RLGN1322 Introduction to Eastern Religions - respond to one of the 3 following prompts. It should be approximately 1500 words in length.It will be double spaced, 12 point font.It should follow a cons

It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries.

Published in Canada by Oxford University Press 8 Sampson Mews, Suite 204, Don Mills, Ontario M3C 0H5 Canada www.oupcanada.com Copyright © Oxford University Press Canada 2015 The moral rights of the authors have been asserted Database right Oxford University Press (maker) First Edition published in 2007 Second Edition published in 2012 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by licence, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Permissions Department at the address above or through the following url: www.oupcanada.com/permission/permission_request.php Every effort has been made to determine and contact copyright holders. In the case of any omissions, the publisher will be pleased to make suitable acknowledgement in future editions.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication A concise introduction to world religions / edited by Willard G. Oxtoby, Roy C. Amore, Amir Hussain, Alan F. Segal. -- Third edition.

Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-19-900855-1 (pbk.) 1. Religions--Textbooks.  I. Oxtoby, Willard G. (Willard Gurdon), 1933-, editor  II. Amore, Roy C., 1942-, author, editor  III. Hussain, Amir, author, editor  IV. Segal, Alan F., 1945-2011, editor  V. Title: World religions.

BL80.3.C65 2015 200 C2014-907523-5 Cover image: Joey Chung/E+/Getty Images Oxford University Press is committed to our environment. Wherever possible, our books are printed on paper which comes from responsible sources.

Printed and bound in the United States of America 1 2 3 4 — 18 17 16 15 900855_00_FM.indd 4 06/01/15 9:44 PM Terry Tak-ling Woo Chinese and Korean Traditions 900855_10_ch10.indd 478 16/12/14 7:00 PM 479 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo Chinese and Korean Traditions Numbers Indigenous traditions such as shamanism, Confucianism, and Daoism do not require exclusive membership: they also tend to be less institutionalized than monotheistic religions. Their membership is therefore very diff cult to count.

Confucianism: Most estimates are in the range of 6 million, but because East Asians generally do not consider Confucianism to be a religion, the true number is impossible to gauge.

Daoism: As with Confucianism, exact numbers are impossible to determine because of issues around def nition; estimates range from 20 million to as many as 400 million.

Chinese folk or popular religion: Daoism is sometimes counted as a folk religion. This category also includes numerous new religious movements and traditional sects whose devotees may consider their practices and beliefs to be more cultural than religious. Estimates range from 225 to 445 million.

Korean shamanism and popular religion: Estimates range from 1 to 7 million.

Distribution Confucians and Daoists live mainly in East and Southeast Asia, Australia and New Zealand, Western Europe, and North America. Adherents of popular religions remain primarily in East Asia, with small pockets in diasporic communities in Australia, New Zealand, North America, and Europe.

Founders and Teachers Mythical founders and heroes include Yao, Shun, and Yu in China, and Dangun in Korea. Famous f rst teachers—some mythical, some historic—include the Yellow Emperor, Confucius, and Laozi in China, and Choe Chung in Korea. Deities For Confucians, the place of a deity is f lled either by Heaven or by Heaven and Earth together. Some Daoists see the Way as personif ed by Laozi as a deity. Popular religions, both Korean and Chinese, include hundreds of deities.

Authoritative Texts Popular and shamanistic religions are not textually oriented. For Confucians, the classics from the Zhou and Han dynasties are the foundational texts.

For Daoists Laozi and, to a lesser degree, Zhuangzi are fundamental, but otherwise different groups focus on different texts, including the Unity of the Three and the Classics of Great Peace and Purity and Tra n q u i l i t y .

For Buddhists, Mahayana texts such as the Lotus , Vimalakirti , Heart , Diamond , P ure L and , and Flower Garland Sutra s are central. The only Chinese text considered “canonical” in the monotheistic sense is the Platform Sutra of the Chan school.

Noteworthy Teachings No East Asian tradition is exclusive; many believers attend temples and shrines of various kinds. The three elite traditions—Daoism, Confucianism, and Buddhism—differ fundamentally in doctrine and vary greatly in practice, but they share a utopian view of a peaceful and harmonious society whose members are devoted to self-cultivation and discipline. In addition, some schools of Buddhism look to an afterlife in the Pure Land of a celestial buddha such as Amituofo (Amitabha). Popular religions syncretize teachings from all three traditions, as well as from more recently introduced religions such as Christianity and Islam. Traditions at a Glance The Dragon and Tiger pagodas, Lotus Lake, Kaohsiung, Taiwan . 900855_10_ch10.indd 479 16/12/14 7:00 PM 480 A Concise Introduction to World ReligionsFrom the beginning, religion in East Asia was inextricably linked to politics. Social harmony and stability in governance have always been central concerns, along with physical sustenance and security. Overview The foundational layers of animism and shamanism remain visible today in traces of tribal prac- tices focused on dealing with the insecurities of life. Philosophers, shamans, and “masters of the methods” such as prognosticians and geomancers all sought to bring peace. Early Confucian and Daoist writings thus included political teachings along with metaphysical ruminations, advice on cultivating good health and moral character, and instructions for achieving mystical union with the divine. It was into this religious landscape that Buddhism ( Fojiao, “teaching of the Buddha”) The three tiers of the Temple of Heaven (Tiantan) in Beijing symbolize the relationship between Heaven, Earth, and human beings; and the circular shape re ects the belief that Heaven is round whereas the Earth is square. It was here that the emperor made offerings to Heaven and prayed for 900855_10_ch10.indd 480 16/12/14 7:00 PM 481 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo was later introduced from India and central Asia. The central focus on peace and harmony led the various religions to embrace a generally tolerant, inclusive, and syncretic ethos. This ancient syncretism is still visible in the practice of folk religion today. Next time you go to a Chinese restaurant, take a look around and see if there is a shrine at the door, or perhaps the back of the sitting area. Chances are good that you will see a red shrine with three incense sticks in a censer, a plate of fruit at the front, a candle on each side, and at least one f gure standing in the centre. If the f gure is holding a halberd or lance, it will represent Guan Gong, who symbolizes the Confucian virtues of integrity or loyalty and the sense of what is right ( yi). A traditional cap and a f owing beard signify the Daoist lineage ancestor Lu Dongbin, while a female f gure usually represents Guanyin, the Buddhist bodhisattva of compassion. If there is no f gure, the back panel of the shrine will often carry a verse of thanksgiving addressed to the local earth god. When the Chinese speak of sanjiao , they are talking about the three (san) teachings, philoso- phies, or religions ( jiao) of Confucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism. Collectively, these are sometimes described as the elite tradition. A much more diffuse fourth tradition, often described as folk or popular religion, honours an assortment of spirits that varies from place to place. For the most part the four traditions have coexisted in peace, and many people consult specialists from across the spectrum— Confucian teachers, Daoist priests, Buddhist monks, spirit mediums, astrologers, feng- shui practitioners. In general, Chinese religions are more interested in right action than right belief.

The Classical Period to the Qin (c. 2300 BCE –20 6 BCE ) Confucian Beginnings Origins Not all of the philosophy that the West calls Confucianism originated with Kongzi or Confucius 479 BCE ).1 Some of its seminal ideas can be found in the Five Classics: the Classic or Book of Changes , the Classic of Documents or Book of History , the Classic of Odes or Book of Poetry, the R ecord s or Book of Rites , and the Spring and Autumn Annals . (A sixth work, the Classic of Music , is now lost.) Some parts of these works may predate Confucius himself, and others were likely written after his time.

Nevertheless, Confucius is revered as the f rst of three foremost classical philosophers in the Con- fucian tradition; the other two are Mengzi ( Mencius; c. 343 –289 BCE ) and Xunzi (c. 310 –219 BCE ).

Originating during the Zhou dynasty (c. 1046 –256 BCE ), the Classics were f rst standardized during the Han (202 BCE –220 CE ) and they have been central to the state examination curriculum since the establishment of the f rst state-supported Confucian college in 124 BCE . Historically, they provided the ideology behind government policy for some 2,000 years in addition to serving as blueprints for family relations and guides to individual moral and spiritual transformation. The Classics record a society in transition. During the Shang era (c. 1750 –1040 BCE ) the world was understood to be under the control of anthropomorphic deities, ghosts, and spirits. In the Zhou era this “supernatural” worldview was gradually replaced by the understanding that the world operated according to impersonal natural principles. The content of the Classics therefore ranges from descriptions of deities, ghosts, and spirits, and the rites ( li) performed for them, to philosophical explanations of the natural principles underlying those rites. The ultimate goal was the creation of a harmonious society through careful self-cultivation. Over time, the Classics were reinterpreted with this goal in mind. 900855_10_ch10.indd 481 16/12/14 7:00 PM 482 A Concise Introduction to World Religions 2357 BCE Time of China’s Sage kings Yao, Shun, and Yu; some accounts place Dangun, the mythical founder of Old Joseon (Korea), in the same period c. 2200–1750 Xia dynasty (China) c. 1750–1046 Shang (Yin) dynasty (China) c. 1046–256 Zhou dynasty (China) 722–479 Spring and Autumn period 551 Birth of Confucius (d. 479); some accounts place Laozi around the same time, some place him earlier, and others say that he never existed 479–221 Warring States period c. 400–100 Huang–Lao school c. 343 contemporar y c. 310 Birth of Xunzi (d. 219), who witnessed the carnage of the late Zhou period c. 300 Old Joseon suffers major losses (Korea) 221–206 Qin dynasty (China); destruction of Confucian texts by the First Qin Emperor 202 BCE –9 CE Early (also Former or Western) Han dynasty; Confucian texts recovered and edited based on copies that had been preserved and the recitations of scholars who had memorized them 10 8 Old Joseon is defeated by the Han 25–220 Latter or Eastern Han 12 4 Emperor Wu establishes the Confucian state college and state examination system c. 50 BCE –668 CE Three Kingdoms of Goguryeo, Baekje, and Silla (Korea) c. 48 CE Birth of Ban Zhao (d. 112), who advocated education for women 142 Zhang Daoling founds the Daoist Celestial Masters (later Orthodox Unity) 220–589 Period of North–South disunion or Six Dynasties (China) 317 Northern China falls to invaders from North and Central Asia c. 370–380 Buddhism introduced to Goguryeo and Baekje, and (later) Silla (Korea) 527 Buddhism is made state religion of Silla c. 530 Baekje monks introduce Buddhism to Japan 618 – 9 07 Tang dynasty (China) 600s Tang rulers send Daoist priests, texts, and images to Goguryeo 629–630 Chinese monk Xuanzang makes pilgrimage to India 647 Second Tang emperor orders the construction of Confucian temples with tablets commemorating 22 orthodox Confucians Timeline 900855_10_ch10.indd 482 16/12/14 7:00 PM 483 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo 661 Korean monks Wonhyo and Uisang start out for China 668–936 Kingdom of United Silla (Korea) 682 United Silla establishes the National Confucian College 824 Death of Han Yu, defender of Confucianism 890 –936 Later Three Kingdoms (Korea) 918 –1392 Goryeo period (Korea); Buddhism is the state religion 960 –1279 Song dynasty (China) 115 8 – 1 2 5 0 Jinul synthesizes the practice-focused Seon (Chan) school and doctrinal schools like Hwaeom (Flower Garland) 136 8 –16 4 4 Ming dynasty (China) 1392 –18 97 Joseon persecution of Buddhism (Korea) 14 0 0 s Both China’s Empress Xu and Joseon’s Queen Sohye write texts entitled Instructions for the Inner Quarters 150 0 s Joseon neo-Confucianism 1529 Death of Confucian Wang Yangming 16 4 4 – 1911 Qing (Manchu) dynasty (China) 19 0 0 s East Asia is recon gured in response to Western challenges; new religions are established and traditional ones renewed 1910 – 4 5 Japanese occupation of Korea 1911 Qing dynasty falls and China becomes a republic 19 4 5 Korea divided between Democratic People’s Republic (North) and Republic (S o u t h) 19 49 People’s Republic of China ( PRC ) established 195 0 s New Confucian movement nds a home in Hong Kong 1966–76 Communist government promotes “Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution” in attempt to eradicate traditional Chinese values and practices 19 8 0 s Revival of Daoism in PRC after more than a century of persecution 19 8 9 PRC for the rst time since 1949 2004 First Confucius Institute opens in Seoul 2006 held in China since 1949—opens in Hangzhou 2007 A privately funded International Forum on the Daodejing is approved by the PRC government 2 0 11 First International Daoism Forum held at the foot of Hengshan, one of the ve sacred Daoist mountains 900855_10_ch10.indd 483 16/12/14 7:01 PM 484 A Concise Introduction to World Religions Confucian Concerns The concerns addressed in the Classics can be categorized in four broad areas: individual, familial, political, and cosmic. The f rst duty of the exemplary Confucian (junzi) is to promote a peaceful, prosperous, and harmonious society. The Classics make it clear that such a society cannot be achieved by men alone, for there can be no harmony in the public world without harmony in the private world of the family—the domain of the Confucian woman. They also explain how sacri- f ces and rituals give symbolic expression to the relationship between the outer and inner worlds.

The essential function of ancestor rituals in particular was to encourage right relationships, espe- cially between men and women. Confucians believe that correctness in human relationships is crucial to a stable society. There and friends—all of which must be guided by ren (goodness, humaneness, benevolence, and com- expected to take into account the effect of his or her actions on others in general; the second person is “ junior” and is expected be upright and loyal.

Confucian Exemplars and Sages The prototypes of the Confucian sage are three mythical “sage kings” named Yao, Shun, and Yu, whose stories are told in the Classic of Documents . The virtues they embody are civil, familial, and f lial rather than military, and their stories are understood as implicit critiques of rule by force. Yao is admired for bringing harmony to his domain and making sure that the common people were well fed and prosperous. In the simple agrarian society of his day, Yao’s virtue was said to have radiated throughout the land. The Classic of Documents recounts how, when Yao recognized that his own son was not virtuous enough to be a good ruler, he asked his ministers to f nd a more appropriate successor. They recommended a man of humble status named Shun because he had managed to live in harmony with his family and fulf ll his f lial duties even though his father was blind (literally and f guratively) and stupid, his stepmother deceitful, and his half-brother arrogant.

In other words, Shun had triumphed over adversity. Accordingly, Yao married his two daughters to Shun, observed his conduct for three years, and then offered him the throne. The last sage king, Yu, is associated with the largely legendary Xia dynasty—the predecessors of the Shang. Yu’s father was said to have thrown the natural cycle into chaos by building dams to contain f oodwaters, but Yu worked with nature by digging deep canals to channel the water away.

According the Documents , this story was told to Wu, the f rst king of Zhou, as a lesson in governance.

Divination and the Pantheon of Spirits At least two related elements from the stories of the sage kings survived into the Shang dynasty: an intense interest in “right” governance and a belief in divine intervention through revelation to the king. The Shang kings served as shamans, practising divination and communicating directly with the spirits that were believed to hold the real power over the empire. Religious ritual was thus an indispensable part of governance.

At the apex of the Shang pantheon of spirits sat the Lord-on-High or Shangdi. Thought to be the ancestor of the Shang clan, he was the sky god who commanded rain, thunder, and wind. Below 900855_10_ch10.indd 484 16/12/14 7:01 PM 485 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo him were the nature spirits believed to animate natural phenomena, followed by celestial spirits such as the sun and moon; then “Former Lords” who were associated with the Shang but were not royal clan members; and, f nally, direct human ancestors, both male and female.

The Mandate of Heaven After more than 700 years in power, the Shang dynasty fell to the Zhou in 1046 BCE . It was in the context of this power shift that the concept of the Mandate of Heaven was developed. When the f rst Zhou ruler, King Wu, died, leaving a young son, his brother the Duke of Zhou served as Table 10.1 Major Chinese (C) and Korean (K) Historical Periods at a Glance C c. 2300 BCE –206 BCE : Classical Period through Qin Dynasty K ?–10 8 BCE : Old Joseon C 202 BCE –220 CE: Han Dynasty K c. 50 BCE –668 CE: Three Kingdoms C 220–589: Six Dynasties Period C 589–907: Sui and Tang Dynasties K 668–1392: United Silla, Later Three Kingdoms, and Goryeo C 960–1644: Song, Yuan, and Ming Dynasties K 1392–1910: Joseon and the Korean Empire C 1644–present: Qing Dynasty and Republican Period K 1910–45: Japanese occupation K 1945–present: Korea partitioned between North and South Document The Mandate of Heaven appears in the Classic of Documents in the form of a public announcement legiti- mating the Zhou overthrow of the Yin (an alternative name for the Shang ).

Heaven has rejected and ended the Mandate of this great state of Yin. Thus, although Yin has many for- mer wise kings in Heaven, when their successor kings and successor people undertook their Man- date, in the end wise and good men lived in misery.

Knowing that they must care for and sustain their wives and children, they then called out in anguish to Heaven and f ed to places where they could not be caught. Ah! Heaven too grieved for the people of all the lands, wanting, with affection, in giving its Mandate to employ those who are deeply com- mitted. The king should have reverent care for his virtue (D. Nivison in de Bary and Bloom 1999: 36).

On the Mandate of Heaven 900855_10_ch10.indd 485 16/12/14 7:01 PM 486 A Concise Introduction to World Religionsregent, but he returned the throne to the boy once he was old enough to rule. Such loyalty was revered by the early Confucians, and the Duke’s popularity rivalled that of Confucius himself. The personif cation of restraint, humility, and willingness to listen to advice, the Duke declared that Heaven had withdrawn the Mandate of Heaven from the later Shang kings because they had failed to provide for the people.In this way moral character became the primary determinant of the right to rule. The idea that good governance was a duty to Heaven ref ected the Zhou belief in a moral force or supreme deity that took an interest in human affairs. How to encourage kings to rule ethically became a central concern for Confucians. In the Classic of Odes , King Wen (the father of Wu) is imagined addressing the last Shang king:

King Wen said, Woe!

Woe upon you, Yin and Shang!

You have been the harsh oppressor, you have been grasping and crushing.

You have been in the places of power, you have held the functions.

Heaven sent recklessness down in you, and you rise by acts of force (Owen 1996: 20).

Thus the mandate to rule was taken away from the cruel Shang and passed to the virtuous Zhou. In this political transition, the term “god” ( di) became associated with the earthly political ruler, while Heaven came to be portrayed as an impartial universal power, a cosmic moral force that cares for human welfare and so gives the people a wise and good king. Humanization: The Transition from Shang to Zhou With the establishment of the Zhou dynasty, the concept of Heaven displaced the more personal “Lord on High” of the Shang. Although divination continued, the methods and materials changed, ref ecting a change in the understanding of the universe. The bones and tortoise shells used for Shang divination were replaced by plant stalks —a change that ref ected a conceptual shift away from an enchanted universe towards a more rational, impersonal one. This shift did not mean that ancient beliefs and practices disappeared. The understanding that the world is controlled by ghosts, nature spirits, and celestial beings remains an integral part of Chinese religion, especially in folk traditions. Nevertheless, new schools of thought developed.

Legalists stressed the power of law in the advancement of human well-being; Naturalists concen- trated on natural elements and processes (see Focus box); and Confucians focused on human rela- tionships. Philosophers came to see the world as regulated by impersonal processes, which they sought to understand in order to use them as models for human society. hence “correct”—foundation on which to structure human society. The 64 hexagrams that are the basis of the Classic of Changes (also known as the Yijing ) , a divination text originating around 1000 BCE , were said to capture the metaphysical structure, transformations, and “Way” of the universe, providing both a general blueprint and a specif c guide for humans facing a cosmos in continual f ux. 900855_10_ch10.indd 486 16/12/14 7:01 PM 487 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo Rites: Performance and Principles Rites explains that a ruler must have a wife as a helpmate. The principle of complementarity is ref ected in the division of labour between the king in the public world and the queen in the private realm. The necessary balance of yin and yang is ref ected in the f rst two trigrams of the Changes or Yijing . Qian (Heaven and the creative) is repre- sented by three solid lines , while kun (Earth and the receptive) is represented by three broken lines . The Naturalists, also known as the yin-yang school, believed that those who followed the laws of nature would thrive while those who did not would perish.

