The influence of Buddhism on China

About 1 century, Indian Buddhism began to be introduced into China from the Western Regions. Since Buddhism was introduced into China, China's religion, philosophy, ethics, architecture and sculpture, language, literature, life and other aspects have undergone earth-shaking changes, greatly enriching the traditional culture of China.

Legends about the introduction of Buddhism into China often depict the Buddha as a fairy with golden light on his head and flying lightly. For example, the record in Ming Di's Dream is as follows: "It is explained that the emperor dreamed of a tall and bright gold man who asked his ministers. Or:' there is a god named Buddha in the west, six feet long and golden yellow.' The emperor left Tianzhu and asked about Buddhism and Taoism, so he drew a picture of China. "Ming Di dreamed of gold, high, with the sun and the moon shining overhead. I want to explain day and night that the popular fairy magic at that time was deeply impressed in people's minds; When Ming Di asked his ministers about it, some people associated the image in Ming Taizu Dream with Buddhism, which reflected the rapid development of Buddhism in China.

In philosophy, the basic point of Buddhist philosophy is to deny the existence of the real world and imagine a "western paradise" opposite to the real world. Various schools of Buddhism demonstrate the illusion of the objective world from different angles and with different evidence, and at the same time do everything possible to demonstrate the absoluteness of the subjective spiritual world, so Buddhist philosophy belongs to the idealistic ideological system. This idealistic philosophy greatly promoted the development of China's original philosophy. In Song Dynasty, Zhu Jiang infiltrated this theory into the traditional Confucian culture in China. The three schools of Buddhism advocate that "all laws are empty", also known as legal schools and empty schools. This Sect takes truth and vulgarity as the key link and "nothing is right" as the basic concept. It believes that everything is a combination of karma and has no self-nature, that is to say, after all, there is nothing, just saying it under a pseudonym to guide all beings. This is the "middle way". By repeatedly denying the "four truthfulness and two truthfulness", this sect shows that any religion mentioned by the Buddha is only orthodox, and only by forgetting what he said can we truly understand the truth said by the Buddha. Other systems of Buddhism include the theory of "the reality of nature" and "the harmony of three truths", which greatly enriched China's philosophical system.

In religion, Buddhism imported new ideas and new doctrines, and formed a new sect, which had a great influence on Taoism and Confucianism. As a foreign religious culture, the development of Buddhism in China was influenced by the highly developed local traditional culture represented by Confucianism and Taoism, and in the interaction with Confucianism and Taoism, it finally formed a kind of China Buddhism different from Indian Buddhism. Buddhism, with its unique teachings, teaches people to be ethereal, empty, not complaining and not reporting, and to endure all kinds of sufferings in the world before they can enter the western paradise. In addition, Buddhism has greatly expanded the spiritual field of China people with its vast religious documents, cosmology and rigorous religious ceremonies.

Taoism and Confucianism have also learned some Buddhist ideas from many aspects. Buddhism was introduced into Chinese mainland from the Han Dynasty, and Taoism gradually took shape. At the same time, both sides are faced with the problem of how to spread it in the social environment dominated by Confucian culture, which has caused the situation of Buddhism and Taoism competing with each other. After Wei and Jin Dynasties, the development of Buddhism gradually reached the level of influencing the whole social life, which triggered a debate with Confucianism and Taoism on the ideological and institutional levels. Wang Fu, a Taoist priest in the Western Jin Dynasty, lost many battles in the argument with Bofazu, a monk, so he fabricated Lao Zi's Hu Jing to belittle Buddhism. It is claimed that Buddhism was established by Laozi's western learning behavior to educate fierce and stubborn Hu people, which is the famous theory of "Laozi transforming Hu"; In the Eastern Jin Dynasty, the Buddhist Pure Sutra appeared as a response, and put forward the theory of "Three Saints' Journey to the East", that is, Laozi, Confucius and Yan Hui were incarnated by three disciples of the Buddha, namely, Mahakaya, Confucian Bodhisattva and Jingguang Bodhisattva, respectively, to prove that Buddhism is superior to Taoism. Later, Fuxi and Nuwa in Taoism were further regarded as Bao Yingping and Bao Jixiang. The appearance of Jing Jie Fa Jing marked the development of the dispute between Buddhism and Taoism, which became more intense in the Southern and Northern Dynasties. Although the struggle between them is fierce, with the development of religion in the same area, they will inevitably tend to merge. Hui Yuan put forward three points in Shaman Disrespecting the King: First, he distinguished the different norms that should be followed in practicing at home and becoming a monk; Second, it is pointed out that Buddhism is characterized by "not helping others, not asking for advice"; Thirdly, it is believed that the basis of mutual integration and complementarity between Buddhism and Confucianism lies in "the internal and external Taoism can be combined and made clear". Although the starting points of Buddhism and Mingjiao, Tathagata and Confucian saints Tang Yao and Confucius are different, they influence each other, and the ultimate goal and destination are the same. Subsequently, the three religions gradually began to merge, and proper terms of Buddhism often appeared in books of Taoism and Confucianism, and Buddhist gods were accepted. During the Western Han Dynasty, the Confucian Dong Zhongshu's transformation of Confucian culture was to absorb some Buddhist thoughts and transform Confucianism into the largest religion in China and the orthodoxy in China. Zhu, a famous Neo-Confucianism scholar in the Song Dynasty, once again absorbed ideas including Buddhism to transform Confucianism, thus ensuring the dominant position of Confucianism. In this way, Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism are no longer absolutely independent religions, but integrated and developed with each other. Hui Yuan directly quoted Confucian "loyalty" and "filial piety" as the moral norms that Buddhist believers must abide by: "Anyone who loves Buddhism so much should worship the monarch first; Those who change their customs and vote for hairpin bend will stand by and follow suit. If you have doubts about your relatives, you should withdraw your ambition so that you can understand each other. Sri Lanka is the reason why Buddhism attaches great importance to students and helps the king become a monk. The purpose of the commentator's statement is the same, so the distinction between husband and outside is clear. " Those who believe in Buddhism at home must first honor their parents and respect the monarch; If you want to become a monk, you must wait for the consent of your relatives and follow their wishes. This also shows that Buddhism obeys the dominant position of Confucianism.

