XLIII. CHINA (continued)…

XLIII. CHINA (continued)

HISTORY.

The traditional date for the introduction of Buddhism is 62 A.D., when the chronicles tell how the Emperor Ming-Ti of the Later Han Dynasty dreamt that he saw a golden man fly into his palace[591] and how his courtiers suggested that the figure was Fo-t'o[592] or Buddha, an Indian God. Ming-Ti did not let the matter drop and in 65 sent an embassy to a destination variously described as the kingdom of the Ta Yüeh Chih[593] or India with instructions to bring back Buddhist scriptures and priests. On its return it was accompanied by a monk called Kâśyapa Mâtanga[594], a native of Central India. A second called Chu Fa-Lan[595], who came from Central Asia and found some difficulty in obtaining permission to leave his country, followed shortly afterwards. Both were installed at Loyang, the capital of the dynasty, in the White Horse Monastery[596], so called because the foreign monks rode on white horses or used them for carrying books.

The story has been criticized as an obvious legend, but I see no reason why it should not be true to this extent that Ming-Ti sent an embassy to Central Asia (not India in our sense) with the result that a monastery was for the first time established under imperial patronage. The gravest objection is that before the campaigns of Pan Ch'ao[597], which began about 73 A.D., Central Asia was in rebellion against China. But those campaigns show that the Chinese Court was occupied with Central Asian questions and to send envoys to enquire about religion may have been politically advantageous, for they could obtain information without asserting or abandoning China's claims to sovereignty. The story does not state that there was no Buddhism in China before 62 A.D. On the contrary it implies that though it was not sufficiently conspicuous to be known to the Emperor, yet there was no difficulty in obtaining information about it and other facts support the idea that it began to enter China at least half a century earlier. The negotiations of Chang Ch'ien[598] with the Yüeh Chih (129-119 B.C.) and the documents discovered by Stein in the ancient military posts on the western frontier of Kansu[599] prove that China had communication with Central Asia, but neither the accounts of Chang Ch'ien's journeys nor the documents contain any allusion to Buddhism. In 121 B.C. the Annals relate that "a golden man" was captured from the Hsiung-nu but, even if it was an image of Buddha, the incident had no consequences. More important is a notice in the Wei-lüeh which gives a brief account of the Buddha's birth and states that in the year 2 B.C. an ambassador sent by the Emperor Ai to the court of the Yüeh Chih was instructed in Buddhism by order of their king[600]. Also the Later Han Annals intimate that in 65 A.D. the Prince of Ch'u[601] was a Buddhist and that there were Śramanas and Upâsakas in his territory.

The author of the Wei-lüeh comments on the resemblance of Buddhist writings to the work of Lao-tzŭ, and suggests that the latter left China in order to teach in India. This theory found many advocates among the Taoists, but is not likely to commend itself to European scholars. Less improbable is a view held by many Chinese critics[602] and apparently first mentioned in the Sui annals, namely, that Buddhism was introduced into China at an early date but was exterminated by the Emperor Shih Huang Ti (221-206) in the course of his crusade against literature. But this view is not supported by any details and is open to the general objection that intercourse between China and India viâ Central Asia before 200 B.C. is not only unproved but improbable.

Still the mystical, quietist philosophy of Lao-tzŭ and Chuang-tzŭ has an undoubted resemblance to Indian thought. No one who is familiar with the Upanishads can read the Tao-Tê-Ching without feeling that if Brahman is substituted for Tao the whole would be intelligible to a Hindu. Its doctrine is not specifically Buddhist, yet it contains passages which sound like echoes of the Pitakas. Compare Tao-Tê-Ching, 33. 1, "He who overcomes others is strong: he who overcomes himself is mighty," with Dhammapada, 103, "If one man overcome a thousand thousand in battle and another overcome himself, this last is the greatest of conquerors"; and 46. 2, "There is no greater sin that to look on what moves desire: there is no greater evil than discontent: there is no greater disaster than covetousness," with Dhammapada, 251, "There is no fire like desire, there is no monster like hatred, there is no snare like folly, there is no torrent like covetousness." And if it be objected that these are the coincidences of obvious ethics, I would call attention to 39. 1̣, "Hence if we enumerate separately each part that goes to form a cart, we have no cart at all." Here the thought and its illustration cannot be called obvious and the resemblance to well-known passages in the Samyutta Nikâya and Questions of Milinda[603] is striking.

Any discussion of the indebtedness of the Tao-Tê-Ching to India is too complicated for insertion here since it involves the question of its date or the date of particular passages, if we reject the hypothesis that the work as we have it was composed by Lao-tzŭ in the sixth century B.C.[604] But there is less reason to doubt the genuineness of the essays of Chuang-tzŭ who lived in the fourth century B.C. In them we find mention of trances which give superhuman wisdom and lead to union with the all-pervading spirit, and of magical powers enjoyed by sages, similar to the Indian iddhi. He approves the practice of abandoning the world and enunciates the doctrines of evolution and reincarnation. He knows, as does also the Tao-Tê-Ching, methods of regulating the breathing which are conducive to mental culture and long life. He speaks of the six faculties of perception, which recall the Shaḍâyatana, and of name and real existence (nâmarûpam) as being the conditions of a thing[605]. He has also a remarkable comparison of death to the extinction of a fire: "what we can point to are the faggots that have been consumed: but the fire is transmitted and we know not that it is over and ended." Several Buddhist parallels to this might be cited[606].

The list of such resemblances might be made longer and the explanation that Indian ideas reached China sporadically, at least as early as the fourth century B.C., seems natural. I should accept it, if there were any historical evidence besides these literary parallels. But there seems to be none and it may be justly urged that the roots of this quietism lie so deep in the Chinese character, that the plant cannot have sprung from some chance wind-wafted seed. That character has two sides, one seen in the Chinese Empire and the classical philosophy, excellent as ethics but somewhat stiff and formal: the other in revolutions and rebellions, in the free life of hermits and wanderers, in poetry and painting. This second side is very like the temper of Indian Buddhism and easily amalgamated with it[607], but it has a special note of its own.

The curiosity of Ming-Ti did not lead to any immediate triumph of Buddhism. We read that he was zealous in honouring Confucius but not that he showed devotion to the new faith. Indeed it is possible that his interest was political rather than religious. Buddhism was also discredited by its first convert, the Emperor's brother Chu-Ying, who rebelled unsuccessfully and committed suicide. Still it flourished in a quiet way and the two foreign monks in the White Horse Monastery began that long series of translations which assumed gigantic proportions in the following centuries. To Kâśyapa is ascribed a collection of extracts known as the Sûtra of forty-two sections which is still popular[608]. This little work adheres closely to the teaching of the Pali Tripitaka and shows hardly any traces of the Mahâyâna. According to the Chinese annals the chief doctrines preached by the first Buddhist missionaries were the sanctity of all animal life, metempsychosis, meditation, asceticism and Karma.

It is not until the third century[609] that we hear much of Buddhism as a force at Court or among the people, but meanwhile the task of translation progressed at Lo-yang. The Chinese are a literary race and these quiet labours prepared the soil for the subsequent efflorescence. Twelve[610] translators are named as having worked before the downfall of the Han Dynasty and about 350 books are attributed to them. None of them were Chinese. About half came from India and the rest from Central Asia, the most celebrated of the latter being An Shih-kao, a prince of An-hsi or Parthia[611]. The Later Han Dynasty was followed by the animated and romantic epoch known as the Three Kingdoms (221-265) when China was divided between the States of Wei, Wu and Shu. Loyang became the capital of Wei and the activity of the White Horse Monastery continued. We have the names of five translators who worked there. One of them was the first to translate the Pâtimokkha[612], which argues that previously few followed the monastic life. At Nanking, the capital of Wu, we also hear of five translators and one was tutor of the Crown Prince. This implies that Buddhism was spreading in the south and that monks inspired confidence at Court.

The Three Kingdoms gave place to the Dynasty known as Western Tsin[613] which, for a short time (A.D. 265-316), claimed to unite the Empire, and we now reach the period when Buddhism begins to become prominent. It is also a period of political confusion, of contest between the north and south, of struggles between Chinese and Tartars. Chinese histories, with their long lists of legitimate sovereigns, exaggerate the solidity and continuity of the Empire, for the territory ruled by those sovereigns was often but a small fraction of what we call China. Yet the Tartar states were not an alien and destructive force to the same extent as the conquests made by Mohammedan Turks at the expense of Byzantium. The Tartars were neither fanatical, nor prejudiced against Chinese ideals in politics and religion. On the contrary, they respected the language, literature and institutions of the Empire: they assumed Chinese names and sometimes based their claim to the Imperial title on the marriage of their ancestors with Chinese princesses.

During the fourth century and the first half of the fifth some twenty ephemeral states, governed by Tartar chieftains and perpetually involved in mutual war, rose and fell in northern China. The most permanent of them was Northern Wei which lasted till 535 A.D. But the Later Chao and both the Earlier and Later Ts'in are important for our purpose[614]. Some writers make it a reproach to Buddhism that its progress, which had been slow among the civilized Chinese, became rapid in the provinces which passed into the hands of these ruder tribes. But the phenomenon is natural and is illustrated by the fact that even now the advance of Christianity is more rapid in Africa than in India. The civilization of China was already old and self-complacent: not devoid of intellectual curiosity and not intolerant, but sceptical of foreign importations and of dealings with the next world. But the Tartars had little of their own in the way of literature and institutions: it was their custom to assimilate the arts and ideas of the civilized nations whom they conquered: the more western tribes had already made the acquaintance of Buddhism in Central Asia and such native notions of religion as they possessed disposed them to treat priests, monks and magicians with respect.

Of the states mentioned, the Later Chao was founded by Shih-Lo[615] (273-332), whose territories extended from the Great Wall to the Han and Huai in the South. He showed favour to an Indian monk and diviner called Fo-t'u-ch'êng[616] who lived at his court and he appears to have been himself a Buddhist. At any rate the most eminent of his successors, Shih Chi-lung[617], was an ardent devotee and gave general permission to the population to enter monasteries, which had not been granted previously. This permission is noticeable, for it implies, even at this early date, the theory that a subject of the Emperor has no right to become a monk without his master's leave.

In 381 we are told that in north-western China nine-tenths of the inhabitants were Buddhists. In 372 Buddhism was introduced into Korea and accepted as the flower of Chinese civilization.

The state known as the Former Ts'in[618] had its nucleus in Shensi, but expanded considerably between 351 and 394 A.D. under the leadership of Fu-Chien[619], who established in it large colonies of Tartars. At first he favoured Confucianism but in 381 became a Buddhist. He was evidently in close touch with the western regions and probably through them with India, for we hear that sixty-two states of Central Asia sent him tribute.

The Later Ts'in dynasty (384-417) had its headquarters in Kansu and was founded by vassals of the Former Ts'in. When the power of Fu-Chien collapsed, they succeeded to his possessions and established themselves in Ch'ang-an. Yao-hsing[620], the second monarch of this line was a devout Buddhist, and deserves mention as the patron of Kumârajîva[621], the most eminent of the earlier translators.

Kumârajîva was born of Indian parents in Kucha and, after following the school of the Sarvâstivâdins for some time, became a Mahayanist. When Kucha was captured in 383 by the General of Fu-Chien, he was carried off to China and from 401 onwards he laboured at Ch'ang-an for about ten years. He was appointed Kuo Shih[622], or Director of Public Instruction, and lectured in a hall specially built for him. He is said to have had 3000 disciples and fifty extant translations are ascribed to him. Probably all the Tartar kingdoms were well disposed towards Buddhism, though their unsettled condition made them precarious residences for monks and scholars. This was doubtless true of Northern Wei, which had been growing during the period described, but appears as a prominent home of Buddhism somewhat later.

Meanwhile in the south the Eastern Tsin Dynasty, which represented the legitimate Empire and ruled at Nanking from 317 to 420, was also favourable to Buddhism and Hsiao Wu-Ti, the ninth sovereign of this line, was the first Emperor of China to become a Buddhist.

The times were troubled, but order was gradually being restored. The Eastern Tsin Dynasty had been much disturbed by the struggles of rival princes. These were brought to an end in 420 by a new dynasty known as Liu Sung which reigned in the south some sixty years. The north was divided among six Tartar kingdoms, which all perished before 440 except Wei. Wei then split into an Eastern and a Western kingdom which lasted about a hundred years. In the south, the Liu Sung gave place to three short dynasties, Ch'i, Liang and Ch'ên, until at last the Sui (589-605) united China.

The Liu Sung Emperor Wên-Ti (424-454) was a patron of Confucian learning, but does not appear to have discouraged Buddhism. The Sung annals record that several embassies were sent from India and Ceylon to offer congratulations on the flourishing condition of religion in his dominions, but they also preserve memorials from Chinese officials asking for imperial interference to prevent the multiplication of monasteries and the growing expenditure on superstitious ceremonies. This marks the beginning of the desire to curb Buddhism by restrictive legislation which the official class displayed so prominently and persistently in subsequent centuries. A similar reaction seems to have been felt in Wei, where the influential statesman Ts'ui Hao[623], a votary of Taoism, conducted an anti-Buddhist campaign. He was helped in this crusade by the discovery of arms in a monastery at Ch'ang-an. The monks were accused of treason and debauchery and in 446 Toba Tao[624], the sovereign of Wei, issued an edict ordering the destruction of Buddhist temples and sacred books as well as the execution of all priests. The Crown Prince, who was a Buddhist, was able to save many lives, but no monasteries or temples were left standing. The persecution, however, was of short duration. Toba Tao was assassinated and almost the first act of his successor was to re-establish Buddhism and allow his subjects to become monks. From this period date the sculptured grottoes of Yün-Kang in northern Shan-si which are probably the oldest specimens of Buddhist art in China. In 471 another ruler of Wei, Toba Hung, had a gigantic image of Buddha constructed and subsequently abdicated in order to devote himself to Buddhist studies. His successor marks a reaction, for he was an ardent Confucianist who changed the family name to Yüan and tried to introduce the Chinese language and dress. But the tide of Buddhism was too strong. It secured the favour of the next Emperor in whose time there are said to have been 13,000 temples in Wei.

In the Sung dominions a conspiracy was discovered in 458 in which a monk was implicated, and restrictive, though not prohibitive, regulations were issued respecting monasteries. The Emperor Ming-Ti, though a cruel ruler was a devout Buddhist and erected a monastery in Hu-nan, at the cost of such heavy taxation that his ministers remonstrated. The fifty-nine years of Liu Sung rule must have been on the whole favourable to Buddhism, for twenty translators flourished, partly natives and partly foreigners from Central Asia, India and Ceylon. In 420 a band of twenty-five Chinese started on a pilgrimage to India. They had been preceded by the celebrated pilgrim Fa-Hsien[625] who travelled in India from 399 to 414.

In the reign of Wu-Ti, the first Emperor of the Ch'i dynasty, one of the imperial princes, named Tzŭ Liang[626], cultivated the society of eminent monks and enjoyed theological discussions. From the specimens of these arguments which have been preserved we see that the explanation of the inequalities of life as the result of Karma had a great attraction for the popular mind and also that it provoked the hostile criticism of the Confucian literati.

The accession of the Liang dynasty and the long reign of its first emperor Wu-Ti (502-549) were important events in the history of Buddhism, for this monarch rivalled Asoka in pious enthusiasm if not in power and prosperity. He obviously set the Church above the state and it was while he was on the throne that Bodhidharma came to China and the first edition of the Tripitaka was prepared.

His reign, though primarily of importance for religion, was not wanting in political interest, and witnessed a long conflict with Wei. Wu-Ti was aided by the dissensions which distracted Wei but failed to achieve his object, probably as a result of his religious preoccupations, for he seemed unable to estimate the power of the various adventurers who from time to time rose to pre-eminence in the north and, holding war to be wrong, he was too ready to accept insincere overtures for peace. Wei split into two states, the Eastern and Western, and Hou-Ching[627], a powerful general who was not satisfied with his position in either, offered his services to Wu-Ti, promising to add a large part of Ho-nan to his dominions. He failed in his promise but Wu-Ti, instead of punishing him, first gave him a post as governor and then listened to the proposals made by the ruler of Eastern Wei for his surrender. On this Hou-Ching conspired with an adopted son of Wu-Ti, who had been set aside as heir to the throne and invested Nanking. The city was captured after the horrors of a prolonged siege and Wu-Ti died miserably.

Wu-Ti was not originally a Buddhist. In fact until about 510, when he was well over forty, he was conspicuous as a patron of Confucianism. The change might be ascribed to personal reasons, but it is noticeable that the same thing occurred in Wei, where a period of Confucianism was succeeded by a strong wave of Buddhism which evidently swept over all China. Hu[628], the Dowager Empress of Wei, was a fervent devotee, though of indifferent morality in both public and private life since she is said to have poisoned her own son. In 518 she sent Sung Yün and Hui Shêng[629] to Udyâna in search of Buddhist books of which they brought back 175.

Wu-Ti's conversion is connected with a wandering monk and magician called Pao-Chih[630], who received the privilege of approaching him at all hours. A monastery was erected in Nanking at great expense and edicts were issued forbidding not only the sacrifice of animals but even the representation of living things in embroidery, on the ground that people might cut up such figures and thus become callous to the sanctity of life. The emperor expounded sûtras in public and wrote a work on Buddhist ritual[631]. The first Chinese edition of the Tripitaka, in manuscript and not printed, was collected in 518. Although Wu-Ti's edicts, particularly that against animal sacrifices, gave great dissatisfaction, yet the Buddhist movement seems to have been popular and not merely an imperial whim, for many distinguished persons, for instance the authors Liu Hsieh and Yao Ch'a[632], took part in it.

In 520 (or according to others, in 525) Bodhidharma (generally called Ta-mo in Chinese) landed in Canton from India. He is described as the son of a king of a country called Hsiang-chih in southern India, and the twenty-eighth Patriarch[633]. He taught that merit does not lie in good works and that knowledge is not gained by reading the scriptures. The one essential is insight, which comes as illumination after meditation. Though this doctrine had subsequently much success in the Far East, it was not at first appreciated and Bodhidharma's introduction to the devout but literary Emperor in Nanking was a fiasco. He offended his Majesty by curtly saying that he had acquired no merit by causing temples to be built and books to be transcribed. Then, in answer to the question, what is the most important of the holy doctrines, he replied "where all is emptiness, nothing can be called holy." "Who," asked the astonished Emperor, "is he who thus replies to me?" "I do not know," said Bodhidharma.

Not being able to come to any understanding with Wu-Ti, Bodhidharma went northwards, and is said to have crossed the Yang-tse standing on a reed, a subject frequently represented in Chinese art[634]. He retired to Lo-yang where he spent nine years in the Shao-Lin[635] temple gazing silently at a wall, whence he was popularly known as the wall-gazer. One legend says that he sat so long in contemplation that his legs fell off, and a kind of legless doll which is a favourite plaything in Japan is still called by his name. But according to another tale he preserved his legs. He wished to return to India but died in China. When Sung Yün, the traveller mentioned above, was returning from India, he met him in a mountain pass bare-footed and carrying one sandal in his hand[636]. When this was reported, his coffin was opened and was found to contain nothing but the other sandal which was long preserved as a precious relic in the Shao-Lin temple.

Wu-Ti adopted many of the habits of a bonze. He was a strict vegetarian, expounded the scriptures in public and wrote a work on ritual. He thrice retired into a monastery and wore the dress of a Bhikkhu. These retirements were apparently of short duration and his ministers twice redeemed him by heavy payments.

In 538 a hair of the Buddha was sent by the king of Fu-nan and received with great ceremony. In the next year a mission was despatched to Magadha to obtain Sanskrit texts. It returned in 546 with a large collection of manuscripts and accompanied by the learned Paramârtha who spent twenty years in translating them[637]. Wu-Ti, in his old age, became stricter. All luxury was suppressed at Court, but he himself always wore full dress and showed the utmost politeness, even to the lowest officials. He was so reluctant to inflict the punishment of death that crime increased. In 547 he became a monk for the third time and immediately afterwards the events connected with Hou-Ching (briefly sketched above) began to trouble the peace of his old age. During the siege of Nanking he was obliged to depart from his vegetarian diet and eat eggs. When he was told that his capital was taken he merely said, "I obtained the kingdom through my own efforts and through me it has been lost. So I need not complain."

Hou-Ching proceeded to the palace, but[638], overcome with awe, knelt down before Wu-Ti who merely said, "I am afraid you must be fatigued by the trouble it has cost you to destroy my kingdom." Hou-Ching was ashamed and told his officers that he had never felt such fear before and would never dare to see Wu-Ti again. Nevertheless, the aged Emperor was treated with indignity and soon died of starvation. His end, though melancholy, was peaceful compared with that in store for Hou-Ching who, after two years of fighting and murdering, assumed the imperial title, but immediately afterwards was defeated and slain. The people ate his body in the streets of Nanking and his own wife is said to have swallowed mouthfuls of his flesh.

One of Wu-Ti's sons, Yüan-Ti, who reigned from 552 to 555, inherited his father's temper and fate with this difference that he was a Taoist, not a Buddhist. He frequently resided in the temples of that religion, studied its scriptures and expounded them to his people. A great scholar, he had accumulated 140,000 volumes, but when it was announced to him in his library that the troops of Wei were marching on his capital, he yielded without resistance and burnt his books, saying that they had proved of no use in this extremity.

This alternation of imperial patronage in the south may have been the reason why Wên Hsüan Ti, the ruler of Northern Ch'i[639], and for the moment perhaps the most important personage in China, summoned Buddhist and Taoist priests to a discussion in 555. Both religions could not be true, he said, and one must be superfluous. After hearing the arguments of both he decided in favour of Buddhism and ordered the Taoists to become bonzes on pain of death. Only four refused and were executed.

Under the short Ch'ên dynasty (557-589) the position of Buddhism continued favourable. The first Emperor, a mild and intelligent sovereign, though circumstances obliged him to put a great many people out of the way, retired to a monastery after reigning for two years. But in the north there was a temporary reaction. Wu-Ti, of the Northern Chou dynasty[640], first of all defined the precedence of the three religions as Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism and then, in 575, prohibited the two latter, ordering temples to be destroyed and priests to return to the world. But as usual the persecution was not of long duration. Five years later Wu-Ti's son withdrew his father's edict and in 582, the founder of the Sui dynasty, gave the population permission to become monks. He may be said to have used Buddhism as his basis for restoring the unity of the Empire and in his old age he became devout. The Sui annals observe that Buddhist books had become more numerous under this dynasty than those of the Confucianists, and no less than three collections of the Tripitaka were made between 594 and 616.

With the seventh century began the great T'ang dynasty (620-907). Buddhism had now been known to the rulers of China for about 550 years. It began as a religion tolerated but still regarded as exotic and not quite natural for the sons of Han. It had succeeded in establishing itself as the faith of the majority among both Tartars and Chinese. The rivalry of Taoism was only an instance of that imitation which is the sincerest flattery. Though the opposition of the mandarins assumed serious proportions whenever they could induce an Emperor to share their views, yet the hostile attitude of the Government never lasted long and was not shared by the mass of the people. It is clear that the permissions to practise Buddhism which invariably followed close on the prohibitions were a national relief. Though Buddhism tended to mingle with Taoism and other indigenous ideas, the many translations of Indian works and the increasing intercourse between Chinese and Hindus had diffused a knowledge of its true tenets and practice.

The T'ang dynasty witnessed a triangular war between Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism. As a rule Confucianism attacked the other two as base superstitions but sometimes, as in the reign of Wu Tsung, Taoism seized a chance of being able to annihilate Buddhism. This war continued under the Northern Sung, though the character of Chinese Buddhism changed, for the Contemplative School, which had considerable affinities to Taoism, became popular at the expense of the T'ien T'ai. After the Northern Sung (except under the foreign Mongol dynasty) we feel that, though Buddhism was by no means dead and from time to time flourished exceedingly, yet Confucianism had established its claim to be the natural code and creed of the scholar and statesman. The Chinese Court remained a strange place to the end but scholarship and good sense had a large measure of success in banishing extravagance from art and literature. Yet, alas, the intellectual life of China lost more in fire and brilliancy than it gained in sanity. Probably the most critical times for literature and indeed for thought were those brief periods under the Sui and T'ang[641] when Buddhist and Taoist books were accepted as texts for the public examinations and the last half century of the Northern Sung, when the educational reforms of Wang An Shih were intermittently in force. The innovations were cancelled in all cases. Had they lasted, Chinese style and mentality might have been different.