Yin–yang theory was later combined with the the- ( wuxing to form a theory of cycles that are generated and overcome. Thus metal generates water, water gener- ates wood, wood generates f re, f re generates earth, and earth generates metal; then the cycle begins again. This cosmology suggests there is nothing in the world that cannot be defeated; and, at the same time, that there is no destruction from which growth cannot come.

Focus The Yin–Yang School A bagua (eight trigrams) mirror is said to ward off evil spirits. This one contains the yin-yang symbol at its centre, surrounded by the eight trigrams and two circles (iStockphoto / Thinkstock). 900855_10_ch10.indd 487 16/12/14 7:01 PM 488 A Concise Introduction to World ReligionsThe rituals described in the Rites evolved over time, as did the understanding of their role in the lives of the individual, the state, and the society. Belief in their magico-religious eff cacy was gradually replaced by a sense of their value in terms of discipline, education, and moral develop- ment. The deeply religious culture of the Shang was humanized by Zhou-era philosophers such as Confucius. In Master Tso’s Commentary on the Spring and Autumn Annals, for example, when a pure, ” he is corrected: “It is not simply that ghosts and spirits are attracted to human beings: it is Confucius Confucius spoke of himself as a transmitter of tradition rather than an innovator. On the connec- tion between goodness and ritual, he famously said:

Respect without ritual becomes tiresome, circumspection without ritual becomes timid- ity, bold fortitude without ritual becomes unruly, and directness without ritual becomes twisted (Sommer 1995: 46).

Confucius used the word li (“rites” or “ritual”) to mean not only religious ritual but also the rules of social etiquette and everyday courtesy. He encouraged his students to practise li in all f ve fundamental relationships, and urged them to seek the spirit and principles behind the rites.

Central to the Confucian understanding of history was the perfection that the sage kings achieved by governing in accordance with the Way. Confucius believed that the time of the sage kings was preceded by a utopian age:

When the Great Way was practised, the world was shared by all alike. The worthy and the able were promoted to off ce and men practised good faith and lived in affection.

Therefore they did not regard as parents only their own parents, or as sons only their own sons. The aged found a f tting close to their lives, the robust their proper employment; the young were provided with an upbringing, and the widow and widower, the orphaned and the sick, with proper care. Men had their tasks and women their hearths.... all evil plotting was prevented and thieves and rebels did not arise, so that the people could leave their outer gates unbolted. This was the age of Grand Commonality [ Datong] (“Evolution In time, greed and self shness ended the Grand Commonality and ushered in the period of Lesser Prosperity, during which the sage kings emerged as exemplars of correct, ethical gover- nance. The primary source of Confucius’ teachings on how to govern in such a potentially chaotic era is the collection known as the Analects .

The Confucian ideal was the junzi (translated variously as “gentleman,” “noble,” or “superior junzi was “son of a lord,” indicating inherited social nobility, in the Analects the junzi is a person of noble character, committed to the development of de—another word that underwent a shift in meaning with Confucius. Originally referring to a kind of magical charismatic power, in the Analects it signif es a moral power rooted in ethical behaviour. The fact that Confucius used these words in non-traditional ways did not mean that the 900855_10_ch10.indd 488 16/12/14 7:01 PM 489 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo meanings he gave them were new; the socio-political ideals he promoted were already present in the classic texts (Odes, Documents , Spring and Autumn Annals , and Changes). Confucius used the sin- gle word ren to capture virtues such as respect, liberality, trustworthiness, earnestness, and kind- ness. He believed that the most effective way to cultivate ren was through careful observance of li.

Above all, Confucius emphasized f lial piety or devotion, explained in the Rites as “caring for” one’s parents according to the Way: that is, to the greatest extent possible without neglecting one’s responsibilities in other relationships (8.2.1). For Confucius, ritual observance was essential to the maintenance of harmony, for he believed that those who treat their parents with the proper respect will be equally loyal to a government ruling with the Mandate of Heaven. Above all, humaneness is ref ected in loyalty and empathetic understanding or reciprocity (4: 15). Confucius sums up his Since all human beings are by nature similar, all have the potential to be noble; however, indi- viduals set themselves apart through their habits and actions (17: 2). Thus even as he democratizes the idea of nobility, Confucius creates a hierarchy of character based on moral cultivation. This hierarchy is all about the mastery of the “heart-mind” ( xin):

Through mastering oneself and returning to ritual one becomes humane. If for a single day one can master oneself and return to ritual, the whole world will return to humane- ness.... Look at nothing contrary to ritual; listen to nothing contrary to ritual; say noth- ing contrary to ritual; do nothing contrary to ritual (12: 1).

Confucius believed that if the ruler wants goodness, the people will be good: “The virtue ( de) of the exemplary person is like the wind, and the virtue of small people is like grass: When the wind the good, wise, and humane must rule over the small-minded and morally inferior. The Confucian mandate is to limit the negative consequences of ignoble behaviour. When a recluse describes Confucius as “a scholar who withdraws from particular men” and suggests that instead he should withdraw from society, Confucius sighs and responds: “If the Way prevailed in nobility must be expressed through action in the public realm.

Mengzi The second most prominent classical thinker after Confucius is Meng Ke, whose name was lati- nized as Mencius. He lived more than a century after Confucius, by which time large conscript armies had been formed and the human cost of war had increased accordingly. Mengzi travelled from state to state, trying to persuade their rulers to stop the carnage for the sake of the people. At the same time he emphasized the practical value of humaneness ( ren) and the importance of the moral sense of what is right ( yi).

The book Mencius is a collection of conversations between Mencius and his disciples, his oppo- nents, and feudal rulers. Among the issues discussed are human nature and government. Mencius traced many of the problems of his day to the human heart-mind ( xin), of which he identif ed four types. The heart-mind of compassion yields benevolence; that of shame leads to observance of rites; that of respect moves people to duty or right behaviour; and that of right and wrong brings wisdom (6.A.6 ibid., 163). 900855_10_ch10.indd 489 16/12/14 7:01 PM 490 A Concise Introduction to World ReligionsMencius taught that sensitivity to others’ suffering is innate, but must be consciously developed if a ruler is to govern as the sage kings did. In later times, a great man was needed to encourage the ruler to cultivate the heart-mind; then, once the prince had become benevolent and dutiful, everyone would emulate him. Mencius did not believe that the effect of the prince’s character on the people was automatic or magical, however. Even though human nature was essentially good, the common people needed supervision: otherwise they would be driven only by material needs and desires, with no higher consciousness. The best way of nurturing the heart-mind of the people, Mencius taught, was to teach them to reduce their desires. Mencius’s belief in the potential of the mature heart-mind allowed him to take some uncon- ventional positions. When someone suggested that Shun, the son-in-law of King Yao, had failed marriage, while Shun’s own heart-mind was so well developed that he could act according to his own conscience. Similarly, Mencius once remarked that it would be better if the Documents had never been written if its contents had to be accepted without critical thought. Most famously, he argued that rebellion is justif ed when the ruler has lost the Mandate of Heaven. For Mencius it was not enough simply to follow the classical teachings: we must use our heart-minds to determine the morally correct course of action. Mencius was not only a political thinker. He has also been described as a mystic because of his emphasis on qi (or ch’i give substance to virtue and to be nourished by it:

This is a ch’i which is . . . vast and unyielding . . . which unites rightness and the Way.

Deprive it of these and it will collapse. It is born of accumulated rightness and cannot be appropriated by anyone through a sporadic show of rightness. Whenever one acts in 8). Xunzi Xun Kuang or Xun Qing (c. 310 –219 BCE ), better known as Master Xun or Xunzi, was a generation younger than Mencius. Living at the end of the Warring States period, he likely witnessed the bloody conf ict that ended in the conquest of the last feudal states by the f rst Qin emperor (Qin Shi Huang). So perhaps it is not surprising that he did not agree with Mencius on the innate goodness of human beings: he believed that human nature was evil, and goodness required conscious effort.

Nevertheless, he did share the core Confucian beliefs in the possibility of sagehood and the value of culture and learning. Xunzi believed that education and ritual were essential to the maintenance of the hierarchy required for an orderly society. But he was not blind to the misuse and corruption of Confucian values. Like Confucius, who says in the Analects that the “village paragon is the thief of virtue” (17:

The collection known as the Xunzi was compiled more than a century after Xunzi’s time, during the Han dynasty. Its form marks a major departure from the recorded conversations of the Analects 900855_10_ch10.indd 490 16/12/14 7:01 PM 491 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo and Mencius : it consists mainly of essays on topics such as the original nature of human beings, ing,” underlines the necessity of effort to achieve moral progress:

Learning should never cease.... A piece of wood as straight as a plumb line may be bent into a circle as true as any drawn with a compass and, even after the wood has dried, it will not straighten out again (Watson 1963: 15).

Why do human beings need to be “straightened out”? Because they are “warped” with innate desires that must be curbed through education and ritual. In his chapter “A Discussion of Heaven,” Xunzi continues Confucius’ effort to humanize the Zhou tradition, rejecting the supernatural in favour of the rational and natural. He sees Heaven, Earth, and humanity as forming a trinity in which each component has its own function. As human beings, even sages do not seek to under- stand Heaven, let alone to take over its “godlike” role. Rather, humans should simply focus on living well. Even though Xunzi believed the world to operate without supernatural intervention, he sup- ported the performance of traditional rituals because he believed they had been perfected by the ancient kings. Only a sage can fully understand the rites, he said; but the noble person f nds com- fort in performing them, while the common person accepts them as a ref ection of the reality of the spirit world. Xunzi took ritual and music out of the realm of magic, interpreting their functions in practical terms. Thus the purpose of teaching the rites is to cultivate the virtues that promote harmony, such as courtesy and humility.

Daoism Origins Not everyone believed in the Confucian way. Daoists developed a counterpoint to the Confucian focus on social hierarchy, political involvement, emotional and moral discipline, and ritual reg- imentation, a counterpoint based on the concept of the Dao (“way”; also spelled Tao). Although they did not seek to overturn Confucianism, they pointed out its limitations. Historically, Daoism was understood to have two branches, philosophical and religious. Daoist philosophy traced its origins to the third and fourth centuries BCE , but Daoist religion was thought to have emerged only in the second century CE , with the formation of two millenarian groups (the Celestial Masters and Yellow Kerchiefs). Recent research, however, shows that philosophers in the northeastern state of Qi (present-day Shandong) were discussing ideas related to both philosoph- ical and religious Daoism as early as the fourth century BCE .

Although the literature of that time does not use the term “Daoist,” it does refer to a Huang– Laozi . Huang–Lao teachings correspond roughly to what we now consider philosophical Daoism; its teachings took shape around the early fourth century, when King Xuan of Qi (r. 319–301 BCE) offered appointments at the Jixia Academy to scholars from various states, north and south, in the hope that they would f nd solutions to the problems of the day. Among those scholars were Men- cius, Xunzi, the Naturalist Zou Yan of the Yin-yang Five Phases (Wuxing or f ve elements) school, and a student of the Huang–Lao teachings named Huan Yuan. 900855_10_ch10.indd 491 16/12/14 7:01 PM 492 A Concise Introduction to World Religions Philosophical Daoism The term “philosophical Daoism” refers to an early prototypical Daoism concerned with ideas such as the nature of virtue, cultivation of the heart-mind, and good governance. Its early history has conventionally been associated with two main sources: the Daodejing (Classic of the Way and Power and the Zhuangzi , named for the thinker whose ideas it purports to represent (in fact, both works are collections of texts written at different times by different authors). Daoist nuns from the Quanzhen (Complete Truth) sect perform daily rituals on Wudang Mountain. The three head of ciates wear the lotus crown and robes embroidered with trigrams. The yellow banners in the background mark the space as sacred and contain writing that resembles Chinese characters but is “heavenly,” not of the human realm 900855_10_ch10.indd 492 16/12/14 7:01 PM 493 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo At least three new sources have proved helpful in reconstructing the early development of philosophical Daoism. Two of them are found in the Guanzi , a collection of writings tradition- ally attributed to a very early (seventh century BCE ) f gure named Guan Zhong; and the third, the Huang-Lao manuscripts, is a recently discovered bundle of silk manuscripts, dating from the second century BCE, that include illustrations of “guiding and stretching” exercises similar to modern-day taiji (the sequence of slow-motion movements known in the West as Tai Chi). Development towards Religious Expression Religious Daoism is widely associated with colourful rituals, belief in deities, ghosts, and spirits, meditation in search of union with the Dao, and the use of drugs in pursuit of immortality or transcendence. Thus it may appear to be diametrically opposed to philosophical Daoism. Yet the two streams do share several fundamental elements: self-discipline, the quest for transcendence of the ordinary self, the ideal of non-action ( wuwei), and the assumption that religion and politics are inseparable. What makes it diff cult to recognize these common elements is the fact that religious Daoism also incorporates two traditions that are clearly not philosophical: a southern tradition of shaman- ism and a northern tradition known as the “way of recipes, methods, and immortality.” Unlike the (northern) divinatory shamanism of the Shang and Zhou eras, this southern shamanism was dis- tinctly religious and non-philosophical. Its character can be seen in a collection called Songs of the South, which features lavish descriptions of gods and goddesses, “soaring phoenixes,” and fabulous unions between humans and gods. The northern tradition of “recipes, methods, and immortality,” for its part, centred on a quest for an elixir of everlasting life conducted by “masters of technical methods” such as magicians, doctors, diviners, and astrologists. The integration of these very dif- Different Streams of Daoism The conjunction of these diverse traditions produced several distinctive streams in early Daoism.

Three elements recur in the classical texts: the concept of the Dao as “the One,” the primary force in the universe; the need for inner discipline to reach the deep tranquillity necessary to The Guanzi originated in the fourth century and took its current form in the f rst century BCE . It was categorized as Daoist during the Han but later reclassif ed as Legalist, and therefore neglected by students of Daoism. Yet recent research has found that two of its sections, both dealing with mental discipline, are directly relevant to the ideas in the two classical Daoist texts. The f rst, Techniques of the Mind I, addresses the broader concerns of govern- ment as well as methods of self-cultivation. The sec- ond, Inward Training, focuses exclusively on spiritual cultivation and bridges the streams of philosophical and religious Daoism. Focus The Guanzi 900855_10_ch10.indd 493 16/12/14 7:01 PM 494 A Concise Introduction to World Religions experience unity with that force; and, f nally, the use of the f rst two elements to achieve benevo- lent government.It has been suggested that the concerns of the classical texts can be classif ed in three streams:

Individualist, Primitivist, and Syncretist. The Individualist stream is mystical; concerned mainly with inner cultivation and union with the cosmos, it is basic to all six of the classical texts. To this the Primitivist stream, which can be seen in the Laozi as well as parts of the Zhuangzi (ch. 8 and the f rst part of 11), adds an appeal for a simple agrarian way of life. Finally, the Syncretist stream, found in the later chapters of the Zhuangzi , Techniques of the Mind I, and the Huang–Lao manuscripts, combines teachings of Laozi and Zhuangzi with those of other schools. The exact chronology of the various writings is not known, but the Daodejing and Inward Training are gen- erally considered to be the earliest. Anecdotes in the Zhuangzi that describe encounters between Confucius and Laozi would make the two men contemporaries, but their historical authenticity is questionable. The f rst seven chapters of the Zhuangzi , if they were in fact composed by Zhuang Zhou (Zhuangzi, 369?–286? BCE ) are also of some antiquity.

Finally, the Songs of the South are traditionally attributed in part to Qu Yuan, a famously righ- teous minister who is remembered in the Dragon Boat festival, though most of them were probably written about a century after his death in 278 BCE . Brief descriptions of the six sources follow. The Dragon Boat Festival ( Duanwujie), held on the fth day of the fth month of the lunar calendar, commemorates the loyal Chu minister Qu Yuan (c. 340–278 BCE ), who drowned himself after he was unjustly banished. The boat 900855_10_ch10.indd 494 16/12/14 7:01 PM 495 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo Inward Training in Daoist and Confucian Contexts Inward Training, a short text on cultivation of the heart-mind embedded in the Guanzi, serves as a bridge between philosophical and religious Daoism and provides examples of the cultural beliefs and practices from the Zhou era that Confucians and Daoists shared. Like the Daodejing , Zhuangzi , Techniques of the Mind I , and Huang–Lao sources, Inward Training recommends a type of meditation known as “holding fast to the One.” But it also refers to concepts uncommon in those philosophical texts—the vital essence ( jing), vital energy or breath ( qi), and the numinous or the spirit ( shen integration of these three elements (through meditation and dietary practices) was believed to con- fer longevity and even physical immortality or spiritual transcendence. Inward Training recalls early Confucianism when it suggests that the virtue of an exemplary per- ing” conditions in the empire by virtue of the harmony he embodies. Section 9 uses the same terms that Confucians do to describe the exemplary person ( junzi) who cultivates this power-virtue ( de).

Like the ideal Confucian ruler, his Daoist counterpart possesses a virtue-power that inf uences lesser persons. Whereas Laozi and Zhuangzi suggest some antipathy towards Confucians, Inward Train- ing hints at a shared desire for tranquillity and recovery of our original or Heavenly nature.

Later forms of Daoism, however, did include practices that some Confucians found abhorrent, including the use of esoteric sexual practices, the ingestion of poisonous cinnabar (mercuric sulphide) to attain immortality, and its emphasis on escaping or transcending the world rather than serving it.

Laozi and the Daodejing If the apparent incongruity of such practices seems puzzling, it may be helpful to remember the famous f rst line of the Daodejing : “The way that can be spoken of / Is not the constant way” (Lau 1963: 57). The f uidity implied by this holy ineffability is characteristic of Daoism. Unlike the authors (or editors) of Inward Training , Laozi takes a dim view of Confucian rites:

“The rites are the wearing thin of loyalty and good faith / And the beginning of disorder” (Lau Daodejing shares with Confucius the ideal of discipline: the only difference is that he seeks to achieve it not through human-created rites but through the all-embracing cosmic Way. The term de in the Daodejing refers to a “virtue-power” that embodies the mystic inner power attained through alignment with the unseen world, the power that allows a sage ruler to infuse his realm with the harmony he has achieved by “doing nothing,” wuwei . (It’s important not to take this phrase literally: in this context, “doing nothing” refers to a state of mind or being in which one is so permeated by the Way that one acts in concert with it, free of self or intention.) The Daoist sage invites the Dao to dwell in him by making himself as empty as the hollow of a cup or the space in a room. Soft as the water that f ows over rocks yet in time wears them down, he is spare in his desires. Overturning convention, he knows the honoured male but keeps to the traditionally subservient and humble female. He knows the symbolic goodness of white but keeps to the unenlightened black (ibid., 127). He embraces the One and remains an uncarved block, 900855_10_ch10.indd 495 16/12/14 7:01 PM 496 A Concise Introduction to World Religionstranscending dichotomies. He refuses to be sculpted with conventional virtues—though Laozi makes it clear that he also teaches conventional values:What others teach I also teach.

“The violent will not come to a natural end.” I shall take this as my precept (Lau 1963: 103).

