Taixu 太虛

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Tàixū 太虛 (1890-1947)

Lay name 俗名: Lǔ Pèilín 吕沛林 Dharma name 法名: Wéixīn 唯心 Pen name 筆名: Bēihuá 悲華[1] Other names: Huázǐ 華子; Xuěshān lǎosēng 雪山老僧; Zhāng Gànsēn 張淦森 Mèiān zhǔrén 昧盦主人; Jìnyún lǎorén 縉雲老人 Born 1/8, 1890 (Guāngxù 光緒 16) in Cháng'ān Town 長安鎮, Hǎiníng county 海寧縣, Zhèjiāng 浙江 Died 3/17, 1947 (Mínguó 民國 36) at Yùfó Temple 玉佛寺, Shànghǎi 上海

Notable Associates: Fǎfǎng 法舫 Dàojiē 道階 Yú Déyuán 虞德元 Zhāng Huàshēng 張化聲 Mǎnzhì 滿智 Zhīfēng 芝峰 Dàxǐng 大醒 Táng Dàyuán 唐大圓 Yáng Wénhuì 楊文會 Yù Huìguān 玉慧觀 Chángxǐng 常惺 Dìxián 諦閑 Huáng Chànhuá 黃懺華 Fàn Gǔnóng 范古農 Yuányīng 圓瑛 Fúshàn 福善 Míngshān 茗山 Shànyīn 善因 Huìjué 會覺 Shǐ Yīrú 史一如 Hán Qīngjìng 韓清淨 Wáng Yītíng 王一亭 Kōngyě 空也 Zōngyǎng 宗仰 Hú Zǐhù 胡子笏 Chén Yuánbái 陳元白 Wáng Sēnfǔ 王森甫 Táiyuán 台源 Rénshān 仁山

Article editor: Gregory Adam Scott

Tàixū 太虛 (1890-1947) was one of the most influential and well-known Chinese Buddhist figures of the modern era, a reformer who established seminaries and Buddhist periodicals, such as his long-running Hǎicháo yīn 海潮音.

Biography

Tàixū was born in northern Zhèjiāng 浙江 province in 1890. His father, a bricklayer, died when he was only a year old, and when his mother remarried his maternal grandmother took care of him. He received a primary education in the Chinese classical learning, and from the age of eight accompanied his grandmother on pilgrimages to sacred mountains in eastern China. In 1901 he was apprenticed to a business in Chángān town, but the death of his mother and health problems of his own prevented him from fulfilling his professional responsibilities.^[2]

Early Years to Sealed Confinement

In 1904, when Tàixū was fourteen, he decided to enter the Buddhist sangha and was tonsured at a small temple in Sūzhōu 蘇州 where he was given the dharma name Wéixīn 唯心 (mind-only). He was later given the style name by which he is most widely known, Tàixū, and later that year took the full precepts at Tiāntóng Temple 天童寺 in Níngbō 寧波 under the monk Jìchán 寄禪. He went on to train at Yongfeng Temple, practicing Chan meditation and engaging in sūtra study. The Śūraṅgama Sūtra (Lèngyán jīng 楞嚴經) and the Lotus Sūtra (Fǎhuá jīng 法華經) were especially attractive to him.^[3] It at this time that Tàixū first met Yuányīng 圓瑛, the start of a productive but difficult friendship. In 1907 Tàixū had an enlightenment experience while reading the Mahaprajnaparamita Sutra 大般若波羅蜜多經, and he would later recall that after this his studies became much easier, as if the insights were coming from his own heart.^[4]

Tàixū's reformist thinking was influenced early on by Huáshān 華山, whom he met in 1908.^[5] Huáshān had already been involved in monastic educational and organization reform in response to the "Build Education with Temple Property" movement 廟產興學. Under Huáshān's influence and later that of Qiyun, Tàixū was exposed to revolutionary philosophical and political works by authors such as Kāng Yǒuwéi 康有為, Liáng Qǐchao 梁啟超, Zhāng Tàiyán 章太炎, and Sun Yat-sen 孫中山.^[6] He would also attend classes at the Jetavana Monastery 祇洹精舍, founded by Yáng Wénhuì 楊文會 in Nánjīng 南京.