The T'ang dynasty, though on the whole favourable to Buddhism, and indeed the period of its greatest prosperity, opened with a period of reaction. To the founder, Kao Tsu, is attributed the saying that Confucianism is as necessary to the Chinese as wings to a bird or water to a fish. The imperial historiographer Fu I[642] presented to his master a memorial blaming Buddhism because it undervalued natural relationships and urging that monks and nuns should be compelled to marry. He was opposed by Hsiao Yü[643], who declared that hell was made for such people as his opponent--an argument common to many religions. The Emperor followed on the whole advice of Fu I. Magistrates were ordered to inquire into the lives of monks and nuns. Those found pure and sincere were collected in the large establishments. The rest were ordered to return to the world and the smaller religious houses were closed. Kao Tsu abdicated in 627 but his son Tai Tsung continued his religious policy, and the new Empress was strongly anti-Buddhist, for when mortally ill she forbade her son to pray for her recovery in Buddhist shrines. Yet the Emperor cannot have shared these sentiments at any rate towards the end of his reign[644]. He issued an edict allowing every monastery to receive five new monks and the celebrated journey of Hsüan Chuang[645] was made in his reign. When the pilgrim returned from India, he was received with public honours and a title was conferred on him. Learned monks were appointed to assist him in translating the library he had brought back and the account of his travels was presented to the Emperor who also wrote a laudatory preface to his version of the Prajnâpâramitâ. It was in this reign also that Nestorian missionaries first appeared in China and were allowed to settle in the capital. Diplomatic relations were maintained with India. The Indian Emperor Harsha sent an envoy in 641 and two Chinese missions were despatched in return. The second, led by Wang Hsüan-Ts'ê[646], did not arrive until after the death of Harsha when a usurper had seized the throne. Wang Hsüan-Ts'ê collected a small army in Tibet, dethroned the usurper and brought him as a prisoner to China.

The latter half of the seventh century is dominated by the figure of the Dowager Empress Wu, the prototype of the celebrated lady who took charge of China's fate in our own day and, like her, superhuman in decision and unscrupulousness, yet capable of inspiring loyalty. She was a concubine of the Emperor Tai Tsung and when he died in 649 lived for a short time as a Buddhist nun. The eventful life of Wu Hou, who was at least successful in maintaining order at home and on the frontiers, belongs to the history of China rather than of Buddhism. She was not an ornament of the faith nor an example of its principles, but, mindful of the protection it had once afforded her, she gave it her patronage even to the extent of making a bonze named Huai I[647] the minister of her mature passions when she was nearly seventy years old. A magnificent temple, at which 10,000 men worked daily, was built for him, but the Empress was warned that he was collecting a body of vigorous monks nominally for its service, but really for political objects. She ordered these persons to be banished. Huai I was angry and burnt the temple. The Empress at first merely ordered it to be rebuilt, but finding that Huai I was growing disrespectful, she had him assassinated.

We hear that the Mahâmegha-sûtra[648] was presented to her and circulated among the people with her approval. About 690 she assumed divine honours and accommodated these pretensions to Buddhism by allowing herself to be styled Maitreya or Kuan-yin. After her death at the age of 80, there does not appear to have been any religious change, for two monks were appointed to high office and orders were issued that Buddhist and Taoist temples should be built in every Department. But the earlier part of the reign of Hsüan Tsung[649] marks a temporary reaction. It was represented to him that rich families wasted their substance on religious edifices and that the inmates were well-to-do persons desirous of escaping the burdens of public service. He accordingly forbade the building of monasteries, making of images and copying of sutras, and 12,000 monks were ordered to return to the world. In 725 he ordered a building known as "Hall of the Assembled Spirits" to be renamed "Hall of Assembled Worthies," because spirits were mere fables.

In the latter part of his life he became devout though addicted to Taoism rather than Buddhism. But he must have outgrown his anti-Buddhist prejudices, for in 730 the seventh collection of the Tripitaka was made under his auspices. Many poets of this period such as Su Chin and the somewhat later Liu Tsung Yüan[650] were Buddhists and the paintings of the great Wu Tao-tzŭ and Wang-wei (painter as well as poet) glowed with the inspiration of the T'ien-t'ai teaching. In 740 there were in the city of Ch'ang-An alone sixty-four monasteries and twenty-seven nunneries. A curious light is thrown on the inconsistent and composite character of Chinese religious sentiment--as noticeable to-day as it was twelve hundred years ago--by the will of Yao Ch'ung[651] a statesman who presented a celebrated anti-Buddhist memorial to this Emperor. In his will he warns his children solemnly against the creed which he hated and yet adds the following direction. "When I am dead, on no account perform for me the ceremonies of that mean religion. But if you feel unable to follow orthodoxy in every respect, then yield to popular custom and from the first seventh day after my death until the last (i.e. seventh) seventh day, let mass be celebrated by the Buddhist clergy seven times: and when, as these masses require, you must offer gifts to me, use the clothes which I wore in life and do not use other valuable things."

In 751 a mission was sent to the king of Ki-pin[652]. The staff included Wu-K'ung[653], also known as Dharmadhâtu, who remained some time in India, took the vows and ultimately returned to China with many books and relics. It is probable that in this and the following centuries Hindu influence reached the outlying province of Yünnan directly through Burma[654].

Letters, art and pageantry made the Court of Hsüan Tsung brilliant, but the splendour faded and his reign ended tragically in disaster and rebellion. The T'ang dynasty seemed in danger of collapse. But it emerged successfully from these troubles and continued for a century and a half. During the whole of this period the Emperors with one exception[655] were favourable to Buddhism, and the latter half of the eighth century marks in Buddhist history an epoch of increased popularity among the masses but also the spread of ritual and doctrinal corruption, for it is in these years that its connection with ceremonies for the repose and honour of the dead became more intimate.

These middle and later T'ang Emperors were not exclusive Buddhists. According to the severe judgment of their own officials, they were inclined to unworthy and outlandish superstitions. Many of them were under the influence of eunuchs, magicians and soothsayers, and many of those who were not assassinated died from taking the Taoist medicine called Elixir of Immortality. Yet it was not a period of decadence and dementia. It was for China the age of Augustus, not of Heliogabalus. Art and literature flourished and against Han-Yü, the brilliant adversary of Buddhism, may be set Liu Tsung Yüan[656], a writer of at least equal genius who found in it his inspiration. A noble school of painting grew up in the Buddhist monasteries and in a long line of artists may be mentioned the great name of Wu Tao-tzŭ, whose religious pictures such as Kuan-yin, Purgatory and the death of the Buddha obtained for him a fame which is still living. Among the streams which watered this paradise of art and letters should doubtless be counted the growing importance of Central and Western Asia in Chinese policy and the consequent influx of their ideas. In the mid T'ang period Manichæism, Nestorianism and Zoroastrianism all were prevalent in China. The first was the religion of the Uigurs. So long as the Chinese had to keep on good terms with this tribe Manichæism was respected, but when they were defeated by the Kirghiz and became unimportant, it was abruptly suppressed (843). In this period, too, Tibet became of great importance for the Chinese. Their object was to keep open the passes leading to Ferghana and India. But the Tibetans sometimes combined with the Arabs, who had conquered Turkestan, to close them and in 763 they actually sacked Chang An. China endeavoured to defend herself by making treaties with the Indian border states, but in 175 the Arabs inflicted a disastrous defeat on her troops. A treaty of peace was subsequently made with Tibet[657].

When Su-Tsung (756-762), the son of Hsüan-Tsung, was safely established on the throne, he began to show his devotion to Buddhism. He installed a chapel in the Palace which was served by several hundred monks and caused his eunuchs and guards to dress up as Bodhisattvas and Genii. His ministers, who were required to worship these maskers, vainly remonstrated as also when he accepted a sort of Sibylline book from a nun who alleged that she had ascended to heaven and received it there.

The next Emperor, Tai-Tsung, was converted to Buddhism by his Minister Wang Chin[658], a man of great abilities who was subsequently sentenced to death for corruption, though the Emperor commuted the sentence to banishment. Tai-Tsung expounded the scriptures in public himself and the sacred books were carried from one temple to another in state carriages with the same pomp as the sovereign. In 768 the eunuch Yü Chao-En[659] built a great Buddhist temple dedicated to the memory of the Emperor's deceased mother. In spite of his minister's remonstrances, His Majesty attended the opening and appointed 1000 monks and nuns to perform masses for the dead annually on the fifteenth day of the seventh month. This anniversary became generally observed as an All Souls' Day, and is still one of the most popular festivals in China. Priests both Buddhist and Taoist recite prayers for the departed, rice is scattered abroad to feed hungry ghosts and clothes are burnt to be used by them in the land of shadows. Large sheds are constructed in which are figures representing scenes from the next world and the evening is enlivened by theatricals, music and fire-works[660].

The establishment of this festival was due to the celebrated teacher Amogha (Pu-k'ung), and marks the official recognition by Chinese Buddhism of those services for the dead which have rendered it popular at the cost of forgetting its better aspects. Amogha was a native of Ceylon (or, according to others, of Northern India), who arrived in China in 719 with his teacher Vajrabodhi. After the latter's death he revisited India and Ceylon in search of books and came back in 746. He wished to return to his own country, but permission was refused and until his death in 774 he was a considerable personage at Court, receiving high rank and titles. The Chinese Tripitaka contains 108 translations[661] ascribed to him, mostly of a tantric character, though to the honour of China it must be said that the erotic mysticism of some Indian tantras never found favour there. Amogha is a considerable, though not auspicious, figure in the history of Chinese Buddhism, and, so far as such changes can be the work of one man, on him rests the responsibility of making it become in popular estimation a religion specially concerned with funeral rites[662].

Some authors[663] try to prove that the influx of Nestorianism under the T'ang dynasty had an important influence on the later development of Buddhism in China and Japan and in particular that it popularized these services for the dead. But this hypothesis seems to me unproved and unnecessary. Such ceremonies were an essential part of Chinese religion and no faith could hope to spread, if it did not countenance them: they are prominent in Hinduism and not unknown to Pali Buddhism[664]. Further the ritual used in China and Japan has often only a superficial resemblance to Christian masses for the departed. Part of it is magical and part of it consists in acquiring merit by the recitation of scriptures which have no special reference to the dead. This merit is then formally transferred to them. Doubtless Nestorianism, in so far as it was associated with Buddhism, tended to promote the worship of Bodhisattvas and prayers addressed directly to them, but this tendency existed independently and the Nestorian monument indicates not that Nestorianism influenced Buddhism but that it abandoned the doctrine of the atonement.

In 819 a celebrated incident occurred. The Emperor Hsien-Tsung had been informed that at the Fa-mên monastery in Shen-si a bone of the Buddha was preserved which every thirty years exhibited miraculous powers. As this was the auspicious year, he ordered the relic to be brought in state to the capital and lodged in the Imperial Palace, after which it was to make the round of the monasteries in the city. This proceeding called forth an animated protest from Han-Yü[665], one of the best known authors and statesmen then living, who presented a memorial, still celebrated as a masterpiece. The following extract will give an idea of its style. "Your Servant is well aware that your Majesty does not do this (give the bone such a reception) in the vain hope of deriving advantage therefrom but that in the fulness of our present plenty there is a desire to comply with the wishes of the people in the celebration at the capital of this delusive mummery.... For Buddha was a barbarian. His language was not the language of China. His clothes were of an alien cut. He did not utter the maxims of our ancient rulers nor conform to the customs which they have handed down. He did not appreciate the bond between prince and minister, the tie between father and son. Had this Buddha come to our capital in the flesh, your Majesty might have received him with a few words of admonition, giving him a banquet and a suit of clothes, before sending him out of the country with an escort of soldiers.

"But what are the facts? The bone of a man long since dead and decomposed is to be admitted within the precincts of the Imperial Palace. Confucius said, 'respect spiritual beings but keep them at a distance.' And so when princes of old paid visits of condolence, it was customary to send a magician in advance with a peach-rod in his hand, to expel all noxious influences before the arrival of his master. Yet now your Majesty is about to introduce without reason a disgusting object, personally taking part in the proceedings without the intervention of the magician or his wand. Of the officials not one has raised his voice against it: of the Censors[666] not one has pointed out the enormity of such an act. Therefore your servant, overwhelmed with shame for the Censors, implores your Majesty that these bones may be handed over for destruction by fire or water, whereby the root of this great evil may be exterminated for all time and the people may know how much the wisdom of your Majesty surpasses that of ordinary men[667]."

The Emperor became furious when he read the memorial and wished to execute its author on the spot. But Han-Yü's many friends saved him and the sentence was commuted to honourable banishment as governor of a distant town. Shortly afterwards the Emperor died, not of Buddhism, but of the elixir of immortality which made him so irritable that his eunuchs put him out of the way. Han-Yü was recalled but died the next year. Among his numerous works was one called Yüan Tao, much of which was directed against non-Confucian forms of religion. It is still a thesaurus of arguments for the opponents of Buddhism and, let it be added, of Christianity.

It is not surprising that the prosperity of the Buddhist church should have led to another reaction, but it came not so much from the literary and sceptical class as from Taoism which continued to enjoy the favour of the T'ang Emperors, although they died one after another of drinking the elixir. The Emperor Wu-Tsung was more definitely Taoist than his predecessors. In 843 he suppressed Manichæism and in 845, at the instigation of his Taoist advisers, he dealt Buddhism the severest blow which it had yet received. In a trenchant edict[668] he repeated the now familiar arguments that it is an alien and maleficent superstition, unknown under the ancient and glorious dynasties and injurious to the customs and morality of the nation. Incidentally he testifies to its influence and popularity for he complains of the crowds thronging the temples which eclipse the imperial palaces in splendour and the innumerable monks and nuns supported by the contributions of the people. Then, giving figures, he commands that 4600 great temples and 40,000 smaller rural temples be demolished, that their enormous[669] landed property be confiscated, that 260,500 monks and nuns be secularized and 150,000 temple slaves[670] set free. These statistics are probably exaggerated and in any case the Emperor had barely time to execute his drastic orders, though all despatch was used on account of the private fortunes which could be amassed incidentally by the executive.

As the Confucian chronicler of his doings observes, he suppressed Buddhism on the ground that it is a superstition but encouraged Taoism which is no better. Indeed the impartial critic must admit that it is much worse, at any rate for Emperors. Undeterred by the fate of his predecessors Wu-Tsung began to take the elixir of immortality. He suffered first from nervous irritability, then from internal pains, which were explained as due to the gradual transformation of his bones, and at the beginning of 846 he became dumb. No further explanation of his symptoms was then given him and his uncle Hsüan Tsung was raised to the throne. His first act was to revoke the anti-Buddhist edict, the Taoist priests who had instigated it were put to death, the Emperor and his ministers vied in the work of reconstruction and very soon things became again much as they were before this great but brief tribulation. Nevertheless, in 852 the Emperor received favourably a memorial complaining of the Buddhist reaction and ordered that all monks and nuns must obtain special permission before taking orders. He was beginning to fall under Taoist influence and it is hard to repress a smile on reading that seven years later he died of the elixir. His successor I-Tsung (860-874), who died at the age of 30, was an ostentatious and dissipated Buddhist. In spite of the remonstrances of his ministers he again sent for the sacred bone from Fa-mên and received it with even more respect than his predecessor had shown, for he met it at the Palace gate and bowed before it.

During the remainder of the T'ang dynasty there is little of importance to recount about Buddhism. It apparently suffered no reverses, but history is occupied with the struggle against the Tartars. The later T'ang Emperors entered into alliance with various frontier tribes, but found it hard to keep them in the position of vassals. The history of China from the tenth to the thirteenth centuries is briefly as follows. The T'ang dynasty collapsed chiefly owing to the incapacity of the later Emperors and was succeeded by a troubled period in which five short dynasties founded by military adventurers, three of whom were of Turkish race, rose and fell in 53 years[671]. In 960 the Sung dynasty united the Chinese elements in the Empire, but had to struggle against the Khitan Tartars in the north-east and against the kingdom of Hsia in the north-west. With the twelfth century appeared the Kins or Golden Tartars, who demolished the power of the Khitans in alliance with the Chinese but turned against their allies and conquered all China north of the Yang-tze and continually harassed, though they did not capture, the provinces to the south of it which constituted the reduced empire of the Sungs. But their power waned in its turn before the Mongols, who, under Chinggiz Khan and Ogotai, conquered the greater part of northern Asia and eastern Europe. In 1232 the Sung Emperor entered into alliance with the Mongols against the Kins, with the ultimate result that though the Kins were swept away, Khubilai, the Khan of the Mongols, became Emperor of all China in 1280.

The dynasties of T'ang and Sung mark two great epochs in the history of Chinese art, literature and thought, but whereas the virtues and vices of the T'ang may be summed up as genius and extravagance, those of the Sung are culture and tameness. But this summary judgment does not do justice to the painters, particularly the landscape painters, of the Sung and it is noticeable that many of the greatest masters, including Li Lung-Mien[672], were obviously inspired by Buddhism. The school which had the greatest influence on art and literature was the Ch'an[673] or contemplative sect better known by its Japanese name Zen. Though founded by Bodhidharma it did not win the sympathy and esteem of the cultivated classes until the Sung period. About this time the method of block-printing was popularized and there began a steady output of comprehensive histories, collected works, encyclopædias and biographies which excelled anything then published in Europe. Antiquarian research and accessible editions of classical writers were favourable to Confucianism, which had always been the religion of the literati.

It is not surprising that the Emperors of this literary dynasty were mostly temperate in expressing their religious emotions. T'ai-Tsu, the founder, forbade cremation and remonstrated with the Prince of T'ang, who was a fervent Buddhist. Yet he cannot have objected to religion in moderation, for the first printed edition of the Tripitaka was published in his reign (972) and with a preface of his own. The early and thorough application of printing to this gigantic Canon is a proof--if any were needed--of the popular esteem for Buddhism.

Nor did this edition close the work of translation: 275 later translations, made under the Northern Sung, are still extant and religious intercourse with India continued. The names and writings of many Hindu monks who settled in China are preserved and Chinese continued to go to India. Still on the whole there was a decrease in the volume of religious literature after 900 A.D.[674] In the twelfth century the change was still more remarkable. Nanjio does not record a single translation made under the Southern Sung and it is the only great dynasty which did not revise the Tripitaka.

The second Sung Emperor also, T'ai Tsung, was not hostile, for he erected in the capital, at enormous expense, a stupa 360 feet high to contain relics of the Buddha. The fourth Emperor, Jên-tsung, a distinguished patron of literature, whose reign was ornamented by a galaxy of scholars, is said to have appointed 50 youths to study Sanskrit but showed no particular inclination towards Buddhism. Neither does it appear to have been the motive power in the projects of the celebrated social reformer, Wang An-Shih. But the dynastic history says that he wrote a book full of Buddhist and Taoist fancies and, though there is nothing specifically Buddhist in his political and economic theories, it is clear from the denunciations against him that his system of education introduced Buddhist and Taoist subjects into the public examinations[675]. It is also clear that this system was favoured by those Emperors of the Northern Sung dynasty who were able to think for themselves. In 1087 it was abolished by the Empress Dowager acting as regent for the young Chê Tsung, but as soon as he began to reign in his own right he restored it, and it apparently remained in force until the collapse of the dynasty in 1127.

The Emperor Hui-Tsung (1101-1126) fell under the influence of a Taoist priest named Lin Ling-Su[676]. This young man had been a Buddhist novice in boyhood but, being expelled for misconduct, conceived a hatred for his old religion. Under his influence the Emperor not only reorganized Taoism, sanctioning many innovations and granting many new privileges, but also endeavoured to suppress Buddhism, not by persecution, but by amalgamation. By imperial decree the Buddha and his Arhats were enrolled in the Taoist pantheon: temples and monasteries were allowed to exist only on condition of describing themselves as Taoist and their inmates had the choice of accepting that name or of returning to the world.

But there was hardly time to execute these measures, so rapid was the reaction. In less than a year the insolence of Lin Ling-Su brought about his downfall: the Emperor reversed his edict and, having begun by suppressing Buddhism, ended by oppressing Taoism. He was a painter of merit and perhaps the most remarkable artist who ever filled a throne. In art he probably drew no distinction between creeds and among the pictures ascribed to him and preserved in Japan are some of Buddhist subjects. But like Hsüan Tsung he came to a tragic end, and in 1126 was carried into captivity by the Kin Tartars among whom he died.

Fear of the Tartars now caused the Chinese to retire south of the Yang-tse and Hang-chow was made the seat of Government. The century during which this beautiful city was the capital did not produce the greatest names in Chinese history, but it witnessed the perfection of Chinese culture, and the background of impending doom heightens the brilliancy of this literary and aesthetic life. Such a society was naturally eclectic in religion but Buddhism of the Ch'an school enjoyed consideration and contributed many landscape painters to the roll of fame. But the most eminent and perhaps the most characteristic thinker of the period was Chu-Hsi (1130-1200), the celebrated commentator on Confucius who reinterpreted the master's writings to the satisfaction of succeeding ages though in his own life he aroused opposition as well as enthusiasm. Chu-Hsi studied Buddhism in his youth and some have detected its influence in his works, although on most important points he expressly condemned it. I do not see that there is much definite Buddhism in his philosophy, but if Mahayanism had never entered China this new Confucianism would probably never have arisen or would have taken another shape. Though the final result may be anti-Buddhist yet the topics chosen and the method of treatment suggest that the author felt it necessary to show that the Classics could satisfy intellectual curiosity and supply spiritual ideals just as well as this Indian religion. Much of his expositions is occupied with cosmology, and he accepts the doctrine of world periods, recurring in an eternal series of growth and decline: also he teaches not exactly transmigration but the transformation of matter into various living forms[677]. His accounts of sages and saints point to ideals which have much in common with Arhats and Buddhas and, in dealing with the retribution of evil, he seems to admit that when the universe is working properly there is a natural Karma by which good or bad actions receive even in this life rewards in kind, but that in the present period of decline nature has become vitiated so that vice and virtue no longer produce appropriate results.

Chu-Hsi had a celebrated controversy with Lu Chiu-Yüan[678], a thinker of some importance who, like himself, is commemorated in the tablets of Confucian temples, although he was accused of Buddhist tendencies. He held that learning was not indispensable and that the mind could in meditation rise above the senses and attain to a perception of the truth. Although he strenuously denied the charge of Buddhist leanings, it is clear that his doctrine is near in spirit to the mysticism of Bodhidharma and sets no store on the practical ethics and studious habits which are the essence of Confucianism.

The attitude of the Yüan or Mongol dynasty (1280-1368) towards Buddhism was something new. Hitherto, whatever may have been the religious proclivities of individual Emperors, the Empire had been a Confucian institution. A body of official and literary opinion always strong and often overwhelmingly strong regarded imperial patronage of Buddhism or Taoism as a concession to the whims of the people, as an excrescence on the Son of Heaven's proper faith or even a perversion of it. But the Mongol Court had not this prejudice and Khubilai, like other members of his house[679] and like Akbar in India, was the patron of all the religions professed by his subjects. His real object was to encourage any faith which would humanize his rude Mongols. Buddhism was more congenial to them than Confucianism and besides, they had made its acquaintance earlier. Even before Khubilai became Emperor, one of his most trusted advisers was a Tibetan lama known as Pagspa, Bashpa or Pa-ssŭ-pa[680]. He received the title of Kuo-Shih, and after his death his brother succeeded to the same honours.