Yet even as the Daodejing counsels against violence—just as the Confucian sages do—it criti- cizes as “false adornments” the Confucian concepts of the wise sage and righteous benevolence. It the unadorned and embrace the uncarved block, / Have little thought of self and as few desires as Unlike the Confucian who concentrates on the virtuous, the Daoist sage “abandons no one” ing even the tumult of the Warring States. Zhuangzi Unlike the sage of the Laozi, the sage of the Zhuangzi shuns politics. Even more strikingly, in the Zhuangzi great sages are not the only ones with wisdom: a humble cook may also be wise. The fan- ciful and the historical exist side by side, like black and white, or female and male. The aspiration The sage allows his mind to wander, blending with the vastness that is the Way. He follows things as they are. In contrast to Laozi’s wuwei or “non-action,” Zhuangzi describes a state of “self- so-ness” or spontaneity ( ziran). Although the principle is not inconsistent with the Confucian ideal of following nature, it is expressed in remarkably different terms. The story of Cook Ding illustrates the Daoist position. When the prince asks the cook for advice, Ding counsels the same approach to governance that a cook would take to carving an ox: instead of hacking at the carcass, he would look for the hollows in the joints. In the same way, the ruler should not rely on preconceived rules and principles, but should examine the situation at hand to understand its natural structure. The condition in which it is possible to assess a situation clearly is that of Oneness through emptiness.

The Huang–Lao Silk Manuscripts , Techniques of the Mind I, and Songs of the South The last three textual sources of early Daoism were likely compiled through the late Zhou, Qin, and early Han periods. The ideas recorded in the Huang–Lao Silk Manuscripts are drawn from a variety of schools, but their underlying theme is Laozi’s ideal of the tranquil sage king who governs through non-action. The prototypical Daoist Huang–Lao scholars were active at court during the early Han, although they disappeared after Emperor Wu (r. 140 – 87 BCE ) made Confucianism the state religion. Sealed in a tomb in 168 BCE, the manuscripts were unknown until 1973.

Like the Huang–Lao teachings, Techniques of the Mind I ref ects the Daoist concerns outlined in Inward Training , the Daodejing, and the Zhuangzi 900855_10_ch10.indd 496 16/12/14 7:01 PM 497 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo restraining desire and emptying the mind— can help a ruler attain the tranquillity necessary to respond harmoniously to any situation in its “self-so-ness.” Women and the Feminine in the Classical Texts Neither Inward Training nor the Daodejing discussed women. The latter talks abstractly about the “mother” and the “spirit of the valley,” which is both the “root of heaven and earth” and the “mys- women: wives are mentioned only as companions in life who are grieved in death, and conven- tional gender roles are accepted. The Daoist Liezi is described as taking over the domestic realm of the feminine after he has attained mature spiritual understanding:

He went home and for three years did not go out. He replaced his wife at the stove, fed the pigs as though he were feeding people, and showed no preferences in the things he did.

He got rid of the carving and polishing and returned to plainness, letting his body stand alone like a clod. In the midst of entanglement he remained sealed, and in this oneness he ended his life (Watson 1968:97).

This association of sacred oneness with animals and the feminine is not surprising. Nor is Zhuangzi’s implied criticism of Confucian-style “carving and polishing,” given the Daoist prefer- ence for non-action and the natural. Images of female power in itself—without reference to men— are limited to a teacher called the Woman Crookback and the Queen Mother of the West, who heads the pantheon of goddesses. These are mythical characters, however: unlike the Confucian classics, the Zhuangzi does not celebrate any historical woman. In the Songs of the South , the theme of men seeking union with the feminine, and women with the masculine, becomes prominent.

Mohism Mohism was the third most inf uential religious system before the introduction of Buddhism. Master Mo (Mozi, 470 –391 BCE ) coexisted with Confucians and Daoists, and his teachings ref ect similar concerns, but were also markedly different. Mozi taught an undifferentiated love, a love of all without distinction. He believed that Heaven willed people to love one another, and that those who failed to do so would be punished; that the ultimate purpose of government was to provide food, shelter, and security for all; and that members of a society should help one another avoid harm and deprivation. The Han Dynasty (202 BCE –220 CE ) State Confucianism, Huang–Lao and Religious Daoism, and the Introduction of Buddhism Early Chinese religious beliefs and practices faded or were recontextualized in new ideas, rituals, and structures. Ancient shamanic traditions endured, and interest in divination using the Yijing persisted. Although eclipsed by Confucianism at court, Daoism re-emerged in the form of religious anti-Han rebel groups like the Yellow Kerchiefs and Celestial Masters. It was into this varied reli- gious landscape that Buddhism was introduced. 900855_10_ch10.indd 497 16/12/14 7:01 PM 498 A Concise Introduction to World Religions Popular Beliefs and Practices Assimilated The worship of deities continued into the Han. During a drought, ordinary folk appealed to the Queen Mother of the West for help. By the Latter Han, she was the head deity of a paradise in the far west that was believed to connect Heaven and Earth; she also became the goddess who bestowed immortality and a protector-deity who granted wealth and children—a precursor to the Buddhist pusa (bodhisattva or enlightened being) Guanyin (Avalokitesvara).

Political Daoism King of Huainan, Liu An, sponsored a collection of Huang–Lao writings called the Masters of Huainan (Huainanzi ), a copy of which he presented to Emperor Wu (his nephew) in 139 BCE . A mural from the Mogao Caves (or Grottoes) at Dunhuang, in western China, shows the celestial buddha Amituofo three extraordinary Buddhist cave-temple systems in north central and western China (the others are Yungang and Longmen). Beginning in 366 CE, more than 400 grottoes were carved out of the rock at Mogao alone and lled with Buddhist paintings, sculptures, and manuscripts. 900855_10_ch10.indd 498 16/12/14 7:01 PM 499 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo rid himself of prejudice so that he can respond appropriately to all situations. The court historian Sima Tan (d. 110 BCE ) was also a follower of the Huang–Lao school. In his discourse “On the Six Lineages of Thought” he describes the Daoists approvingly as “mov[ing] in in de Bary and Bloom 1999: 279). By contrast, he writes that the New Text Confucians (who by purposeful “right” action, Sima Tan made clear his preference for the Daoists. Nevertheless, underlying both traditions is a fundamental emphasis on self-cultivation for the sake of harmony in the universe. Both Confucians and Daoists seek to control the heart-mind in order to attain the tranquillity necessary to achieve union with the Way. Both believe that oneness with the Dao, hence with Heaven and Earth, allows us to transcend our selves and serve others. The Introduction of Buddhism Buddhism, like Daoism, emphasizes meditation, breath control, and abstinence from certain foods. Like both Indigenous religions, it focuses on purity of the heart-mind and mastery of the passions. But its trajectory and methods tend to be more extreme. For example, the Sutra in Forty- Two Sections stresses the hindrance that lust poses for a man seeking enlightenment, and the Buddha instructs his monks not to look at women, let alone talk to them. During the Han dynasty, the features that Buddhism appeared to share with Confucianism and Daoism helped to mask its more fundamental differences. Sometimes Daoist terms and ideas were used to convey Buddhism to potential converts.

Document The Sutra in Forty- Two Sections is a defence of Bud- dhism purportedly written by a Chinese convert at the end of the second century. But it was most likely com- posed in the f fth or sixth century, when Buddhism was at the height of its inf uence. The following excerpts address the deleterious effects of passion, especially lust.

Those who are addicted to the passions are like the torchbearers running against the wind; their hands are sure to be burned.

From the passions arises worry and from worry arises fear. Away with the passions, and no fear, no worry. People cleave to their worldly possessions and self- ish passions so blindly as to sacrif ce their own lives for them. They are like a child who tries to eat a little honey smeared on the edge of a knife.

The Lord of Heaven offered a beautiful maiden to the Buddha, desiring to test the Buddha’s inten- tions and teachings. The Buddha replied, “You are but a leather bag f lled with f lth, why do you From the Sutra in Forty- Two Sections 900855_10_ch10.indd 499 16/12/14 7:01 PM 500 A Concise Introduction to World Religions Confucianism The Birth of Political State Confucianism The victory of the Qin unif ed the Warring States. To minimize dissent, however, the f rst emperor ordered the destruction of almost all the scholarly books that might encourage deep ref ection on social and political values, among them the Confucian classics. Although one copy of each work was preserved in the imperial library, those copies were destroyed in a f re when the capital was sacked. Thus when the Han dynasty (202 BCE–220 CE ) replaced the short-lived Qin, a great many works had to be reconstructed. The political and intellectual changes that took place during the Han would continue to shape imperial ideology as well as religious beliefs and practices for the next 2,000 years. To the four vir- added a f fth: trustworthiness. Also central to Han ideology were the notions that Heaven, Earth, and humankind form a trinity; and that the celestial and terrestrial powers respond to human entreaty. Confucian thinkers ref ected the inf uence both of Xunzi and of a chapter in the Rites called “Centrality and Equilibrium”: they believed that humans who were sincere in their efforts to bring about peace and harmony could share in the creative, transformative powers of Heaven and Earth. Echoing Mencius and Xunzi, Han Confucians identif ed economic welfare as the basis of morality. The government, in particular the emperor, was obliged to provide both the physi- cal sustenance and the moral education necessary for people to lead secure and happy lives.

Following Xunzi, Han Confucians also promoted moral education through ritual, music, and literature. Both a Confucian canon (in the form of the Five Classics) and political or state Confucianism were established during the Han. Philosophers seeking a holistic account of the universe and humankind’s place in it tried to syncretize the Confucian tradition with other philosophies. The result was a Confucianism that blended ideas from traditional texts with those of thinkers such as the masters of technical methods, who sought to manipulate the cosmos; and the Naturalists, who developed the notions of qi inf uential non-canonical texts were written or compiled and edited, among them the Biographies of Exemplary (or Virtuous) Wo m e n , Admonitions (or Lessons ) for Wo m e n , and the Classic of Filiality .

The f rst two in particular def ned what was expected of women and formed the foundation of a specif cally female Confucian tradition. The Compilation of the Five Classics Han Confucians believed that Confucius himself had transmitted the Zhou tradition through the canonical texts, and that he had had a hand in the selection, compilation, and editing of all f ve Classics. However, later scholars have shown that a good portion of their content originated after Confucius’ time. The f rst classic, the Changes or Yijing , assumed particular importance during the Han. It is divided into two parts: a series of short passages interpreting the 64 hexagrams, and 10 appendices or “wings” (traditionally attributed to Confucius) that elaborate on those interpretations. Confucius is also said to have edited or written a short introduction to each section of the second classic, the Documents . Although some of the content is now thought to date from as late as the fourth century 900855_10_ch10.indd 500 16/12/14 7:01 PM 501 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo CE , this volume was historically considered an accurate account of China’s ancient rulers, from the sage kings to the early Zhou. The third classic, the Odes , consists of roughly 300 poems, mostly from the early Zhou, that Confucius is believed to have chosen and edited. They include songs from both ordinary people and the aristocracy and were often interpreted politically as expressions of popular sentiment— praising virtuous rulers and criticizing bad ones. The fourth classic, the Rites , consists of three separate texts, some of which Confucius is cred- ited with compiling and editing: Rites of Etiquette and Ceremonials for minor off cials, Rites (or Insti- tutions ) of Zhou , and the R ecord s or Book of Rites, which explores the principles behind particular rites. The contents, which likely date from the mid- to late Zhou and the early Han and took their current form over time, range from minutely detailed advice on how to live daily life to broad phil- osophical discussions of the meaning of state rituals. N MONGOLIA STEPPE AND DESERT LANDS ANNAM (VIETNAM) GREAT WALL TAIWAN SOUTH CHINA SEA Kunming Lanzhou GuangzhouWuhan Shanghai Chongqing Xi’an SongshanKaifeng Huashan Luoyang Nanjing Beijing NORTH KOREA YELLOW SEA Yellow R. Yangtze R.

Taishan Qufu (birthplace of Confucius) Birthplace of Mencius 0 200 400 km 0 200 mi. TIBET Hengshan Hengshan SOUTH KOREASeoul P’yongyang HAINAN Capitals of China (from fourth century BCE), contemporary centres of state (Confucian) religion Mountains most sacred to Daoists Land 660–10,000 ft (200–3,050 m) Land 10,000 ft (3,050 m) and over Map 10.1 Indigenous Chinese Religions Source : Adapted from al Faruqi and Sopher 1974: 111. 900855_10_ch10.indd 501 16/12/14 7:01 PM 502 A Concise Introduction to World ReligionsThe f fth and last classic, the Spring and Autumn Annals , is a terse chronicle of events in Con- fucius’ native state of Lu from 722 to 481 BCE that Confucius is said to have compiled to express his judgment of them. It was therefore used as a guide to moral laws and principles. The text-focused Confucians were the hardest hit by the Qin emperor’s book burning. And it was the Confucians of the third and second centuries BCE who took up the task of retrieving and reassembling the lost texts, including those of other schools. Dong Zhongshu The most inf uential Confucian at the court of Emperor Wu was Dong Zhongshu (195?–105?

BCE between the macrocosm of Heaven and Earth and the microcosm of the human body. Dong set out to integrate Confucian thought with the supernatural thinking of court diviners, the Naturalist school. Dong took ideas from Mencius and Xunzi and combined them with the Nat- uralist concept of vital force (qi ) operating through the dynamics of yin and yang. At the close of the Han, two rationalist scholars named Yang Xiong and Wang Chong deconstructed Dong’s sys- and cleared away some of his more extravagant accretions. The Classic of Filiality A version of the f ve relationships known as the three bonds was central to Han Confucianism; they concentrated on the distinction between the senior and junior roles encapsulated in emperor– minister, parent–child and husband–wife. The importance of the minister’s role was especially clear in the Classic of Filiality form of a conversation between Zengzi and Confucius, the Classic of Filiality extends the notion of continuity between the human and spirit worlds through the veneration of ancestors and connects f lial piety to the idea of the triad formed by Heaven, Earth, and human beings. Following the Rites , the work establishes f liality as the foundation of all virtues and the basis of public morality. By the Latter Han, Filiality and the Analects were added to the list of Classics.

Women Liu Xiang (79– 8 BCE ) is said to have written the Biographies of Exemplary Women because he believed that women (beginning with the empress) had a critical, albeit indirect, role to play in government through their inf uence on their husbands. Drawing on the Odes and Documents , he identif ed seven types of women, six of which had contributed to peace and prosperity, and one of which had destroyed dynasties (Raphals 1998: 19):

1. Maternal rectitude 2. Sage intelligence 3. Benevolent wisdom 4. Chaste and obedient 5. Chaste and righteous 900855_10_ch10.indd 502 16/12/14 7:01 PM 503 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo 6. Skill in argument 7. Vicious and depraved.

Under “Maternal Rectitude” he tells the famous story of Mengmu, the widowed mother of Men- cius. She is said to have moved three times to facilitate her son’s education. On one occasion, when Mengmu asked how his day at school had gone and Mencius answered nonchalantly “As usual,” she took a knife and destroyed the cloth she had been weaving to teach him that a man who does not take learning seriously is like a woman who neglects her responsibility to her family. Ban Zhao Like a man’s moral development, a woman’s cultivation began at home, in the family. Self- cultivation was especially important for women because of the inf uence a mother was thought to have on her fetus. According to the Rites , boys and girls should be separated after the age of seven. At ten, boys were sent out to study the six arts (rites, music, archery, chariot racing, calligraphy and mathe- matics) while girls were kept home to learn domestic skills and develop the mental discipline they would need to care for their future families. In addition to learning how to weave, sew, and prepare food, girls were taught etiquette—the social conventions required for harmonious relations—and how to perform the rituals, including the sacrif ces required to keep peace with the ancestors. Born into a family of scholars, Ban Zhao (c. 48 –112 CE ) said that she wrote Admonitions for Wo m e n for her daughters, who had not had the benef t of systematic training in their roles either as wives or as daughters- and sisters-in-law in their husbands’ families. Well-educated, socially prominent, and politically inf uential, Ban Zhao was typical of aristocratic women in Han society.

According to one later history, she worked in the imperial libraries and supervised the writing of treatises on astronomy and the chronological tables of nobles. Recognizing Ban’s erudition, the emperor appointed her as tutor to the women at court, and she later served as an advisor to Empress Deng. Admonitions is divided into seven chapters:

1. Humility 2. Husband and wife 3. Respect and caution 4. Womanly qualif cations 5. Whole-hearted devotion 6. Implicit obedience 7. Harmony with younger brothers- and sisters-in-law.

Ban describes three rituals performed at the birth of a girl and explains the principles behind them.

First, whereas a baby boy was placed on the bed, a girl was placed below it, to signify her lowliness; second, she was given broken pieces of pottery to play with to signify that she must work hard; and third, her birth was announced to the ancestors to draw attention to her future role in their veneration. Ban belongs f rmly in the Confucian lineage. She believed that relationships are founded on the cosmic principles of yin and yang: because yang is rigid, a man was honoured for his strength; and because yin is yielding, a woman was considered beautiful for her gentleness. Over time, the name Ban Zhao became synonymous with womanly erudition. Some 400 years after her death, she was included in a list of exemplary women venerated in state sacrif ces. 900855_10_ch10.indd 503 16/12/14 7:01 PM 504 A Concise Introduction to World Religions Daoism Differentiation during the Han Although the Huang–Lao school disappeared from the Han court after Confucianism was made the state religion, Daoist practice continued to develop outside the palace, among the common people.

Inner and Outer Alchemy The f rst text on inner alchemy was published in the mid-second century. Traditionally ascribed to Wei Boyang, an alchemist from the south, The Seal of the Unity of the Three took its name from its three main subjects: cosmology from the Changes, wuwei from Daoism, and alchemy. Wei fused the three elements into a single doctrine. Like Dong Zhongshu, Wei used correlative cosmology, drawing on yin-yang and f ve phases to describe the cosmos in relation to the Dao, the relative to the Absolute, multiplicity to Oneness, and time to timelessness. The classical texts taught that the three vital elements of essence, energy, and numinous spirit must be returned to their original wholeness (broken by worldly activity and the disruptive aware- ness of things as separate from one another) by meditation: “holding fast to the One,” “sitting and forgetting,” visualizing the cosmos within one’s body, and following the internal circulation of vital energy. According to Wei, practitioners of inner alchemy sought to return to the Dao by reversing the processes of disunion—as though they were sculptures “unsculpting” themselves to recover their original unity as uncarved blocks. In practice, through meditative visualization, devotees sought to move from form to essence, from essence to vital energy, from vital energy to spirit, and from spirit to emptiness or the Void, which, though formless, can be visualized as the highest deity: the Great One, Supreme Unity, or Supreme Oneness (Taiyi). Belief in physical immortality was strong. It was thought that, after a long period of inward True Self would be born. There were also some who believed that immortality could be achieved through the ingestion of cinnabar.

