutional Buddhism in China during the second half of the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth century, because, as he says, “it is the most convenient and customary way of referring to the varied development that took place in Chinese Buddhism.”¹ At the end of the book, however, Welch is uncertain whether he has used the right term because of the vague implication of “revival.” Indeed, the picture presented by Holmes Welch hardly conveys an idea that Buddhism was reviving. The sangha was full of ignorant and disoriented monks and nuns who were considered by many intellectuals as “parasites of society,” living in dilapidated temples, lacking spiritual inspiration. Therefore, Welch worries that the idea of revival might be “trebly misleading.”² Still, he maintains the term with the justification and hope that “Repeatedly, religious practices have seemed to fade away only to rise again, perhaps in new forms.”³

After all, following the destruction of the Taiping Rebellion (1850–1864), many large temples in Jiangsu and Zhejiang had soon been reconstructed. By 1885, Baohua Shan 寶華山, one of the most well-known sites for Buddhist ordination, had fully recovered and was active in operation. In 1911, the reconstruction of Lingyin Si 靈隱寺, the largest monastery in Hangzhou, was completed. Some temples were rebuilt on a larger and more lavish scale than before. Jinshan 金山, looted and burned down to the ground by the Taiping rebels, reemerged less than five years after the rebellion was crushed by Qing armies, a sizable temple complex in better condition impressing Buddhist devotees and tourists.⁴

The rebuilding of temples in large scale within a short period showed that institutional Buddhism was not dead, as some nineteenth-century missionaries claimed, but continued to attract Chinese. Even though the sangha was full of corrupted monks and malpractices, Buddhist institutions also produced numerous virtuous and learned monks who enjoyed high veneration from society. Monks, like Jichan (1851–1913), Yekai (1852–1922), Yingguang (1861–1940), and Xuyun (1840–1959), who were accomplished in religious practice or Buddhist learning and proficient in religious preaching, attracted tens and thousands of followers. Meanwhile, Buddhist philosophy fascinated a number of intellectuals, who began to study Buddhism in their quest for social, political, and intellectual reform in China. These phenomena convinced Holmes Welch that the early western missionaries had intentionally exaggerated the decline of the sangha.⁵ They portrayed the worst of what they saw about the sangha and then generalized the dark side of Buddhist situations to cover what they did not see, or to ignore the positive side of what they saw.

The decline of Buddhist spiritual practice and the renovation of temples shaped and mirrored contemporary Chinese Buddhist history in which old and new, conservatives and reformers existed side by side. The gradual disappearance of the old and the birth of the new within institutional Buddhism made modern Buddhist history too complicated to be described simply in terms of “revival.” Therefore, for the sake of convenience and greater accuracy, I propose the term “awakening” for Buddhist developments in conjunction with the contemporary social, political, and intellectual movement of national awakening (minzu juexing 民族覺醒) in an effort for self-strengthening in China that started after the Opium War in 1842. Awakening or enlightenment—in Chinese jue 覺, juewu 覺悟, wu 悟, xing 醒, or juexing 覺醒—is in fact a Buddhist concept, literally meaning waking from dreamful sleep or illusion, and figuratively indicating seeing reality and realizing truth. According to Buddhist philosophy, all sentient beings full of ignorance are said to have fallen asleep and live in the world of illusion; and the teaching of the Buddha will awaken them and enable them to achieve enlightenment.

Foreign invasions and humiliations of repeated defeat, beginning in the 1840s, and especially after the first Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895), caused Chinese, especially intellectuals, to awaken their nationhood and national identity. Nationalism thus gradually replaced culturalism, which had dominated Chinese view of self identity for centuries. The idea of nation-state replete with sovereignty and territory in contrast to foreign states spread among Chinese people.⁶ With the social Darwinist concept of the survival of the fittest, many intellectuals and revolutionaries began to construct the ideas of the new Chinese nation and endeavored to enlighten others about “Chineseness.” The awaking of modern nationalism culminated in the overthrow of the Manchu Qing dynasty, which came to be regarded as alien to “Chineseness.”⁷ After the establishment of the Republic in 1912, the “Chinese people” was expanded to include five ethnic nationalities— Han, Tibetan, Mongolian, Muslim, and Manchu—in China as a whole, and to uphold its inherited empire together as a Chinese nation-state, and to unite all these peoples against foreign invasion and occupation. The Chinese nation was thus said to have finally begun to awaken.⁸ The spirit of nationalism further developed in the New Culture Movement in 1915 and the May Fourth Movement in 1919, and reached its peak during the time of the Anti-Japanese War.