Khubilai also showed favour to Mohammedans, Christians, Jews and Confucianists, but little to Taoists. This prejudice was doubtless due to the suggestions of his Buddhist advisers, for, as we have seen, there was often rivalry between the two religions and on two occasions at least (in the reigns of Hui Tsung and Wu Tsung) the Taoists made determined, if unsuccessful, attempts to destroy or assimilate Buddhism. Khubilai received complaints that the Taoists represented Buddhism as an offshoot of Taoism and that this objectionable perversion of truth and history was found in many of their books, particularly the Hua-Hu-Ching[681]. An edict was issued ordering all Taoist books to be burnt with the sole exception of the Tao-Tê-Ching but it does not appear that the sect was otherwise persecuted.

The Yüan dynasty was consistently favourable to Buddhism. Enormous sums were expended on subventions to monasteries, printing books and performing public ceremonies. Old restrictions were removed and no new ones were imposed. But the sect which was the special recipient of the imperial favour was not one of the Chinese schools but Lamaism, the form of Buddhism developed in Tibet, which spread about this time to northern China, and still exists there. It does not appear that in the Yüan period Lamaism and other forms of Buddhism were regarded as different sects[682]. A lamaist ecclesiastic was the hierarchical head of all Buddhists, all other religions being placed under the supervision of a special board.

The Mongol Emperors paid attention to religious literature. Khubilai saw to it that the monasteries in Peking were well supplied with books and ordered the bonzes to recite them on stated days. A new collection of the Tripitaka (the ninth) was published 1285-87. In 1312, the Emperor Jên-tsung ordered further translations to be made into Mongol and later had the whole Tripitaka copied in letters of gold. It is noticeable that another Emperor, Chêng Tsung, had the Book of Filial Piety translated into Mongol and circulated together with a brief preface by himself.

It is possible that the Buddhism of the Yüan dynasty was tainted with Śâktism from which the Lama monasteries of Peking (in contrast to all other Buddhist sects in China) are not wholly free. The last Emperor, Shun-ti, is said to have witnessed indecent plays and dances in the company of Lamas and created a scandal which contributed to the downfall of the dynasty[683]. In its last years we hear of some opposition to Buddhism and of a reaction in favour of Confucianism, in consequence of the growing numbers and pretensions of the Lamas.

Whole provinces were under their control and Chinese historians dwell bitterly on their lawlessness. It was a common abuse for wealthy persons to induce a Lama to let their property be registered in his name and thus avoid all payment of taxes on the ground that priests were exempt from taxation by law[684].

The Mongols were driven out by the native Chinese dynasty known as Ming, which reigned from 1368 to 1644. It is not easy to point out any salient features in religious activity or thought during this period, but since the Ming claimed to restore Chinese civilization interrupted by a foreign invasion, it was natural that they should encourage Confucianism as interpreted by Chu-Hsi. Yet Buddhism, especially Lamaism, acquired a new political importance. Both for the Mings and for the earlier Manchu Emperors the Mongols were a serious and perpetual danger, and it was not until the eighteenth century that the Chinese Court ceased to be preoccupied by the fear that the tribes might unite and again overrun the Empire. But the Tibetan and Mongolian hierarchy had an extraordinary power over these wild horsemen and the Government of Peking won and used their goodwill by skilful diplomacy, the favours shown being generally commensurate to the gravity of the situation. Thus when the Grand Lama visited Peking in 1652 he was treated as an independent prince: in 1908 he was made to kneel.

Few Ming Emperors showed much personal interest in religion and most of them were obviously guided by political considerations. They wished on the one hand to conciliate the Church and on the other to prevent the clergy from becoming too numerous or influential. Hence very different pictures may be drawn according as we dwell on the favourable or restrictive edicts which were published from time to time. Thus T'ai-Tsu, the founder of the dynasty, is described by one authority as always sympathetic to Buddhists and by another as a crowned persecutor[685]. He had been a bonze himself in his youth but left the cloister for the adventurous career which conducted him to the throne. It is probable that he had an affectionate recollection of the Church which once sheltered him, but also a knowledge of its weaknesses and this knowledge moved him to publish restrictive edicts as to the numbers and qualifications of monks. On the other hand he attended sermons, received monks in audience and appointed them as tutors to his sons. He revised the hierarchy and gave appropriate titles to its various grades. He also published a decree ordering that all monks should study three sutras (Lankâvatâra, Prajnâpâramitâ and Vajracchedikâ), and that three brief commentaries on these works should be compiled (see Nanjio's Catalogue, 1613-15).

It is in this reign that we first hear of the secular clergy, that is to say, persons who acted as priests but married and did not live in monasteries. Decrees against them were issued in 1394 and 1412, but they continued to increase. It is not clear whether their origin should be sought in a desire to combine the profits of the priesthood with the comforts of the world or in an attempt to evade restrictions as to the number of monks. In later times this second motive was certainly prevalent, but the celibacy of the clergy is not strictly insisted on by Lamaists and a lax observance of monastic rules[686] was common under the Mongol dynasty.

The third Ming Emperor, Ch'êng-tsu[687], was educated by a Buddhist priest of literary tastes named Yao Kuang-Hsiao[688], whom he greatly respected and promoted to high office. Nevertheless he enacted restrictions respecting ordination and on one occasion commanded that 1800 young men who presented themselves to take the vows should be enrolled in the army instead. His prefaces and laudatory verses were collected in a small volume and included in the eleventh collection of the Tripitaka[689], called the Northern collection, because it was printed at Peking. It was published with a preface of his own composition and he wrote another to the work called the Liturgy of Kuan-yin[690], and a third introducing selected memoirs of various remarkable monks[691]. His Empress had a vision in which she imagined a sûtra was revealed to her and published the same with an introduction. He was also conspicuously favourable to the Tibetan clergy. In 1403 he sent his head eunuch to Tibet to invite the presence of Tsoṇ-kha-pa, who refused to come himself but sent a celebrated Lama called Halima[692]. On arriving at the capital Halima was ordered to say masses for the Emperor's relatives. These ceremonies were attended by supernatural manifestations and he received as a recognition of his powers the titles of Prince of the Great Precious Law and Buddha of the Western Paradise[693]. His three principal disciples were styled Kuo Shih, and, agreeably to the precedent established under the Yüan dynasty, were made the chief prelates of the whole Buddhist Church. Since this time the Red or Tibetan Clergy have been recognized as having precedence over the Grey or Chinese.

In this reign the Chinese made a remarkable attempt to assert their authority in Ceylon. In 1405 a mission was sent with offerings to the Sacred Tooth and when it was ill received a second mission despatched in 1407 captured the king of Ceylon and carried him off as a prisoner to China. Ceylon paid tribute for fifty years, but it does not appear that these proceedings had much importance for religion[694].

In the reigns of Ying Tsung and Ching-Ti[695] (1436-64) large numbers of monks were ordained, but, as on previous occasions, the great increase of candidates led to the imposition of restrictions and in 1458 an edict was issued ordering that ordinations should be held only once a year. The influence of the Chief Eunuchs during this period was great, and two successive holders of this post, Wang-Chên and Hsing-An[696], were both devoted Buddhists and induced the Emperors whom they served to expend enormous sums on building monasteries and performing ceremonies at which the Imperial Court were present.

The end of the fifteenth century is filled by two reigns, Hsien Tsung and Hsiao Tsung. The former fell under the influence of his favourite concubine Wan and his eunuchs to such an extent that, in the latter part of his life, he ceased to see his ministers and the chief eunuch became the real ruler of China. It is also mentioned both in 1468 and 1483 that he was in the hands of Buddhist priests who instructed him in secret doctrines and received the title of Kuo-Shih and other distinctions. His son Hsiao Tsung reformed these abuses: the Palace was cleansed: the eunuchs and priests were driven out and some were executed: Taoist books were collected and burnt. The celebrated writer Wang Yang Ming[697] lived in this reign. He defended and illustrated the doctrine of Lu Chin-Yüan, namely that truth can be obtained by meditation. To express intuitive knowledge, he used the expression Liang Chih[698] (taken from Mencius). Liang Chih is inherent in all human minds, but in different degrees, and can be developed or allowed to atrophy. To develop it should be man's constant object, and in its light when pure all things are understood and peace is obtained. The phrases of the Great Learning "to complete knowledge," "investigate things," and "rest in the highest excellence," are explained as referring to the Liang Chih and the contemplation of the mind by itself. We cannot here shut our eyes to the influence of Bodhidharma and his school, however fervently Wang Yang Ming may have appealed to the Chinese Classics.

The reign of Wu-tsung (1506-21) was favourable to Buddhism. In 1507 40,000 men became monks, either Buddhist or Taoist. The Emperor is said to have been learned in Buddhist literature and to have known Sanskrit[699] as well as Mongol and Arabic, but he was in the hands of a band of eunuchs, who were known as the eight tigers. In 1515 he sent an embassy to Tibet with the object of inducing the Grand Lama to visit Peking, but the invitation was refused and the Tibetans expelled the mission with force. The next Emperor, Shih-T'sung (1522-66), inclined to Taoism rather than Buddhism. He ordered the images of Buddha in the Forbidden City to be destroyed, but still appears to have taken part in Buddhist ceremonies at different periods of his reign. Wan Li (1573-1620), celebrated in the annals of porcelain manufacture, showed some favour to Buddhism. He repaired many buildings at P'u-t'o and distributed copies of the Tripitaka to the monasteries of his Empire. In his edicts occurs the saying that Confucianism and Buddhism are like the two wings of a bird: each requires the co-operation of the other.

European missionaries first arrived during the sixteenth century, and, had the Catholic Church been more flexible, China might perhaps have recognized Christianity, not as the only true religion but as standing on the same footing as Buddhism and Taoism. The polemics of the early missionaries imply that they regarded Buddhism as their chief rival. Thus Ricci had a public controversy with a bonze at Hang-Chou, and his principal pupil Hsü Kuang-Ch'i[700] wrote a tract entitled "The errors of the Buddhists exposed." Replies to these attacks are preserved in the writings of the distinguished Buddhist priest Shen Chu-Hung[701].

In 1644 the Ming dynasty collapsed before the Manchus and China was again under foreign rule. Unlike the Mongols, the Manchus had little inclination to Buddhism. Even before they had conquered China, their prince, T'ai Tsung, ordered an inspection of monasteries and limited the number of monks. But in this edict he inveighs only against the abuse of religion and admits that "Buddha's teaching is at bottom pure and chaste, true and sincere: by serving him with purity and piety, one can obtain happiness[702]." Shun-Chih, the first Manchu Emperor, wrote some prefaces to Buddhist works and entertained the Dalai Lama at Peking in 1652[703]. His son and successor, commonly known as K'ang-Hsi (1662-1723), dallied for a while with Christianity, but the net result of his religious policy was to secure to Confucianism all that imperial favour can give. I have mentioned above his Sacred Edict and the partial favour which he showed to Buddhism. He gave donations to the monasteries of P'u-t'o, Hang-chou and elsewhere: he published the Kanjur with a preface of his own[704] and the twelfth and last collection of the Tripitaka was issued under the auspices of his son and grandson. The latter, the Emperor Ch'ien Lung, also received the Teshu Lama not only with honour, but with interest and sympathy, as is clear from the inscription preserved at Peking, in which he extols the Lama as a teacher of spiritual religion[705]. He also wrote a preface to a sutra for producing rain[706] in which he says that he has ordered the old editions to be carefully corrected and prayer and worship to be offered, "so that the old forms which have been so beneficial during former ages might still be blessed to the desired end." Even the late Empress Dowager accepted the ministrations of the present Dalai Lama when he visited Peking in 1908, although, to his great indignation she obliged him to kneel at Court[707]. Her former colleague, the Empress Tzŭ-An was a devout Buddhist. The statutes of the Manchu dynasty (printed in 1818) contain regulations for the celebration of Buddhist festivals at Court, for the periodical reading of sutras to promote the imperial welfare, and for the performance of funeral rites.

Still on the whole the Manchu dynasty showed less favour to Buddhism than any which preceded it and its restrictive edicts limiting the number of monks and prescribing conditions for ordination were followed by no periods of reaction. But the vitality of Buddhism is shown by the fact that these restrictions merely led to an increase of the secular clergy, not legally ordained, who in their turn claimed the imperial attention. Ch'ien Lung began in 1735 by giving them the alternative of becoming ordinary laymen or of entering a monastery but this drastic measure was considerably modified in the next few years. Ultimately the secular clergy were allowed to continue as such, if they could show good reason, and to have one disciple each.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 591: See B.E.F.E.O. 1910, Le Songe et l'Ambassade de l'Empereur Ming Ti, par M. H. Maspéro, where the original texts are translated and criticized. It is a curious coincidence that Ptolemy Soter is said to have introduced the worship of Serapis to Egypt from Sinope in consequence of a dream.]

[Footnote 592: [Chinese: ] No doubt then pronounced something like Vut-tha.]

[Footnote 593: [Chinese: ] or [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 594: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 595: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 596: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 597: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 598: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 599: See Chavannes, _Les documents Chinois découverts par Aurel Stein_, 1913, Introduction. The earliest documents are of 98 B.C.]

[Footnote 600: The Wei-lüeh or Wei-lio [Chinese: ], composed between 239 and 265 A.D., no longer exists as a complete work, but a considerable extract from it dealing with the countries of the West is incorporated in the San Kuo Chih [Chinese: ] of P'ei-Sung-Chih [Chinese: ] (429 A.D.). See Chavannes, translation and notes in T'oung Pao, 1905, pp. 519-571.]

[Footnote 601: [Chinese: ]. See Chavannes, l.c. p. 550.]

[Footnote 602: See Francke, Zur Frage der Einführung des Buddhismus in China, 1910, and Maspéro's review in B.E.F.E.O. 1910, p. 629. Another Taoist legend is that Dipankara Buddha or Jan Têng, described as the teacher of Śâkyamuni was a Taoist and that Śâkyamuni visited him in China. Giles quotes extracts from a writer of the eleventh century called Shên Kua to the effect that Buddhism had been flourishing before the Ch'in dynasty but disappeared with its advent and also that eighteen priests were imprisoned in 216 B.C. But the story adds that they recited the Prajnâpâramitâ which is hardly possible at that epoch.]

[Footnote 603: Sam. Nik. v. 10. 6. Cf. for a similar illustration in Chuang-tzŭ, S.B.E. XL. p. 126.]

[Footnote 604: I may say, however, that I think it is a compilation containing very ancient sayings amplified by later material which shows Buddhist influence. This may be true to some extent of the Essays of Chuang-tzŭ as well.]

[Footnote 605: See Legge's translation in S.B.E. Part I. pp. 176, 257, II. 46, 62; ib. I. pp. 171, 192, II. 13; ib. II. p. 13; ib. II. p. 9, I. p. 249; ib. pp. 45, 95, 100, 364, II. p. 139; ib. II. p. 139; ib. II. p. 129.]

[Footnote 606: Ib. I. p. 202; cf. the Buddha's conversation with Vaccha in Maj. Nik. 72.]

[Footnote 607: Kumârajîva and other Buddhists actually wrote commentaries on the Tao-Tê-Ching.]

[Footnote 608: [Chinese: ] It speaks, however, in section 36 of being born in the condition or family of a Bodhisattva (P'u-sa-chia), where the word seems to be used in the late sense of a devout member of the Buddhist Church.]

[Footnote 609: But the Emperor Huan is said to have sacrificed to Buddha and Lao-tzŭ. See Hou Han Shu in T'oung Pao, 1907, p. 194. For early Buddhism see "Communautés et Moines Bouddhistes Chinois au II et au III siècles," by Maspéro in B.E.F.E.O. 1910, p. 222. In the second century lived Mou-tzŭ [Chinese: ] a Buddhist author with a strong spice of Taoism. His work is a collection of questions and answers, somewhat resembling the Questions of Milinda. See translation by Pelliot (in T'oung Pao, vol. XIX. 1920) who gives the date provisionally as 195 A.D.]

[Footnote 610: Accounts of these and the later translators are found in the thirteen catalogues of the Chinese Tripitaka (see Nanjio, p. xxvii) and other works such as the Kao Sang-Chuan (Nanjio, No. 1490).]

[Footnote 611: [Chinese: ]. He worked at translations in Loyang 148-170.]

[Footnote 612: Dharmakâla, see Nanjio, p. 386. The Vinaya used in these early days of Chinese Buddhism was apparently that of the Dharmagupta school. See J.A. 1916, II. p. 40. An Shih-kao (c. A.D. 150) translated a work called The 3000 Rules for Monks (Nanjio, 1126), but it is not clear what was the Sanskrit original.]

[Footnote 613: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 614: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 615: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 616: [Chinese: ]. He was a remarkable man and famous in his time, for he was credited not only with clairvoyance and producing rain, but with raising the dead. Rémusat's account of him, based on the Tsin annals, may still be read with interest. See Nouv. Mélanges Asiatiques, II. 1829, pp. 179 ff. His biography is contained in chap. 95 of the Tsin [Chinese: ] annals.]

[Footnote 617: [Chinese: ]. Died 363 A.D.]

[Footnote 618: Ts'in [Chinese: ] must be distinguished from Tsin [Chinese: ], the name of three short but legitimate dynasties.]

[Footnote 619: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 620: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 621: See Nanjio, Catalogue, p. 406.]

[Footnote 622: [Chinese: ]. For this title see Pelliot in _T'oung Pao_, 1911, p. 671.]

[Footnote 623: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 624: [Chinese: ]. He was canonized under the name of Wu [Chinese: ], and the three great persecutions of Buddhism are sometimes described as the disasters of the three Wu, the others being Wu of the North Chou dynasty (574) and Wu of the T'ang (845).]

[Footnote 625: [Chinese: ]. For the 25 pilgrims see Nanjio, p. 417.]

[Footnote 626: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 627: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 628: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 629: [Chinese: ], [Chinese: ]. See Chavannes, "Voyage de Song Yun dans l'Udyâna et le Gandhâra, 518-522," p. E in B.E.F.E.O. 1903, pp. 379-441. For an interesting account of the Dowager Empress see pp. 384-5.]

[Footnote 630: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 631: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 632: [Chinese: ] and [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 633: See chap. XXIII. p. 95, and chap. XLV below (on schools of Chinese Buddhism), for more about Bodhidharma. The earliest Chinese accounts of him seem to be those contained in the Liang and Wei annals. But one of the most popular and fullest accounts is to be found in the Wu Têng Hui Yüan (first volume) printed at Kushan near Fuchow.]

[Footnote 634: His portraits are also frequent both in China and Japan (see Ostasiat. Ztsft 1912, p. 226) and the strongly marked features attributed to him may perhaps represent a tradition of his personal appearance, which is entirely un-Chinese. An elaborate study of Bodhidharma written in Japanese is noticed in B.E.F.E.O. 1911, p. 457.]

[Footnote 635: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 636: The legend does not fit in well with chronology since Sung-Yün is said to have returned from India in 522.]

[Footnote 637: See Takakusu in J.R.A.S. 1905, p. 33.]

[Footnote 638: Mailla, Hist. Gén. de la Chine, p. 369.]

[Footnote 639: [Chinese: ], [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 640: [Chinese: ], [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 641: See Biot, Hist, de l'instruction publique en Chine, pp. 289, 313.]

[Footnote 642: [Chinese: ]. Is celebrated in Chinese history as one of the greatest opponents of Buddhism. He collected all the objections to it in 10 books and warned his son against it on his death bed. Giles, Biog. Dict. 589.]

[Footnote 643: [Chinese: ]. An important minister and apparently a man of talent but of ungovernable and changeable temper. In 639 he obtained the Emperor's leave to become a priest but soon left his monastery. The Emperor ordered him to be canonized under the name Pure but Narrow. Giles, Biog. Dict. 722. The monk Fa-Lin [Chinese: ] also attacked the views of Fu I in two treatises which have been incorporated in the Chinese Tripitaka. See Nanjio, Cat. Nos. 1500, 1501.]

[Footnote 644: Subsequently a story grew up that his soul had visited hell during a prolonged fainting fit after which he recovered and became a devout Buddhist. See chap. XI of the Romance called Hsi-yu-chi, a fantastic travesty of Hsüan Chuang's travels, and Wieger, Textes Historiques, p. 1585.]

[Footnote 645: [Chinese: ]. This name has been transliterated in an extraordinary number of ways. See B.E.F.E.O. 1905, pp. 424-430. Giles gives Hsüan Chuang in his Chinese Dictionary, but Hsüan Tsang in his Biographical Dictionary. Probably the latter is more correct. Not only is the pronunciation of the characters variable, but the character [Chinese: ] was tabooed as being part of the Emperor K'ang Hsi's personal name and [Chinese: ] substituted for it. Hence the spelling Yüan Chuang.]

[Footnote 646: [Chinese: ]. See Vincent Smith, Early History of India, pp. 326-327, and Giles, Biog. Dict., s.v. Wang Hsüan-T'sê. This worthy appears to have gone to India again in 657 to offer robes at the holy places.]

[Footnote 647: [Chinese: ] Some of the principal statues in the caves of Lung-men were made at her expense, but other parts of these caves seem to date from at least 500 A.D. Chavannes, Mission Archéol. tome I, deuxième partie.]

[Footnote 648: [Chinese: ]. Ta-Yün-Ching. See J.A. 1913, p. 149. The late Dowager Empress also was fond of masquerading as Kuan-yin but it does not appear that the performance was meant to be taken seriously.]

[Footnote 649: "That romantic Chinese reign of Genso (713-756) which is the real absolute culmination of Chinese genius." Fenollosa, Epochs of Chinese and Japanese art I. 102.]

[Footnote 650: [Chinese: ], [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 651: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 652: [Chinese: ] The meaning of this name appears to vary at different times. At this period it is probably equivalent to Kapisa or N.E. Afghanistan.]

[Footnote 653: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 654: See B.E.F.E.O. 1904, p. 161. This does not exclude the possibility of an opposite current, viz. Chinese Buddhism flowing into Burma.]

[Footnote 655: Wu-Tsung, 841-847.]

[Footnote 656: "Liu-Tsung-Yuan has left behind him much that for purity of style and felicity of expression has rarely been surpassed," Giles, Chinese Literature, p. 191.]

[Footnote 657: Apparently in 783 A.D. See Waddell's articles on Ancient Historical Edicts at Lhasa in J.R.A.S. 1909, 1910, 1911.]

[Footnote 658: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 659: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 660: See Eitel, Handbook of Chinese Buddhism, p. 185 s.v. Ullambana, a somewhat doubtful word, apparently rendered into Chinese as Yü-lan-p'ên.]

[Footnote 661: Sec Nanjio Catalogue, pp. 445-448.]

[Footnote 662: He is also said to have introduced the images of the Four Kings which are now found in every temple. A portrait of him by Li Chien is reproduced in Tajima's Masterpieces, vol. viii, plate ix. The artist was perhaps his contemporary.]

[Footnote 663: E.g. Sacki, The Nestorian Monument in China, 1916. See also above, p. 217.]

[Footnote 664: See Khuddaka-Patha, 7; Peta Vatthu, 1, 5 and the commentary; Milinda Panha, iv. 8, 29; and for modern practices my chapter on Siam, and Copleston, Buddhism, p. 445.]

[Footnote 665: [Chinese: ] Some native critics, however, have doubted the authenticity of the received text and the version inserted in the Official History seems to be a summary. See Wieger, Textes Historiques, vol. iii. pp. 1726 ff., and Giles, Chinese Literature, pp. 200 ff.]

[Footnote 666: The officials whose duty it was to remonstrate with the Emperor if he acted wrongly.]

[Footnote 667: Giles, Chinese Literature, pp. 201, 202--somewhat abbreviated.]

[Footnote 668: See Wieger, Textes Historiques, vol. III. pp. 1744 ff.]

[Footnote 669: "Thousands of ten-thousands of Ch'ing." A Ch'ing = 15.13 acres.]

[Footnote 670: Presumably similar to the temple slaves of Camboja, etc.]