The Celestial Masters and Yellow Kerchiefs Over time, the Confucian underpinnings of the Han regime were challenged by political corrup- tion, natural disaster, and military turbulence. The resulting economic and social turmoil pro- voked uprisings, some of which ref ected Daoist inf uences. At the same time, the Classic of the Great Peace (Taiping jing ) was circulating, prophesying the coming of a celestial master who would bring peace to a time of surging chaos. The Great Peace likely inf uenced both the Celestial Masters and the Yellow Kerchiefs ( Taiping Dao CE , the Celestial Masters ( Tianshi; later renamed Ortho- dox Unity) traced its origins to a deif ed Laozi who revealed to Zhang Daoling the teachings of Orthodox Unity and gave him a covenant establishing a new relationship between the gods and humans. A central feature of this covenant was the abolition of traditional blood sacrif ces: no longer would the gods be inf uenced by animal offerings. Instead, they would operate as a kind of celestial bureaucracy, modelled after the governmental bureaucracy, to whom believers could present their appeals. The priests were expected to provide their services in return for an annual donation of f ve bushels of rice from devotees. 900855_10_ch10.indd 504 16/12/14 7:01 PM 505 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo Initiates of the Celestial Masters gained access to esoteric sacred texts. The Daodejing was used in liturgy; practices included chanting and meditation; and purity chambers were provided for the cultivation of the spirit embryo. The sect established a theocracy in the state of Shu (Sichuan) and was the state religion of the Wei kingdom until it was dispersed across northern China, uninten- tionally aiding the spread of Daoism. The Yellow Kerchiefs movement, based in Shandong, was established with the express pur- pose of challenging the Han regime in the name of the Yellow Emperor. Like the Celestial Mas- ters, the Yellow Kerchiefs practised confession, repentance of sins, meditation, and chanting; they also believed in inherited guilt, passed on from ancestors to descendants. They attracted a massive following, but when they rose in rebellion in 184 they were crushed and the movement disappeared. Buddhism When Buddhism was f rst introduced to China, Confucianism was soon to become the off cial religion, and the various prototypical Daoist elements had yet to be synthesized. At f rst the Chi- nese had diff culty understanding the relationship between rebirth and the idea of no-self ( wuwo, or anatman ; see Chapter 5). If there was no enduring soul, what was reborn? Misunderstanding of this concept led Han Buddhists to erroneously teach the indestructibility of a soul that is bound to the cycle of rebirth through cause and effect ( yinguo or karma). The idea of an enduring soul was familiar to China, but the idea of karma was something new. Contrary to the I ndigenous idea that descendants would inherit the sins of their ancestors, Buddhism suggested that reward and punishment would be bound to the individual alone. One unexpected development during the Han encounter between Buddhism and Daoism was the idea that when (according to Daoist lore) Laozi left China and travelled to the west, he became the Buddha and converted the western “barbarians” to Buddhism. Thus both traditions were con- sidered members of one religious family, and altars were set up for Huang–Lao and the Buddha in the imperial palace. Even so, the Taiping jing attacked Buddhism on four counts that ref ected core Chinese concerns: it encouraged the abandonment of parents; to become a monk it was necessary to abandon wife and children; the requirement of celibacy def ed the duty to continue the family lineage; and the monks’ dependence on alms promoted begging. In time, Buddhism disentangled itself from Daoism and established its own communities of monks, nuns, and lay practitioners, which became more popular than their Daoist counterparts.

Reciprocal relationships and mutual inf uence developed as the traditions matured: Confucianism and Daoism inf uenced the evolution of Buddhism, and Buddhism in turn had a profound inf u- ence on the development of the two I ndigenous traditions.

The Six Dynasties Period (220–589) The Six Dynasties period, covering the Three Kingdoms (220 420), and Southern and Northern Dynasties (420 both “barbarian” invaders from North and Central Asia and a foreign religion, Buddhism. Religious teachings in this period were shaped by the tension between China’s desire to preserve its tradi- tional values and political independence and its sometimes-grudging admiration and acceptance of an increasingly sinicized Buddhism. 900855_10_ch10.indd 505 16/12/14 7:01 PM 506 A Concise Introduction to World ReligionsTensions notwithstanding, Buddhist ideas were attractive, and as they began to permeate Chi- nese society, different spheres were allocated to each religion. Buddhism was seen as medicine for spiritual disorders, and Confucianism continued to play an important role in family life despite its loss of off cial status. It survived not only through individual study of the classic texts, but also in handbooks offering practical advice on everyday matters. The development of large-scale religious organizations like the Celestial Masters was greatly strengthened by the new model of Buddhist monastic discipline. The nascent Daoist and Buddhist movements went far beyond the traditional state- and family-centred cults such as those dedicated to Heaven, the ancestors, or the gods of soil and grain. Although they respected the foundational values of f lial piety and socio-political harmony, they did not show the traditional respect for hier- archies: thus monks and nuns refused to bow before kings. Confucianism Interaction with Daoism and Buddhism The fall of the Han dynasty, in 220, marked the beginning of almost four centuries of instability.

During this period (the Six Dynasties), China experienced repeated invasions, Confucianism lost state support, and those seeking religious guidance increasingly looked to Daoism and Buddhism.

Wan g B i Among the Confucian literati was one who has also been described as a neo-Daoist. In his short life (226–249), Wang Bi wrote extensive commentaries not only on the Analects and Changes (a text revered by Daoists as well as Confucians) but also on Laozi. Like the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove—famous neo-Daoist eccentrics who were near-contemporaries of his (see p. 513)—Wang was interested in xuanxue (study of the “dark” or mysterious and profound). Above all, he empha- sized the concept of principle (li, written differently in Chinese from the li meaning “rites”), which would become the linchpin for the neo-Confucians of the Song period (960–1279), nearly 1,000 years later.

Criticism of Buddhism As Daoism and Confucianism drew closer together, both criticized Buddhism on the same grounds that the Taiping jing had. There were also questions about Buddhist practices. To shave one’s head, for instance, was construed as an act of gross disrespect, since it amounted to harming the body given by one’s ancestors. Industrious Confucians interpreted Buddhist monks’ ascetic withdrawal from productive work as a shirking of responsibility, and the monastic tradition of begging for food as parasitism. In addition, Confucians and Daoists argued that Buddhism lacked authority because it was not mentioned in the Five Classics. Furthermore, the Buddhist renunci- ation of worldly pleasures went far beyond the Confucian ideal of moderation, effectively denying the value that Confucianism attributed to life in the world (de Bary and Hurvitz in de Bary 1972:

ing to Mouzi, Confucians were baff ed by the Buddhist practice of ref ecting on the impurities of the body: 900855_10_ch10.indd 506 16/12/14 7:01 PM 507 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo The ascetic engages in contemplation of himself and observes that all the noxious seepage of his internal body is impure. Hair, skin, skull and f esh; tears from the blinking of the eyes and spittle; veins, arteries, sinew and marrow; liver, lungs, intestines and stomach; feces, urine, mucus and blood: such a mass of f lth when combined produces a man.... awak- ened to the detestability of the body, concentrating his mind, he gains dhyana (ibid., 129).

This emphasis on the impurity of the body was especially harsh for women, given the additional def lements of menstruation and childbirth. Although it contradicted the I ndigenous Chinese idea that the body is a gift from the ancestors, fundamentally good, the negativity of other Bud- dhist ideas about women was not inconsistent with Chinese ideas. The depictions of “Vicious and Depraved” females in Liu Xiang’s Biographies of Exemplary Women are quite in line with Buddhist notions of women’s physical and spiritual impurity. Buddhism Amid the chaos of the Six Dynasties, Chinese Buddhism developed in two distinctive streams. In the north, where many states were under non-Han rule, Buddhism political dissenters were attracted by monks’ claims of mysterious powers such as clairvoyance and the ability to make themselves invis- ible. In the south, where many Han scholars and off cials had taken refuge and society was steeped in an apolitical neo-Daoism, Buddhism was only occasionally drawn into politics. Hinayana ( Xiaocheng or “Small Vehicle”) as well as Mahayana ( Dacheng or “Great Vehicle”) traditions were practised in China. In this early period, meditation was more closely associated with the Hinayana school, while Mahayana Buddhists were more interested in exploring what constitutes wisdom ( zhi or prajna ). Several texts on the Perfection of Transcendental Wisdom ( pra- jnaparamita ), such as the Heart and Diamond sutras, had been translated into Chinese by the end of the 300s, and many Mahayana texts were translated after the famous scholar-monk Kumarajiva arrived in 401, including the Lotus and Vimalakirti Sutras.

Buddhism and Daoism Nevertheless, the Chinese continued to think of Buddhism as a variant of Daoism. The Perfection of Transcendental Wisdom writings teach a notion of emptiness or the void that recalls the Daoist belief in non-being. The monk Zhi Dun’s idea that there is a transcendental absolute ( li), an essence and ultimate truth that is expressed in the relative mundane world, found echoes in Wang Bi’s li or principle. Moreover, just as a buddha is free of all attachments, a sage is free from all desires; and in both, all dualities and distinctions disappear. As one Fan Ye (398 – 445) said:

If we examine closely its teachings about purifying the mind and gaining release from the ties of life, and its emphasis upon casting aside both “emptiness” and “being,” we see that it belongs to the same current as do the Taoist writings (Chen 1964: 64).

In addition, Buddhism’s dual focus on wisdom and compassion echoed the traditional Chinese concern with security, stability, and harmony, while the Buddhist notion of impermanence was in tune with Chinese assumption of continual change. At the same time, Buddhist teachings on suffering and the path to liberation resonated with people in a time of instability. 900855_10_ch10.indd 507 16/12/14 7:01 PM 508 A Concise Introduction to World Religions Reasons for the Popularity ofBuddhism People were attracted to Buddhism for many reasons, including its art (paintings and sculp- tures) and architecture (pagodas modelled after stupas); the promise of enlightenment, or at least a better chance at happiness in this life; a well- tested, progressive program of precept-taking, chanting, meditation, and study to help the faithful achieve that goal; and the sophisticated philosophy, literature, and erudition of its pro- ponents. Even though some found the monas- tic life unf lial, others were positively attracted to the idea of a religious community (sangha or seng jia ) that was separate from the family and clan. New ideas added to the fascination with Buddhism. Concepts such as lunhui (t h e c y c l e of rebirth, or sam sara ), niepan (extinction/ release or nir vana ), yinguo (cause and effect or karma), and narratives of heavens and hells offered the Chinese a novel understanding of the cosmos. As Buddhism became more popu- lar, it also offered new possibilities to women.

Baochang’s Lives of Nuns is a testament to the devotion and accomplishments of the f rst Chinese nuns, many of whom were ordained in the f fth century by a quorum of nuns from Sri Lanka. Of course, their male counterparts were remembered as well, in parallel biog- raphies like the Lives of Famous Monks , also by Baochang, and Huijiao’s Lives of Eminent Monks . Power Struggle between Seng jia and State It was not long before the seng jia attracted charges of extravagant spending on its monasteries and monks were accused of moral laxity, graft, and corruption. According to a memorial submitted to Emperor An of the Eastern Jin dynasty in 389, Monks [and] nuns . . . are vying with each other to enter into cliques and parties. . . .

Ihave heard that the Buddha is a spirit of purity, far-reaching intelligence, and mysterious emptiness.... But nowadays the devotees are vile, rude, servile, and addicted to wine and The rst ve storeys of the Big Wild Goose Pagoda in Xian were built in 652 as a part of a temple complex designed to house Buddhist artifacts brought from India (© GRANT ROONEY PREMIUM / Alamy). 900855_10_ch10.indd 508 16/12/14 7:02 PM 509 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo 420), they were accused of meddling in politics. In 403 Huan Xuan, who usurped power from the Eastern Jin, demanded that monks and nuns bow to him, as laypeople were obliged to, but the famous monk Hui Yuan (344– 416) successfully argued against this command. The leader of a well-organized and strictly disciplined community that worshipped the celestial Amituofo of the Pure Land, he contended that Buddhists can be divided into two groups: the laity who, because they remain in the world, should obey all rules; and the monastics who, having left home, have abandoned the secular realm and therefore should not be required to adhere to its rules.

Success and Subsequent Inter-religious Con ict The popularity of Buddhism proved to be its undoing. While in the south hostility towards it was channelled into written form, in the north it resulted in full-blown persecution, once under Emperor Taiwu of Northern Wei in 446, and twice under Emperor Wu of Northern Zhou, in 574 and then again in 577.Scholars suggest that Taiwu, who was likely of Turkish background, was predisposed against Buddhism because he wanted to prove his acculturation to Chinese values. His antipathy was aggravated when he discovered that weapons had been hidden in a monastery; that men were becoming monks to avoid corvee labour and conscription; and, worse yet, that monks were secretly living with women in subterranean apartments. He was further outraged when he learned that some monks had sold off grain intended for the poor in times of famine. To make things worse, the monastic system was a powerful organization operating alongside the state, and even its architecture rivalled that of the imperial buildings. Taiwu’s Daoist– Confucian Document The Lives of Nuns , by a sixth-century monk named Baochang, tells the stories of 65 Buddhist nuns who lived between 316 and 516. Two earlier efforts to capture the religious lives of women are the anonymous Buddhist Song of the Sisters and Liu Xiang’s Confucian Biog- raphies of Exemplary Women. The following excerpt tells of a young devotee who rejected a marriage arranged by her family.

Sengduan had vowed that she would leave the house- hold life rather than be married off. Nevertheless, her beauty of face and f gure were well known in the region, and a wealthy family had already received her mother and elder brother’s agreement to a betrothal. Three days before the marriage ceremony Sengduan f ed in the middle of the night to a Buddhist con- vent whose abbess hid her . . . and supplied her with everything she needed. Sengduan also had a copy of the Bodhisattva Guanshiyin [another name for Guanyin] Sutra that she was able to chant from memory after only two days of study. She rained tears and made prostrations day and night without ceasing. Three days later, during her worship, she saw an image of the Buddha, who announced to her, “Your bridegroom’s lifespan is coming to an end. You need only continue your ardent practice without har- boring sorrowful thoughts.” The next day her bride- groom was gored to death by an ox (Tsai: 49–50).

From the Lives of Nuns 900855_10_ch10.indd 509 16/12/14 7:02 PM 510 A Concise Introduction to World Religionsprime minister Cui Hao, whose brother and wife were both Buddhists, encouraged him to take such harsh measures against Buddhists, monastics and lay, that even the Daoist Kou Qianzhi counselled against them. The other northern ruler to torment the Buddhists was Emperor Wu of the Northern Zhou. Unlike Taiwu, however, he included Daoists in his persecutions. A different Emperor Wu, this one in the south, was a devout Buddhist himself. Liang Wudi temples, and returned all Daoist priests, men and women, to lay life. Many Daoists f ed north. Ideas Central to Chinese Buddhism Non-duality and Emptiness As more Buddhist teachings made their way into China, it became clear that the Hinayana and Mahayana doctrines sometimes contradicted one another (see Chapter 5). The Heart Sutra , for example, presents the Madhyamaka ( zhonglun or sanlun ) teaching of non-duality, which negates Hinayana teachings such as the f ve components of personality ( skandhas or yun). The second stanza of this short but essential sutra, often chanted in liturgy, begins with the bodhisattva of compassion, Avalokiteshvara or Guanyin, in a deep trance, recognizing that the f ve components and consciousness.” Doctrinal Categorization and Skillful Means The Lotus Sutra offered a way of understanding these divergent teachings. Two ideas developed to account for the theoretical differences: doctrinal categorization or classif cation and skillful means or upaya varying doctrines based on different periods and audiences. The second idea explains why:

to suit the capacities of his audience. The famous story of the burning house (see Chapter 5) is reinforced by the following passage, also in the L ot u s Sutra , according to which there is only one Buddha vehicle:

[T]he Buddhas of the past used countless numbers of expedient means, various causes and conditions, and words of simile and parable in order to expound the doctrines for the sake of living beings. These doctrines are all for the sake of the one Buddha vehicle (Wat son 20 01: 9).

Guanyin Over time, the Chinese accepted the three baskets of the Hinayana, but gave priority to Mahayana teachings. In the L ot u s Sutra , the Buddha himself says nothing about the classic Hinayana themes, but he does advise the faithful to call on Guanyin:

If a woman wishes to give birth to a male child, she should offer obeisance and alms to Bodhisattva Perceiver of the World’s Sounds [Guanyin] and then she will bear a son blessed with merit, virtue, and wisdom. And if she wishes to bear a daughter, she will bear one with all the marks of comeliness, one who in the past planted the roots of virtue and is loved and respected by many persons (Watson 2001: 121). 900855_10_ch10.indd 510 16/12/14 7:02 PM 511 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo The idea of a self ess being who defers enlighten- ment, is capable of taking on an inf nite number of forms, and disregards socio-cultural and religious boundaries in order to aid the suffering had the effect of expanding and deepening Chinese religi- osity. The L ot u s S utra continues:

If they [the people] need a monk, a nun, a layman believer, or a laywoman believer to be saved, immediately [Guanyin] becomes a monk, a nun, a layman believer, or a laywoman believer and preaches the Law for them. . .

(ibid., 123).

The innumerable guises of Guanyin recall the f rst two lines of the Daodejing : “The way that can be spoken of / Is not the constant way; / The name that can be named / Is not the constant name” (Lau 1963: 57). And the pusa’s compassion resonates with the ideal of the sage, central to both Confu- cianism and Daoism. But the Buddhist Guanyin introduced a stronger version of the Indigenous ideas of transformation implicit in the Changes : he/ she can take any form necessary to rescue those in need.

Lay Practice As part of its accommodation to local ideals, Bud- dhism shifted its focus from monasticism to lay practice. One of the most popular sutras, the Vimal- akirti , teaches that there is no need to abandon home and family in order to become enlightened: in it the Buddha’s students tell him that Vimalakirti—a wise, pure, celibate layman—understands the teachings better than they do. This lay orientation no doubt helped in the sinicization of Buddhism.

The Mind in Both Aspects: Pure and Impure The mind that is “upright” and “deeply searching,” that “aspires to bodhi,” illustrates two core Mahayana ideas: that Mind or Consciousness is crucial in the alleviation of suffering, and that it has two aspects—which means that those three positive characteristics can never be sepa- rated from their opposites: non-uprightness, not deeply searching, and not aspiring to bodhi .

The f rst idea belongs to the Yogacara or Consciousness Only school (see Chapter 5), known as Faxiang in China. The second is an expression of the concept of the non-dual One Mind found in the teachings on the Matrix of the Tathagata ( Tathagatagarbha) and discussed at length in the This early image of Guanyin (550–560) clearly represents the bodhisattva as male: the robe lies on a at chest.

But later devotees often understood “him” to be female.

While Guanyin can take any form, she/he is usually sumptuously dressed and recognizable by Amituofo’s face in her/his crown (© Peter Horree / Alamy). 900855_10_ch10.indd 511 16/12/14 7:02 PM 512 A Concise Introduction to World ReligionsL ankavatara Sutra and a treatise entitled The Awakening of Faith ( Dacheng qixin lun), which has no Sanskrit original. The two aspects of the One Mind may take several forms: the universal and the particular, the transcendental and the phenomenal, the pure and the impure. The Matrix (garbha) also has two aspects, symbolizing both the seed of the Tathagata (the Buddha) and the womb in which it may grow. It represents Buddha-nature and the capacity for enlightenment that are inherent in all human beings (a concept that parallels Confucian and Daoist ideas about sagehood). But it is important to understand that (in line with the concept of no-self) Buddha-nature has no substance:

it is not a thing, even in the sense that a soul would be a thing. When the One Mind is unhin- dered by def lements, the luminosity of Buddha-nature will be clear. Thus Buddha-nature is not something we possess, but something we are. The key to uncovering or cultivating the One Mind is meditation.

Mofa or End Time From the beginning, Buddhism taught that the universe was in a phase of decline when Shakya- muni was born to set the wheel of dharma in motion again. The Three Stages School ( Sanjiejiao), founded in the late sixth century, developed that idea, teaching that time was divided into three periods—those of the Correct Law, the Counterfeit Law, and the Decadent or Final Law—and that the Chinese were living during the last of the three, the end times ( mofa). During the time of the Buddha, people were able to attain enlightenment through practice, but during the time of false teachings Buddhism becomes increasingly formalized, so that fewer and fewer people are able to benef t from it. During the end time, humans lose their aspiration for enlightenment and Bud- dhism is incapable of leading them to buddhahood.