His "revolutionary" activities would begin in 1912 when he and Rénshān 仁山 collaborated on a plan to take over Jīnshān Monastery 金山寺 in Zhènjiāng 鎮江 and use its resources to establish a modern school for monastics 僧學堂. The so-called "Invasion of Jinshan" 大鬧金山 failed, but the incident established Tàixū's reputation as a revolutionary monk. Tàixū came to epitomize the radical changes feared by conservatives and supported by more progressive members of the Buddhist community.^[7]

In April of 1912, Tàixū traveled to Shànghǎi 上海 at Jìchán's request to help him establish the Chinese General Buddhist Association 中華佛教總會. Much of the impetus for this move came from the emergence of the Chinese Buddhist Association 中國佛教會, founded in Nánjīng 南京 by a group that included Oūyáng Jiàn 歐陽漸, a former student of Yáng Wénhuì. The CBA was led by laypeople, and its charter, which outlined broad powers over Buddhist activities in China, had already received the assent of Sun Yat-sen, then Provisional President of the Republic. Jìchán therefore sought the help of Yuányīng, Dìxián 諦閑, Xūyún 虛雲 and others to establish a Buddhist organization that better represented the monastic institution. He even had Tàixū suspend promotion of his own Association for the Advancement of Buddhism 佛教協進會 and throw his support behind this new group. In November of 1912, however, Jìchán died in Běijīng 北京, and without his leadership the organization only survived for two more years.^[8]

Faced with the inhumanity of the First World War, as well as his setbacks in enacting change on Jīnshān and elsewhere, in the fall of 1914 Tàixū began a three-year period of sealed confinement 閉關 in the Xílín Chan Hall 錫麟禪院 on Mount Putuo 普陀山 in Zhèjiāng province.^[9] During this time he followed a schedule of venerating the Buddhas, meditation, and textual study. His reading included Buddhist scriptures, the Chinese classics, modern literature and works on Western science, logic, and philosophy. He also began to study the Consciousness-only school, as well as the texts Awakening of Faith in the Mahāyāna (Dàshèng qǐxìn lùn 大乘起信論) and the Discourse on the Theory of Consciousness-only (Chéng wéishì lùn 成唯識論). Tàixū was prolific with his writing as well, producing over ten works on topics such as education, science, and sangha reform. During his seclusion he remained appraised of important political events, such as the acceptance by Yuán Shìkǎi 袁世凱 of Japan's Twenty-one Demands in 1915, and the passage of the Regulations for the Control of Monasteries and Temples 管理寺廟條例 by the Beijing parliament later that year.^[10]

Publishing and Education

After completing his period of confinement, Tàixū traveled to Japan, Taiwan and Southeast Asia. On his return to China he continued to promote reform, helping to found the Juéshè 覺社 (Awakening Society) in Shànghǎi in 1918 and its periodical Juéshè cóngshū 覺社叢書 (Awakening Society Collectanea). Over the year of its print run he gradually gained more editorial control until in early 1920 he moved to Hángzhōu 杭州 and reorganized the publication as Hǎicháo yīn 海潮音 (Sound of the Sea Tide). Hǎicháo yīn would continue to be published throughout the Republican era and after a brief hiatus resumed publication in Taiwan after 1949.

In 1921 he became abbot of Jìngcí Temple 净慈寺 in Hángzhōu but by the end of the year had to leave this position because of criticism. Traveling to Wǔhàn 武漢, he accepted a teaching position at Zhonghua University, a private university in Wǔchāng 武昌, where he lectured on philosophy and Hetuvidyā (the ancient Indian science of logic). In 1922 he founded the Wǔchāng Buddhist Seminary 武昌佛學院 and served as principal.

Impact and Legacy

Tàixū's place in the history of Modern Chinese Buddhism was established very early on, but the nature of the impact he had and the meaning of his legacy continues to be a matter of some debate. While Welch's 1968 study was quite critical of Tàixū's legacy, and questioned whether his reforms were moving toward something that could rightly be called "Buddhism", Pittman's more recent book puts Tàixū's work in a much more positive light.

Notable Organizations and Seminaries

• The Awakening Society 覺社
• Chinese General Buddhist Association 中華佛教總會
• World Buddhist Federation 世界佛教聯合會
• World Buddhist Studies Center 世界佛學苑
• Wǔchāng Buddhist Seminary 武昌佛學院
• Mǐnnán Buddhist Seminary 閩南佛學院
• Sino-Tibetan Institute of the World Buddhist Studies Center 世界佛學苑漢藏教理院

Important Publications

• 海潮音 (The Sound of the Sea Tide). 上海, 1920 - 1949.
• Lectures in Buddhism. Paris: Les Amis de Bouddhisme, 1928.
• 佛學的將來 (The Future of Buddhism). 香港: 香港佛學會, 民國24 (1935).
• 法相唯識學 (Dharmalakṣaṇa and Consciousness-Only). 上海: 商務印書館, 民國25 (1936).
• 太虛護國言論集 (Collected Speeches by Tàixū on Protecting the Nation). 香港: 該社; 覺音社, 民國28(1939).
• 太虛大師全書 (The Complete Works of Venerable Taixu). 21 Vols. 香港: 1950-1959.
• 整頓僧伽制度論 (On Reorganizing the Monastic System). 台北: 臺灣印經處, 1958.
• 太虛大師全書 (The Complete Works of Venerable Taixu). 33 Vols. 台北: 民國59 (1970).