[Footnote 671: One Emperor of this epoch, Shih-Tsung of the later Chou dynasty, suppressed monasteries and coined bronze images into currency, declaring that Buddha, who in so many births had sacrificed himself for mankind, would have no objection to his statues being made useful. But in the South Buddhism nourished in the province of Fukien under the princes of Min [Chinese: ] and the dynasty which called itself Southern T'ang.]

[Footnote 672: [Chinese: ] See Kokka No. 309, 1916.]

[Footnote 673: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 674: The decrease in translations is natural for by this time Chinese versions had been made of most works which had any claim to be translated.]

[Footnote 675: See Biot, L'instruction publique en Chine, p. 350.]

[Footnote 676: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 677: See Le Gall, Variétés Sinologiques, No. 6 Tchou-Hi: Sa doctrine Son influence. Shanghai, 1894, pp. 90, 122.]

[Footnote 678: [Chinese: ]. Compare the similar doctrines of Wang Yang-Ming.]

[Footnote 679: E.g. his elder brother Mangku who showed favour to Buddhists, Mohammedans and Nestorians alike. He himself wished to obtain Christian teachers from the Pope, by the help of Marco Polo, but probably merely from curiosity.]

[Footnote 680: More accurately hPhags-pa. It is a title rather than a name, being the Tibetan equivalent of Arya. Khubilai seems to be the correct transcription of the Emperor's name. The Tibetan and Chinese transcriptions are Hvopilai and Hu-pi-lieh.]

[Footnote 681: For this curious work see B.E.F.E.O. 1908, p. 515, and J.A. 1913, I, pp. 116-132. For the destruction of Taoist books see Chavannes in T'oung Pao, 1904, p. 366.]

[Footnote 682: At the present day an ordinary Chinese regards a Lama as quite different from a Hoshang or Buddhist monk.]

[Footnote 683: The Yüan Emperors were no doubt fond of witnessing religious theatricals in the Palace. See for extracts from Chinese authors, New China Review, 1919, pp. 68 ff. Compare the performances of the T'ang Emperor Su Tsung mentioned above.]

[Footnote 684: For the ecclesiastical abuses of the time see Köppen, II. 103, and de Mailla, Histoire de la Chine, IX. 475, 538.]

[Footnote 685: See Wieger, Textes Historiques, III. p. 2013, and De Groot, Sectarianism and Religious Persecution in China, I. p. 82. He is often called Hung Wu which is strictly speaking the title of his reign. He was certainly capable of changing his mind, for he degraded Mencius from his position in Confucian temples one year and restored him the next.]

[Footnote 686: See de Mailla, Histoire de la Chine, IX. p. 470.]

[Footnote 687: Often called Yung-Lo which is strictly the title of his reign.]

[Footnote 688: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 689: See Nanjio, Cat. 1613-16.]

[Footnote 690: See Beal, Catena of Buddhist Scriptures, p. 398. The Emperor says: "So we, the Ruler of the Empire ... do hereby bring before men a mode for attaining to the condition of supreme Wisdom. We therefore earnestly exhort all men ... carefully to study the directions of this work and faithfully to follow them."]

[Footnote 691: Nanjio, Cat. 1620. See also ib. 1032 and 1657 for the Empress's sûtra.]

[Footnote 692: Or Kalima [Chinese: ] In Tibetan Karma de bshin gshegs-pa. He was the fifth head of the Karma-pa school. See Chandra Das's dictionary, s.v., where a reference is given to kLong-rdol-gsung-hbum. It is noticeable that the Karma-pa is one of the older and more Tantric sects.]

[Footnote 693: [Chinese: ], [Chinese: ]. Yüan Shih K'ai prefixed to this latter the four characters [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 694: See Yule, Cathay and the Way Thither, pp. 75 ff.]

[Footnote 695: When Ying Tsung was carried away by the Mongols in 1449 his brother Ching-Ti was made Emperor. Though Ying Tsung was sent back in 1450, he was not able to oust Ching-Ti from the throne till 1457.]

[Footnote 696: [Chinese: ], [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 697: [Chinese: ] His real name was Wang Shou Jên [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 698: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 699: Though the ecclesiastical study of Sanskrit decayed under the Ming dynasty, Yung-lo founded in 1407 a school of language for training interpreters at which Sanskrit was taught among other tongues.]

[Footnote 700: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 701: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 702: De Groot, l.c. p. 93.]

[Footnote 703: Some authorities say that he became a monk before he died, but the evidence is not good. See Johnston in New China Review, Nos. 1 and 2, 1920.]

[Footnote 704: See T'oung Pao, 1909, p. 533.]

[Footnote 705: See E. Ludwig, _The visit of the Tcshoo Lama to Peking_, Tien Tsin Press, 1904.]

[Footnote 706: The Ta-yün-lung-ch'ing-yü-ching. Nanjio's Catalogue, Nos. 187-8, 970, and see Beal, Catena of Buddhist Scriptures, pp. 417-9.]

[Footnote 707: See for an account of his visit "The Dalai Lamas and their relations with the Manchu Emperor of China" in T'oung Pao, 1910, p. 774.]

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us

XLIV. CHINA (continued)

THE CANON

The Buddhist scriptures extant in the Chinese language are known collectively as San Tsang[708] or the three store-houses, that is to say, Tripitaka. Though this usage is justified by both eastern and European practice, it is not altogether happy, for the Chinese thesaurus is not analogous to the Pali Canon or to any collection of sacred literature known in India, being in spite of its name arranged in four, not in three, divisions. It is a great Corpus Scriptorum Sanctorum, embracing all ages and schools, wherein translations of the most diverse Indian works are supplemented by original compositions in Chinese. Imagine a library comprising Latin translations of the Old and New Testaments with copious additions from the Talmud and Apocryphal literature; the writings of the Fathers, decrees of Councils and Popes, together with the opera omnia of the principal schoolmen and the early protestant reformers and you will have some idea of this theological miscellany which has no claim to be called a canon, except that all the works included have at some time or other received a certain literary or doctrinal hall-mark.

1

The collection is described in the catalogue compiled by Bunyiu Nanjio[709]. It enumerates 1662 works which are classified in four great divisions, (a) Sûtra, (b) Vinaya, (c) Abhidharma, (d) Miscellaneous. The first three divisions contain translations only; the fourth original Chinese works as well.

The first division called Ching or Sûtras amounts to nearly two-thirds of the whole, for it comprises no less than 1081 works and is subdivided as follows: (a) Mahâyâna Sûtras, 541, (b) Hînayâna Sûtras, 240, (c) Mahâyâna and Hînayâna Sûtras, 300 in number, admitted into the canon under the Sung and Yüan dynasties, A.D. 960-1368. Thus whereas the first two subdivisions differ in doctrine, the third is a supplement containing later translations of both schools. The second subdivision, or Hînayâna Sûtras, which is less numerous and complicated than that containing the Mahâyâna Sûtras, shows clearly the character of the whole collection. It is divided into two classes of which the first is called A-han, that is, Agama[710]. This comprises translations of four works analogous to the Pali Nikâyas, though not identical with the texts which we possess, and also numerous alternative translations of detached sûtras. All four were translated about the beginning of the fifth century whereas the translations of detached sûtras are for the most part earlier. This class also contains the celebrated Sûtra of Forty-two Sections, and works like the Jâtaka-nidâna. The second class is styled Sûtras of one translation[711]. The title is not used rigorously, but the works bearing it are relatively obscure and it is not always clear to what Sanskrit texts they correspond. It will be seen from the above that the Chinese Tripitaka is a literary and bibliographical collection rather than an ecclesiastical canon. It does not provide an authorized version for the edification of the faithful, but it presents for the use of the learned all translations of Indian works belonging to a particular class which possess a certain age and authority.

The same characteristic marks the much richer collection of Mahâyâna Sûtras, which contains the works most esteemed by Chinese Buddhists. It is divided into seven classes:

1. [Chinese: ] Pan-jo (Po-jo) or Prajnâpâramitâ[712].

2. [Chinese: ] Pao-chi or Ratnakûṭa.

3. [Chinese: ] Ta-chi or Mahâsannipâta.

4. [Chinese: ] Hua-yen or Avatamsaka.

5. [Chinese: ] Nieh-pan or Parinirvâṇa.

6. [Chinese: ] Sûtras in more than one translation but not falling into any of the above five classes.

7. [Chinese: ] Other sûtras existing in only one translation.

Each of the first five classes probably represents a collection of sûtras analogous to a Nikâya and in one sense a single work but translated into Chinese several times, both in a complete form and in extracts. Thus the first class opens with the majestic Mahâprajnâpâramitâ in 600 fasciculi and equivalent to 200,000 stanzas in Sanskrit. This is followed by several translations of shorter versions including two of the little sûtras called the Heart of the Prajnâpâramitâ, which fills only one leaf. There are also six translations of the celebrated work known as the Diamond-cutter[713], which is the ninth sûtra in the Mahâprajnâpâramitâ and all the works classed under the heading Pan-jo seem to be alternative versions of parts of this great Corpus.

The second and third classes are collections of sûtras which no longer exist as collections in Sanskrit, though the Sanskrit text of some individual sûtras is extant. That called Pao-chi or Ratnakûṭa opens with a collection of forty-nine sûtras which includes the longer version of the Sukhâvatîvyûha. This collection is reckoned as one work, but the other items in the same class are all or nearly all of them duplicate translations of separate sûtras contained in it. This is probably true of the third class also. At least seven of the works included in it are duplicate translations of the first, which is called Mahâsannipâta, and the sûtras called Candragarbha, Kshitig., Sumerug., and Akâśag., appear to be merely sections, not separate compositions, although this is not clear from the remarks of Nanjio and Wassiljew.

The principal works in class 4 are two translations, one fuller than the other, of the Hua-yen or Avatamsaka Sûtra[714], still one of the most widely read among Buddhist works, and at least sixteen of the other items are duplicate renderings of parts of it. Class 5 consists of thirteen works dealing with the death of the Buddha and his last discourses. The first sûtra, sometimes called the northern text, is imperfect and was revised at Nanking in the form of the southern text[715]. There are two other incomplete versions of the same text. To judge from a specimen translated by Beal[716] it is a collection of late discourses influenced by Vishnuism and does not correspond to the Mahâparinibbânasutta of the Pali Canon.

Class 6 consists of sûtras which exist in several translations, but still do not, like the works just mentioned, form small libraries in themselves. It comprises, however, several books highly esteemed and historically important, such as the Saddharmapuṇḍarîka (six translations), the Suvarṇaprabhâsa, the Lalitavistara, the Lankâvatâra, and the Shorter Sukhâvatîvyûha[717], all extant in three translations. In it are also included many short tracts, the originals of which are not known. Some of them are Jâtakas, but many[718] deal with the ritual of image worship or with spells. These characteristics are still more prominent in the seventh class, consisting of sûtras which exist in a single translation only. The best known among them are the Śûrângama and the Mahâvairocana (Ta-jih-ching), which is the chief text of the Shin-gon or Mantra School[719].

The Lü-tsang or Vinaya-pitaka is divided into Mahâyâna and Hînayâna texts, neither very numerous. Many of the Mahâyâna texts profess to be revelations by Maitreya and are extracts of the Yogâcâryabhûmiśâstra[720] or similar to it. For practical purposes the most important is the Fan-wang-ching[721] or net of Brahmâ. The Indian original of this work is not known, but since the eighth century it has been accepted in China as the standard manual for the monastic life[722].

The Hînayâna Vinaya comprises five very substantial recensions of the whole code, besides extracts, compendiums, and manuals. The five recensions are: (a) Shih-sung-lü in sixty-five fasciculi, translated in A.D. 404. This is said to be a Vinaya of the Sarvâstivâdins, but I-Ching[723] expressly says that it does not belong to the Mûlasarvâstivâdin school, though not unlike it. (b) The Vinaya of this latter translated by I-Ching who brought it from India. (c) Shih-fen-lü-tsang in sixty fasciculi, translated in 405 and said to represent the Dharmagupta school. (d) The Mi-sha-so Wu-fên Lü or Vinaya of the Mahîśâsakas, said to be similar to the Pali Vinaya, though not identical with it[724]. (e) Mo-ko-sêng-chi Lü or Mahasanghika Vinaya brought from India by Fa-Hsien and translated 416 A.D. It is noticeable that all five recensions are classed as Hinayanist, although (b) is said to be the Vinaya used by the Tibetan Church. Although Chinese Buddhists frequently speak of the five-fold Vinaya[725], this expression does not refer to these five texts, as might be supposed, and I-Ching condemns it, saying that[726] the real number of divisions is four.

The Abhidharma-Pitaka or Lun-tsang is, like the Sûtra Pitaka, divided into Mahayanist and Hinayanist texts and texts of both schools admitted into the Canon after 960 A.D. The Mahayanist texts have no connection with the Pali Canon and their Sanskrit titles do not contain the word Abhidharma[727]. They are philosophical treatises ascribed to Aśvaghosha, Nâgârjuna, Asanga, Vasubandhu and others, including three works supposed to have been revealed by Maitreya to Asanga[728]. The principal of these is the Yogâcârya-bhûmiśâstra, a scripture of capital importance for the Yogâcârya school. It describes the career of a Bodhisattva and hence parts of it are treated as belonging to the Vinaya. Among other important works in this section may be mentioned the Madhyamaka Śâstra of Nâgârjuna, the Mahâyânasûtrâlankâra of Asanga, and the Awakening of Faith ascribed to Aśvaghosha[729].

The Hînayâna texts also show no correspondence with the Pali Pitaka but are based on the Abhidharma works of the Sarvâstivâdin school[730]. These are seven in number, namely the Jnânaprasthânasâstra of Kâtyâyanîputra with six accessory treatises or Pâdas[731]. The Mahâvibhâshasâstra, or commentary on the Jnânaprasthâna, and the Abhidharmakósa[732] are also in this section.

The third division of the Abhidharma is of little importance but contains two curious items: a manual of Buddhist terminology composed as late as 1272 by Pagspa for the use of Khubilai's son and the Sânkhyakârikâbhâshya, which is not a Buddhist work but a compendium of Sânkhya philosophy[733].

The fourth division of the whole collection consists of miscellaneous works, partly translated from Sanskrit and partly composed in Chinese. Many of the Indian works appear from their title not to differ much from the later Mahâyâna Sûtras, but it is rather surprising to find in this section four translations[734] of the Dharmapada (or at least of some similar anthology) which are thus placed outside the Sûtra Pitaka. Among the works professing to be translated from Sanskrit are a History of the Patriarchs, the Buddhacarita of Aśvaghosha, a work similar to the Questions of King Milinda, Lives of Aśvaghosha, Nâgârjuna, Vasubandhu and others and the Suhrillekha or Friendly Epistle ascribed to Nâgârjuna.

The Chinese works included in this Tripitaka consist of nearly two hundred books, historical, critical, controversial and homiletic, composed by one hundred and two authors. Excluding late treatises on ceremonial and doctrine, the more interesting may be classified as follows:

(a) Historical.--Besides general histories of Buddhism, there are several collections of ecclesiastical biography. The first is the Kao-sêng-chuan[735], or Memoirs of eminent Monks (not, however, excluding laymen), giving the lives of about five hundred worthies who lived between 67 and 519 A.D. The series is continued in other works dealing with the T'ang and Sung dynasties. For the Contemplative School there are further supplements carrying the record on to the Yüan. There are also several histories of the Chinese patriarchs. Of these the latest and therefore most complete is the Fo-tsu-t'ung-chi[736] composed about 1270 by Chih P'an of the T'ien-T'ai school. The Ching-tê-ch'uan-têng-lu[737] and other treatises give the succession of patriarchs according to the Contemplative School. Among historical works may be reckoned the travels of various pilgrims who visited India.

(b) Critical.--There are thirteen catalogues of the Tripitaka as it existed at different periods. Several of them contain biographical accounts of the translators and other notes. The work called Chên-chêng-lun criticizes several false sûtras and names. There are also several encyclopædic works containing extracts from the Tripitaka, arranged according to subjects, such as the Fa-yüan-chu-lin[738] in 100 volumes; concordances of numerical categories and a dictionary of Sanskrit terms, Fan-i-ming-i-chi[739], composed in 1151.

(c) The literature of several Chinese sects is well represented. Thus there are more than sixty works belonging to the T'ien T'ai school beginning with the San-ta-pu or three great books attributed to the founder and ending with the ecclesiastical history of Chih-p'an, written about 1270. The Hua-yen school is represented by the writings of four patriarchs and five monks: the Lü or Vinaya school by eight works attributed to its founder, and the Contemplative School by a sûtra ascribed to Hui-nêng, the sixth patriarch, by works on the history of the Patriarchs and by several collections of sayings or short compositions.

(d) Controversial.--Under this heading may be mentioned polemics against Taoism, including two collections of the controversies which took place between Buddhists and Taoists from A.D. 71 till A.D. 730: replies to the attacks made against Buddhism by Confucian scholars and refutations of the objections raised by sceptics or heretics such as the Chê-i-lun and the Yüan-jên-lun, or Origin of man[740]. This latter is a well-known text-book written by the fifth Patriarch of the Hua-yen school and while criticizing Confucianism, Taoism, and the Hînâyana, treats them as imperfect rather than as wholly erroneous[741]. Still more conciliatory is the Treatise on the three religions composed by Liu Mi of the Yüan dynasty[742], which asserts that all three deserve respect as teaching the practice of virtue. It attacks, however, anti-Buddhist Confucianists such as Han-Yü and Chu-Hsi.

The Chinese section contains three compositions attributed to imperial personages of the Ming, viz., a collection of the prefaces and laudatory verses written by the Emperor T'ai-Tsung, the Shên-Sêng-Chuan or memoirs of remarkable monks with a preface by the Emperor Ch'êng-tsu, and a curious book by his consort the Empress Jên-Hsiao, introducing a sûtra which Her Majesty states was miraculously revealed to her on New Year's day, 1398 (see Nanjio, No. 1657).

Though the Hindus were careful students and guardians of their sacred works, their temperament did not dispose them to define and limit the scriptures. But, as I have mentioned above[743], there is some evidence that there was a loose Mahayanist canon in India which was the origin of the arrangement found in the Chinese Tripitaka, in so far as it (1) accepted Hinayanist as well as Mahayanist works, and (2) included a great number of relatively late sûtras, arranged in classes such as Prajnâpâramitâ and Mahâsannipâta.

2

The Tripitaka analyzed by Nanjio, which contains works assigned to dates ranging from 67 to 1622 A.D., is merely the best known survivor among several similar thesauri[744]. From 518 A.D. onwards twelve collections of sacred literature were made by imperial order and many of these were published in more than one edition. The validity of this Canon depends entirely on imperial authority, but, though Emperors occasionally inserted the works of writers whom they esteemed[745], it does not appear that they aimed at anything but completeness nor did they favour any school. The Buddhist Church, like every other department of the Empire, received from them its share of protection and supervision and its claims were sufficient to induce the founder, or at least an early Sovereign, of every important dynasty to publish under his patronage a revised collection of the scriptures. The list of these collections is as follows[746]:

1. A.D. 518 in the time of Wu-Ti, founder of the Liang. 2. " 533-4 Hsiao-Wu of the Northern Wei. 3. " 594 } Wan-ti, founder of the Sui. 4. " 602 } Wan-ti, founder of the Sui. 5. " 605-16 Yang-Ti of the Sui. 6. " 695 the Empress Wu of the T'ang. 7. " 730 Hsüan-Tsung of the T'ang. 8. " 971 T'ai-Tsu, founder of the Sung. 9. " 1285-7 Khubilai Khan, founder of the Yüan. 10. " 1368-98 Hung-Wu, founder of the Ming. 11. " 1403-24 Yung-Lo of the Ming. 12. " 1735-7 Yung-Ching and Ch'ien-Lung of the Ch'ing[747].

Of these collections, the first seven were in MS. only: the last five were printed. The last three appear to be substantially the same. The tenth and eleventh collections are known as southern and northern[748], because they were printed at Nanking and Peking respectively. They differ only in the number of Chinese works admitted and similarly the twelfth collection is merely a revision of the tenth with the addition of fifty-four Chinese works.

As mentioned, the Tripitaka contains thirteen catalogues of the Buddhist scriptures as known at different dates[749]. Of these the most important are (a) the earliest published between 506 and 512 A.D., (b) three published under the T'ang dynasty and known as Nei-tien-lu, T'u-chi (both about 664 A.D.), and K'ai-yüan-lu (about 720 A.D.), (c) Chih-Yüan-lu or catalogue of Yüan dynasty, about 1285, which, besides enumerating the Chinese titles, transliterates the Sanskrit titles and states whether the Indian works translated are also translated into Tibetan. (d) The catalogue of the first Ming collection.

The later collections contain new material and differ from the earlier by natural accretion, for a great number of translations were produced under the T'ang and Sung. Thus the seventh catalogue (695 A.D.) records that 859 new works were admitted to the Canon. But this expansion was accompanied by a critical and sifting process, so that whereas the first collection contained 2213 works, the Ming edition contains only 1622. This compression means not that works of importance were rejected as heretical or apocryphal, for, as we have seen, the Tripitaka is most catholic, but that whereas the earlier collections admitted multitudinous extracts or partial translations of Indian works, many of these were discarded when complete versions had been made.

Nanjio considers that of the 2213 works contained in the first collection only 276 are extant. Although the catalogues are preserved, all the earlier collections are lost: copies of the eighth and ninth were preserved in the Zō-jō-ji Library of Tokyo[750] and Chinese and Japanese editions of the tenth, eleventh and twelfth are current. So far as one can judge, when the eighth catalogue, or K'ai-yüan-lu, was composed (between 713 and 741), the older and major part of the Canon had been definitively fixed and the later collections merely add the translations made by Amogha, and by writers of the Sung and Yüan dynasties.

The editions of the Chinese Tripitaka must be distinguished from the collections, for by editions are meant the forms in which each collection was published, the text being or purporting to be the same in all the editions of each collection. It is said[751] that under the Sung and Yüan twenty different editions were produced. These earlier issues were printed on long folding sheets and a nun called Fa-chên[752] is said to have first published an edition in the shape of ordinary Chinese books. In 1586 a monk named Mi-Tsang[753] imitated this procedure and his edition was widely used. About a century later a Japanese priest known as Tetsu-yen[754] reproduced it and his publication, which is not uncommon in Japan, is usually called the Ō-baku edition. There are two modern Japanese editions: (a) that of Tokyo, begun in 1880, based on a Korean edition[755] with various readings taken from other Chinese editions. (b) That of Kyoto, 1905, which is a reprint of the Ming collection[756]. A Chinese edition has been published at Shanghai (1913) at the expense of Mrs. Hardoon, a Chinese lady well known as a munificent patron of the faith, and I believe another at Nanking, but I do not know if it is complete or not[757].

3

The translations contained in the Chinese Tripitaka belong to several periods[758]. In the earliest, which extends to the middle of the fourth century, the works produced were chiefly renderings of detached sûtras[759]. Few treatises classified as Vinaya or Abhidharma were translated and those few are mostly extracts or compilations. The sûtras belong to both the Hîna and Mahâyâna. The earliest extant translation or rather compilation, the Sûtra of Forty-two sections, belongs to the former school, and so do the majority of the translations made by An-Shih-Kao (148-170 A.D.), but from the second century onwards the Prajnâpâramitâ and Amitâbha Sûtras make their appearance[760]. Many of the translations made in this period are described as incomplete or incorrect and the fact that most of them were superseded or supplemented by later versions shows that the Chinese recognized their provisional character. Future research will probably show that many of them are paraphrases or compendiums rather than translations in our sense.

