Hinduism and Buddhism, An Historical Sketch Volume III Part 35

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'ng-s.h.i.+h-tsung and San-lun-tsung[791].

The first is considered as Hinayanist and equivalent to the Sautrntikas[792]. In the seventh century it pa.s.sed over to j.a.pan 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 Mdhyamika.s.stra and Dvdasanikya.s.stra of Ngrjuna with the Sata.s.stra of his pupil Deva. It is simply the school of these two doctors and represents the extreme of Mahayanism. It had some importance in j.a.pan, 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 inst.i.tution 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 subst.i.tute _tman_ for Buddha or Buddha nature to see how closely this teaching resembles certain pa.s.sages 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 p.r.i.c.k it. The doctrine of My 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 antic.i.p.ation of Sankara's monism, but it is formulated in consistently Buddhist language and is in harmony with the views of the Mdhyamika 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 flouris.h.i.+ng and influenced art as well as thought, but it probably decayed under the Yan 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-mn or Ch'an-tsung, but this word Ch'an[798] is perhaps better known to Europe in its j.a.panese form Zen.

Bodhidharma is also accounted the twenty-eighth Patriarch, a t.i.tle which represents the Chinese Tsu s.h.i.+h[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 t.i.tle 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 t.i.tle of Tsu-s.h.i.+h. From time to time the Emperor appointed overseers of religion with the t.i.tle of Kuo-s.h.i.+h[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 Asvaghosha, Ngrjuna, 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 Simhlaputra 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 Nland[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 Sng-ts'an, Tao-hsin, Hung-jn, and Hui-nng[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 princ.i.p.al 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 L-tsung or schools of contemplation and of discipline. Even in the lifetime of Hui-nng there seems to have been a division, for he is sometimes called the Patriarch of the South, Shn-Hsiu[807] being recognized as Patriarch of the North. But all subsequent divisions of the Ch'an-tsung trace their lineage to Hui-nng. Two of his disciples founded two schools called Nan Yeh and Ch'ing Yan[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, Yn-Mn and Fa-Yen[809]. This is the chronological order, but the most important school is the Lin-Chi, founded by I-Hsan[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 L-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-mn, all the others are sometimes cla.s.sed together as Chiao-mn. 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-mn, belongs specially to the Buddhism of the Far East and is both an offshoot of the Tsung-mn and a protest against it--there being nothing incompatible in this double relations.h.i.+p. This is the T'ien-t'ai[815] school which takes its name from a celebrated monastery in the province of Ch-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 Ngrjuna. He had a special veneration for the Lotus Stra 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 Vipa.s.san, taken to mean calm and insight.

The T'ien-T'ai is distinguished by its many-sided and almost encyclopdic 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 Stra; (_b_) the Hnayna Stras; (_c_) the Lng-yen-ching; (_d_) the Prajn-pramit; (_e_) the Lotus Stra 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 Hnayna, 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 Hna and Mahyan 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 Mahyan and means the special excellences of a Bodhisattva. Yan, 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 Ngrjuna'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 (pn) 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 _pn_ 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 ill.u.s.trious 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 Ch-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 stras 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 formul and the wors.h.i.+p 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 Amitbha (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 Amitbha, 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 Yeh-chih called Lokks.h.i.+, who translated the longer Sukhvat-vyha. 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 stra existed in Sanskrit some time previously. Another translation by the Parthian An s.h.i.+h-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 stra was esteemed there. The shorter Sukhvat-vyha was translated by k.u.mrajva (_c._ 402) and later by Hsan Chuang. The Amityurdhynastra was translated by Klayasas about 424. These three books[828] are the princ.i.p.al scriptures of the school and copies of the greater Sukhvat may still be found in almost every Chinese monastery, whatever principles it professes.

Hui Yan[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-tzu 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 t.i.tle of Kuo-s.h.i.+h about 770 A.D., and Shan-tao, who nourished about 650 and wrote commentaries, was one of its princ.i.p.al literary men[832]. He popularized the doctrine of the Pai-tao or White Way, that is, the narrow bridge leading to Paradise across which Amitbha 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 t.i.tle 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 Ch-sh-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 Abhidharmakosa.s.stra of Vasubandhu[835]. This work expounds the doctrine of the Sarvstivdins, but in a liberal spirit and without ignoring other views. Though the Ch-sh-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 j.a.pan (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 Dharmalakshan?a and the school is also known as Tz'u-n-tsung[836], and also as Wei-s.h.i.+h-hsiang-chiao because its princ.i.p.al text-book is the Ch'ng-wei-s.h.i.+h-lun[837]. This name, equivalent to Vidymtra, or Vijnnamtra, is the t.i.tle of a work by Hsan 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 Mahynastrlankra[839] expresses its views. It claims as its founder Slabhadra the teacher of Hsan 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 Avatamsakastra. The doctrines of this work and of Ngrjuna 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 t.i.tle 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 L-tsung or Vinaya school[842] was founded by Tao Hsan (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 Hnayna 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 doc.u.ments 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 princ.i.p.al monastery, Pao-hua-shan in Kiangsu, are stricter and more learned than any other.

The school called Chn-yen (in j.a.panese s.h.i.+n-gon), true word, or Mi-chiao[844], secret teaching, equivalent to the Sanskrit Mantrayna or Tantrayna, 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 princ.i.p.al deity (the word is not inaccurate) is Vairocana, a.n.a.logous to Amitbha, and probably like him a Persian sun G.o.d 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 formul 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 j.a.panese monk Kobo Dais.h.i.+ who established the school in j.a.pan under the name of s.h.i.+ngon[846].

The princ.i.p.al scripture of this sect is the Ta-jih-ching or stra 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 cla.s.ses. 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 Garbhadhtu (material) and Vajradhtu (indestructible), the two together forming Dharmadhtu. 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 j.a.pan. What appealed only too powerfully to Chinese superst.i.tion was the use of spells, charms and magical formul 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 j.a.pan 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 wors.h.i.+p.

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 Yan 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 pa.s.sed 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 a.s.sociation. 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. j.a.panese 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 Hinyna is considered as a necessary preliminary to the Mahyna 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 superst.i.tion[854].

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 790: [Chinese: ] See especially Hackmann, "Die Schulen des chinesischen Buddhismus" (in the _Mitth. Seminars fr Orientalische Sprachen_, Berlin, 1911), which contains the text and translation of an Essay by a modern Chinese Buddhist, Yang Wn 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'u-Fu-Ssu 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-Lng-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 Satyasiddhisstra of Harivarman, Nanjio, Cat. 1274.]

[Footnote 793: This meditation however is of a special sort. The six Pramits are, Dna, Sla, Kshanti, Vrya, Dhyna and Praj. The meditation of Bodhidharma is not the Dhyna of this list, but meditation on Praj, the highest of the Pramits. See Hackmann's Chinese text, p. 249.]

[Footnote 794: Ta-mo-hse-mai-lun, a.n.a.lyzed 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-shn or dharmakya 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-tzu and his own style shows that he was well-read in this author.]

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

[Footnote 798: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 799: [Chinese: ]]

[Footnote 800: Acriyaparampar. There is a list of such teachers in Mahvam?sa, V. 95 ff., Dpavam?sa, 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-yan-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 Maspro in _Mlanges d'Indianisme_: Sylvain Lvi, 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-t-ch'uan-tng-lu together with the Tsung-mn-t'ung-yao-hs-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.

Mahksyapa; 2. Ananda; 3. Sanavsa or Sanakavsa; 4. Upagupta; 5.