The South China Buddhist Seminary (Huá'nán fóxué yuàn 華南佛學院) was a Buddhist seminary 佛學院 established in Hong Kong during the Chinese Civil War.
One of the reasons for the establishment of this seminary was that many monks were fleeing the chaos caused by the Civil War on the Chinese mainland. A number of these monks were attracted to the hybrid Buddho-Christian practices being undertaken at Tao Fung Shan 道風山, which was run by the Norwegian missionary Karl Ludvig Reichelt 艾香德. In an effort to prevent these monks from converting to Christianity, a group of laymen set about to establish a Buddhist seminary. The seminary was established in 1948 at the location of the then unused Dharma Propagation Hermitage 弘法精舍, which had been started by Bǎojìng 寶靜. Yè Gōngchuò 葉恭綽 invited his former acquaintance Tánxū 倓虛, who had just arrived in Guǎngzhōu 廣州 from Qīngdǎo 青島, to head this new seminary. The seminary initially had 10 monks in residence, but as more monks fled the chaos in Civil War China, that number swelled to over 20. The monks planted vegetables and gathered firewood, but even then the money they received from their lay supporters was not enough.
The seminary's first class graduated in 1952, and the second class (also over 20 students in number), graduated in 1954. Tánxū wanted to retire, but the seminary's board did not wish to let him go, so they transformed the seminary into a research school (which reduced Tánxū's teaching load considerably).
Section Editor: Erik Hammerstrom