• A digital version of Tàixū's collected works is available here [3] in PDF form

Notes

1. ↑ Luó Tóngbīng 羅同兵 connects Tàixū to this pen name in a forthcoming volume
2. ↑ Pittman, 63-65.
3. ↑ Pittman, 66.
4. ↑ Ritzinger, 4; Pittman, 67.
5. ↑ For more on Huáshān, see Shì Dōngchū 釋東初. Zhōngguó Fójiào jìndài shǐ 中國佛教近代史 (A History of Early Contemporary Chinese Buddhism), in Dōngchū lǎorén quánjí 東初老人全集 (Complete Collection of Old Man Dongchu), vols. 1-2. Taipei: Dongchu, 1974: Vol. 2, pp. 887-889.
6. ↑ Pittman, 67-69.
7. ↑ Pittman, 74-77; Welch 28-33.
8. ↑ Pittman, 77-79.
9. ↑ For more on Tàixū's period of confinement, see 法空, "太虛大師在錫麟禪院「閉關」潛修" in 香港佛教, Vols. 469 [1] and 470 [2].
10. ↑ Pittman, 81-85.

References and Resources

• Callahan, Paul E. "T'ai-hsü and the New Buddhist Movement." Harvard University: Paper on China 6 (1952): 149-188.
• Chou Hsiang-kuang. T'ai-hsü: His Life and Teachings. Allahabad: Indo-Chinese Literature Publications, 1957.
• Dharma Drum Person Authority Database, Record #A004819. [4]
• Hamilton, C. H. "An Hour with T'ai-hsü, Master of the Law." The Open Court. 42 (1928): 162-169.
• Hodous, Lewis. "The Buddhist Outlook in China." Chinese Student's Monthly 21:6 (1926): 9-11.
• Millican, Frank R. "T'ai-hsü and Modern Buddhism." Chinese Recorder 54:6 (1923): 326-334.
• Long, Darui. "An Interfaith Dialogue between the Chinese Buddhist Leader Taixu and Christians." Buddhist Christian Studies 20 (2000): 167–189.
• Pittman, Don A. Toward a Modern Chinese Buddhism: Taixu's Reforms. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2001.
• Reichelt, Karl L. "A Conference of Chinese Buddhist Leaders." Chinese Recorder 54:11 (1923): 667-669.
• Ritzinger, Justin R. "Taixu: To Renew Buddhism and Save the Modern World". Thesis, available at [5].
• Shì Dōngchū 釋東初. Zhōngguó Fójiào jìndài shǐ 中國佛教近代史 (A History of Early Contemporary Chinese Buddhism), in Dōngchū lǎorén quánjí 東初老人全集 (Complete Collection of Old Man Dongchu), vols. 1-2. Taipei: Dongchu, 1974 Pp. 2.805-811.
• Shì Tàixū 釋太虛. Tàixū dàshī quánshū 太虛大師全書 (Complete Works of Master Tàixū), 10 vols. Beijing: Zongjiao wenhua chubanshe, 2005.
• Shì Tàixū 釋太虛, ed. Fǎxiàng wéishì xué 法相唯識學. Beijing: Shangwu yinshuguan, 2002. Originally published in Chángshā 長沙, ca. 1938.
• Yú Língbō 于凌波, ed. Xiàndài Fójiào rénwù cídiǎn 現代佛教人物辭典 (A Dictionary of Modern Buddhist Persons), 2 vols. Taipei: Foguang, 2004. Pp. 1.95b-97c.
• Taixu. "The Meaning of Buddhism." trans. Frank Millican. Chinese Recorder 65 (1934): 689-695.
• Taixu. "A Statement to Asiatic Buddhists." The Young East 1 (1925): 177-182.
• "Urge Cultural tie with the Orient: Delegates Representing Eastern and Western Religions Unite in Movement to Promote World Peace." New York Times, March 6, 1929.
• Welch, Holmes. The Buddhist Revival in China. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1968. Particularly pp. 51-71.
• Yìnshùn 印順. Tàixū dàshī niánpǔ 太虛大師年普 (Chronology of Master Tàixū). Xinzhu: Fuyan jingshe liutong 福嚴精舍流通, 1950; 1973 printing. Electronic edition available here [6].