If the awakening of the Chinese nation was prompted internally by self-deterioration and externally by foreign invasions, and if Chinese nationalism was closely associated with internationalism in the sense of learning foreign techniques for self-modernization, Buddhist awakening was also the result of the external challenges of Christianity, of Japanese Buddhist missionaries, in addition to the state appropriation of temple properties and by self-corruption within the sangha, with the sense of learning from Christian charity work and Japanese Buddhist reform. The dangers that Chinese Buddhism faced forced many Buddhists, both lay and clerical, to realize the importance of self-reform for Buddhist survival and revival, and thus they became actively engaged in Buddhist intellectual studies and social services. They believed that Buddhism would not survive in China if monks and nuns continued to remain inactive inside temples and isolated from society.

Modern Lay Buddhist Movement

The revival of intellectual Buddhism was initiated by lay Buddhists, such as Yang Renshan 楊仁山 (1837–1911) and Ouyang Jian 歐陽漸 (1871–1943), most of whom endeavored to revitalize Buddhism to meet contemporary social needs and political challenges by publishing Buddhist texts and inculcating Buddhist philosophy among intellectuals. This lay movement was succeeded and expanded by some well-known social elites and politicians, who attempted to make use of Buddhism to implement social and political reforms in China.

In 1866, Yang Renshan (Yang Wenhui), who is regarded as the “father of modern Chinese Buddhism,” founded Jinling Buddhist Press (Jinling kejing chu 金陵刻經處), which printed millions of copies of Buddhist texts for free distribution in society.⁹ He was able to retrieve a large number of the scriptures of the Dharmalaksana School 法相宗 from Japan through his acquaintance with Nanjo Bunyu 南條文雄, a well-known Japanese Buddhist scholar. In 1908, Yang Renshan donated part of his residence in Nanjing for the establishment of a Buddhist college, namely Jetavana Hermitage (Qiyuan Jinshe 祇洹精舍), which produced some of the most eminent Buddhist scholars, such as Ouyang Jian, in the Republican period. The reintroduction of the texts of the Dharmalaksana School stimulated Buddhist studies in China. Intellectuals and politicians, like Tan Sitong (1866–1898), Liang Qichao (1873–1929), and Zhang Taiyan (1868–1936), found inspirations in such Buddhist philosophies such as no-self, impermanence, universal oneness, and the path of bodhisattva, and made use of them as an alternative ideology for China’s self-strengthening. These lay Buddhist intellectuals exercised considerable influence on modern Chinese Buddhist thought and provided the foundation for Buddhist reform movement. The Buddhist studies with their participation enhanced society’s interest in Buddhism, and many literati and politicians in the Republic era began to play active roles in Buddhist developments such as charity and relief works. Some of them became leading members of the Chinese Buddhist Society founded in 1929. Meanwhile, a number of lay Buddhist organizations emerged, such as Zhina neixue yuan 支那內學院 (China Metaphysical Institute) in Nanjing, Hankou fojiao hui 漢口佛教會 (Hankou Buddhist Society) in Wuhan, Sanshi xueshe 三時學社 (Sanshi Study Society) in Beijing, and Shanghai jushi lin 上海居士林 (Shanghai Lay Buddhist Society) in Shanghai.¹⁰

The rise of lay Buddhist activities at the turn of the century greatly impressed some scholars who now claim that modern Buddhist history was dominated by the lay Buddhist movement. Holmes Welch, being one of such scholars, attributed the Buddhist revival to the efforts of laymen,¹¹ while Wing-tsit Chan even suggested that Mahayana Buddhism was dominated by lay-Buddhists who provided the leadership to Buddhist affairs. Chan concluded:

The shift from the Buddhist clergy to the layman was inevitable. Long ago China transformed Hinayana Buddhism centering on the monastic order to Mahayana Buddhism centering on lay society… the weakness and degeneration of the Sangha encouraged the transition; modern Buddhist developments have made it complete.¹²