Help from the Celestial Buddhas So what if one is a layperson living in the end time and cannot reach enlightenment? One group of practitioners offered a solution: When you cannot do it on your own, ask to be reborn in the Pure Land of a celestial buddha such as Amituofo. The Larger Pure Land Sutra , or Sutra on the Buddha of Inf nite Life, is one of three Pure Land ( Jingtu ) sutras; the other two are the Smaller Pure Land or Amitayus Sutra and the Contempla- tion (Amitayurdhyana ) Sutra . According to the L arger Sutra , Amituofo, in a previous incarnation, vowed to bring into his Western Paradise all who “sincerely and joyfully entrust themselves to Contemplation Sutra , one may simply repeat the mantra for rebirth into the Pure Land ten times: “Homage to Amitayus Buddha” ( Namo Amituofo). The mantra can be used as a focus in silent meditation or chanted aloud.

Flower Garland Another important idea that shaped Chinese Buddhism is found in the Flower Garland Sutra ( Avat- amsaka or Huayan ): that is, the belief that all things are interconnected.

Some Chinese schools, such as Tiantai and Huayan, were organized around a particular teach- ing or doctrine (those of the Lotus and Flower Garland Sutras respectively), while others, such as Chan and Pure Land, were centred on a core practice (meditation and chanting, respectively). We will look at the most inf uential schools in the next section. But f rst we will return to Daoism and see how it was faring during this period. 900855_10_ch10.indd 512 16/12/14 7:02 PM 513 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo Daoism Buddhist In uences Daoism assimilated beliefs and practices from Buddhism, blending them into the various streams of Daoist thought and developed them while remaining faithful to its own beliefs and practices.

Thus Daoist teachings were reinterpreted in terms of yinguo (karma) and lunhui (rebirth), and Dao- ist rituals were adapted to ref ect the new ideas about death that Buddhism had introduced. Both monastic and lay institutions were established, culminating in the construction of the f rst Daoist temple in the f fth century. Some Daoist leaders stayed active politically, but others turned inward and focused on individual cultivation. The quest for transcendence took two forms: the pursuit of spiritual transcendence through meditation, and the pursuit of physical immortality through methods that included a sexual ritual known as the joining of energy or the union of breaths and the ingestion of poisonous substances such as cinnabar.

Mysterious Learning and Outer Alchemy The Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove concentrated on private individual cultivation, and (like the Confucian Wang Bi), they were interested in xuanxue . Discouraged from participating in public life after the fall of the Han, and inspired by Zhuangzi’s notions of spontaneity and spiritual freedom, they gained a reputation for eccentric behaviour (one of them was said to have roamed around naked in his hermitage). Having f ed the turmoil of northern China for the south, the Seven Sages cian and Buddhist as well as Daoist inf uences. It was likely sometime in the 300s that the Liezi —the third most important Daoist “philosoph- ical” text, after the Daodejing and Zhuangzi—was compiled, bringing together stories about one of the Daoist thinkers mentioned in the Zhuangzi. A less important but still informative text, probably written in the 320s, was Ge Hong’s Baopuzi collection of essays on classic Daoist themes, including methods of driving away harmful spirits, reaching the gods, and alchemical recipes for achieving longevity and immortality.

The Highest Clarity and Numinous Treasure Schools Two new religious Daoist schools emerged in the latter part of the same century. Yang Xi, a medium and shaman, formed the Highest Clarity (Shangqing) school when he received scrip- tures from the immortal Lady Wei of the Heaven of Highest Clarity. Yang and his followers sought to become “true beings” or “perfected persons” ( zhenren) through practices that included the use of outer alchemy to facilitate f ights to the star deities who controlled human destiny. Devotees ate very little, believing that fasting would make their bodies light and radiant for their ascent to the heavens. The second new school, Numinous Treasure (Lingbao), was founded a few decades later by Ge Chaofu, a grandnephew of Ge Hong who received from his clan ancestors a series of reve- lations involving the Buddhist concepts of karma, rebirth, and cycles of time ( kalpas). Where a s Highest Clarity focused on the individual, Numinous Treasure looked outward to the local 900855_10_ch10.indd 513 16/12/14 7:02 PM 514 A Concise Introduction to World Religions community and beyond to all of humanity, suggesting a synthesis of Daoist and Buddhist ideas.

The Scripture for the Salvation of Humanity ( D urenjing) illustrates this synthesis, describing a cos- mic deity who sends an emissary to E arth to reveal the D urenjing and ferries suffering humans to liberation and peace—paralleling the service performed by Amituofo and the historical Buddha Gautama himself. Numinous Treasure focused especially on purif cation and communal renewal rituals. The goals of the former were typical of the era: prevention of disease, warding off natural calamities, and salvation of ancestors. Performed around a temporary altar, they began with cleansing of the body and purif cation of the heart-mind through confession of sins; a communal feast was then held to celebrate the reinstatement of harmony between the gods and human beings. In commu- nity renewal rituals (still practised today), deities were invited down into the altar, incense was offered, and the sponsors of the rituals were granted audiences with the gods, during which they would request favours for their communities. China Reunited In 589 China was reunited for the f rst time since the fall of the Han, and in 618 the Tang came to power. Daoism and Buddhism both reached new heights of popularity over the next three centu- ries of relative peace and prosperity, and Confucianism experienced a renewal.

Confucianism The second Tang emperor, Taizhong, established an academy for scholar-off cials where the curric- it became possible for a commoner to work his way into off cialdom. Taizhong also ordered all districts to build Confucian temples, and in 647 installed in each temple 22 tablets commemorat- ing orthodox Confucians of the Han era. A century later, the title “King of Manifest Culture” was bestowed on Confucius, who now displaced the Duke of Zhou as the “uncrowned king” of Chinese civilization. In time, the Confucian curriculum was expanded to include 12 works, among them the Ana- lects and the Classic of Filiality. The revival of interest in Confucian thought was ref ected in three writers: Madame Zheng, author of the late seventh-century Classic of Filiality for Women ; H a n Yu (768 – 824), a prominent scholar-off cial intent on reintroducing Confucianism to the people; and Han’s contemporary Song Ruozhao, who wrote the Analects for Women.

Madame Zheng’s Classic of Filiality for Women The wife of a government off cial, Madame Zheng set out to create a female Confucian tradition starting from Ban Zhao. Her Classic of Filiality for Women emphasizes the importance of chastity, f lial piety, intelligence, and wisdom. Zheng imagines Ban Zhao teaching a group of women that a wife should encourage her husband in good behaviour and guide him with “modesty and defer- 900855_10_ch10.indd 514 16/12/14 7:02 PM 515 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo husbands’ every command, Ban cites numerous historical examples of wives who corrected or criticized their husbands and explains:If a husband has a remonstrating wife, then he won’t fall into evil ways. Therefore, if a husband transgresses against the Way, you must correct him. How could it be that to obey your husband in everything would make you a virtuous person? (ibid., 827) Han Yu’s Defence of Confucianism Han Yu marks an important point of Confucian renewal. Although Confucian principles had been reintroduced into government, they had little popular currency. In an effort to bring Con- fucianteaching back to the people, Han Yu wrote Essentials of the Moral Way . In it he answers the question “What is the teaching of the former kings?” as follows:

To love largely is called a sense of humaneness; to act according to what should be done is called rightness. To proceed from these principles is called the moral Way; to be suff cient unto oneself without relying on externals is called inner power.... Its methods are the rites, music, chastisement, and government. Its classes of people are scholars, peasants, craftsmen, and merchants.... (C. Hartman in de Bary and Bloom 1999: 569) Song Ruozhao’s Analects for Women The Analects for Women is usually attributed to Song Ruozhao, though some say that the actual author was her sister Ruohua. From a scholarly family, Ruozhao was appointed to the court as a scholar, and taught the imperial princesses. The Analects focuses on emotional restraint and self-cultivation, beginning with a chapter entitled “Establishing oneself as a person.” Daoism The founder of the Tang dynasty, Li Yuan, claimed descent from Laozi, and under his family’s rule Daoism once again became the state religion. Some patriarchs from the Highest Clarity School held government posts. The “Brilliant Emperor” Xuanzhong wrote a commentary on the Daodejing and invited the Highest Clarity patriarch Sima Chengzen to court; princesses were ordained as Daoist priestesses and performed state rituals; colleges of Daoism were established; and the Daodejing was brief y included in state examinations. By 739 there were 1,137 abbeys for Daoshi and 550 for Nuguan (male and female Daoist priests respectively). Classical Daoism reached the height of its power and popularity during the Tang.

Buddhism The f rst two centuries of the Tang dynasty are often seen as the apex of Buddhism in China.

Monks visited the imperial court often, and several Chinese Buddhist schools developed around rst and only female emperor. The Great Cloud Sutra prophesied the imminent arrival of a female Maitreya 900855_10_ch10.indd 515 16/12/14 7:02 PM 516 A Concise Introduction to World Religions(Milo), a salvational f gure who would bring peace and prosperity to the land. After the death of her husband, the Emperor Gaozong, Wu Zetian claimed to be that f gure and took the throne as Empress Wu of the Zhou dynasty. The two types of Buddhist schools, doctrinal and practical, were often described as two wings of a single bird. Among the doctrinal schools that were inf uential during the Tang were Tiantai, based on the L ot u s Sutra ; Huayan, based on the Flower Garland Sutra ; and Faxiang (Yogacara, or Consciousness Only). Vajrayana Buddhism, known in China as Zhenyan (True Word or Mantra), was introduced in the 700s, but was soon absorbed into other schools. Towards the end of the dynasty, the scholar-monk Zongmi (780 – 841) integrated Confucianism and Daoism into a Buddhist framework in his Treatise on the Original Nature of Man —a classic example of the Chinese ten- dency towards syncretism. Late Tang Persecution of Buddhism Zongmi’s efforts notwithstanding, Daoist priests even- tually persuaded Emperor Wuzong to put an end to the spread of Buddhism in China. In 845 Wuzong issued an edict that summarized the charges against the foreign religion that had “poisoned the customs of ou r n at ion”:

. . . At present there are an inestimable number of monks and nuns in the empire, each of them waiting for the farmers to feed him and the silkworms to clothe him, while the pub- lic temples and private chapels have reached boundless number, all with soaring towers and elegant ornamentation suff cient to outshine the imperial palace itself... (B. Watson 6). The Song, Yuan, and M i n g D y n a s t i e s ( 9 6 0 4 4) In the aftermath of the late Tang persecution, the monastic community was decimated, and the only schools that retained strong followings among ordinary people were the two that focused on practice rather than study: Chan (Meditation) and Jingtu (Pure Land). After the fall of the Tang, however, Daoism itself was stripped of its status as the state religion. The Song (960 –1279) would prove to be a period of renewal for Confucianism, which synthesized ideas from both Daoism and Buddhism and reasserted itself at the state level as neo-Confucianism. The only female emperor in Chinese history, Wu Zetian (625–705) ruled from behind the throne for a time after her husband’s death; then, encouraged by Buddhist monks and prophecies, she took the throne herself (The Art Archive / British Library). 900855_10_ch10.indd 516 16/12/14 7:02 PM 517 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo Daoism The Complete Truth School The Daoist school of Complete Truth (Quanzhen; also translated as Perfect Realization, Perfect Truth, or Complete Perfection) was founded in the twelfth century and is still active today. Asso- ciated with the White Cloud Abbey in Beijing, it is distinctive in its monasticism—a feature that its founder, Wang Chongyang, modelled on Buddhism. Wang also argued against the superstitions and supernatural elements that had accrued to Daoism over time, and taught a more down- to- earth understanding of transcendence or immortality:

Leaving the world does not mean that the body departs.... When you realize the Tao, your body will be in the sphere of the ordinary, but your mind will be in the realm of the sages. Nowadays, people want to avoid death forever and at the same time leave the ordi- nary world. They are very foolish, indeed, and have not even glimpsed the true principle of the Tao (Kirkland 2004: 188).

Wang urged his disciples to read across all three major traditions, especially the Confucian Classic of Filiality , the Buddhist Heart Sutra , and the Daodejing. His “Fifteen Precepts for Establish- ing the Teaching” includes practical recommendations alongside more elevated principles. For example, he advises that to achieve harmony in spirit and vital energy, the body must be well rested. He also recommends using herbs for healing, living a simple life, and maintaining good Daoist friends. The “basic motif of the art of self-cultivation,” he wrote, is the “search for the hidden Document The Platfor m Sutra is the only “canonical” non-Indian Buddhist text. It records the teachings of Huineng, the sixth patriarch of the Chan school. In the following pas- sages, he explains that practising meditation and non- attachment does not mean having no thoughts, and that there is no “right” way to become enlightened.

Learned Audience, some teachers of meditation instruct their disciples to keep a watch on their mind for tran- quillity, so that it will cease from activity. Henceforth the disciples give up all exertion of mind. Ignorant per- sons become insane from having too much conf dence in such instruction. Such cases are not rare, and it is a great mistake to teach others to do this. . . .

In orthodox Buddhism the distinction between the Sudden school and the Gradual school does not really exist; the only difference is that by nature some men are quick-witted, while others are dull in understanding. Those who are enlightened realize the truth in a sudden, while those who are under delusion have to train themselves gradually. But such a difference will disappear when we know own mind and realize our own nature. Therefore these terms gradual and sudden are more apparent than real (Price and Wong 1990: 95).

From the Platform Sutra , fourth chapter, “Samadhi and Prajna ” 900855_10_ch10.indd 517 16/12/14 7:02 PM 518 A Concise Introduction to World Religions Sun Buer 83), the wife of Wang Chong- ties that women of her time faced in their search for enlightenment.One day Sun heard Wang say that an immortal was expected to emerge in the city of Luoyang, far from her home in Shandong. She asked Wang for permission to go there, but he refused, pre- dicting that she would be molested and the shame would kill her. Undeterred, Sun went to her kitchen, heated some oil in a wok, poured cold water into it, and stood over the boiling oil as it spattered her face. When Wang saw her scars, he recognized her sincerity and agreed to teach her the methods of inner alchemy, but he advised her to hide her knowledge even from her husband. To ensure that she would be left alone, Sun pretended to be insane. Eventually, she slipped out of the house and travelled to Loyang. There—as Wang had anticipat ed—two men accosted her. When a rain of enormous hailstones helped her escape, the men recognized her special nature and spread the story. Left in peace for 12 years, Sun became the only female among the famed seven masters of the Complete Truth School.

Revival of Orthodox Unity Daoism continued to thrive until the twelfth century, when the Mongolian Kublai Khan extended his rule to the south. There he gave exclusive authority to the Orthodox Unity sect, renamed for the revelations given to the Celestial Masters. After the Mongols were overthrown, Orthodox Unity was entrusted with the com pilation of the Daoist canon ( Da ozang), which was printed i n 14 45. Confucianism The Emergence of Neo-Confucianism Meanwhile, the ongoing development of Confucianism culminated in the emergence of what the West calls neo-Confucianism. This development reached its apex with Zhu Xi (1130 0), but much of Zhu’s work drew on thinkers from the preceding century, among them Zhou Dunyi, Zhang Zai, and the brothers Cheng Yi and Hao. Although neo-Confucianism traced its roots to the ancient writings, much of its philosophy ref ected Buddhist and Daoist inf uences. Thus Zhou Dunyi (1017–73) advocated what he called “quiet-sitting”—a practice clearly modelled on Daoist and Buddhist meditation—and his most important work, “An Explanation of the Dia- gram of the Great Ultimate,” was based on a Daoist representation of the creation of the material world. For Zhou, the Great Ultimate and the Ultimate Non-being are identical. Through movement, yang is generated from the Ultimate Non-being /Great Ultimate. When its limit is reached, it becomes quiet and yin is generated. When yin reaches its limit, then activity, or yang, begins again. Thus the alternation between stillness and movement produces yin and yang, which in turn give rise to the f ve vital elements: f re, water, earth, metal, and wood. When Ultimate Non-being interacts with the essences of yin-yang and the f ve elements, a mysterious union occurs, from which Heaven and Earth come into being. 900855_10_ch10.indd 518 16/12/14 7:02 PM 519 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo Zhu Xi and the School of Principle Lixue) explicitly linked li , the principles or patterns of nature, to human relationships and theories about education and government. Zhu Xi, considered the founder of this new school, synthesized the ideas of the earlier Song thinkers and gave Confucianism a metaphysical bent. Zhu focused on the nature, place, and function of self in the Great Ultimate. Like most Chinese philosophers, he understood human beings to be part of the fabric of the universe. Although he was interested in Buddhist-style “quiet sitting,” Zhu was quintessentially Confucian in his focus on self-cultivation. Zhu commented on “Centrality and Equilibrium” and “The Great Learning” ( Daxue), another chapter from the Rites, in which self-discipline or self-cultivation is the f rst link in a chain that extends from the individual through the family to the state and recalls the ideal of the Grand Com- monality. A famous passage from “The Great Learning” argues that proper self-cultivation begins with the acquisition of knowledge:

In antiquity, those who wanted to clarify their bright virtue throughout the entire realm f rst had to govern their states well. Those who wanted to govern their states well f rst hadto manage their own families, and those who wanted to manage their families f rsthad to develop their own selves. Those who wanted to develop themselves f rst rectif ed their own minds, and those who wanted to rectify their minds f rst made their thoughts sin- cere. Those who wanted to make their thoughts sincere f rst extended their knowledge.

Those who wanted to extend their knowledge f rst had to investigate things (Sommer 19 95: 39).

Document Zhang Zai (1020–77) took Zhou Dunyi’s universal cos- molog y and expressed it in terms of a human family. The following excerpt shows how he correlated the essential Confucian elements of self, family, humanity, and virtue to the broader elements of nature and the cosmos.

Heaven is my father and Earth is my mother, and even such a small creature as I f nds an intimate place in their midst.Therefore that which f lls the universe I regard as my body and that which directs the universe I consider as my nature. All people are my brothers and sisters, and all things are my companions. The great ruler (the emperor) is the eldest son of my parents (Heaven and Earth), and the great ministers are his stewards.... He who disobeys [the Principle of Nature] vio- lates virtue. He who destroys humanity is a robber.

He who promotes evil lacks [moral] capacity. But he who puts his moral nature into practice and brings his physical existence into complete fulf llment can match [Heaven and Earth].... (W.T. Chan in Som- mer 1995: 188).

From Zhang Zai’s Western Inscription 900855_10_ch10.indd 519 16/12/14 7:02 PM 520 A Concise Introduction to World Religions Women in Neo-Confucianism Neo-Confucianism continued to thrive into the Ming dynasty (1368 regained control from the Mongols, the education of women— esteemed as the transmitters of culture to the young—received renewed attention. Empress Xu, the wife of the third Ming emperor, wrote Instructions for the Inner Quarters (Neixun) under the inspiration of her mother-in- law Empress Ma, who had believed it her duty, as Mother of the people, to challenge her cruel, sibility. When a set of “Four Books for Women” was compiled during the Ming, Empress Xu’s Instructions was one of them, along with Ban Zhao’s Admonitions , Song Ruozhao’s Analects, and Madame Zheng’s Filiality .

Wang Yangming Approximately three centuries after Zhu Xi’s death, Wang Yangming (1472–1529) challenged his view that the process of self-cultivation must begin with studying the classics and learning about the outside world. He argued that our moral sense is innate in our heart-minds, and takes precedence over any external learning; this teaching became known as Xinxue, the School of the Heart-Mind.