The next period, roughly speaking 375-745 A.D., was extraordinarily prolific in extensive and authoritative translations. The translators now attack not detached chapters or discourses but the great monuments of Indian Buddhist literature. Though it is not easy to make any chronological bisection in this period, there is a clear difference in the work done at the beginning and at the end of it. From the end of the fourth century onwards a desire to have complete translations of the great canonical works is apparent. Between 385 and 445 A.D. were translated the four Agamas, analogous to the Nikâyas of the Pali Canon, three great collections of the Vinaya, and the principal scriptures of the Abhidharma according to the Sarvâstivâdin school. For the Mahâyâna were translated the great sûtras known as Avatamsaka, Lankâvatâra, and many others, as well as works ascribed to Aśvaghosha and Nâgârjuna. After 645 A.D. a further development of the critical spirit is perceptible, especially in the labours of Hsüan Chuang and I-Ching. They attempt to give the religious public not only complete works in place of extracts and compendiums, but also to select the most authoritative texts among the many current in India. Thus, though many translations had appeared under the name of Prajnâpâramitâ, Hsüan Chuang filled 600 fasciculi with a new rendering of the gigantic treatise. I-Ching supplemented the already bulky library of Vinaya works with versions of the Mûlasarvâstivâdin recension and many auxiliary texts.

Amogha (Pu-K'ung) whose literary labours extended from 746 to 774 A.D. is a convenient figure to mark the beginning of the next and last period, although some of its characteristics appear a little earlier. They are that no more translations are made from the great Buddhist classics--partly no doubt because they had all been translated already, well or ill--but that renderings of works described as Dhâraṇî or Tantra pullulate and multiply. Though this literature deserves such epithets as decadent and superstitious, yet it would appear that Indian Tantras of the worst class were not palatable to the Chinese.

4

The Chinese Tripitaka is of great importance for the literary history of Buddhism, but the material which it offers for investigation is superabundant and the work yet done is small. We are confronted by such questions as, can we accept the dates assigned to the translators, can we assume that, if the Chinese translations or transliterations correspond with Indian titles, the works are the same, and if the works are professedly the same, can we assume that the Chinese text is a correct presentment of the Indian original?

The dates assigned to the translators offer little ground for scepticism. The exactitude of the Chinese in such matters is well attested, and there is a general agreement between several authorities such as the Catalogues of the Tripitaka, the memoirs known as Kao-Sêng Chuan with their continuations, and the chapter on Buddhist books in the Sui annals. There are no signs of a desire to claim improbable accuracy or improbable antiquity. Many works are said to be by unknown translators, doubtful authorship is frankly discussed, and the movement of literature and thought indicated is what we should expect. We have first fragmentary and incomplete translations belonging to both the Mahâ and Hînayâna: then a series of more complete translations beginning about the fifth century in which the great Hînayâna texts are conspicuous: then a further series of improved translations in which the Hînayâna falls into the background and the works of Asanga and Vasubandhu come to the front. This evidently reflects the condition of Buddhist India about 500-650 A.D., just as the translations of the eighth century reflect its later and tantric phase.

But can Chinese texts be accepted as reasonably faithful reproductions of the Indian originals whose names they bear, and some of which have been lost? This question is really double; firstly, did the translators reproduce with fair accuracy the Indian text before them, and secondly, since Indian texts often exist in several recensions, can we assume that the work which the translators knew under a certain Sanskrit name is the work known to us by that name? In reply it must be said that most Chinese translators fall short of our standards of accuracy. In early times when grammars and dictionaries were unknown the scholarly rendering of foreign books was a difficult business, for professional interpreters would usually be incapable of understanding a philosophic treatise. The method often followed was that an Indian explained the text to a literary Chinese, who recast the explanation in his own language. The many translations of the more important texts and the frequent description of the earlier ones as imperfect indicate a feeling that the results achieved were not satisfactory. Several so-called translators, especially Kumârajîva, gave abstracts of the Indian texts[761]. Others, like Dharmaraksha, who made a Chinese version of Aśvaghosha's Buddhacarita, so amplified and transposed the original that the result can hardly be called a translation[762]. Others combined different texts in one. Thus the work called Ta-o-mi-to-ching[763] consists of extracts taken from four previous translations of the Sukhâvatîvyûha and rearranged by the author under the inspiration of Avalokita to whom, as he tells us, he was wont to pray during the execution of his task. Others again, like Dharmagupta, anticipated a method afterwards used in Tibet, and gave a word for word rendering of the Sanskrit which is hardly intelligible to an educated Chinese. The later versions, e.g. those of Hsüan Chuang, are more accurate, but still a Chinese rendering of a lost Indian document cannot be accepted as a faithful representation of the original without a critical examination[764].

Often, however, the translator, whatever his weaknesses may have been, had before him a text differing in bulk and arrangement from the Pali and Sanskrit texts which we possess. Thus, there are four Chinese translations of works bearing some relation to the Dhammapada of the Pali Canon. All of these describe the original text as the compilation of Dharmatrâta, to whom is also ascribed the compilation of the Tibetan Udânavarga[765]. His name is not mentioned in connection with the Pali text, yet two of the Chinese translations are closely related to that text. The Fa-chü-ching[766] is a collection of verses translated in 224 A.D. and said to correspond with the Pali except that it has nine additional chapters and some additional stanzas. The Fa-chü-p'i-yü-ching[767] represents another edition of the same verses, illustrated by a collection of parables. It was translated between 290 and 306. The Ch'u-yao-ching[768], translated in 399, is a similar collection of verses and parables, but founded on another Indian work of much greater length. A revised translation containing only the verses was made between 980 and 1001[769]. They are said to be the same as the Tibetan Udâna, and the characteristics of this book, going back apparently to a Sanskrit original, are that it is divided into thirty-three chapters, and that though it contains about 300 verses found in Pali, yet it is not merely the Pali text plus additions, but an anthology arranged on a different principle and only partly identical in substance[770].

There can be little doubt that the Pali Dhammapada is one among several collections of verses, with or without an explanatory commentary of stories. In all these collections there was much common matter, both prose and verse, but some were longer, some shorter, some were in Pali and some in Sanskrit. Whereas the Chinese Dhammapada is longer than the Indian texts, the Chinese version of Milinda's Questions[771] is much shorter and omits books iv-vii. It was made between 317 and 420 A.D. and the inference is that the original Indian text received later additions.

A more important problem is this: what is the relation to the Pali Canon of the Chinese texts bearing titles corresponding to Dîrgha, Madhyama, Samyukta and Ekottara? These collections of sûtras do not call themselves Nikâya but A-han or Agama: the titles are translated as Ch'ang (long), Chung (medium), Tsa (miscellaneous) and Tseng-i, representing Ekottara rather than Anguttara[772]. There is hence prima facie reason to suppose that these works represent not the Pali Canon, but a somewhat similar Sanskrit collection. That one or many Sanskrit works may have coexisted with a somewhat similar Pali work is clearly shown by the Vinaya texts, for here we have the Pali Canon and Chinese translations of five Sanskrit versions, belonging to different schools, but apparently covering the same ground and partly identical. For the Sûtra Pitaka no such body of evidence is forthcoming, but the Sanskrit fragments of the Samyuktâgama found near Turfan contain parts of six sûtras which are arranged in the same order as in the Chinese translation and are apparently the original from which it was made. It is noticeable that three of the four great Agamas were translated by monks who came from Tukhara or Kabul. Guṇabhadra, however, the translator of the Samyuktâgama, came from Central India and the text which he translated was brought from Ceylon by Fa-Hsien. It apparently belonged to the Abhayagiri monastery and not to the Mahâvihâra. Nanjio[773], however, states that about half of it is repeated in the Chinese versions of the Madhyama and Ekottara Agamas. It is also certain that though the Chinese Agamas and Pali Nikâyas contain much common matter, it is differently distributed[774].

There was in India a copious collection of sûtras, existing primarily as oral tradition and varying in diction and arrangement, but codified from time to time in a written form. One of such codifications is represented by the Pali Canon, at least one other by the Sanskrit text which was rendered into Chinese. With rare exceptions the Chinese translations were from the Sanskrit[775]. The Sanskrit codification of the sûtra literature, while differing from the Pali in language and arrangement, is identical in doctrine and almost identical in substance. It is clearly the product of the same or similar schools, but is it earlier or later than the Pali or contemporary with it? The Chinese translations merely fix the latest possible date. A portion of the Samyuktâgama (Nanjio, No. 547) was translated by an unknown author between 220 and 280. This is probably an extract from the complete work which was translated about 440, but it would be difficult to prove that the Indian original was not augmented or rearranged between these dates. The earliest translation of a complete Agama is that of the Ekottarâgama, 384 A.D. But the evidence of inscriptions[776] shows that works known as Nikâyas existed in the third century B.C. The Sanskrit of the Agamas, so far as it is known from the fragments found in Central Asia, does not suggest that they belong to this epoch, but is compatible with the theory that they date from the time of Kanishka of which if we know little, we can at least say that it produced much Buddhist Sanskrit literature. M. Sylvain Lévi has suggested that the later appearance of the complete Vinaya in Chinese is due to the late compilation of the Sanskrit original[777]. It seems to me that other explanations are possible. The early translators were clearly shy of extensive works and until there was a considerable body of Chinese monks, to what public would these theological libraries appeal? Still, if any indication were forthcoming from India or Central Asia that the Sanskrit Agamas were arranged or rearranged in the early centuries of our era, the late date of the Chinese translations would certainly support it. But I am inclined to think that the Nikâyas were rewritten in Sanskrit about the beginning of our era, when it was felt that works claiming a certain position ought to be composed in what had become the general literary language of India[778]. Perhaps those who wrote them in Sanskrit were hardly conscious of making a translation in our sense, but simply wished to publish them in the best literary form.

It seems probable that the Hinayanist portion of the Chinese Tripitaka is in the main a translation of the Canon of the Sarvastivâdins which must have consisted of:

(1) Four Agamas or Nikâyas only, for the Dhammapada is placed outside the Sutta Pitaka.

(2) A voluminous Vinaya covering the same ground as the Pali recension but more copious in legend and anecdote.

(3) An Abhidharma entirely different from the Pali works bearing this name.

It might seem to follow from this that the whole Pali Abhidharma and some important works such as the Thera-Therîgâthâ were unknown to the Hinayanists of Central Asia and Northern India in the early centuries of our era. But caution is necessary in drawing such inferences, for until recently it might have been said that the Sutta Nipâta also was unknown, whereas fragments of it in a Sanskrit version have now been discovered in Eastern Turkestan[779]. The Chinese editors draw a clear distinction between Hinayanist and Mahayanist scriptures. They exclude from the latter works analogous to the Pali Nikâyas and Vinaya, and also the Abhidharma of the Sarvâstivâdins. But the labours of Hsüan Chuang and I-Ching show that this does not imply the rejection of all these works by Mahayanists.

5

Buddhist literary activity has an interesting side aspect, namely the expedients used to transliterate Indian words, which almost provided the Chinese with an alphabet. To some extent Indian names, particularly proper names possessing an obvious meaning, are translated. Thus Asoka becomes Wu-yu, without sorrow: Aśvaghosha, Ma-ming or horse-voice, and Udyâna simply Yüan or park[780]. But many proper names did not lend themselves to such renderings and it was a delicate business to translate theological terms like Nirvâṇa and Samâdhi. The Buddhists did not perhaps invent the idea of using the Chinese characters so as to spell with moderate precision[781], but they had greater need of this procedure than other writers and they used it extensively[782] and with such variety of detail that though they invented some fifteen different syllabaries, none of them obtained general acceptance and Julien[783] enumerates 3000 Chinese characters used to represent the sounds indicated by 47 Indian letters. Still, they gave currency[784] to the system known as fan-ch'ieh which renders a syllable phonetically by two characters, the final of the first and the initial of the second not being pronounced. Thus, in order to indicate the sound Chung, a Chinese dictionary will use the two characters chu yung, which are to be read together as Ch ung.

The transcriptions of Indian words vary in exactitude and the later are naturally better. Hsüan Chuang was a notable reformer and probably after his time Indian words were rendered in Chinese characters as accurately as Chinese words are now transcribed in Latin letters. It is true that modern pronunciation makes such renderings as Fo seem a strange distortion of the original. But it is an abbreviation of Fo-t'o and these syllables were probably once pronounced something like Vut-tha[785]. Similarly Wên-shu-shih-li[786] seems a parody of Manjuśri. But the evidence of modern dialects shows that the first two syllables may have been pronounced as Man-ju. The pupil was probably taught to eliminate the obscure vowel of shih, and li was taken as the nearest equivalent of ri, just as European authors write chih and tzŭ without pretending that they are more than conventional signs for Chinese sounds unknown to our languages. It was certainly possible to transcribe not only names but Sanskrit prayers and formulæ in Chinese characters, and though many writers sneer at the gibberish chanted by Buddhist priests yet I doubt if this ecclesiastical pronunciation, which has changed with that of the spoken language, is further removed from its original than the Latin of Oxford from the speech of Augustus.

Sanskrit learning flourished in China for a considerable period. In the time of the T'ang, the clergy numbered many serious students of Indian literature and the glossaries included in the Tripitaka show that they studied the original texts. Under the Sung dynasty (A.D. 1151) was compiled another dictionary of religious terms[787] and the study of Sanskrit was encouraged under the Yüan. But the ecclesiastics of the Ming produced no new translations and apparently abandoned the study of the original texts which was no longer kept alive by the arrival of learned men from India. It has been stated that Sanskrit manuscripts are still preserved in Chinese monasteries, but no details respecting such works are known to me. The statement is not improbable in itself[788] as is shown by the Library which Stein discovered at Tun-huang and by the Japanese palm-leaf manuscripts which came originally from China. A few copies of Sanskrit sûtras printed in China in the Lanja variety of the Devanâgari alphabet have been brought to Europe[789]. Max Müller published a facsimile of part of the Vajracchedikâ obtained at Peking and printed in Sanskrit from wooden blocks. The place of production is unknown, but the characters are similar to those used for printing Sanskrit in Tibet, as may be seen from another facsimile (No. 3) in the same work. Placards and pamphlets containing short invocations in Sanskrit and Tibetan are common in Chinese monasteries, particularly where there is any Lamaistic influence, but they do not imply that the monks who use them have any literary acquaintance with those languages.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 708: [Chinese: ] For an account of some of the scriptures here mentioned see chap. XX.]

[Footnote 709: A catalogue of the Chinese Translation of the Buddhist Tripitaka. Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1893. An index to the Tokyo edition has been published by Fujii. Meiji XXXI (1898). See too Forke, Katalog des Pekinger Tripitaka, 1916.]

[Footnote 710: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 711: Tan-i-ching [Chinese: ]. Some of the works classed under Tan-i-ching appear to exist in more than one form, e.g. Nanjio, Nos. 674 and 804.]

[Footnote 712: These characters are commonly read Pojo by Chinese Buddhists but the Japanese reading Hanṇya shows that the pronunciation of the first character was Pan.]

[Footnote 713: Vajracchedikâ or [Chinese: ] Chin Kang.]

[Footnote 714: Winternitz (Gesch. Ind. Lit. II. i. p. 242) states on the authority of Takakusu that this work is the same as the Gaṇḍavyûha. See also Pelliot in J. A. 1914, II. pp. 118-21. The Gaṇḍavyûha is probably an extract of the Avatamsaka.]

[Footnote 715: Nos. 113 and 114 [Chinese: ] and [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 716: Catena of Buddhist Scriptures, pp. 160 ff.]

[Footnote 717: The longer Sukhâvatîvyûha is placed in the Ratnakûta class.]

[Footnote 718: The Sûtra of Kuan-yin with the thousand hands and eyes is very popular and used in most temples. Nanjio, No. 320.]

[Footnote 719: No. 399 [Chinese: ] and 530 [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 720: Said to have been revealed to Asanga by Maitreya. No. 1170.]

[Footnote 721: [Chinese: ] No. 1087. It has nothing to do with the Pali Sûtra of the same name. Digha, I.]

[Footnote 722: See below for an account of it.]

[Footnote 723: Record of Buddhist Practices, p. 20.]

[Footnote 724: See Oldenberg, Vinaya, vol. I. pp. xxiv-xlvi.]

[Footnote 725: See Watters, Yüan Chwang, I. p. 227. The five schools are given as Dharmagupta, Mahîs'âsika, Sarvâstivâdin, Kâ'syapîya and Mahâsanghika. For the last Vatsiputra or Sthavira is sometimes substituted.]

[Footnote 726: Record of Buddhist Practices, p. 8.]

[Footnote 727: The Chinese word lun occurs frequently in them, but though it is used to translate Abhidharma, it is of much wider application and means discussion of Śâstra.]

[Footnote 728: See Watters, Yüan Chwang, I, pp. 355 ff.]

[Footnote 729: Nos. 1179, 1190, 1249.]

[Footnote 730: For a discussion of this literature see Takakusu on the Abhidharma Literature of the Sarvâstivâdins, J. Pali Text Society, 1905, pp. 67 ff.]

[Footnote 731: Nanjio, Cat. Nos. 1273, 1275, 1276, 1277, 1292, 1281, 1282, 1296, 1317. This last work was not translated till the eleventh century.]

[Footnote 732: Nanjio, Cat. Nos. 1263, 1267 and 1269.]

[Footnote 733: See Takakusu's study of these translations in B.E.F.E.O. 1904, pp. 1 ff. and pp. 978 ff.]

[Footnote 734: Nanjio, Cat. Nos. 1321, 1353, 1365, 1439.]

[Footnote 735: [Chinese: ] No. 1490.]

[Footnote 736: [Chinese: ] No. 1661. For more about the Patriarchs see the next chapter.]

[Footnote 737: [Chinese: ] No. 1524, written A.D. 1006.]

[Footnote 738: [Chinese: ] No. 1482.]

[Footnote 739: [Chinese: ] No. 1640.]

[Footnote 740: [Chinese: ] and [Chinese: ]. Nos. 1634 and 1594.]

[Footnote 741: See for some account of it Masson-Oursel's article in J.A. 1915, I. pp. 229-354.]

[Footnote 742: [Chinese: ] by [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 743: See chap. XX on the Mahayanist canon in India.]

[Footnote 744: It is described at the beginning as Ta Ming San Tsang, but strictly speaking it must be No. 12 of the list, as it contains a work said to have been written about 1622 A.D. (p. 468).]

[Footnote 745: Thus the Emperor Jên Tsung ordered the works of Ch'i Sung [Chinese: ] to be admitted to the Canton in 1062.]

[Footnote 746: Taken from Nanjio's Catalogue, p. xxvii.]

[Footnote 747: Ch'ien-Lung is said to have printed the Tripitaka in four languages, Chinese, Tibetan, Mongol and Manchu, the whole collection filling 1392 vols. See Möllendorf in China Branch, J.A.S. xxiv. 1890, p. 28.]

[Footnote 748: But according to another statement the southern recension was not the imperial collection begun in 1368 but a private edition now lost. See Nanjio, Cat. p. xxiii.]

[Footnote 749: See for the complete list Nanjio, Cat. p. xxvii. Those named above are (a) [Chinese: ], [Chinese: ], [Chinese: ], Nos. 1483, 1485, 1487, and (b) [Chinese: ], No. 1612. For the date of the first see Maspéro in B.E.F.E.O. 1910, p. 114. There was a still earlier catalogue composed by Tao-an in 374 of which only fragments have been preserved. See Pelliot in T'oung Pao, XIX. 1920, p. 258.]

[Footnote 750: For the Korean copy now in Japan, see Courant, Bibliographie coréenne, vol. III. pp. 215-19.]

[Footnote 751: See Nanjio, Cat. p. xxii.]

[Footnote 752: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 753: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 754: Also called Do-ko.]

[Footnote 755: The earlier collections of the Tripitaka seem to have been known in Korea and about 1000 A.D. the king procured from China a copy of the Imperial Edition, presumably the eighth collection (971 A.D.). He then ordered a commission of scholars to revise the text and publish an edition of his own. The copy of this edition, on which the recent Tokyo edition was founded, was brought to Japan in the Bun-mei period 1469-1486.]

[Footnote 756: A supplement to the Tripitaka containing non-canonical works in 750 volumes (Dai Nippon Zoku-Zōkyō) was published in 1911.]

[Footnote 757: The Peking Tripitaka catalogued by Forke appears to be a set of 1223 works represented by copies taken from four editions published in 1578, 1592, 1598 and 1735 A.D., all of which are editions of the collections numbered 11 and 12 above.]

[Footnote 758: For two interesting lives of translators see the T'oung Pao, 1909, p. 199, and 1905, p. 332, where will be found the biographies of Sêng Hui, a Sogdian who died in 280 and Jinagupta a native of Gandhâra (528-605).]

[Footnote 759: But between 266 and 313 Dharmaraksha translated the Saddharmapundarîka (including the additional chapters 21-26) and the Lalitavistara. His translation of the Prajñâpâramitâ is incomplete.]

[Footnote 760: In the translations of Lokâkshî 147-186, Chih-Ch'ien 223-243, Dharmaraksha 266-313.]

[Footnote 761: But his translation of the Lotus won admiration for its literary style. See Anesaki Nichiren, p. 17. Wieger (Croyances, p. 367) says that the works of An-shih-kao illustrate the various methods of translation: absolutely literal renderings which have hardly any meaning in Chinese: word for word translations to which is added a paraphrase of each sentence in Chinese idiom: and elegant renderings by a native in which the original text obviously suffers.]

[Footnote 762: Yet it must have been intended as such. The title expressly describes the work as composed by the Bodhisattva Ma-Ming (Aśvaghosha) and translated by Dharmaraksha. Though his idea of a translation was at best an amplified metrical paraphrase, yet he coincides verbally with the original so often that his work can hardly be described as an independent poem inspired by it.]

[Footnote 763: [Chinese: ] No. 203.]

[Footnote 764: See Sukhâvatîvyûha, ed. Max Müller and Bunyiu Nanjio, Oxford, 1883. In the preface, pp. vii-ix, is a detailed comparison of several translations and in an appendix, pp. 79 ff., a rendering of Sanghavarman's Chinese version of verses which occur in the work. Chinese critics say that Tao-an in the third century was the first to introduce a sound style of translation. He made no translations himself which have survived but was a scholar and commentator who influenced others.]

[Footnote 765: This is an anthology (edited by Beckh, 1911: translated by Rockhill, 1892) in which 300 verses are similar to the Pali Dhammapada.]

[Footnote 766: [Chinese: ] No. 1365.]

[Footnote 767: [Chinese: ] No. 1353.]

[Footnote 768: [Chinese: ] No. 1321.]

[Footnote 769: [Chinese: ] Fa-chi-yao-sung-ching, No. 1439.]

[Footnote 770: There seem to be at least two other collections. Firstly a Prâkrit anthology of which Dutreuil de Rhins discovered a fragmentary MS. in Khotan and secondly a much amplified collection preserved in the Korean Tripitaka and reprinted in the Tokyo edition (xxiv.'g). The relation of these to the other recensions is not clear.]

[Footnote 771: Nanjio, Cat. 1358. See Pelliot, J.A. 1914, II. p. 379.]

[Footnote 772: [Chinese: ] For the relations of the Chinese translations to the Pali Tripitaka, and to a Sanskrit Canon now preserved only in a fragmentary state, see inter alia, Nanjio, Cat. pp. 127 ff., especially Nos. 542, 543, 545. Anesaki, J.R.A.S. 1901, p. 895; id. "On some problems of the textual history of the Buddhist scriptures," in Trans. A. S. Japan, 1908, p. 81, and more especially his longer article entitled, "The Four Buddhist Agamas in Chinese" in the same year of the Trans.; id. "Traces of Pali Texts in a Mahâyana Treatise," Muséon, 1905. S. Lévi, Le Samyuktâgama Sanskrit, T'oung Pao, 1904, p. 297.]

[Footnote 773: No. 544.]

[Footnote 774: Thus seventy sûtras of the Pali Anguttara are found in the Chinese Madhyama and some of them are repeated in the Chinese Ekottara. The Pali Majjhima contains 125 sûtras, the Chinese Madhyamâgama 222, of which 98 are common to both. Also twenty-two Pali Majjhima dialogues are found in the Chinese Ekottara and Samyukta, seventy Chinese Madhyama dialogues in Pali Anguttara, nine in Digha, seven in Samyutta and five in Khuddaka. Anesaki, Some Problems of the textual history of the Buddhist Scriptures. See also Anesaki in Muséon, 1905, pp. 23 ff. on the Samyutta Nikâya.]