Chan’s claim that China transformed Hinayana Buddhism into Mahayana Buddhism centering on lay society is disputable. In Chinese Buddhist history, the monastic sangha, just as its counterparts in the Theravada tradition in other Asian countries, always dominated Buddhist affairs and temples were the centers of Buddhist activities. The rise of Mahayana Buddhism in India and its subsequent development in China were certainly not the result of the efforts of lay Buddhists, but internal evolution by Buddhist monks such as Nagarjuna, Asangha, and Vasubandhu. It could be regarded as an inner effort to expand Buddhism and make it more accessible to society. Although Mahayana Buddhism makes less differentiation between clergy and lay people and both of whom can be regarded as bodhisattvas, monks played the central role in Buddhist development in both India and China. It is uncertain how much will be left if we sweep aside the activities of the monks based on temples throughout history.

The conclusion that modern Buddhism was a lay Buddhist movement may be right for the activities of intellectual Buddhism that, to some extent, ushered in changes of Buddhism in modern China. Nevertheless, intellectual Buddhism led by lay Buddhists never became widespread in Chinese society, but remained among a small group of intellectuals in cosmopolitan areas, such as Shanghai, Nanjing, and Beijing. These lay Buddhists, who were part of the larger intellectual awakening in China, and who promoted Buddhist studies and opened a way for Buddhism to reintegrate itself into society, had a limited impact on institutional Buddhism at large. Lay people’s role in leading Buddhist studies was gradually reduced and they were soon replaced by monks who quickly emerged to lead Buddhist reform. Even when these lay Buddhists were active in Buddhist studies, social work, and Buddhist education during the early Republican period, the clergy continued to be in charge of Buddhist activities centered on temples. Lay Buddhist intellectuals, such as Ouyang Jian in Nanjing, never exclusively dominated the affairs of the Dharmalakasana philosophical studies, nor did their Buddhist research extensively influence Chinese Buddhist society in general, especially the monastic community. A large number of monks, such as Taixu, Changxing, and Zhenhua, to name only a few, were also very active, and they made distinguished contributions to modern Buddhist studies and extended Buddhist impact in society.

We must not be blind to the rejuvenated spirit of the Chinese sangha for Buddhist awakening and regaining Buddhist glory of the past, and many Buddhist organizations at national and provincial levels were established by the monks to reorganize Chinese Buddhism. Buddhist schools were opened in temples to educate monks and nuns, and numerous Buddhist journals were published: both were under the leadership of monks even though they were sometimes financially supported by lay Buddhists. Although there were many influential lay Buddhists working in such Buddhist organizations or acting as sponsors, most of them were well-known not because of their Buddhist activities but because of their social and political preeminence; although the Chinese sangha in general had deteriorated morally and spiritually, monks continued to dominate Buddhist affairs, and temples still played central roles in religious activities all over China. In 1906, the first modern Buddhist school was founded by monks at Tianning Si 天宁寺 in Yangzhou, one year earlier than Jetavana Seminary set up by Yang Renshan.¹³ In early 1912, some lay Buddhist intellectuals, including Ouyang Jian, Li Zhenggan, and Gui Bohua, organized the Buddhist Society in Nanjing and obtained an endorsement letter from Sun Yatsen, the first President of the Republic of China. They began to criticize monks and nuns and attempted to establish a new Buddhism in China dominated by lay Buddhists. Their attitudes and criticisms resulted in mounting counterattacks from other Buddhists, especially clergy, and within a few months they had to declare the cancellation of the society.¹⁴

Meanwhile, some eminent monks initiated their own efforts to reorganize Chinese Buddhism and to revitalize Buddhism’s social appeal, and in 1912 they founded the All China Buddhist Congress (Zhongguo fojiao zonghui 中華佛教總會). During the next several decades, monks established dozens of national or regional Buddhist organizations, the most important of which being the Chinese Buddhist Society (Zhongguo fojiao hui 中國佛教會) established in 1929. Although some leading lay Buddhists were active in sponsorship, and disunity and mismanagement of the clergy prevented such organizations from playing efficient roles or from articulating a uniform voice in Buddhist reform, the establishment of these organizations showed the aspirations of monks to be more engaged in Buddhist social and political activities. To some extent, these organizations were powerful because they were legitimately registered and connected with Buddhist temples all over China. On many occasions, ...