Buddhism Critics of Wang Yangming charged that his focus on the heart-mind ref ected the inf uence of Bud- dhism. It is true that his emphasis on intuitive, innate knowing resonated with both the Chan view of enlightenment and the general Mahayana belief in the universality of Buddha-nature. The Chan of the early Tang period had developed broadly into two schools with different notions on how to achieve enlightenment: a Northern “gradual” school and a Southern “sudden” school associated with the sixth patriarch, Huineng (see Chapter 5). By the end of the Tang, the two schools were represented by two distinct lineages—Linji and Caodong—both of which survive today. Following Zhou Dunyi and Zhang Zai, Zhu Xi believed human beings—like everything else in the universe—to be the product of the interaction between heavenly “principle” and the material forces of yin-yang and the f ve elements. Thus humans possessed both principle and material force. Like Mencius, Zhu Xi believed human nature to be intrinsically good; yet human action was not nec- essarily good. Zhu Xi attributed this apparent con- tradiction to the effects (or lack thereof ) of material force on the three aspects of human personality:

heavenly nature (i.e., principle), hu man feelings, that “Nature is the state before activity begins and feelings are the state when activity has started, and the mind includes both of these states” (W.T. Chan in Sommer 1995: 192). Nature, being Heaven-given, is always good; but feelings can be good or bad, while the mind brings nature and feelings together but remains a separate entity.

Focus Zhu Xi on Human Nature 900855_10_ch10.indd 520 16/12/14 7:02 PM 521 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo New literary genres also developed: discourse records (yulu) of individual masters, and “lamp” gongan (public documents gongan when a living master wrote a commentary on it that “proved” him to be a part of the lineage of enlightened masters. Eventually, the cases became pedagogical tools used to bypass the student’s intellect and spark sudden enlightenment. Famous collections of these stories and their commentaries include the Book of Serenity, Blue Cliff Record , and the Gateless Gate, collected and edited in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. (See the document box for a comparison of Chan and Daoist dialogue on the Buddha and the Dao respectively.) Popular Buddhism The second school of Buddhism to survive the Tang persecution relatively well, Jingtu, offered comfort with the promise of an afterlife in the “pure land” of Amituofo. In time, other forms of popular Buddhism developed, but they tended to be more prosaic in their promises. The monk death penalty” was worth 100. Conversely, failure to help a sick person meant two demerit points; Document Scholars have noted a general eccentricity in Chan dia- logues that is shared by the Daoist Zhuangzi. The two excerpts that follow, the f rst from the Chan Gateless Gate and the second from the Zhuangzi , point to an earthy irreverence in both traditions.

A Chan gongan: A monk asked [Yunmen Wenyan, c. 863 –949]:

“What is Buddha?” [Yunmen] answered him: “Dried dung.” [Wumen’s] comment: It seems to me [Yunmen] is so poor he cannot distinguish the taste of one food from another, or else he is too busy to write readable letters. Well, he tried to hold his school with dried dung. And his teaching was just as useless. Lightning f ashes, Sparks shower.

In one blink of your eyes You have missed seeing (Reps 1989 [1960]:

10 6 阷 ).

A dialogue from Zhuangzi:

Master Tung-kuo asked Chuang Tzu, “This thing called the Way—where does it exist?” Chuang Tzu said, “There’s no place it doesn’t e x i s t .” “Come,” said Master Tung-kuo, “you must be “It is in the ant.” “As low a thing as that?” “It is in the panic grass.” “But that’s lower still!” “It is in the tiles and shards.” “How can it be so low?” “It is in the piss and shit!” Master Tung-kuo made no reply (Watson 1968:

24 0 –1).

Excerpts from the Gateless Gate and Zhuangzi 900855_10_ch10.indd 521 16/12/14 7:02 PM 522 A Concise Introduction to World Religionsand the penalty for murder was 100 points. According to this scheme, those who earned 10,000 points would see their wishes granted; but if one died with more demerit than merit points, one’s 8). This system was adapted from a monk who had learnt it when he was a Daoist, which may explain the non-Buddhist idea of transference of ancestral demerit points Popular Religion The White Lotus Society is thought to have originated in the eleventh century as a lay movement dedicated to Amituofo that over time incorporated other elements, including Daoist longevity prac- tices and millenarian expectations surrounding a messianic Milo. White Lotus members played a substantial role in overthrowing the Mongols, who had established Tibetan Buddhism as the state refer to any religious group they considered suspect.

The Qing Dynasty and Republican The Challenges of Modernity The Qing Manchus retained Tibetan Buddhism as the state religion, but they continued to use Confucianism for government until 1911, when dynastic rule was replaced by republicanism. The end of the Qing was marked by hostility against traditional beliefs and practices. By mid-century “China” had splintered into the People’s Republic of China ( PRC ) on the mainland, the Republic of China on the island of Taiwan, and the British Crown Colony of Hong Kong, existing alongside sizable Chinese communities in the city-state of Singapore and elsewhere in Southeast Asia, as well as a global diaspora. Yet despite the persecution that traditional institutions and folk spiritualties have suffered over the last 120 ye ars, popular annual celebrations, folk religious practices, Confucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism continue to thrive outside the mainland. Moreover, many religious beliefs and prac- tices have experienced a renaissance in the PRC itself since the 1980s. Confucianism Encounter with the West and Modernization In 1838 the Qing emperor appointed Lin Zexu to put an end to the opium trade initiated by the British in hopes of balancing their trade def cit with China. In addition to conf scating and destroy- ing vast quantities of the drug, Lin composed an open letter of protest to Queen Victoria in which, as a Confucian, he framed his argument in moral terms:

The wealth of China is used to prof t the barbarians [the British]. . . . By what right do they then in return use the poisonous drug [opium] to injure the Chinese people? Let us 900855_10_ch10.indd 522 16/12/14 7:02 PM 523 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo ask, where is your conscience? I have heard that the smoking of opium is very strictly for- bidden by your country; that is because the harm caused by opium is clearly understood.

Since it is not permitted to do harm to your own country, then even less should you let it be passed on to the harm of other countries—how much less to China! (S.Y. Teng and J.

Fairbank in deBary and Lufrano 2000: 203).

42; a sec- ond war would follow in 1856 – 60). The defeat of the hopelessly outgunned Chinese was a water- shed in East Asian history, presaging the end of the dynastic system and leading to a profound victory in the Sino-Japanese War of 1894–5. That Japan—a former vassal state—had not only succeeded in modernizing along Western lines but had defeated China meant that radical reform was necessary. Some reformers urged the abandonment of all traditions; others argued that cer- tain aspects of China’s cultural heritage should be preserved. Among the latter was Kang Youwei (1858 the stultifying inf uence of Buddhism, giving it a strong national identity, and helped it to focus on modernization. Although he argued that Confucianism could play a similar role for China, the ancient teaching continued to lose ground. “New Confucians” in Post-dynastic China Soon after Kang, Sun Yatsen, the father of modern republican China, found precedents for democ- racy in the Confucian Mencius and the neo-Confucian Cheng Yi. He identif ed three principles as fundamental to democracy—nationalism, citizen rights, and human welfare—and argued that Sun Yatsen’s insights notwithstanding, state Confucianism was disestablished following the formation of the Chinese Republic in 1911. But scholars such as Fang Dongmei—who settled in Taiwan after the communist takeover of the mainland— encouraged the ongoing development of Confucianism in the diaspora.

Diaspora Attempts to Reconstruct Chinese Culture In 1958 a group of “New Confucians” based in Hong Kong responded to Western critics of China with an English-language “Manifesto for a Reappraisal of Sinology and the Reconstruction of Chi- nese Culture.” Following a discussion of “what the West can learn from Eastern thought,” the authors concluded with a few remarks on the future “intellectual development of China and of the world.” Noting the friction caused by the expansion of Western civilization, they called for “respect and sympathy toward other cultures” and “genuine compassion and commiseration.” Second, since as a conscious, existential being [and] applies understanding to conduct, by which one may tran- scend existence to attain spiritual enlightenment.” Finally, they suggested that the end product of in de Bary and Lufrano 2000: 559). 900855_10_ch10.indd 523 16/12/14 7:02 PM 524 A Concise Introduction to World ReligionsEven though they clearly identif ed themselves with the Confucian tradition, the authors included Daoism and Buddhism in their discussion; and their use of the Christian term “God” shows their willingness to adopt foreign concepts. Their efforts are ref ected in the work of scholars such as Du Weiming of Harvard and John Berthrong of Boston University; the controversial Daniel A. Bell, a Canadian who describes himself as a Confucian philosopher and scholar, who teaches at the Center for International and Comparative Political Philosophy in Beijing; and Lee Kuan Yew, the f rst president of Singapore, who tried (unsuccessfully) to introduce both Confucian and reli- gious studies into the new republic’s high schools. Winds of Change in the People’s Republic of China Since the 1980s, the PRC has reintroduced state celebrations of the sage’s birthday (the Republic of China, Taiwan, has always celebrated it). Some elementary schools have integrated classical liter- ature into their curricula, along with a focus on rites and ethics, and introduced traditional garb such as the scholar’s robe into their classrooms. Scholars also note that the Chinese govern- ment’s emphasis on a “harmonious society,” non-interference in foreign policy, soft diplomacy, the establishment of Confucius Institutes outside China, and the development of online sites for Chinese language and culture all ref ect the Con- fucian concern to promote social security and sta- bility through the disciplined self-cultivation of individual persons. Daoism and Popular Religion Even as neo-Confucianism became entrenched as state ideology during the Qing dynasty (1644– 1911), Dao ism continued to inspire popular moral- ity books and a variety of practices from meditation to taiji and qigong (breath exer cises that help the movement of vital energy through the body). How- ever, it suffered enormous setbacks after the Opium Wars, when Western-inspired reformers began to attack traditional be liefs and practices. Daoism, with its Eight Immortals (legendary f gures who play a role not unlike that of human saints) and its elaborate liturgies inviting the dei- ties into this realm, can be diff cult to distinguish from folk religion. Modernizers perceived both This Ming dynasty bottle shows Zhongli Quan, one of the eight Daoist “Immortals” who serve as patrons of various groups and trades. Recognizable by his two topknots, exposed belly, and fan, Zhongli is believed to have been a successful Han general who discovered the Dao only after he had experienced defeat for the rst time; he is also said to have Museum of Art, Image source: Art Resource, NY). 900855_10_ch10.indd 524 16/12/14 7:02 PM 525 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo Daoism and folk religion as su perstitious and hostile to progress, especially after the failure of the anti-Western uprising (1899–1901) known in the West as the “Boxer Rebellion.” The Boxers had believed they could drive out the foreigners on the strength of their martial arts skills alone, which they thought would make them impervious to Western guns and cannon.

Buddhism Reform and Modernization Of the three elite religions, Buddhism has been the most successful in modernizing itself. A leader a school for monastics in Nanjing, and inspired Tan Sitong (1865–98) to propose a process through which millennia-old institutional and cultural barriers in Chinese society might be cleared away.

In his book Renxue ren was the same as Mohism’s love without distinction, Buddhism’s compassion, and Christianity’s love. Appealing to Huayan ideas of interconnectedness, he described a state of oneness or non-differentiation in which communication between people is always possible. Tragically, he was beheaded for plotting against the Qing government, but his wife, Li Run, remained true to his ideal of non-differentiation and established a school for girls in rural Hunan—a feat unheard of in the early twentieth century. Elsewhere, several monks also worked to revive and reform Buddhism. Yinguang (1861–1940) was a conservative monk credited with reviving the Pure Land school, while Taixu (1890 –1947) argued that of all religions, Buddhism was the one most compatible with modern science; he also advocated a modern education for monastics. He made his reputation as an activist in 1912 when he and another monk, Renshan, announced that they had petitioned the government for permis- sion to open a new school for monastics and planned to use the monastery’s resources to run it. The monk-off cers of the temple successfully prevented the construction of the school. But the seeds of Humanistic Buddhism had been sown. Instead of retreating into meditation or scriptural study, monastics and laypeople alike were encouraged to become “engaged” in the world: in edu- cation, social work, medicine, and politics. In 1929 the Chinese Buddhist Association was estab- lished in Shanghai and charged with reforming and reviving Buddhism in China.

Government Treatment of Religion In 1949 the PRC guaranteed freedom of religion. The off cial policy, in line with Marxist histor- ical materialism, stated that to coerce religious people without material improvement of society was “useless and positively harmful.” Nevertheless, in 1950 the Chinese Buddhist Association decamped to Taiwan with the Nationalist government and was replaced by a state-administered Buddhist Association. And in 1966 the government launched the Cultural Revolution. Fuelled by the Marxist notion of religion as an opiate that blunts the masses’ instinct for justice and hin- ders advancement, the “revolutionaries” systematically targeted all religious traditions. By the mid- 1970s the social and economic foundations of traditional Chinese society had been destroyed, and the government acknowledged that a new approach was necessary. Today the Chinese government and Islam (Confucianism is considered a philosophy rather than a religion.) At the same time, although it is not off cially recognized, popular religion is experiencing a revival in the PRC . 900855_10_ch10.indd 525 16/12/14 7:02 PM 526 A Concise Introduction to World Religions Popular Religion A loose collection of beliefs and practices centred on the power of dei ties, ghosts, and spirits, popu- lar religion may draw elements from any of the more established traditions, including Christianity and Islam. Spirits of all kinds are seen as compassionate helpers, regardless of tradition.The goals of practitioners have remained stable through the ages: children (especially sons), happiness, academic success, prosperity, safety at work (especially in potentially dangerous occu- pations such as f shing and policing), and even political change. They can be divided into two streams: personal religiosity and political activism. One important el ement in personal religiosity is the belief that the spirits of the deceased con- tinue to intervene in the world, and that their power can be harnessed for the benef t of the living.

This belief f nds expression not only in ancestral tablets in temples, or family altars dedicated to ancestors, but also in shrines in commercial establishments. Local folk heroes and heroines, bud- dhas, bodhisattvas, Daoist perfected beings: all can be called on for help. But popular religion can also be externalized in a less individual, more dogmatic and partisan way. When an idea such as the Mandate of Heaven or a messianic f gure such as Milo (Maitreya) is incorporated into popular religion, it can give rise to politically charged movements like the White Lotus Society, the Boxers, or the Heavenly Kingdom of Great Peace. Daoism and folk religion are re-establishing themselves in the PRC, and Daoism is especially popular in Europe and the Americas, where its dual focus on living a simple, balanced life and promoting health, longevity, and transcendence are increasingly valued. The Daodejing ranks only second to the Bible as the most translated book in the world. Recent Developments Study after study tells us that the Chinese, Koreans, Japanese, and Vietnamese are the least reli- gious of all ethnic groups. This calls into question the term “religion.” Clearly, Chinese traditions f t badly into the monotheistic frame of reference.

Revival of Confucianism The f rst two generations of the twentieth-century New Confucians wrote from the cultural margins— Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, Boston—while China lagged far behind the West developmentally.

Yet by the late 1970s it was clear that communism had failed to improve life for the people. Thus in 1978 a process of economic and political reform began. Rapid industrial and economic growth lifted half a billion people out of poverty by 2004, and by 2012 China had achieved exceptional economic stability, despite a global f nancial disaster. Despite (or because of) this remarkable material success, some long-standing problems remained and some new ones surfaced: social alienation, radical indi- vidualism, ecological degradation, and infractions of human rights. As antidotes, both political and academic leaders recommended the revival and integration of traditional Confucian values such as integrity, loving respect, and belief in the unity of human beings with the cosmos. The New Confucianism that had developed in the diaspora was harnessed to neutralize inter- national fears that economic success would turn China into an imperialistic superpower. In 1984, just six years after the reform process began, the state-supported China Confucius Foundation was created with the explicit mandate to expand the inf uence of Confucianism both internally 900855_10_ch10.indd 526 16/12/14 7:02 PM 527 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo and internationally. By 2007 there were close to 200 Institutes around the globe, all supported by the Chinese government. None of this activity is “religious” in the Western sense. Yet the Chinese government’s strategy of persuasion through education, both in and outside China, clearly recalls the traditional Confucian belief that moral development is fundamental to a peaceful society.

Daoism under Reconstruction Daoism has been more popular than Confucianism in the West: Daoist teachings were integral to the counterculture movement of the 1960s, and some Westerners continue to cherish the Daoist ideals of wuwei and z iran. Daoism has also been used to encourage “green” thinking in Taiwan, and as the PRC becomes prosperous enough to turn its attention to the natural environment, the value of the Daoist emphasis on achieving harmony with the cosmos is being recognized there as well. Folk Religiosity Many popular religious groups focus on cultivating inner calm and peace. Others, such as the Taiwan-based Yiguandao (Unity, Pervasive Truth, or Consistent Way) movement, are millenarian, believing that these are the end times and urging repentance of sins and reunion with the Eternal Mother. Still other movements are syncretic, combining elements from Confucianism, Daoism, Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam; one of these movements, Tien De or Tiande (Heavenly Virtue), professes to use cosmic energy and spiritual healing to cure disease.

Humanistic Buddhism: A Religion for This World enced by the reformer Taixu have been particularly active in growing global Buddhism, and all accepts all the teachings of eight traditional schools (Tiantai, Huayan, Sanlun, Faxiang, Lu, Zhen- yan, Chan, and Jingtu) focuses on education and has three universities, one of which is the Uni- versity of the West in Rosemead, California. The founder of Fagushan (Dharma Drum Mountain), Sheng Yen (1930 Ethics of the Mind”: Family Ethics, Living Ethics, School Ethics, Environmental Ethics, Workplace Ethics, and Ethics between Ethnic Groups. The third group, Cizi or Tzu Chi (Compassionate Relief ), is a charitable foundation based in Taiwan that is active in disaster relief around the world. It was founded by a Buddhist nun organized to help the sick and the poor in her town. With the help of housewife-disciples, Cheng established Cizi in 1966.

Korean Religions Theoretically, traditional Korean religiosity can be classif ed as non-theistic at the elite level and polytheistic at the popular level, but in practice (like its Chinese counterpart) it tends to be syn- cretic. Thus neither of these categories necessarily excludes the other. It is even possible to identify a quasi-monotheistic belief in a purposeful and creative Way (or Heaven, or Heaven-and-Earth) 900855_10_ch10.indd 527 16/12/14 7:02 PM 528 A Concise Introduction to World Religionsco-existing with both the polytheistic belief in ancestral spirits and nature deities and the non- theistic belief in an impersonal natural Way. Korea and China: A Shared History Ancient Korean culture shows traces of inf uences from both continental East Asia and Central Asia. Migration from China to the Korean peninsula was underway as early as the Zhou dynasty (10 4 6 BCE ), and political relations between the two populations have always ref ected a mix- ture of kinship and antipathy, relatedness and differentiation. This early twentieth-century painting shows the Mountain God with three symbols of longevity: a crane (left), a deer (right), and pine trees (foreground). An example of Korean syncretism, the Mountain God is variously portrayed as the legendary founder Dangun, a Confucian sage, a Daoist immortal, and 900855_10_ch10.indd 528 16/12/14 7:03 PM 529 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo The earliest written records of Korea are Chinese. Sima Qian’s Records of the Grand Historian describes Wiman, one of the later kings of the proto-state of Old Joseon, as a refugee from northern China who ruled over Chinese refugees and I ndigenous inhabitants at Wanggeom (present-day Pyongyang) in the sixth and f fth centuries BCE . Another Chinese source, the sixth-century History of the Wei Dynasty , tells how the mythical king Dangun founded Old Joseon during the time of China’s legendary sage king Yao. Old Joseon An early Korean source, now lost, told of Dangun’s divine grandfather Hwanin and father Hwa- nung. Hwanin knew that his son wanted to descend from heaven and live in the world of human beings, so he settled Hwanung in a cave on Mount Taebaek. But Hwanung was not alone in the cave: a bear and a tiger were also living there, and they asked him to transform them into human beings. So Hwanung gave them a bundle of sacred mug- worts and 20 cloves of garlic, with instructions to eat these foods and avoid the sunlight. After 21 days the bear became a woman, but the tiger had failed to avoid the light and therefore was not transformed. The woman remained alone, unable to f nd a husband, so she prayed for a child. In response to her prayers, Hwanung transformed himself, lay with her, and gave her a son, Dangun Wanggeom. This foundation myth became a marker of national identity when Korea faced a series of Mon- Memorabilia of the Three Kingdoms , the god Hwanung descended into the human world and married a she-bear who gave birth to Dangun (a bear cult still exists among the Ainu people of Japan). Yi Suenghyu in his Songs of Emperors and Kings (1287) gives a variant account in which the great king Hwanung gave medicine to his granddaughter to change her into a human being; she then married a tree god and bore Dangun (a tree cult was prevalent in the southern portion of the Korean peninsula). Interestingly, there is no reference to Dangun in the off cial History of the Three Kingdoms, compiled a century earlier, under Confucian inspiration, by Gim Busik.

