The followers of this meditative school are to be found throughout the
monasteries of China and Korea where they are known as the _Chan_
sect; but here more than in Japan their quietism is mingled with the
devotion to Amitābha or Omito-Fo, and though in many places such as
the exquisite island of Putoshan they are faithful in the practice of
meditation, they seem to have carried it to a far less perfect pitch
than the more scholarly followers of the Japanese school.
A Chinese Temple.
Let us get a glimpse of Chinese Buddhism in one of these great
monasteries. The day is a round of worship[15] and the worship is
divided amongst many Buddhas and Bodhisattvas. Here some rich layman
is making an offering for masses for his dead; Buddhism in China has
indeed become largely a matter of such masses, and the filial Chinese
spend yearly scores of millions upon them.[16] The priests have turned
out in force, and the abbot is reciting the praises now of Omito-Fo,
now of Pilochana, the great sun-Buddha, now of the merciful Kwanyin
whose ears are ever open to human prayer, and now of Titsang, guardian
of the dead. Beautiful figures these, and especially that of this
strong conqueror of death so popular amongst the Japanese as the
guardian of the little ones who have gone into the dark under-world.
Innumerable figures of him adorned with baby garments tell their own
pathetic tale, and he is unimaginative indeed who cannot find here in
these ideal figures traces of the Spirit of God at work in human
hearts.
It is harder to sympathise with and to admire the Lama Buddhism which
has penetrated China from Tibet, but even here there are some
beautiful figures such as the _Tāras_, and amongst the mummery and
moral corruption of a Lama temple one may find some sparks of the
divine spirit, even if one fails to meet the Lama of Kim!
Buddhism in China, decadent though it is in many places, is reviving
itself; there is great building activity at certain centres such as
Ningpo and Hangchow; there are probably nearly half a million monks,
and at one ordination in 1920 a thousand candidates were ordained in
Changchow. Many men, indeed, disillusioned at the failure of the
revolution, are seeking the quiet otherworldly retreats of Buddhism,
and others of scholarly bent delight in the classical scriptures which
the early missionaries from India translated into Chinese, and which
are still models of beauty.
Among laymen also there is an increasing interest in the Buddhist
scriptures. Turn into this bookstore at Peking and you will find over
a thousand copies of different texts and commentaries, and there are
publishing-houses in most of the great cities. Two notable works are
the reprint of the whole of the Scriptures and a new dictionary of
Buddhist terms, containing over three thousand pages. At Ningpo one
will find a small group of young enthusiasts working for a
"neo-Buddhism." Antipathetic to Christianity, and especially to the
aggressions of "Christian" nations, these men, like some of the
propagandists in Ceylon, use weapons which are two-edged and dangerous
to all religion, not only to Christianity; they seem to feed upon the
publications of the rationalist press, and must not be taken too
seriously. Yet we can sympathise with their resentment of Western
aggression, which is a large factor in these Buddhist movements
everywhere. "Buddhism: the Religion of Asia" often accompanies and
reinforces another cry, "Asia for the Asiatics."
Of great significance are these Pan-Buddhist movements attempting to
unite the Buddhist peoples in a strong Eastern civilisation such as
that which welded them together for a thousand years in the Golden Age
of the past. One such movement originates in Ceylon with the vigorous
layman Dharmapala, in whom resentment against the West blends with a
real enthusiasm for Buddhism. In 1893 he visited China, and stirred up
some of the Chinese monks, calling upon them to go to India as
missionaries; in Japan he attacked some of the great abbots as
wine-drinkers and corrupt, and every where he is a pungent and
provocative influence. In 1918 a Pan-Buddhist Association was started
in Tokyo and in the following year a rival one was founded in Peking.
It is, in fact, rather pathetic to find Buddhism being promoted by the
Japanese in Korea as a part of their propaganda to Japanise the
Koreans, and at the same time claiming in China to be _the_ religion
for democratic nations.
In justification of such claims, however, Buddhism is doing some good
work in social service, and in education, and takes its part in famine
relief, prison visitation, and the beneficent work of the Red Cross.
The Chinese are a religious people, whatever critics may say. Vast
armies of monks and innumerable temples and shrines witness to this
other-worldly strain, and though much of their religion is
superstitious, and almost all of it needs moralising, the sympathetic
observer will find on every hand the evidences that these are not a
"secular-minded" people.
In almost every house are not only ancestor-tablets, but images of
Kwanyin and other Buddhist deities, and pilgrimages play in China as
elsewhere in Asia a great part in the national life.
Follow this merry throng as it climbs the slopes of some great
mountain; note the groves and the poetical inscriptions on the rocks;
enter this noble group of temples with them and watch their acts of
worship.
Here before Kwanyin a young apprentice bows: carelessly he tosses the
bamboo strips which will tell him if his prayer is to be answered, and
defiantly he tosses his head as he turns away with a refusal from the
goddess: but here is an old widow, with sorrowful persistence
importuning the Compassionate One, and in even the most careless is a
belief that Heaven rules in the affairs of men and that Heaven is
just.
Here prayers are offered for rain and harvest, for children and
wealth, for release from suffering and demons.
As in many Christian nations the bridge between natural religion and
the essential truths of Christian Theism is a very shaky one--so here
in China and Japan, whilst there is a widespread belief in Karma and
in Heaven's laws, this is but vaguely connected with the polytheistic
cults of the masses. And as in some other Christian lands, the worship
of the saints and local gods--even of the great Kwanyin--is not
always moralised. Habitual sinners--opium fiends who, it may be, are
ruining scores of lives, prostitutes and murderers--will pay their
daily court to the family or local god: not conscious of any demand
from the Compassionate that they should show compassion, or from the
Righteous that they should be righteous. Buddhism has indeed lost its
early salt of morality. It is for these and other reasons that China
and Japan urgently need the Gospel of Jesus and of His Kingdom. In
their own religious development is a noble preparation for this New
Order: and in the Jesus of History they are finding a Norm and a
Vision of God which makes their old ideals real and vital, and which
purifies their idea of God. In this faith the Church is at work in
these wonderful lands, believing that they have rich gifts for the
Kingdom of God, and that it will greatly enrich them and carry to its
fulfilment their noble civilisations whilst it emancipates their
masses from fear and superstition. With all its achievements Buddhism
has failed because it has had no power to cast out fear, and its
Confucian critics even accuse it of playing upon the superstition of
the people and of letting loose more demons to plague them. Yet it has
done much for China, not only ennobling her art and culture but giving
a new value to the individual, a new respect for women, a new love of
nature, and many noble objects of worship to hungry human hearts.
Whilst then the Gospel wins its way slowly but surely in Asia,
leavening and giving new and abundant life, there are those in
Christendom who hold that it is played out, and that Buddhism is
destined to supersede it as the religion of the intelligent!
The student should investigate their activities in London, Breslau,
and other Western cities; and he may find Appendix I a finger-post to
guide him in his quest.
Appendix II is offered as a similar guide to a course of reading.
[15] The chief services are at 2 a.m. and at 4 p.m.
[16] During the war many such masses were said for the fallen, whether
friend or foe.