[Footnote 775: Anesaki, "Traces of Pali Texts," Muséon, 1905, shows that the Indian author of the Mahâprajnâpâramitâ Sâstra may have known Pali texts, but the only certain translation from the Pali appears to be Nanjio, No. 1125, which is a translation of the Introduction to Buddhaghosa's Samanta-pâsâdikâ or commentary on the Vinaya. See Takakusu in J.R.A.S. 1896, p. 415. Nanjio's restoration of the title as Sudarśana appears to be incorrect.]

[Footnote 776: See Epigraphia Indica, vol. II. p. 93.]

[Footnote 777: In support of this it may be mentioned that Fa-Hsien says that at the time of his visit to India the Vinaya of the Sarvâstivâdins was preserved orally and not committed to writing.]

[Footnote 778: The idea that an important book ought to be in Sanskrit or deserves to be turned into Sanskrit is not dead in India. See Grierson, J.R.A.S. 1913, p. 133, who in discussing a Sanskrit version of the Râmâyana of Tulsi Das mentions that translations of vernacular works into Sanskrit are not uncommon.]

[Footnote 779: J.R.A.S. 1916, p. 709. Also, the division into five Nikâyas is ancient. See Bühler in Epig. Indica, II. p. 93. Anesaki says (Trans. A.S. Japan, 1908, p. 9) that Nanjio, No. 714, Pên Shih is the Itivuttakam, which could not have been guessed from Nanjio's entry. Portions of the works composing the fifth Nikâya (e.g. the Sutta Nipata) occur in the Chinese Tripitaka in the other Nikâyas. For mentions of the fifth Nikâya in Chinese, see J.A. 1916, II. pp. 32-33, where it is said to be called Tsa-Tsang. This is also the designation of the last section of the Tripitaka, Nanjio, Nos. 1321 to 1662, and as this section contains the Dharmapada, it might be supposed to be an enormously distended version of the Kshudraka Nikâya. But this can hardly be the case, for this Tsa-Tsang is placed as if it was considered as a fourth Piṭaka rather than as a fifth Nikâya.]

[Footnote 780: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 781: See Watters, Essays on the Chinese Language, pp. 36, 51, and, for the whole subject of transcription, Stanislas Julien, Méthode pour déchiffrer et transcrire les noms Sanscrits qui se rencontrent dans les livres chinois.]

[Footnote 782: Entire Sanskrit compositions were sometimes transcribed in Chinese characters. See Kien Ch'ui Fan Tsan, Bibl. Budd. XV. and Max Müller, Buddhist Texts from Japan, III. pp. 35-46.]

[Footnote 783: L.c. pp. 83-232.]

[Footnote 784: See inter alia the Preface to K'ang Hsi's Dictionary. The fan-ch'ieh [Chinese: ] system is used in the well-known dictionary called Yü-Pien composed 543 A.D.]

[Footnote 785: Even in modern Cantonese Fo is pronounced as Fat.]

[Footnote 786: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 787: Nanjio, Cat. No. 1640.]

[Footnote 788: History repeats itself. I have seen many modern Burmese and Sinhalese MSS. in Chinese monasteries.]

[Footnote 789: Buddhist Texts from Japan, ed. Max Müller in Anecdota Oxoniensia, Aryan Series, I, II and III. For the Lanja printed text see the last facsimile in I, also III. p. 34 and Bibl. Budd. XIV (Kuan-si-im Pusar), pp. vi, vii. Another copy of this Lanja printed text was bought in Kyoto, 1920.]

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us

XLV. CHINA (continued)

SCHOOLS[790] OF CHINESE BUDDHISM

The Schools (Tsung) of Chinese Buddhism are an intricate subject of little practical importance, for observers agree that at the present day all salient differences of doctrine and practice have been obliterated, although the older monasteries may present variations in details and honour their own line of teachers. A particular Bodhisattva may be singled out for reverence in one locality or some religious observance may be specially enjoined, but there is little aggressiveness or self assertion among the sects, even if they are conscious of having a definite name: they each tolerate the deities, rites and books of all and pay attention to as many items as leisure and inertia permit. There is no clear distinction between Mahâyâna and Hînayâna.

The main division is of course into Lamaism on one side and all remaining sects on the other. Apart from this we find a record of ten schools which deserve notice for various reasons. Some, though obscure in modern China, have flourished after transportation to Japan: some, such as the T'ien-t'ai, are a memorial of a brilliant epoch: some represent doctrines which, if not now held by separate bodies, at least indicate different tendencies, such as magical ceremonies, mystical contemplation, or faith in Amitâbha.

The more important schools were comparatively late, for they date from the sixth and seventh centuries. For two or three hundred years the Buddhists of China were a colony of strangers, mainly occupied in making translations. By the fifth century the extent and diversity of Indian literature became apparent and Fa-Hsien went to India to ascertain which was the most correct Vinaya and to obtain copies of it. Theology was now sufficiently developed to give rise to two schools both Indian in origin and merely transported to China, known as Ch'êng-shih-tsung and San-lun-tsung[791].

The first is considered as Hinayanist and equivalent to the Sautrântikas[792]. In the seventh century it passed over to Japan where it is known as Ji-jitsu-shu, but neither there nor in China had it much importance. The San-lun-tsung recognizes as three authorities (from which it takes its name) the Mâdhyamikaśâstra and Dvâdasanikâyaśâstra of Nâgârjuna with the Śataśâstra of his pupil Deva. It is simply the school of these two doctors and represents the extreme of Mahayanism. It had some importance in Japan, where it was called San-Ron-Shu.

The arrival of Bodhidharma at Canton in 520 (or 526) was a great event for the history of Buddhist dogma, although his special doctrines did not become popular until much later. He introduced the contemplative school and also the institution of the Patriarchate, which for a time had some importance. He wrote no books himself, but taught that true knowledge is gained in meditation by intuition[793] and communicated by transference of thought. The best account of his teaching is contained in the Chinese treatise which reports the sermon preached by him before the Emperor Wu-Ti in 520[794]. The chief thesis of this discourse is that the only true reality is the Buddha nature[795] in the heart of every man. Prayer, asceticism and good works are vain. All that man need do is to turn his gaze inward and see the Buddha in his own heart. This vision, which gives light and deliverance, comes in a moment. It is a simple, natural act like swallowing or dreaming which cannot be taught or learnt, for it is not something imparted but an experience of the soul, and teaching can only prepare the way for it. Some are impeded by their karma and are physically incapable of the vision, whatever their merits or piety may be, but for those to whom it comes it is inevitable and convincing.

We have only to substitute âtman for Buddha or Buddha nature to see how closely this teaching resembles certain passages in the Upanishads, and the resemblance is particularly strong in such statements as that the Buddha nature reveals itself in dreams, or that it is so great that it embraces the universe and so small that the point of a needle cannot prick it. The doctrine of Mâyâ is clearly indicated, even if the word was not used in the original, for it is expressly said that all phenomena are unreal. Thus the teaching of Bodhidharma is an anticipation of Śankara's monism, but it is formulated in consistently Buddhist language and is in harmony with the views of the Mâdhyamika school and of the Diamond-cutter. This Chinese sermon confirms other evidence which indicates that the ideas of the Advaita philosophy, though Brahmanic in their origin and severely condemned by Gotama himself, were elaborated in Buddhist circles before they were approved by orthodox Hindus.

Bodhidharma's teaching was Indian but it harmonized marvellously with Taoism and Chinese Buddhists studied Taoist books[796]. A current of Chinese thought which was old and strong, if not the main stream, bade man abstain from action and look for peace and light within. It was, I think, the junction of this native tributary with the river of inflowing Buddhism which gave the Contemplative School its importance. It lost that importance because it abandoned its special doctrines and adopted the usages of other schools. When Taoism flourished under the Sung Emperors it was also flourishing and influenced art as well as thought, but it probably decayed under the Yüan dynasty which favoured religion of a different stamp. It is remarkable that Bodhidharma appears to be unknown to both Indian and Tibetan[797] writers but his teaching has imparted a special tone and character to a section (though not the whole) of Far Eastern Buddhism. It is called in Chinese Tsung-mên or Ch'an-tsung, but this word Ch'an[798] is perhaps better known to Europe in its Japanese form Zen.

Bodhidharma is also accounted the twenty-eighth Patriarch, a title which represents the Chinese Tsu Shih[799] rather than any Indian designation, for though in Pali literature we hear of the succession of teachers[800], it is not clear that any of them enjoyed a style or position such as is implied in the word Patriarch. Hindus have always attached importance to spiritual lineage and every school has a list of teachers who have transmitted its special lore, but the sense of hierarchy is so weak that it is misleading to describe these personages as Popes, Patriarchs or Bishops, and apart from the personal respect which the talents of individuals may have won, it does not appear that there was any succession of teachers who could be correctly termed heads of the Church. Even in China such a title is of dubious accuracy for whatever position Bodhidharma and his successors may have claimed for themselves, they were not generally accepted as being more than the heads of a school and other schools also gave their chief teachers the title of Tsu-shih. From time to time the Emperor appointed overseers of religion with the title of Kuo-shih[801], instructor of the nation, but these were officials appointed by the Crown, not prelates consecrated by the Church.

Twenty-eight Patriarchs are supposed to have flourished between the death of the Buddha and the arrival of Bodhidharma in China. The Chinese lists[802] do not in the earlier part agree with the Singhalese accounts of the apostolic succession and contain few eminent names with the exception of Aśvaghosha, Nâgârjuna, Deva and Vasubandhu.

According to most schools there were only twenty-four Patriarchs. These are said to have been foretold by the Buddha and twenty-four is a usual number in such series[803]. The twenty-fourth Patriarch Simha Bhikshu or Simhâlaputra went to Kashmir and suffered martyrdom there at the hands of Mihirakula[804] without appointing a successor. But the school of Bodhidharma continues the series, reckoning him as the twenty-eighth, and the first of the Chinese Patriarchs. Now since the three Patriarchs between the martyr and Bodhidharma are all described as living in southern India, whereas such travellers as Fa-Hsien obviously thought that the true doctrine was to be found in northern India, and since Bodhidharma left India altogether, it is probable that the later Patriarchs represent the spiritual genealogy of some school which was not the Church as established at Nâlandâ[805].

It will be convenient to summarize briefly here the history of Bodhidharma's school. Finding that his doctrines were not altogether acceptable to the Emperor Wu-Ti (who did not relish being told that his pious exertions were vain works of no value) he retired to Lo-yang and before his death designated as his successor Hui-k'o. It is related of Hui-k'o that when he first applied for instruction he could not attract Bodhidharma's attention and therefore stood before the sage's door during a whole winter night until the snow reached his knees. Bodhidharma indicated that he did not think this test of endurance remarkable. Hui-k'o then took a knife, cut off his own arm and presented it to the teacher who accepted him as a pupil and ultimately gave him the insignia of the Patriarchate--a robe and bowl. He taught for thirty-four years and is said to have mixed freely with the lowest and most debauched reprobates. His successors were Sêng-ts'an, Tao-hsin, Hung-jên, and Hui-nêng[806] who died in 713 and declined to nominate a successor, saying that the doctrine was well established. The bowl of Bodhidharma was buried with him. Thus the Patriarch was not willing to be an Erastian head of the Church and thought the Church could get on without him. The object of the Patriarchate was simply to insure the correct transmission from teacher to scholar of certain doctrines, and this precaution was especially necessary in sects which rejected scriptural authority and relied on personal instruction. So soon as there were several competent teachers handing on the tradition such a safeguard was felt to be unnecessary.

That this feeling was just is shown by the fact that the school of Bodhidharma is still practically one in teaching. But its small regard for scripture and insistence on oral instruction caused the principal monasteries to regard themselves as centres with an apostolic succession of their own and to form divisions which were geographical rather than doctrinal. They are often called school (tsung), but the term is not correct, if it implies that the difference is similar to that which separates the Ch'an-tsung and Lü-tsung or schools of contemplation and of discipline. Even in the lifetime of Hui-nêng there seems to have been a division, for he is sometimes called the Patriarch of the South, Shên-Hsiu[807] being recognized as Patriarch of the North. But all subsequent divisions of the Ch'an-tsung trace their lineage to Hui-nêng. Two of his disciples founded two schools called Nan Yüeh and Ch'ing Yüan[808] and between the eighth and tenth centuries these produced respectively two and three subdivisions, known together as Wu-tsung or five schools. They take their names from the places where their founders dwelt and are the schools of Wei-Yang, Lin-Chi, Ts'ao-Tung, Yün-Mên and Fa-Yen[809]. This is the chronological order, but the most important school is the Lin-Chi, founded by I-Hsüan[810], who resided on the banks of a river[811] in Chih-li and died in 867. It is not easy to discriminate the special doctrines[812] of the Lin-Chi for it became the dominant form of the school to such an extent that other variants are little more than names. But it appears to have insisted on the transmission of spiritual truths not only by oral instruction but by a species of telepathy between teacher and pupil culminating in sudden illumination. At the present day the majority of Chinese monasteries profess to belong to the Ch'an-tsung and it has encroached on other schools. Thus it is now accepted on the sacred island of P'uto which originally followed the Lü-tsung.

Although the Ch'an school did not value the study of scripture as part of the spiritual life, yet it by no means neglected letters and can point to a goodly array of ecclesiastical authors, extending down to modern times[813]. More than twenty of their treatises have been admitted into the Tripitaka. Several of these are historical and discuss the succession of Patriarchs and abbots, but the most characteristic productions of the sect are collections of aphorisms, usually compiled by the disciples of a teacher who himself committed nothing to writing[814].

In opposition to the Contemplative School or Tsung-mên, all the others are sometimes classed together as Chiao-mên. This dichotomy perhaps does no more than justice to the importance of Bodhidharma's school, but is hardly scientific, for, whatever may be the numerical proportion, the other schools differ from one another as much as they differ from it. They all agree in recognizing the authority not only of a founder but of a special sacred book. We may treat first of one which, like the Tsung-mên, belongs specially to the Buddhism of the Far East and is both an offshoot of the Tsung-mên and a protest against it--there being nothing incompatible in this double relationship. This is the T'ien-t'ai[815] school which takes its name from a celebrated monastery in the province of Chê-kiang. The founder of this establishment and of the sect was called Chih-K'ai or Chih-I[816] and followed originally Bodhidharma's teaching, but ultimately rejected the view that contemplation is all-sufficient, while still claiming to derive his doctrine from Nâgârjuna. He had a special veneration for the Lotus Sûtra and paid attention to ceremonial. He held that although the Buddha-mind is present in all living beings, yet they do not of themselves come to the knowledge and use of it, so that instruction is necessary to remove error and establish true ideas. The phrase Chih-kuan[817] is almost the motto of the school: it is a translation of the two words Samatha and Vipassanâ, taken to mean calm and insight.

The T'ien-T'ai is distinguished by its many-sided and almost encyclopædic character. Chih-I did not like the exclusiveness of the Contemplative School. He approved impartially of ecstasy, literature, ceremonial and discipline: he wished to find a place for everything and a point of view from which every doctrine might be admitted to have some value. Thus he divided the teaching of the Buddha into five periods, regarded as progressive not contradictory, and expounded respectively in (a) the Hua-yen Sûtra; (b) the Hînayâna Sûtras; (c) the Lêng-yen-ching; (d) the Prajnâ-pâramitâ; (e) the Lotus Sûtra which is the crown, quintessence and plenitude of all Buddhism. He also divided religion into eight parts[818], sometimes counted as four, the latter half of the list being the more important. The names are collection, progress, distinction and completion. These terms indicate different ways of looking at religion, all legitimate but not equally comprehensive or just in perspective. By collection is meant the Hînayâna, the name being apparently due to the variously catalogued phenomena which occupy the disciple in the early stages of his progress: the scriptures, divisions of the universe, states of the human minds and so on. Progress (T'ung, which might also be rendered as transition or communication) is applicable to the Hîna and Mahâyanâ alike and regards the religious life as a series of stages rising from the state of an unconverted man to that of a Buddha. Pieh, or distinction, is applicable only to the Mahâyanâ and means the special excellences of a Bodhisattva. Yüan, completeness or plenitude, is the doctrine of the Lotus which embraces all aspects of religion. In a similar spirit of synthesis and conciliation Chih-I uses Nâgârjuna's view that truth is not of one kind. From the stand-point of absolute truth all phenomena are void or unreal; on the other hand they are indubitably real for practical purposes. More just is the middle view which builds up the religious character. It sees that all phenomena both exist and do not exist and that thought cannot content itself with the hypothesis either of their real existence or of the void. Chih-I's teaching as to the nature of the Buddha is almost theistic. It regards the fundamental (pên) Buddhahood as not merely the highest reality but as constant activity exerting itself for the good of all beings. Distinguished from this fundamental Buddhahood is the derivative Buddhahood or trace (chi) left by the Buddha among men to educate them. There has been considerable discussion in the school as to the relative excellence of the pên and the chi[819].

The T'ien-T'ai school is important, not merely for its doctrines, but as having produced a great monastic establishment and an illustrious line of writers. In spite of the orders of the Emperor who wished to retain him at Nanking, Chih-I retired to the highlands of Chê-Kiang and twelve monasteries still mark various spots where he is said to have resided. He had some repute as an author, but more as a preacher. His words were recorded by his disciple Kuan-Ting[820] and in this way have been preserved two expositions of the Lotus and a treatise on his favourite doctrine of Chih-Kuan which together are termed the San-ta-pu, or Three Great Books. Similar spoken expositions of other sûtras are also preserved. Some smaller treatises on his chief doctrines seem to be works of his own pen[821]. A century later Chan-Jan[822], who is reckoned the ninth Patriarch of the T'ien-t'ai school, composed commentaries on the Three Great Books as well as some short original works. During the troubled period of the Five Dynasties, the T'ien-t'ai monasteries suffered severely and the sacred books were almost lost. But the school had a branch in Korea and a Korean priest called Ti-Kuan[823] re-established it in China. It continued to contribute literature to the Tripitaka until 1270 but after the tenth century its works, though numerous, lose their distinctive character and are largely concerned with magical formulæ and the worship of Amida.

The latter is the special teaching of the Pure Land school, also known as the Lotus school, or the Short Cut[824]. It is indeed a short cut to salvation, striking unceremoniously across all systems, for it teaches that simple faith in Amitâbha (Amida) and invocation of his name can take the place of moral and intellectual endeavour. Its popularity is in proportion to its facility: its origin is ancient, its influence universal, but perhaps for this very reason its existence as a corporation is somewhat indistinct. It is also remarkable that though the Chinese Tripitaka contains numerous works dedicated to the honour of Amitâbha, yet they are not described as composed by members of the Pure Land school but appear to be due to authors of all schools[825].

The doctrine, if not the school, was known in China before 186, in which year there died at Lo-yang, a monk of the Yüeh-chih called Lokâkshi, who translated the longer Sukhâvatî-vyûha. So far as I know, there is no reason for doubting these statements[826]. The date is important for the history of doctrine, since it indicates that the sûtra existed in Sanskrit some time previously. Another translation by the Parthian An Shih-Kao, whose activity falls between 148 and 170 A.D. may have been earlier and altogether twelve translations were made before 1000 A.D. of which five are extant[827]. Several of the earlier translators were natives of Central Asia, so it is permissible to suppose that the sûtra was esteemed there. The shorter Sukhâvatî-vyûha was translated by Kumârajîva (c. 402) and later by Hsüan Chuang. The Amitâyurdhyânasûtra was translated by Kâlayaśas about 424. These three books[828] are the principal scriptures of the school and copies of the greater Sukhâvatî may still be found in almost every Chinese monastery, whatever principles it professes.

Hui Yüan[829] who lived from 333 to 416 is considered as the founder of the school. He was in his youth an enthusiastic Taoist and after he turned Buddhist is said to have used the writings of Chuang-tzŭ to elucidate his new faith. He founded a brotherhood, and near the monastery where he settled was a pond in which lotus flowers grew, hence the brotherhood was known as the White Lotus school[830]. For several centuries[831] it enjoyed general esteem. Pan-chou, one of its Patriarchs, received the title of Kuo-shih about 770 A.D., and Shan-tao, who nourished about 650 and wrote commentaries, was one of its principal literary men[832]. He popularized the doctrine of the Pai-tao or White Way, that is, the narrow bridge leading to Paradise across which Amitâbha will guide the souls of the faithful. But somehow the name of White Lotus became connected with conspiracy and rebellion until it was dreaded as the title of a formidable secret society, and ceased to be applied to the school as a whole. The teaching and canonical literature of the Pure Land school did not fall into disrepute but since it was admitted by other sects to be, if not the most excellent way, at least a permissible short cut to heaven, it appears in modern times less as a separate school than as an aspect of most schools[833]. The simple and emotional character of Amidism, the directness of its "Come unto me," appeal so strongly to the poor and uneducated, that no monastery or temple could afford to neglect it.

Two important Indian schools were introduced into China in the sixth and seventh centuries respectively and flourished until about 900 A.D. when they began to decay. These are the Chü-shê-tsung and Fa-hsiang-tsung[834]. The first name is merely a Chinese transcription of the Sanskrit Ko'sa and is due to the fact that the chief authority of the school is the Abhidharmakośaśâstra of Vasubandhu[835]. This work expounds the doctrine of the Sarvâstivâdins, but in a liberal spirit and without ignoring other views. Though the Chü-shê-tsung represented the best scholastic tradition of India more adequately than any other Chinese sect, yet it was too technical and arid to become popular and both in China and Japan (where it is known as Kusha-shu) it was a system of scholastic philosophy rather than a form of religion. In China it did not last many centuries.

The Fa-Hsiang school is similar inasmuch as it represented Indian scholasticism and remained, though much esteemed, somewhat academic. The name is a translation of Dharmalakshaṇa and the school is also known as Tz'ŭ-ên-tsung[836], and also as Wei-shih-hsiang-chiao because its principal text-book is the Ch'êng-wei-shih-lun[837]. This name, equivalent to Vidyâmâtra, or Vijnânamâtra, is the title of a work by Hsüan Chuang which appears to be a digest of ten Sanskrit commentaries on a little tract of thirty verses ascribed to Vasubandhu. As ultimate authorities the school also recognizes the revelations made to Asanga by Maitreya[838] and probably the Mahâyânasûtrâlankâra[839] expresses its views. It claims as its founder Śîlabhadra the teacher of Hsüan Chuang, but the latter was its real parent.

Closely allied to it but reckoned as distinct is the school called the Hua-yen-tsung[840] because it was based on the Hua-yen-ching or Avatamsakasûtra. The doctrines of this work and of Nâgârjuna may be conveniently if not quite correctly contrasted as pantheistic and nihilistic. The real founder and first patriarch was Tu-Fa-Shun who died in 640 but the school sometimes bears the name of Hsien-Shou, the posthumous title of its third Patriarch who contributed seven works to the Tripitaka[841]. It began to wane in the tenth century but has a distinguished literary record.

The Lü-tsung or Vinaya school[842] was founded by Tao Hsüan (595-667). It differs from those already mentioned inasmuch as it emphasizes discipline and asceticism as the essential part of the religious life. Like the T'ien-t'ai this school arose in China. It bases itself on Indian authorities, but it does not appear that in thus laying stress on the Vinaya it imitated any Indian sect, although it caught the spirit of the early Hînayâna schools. The numerous works of the founder indicate a practical temperament inclined not to mysticism or doctrinal subtlety but to biography, literary history and church government. Thus he continued the series called Memoirs of Eminent Monks and wrote on the family and country of the Buddha. He compiled a catalogue of the Tripitaka, as it was in his time, and collections of extracts, as well as of documents relating to the controversies between Buddhists and Taoists[843]. Although he took as his chief authority the Dharmagupta Vinaya commonly known as the Code in Four Sections, he held, like most Chinese Buddhists, that there is a complete and perfect doctrine which includes and transcends all the vehicles. But he insisted, probably as a protest against the laxity or extravagance of many monasteries, that morality and discipline are the indispensable foundation of the religious life. He was highly esteemed by his contemporaries and long after his death the Emperor Mu-tsung (821-5) wrote a poem in his honour. The school is still respected and it is said that the monks of its principal monastery, Pao-hua-shan in Kiangsu, are stricter and more learned than any other.