The Three Kingdoms (c. 50 BCE–668 CE) The proto-state of Old Joseon was followed by the Three Kingdoms of Goguryeo, Baekje, and Silla.

Songs of the South in both form and content, telling how the founder Jumong, who eventually took the title King Dongmyeong, was born from an egg after the sun—Haemosu, the Son of Heaven—shone on the breast of his mother, the eldest daughter of the River Earl. After ruling for 19 years, Dongmy- eong forsook his throne and rose to heaven. Goguryeo was closely linked to Baekje, whose founder, King Onjo, is said to have been Dongmyeong’s son. Silla’s foundation myth, like Old Joseon’s, was recorded in Iryeon’s Me morabilia . Like King Dongmyeong, King Hyeokgeose (“Bright”) was born from an egg. His birth was announced by an eerie lightning-like emanation from a well. When the people cracked open the egg, they found a beautiful boy inside. When they bathed him he emitted light; the “birds and beasts danced for joy, a dragon appeared and brought an infant girl from under her left rib. When the two reached the age of 13, they married and became king and queen. 900855_10_ch10.indd 529 16/12/14 7:03 PM 530 A Concise Introduction to World Religions Daoism Korea’s foundation myths contain several elements reminiscent of the shamanist stream in Daoism, including nature deities (the River Earl), marriage between gods and human beings (Hwanung and the bear-woman), and ascension into heaven (King Dongmyeong). In Silla, the people believed in the Holy Mother of Mount Fairy Peach: a goddess, the guardian of the country, who was said to live on a mountain to the west of the capital, recalling the Queen Mother of the West in the Zhuangzi.

These apparently Daoist elements have led some scholars to suggest that her cult was a composite of an I ndigenous mountain deity cult and a Daoist immortality cult. Her tale (see Document box) underlines the syncretic nature of Korean religion, linking the Holy Mother with a Buddhist nun as well as a Chinese emperor and King Hyeokgeose (Hyokkose) of Silla. This mythological syncretism is reinforced in Silla’s history. In the 700s Gim Jiseong, a vice-minister of state, kept one image each of Amitabha, the buddha of the West, and Maitreya, the buddha of the Future. He read Mahayana literature but also enjoyed Laozi and the Zhuangzi.

Echoes of Daoist scripture continued into the 1400s, during the staunchly neo-Confucian Joseon or I dynasty, when literati (much like the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove) retired from off cial life to engage in metaphysical conversation. Murals in Goguryeo tombs suggest that the Daoist cult of immortality merged with local beliefs in prognostication. The early Tang court sent a Daoist adept and a copy of the Daodejing to Korea.

In the same period, a Buddhist monastery near the border with China was converted into a Daoist temple; and in 643, at the request of the Goguryeo king, eight Daoist priests were sent there from China. By 650, the Daoist inf uence at the Goguryeo court was so strong that a monk who opposed Document From the Collected Works of Minister I of Korea In early summer, when the Great Bear stood in the Snake, Haemosu came to Korea, A true Son of Heaven.

He came down through the air In a f ve-dragon chariot, With a retinue of hundreds, Robes streaming, riding on swans, The atmosphere echoed with chiming music.

Banners f oated on the tinted clouds.

. . . North of the capital was the Green River, Where the River Earl’s three beautiful daughters Rose from the drake-neck ’s green waves To play in the Bear’s Heart Pool.

Their jade ornaments tinkled.

They might have been fairies of the Han River banks, Or goddesses of the Lo River islets.

The king, out hunting, espied them, Was fascinated and lost his heart.

Not from lust for girls, But from eager desire for an heir (Lee et al. 1993: 24).

The Lay of King Dongmyeong 900855_10_ch10.indd 530 16/12/14 7:03 PM 531 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo Shamanism With its focus on deities, ghosts, and spirits, Daoism found deep resonance in Korean shamanism (mug yo ). Each village had its own deity: a local mountain god or goddess in inland regions and a dragon king by the sea. Traditional household deities included the gods of the hearth, the roof beam, and the outhouse. Shamans ( mudang) regularly performed rituals at community celebra- tions and ceremonies.

Buddhism A Buddhism that was focused on karma and the search for happiness was introduced to Goguryeo by a Chinese monk in 372 and to Baekje by an Indian monk in 384; both received imperial sup- port. In Silla King Pophung and his minister Yi Chadon made Buddhism the state religion in the sixth century. In 540, when King Chinhung established a youth group, he made the Buddhist f ve precepts (p. 400) part of its ethical foundation. And in 661 two monks named Wonhyo and Uisang set out for China in search of new teachers. In the end they did not travel far. One night, while waiting out a rainstorm, they unknowingly slept in an ancient tomb and drank water that had collected in a human skull. The next morn- ing Wonhyo was horrif ed to see what he had used as a drinking vessel; then he realized that his response had been determined solely by his mind. Having achieved enlightenment, Wonhyo returned home, left the monastery, and developed what came to be known as “interpenetrated Buddhism” ( tongbulg yo), harmonizing the teachings of the Samron (Sanlun or Madhyamaka) and Yusik or Yugagyo (Weishi or Yogacara) schools. Wonhyo’s tongbulg yo ref ected the teachings of his friend Uisang, who had completed the trip to China and returned to found the Hwaeom school— the Korean version of the Huayan (Flower Garland) tradition.

Document The phrases “art of the immortals” and “art of longevity” suggest that the Holy Mother embraced Daoism as well as Buddhism.

During the reign of King Chinpyong [579– 632], a nun... wished to repair a hall for the Buddha... but could not carry out her desire. A beautiful immortal fairy, her hair adorned with ornaments, appeared in the nun’s dreams and consoled her: “I’m the holy goddess mother of Mount Fairy Peach [Mount West], and I am pleased that you would repair the Buddha Hall. I offer you ten kun of gold. . . holy mother, origi nally the daughter of a Chinese emperor, was named Saso. Early in her life she learned the art of the immortals. . . . When Saso f rst came to Chinhan, she gave birth to a holy man Hyok kose.... Saso donated gold to make a Buddha image, lighted incense for the living beings, and ini- tiated a religion. How could she be merely one who learned the art of longevity and became a prisoner in the boundless mist? (Lee et al. 1993: 94) The Holy Mother of Mount Fairy Peach 900855_10_ch10.indd 531 16/12/14 7:03 PM 532 A Concise Introduction to World Religions United Silla, Later Three Kingdoms, and Goryeo (668–1392) Confucianism Today Korea has the largest network of Confucian shrines in the world. The process of Confucian- ization started around 600, but it was not until the Goryeo period (918 united the Three Kingdoms that splintered from Silla and founded Goryeo in 918, was an ardent Buddhist, but he also encouraged Confucian learning. Taejo replaced Silla’s tradition of governance by a hereditary aristocracy with the examination- based bureaucratic system of Tang China. He is also said to have left for his successors a list of “Ten Injunctions” that brought together Buddhist, Confucian, and Indigenous perspectives. The f rst injunction, for example, clearly honours the Buddhist tradition:

The success of the great enterprise of founding our dynasty is entirely owing to the pro- tective powers of the many Buddhas. We therefore must build temples for both Son [Med- itation] and Kyo (Textual) Schools and appoint abbots, that they may perform the proper ceremonies and themselves cultivate the way (Lee 1985: 132).

But the third injunction pays tribute to the Confucian tradition: . . . if the eldest son is not worthy of the crown, let the second eldest succeed to the throne.

If the second eldest, too, is unworthy, choose the brother the people consider the best qualif ed for the throne.

And the fourth injunction emphasizes the primacy of I ndigenous traditions:

In the past we have always had a deep attachment for the ways of China and all of our institutions have been modelled upon those of Tang. But our country occupies a different geographical location and our people’s character is different from that of the Chinese.

Hence, there is no reason to strain ourselves unreasonably to copy the Chinese way...

(H. Kang in Lee 1993: 263).

Soon after this, the inf uence of Confucianism was further reinforced when Choe Chung (948 – 1068) established a private Confucian Academy.

Buddhism A new era began around 800 CE with the establishment of the Seon (Chan) school. Although the established Gyo (doctrinal) schools resisted its innovations, two monks, Uicheon (1055–1101) and Jinul (1158 Jinul brought together the two views on enlightenment, sudden and gradual, with the dictum “sudden enlightenment followed by gradual practice.” He integrated gwanhwa (meditating on the word) or gongan practice into Seon, turned his back on the excesses of other Buddhist schools, and established the Jogye Order as a new community of pure-minded and disciplined Seon prac- titioners on Mount Jogye. 900855_10_ch10.indd 532 16/12/14 7:03 PM 533 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo Joseon (1392–1910) Confucian Antipathy to Buddhism In Korea as in China, Buddhism’s success eventually led to corruption and backlash. The founder of the Joseon dynasty, another Taejo, banned the building of new Buddhist temples; then his son Taejong disestablished temples and conf scated their estates and workers, including slaves.

mountains.Around the same time, families began installing shrines for ancestral tablets in their homes, in accordance with Confucian custom. Eventually, the responsibility for performing the rites of ancestor veneration was entrusted to the f rst son, who became the only one with the right of inher- itance. This system of primogeniture put an end to the Goryeo system under which daughters were also entitled to inherit and couples could hold property jointly.

Neo-Confucianism In the early 1500s, the philosopher Jo Gwang jo continued to root out superstitions deemed incom- patible with Confucianism. He encouraged government by moral suasion and instituted a system of local self-government based on the idea of a village code or “Family Compact,” outlined by the The Tripitaka Koreana is the most complete collection of Buddhist texts in the world. Engraved in Chinese characters on 80,000 woodblocks, it was completed between 1237 and 1248. This immense government-sponsored project was undertaken in an effort to win the Buddha’s protection against 900855_10_ch10.indd 533 16/12/14 7:03 PM 534 A Concise Introduction to World ReligionsChinese neo-Confucian Zhu Xi. At the heart of this system was a notion of reciprocity expressed in mutual encouragement of morality, supervision of conduct, decorum in social relations, and aid in times of hardship or disaster. in them both a principle or pattern of nature that is wholly good and a vital or material force that can be good or bad. The latter is good when desires and emotions are expressed in appropriate balance and bad when a lack or an excess is expressed. This inspired a famous exchange of letters between the Korean philosophers I Hwang (Toegye) and I I (or Yulgok) in the mid-1500s. At the centre of this exchange, known as the “Four–Seven Debate,” was the relationship between according to “Centrality and Equilibrium,” cause some human actions to be less than good when they are not expressed in correct proportion. Both taking Zhu Xi as their starting-point, I Hwang and I I arrived at different conclusions. I Hwang argued that principle or pattern in nature ( i) rises and material force ( ki) follows, implying that human nature is mixed from the beginning. I I, on the other hand, argued that if principle pervades everything, is uniform and undifferentiated, then it must be material force that initiates action, implying that human nature is originally wholly good. Behind the philosophers’ quest for a deeper understanding of human nature was the commitment to psychological–moral transforma- tion of the self—the neo-Confucian equivalent of classic Confucian self-cultivation. The quest for self-improvement was not limited to men. Three prominent documents written by or for women were Queen Sohye’s Instructions for the Inner Quarters (1475); a letter written by the seventeenth-century Confucian Song Siyol on the occasion of his daughter’s marriage, empha- for elders, as well as compassion for paternal aunts. As neo-Confucianism became increasingly entrenched at the state level and Daoism was grad- ually assimilated into Joseon culture, Buddhist monastics argued for reconciliation of the various religions—in effect, syncretism. As the sixteenth-century monk Hyujeong wrote in his Mirror of Three Religions: “An ancient man said: ‘Confucianists plant the root, Taoists grow the root, and Buddhists harvest the root’” (Lee et al. 1993: 662). Nevertheless, Confucianism retained its dominant position. Recent Developments: 1897 to the Present From the late-nineteenth century to the mid-twentieth, Korea was forced to contend with both Japanese imperialism and the increasing presence of the West. Korean responses to the West wholesale Westernization and an end to the relationship with China, which was then known as the “sick man of East Asia.” Like his contemporaries in China, Yun argued that if Koreans were poor and oppressed, Confucianism was to blame. Yun’s antipathy towards Confucianism was not unreasonable, for in addition to being seen as regressive, it was associated with Japanese imperialism. During Japan’s occupation of Korea (1910 – 45), the old Royal Confucian Academy was renovated and institutions like the Society for the Promotion of the Confucian Way were established to aid the imposition of Japanese culture on the Koreans. 900855_10_ch10.indd 534 16/12/14 7:03 PM 535 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo Contemporary Confucianism Other Korean scholars agreed that Korea’s adherence to the conservative teachings of Zhu Xi, which focused on maintaining the status quo through mastery of classical literature, had held it back. However, like the Chinese New Confucians, they also believed that a renewed transnational Confucianism based on traditional values could help to bring peace and stability to the whole Wang Yangming even though Wang had been overshadowed by Zhu Xi in Korea. Bak saw hope in Wang’s emphasis on the “manifesting” of the naturally “clear character” through cultivation of the heart-mind and uncovering of the innate goodness in human beings. He was not alone in his choice of Wang’s Confucianism as a response to modernity.Gim Chungnyol, who studied with the New Confucian Fang Dongmei in the 1950s and 1960s, was an activist in the Korean democracy movement in the 1970s and 1980s. He believed that Con- fucianism could serve as an antidote to the excesses of capitalist industrialization. But the movement for the revival of Confucianism in Korea is not monolithic. So Chonggi, for one, was critical of authoritarian rule even if it was Confucian, but he believed that a Confucianism of the people could be good for Korea. The recent establishment of an Institute of Confucian Philosophy and Culture at Sungkyunkwan University suggests a revival of scholarly interest in the Confucian tradition. Even so, popular support for Confucianism as a religion is not strong.

Buddhism The Japanese occupation was particularly diff cult for Korean Buddhists. The traditional temple sys- tem was replaced with the Japanese system. Temple abbots were given the right to private ownership and inheritance, and some monks adopted the Japanese customs of marrying and having children.

In 1920 the 31 main temples were put under the oversight of the Japanese government. After the defeat of Japan in 1945, deep rifts developed between the “Japanized” monks and those who had remained celibate. In time the Jogye Order became the dominant school and took over the manage- ment of the temples from the married priests. Beginning in the 1960s, Korean Buddhism adopted a Protestant model of active missionizing, encouraging lay associations and focusing on youth, and the South Korean government devoted many resources to restoring and reconstructing historic temples.

Wo n Bu d d h i s m Won or Circle Buddhism (Wonbulgyo) is a twentieth-century school that can be placed in the Seon tradition because of its practice of meditation and its emphasis on harnessing the mind. Its sym- bol, the circle, stands for ultimate reality and the belief that, in the words of its founder, Sotaesan where the truth of no birth and no death and the principle of cause and effect operate on an inter- related basis as a single, perfect organ.” Today Won Buddhism has a global presence.

North Korea In 1953 the Korean peninsula was divided into two parts. North Korea, like the PRC , is communist, and although its laws support religious freedom, in practice religion is barely tolerated. There are reports that Buddhism fares a little better than Christianity, but it still has a very limited presence in the country. 900855_10_ch10.indd 535 16/12/14 7:03 PM 536 A Concise Introduction to World Religions South Korea In the early 2000s nearly half of South Korea’s population professed to have no religion—a similar pattern to the Chinese. Those who did claim an institutional aff liation were almost equally divided between Buddhism and Christianity (mainly Protestant, especially Pentecostal). Confucianism claimed only 0.3 per cent and the Indigenous shamanic tradition was statistically invisible, even though both traditions still seem pervasive in Korean life. There are more than 200 new religions in South Korea. Because their beliefs and practices are syncretic, often more “cultural” than “religious,” they may not be captured in census statistics. But they demonstrate the pervasiveness of Korean religiosity and its multiple inf uences. Some modern progressives urge the revival of folk traditions as a way of reclaiming Korean culture; yet others call for shamanism to be rooted out as mere superstition. A sampling of new religious movements shows that Korean religious responses to modernity are diverse. The oldest of the new movements, the Religion of the Heavenly Way or Cheondogyo, was founded in 1860 in response to Catholicism. It syncretizes Korean, Chinese, and Christian values, and combines monotheism and belief in the equality of all human beings with the broad East Asian vision of religious practice as enabling humans to live in harmony with the universe. Another response to Western culture and globalization is the Religion of the Great Ances- tors (Daejonggyo), which sees itself as a revival of ancient Korean shamanism. Founded in 1910, Students wearing traditional costumes perform during one of the regular celebrations of Confucius held 900855_10_ch10.indd 536 16/12/14 7:03 PM 537 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo it depicts God as Korean and presents the heavenly triad of Indigenous ancestors—Hwanin, Hwanung, and Dangun—as an alternative to the Christian Trinity. Other new religions, such as Dahn Yoga, have been inf uenced by the Daoist practice of internal alchemy aimed at both physical longevity and spiritual transcendence.

Summar y The ancient popular beliefs and practices at the root of the elite religions of China and Korea do not claim exclusive truth. They come from many different places and cultures. Yet most of them share a single aspiration to harmony—individual and communal, earthly and cosmic. Further- Sites Beijing, People’s Republic of China The Imperial Palace complex (the “Forbidden City”) includes the Altar or Temple of Heaven, where the Ming and Qing emperors performed the grandest sacrif ces. Beijing is also home to the ancestral tem- ple of both dynasties (the Taimiao), a Confucian temple dedi cated to scholar-off cials, and the tombs of the later Ming emperors.

Qufu, Shandong province, People’s Republic of China Among the monuments in the birthplace of Con- fucius are a temple, a family mansion, and a ceme- tery containing Confucius’ tomb and the remains of more than 100,000 of his descendants.

Xian, Shaanxi province, PRC Xian (formerly Chang’an) was China’s capital through many dynasties. The famous terracotta warrior guardians were discovered nearby.

Wudangshan, Hubei province, PRC Mount Wudang is home to many Daoist monaster- ies, as well as a complex of palaces and temples that contain some of the f nest examples of Chinese art and architecture; most were built during the Ming dynasty (1368 date from as early as the seventh century. Guangzhou, Guangdong province,PRC It was in Guangzhou that Huineng (638 sixth Chan patriarch, was enlightened. His remains are enshrined in the Nanhua Temple, north of Guangzhou.

Cheongju City, South Korea The f rst book in the world to be produced using movable metal type was printed in 1377 at the Heu- ngdeok Temple in Cheong ju. The Monk Baegun’s Antholog y of the Great Buddhist Patriarchs’ Seon Teach- ings, better known as Jikji (Straight Pointing ) is now housed in the National Library of France.