In ethics, Buddhism has strengthened some characteristics of China people's traditional morality, including kindness and attaching importance to human life, and further developed these unique virtues, advocating attaching importance to all living things. It is true that all sects and schools in China advise us to be kind and love peace. However, each faction has an obvious shortcoming of human nature. Before Buddhism entered China, Mencius was considered to be the only one who felt that killing was a cruel thing, but Mencius did not exclude eating meat, so he could only put forward the view that "a gentleman should eat far away" to put an end to killing, which was a bit like "stealing the bell".

However, since Buddhism was introduced into China, China's ethics and morals have further developed, especially in killing people. Buddhism advocates the equality of all beings and animism, and holds that killing is not only inhuman, but also something that God does not allow. There is a story in the Buddhist scriptures that the Buddha met an eagle and hunted for food. Because the eagle couldn't bear to eat rabbits, he cut meat from himself and fed it to the eagle, and he died without regret. In such a story, we can see that the Buddha would rather sacrifice himself than see the loss of other lives. Therefore, the Buddha's teaching is to have mercy on life.

In architectural sculpture, the influence of Buddhism is particularly significant. After Buddhism was introduced into China, pagodas completely originated from India appeared in China and can be seen everywhere. Before Buddhism was introduced, we never had this thing. It is a slightly modified dome pagoda in India. This architectural form has greatly increased the natural beauty of our mountains and rivers. Such as the four famous Buddhist mountains: Wutai Mountain in Shanxi, Emei Mountain in Sichuan, Jiuhua Mountain in Anhui and Putuo Mountain in Zhejiang; Lingyan Temple in Changqing County, Shandong Province, Congress Temple in Tiantai County, Zhejiang Province, yuquan temple in dangyang city, Hubei Province, and Qixia in Nanjing; Three grottoes art: Yungang, Dunhuang, Longmen, three grottoes.

In addition, in terms of sculpture, there were only stone carvings in ancient China, and there were no three-dimensional sculptures before Buddhism was introduced into China, but Buddhism brought three-dimensional sculptures in this respect. This kind of cube carving first appeared in ancestral temples, and later appeared in people's lives, such as the relief on the bridge, the carving of life ornaments and so on.

In terms of language, China characters have no letters, but are pictographic, which has caused great inconvenience in some aspects. When Buddhist missionaries came to China, they tried to solve our difficulties with their own words, thus inventing a way to use letters. Although it was very rough and didn't produce very satisfactory results, their phonetic analysis through the so-called initials and finals later became a part of China's language and literature, which provided valuable information for our further experiments. In addition, Buddhism has enriched our daily language and become idioms, proverbs, proverbs and idioms in our lives. Such as "spotless", Buddhists call color, sound, fragrance, taste, touch and dharma "six dusts", "Zhang Er monks don't understand", "Monks throw umbrellas-lawlessness", "No matter what happens, monks can't get out of the temple", "There are little buddhas in the temple" and "cramming for the Buddha's feet temporarily".

In life, generous dresses, exquisite vegetarian food and various stories enrich our daily life and make our life more colorful. Buddhism has a great influence on China, and its shadow can be found in people's daily life.

With the introduction of Buddhism, great changes have taken place in all walks of life in China, providing more choices for China's beliefs, enriching the traditional culture of China and adding more colors to the colorful traditional culture of China.

References:

1, Introduction to Religious History, edited by Lin Zhongze, Beijing, Higher Education Press, 2002.438+02.

2. Selected materials of China's Buddhist thoughts [monograph]/Stone Volume I-Beijing: Zhonghua Book Company 198 1.6.

3. China Buddhism and Traditional Culture [Monograph]/Fang. -Shanghai: Shanghai People's Publishing House 1988.4.