The school called Chên-yen (in Japanese Shin-gon), true word, or Mi-chiao[844], secret teaching, equivalent to the Sanskrit Mantrayâna or Tantrayâna, is the latest among the recognized divisions of Chinese Buddhism since it first made its appearance in the eighth century. The date, like that of the translation of the Amida scriptures is important, for the school was introduced from India and it follows that its theories and practices were openly advocated at this period and probably were not of repute much earlier. It is akin to the Buddhism of Tibet and may be described in its higher aspects as an elaborate and symbolic pantheism, which represents the one spirit manifesting himself in a series of emanations and reflexes. In its popular and unfortunately commoner aspect it is simply polytheism, fetichism and magic. In many respects it resembles the Pure Land school. Its principal deity (the word is not inaccurate) is Vairocana, analogous to Amitâbha, and probably like him a Persian sun god in origin. It is also a short cut to salvation, for, without denying the efficiency of more laborious and ascetic methods, it promises to its followers a similar result by means of formulæ and ceremonies. Like the Pure Land school it has become in China not so much a separate corporation as an aspect, and often the most obvious and popular aspect, of all Buddhist schools.

It claims Vajrabodhi as its first Patriarch. He was a monk of the Brahman caste who arrived in China from southern India[845] in 719 and died in 730 after translating several Tantras and spells. His companion and successor was Amoghavajra of whose career something has already been said. The fourth Patriarch, Hui Kuo, was the instructor of the celebrated Japanese monk Kobo Daishi who established the school in Japan under the name of Shingon[846].

The principal scripture of this sect is the Ta-jih-ching or sûtra of the Sun-Buddha[847]. A distinction is drawn between exoteric and esoteric doctrine (the "true word") and the various phases of Buddhist thought are arranged in ten classes. Of these the first nine are merely preparatory, but in the last or esoteric phase, the adept becomes a living Buddha and receives full intuitive knowledge. In this respect the Tantric school resembles the teaching of Bodhidharma but not in detail. It teaches that Vairocana is the whole world, which is divided into Garbhadhâtu (material) and Vajradhâtu (indestructible), the two together forming Dharmadhâtu. The manifestations of Vairocana's body to himself--that is Buddhas and Bodhisattvas--are represented symbolically by diagrams of several circles[848]. But it would be out of place to dwell further on the dogmatic theology of the school, for I cannot discover that it was ever of importance in China whatever may have been its influence in Japan. What appealed only too powerfully to Chinese superstition was the use of spells, charms and magical formulæ and the doctrine that since the universe is merely idea, thoughts and facts are equipollent. This doctrine (which need not be the outcome of metaphysics, but underlies the magical practices of many savage tribes) produced surprising results when applied to funeral ceremonies, which in China have always formed the major part of religion, for it was held that ceremonial can represent and control the fortunes of the soul, that is to say that if a ceremony represents figuratively the rescue of a soul from a pool of blood, then the soul which is undergoing that punishment will be delivered. It was not until the latter part of the eighth century that such theories and ceremonies were accepted by Chinese Buddhism, but they now form a large part of it.

Although in Japan Buddhism continued to produce new schools until the thirteenth century, no movement in China attained this status after about 730, and Lamaism, though its introduction produced considerable changes in the north, is not usually reckoned as a Tsung. But numerous societies and brotherhoods arose especially in connection with the Pure Land school and are commonly spoken of as sects. They differ from the schools mentioned above in having more or less the character of secret societies, sometimes merely brotherhoods like the Freemasons but sometimes political in their aims. Among those whose tenets are known that which has most religion and least politics in its composition appears to be the Wu-wei-chiao[849], founded about 1620 by one Lo-tsu[850] who claimed to have received a revelation contained in five books. It is strictly vegetarian and antiritualistic, objecting to the use of images, incense and candles in worship.

There are many other sects with a political tinge. The proclivity of the Chinese to guilds, corporations and secret societies is well known and many of these latter have a religious basis. All such bodies are under the ban of the Government, for they have always been suspected with more or less justice of favouring anti-social or anti-dynastic ideas. But, mingled with such political aspirations, there is often present the desire for co-operation in leading privately a religious life which, if made public, would be hampered by official restrictions. The most celebrated of these sects is the White Lotus. Under the Yüan dynasty it was anti-Mongol, and prepared the way for the advent of the Ming. When the Ming dynasty in its turn became decadent, we hear again of the White Lotus coupled with rebellion, and similarly after the Manchus had passed their meridian, its beautiful but ill-omened name frequently appears. It seems clear that it is an ancient and persistent society with some idea of creating a millennium, which becomes active when the central government is weak and corrupt. Not unlike the White Lotus is the secret society commonly known as the Triad but called by its members the Heaven and Earth Association. The T'ai-p'ing sect, out of which the celebrated rebellion arose, was similar but its inspiration seems to have come from a perversion of Christianity. The Tsai-Li sect[851] is still prevalent in Peking, Tientsin, and the province of Shantung. I should exceed the scope of my task if I attempted to examine these sects in detail[852], for their relation to Buddhism is often doubtful. Most of them combine with it Taoist and other beliefs and some of them expect a Messiah or King of Righteousness who is usually identified with Maitreya. It is easy to see how at this point hostility to the existing Government arises and provokes not unnatural resentment[853].

Recently several attempts have been made to infuse life and order into Chinese Buddhism. Japanese influence can be traced in most of them and though they can hardly be said to represent a new school, they attempt to go back to Mahayanism as it was when first introduced into China. The Hinâyâna is considered as a necessary preliminary to the Mahâyâna and the latter is treated as existing in several schools, among which are included the Pure Land school, though the Contemplative and Tantric schools seem not to be regarded with favour. They are probably mistrusted as leading to negligence and superstition[854].

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 790: [Chinese: ] See especially Hackmann, "Die Schulen des chinesischen Buddhismus" (in the Mitth. Seminars für Orientalische Sprachen, Berlin, 1911), which contains the text and translation of an Essay by a modern Chinese Buddhist, Yang Wên Hui. Such a review of Chinese sects from the contemporary Buddhist point of view has great value, but it does not seem to me that Mr. Yang explains clearly the dogmatic tenets of each sect, the obvious inference being that such tenets are of little practical importance. Chinese monasteries often seem to combine several schools. Thus the Tz'ŭ-Fu-Ssŭ monastery near Peking professes to belong both to the Lin-Chi and Pure Land schools and its teachers expound the Diamond-cutter, Lotus and Shou-Lêng-Ching. So also in India. See Rhys Davids in article Sects Buddhist, E.R.E. Hackmann gives a list of authorities. Edkins, Chinese Buddhism (chaps. VII and VIII), may still be consulted, though the account is far from clear.]

[Footnote 791: [Chinese: ] and [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 792: It based itself on the Satyasiddhiśâstra of Harivarman, Nanjio, Cat. 1274.]

[Footnote 793: This meditation however is of a special sort. The six Pâramitâs are, Dâna, Sîla, Kshanti, Vîrya, Dhyâna and Prajñâ. The meditation of Bodhidharma is not the Dhyâna of this list, but meditation on Prajñâ, the highest of the Pâramitâs. See Hackmann's Chinese text, p. 249.]

[Footnote 794: Ta-mo-hsüe-mai-lun, analyzed by Wieger in his Histoire des Croyances religieuses en Chine, pp. 520 ff. I could wish for more information about this work, but have not been able to find the original.]

[Footnote 795: Also called Fa-shên or dharmakâya in the discourse. Bodhidharma said that he preached the seal of the heart (hsinyin). This probably corresponds to some Sanskrit expression, but I have not found the Indian equivalent.]

[Footnote 796: I-Ching, in his Memoirs of Eminent Monks, mentions three pilgrims as having studied the works of Chuang-tzŭ and his own style shows that he was well-read in this author.]

[Footnote 797: He is not mentioned by Târanâtha.]

[Footnote 798: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 799: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 800: Acâriyaparamparâ. There is a list of such teachers in Mahâvaṃsa, V. 95 ff., Dîpavaṃsa, IV. 27 ff. and V. 69.]

[Footnote 801: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 802: The succession of Patriarchs is the subject of several works comprised in the Chinese Tripitaka. Of these the Fu-fa-tsang-yin-yüan-ching (Nanjio, 1340) is the most important, because it professes to be translated (A.D. 472) from an Indian work, which, however, is not in the Tibetan Canon and is not known in Sanskrit. The Chinese text, as we have it, is probably not a translation from the Sanskrit, but a compilation made in the sixth century which, however, acquired considerable authority. See Maspéro in Mélanges d'Indianisme: Sylvain Lévi, pp. 129-149, and _B.E.F.E.O._1911, pp. 344-348. Other works are the Fo-tsu-t'ung-chi (Nanjio, 1661), of Chih P'an (c. 1270), belonging to the T'ien-t'ai school, and the Ching-tê-ch'uan-têng-lu together with the Tsung-mên-t'ung-yao-hsü-chi (Nanjio, 1524, 1526) both belonging to the school of Bodhidharma. See also Nanjio, 1528, 1529. The common list of Patriarchs is as follows: 1. Mahâkâśyapa; 2. Ananda; 3. Śanavâsa or Śanakavâsa; 4. Upagupta; 5. Dhṛitaka; 6. Micchaka. Here the name of Vasumitra is inserted by some but omitted by others; 7. Buddhanandi; 8. Buddhamitra; 9. Pârśva; 10. Punyayasas; 11. Aśvaghosha; 12. Kapimala; 13. Nâgârjuna; 14. Deva (Kâṇadeva); 15. Râhulata; 16. Sanghanandi; 17. Sanghayaśas; 18. Kumârata; 19. Jayata; 20. Vasubandhu; 21. Manura; 22. Haklena or Padmaratna; 23. Simha Bhikshu; 24. Basiasita; 25. Putṇomita or Punyamitra; 26. Prajnâtara; 27 (or 28, if Vasumitra is reckoned) Bodhidharma. Many of these names are odd and are only conjectural restorations made from the Chinese transcription, for which see Nanjio, 1340. Other lists of Patriarchs vary from that given above, partly because they represent the traditions of other schools. It is not strange, for instance, if the Sarvâstivâdins did not recognize Nâgârjuna as a Patriarch. Two of their lists have been preserved by Sêng-yu (Nanjio, 1476) who wrote about 520. Some notes on the Patriarchs and reproductions of Chinese pictures representing them will be found in Doré, pp. 244 ff. It is extremely curious that Aśvaghosha is represented as a woman.]

[Footnote 803: It is found, for instance, in the lists of the Jain Tirthankaras and in some accounts of the Buddhas and of the Avatâras of Vishnu.]

[Footnote 804: See Watters, Yüan Chwang, p. 290. But the dates offer some difficulty, for Mihirakula, the celebrated Hun chieftain, is usually supposed to have reigned about 510-540 A.D. Târanâtha (Schiefner, p. 95) speaks of a martyr called Mâlikabuddhi. See, too, ib. p. 306.]

[Footnote 805: It is clear that the school of Valabhi was to some extent a rival of Nâlandâ.]

[Footnote 806: For a portrait of Hui-nêng see Kokka, No. 297. The names of Bodhidharma's successors are in Chinese characters [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 807: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 808: [Chinese: ] Much biographical information respecting this and other schools will be found in Doré, vols. VII and VIII. But there is little to record in the way of events or literary and doctrinal movements.]

[Footnote 809: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 810: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 811: Lin-Chi means coming to the ford. Is this an allusion to the Pali expression Sotâpanno? The name appears in Japanese as Rinzai. Most educated Chinese monks when asked as to their doctrine say they belong to the Lin-Chi.]

[Footnote 812: They are generally called the three mysteries (Hsüan) and the three important points (Yao), but I have not been able to obtain any clear explanation of what they mean. See Edkins, Chinese Buddhism, p. 164, and Hackmann, l.c. p. 250.]

[Footnote 813: Wieger, Bouddhisme Chinois, p. 108, states that 230 works belonging to this sect were published under the Manchu dynasty.]

[Footnote 814: See e.g. Nanjio, Cat. 1527, 1532.]

[Footnote 815: [Chinese: ]. Tendai in Japanese. It is also called in China [Chinese: ] Fa-hua.]

[Footnote 816: [Chinese: ]. Also often spoken of as Chih-chê-ta-shih [Chinese: ]. Officially he is often styled the fourth Patriarch of the school. See Doré, p. 449.]

[Footnote 817: [Chinese: ]. In Pali Buddhism also, especially in later works, Samatha and Vipassanâ may be taken as a compendium of the higher life as they are respectively the results of the two sets of religious exercises called Adhicitta and Adhipaññâ. (See Ang. Nik. III 88.)]

[Footnote 818: In Chinese [Chinese: ], [Chinese: ], [Chinese: ], [Chinese: ], [Chinese: ], [Chinese: ], [Chinese: ], [Chinese: ]. Tun, Chien, Pi-mi, Pu-ting, Tsang, T'ung, Pieh, Yüan. See Nanjio, 1568, and for very different explanations of these obscure words. Edkins, Chinese Buddhism, p. 182, and Richard's _New Testament of Higher Buddhism_, p. 41. Masson-Oursel in J.A. 1915, I. p. 305.]

[Footnote 819: [Chinese: ] and [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 820: [Chinese: ] The books are Nanjio, Nos. 1534, 1536, 1538.]

[Footnote 821: Among them is the compendium for beginners called Hsiao-chih-kuan, (Nanjio, 1540), partly translated in Beal's Catena, pp. 251 ff.]

[Footnote 822: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 823: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 824: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 825: The list of Chinese authors in Nanjio's Catalogue, App. III, describes many as belonging to the T'ien-t'ai, Avatamsaka or Dhyâna schools, but none as belonging to the Ching-T'u.]

[Footnote 826: For the authorities, see Nanjio, p. 381.]

[Footnote 827: Nanjio, p. 10, note.]

[Footnote 828: They are all translated in S.B.E. XLIX. The two former exist in Sanskrit. The Amitâyurdhyâna is known only in the Chinese translation. They are called in Chinese [Chinese: ], [Chinese: ] and [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 829: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 830: [Chinese: ] The early history of the school is related in a work called Lien-shê-kao-hsien-ch'uan, said to date from the Tsin dynasty. See for some account of the early worthies, Doré, pp. 280 ff. and 457 ff. Their biographies contain many visions and miracles.]

[Footnote 831: Apparently at least until 1042. See De Groot, Sectarianism, p. 163. The dated inscriptions in the grottoes of Lung-mên indicate that the cult of Amitâbha flourished especially from 647 to 715. See Chavannes, Mission. Archéol. Tome I, deuxième partie, p. 545.]

[Footnote 832: [Chinese: ] and [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 833: See for instance the tract called Hsüan-Fo-P'u [Chinese: ] and translated by Richard under the title of _A Guide to Buddhahood_, pp. 97 ff.]

[Footnote 834: [Chinese: ] and [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 835: See Watters, On Yüan Chwang, I. 210, and also Takakusu, Journal of the Pali Text Soc. 1905, p. 132.]

[Footnote 836: [Chinese: ] The name refers not to the doctrines of the school, but to Tz'ŭ-ên-tai-shih, a title given to Kuei-chi the disciple of Hsüan Chuang who was one of its principal teachers and taught at a monastery called Tz'ŭ-ên.]

[Footnote 837: [Chinese: ] See Nanjio, Cat. Nos. 1197 and 1215.]

[Footnote 838: See Watters, On Yüan Chwang, I. pp. 355 ff.]

[Footnote 839: Ed. and transl. by Sylvain Lévi, 1911.]

[Footnote 840: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 841: His name when alive was Fa-tsang. See Nanjio, Cat. p. 462, and Doré, 450. The Empress Wu patronized him.]

[Footnote 842: [Chinese: ]. Also called Nan Shan or Southern mountain school from a locality in Shensi.]

[Footnote 843: [Chinese: ]. Nanjio, Cat. 1493, 1469, 1470, 1120, 1481, 1483, 1484, 1471.]

[Footnote 844: [Chinese: ] or [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 845: From Mo-lai-yè, which seems to mean the extreme south of India. Doré gives some Chinese legends about him, p. 299.]

[Footnote 846: For an appreciative criticism of the sect as known in Japan, see Anesaki's Buddhist Art, chap. III.]

[Footnote 847: Nanjio, No. 530. Nos. 533, 534 and 1039 are also important texts of this sect.]

[Footnote 848: In the T'ien-t'ai and Chên-yen schools, and indeed in Chinese Buddhism generally, Dharma (Fa in Chinese) is regarded as cosmic law. Buddhas are the visible expression of Dharma. Hence they are identified with it and the whole process of cosmic evolution is regarded as the manifestation of Buddhahood.]

[Footnote 849: [Chinese: ] See the account by Edkins, Chinese Buddhism, pp. 271 ff.]

[Footnote 850: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 851: [Chinese: ] See China Mission Year Book, 1896, p. 43.]

[Footnote 852: For some account of them, see Stanton, The Triad Society, White Lotus Society, etc., 1900, reprinted from China Review, vols. XXI, XXII, and De Groot, Sectarianism and religious persecution in China, vol. I. pp. 149-259.]

[Footnote 853: The Republic of China has not changed much from the ways of the Empire. The Peking newspapers of June 17, 1914, contain a Presidential Edict stating that "the invention of heretical religions by ill-disposed persons is strictly prohibited by law," and that certain religious societies are to be suppressed.]

[Footnote 854: See, for an account of such a reformed sect, O. Francke, "Ein Buddhistischer Reformversuch in China," T'oung Pao, 1909, p. 567.]

Spotted a typo or a problem in this chapter? Tell us

XLVI. CHINA (continued)

CHINESE BUDDHISM AT THE PRESENT DAY

The Buddhism treated of in this chapter does not include Lamaism, which being identical with the religion of Tibet and Mongolia is more conveniently described elsewhere. Ordinary Chinese Buddhism and Lamaism are distinct, but are divided not so much by doctrine as by the race, language and usages of the priests. Chinese Buddhism has acquired some local colour, but it is still based on the teaching and practice imported from India before the Yüan dynasty, whereas Lamaist tradition is not direct: it represents Buddhism as received not from India but from Tibet. Some holy places, such as P'uto and Wu-t'ai-shan are frequented by both Lamas and Chinese monks, and Tibetan prayers and images may sometimes be seen in Chinese temples, but as a rule the two divisions do not coalesce.

Chinese Buddhism has a physiognomy and language of its own. The Paraphrase of the Sacred Edict in a criticism, which, though unfriendly, is not altogether inaccurate, says that Buddhists attend only to the heart, claim that Buddha can be found in the heart, and aim at becoming Buddhas. This sounds strange to those who are acquainted only with the Buddhism of Ceylon and Burma, but is intelligible as a popular statement of Bodhidharma's doctrine. Heart[855] means the spiritual nature of man, essentially identical with the Buddha nature and capable of purification and growth so that all beings can become Buddhas. But in the Far East the doctrine became less pantheistic and more ethical than the corresponding Indian ideas. The Buddha in the heart is the internal light and monitor rather than the universal spirit. Amida, Kuan-yin and Ti-tsang with other radiant and benevolent spirits have risen from humanity and will help man to rise as they have done. Chinese Buddhists do not regard Amida's vows as an isolated achievement. All Boddhisattvas have done the same and carried out their resolution in countless existences. Like the Madonna these gracious figures appeal directly to the emotions and artistic senses and their divinity offers no difficulty, for in China Church and State alike have always recognized deification as a natural process. One other characteristic of all Far Eastern Buddhism may be noticed. The Buddha is supposed to have preached many creeds and codes at different periods of his life and each school supposes its own to be the last, best and all inclusive.

As indicated elsewhere, the essential part of the Buddhist Church is the monkhood and it is often hard to say if a Chinese layman is a Buddhist or not. It will therefore be best to describe briefly the organization and life of a monastery, then the services performed there and to some extent attended by the laity, and thirdly the rites performed by monks on behalf of the laity, especially funeral ceremonies.

The Chinese Tripitaka contains no less than five recensions of the Vinaya, and the later pilgrims who visited India made it their special object to obtain copies of the most correct and approved code. But though the theoretical value of these codes is still admitted, they have for practical purposes been supplemented by other manuals of which the best known are the Fan-wang-ching or Net of Brahmâ[856] and the Pai-chang-ts'ung-lin-ch'ing-kuei or Rules of Purity of the Monasteries of Pai Chang.

The former is said to have been translated in A.D. 406 by Kumârajîva and to be one chapter of a larger Sanskrit work. Some passages of it, particularly the condemnation of legislation which forbids or imposes conditions on the practice of Buddhism[857], read as if they had been composed in China rather than India, and its whole attitude towards the Hinayanist Vinaya as something inadequate and superseded, can hardly have been usual in India or China even in the time of I-Ching (700 A.D.). Nothing is known of the Indian original, but it certainly was not the Brahmajâlasutta of the Pali Canon[858]. Though the translation is ascribed to so early a date, there is no evidence that the work carried weight as an authority before the eighth century. Students of the Vinaya, like I-Ching, ignore it. But when the scholarly endeavour to discover the most authentic edition of the Vinaya began to flag, this manual superseded the older treatises. Whatever external evidence there may be for attributing it to Kumârajîva, its contents suggest a much later date and there is no guarantee that a popular manual may not have received additions. The rules are not numbered consecutively but as 1-10 and 1-48, and it may be that the first class is older than the second. In many respects it expounds a late and even degenerate form of Buddhism for it contemplates not only a temple ritual (including the veneration of images and sacred books), but also burning the head or limbs as a religious practice. But it makes no allusion to salvation through faith in Amitâbha and says little about services to be celebrated for the dead[859].

Its ethical and disciplinary point of view is dogmatically Mahayanist and similar to that of the Bodhicaryâvatâra. The Hînayâna is several times denounced[860] and called heretical, but, setting aside a little intolerance and superstition, the teaching of this manual is truly admirable and breathes a spirit of active charity--a desire not only to do no harm but to help and rescue.

It contains a code of ten primary and forty-eight secondary commandments, worded as prohibitions, but equivalent to positive injunctions, inasmuch as they blame the neglect of various active duties. The ten primary commandments are called Prâtimoksha and he who breaks them is Pârâjika[861], that is to say, he ipso facto leaves the road leading to Buddhahood and is condemned to a long series of inferior births. They prohibit taking life, theft, unchastity, lying, trading in alcoholic liquors, evil speaking, boasting, avarice, hatred and blasphemy. Though infraction of the secondary commandments has less permanently serious consequence, their observance is indispensable for all monks. Many of them are amplifications of the ten major commandments and are directed against indirect and potential sins, such as the possession of weapons. The Bhikshu may not eat flesh, drink alcohol, set forests on fire or be connected with any business injurious to others, such as the slave trade. He is warned against gossip, sins of the eye, foolish practices such as divination and even momentary forgetfulness of his high calling and duties. But it is not sufficient that he should be self-concentrated and without offence. He must labour for the welfare and salvation of others, and it is a sin to neglect such duties as instructing the ignorant, tending the sick, hospitality, saving men or animals from death or slavery, praying[862] for all in danger, exhorting to repentance, sympathy with all living things. A number of disciplinary rules prescribe a similarly high standard for daily monastic life. The monk must be strenuous and intelligent; he must yield obedience to his superiors and set a good example to the laity: he must not teach for money or be selfish in accepting food and gifts. As for creed he is strictly bidden to follow and preach the Mahâyâna: it is a sin to follow or preach the doctrine of the Srâvakas[863] or read their books or not aspire to ultimate Buddhahood. Very remarkable are the injunctions to burn one's limbs in honour of Buddhas: to show great respect to copies of the scriptures and to make vows. From another point of view the first and forty-seventh secondary commandments are equally remarkable: the first bids officials discharge their duties with due respect to the Church and the other protests against improper legislation.