Seoul, South Korea The Changdeokgung (Palace of Prospering Vir- tue) complex was established by Taejong, the third Joseon king. It includes Jongmyo, the oldest of the surviving Confucian shrines dedicated to the ances- tors of Joseon. 900855_10_ch10.indd 537 16/12/14 7:03 PM 538 A Concise Introduction to World Religions Religion Classical and Sacred Texts Composition/ Compilation Process Compilation/ Revision Process Use (Oral, Legal, Ritual) Confucianism (Texts are understood to come from sages and are not Book of Music, Poetry, History, Changes, Rites and the Spring and Autumn Annals 5th–3rd centuries BCE 17 5 CE stone engraving of the Classics after the burning of the books in 213 BCE ; the Book of Music is lost Used for home education; curriculum assigned for state examination and of cial learning Confucianism Classic of Filial Piety, The Analects, Er Ya (the earliest Chinese dictionar y), three commentaries on the Spring and Autumn Annals and Rites in three sections (The Rites of Zhou , The Book of Rites , and Ceremonial Rites 7th–10th centuries The Five Classics increased to Nine and then Twelve Books and inscribed on stone As above Confucianism Zhu Xi formulates standard texts into the Four Books (Great Learning Centrality and Equilibrium both from the Book of Rites, Mencius, The Analects ) and Five Classics from ancient times 10th–13th centuries With Mencius , the Twelve Classics become Thirteen As above Confucianism Four Books for women include Admonitions for Women, Filial Piety for Women , Analects for Women , and Instructions for the Inner Quarters 1st–2nd centuries 7th–9th centuries see two new additions; Instructions is added in the 15th century; Filial Piety replaced by a Handy Record of Rules for Wome n Education for women Sacred/Foundational Texts more, many see the achievement of harmony as dependent on the disciplined transcendence of self. Although individual groups vary in their specif c goals and methods, they have all tended to believe that basic human desires—for material well-being, health, familial joy, personal security, social stability, spiritual maturity, and, ultimately, release from the cycle of rebirth—should be harnessed and directed towards the care of others: family and friends, the community, the state, and the natural world.

Like Korea’s, China’s religious culture has undergone signif cant transformations over the last 1,500 years, incorporating new inf uences—from Confucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism to Christi- anity—without abandoning its Indigenous shamanistic traditions. Today both societies remain plu- ralistic and syncretic. None of the traditional religions have disappeared. Buddhism has thrived in Taiwan while Christianity has f ourished in Hong Kong and South Korea. New religious movements have developed in Taiwan and Hong Kong; and there are now more than 200 active new ones in South Korea. But religious freedom remains elusive in the People’s Republic and North Korea. How the various religions will develop and interact with one another remains to be seen. 900855_10_ch10.indd 538 16/12/14 7:03 PM 539 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo Religion Classical and Sacred Texts Composition/ Compilation Process Compilation/ Revision Process Use (Oral, Legal, Ritual) Daoism (early texts seen primarily as words of wisdom from sages) Daodejing Contested but early 3rd century BCE generally accepted 3rd century CE Wang Bi commentary Liturgical use and acts as basis for movements seeking legitimacy from Laozi Daoism Zhuangzi First seven chapters attributed to namesake; 4th to 3rd centuries BCE Guo Xiang believed to be the compiler of the current textKnown as the Classic of South China ( Nanhuajing ) and used in education Daoism Techniques of the Mind and Inward Training 4th century BCE Both were lost to the main tradition and “found” recently in the Legalist GuanziLikely used as meditation manual Daoism Classic of the Great Peace 1st century CE Reassembled in 6th century after its destruction in 3rd centuryRitual use and instructional manual Daoism Master Who Embraces Spontaneous Nature or Simplicity 320s 14th century saw the combination of the “inner” and “outer” sections of the current text Used as manual for external alchemy Daoism High Clarity scriptures Revealed 364 to 379 Edited into Pronouncements of the Perfected by Tao Hong jing Doctrinal and ritual use Daoism Scripture for the Salvation of Humanity of the Lingbao school Revealed 4th century 12th century 61-chapter version presented to Song emperor Used in recitation Daoism Fifteen Precepts for the Establishing of the Teaching 12th century Collected as part of Wang Chongyang’s writings Doctrinal for Complete Tr u t h s c h o o l Buddhism Three Baskets of the Theravada/Hinayana Originals from India; see chapter on BuddhismMost translated during the 3rd to 6th centuries Used in study and as reference for monastic law Buddhism Many; core to Chinese and Korean practice are treatises like The Awakening of Faith; sutras such as the Pure Land (in three volumes), Lotus , Flower Garland , Platform of Hui-neng , Vimalakirti , and others (see Chapter 8); and Recorded Sayings by Chan masters like Baegan’s jikji .

Wumen’s Gateless Gate , and the Blue Cliff Records Most from South Asia except for The Platform Sutra and records of sayings from masters of the Chan school; and The Awakening of Faith which has no Sanskrit original Most translated during the 4th to 6th centuries See Chapter 5 Popular tradition Innumerable tracts of religious rituals and devotion Throughout histor y New writings appear based on new movements Instructional and ritual Sacred/Foundational Texts (Continued) 900855_10_ch10.indd 539 16/12/14 7:03 PM 540 A Concise Introduction to World Religions Discussion Questions 1. How does the popular shrine described at the beginning of this chapter illustrate the syncretic quality of Chinese religion?

2. What assumptions and values do Confucianism and Daoism share? What sets them apart?

3. Would you consider Confucianism to be patriarchal, misogynist, and oppressive for women? Explain your position, using evidence from China and Korea.

4. What are some of the core spiritual concerns in the early prototypical Daoist texts? How did they inf uence the goals, methods of cultivation, and institutional development of religious Daoism?

5. Compare and contrast classical and neo-Confucianism. What accounts for their differences?

6. What qualities would make an ideal Buddhist woman?

7. Explore points of tension and convergence between Confucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism.

8. What allows for such disparate groups as the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove and Complete Truth to coexist under the umbrella of Daoism? What makes them both Daoist?

9. Who are the “New Confucians”? What issues are they tackling? What are their goals?

10. How does Engaged or Humanistic Buddhism differ from traditional Buddhism?

11. What do the Korean foundation myths suggest about the nature of Korean culture and religiosity?

12. What are some of the challenges facing modern Korean Buddhism?

13. In this book, the religious traditions of East Asia have been organized geographically in two groups:

“China and Korea” and “Japan.” Would a different organization, based on the traditions— Indigenous shamanism (as in Shinto and mug yo ), Daoism, Confucianism, and East Asian Buddhism—be more appropriate or less so? Why?

Glossar y Ban Zhao (c. 48–112 CE) The inf uen- tial female Confucian scholar who wrote Admonitions (or Lessons) for Women.

Chan From Sanskrit dhyana (medita- tion); the Buddhist school known as Seon in Korea and Zen in Japan .

Confucius 479 BCE ) The f rst teacher of Confucianism, known in Chinese as Kongzi or Kongfuzi.

Dao/dao (a l s o Tao/tao) Either the “Way” in the sense of the Ultimate or the “way” in the sense of the path taken by followers of a particular tradition.

Daodejing The Classic of the Way and Power or Virtue is the multi-authored foundational Daoist text purportedly written by Laozi.

de Power or virtue.

Dong Zhongshu (195?–105? BCE ) The most prominent Confucian of the New Text school, who helped establish Con- fucianism as the state religion.

f v e p h a s e s The generative and destruc- tive cycles between metal, wood, water, f re, and earth represent a dynamic view of the cosmos. The concept is also translated as f ve agents or elements depending on the meaning. See wu x ing.

Ha n Yu (768 – 824) Played a pivotal role in the revival of Confucianism in a period when it was overshadowed by Daoism and Buddhism.

Huayan Flower Garland Buddhism; Hwaeom in Korea.

Jingtu Pure Land Buddhism.

junzi A person of exemplary or authori- tative behaviour, especially in Confucian- ism; traditionally translated in English as “gentleman,” implying the virtues of the upper class; a superior person, or one of virtue and exceptional character.

Laozi The “Old Master”; the putative patriarch of Daoism and author of the Daodejing ; may or may not have been an actual historical f gure. 900855_10_ch10.indd 540 16/12/14 7:03 PM 541 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo li The single English transliteration used for two different Chinese words.

Li in the first sense refers to ritual practice and decorum and is usually translated as “rites.” Li in the second sense refers to the pattern in a natu- ral material such as wood or stone; it was used by the neo-Confucians to designate the force that pervades the cosmos and is translated as “principle.” lunhui Rebirth or samsara .

Mencius (c. 343 –289 BCE ) The second most prominent Confucian thinker, known in Chinese as Meng Ke, Mas- ter Meng, or Mengzi; he believed that human nature is inherently good.

pusa Bodhisattva; an enlightened being who foregoes release/liberation to stay in the world and help others.

qi material force or vital energy qigong A “ breath” discipline or set of exercises used to enhance health and spiritual well-being; also the vital or material energy or force that animates everything in the universe.

ren The central Confucian vir- tue, usually translated as “humane- ness,” “ benevolence,” “goodness,” or “compassion.” taiji The “Great Ultimate,” understood to coexist with the Ultimate of Non- being; also the term for the slow-motion exer- cise sequence widely known in English as Tai Chi.

Wang Yangming (1472–1529) The Ming Confucian who challenged Zhu Xi’s understanding of self-cultivation and established the neo-Confucian School of Mind.

wuwei “Not-doing” as a way of being in the world: a state not of “doing nothing” but of acting without inten- tion or self-interest; an ideal for both Daoists and Confucians, though most prominently associated with the for mer.

wuxing Five agents, elements, or phases. See also f v e p h a s e s and yin-yang .

xin The single English transliteration used for two different Chinese char- acters: the f rst is translated through- out this chapter as “heart-mind” when discussing Daoism and Confucianism and is associated with both the think- ing and feeling capacities; the same character also refers to Mind or Con- sciousness in Buddhism. The second character means trustworthiness, a quality valued by Daoists and Confu- cians alike.

Xunzi (c. 310 –219 BCE ) The third most important classical Confucian thinker; he believed that human nature is evil and that conscious effort is required to develop goodness. yi A moral sense of what is right, what is required and appropriate for a situ- ation; most often used in conjunction with ren.

yinguo Cause and effect or karma.

yin-yang wuxing “Yin” and “yang” orig- inally referred to the shady and sunny sides of a mountain, but in time they came to be associated with female and male qualities and, more broadly, complementary forces in the universe.

Wu xing can be trans- lated as “element,” “agent,” “force,” or “phase.” Together, these terms specify the dynamic nature of the universe—a concept integral to the Naturalist school of thought, which was popular during the Han dynasty.

Zhang Daoling According to tradition, he established the oldest surviving Daoist school, the Way of the Celestial Masters, after Laozi appeared to him in a vision in 142 CE.

Zhuangzi (369?–286?) The second most important early Daoist thinker, after Laozi; also the title of the book attributed to him.

Zhu Xi (1130 –1200) The most import- ant member of the neo-Confucian School of Principle. He synthesized early Song Confucian writings, focused on book learning, and sought to f nd the principle/pattern common to Nature.

ziran Spontaneity or “self-so-ness.” Further Reading Bell, Daniel A., and Chaibong Hahm, eds. 2003. Confucianism for the Modern World . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Draws from Chinese, Korean, and Japanese texts and histories to argue that Confucianism is relevant to our world.

Buswell, Robert E., ed. 2007. Religions of Korea in Practice .

Prince ton: Princeton University Press. Presents prima- r y-source selections regarding ordinar y devotional beliefs and practices as well as critical analysis; also includes a helpful intro- ductor y essay by Don Baker.

Elman, Benjamin A., ed. 2002. Rethinking Confucianism: Past and Present in China, Japan, Korea, and Vietnam . Los Ange- les: UCLA Asian Pacif c Monograph Series. Explores issues of gender and national variations, and asks who represents Confucianism.

Kirkland, Russell. 2004. Taoism: The Enduring Tradition . Lon- don: Routledge. An introductor y text by an author who believes Daoism has been misrepresented and seeks to offer a new perspective.

Kohn, Livia, ed. 1993. The Taoist Experience: An Anthology .

Albany: SUNY Press. Primar y sources (with brief notes) for a range of philosophical, liturgical, and alchemical texts, mostly from medieval Daoism.

Lopez, Donald S., ed. 1996. Religions of China in Practice . Prince- ton: Princeton University Press. Includes essays on the religious 900855_10_ch10.indd 541 16/12/14 7:03 PM 542 A Concise Introduction to World Religions practices of ethnic minorities such as the Manchus and Yi; Ste- phen Teiser’s introductor y essay provides a helpful overview.

Miller, James. 2003. Daoism: A Short Introduction. Oxford: Oneworld. Covers the historical development, political involvement, and physi- cal practices of Daoism as well as its understanding of nature.

Rainey, Lee Dian. 2010. Confucius and Confucianism: The Essen- tials . London: Wiley-Blackwell. A delightfully accessible intro- duction to the origins and development of Confucianism, with an account of its contemporary relevance.

Robinet, Isabelle. 1993. Taoist Meditation: The Mao-Shan Tra- dition of Great Purity . Julian F. Pas and Norman J. Giradot, trans. Albany: SUNY Press. A detailed study of the Shangqing (Highest Clarity) tradition.

Wu, Ch’eng-en. 1970 [1943]. Monkey . Arthur Waley, trans. New York: Grove Press. A f ctional look at popular religious beliefs and practices in medieval China.

Yao, Xinzhong. 2000. An Introduction to Confucianism . Cam- bridge: Cambridge University Press. Focuses on China; Korea and Japan are dealt with ver y brief y.

Yu, Anthony. 2005. State and Religion in China . Chicago and La Salle, IL: Open Court. Argues persuasively that religions in China have always been closely involved with worldly politics. Recommended Websites w w w.orientalarchitecture.com Asian Historical Architecture offers photographs of numerous reli- gious sites in China, Korea, and other countries in Asia, with brief historical notes and descriptions of how the buildings are used.

w w w.clickkorea.org/ A general-interest site, sponsored by the Korea Foundation; to access essays on Korean religions, select the main categor y “Thought & Religion” and then choose from six subcategories.

w w w.stanford.edu/~pregadio/index.html “The Golden Elixir: Taoism and Chinese Alchemy” is hosted by Fabrizio Pregadio of Stanford University, who gives a concise intro- duction to Daoism and includes an impressive list of sources on alchemical beliefs and practices in Daoism.

eng.taoism.org.hk The Taoist Culture and Information Centre offers an insider’s view of Daoism’s histor y and place in the world today. The site is sponsored by a Daoist temple in Hong Kong and maintained with the help of scholars from North America, Europe, and China.

w w w.chinakongzi.org The Chinese-language site of the China Confucius Foundation ( CCF ). Established in 1984, the CCF is dedicated to promoting the teachings of Confucius. w w w.ica.org.cn The mandate of the International Confucian Association is to advance the study of Confucianism in order to promote peace and prosperity around the world. Its site is also available in Chinese.

english.hanban.org/node_10971.htm The English-language site of the Confucius Institute/Classroom offers information on teaching materials, tests, teachers, and scholarships.

college.chinese.cn/en The Confucius Institute Online; the contents of this site are available in many languages, including Chinese, French, German, Russian, Korean, Spanish, Japanese, and Arabic.

w w w.fgs.org.tw/english/index.html Foguangshan (Buddha’s Light Mountain) is an ecumenical group that favours Pure Land teachings; it is based in Gaoxiong in south- er n Ta iwa n.

w w w.dharmadrum.org/ Fagushan (Dharma Drum Mountain) is a Chan group headquartered in New Taipei City in Taiwan.

tw.tzuchi.org/en/ Tzu Chi (Compassionate Relief), also transliterated as Cizi, is a Taiwan- ese group, led by the nun Zhengyan, involved primarily in healthcare. References al-Faruqi, I., and D.E. Sopher, eds. 1974. Historical Atlas of the Reli- gions of the World . New York: Macmillan.

Bell, Daniel A., and Chaibong Hahm, eds. 2003. Confucianism for the Mod e r n World . Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Chen, Kenneth. 1964. Buddhism in China. A Historical Survey . Prince- ton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press.

Ch’oe, Yongcho, Peter Lee, and W. Theodore de Bary, eds. 2000. Sources of Korean Tradition. Vol. II. New York: Columbia University Press. Clear y, Thomas. 1989. Immortal Sisters: Secret Teachings of Taoist Wom e n . Berkeley: North Atlantic Books.

de Bar y, Theodore, ed. 1972. The Buddhist Tradition in India, China and Japan . New York: Vintage Books. , and Irene Bloom, comp. 1999. Sources of Chinese Tradition, 2nd edn. Vol. 1. New York: Columbia University Press.

, and Richard Lufrano, comp. 2000. Sources of Chinese Tra- dition , 2nd edn. Vol. 2. New York: Columbia University Press. 900855_10_ch10.indd 542 16/12/14 7:03 PM 543 Chinese and Korean Traditions | Woo Note 1. Some scholars prefer 552, based on scientif c dating of an eclipse mentioned in the records of the time.

Fung, Yu-lan. 1934/1953. A History of Chinese Philosophy . Vol. 2. Derk Bodde, trans. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

Inagaki, Hisao, trans. 1994. The Three Pure Land Sutras . Kyoto:

Nagata Bunshodo.

Jochim, Christian. 1986. Chinese Religions: A Cultural Perspective .

Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.

Kirkland, Russell. 2004. Taoism: The Enduring Tradition . New York and London: Routledge.

Lau, D.C., trans. 1970. Mencius . Middlesex and New York: Penguin. , trans. 1963. L a o Tz u: Tao Te Ching . Middlesex and New York: Penguin.

Lee, Ki-Baik. 1985. A New History of Korea . Edward Wagner, trans.

Cambridge, M A: Harvard University Press.

Lewis, Mark Edward. 2009. China Between Empires. The Northern and Southern Dynasties . Cambridge, M A, and London: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.

Little, Reg. 1995. “Confucius in Beijing: The Conference of the Interna- tional Confucian Foundation.” Culture Mandala: The Bulletin of the Centre for East-West Cultural and Economic Studies. Vol. 1, issue 2, arti- cle 4. Available at http://epublications.bond.edu.au/cm/vol1/iss2/4.

Lee, Peter H., et al., eds. 1993. Sourcebook of Korean Civilization . Vol.

I. New York: Columbia University Press.

Owen, Stephen, ed. and trans. 1996. An Anthology of Chinese Litera- ture . New York, London: W.W. Norton. Pregadio, Fabrizio. 2006. Great Clarity: Daoism and Alchemy in Medi- eval C hina . Stanford: Stanford University Press.

Price, A. F. and Wong Mou-lam. 1990 (1969). The Diamond Sutra & The Sutra of Hui-neng . Boston: Shambhala.

Raphals, Lisa. 1998. Sharing the Light: Representations of Women and Virtue in Early China . Albany: SUNY Press.

Reps, Paul, comp. 1989 (1960). Zen Flesh, Zen Bones: A Collection of Zen and Pre-Zen Writings . New York, London, Toronto, Sydney, Auckland: Anchor Books, Doubleday.

Roetz, Heiner. 2008. “Confucianism between Tradition and Moder- nity, Religion, and Secularization: Questions to Tu Weiming.” Dao 7: 367-380.

Roth, Harold D. 1999. Original Tao: Inward Training and the Founda- tions of Taoist Mysticism . New York: Columbia University Press.

Sommer, Deborah, ed. 1995. Chinese Religion: An Antholog y of Sources .

New York, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Watson, Burton, trans. 2001. The Essential Lotus: Selections from the L ot u s S utra . New York: Columbia University Press. . 1997. The Vimalakirti Sutra . New York: Columbia University Press.

. 1968. The Complete Works of Chuang Tzu . New York: Colum- bia University Press.

. 1963. Xunzi: Basic Writings. New York: Columbia University Press. 900855_10_ch10.indd 543 16/12/14 7:03 PM