The Fan-wang-ching is the most important and most authoritative statement of the general principles regulating monastic life in China. So far as my own observation goes, it is known and respected in all monasteries. The Pai-chang-ch'ing-kuei[864] deals rather with the details of organization and ritual and has not the same universal currency. It received the approval of the Yüan dynasty[865] and is still accepted as authoritative in many monasteries and gives a correct account of their general practice. It was composed by a monk of Kiang-si, who died in 814 A.D. He belonged to the Ch'an school, but his rules are approved by others. I will not attempt to summarize them, but they include most points of ritual and discipline mentioned below. The author indicates the relations which should prevail between Church and State by opening his work with an account of the ceremonies to be performed on the Emperor's birthday, and similar occasions.

Large Buddhist temples almost always form part of a monastery, but smaller shrines, especially in towns, are often served by a single priest. The many-storeyed towers called pagodas which are a characteristic beauty of Chinese landscapes, are in their origin stupas erected over relics but at the present day can hardly be called temples or religious buildings, for they are not places of worship and generally owe their construction to the dictates of Fêng-shui or geomancy. Monasteries are usually built outside towns and by preference on high ground, whence shan or mountain has come to be the common designation of a convent, whatever its position. The sites of these establishments show the deep feeling of cultivated Chinese for nature and their appreciation of the influence of scenery on temper, an appreciation which connects them spiritually with the psalms of the monks and nuns preserved in the Pali Canon. The architecture is not self-assertive. Its aim is not to produce edifices complete and satisfying in their own proportions but rather to harmonize buildings with landscape, to adjust courts and pavilions to the slope of the hillside and diversify the groves of fir and bamboo with shrines and towers as fantastic and yet as natural as the mountain boulders. The reader who wishes to know more of them should consult Johnston's Buddhist China, a work which combines in a rare degree sound knowledge and literary charm.

A monastery[866] is usually a quadrangle surrounded by a wall. Before the great gate, which faces south, or in the first court is a tank, spanned by a bridge, wherein grows the red lotus and tame fish await doles of biscuit. The sides of the quadrangle contain dwelling rooms, refectories, guest chambers, store houses, a library, printing press and other premises suitable to a learned and pious foundation. The interior space is divided into two or three courts, bordered by a veranda. In each court is a hall of worship or temple, containing a shelf or alcove on which are set the sacred images: in front of them stands a table, usually of massive wood, bearing vases of flowers, bowls for incense sticks and other vessels. The first temple is called the Hall of the Four Great Kings and the figures in it represent beings who are still in the world of transmigration and have not yet attained Buddhahood. They include gigantic images of the Four Kings, Maitreya, the Buddha designate of the future, and Wei-to[867], a military Bodhisattva sometimes identified with Indra. Kuan-ti, the Chinese God of War, is often represented in this building. The chief temple, called the Precious Hall of the Great Hero[868], is in the second court and contains the principal images. Very commonly there are nine figures on either side representing eighteen disciples of the Buddha and known as the Eighteen Lohan or Arhats[869]. Above the altar are one or more large gilt images. When there is only one it is usually Śâkya-muni, but more often there are three. Such triads are variously composed and the monks often speak of them vaguely as the "three precious ones," without seeming to attach much importance to their identity[870]. The triad is loosely connected with the idea of the three bodies of Buddha but this explanation does not always apply and the central figure is sometimes O-mi-to or Kuan-yin, who are the principal recipients of the worship offered by the laity. The latter deity has usually a special shrine at the back of the main altar and facing the north door of the hall, in which her merciful activity as the saviour of mankind is represented in a series of statuettes or reliefs. Other Bodhisattvas such as Ta-shih-chi (Mahâsthâmaprâpta) and Ti-tsang also have separate shrines in or at the side of the great hall[871]. The third hall contains as a rule only small images. It is used for expounding the scriptures and for sermons, if the monastery has a preacher, but is set apart for the religious exercises of the monks rather than the devotions of the laity. In very large monasteries there is a fourth hall for meditation.

Monasteries are of various sizes and the number of monks is not constant, for the peripatetic habit of early Buddhism is not extinct: at one time many inmates may be absent on their travels, at another there may be an influx of strangers. There are also wandering monks who have ceased to belong to a particular monastery and spend their time in travelling. A large monastery usually contains from thirty to fifty monks, but a very large one may have as many as three hundred. The majority are dedicated by their parents as children, but some embrace the career from conviction in their maturity and these, if few, are the more interesting. Children who are brought up to be monks receive a religious education in the monastery, wear monastic clothes and have their heads shaved. At the age of about seventeen they are formally admitted as members of the order and undergo three ceremonies of ordination, which in their origin represented stages of the religious life, but are now performed by accumulation in the course of a few days. One reason for this is that only monasteries possessing a licence from the Government[872] are allowed to hold ordinations and that consequently postulants have to go some distance to be received as full brethren and are anxious to complete the reception expeditiously. At the first ordination the candidates are accepted as novices: at the second, which follows a day or two afterwards and corresponds to the upasampadâ, they accept the robes and bowl and promise obedience to the rules of the Prâtimoksha. But these ceremonies are of no importance compared with the third, called Shou Pu-sa-chieh[873] or acceptance of the Bodhisattva precepts, that is to say the fifty-eight precepts enunciated in the Fan-wang-ching. The essential part of this ordination is the burning of the candidate's head in from three to eighteen places. The operation involves considerable pain and is performed by lighting pieces of charcoal set in a paste which is spread over the shaven skull.

Although the Fan-wang-ching does not mention this burning of the head as part of ordination, yet it emphatically enjoins the practice of burning the body or limbs, affirming that those who neglect it are not true Bodhisattvas[874]. The prescription is founded on the twenty-second chapter of the Lotus[875] which, though a later addition, is found in the Chinese translation made between 265 and 316 A.D.[876] I-Ching discusses and reprobates such practices. Clearly they were known in India when he visited it, but not esteemed by the better Buddhists, and the fact that they form no part of the ordinary Tibetan ritual indicates that they had no place in the decadent Indian Buddhism which in various stages of degeneration was introduced into Tibet[877]. In Korea and Japan branding is practised but on the breast and arms rather than on the head.

It would appear then that burning and branding as part of initiation were known in India in the early centuries of our era but not commonly approved and that their general acceptance in China was subsequent to the death of I-Ching in A.D. 713[878]. This author clearly approved of nothing but the double ordination as novice and full monk. The third ordination as Bodhisattva must be part of the later phase inaugurated by Amogha about 750[879].

This practice is defended as a trial of endurance, but the earlier and better monks were right in rejecting it, for in itself it is an unedifying spectacle and it points to the logical conclusion that, if it is meritorious to cauterize the head, it is still more meritorious to burn the whole body. Cases of suicide by burning appear to have occurred in recent years, especially in the province of Che-Kiang[880]. The true doctrine of the Mahâyâna is that everyone should strive for the happiness and salvation of all beings, but this beautiful truth may be sadly perverted if it is held that the endurance of pain is in itself meritorious and that such acquired merit can be transferred to others. Self-torture, seems not to be unknown in the popular forms of Chinese Buddhism[881].

The postulant, after receiving these three ordinations, becomes a full monk or Ho-shang[882] and takes a new name. The inmates of every monastery owe obedience to the abbot and some abbots have an official position, being recognized by the Government as representing the clergy of a prefecture, should there be any business to be transacted with the secular authorities. But there is no real hierarchy outside the monasteries, each of which is an isolated administrative unit. Within each monastery due provision is made for discipline and administration. The monks are divided into two classes, the Western who are concerned with ritual and other purely religious duties and the Eastern who are relatively secular and superintend the business of the establishment[883]. This is often considerable for the income is usually derived from estates, in managing which the monks are assisted by a committee of laymen. Other laymen of humbler status[884] live around the monastery and furnish the labour necessary for agriculture, forestry and whatever industries the character of the property calls into being. As a rule there is a considerable library. Even a sympathetic stranger will often find that the monks deny its existence, because many books have been destroyed in political troubles, but most monasteries possess copies of the principal scriptures and a complete Tripitaka, usually the edition of 1737, is not rare. Whether the books are much read I do not know, but I have observed that after the existence of the library has been admitted, it often proves difficult to find the key. There is also a printing press, where are prepared notices and prayers, as well as copies of popular sûtras.

The food of the monks is strictly vegetarian, but they do not go round with the begging bowl nor, except in a few monasteries, is it forbidden to eat after midday. As a rule there are three meals, the last about 6 p.m., and all must be eaten in silence. The three garments prescribed by Indian Buddhism are still worn, but beneath them are trousers, stockings, and shoes which are necessary in the Chinese climate. There is no idea that it is wrong to sleep on a bed, to receive presents or own property.

Two or three services are performed daily in the principal temple, early in the morning, about 4 p.m., and sometimes in the middle of the day. A specimen of this ritual may be seen in the service called by Beal the Liturgy of Kuan Yin[885]. It consists of versicles, responses and canticles, and, though strangely reminiscent both in structure and externals (such as the wearing of vestments) of the offices of the Roman Church[886], appears to be Indian in origin. I-Ching describes the choral services which he attended in Nalanda and elsewhere--the chanting, bowing, processions--and the Chinese ritual is, I think, only the amplification of these ceremonies. It includes the presentation of offerings, such as tea, rice and other vegetables. The Chinese pilgrims testify that in India flowers, lights and incense were offered to relics and images (as in Christian churches), and the Bodhicaryâvatâra[887], one of the most spiritual of later Mahayanist works, mentions offerings of food and drink as part of worship. Many things in Buddhism lent themselves to such a transformation or parody of earlier teaching. Offerings of food to hungry ghosts were countenanced, and it was easy to include among the recipients other spirits. It was meritorious to present food, raiment and property to living saints: oriental, and especially Chinese, symbolism found it natural to express the same devotion by offerings made before images.

In the course of most ceremonies, the monks make vows on behalf of all beings and take oath to work for their salvation. They are also expected to deliver and hear sermons and to engage in meditation. Some of them superintend the education of novices which consists chiefly in learning to read and repeat religious works. Quite recently elementary schools for the instruction of the laity have been instituted in some monasteries[888].

The regularity of convent life is broken by many festivals. The year is divided into two periods of wandering, two of meditation and one of repose corresponding to the old Vassa. Though this division has become somewhat theoretical, it is usual for monks to set out on excursions in the spring and autumn. In each month there are six fasts, including the two uposatha days. On these latter the 250 rules of the Prâtimoksha are recited in a refectory or side hall and subsequently the fifty-eight rules of the Fan-wang-ching are recited with greater ceremony in the main temple.

Another class of holy days includes the birthdays[889] not only of Sâkya-muni, but of other Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, the anniversaries of events in Sâkya-muni's life and the deaths of Bodhidharma and other Saints, among whom the founder or patron of each monastery has a prominent place. Another important and popular festival is called Yü-lan-pên or All Souls' day, which is an adaptation of Buddhist usages to Chinese ancestral worship. Of many other festivals it may be said that they are purely Chinese but countenanced by Buddhism: such are the days which mark the changes of the seasons, those sacred to Kuan-ti and other native deities, and (before the revolution) imperial birthdays.

The daily services are primarily for the monks, but the laity may attend them, if they please. More frequently they pay their devotions at other hours, light a few tapers and too often have recourse to some form of divination before the images. Sometimes they defray the cost of more elaborate ceremonies to expiate sins or ensure prosperity. But the lay attendance in temples is specially large at seasons of pilgrimage. For an account of this interesting side of Chinese religious life I cannot do better than refer the reader to Mr. Johnston's volume already cited.

Though the services of the priesthood may be invoked at every crisis of life, they are most in requisition for funeral ceremonies. A detailed description of these as practised at Amoy has been given by De Groot[890] which is probably true in essentials for all parts of China. These rites unite in incongruous confusion several orders of ideas. Pre-Buddhist Chinese notions of the life after death seem not to have included the idea of hell. The disembodied soul is honoured and comforted but without any clear definition of its status. Some representative--a person, figure, or tablet--is thought capable of giving it a temporary residence and at funeral ceremonies offerings are made to such a representative and plays performed before it. Though Buddhist language may be introduced into this ritual, its spirit is alien to even the most corrupt Buddhism.

Buddhism familiarized China with the idea that the average man stands in danger of purgatory and this doctrine cannot be described as late or Mahayanist[891]. Those epithets are, however, merited by the subsidiary doctrine that such punishment can be abridged by vicarious acts of worship which may take the form of simple prayer addressed to benevolent beings who can release the tortured soul. More often the idea underlying it is that the recitation of certain formulæ acquires merit for the reciter who can then divert this merit to any purpose[892]. This is really a theological refinement of the ancient and widespread notion that words have magic force. Equally ancient and unBuddhist in origin is the theory of sympathetic magic. Just as by sticking pins into a wax figure you may kill the person represented, so by imitating physical operations of rescue, you may deliver a soul from the furnaces and morasses of hell. Thus a paper model of hades is made which is knocked to pieces and finally burnt: the spirit is escorted with music and other precautions over a mock bridge, and, most singular of all, the priests place over a receptacle of water a special machine consisting of a cylinder containing a revolving apparatus which might help a creature immersed in the fluid to climb up. This strange mummery is supposed to release those souls who are condemned to sojourn in a pool of blood[893]. This, too, is a superstition countenanced only by Chinese Buddhism, for the punishment is incurred not so much by sinners as by those dying of illnesses which defile with blood. Many other rites are based on the notion that objects--or their paper images--ceremonially burnt are transmitted to the other world for the use of the dead. Thus representations in paper of servants, clothes, furniture, money and all manner of things are burned together with the effigy of the deceased and sometimes also certificates and passports giving him a clean bill of health for the Kingdom of Heaven.

As in funeral rites, so in matters of daily life, Buddhism gives its countenance and help to popular superstition, to every kind of charm for reading the future, securing happiness and driving away evil spirits. In its praise may be said that this patronage, though far too easy going, is not extended to cruel or immoral customs. But the reader will ask, is there no brighter side? I believe that there is, but it is not conspicuous and, as in India, public worship and temple ritual display the lower aspects of religion. But in China a devout Buddhist is generally a good man and the objects of Buddhist associations are praiseworthy and philanthropic. They often include vegetarianism and abstinence from alcohol and drugs. The weakness of the religion to-day is no doubt the want of intelligence and energy among the clergy. There are not a few learned and devout monks, but even devotion is not a characteristic of the majority. On the other hand, those of the laity who take their religion seriously generally attain a high standard of piety and there have been attempts to reform Buddhism, to connect it with education and to spread a knowledge of the more authentic scriptures[894].

When one begins to study Buddhism in China, one fears it may be typified by the neglected temples on the outskirts of Peking, sullen and mouldering memorials of dynasties that have passed away. But later one learns not only that there are great and nourishing monasteries in the south, but that even in Peking one may often step through an archway into courtyards of which the prosaic streets outside give no hint and find there refreshment for the eye and soul, flower gardens and well-kept shrines tended by pious and learned guardians.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 855: [Chinese: ] For a specimen of devotional literature about the heart see the little tract translated in China Branch, R.A.S. XXIII. pp. 9-22.]

[Footnote 856: [Chinese: ] For text translation and commentary, see De Groot, Code du Mahâyâna en Chine, 1893, see also Nanjio, No. 1087.]

[Footnote 857: De Groot, p. 81.]

[Footnote 858: The identity of name seems due to a similarity of metaphor. The Brahmajâla sutta is a net of many meshes to catch all forms of error. The Fan-wang-ching compares the varieties of Buddhist opinion to the meshes of a net (De Groot, l.c. p. 26), but the net is the all-inclusive common body of truth.]

[Footnote 859: See, however, sections 20 and 39.]

[Footnote 860: See especially De Groot, l.c. p. 58, where the reading of the Abhidharma is forbidden. Though this name is not confined to the Hînayâna, A-pi-t'an in Chinese seems to be rarely used as a title of Mahayanist books.]

[Footnote 861: The Indian words are transliterated in the Chinese text.]

[Footnote 862: More accurately reading the sûtras on their behalf, but this exercise is practically equivalent to intercessory prayer.]

[Footnote 863: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 864: The full title is [Chinese: ] Pai Chang is apparently to be taken as the name of the author, but it is the designation of a monastery used as a personal name. See Hackmann in T'oung Pao, 1908, pp. 651-662. It is No. 1642 in Nanjio's Catalogue. He says that it has been revised and altered.]

[Footnote 865: See T'oung Pao, 1904, pp. 437 ff.]

[Footnote 866: It is probable that the older Chinese monasteries attempted to reproduce the arrangement of Nâlanda and other Indian establishments. Unfortunately Hsüan Chuang and the other pilgrims give us few details as to the appearance of Indian monasteries: they tell us, however, that they were surrounded by a wall, that the monks' quarters were near this wall, that there were halls where choral services were performed and that there were triads of images. But the Indian buildings had three stories. See Chavannes, Mémoire sur les Religieux Eminents, 1894, p. 85.]

[Footnote 867: [Chinese: ] or [Chinese: ] For this personage see the article in B.E.F.E.O. 1916. No. 3, by Péri who identifies him with Wei, the general of the Heavenly Kings who appeared to Tao Hsüan the founder of the Vinaya school and became popular as a protecting deity of Buddhism. The name is possibly a mistaken transcription of Skandha.]

[Footnote 868: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 869: [Chinese: ] See Lévi and Chavannes' two articles in J.A. 1916, I and II, and Watters in J.R.A.S. 1898, p. 329, for an account of these personages. The original number, still found in a few Chinese temples as well as in Korea, Japan and Tibet was sixteen. Several late sûtras contain the idea that the Buddha entrusted the protection of his religion to four or sixteen disciples and bade them not enter Nirvana but tarry until the advent of Maitreya. The Ta-A-lo-han-nan-t'i-mi-to-lo-so-shuo-fa-chu-chi (Nanjio, 1466) is an account of these sixteen disciples and of their spheres of influence. The Buddha assigned to each a region within which it is his duty to guard the faith. They will not pass from this life before the next Buddha comes. Piṇḍola is the chief of them. Nothing is known of the work cited except that it was translated in 654 by Hsüan Chuang, who, according to Watters, used an earlier translation. As the Arhats are Indian personalities, and their spheres are mapped out from the point of view of Indian geography, there can be no doubt that we have to do with an Indian idea, imported into Tibet as well as into China where it became far more popular than it had ever been in India. The two additional Arhats (who vary in different temples, whereas the sixteen are fixed) appear to have been added during the T'ang dynasty and, according to Watters, in imitation of a very select order of merit instituted by the Emperor T'ai Tsung and comprising eighteen persons. Chavannes and Lévi see in them spirits borrowed from the popular pantheon.

Chinese ideas about the Lohans at the present day are very vague. Their Indian origin has been forgotten and some of them have been provided with Chinese biographies. (See Doré, p. 216.) One popular story says that they were eighteen converted brigands.

In several large temples there are halls containing 500 images of Arhats, which include many Chinese Emperors and one of them is often pointed out as being Marco Polo. But this is very doubtful. See, however, Hackmann, Buddhismus, p. 212.]

[Footnote 870: Generally they consist of Śâkya-muni and two superhuman Buddhas or Bodhisattvas, such as O-mi-to (Amitâbha) and Yo-shih-fo (Vaidûrya): Pi-lu-fo (Vairocana) and Lo-shih-fo (Lochana): Wên-shu (Manjuś-ri) and P'u-hsien (Śamantabhadra). The common European explanation that they are the Buddhas of the past, present and future is not correct.]

[Footnote 871: [Chinese: ] and [Chinese: ]. For the importance of Ti-tsang in popular Buddhism, which has perhaps been underestimated, see Johnston, chap. VII.]

[Footnote 872: I speak of the Old Imperial Government which came to an end in 1911.]

[Footnote 873: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 874: De Groot, l.c. p.51.]

[Footnote 875: See Kern's translation, especially pp. 379 and 385.]

[Footnote 876: See Nanjio, Nos. 138 and 139. The practice is not entirely unknown in the legends of Pali Buddhism. In the Lokapaññatti, a work existing in Burma but perhaps translated from the Sanskrit, Asoka burns himself in honour of the Buddha, but is miraculously preserved. See B.E.F.E.O. 1904, pp. 421 and 427.]

[Footnote 877: See I-Tsing, Records of the Buddhist Religion, trans. Takakusu, pp. 195 ff., and for Tibet, Waddell, Buddhism of Tibet, p. 178, note 3, from which it appears that it is only in Eastern Tibet and probably under Chinese influence that branding is in vogue. For apparent instances in Central Asian art, see Grünwedel, Budd. Kultst. p. 23, note 1.]

[Footnote 878: Branding is common in many Hindu sects, especially the Mâdhvas, but is reprobated by others.]

[Footnote 879: It is condemned as part of the superstition of Buddhism in a memorial of Han Yü, 819 A.D.]

[Footnote 880: See those cited by De Groot, l.c. p. 228, and the article of MacGowan (Chinese Recorder, 1888) there referred to. See also Hackmann, Buddhism as a Religion, p. 228. Chinese sentiment often approves suicide, for instance, if committed by widows or the adherents of defeated princes. For a Confucian instance, see Johnston, p. 341.]

[Footnote 881: See e.g. Du Bose, The Dragon, Image and Demon, p. 265. I have never seen such practices myself. See also Paraphrase of the Sacred Edict, VII. 8.]

[Footnote 882: [Chinese: ] This word, which has no derivation in Chinese, is thought to be a corruption of some vernacular form of the Sanskrit Upâdhyâya current in Central Asia. See I-tsing, transl. Takakusu, p. 118. Upâdhyâya became Vajjha (as is shown by the modern Indian forms Ojha or Jha and Tamil Vâddyar). See Bloch in Indo-Germanischen Forschungen, vol. XXV. 1909, p. 239. Vajjha might become in Chinese Ho-sho or Ho-shang for Ho sometimes represents the Indian syllable va. See Julien, Méthode, p. 109, and Eitel, Handbook of Chinese Buddhism, p. 195.]

[Footnote 883: For details see Hackmann in T'oung Pao, 1908.]

[Footnote 884: They apparently correspond to the monastic lay servants or "pure men" described by I-Ching, chap. XXXII, as living as Nâlanda.]

[Footnote 885: A Catena of Buddhist Scriptures from the Chinese, pp. 339 ff.]

[Footnote 886: The abbot and several upper priests wear robes, which are generally red and gold, during the service. The abbot also carries a sort of sceptre. The vestments of the clergy are said to be derived from the robes of honour which used to be given to them when they appeared at Court.]

[Footnote 887: II. 16. Cf. the rituals in De la Vallée Poussin's Bouddhisme et Matériaux, pp. 214 ff. Târanâtha frequently mentions burnt offerings as part of worship in medieval Magadha.]

[Footnote 888: I do not refer to the practice of turning disused temples into schools which is frequent. In some monasteries the monks, while retaining possession, have themselves opened schools.]

[Footnote 889: It is not clear to me what is really meant by the birthdays of beings like Maitreya and Amitâbha.]

[Footnote 890: Actes du Sixième Congres des Orientalistes, Leide, 1883, sec. IV. pp. 1-120.]

[Footnote 891: E.g. in Dipavamsa, XIII; Mahâv. XIV. Mahinda is represented as converting Ceylon by accounts of the terrors of the next world.]

[Footnote 892: The merit of good deeds can be similarly utilized. The surviving relatives feed the poor or buy and maintain for the rest of its life an animal destined to slaughter. The merit then goes to the deceased.]

[Footnote 893: It may possibly be traceable to Manichæism which taught that souls are transferred from one sphere to another by a sort of cosmic water wheel. See Cumont's article, "La roue à puiser les âmes du Manichéisme" in Rev. de l'Hist, des Religions, 1915, p. 384. Chavannes and Pelliot have shown that traces of Manichæism lingered long in Fu-Kien. The metaphor of the endless chain of buckets is also found in the Yüan Jên Lun.]

[Footnote 894: See Francke, "Ein Buddhistischer Reformversuch in China," T'oung Pao, 1909, pp. 567-602.]

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