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Rethinking the Precept of Not Taking Money in Contemporary Taiwanese and Mainland Chinese Buddhist Nunneries
Around two and half millennia ago, the order of nuns was established when the Buddha allowed women to join the Buddhist monastic community. Buddhist nuns play prominent and respected roles in the Therīgāthā (Verses of the Elder Nuns) from ancient India. The historical work the Biqiuni zhuan 比丘尼傳 (Biographies of Nuns) reports how Buddhist nuns influenced and contributed to Chinese Buddhism in the medieval era. In recent decades, there has been a strong revival of Chinese Buddhism, amid which Buddhist nuns have exerted an ever-growing impact on the monastic environment, and their opinions have gradually become very influential, particularly in Taiwan. Indeed, as aptly put by Chün-fang Yü (Light 1), “Taiwanese nuns today are highly educated and greatly outnumber monks, characteristics unprecedented in the history of Chinese Buddhism.” In Mainland China, some prominent nuns (e.g., Shi Longlian) have held posts in the official organization of Chinese Buddhism or made significant contributions to Buddhist education and Dharma teaching. However, contemporary Mainland Chinese nuns’ religious life has scarcely been explored or discussed. This study aims to rectify this imbalance by examining a central ethical issue of monastic daily life to which scant scholarly attention has hitherto been paid.
Chan Buddhism During the Times of Venerable Master Yixuan and Venerable Master Hsing Yun: Applying Chinese Chan Principles to Contemporary Society
Linji Venerable Master Yixuan 臨濟義玄 (d. 866) and Fo Guang Venerable Master Hsing Yun 佛光星雲 (1927–), although separated by more than a millennium, innovatively applied Chan teachings to the societies in which they lived to help their devotees discover their humanity and transcend their existential conditions. Both religious leaders not only survived persecution, but brought their faiths to greater heights. This paper studies how these masters adapted Chan Buddhist teachings to the woes and conditions of their times. In particular, I shall review how Venerable Master Yixuan and Venerable Master Hsing Yun adapted the teachings of their predecessors, added value to the sociopolitical milieu of their times, and used familiar language to reconcile reality and their beliefs.
Human Condition: Earthly and Cosmic
When Mahāyāna Meets Theravāda: Humanistic Buddhism’s Challenges and Opportunities in Myanmar
From the early Buddhist era to the present day, antagonism between the Mahāyāna and Theravāda schools has existed, and will not be easy to resolve. In the past few decades, however, an increasing number of religious activities and cultural-exchange events have involved union between practitioners of Mahāyāna and Theravāda Buddhism, to the point that one can cautiously hail a breakthrough in cross-traditional understanding and communication. Against this backdrop, my paper has aimed to paint a broad-brush picture of Humanistic Buddhism’s challenges and potential opportunities in Myanmar, based on my latest fieldwork data as well as the relevant prior literature.
Causes and Consequences
“Welcome to a second series of monthly talks about Buddhism in terms of our lived experiences. It has been nearly a year since the first of these were given. Looking back, I realize that our world is still struggling with the pandemic and a number of troubling issues long after we hoped all would be under control. My concern in this talk is to present some of the Buddhist ideas of ‘cause’ in a fashion that gives relevance to the issues that are besetting us. Our world is dealing with debates that concern ‘disinformation.’ From left and right come claims and counterclaims. What do Buddhists have to say that can give us some guidance in such a situation? Can we determine what ‘cause’ is in terms of information available to us?”
On Reincarnation and Emptiness
The importance of the idea of reincarnation was brought to me one afternoon in a small Sherpa village in Nepal near Mt. Everest. The village had a small Buddhist temple and it contained Tibetan texts that interested me. When I asked if I could look at the texts that were housed in the shrine room, the guardian of the temple said they were being kept for the Lama and were not available to others. I asked if I could meet the Lama, expecting to hear that he was on a trip and away. Instead, the person said, “You can. He is just over there in that house” and he pointed to it nearby. I walked over and was greeted by a woman holding a young child. They were both very beautiful and their resemblance noticeable. As you may guess, the child in her arms was the Lama. She explained, looking at the boy with a mix of pride, reverence, and sadness: “This Lama has come to me and I must care for him until he is ready to be trained again.” She was aware that by the time he was five or six, he would be taken from her to live his life as a Lama.
Bodhisattva in the Perfection of Wisdom Buddhist Texts
When we talk about the Prajnaparamita, we sometimes get deep into it. To begin, I have always been interested in the fact that before Sakyamuni became the Buddha and gained his enlightenment, he went to other teachers. We don’t often think about what his teachers have taught him. For example, Alara Kalama taught him a meditation where he could experience infinite space and be conscious of infinite space. After being taught about how to meditate in this way and having experienced infinite space, the Buddha thought it was interesting but it wasn’t good enough. He still hasn’t had the release and hasn’t reached moksha. So, he continued to study with other teachers. Uddaka taught him to go deeper into his mind and reach a mental state which is neither perception nor the lack of perception. A very deep and special state. But, once again, it wasn’t sufficient. Why wasn’t it sufficient? What was lacking? Why did he keep pursuing another path? What was the path he pursued? And, what was the difference between what he finally reached and what his great teachers had taught him? I looked into the Eight Thousand-Line Perfection of Wisdom Sutra having these questions in mind. When we look into this sutra, it is interesting to see that when the Buddha had gathered his audience, all of them were arhats. There was not a bodhisattva in sight. Where were all these bodhisattvas then? What we later on defined as a bodhisattva is what the Prajnaparamita Sutras taught for the first time. The Prajnaparamita created the bodhisattvas. In other words, at the time when he started teaching, this was the first Prajnaparamita Sutra. When the Buddha first taught it, there were no bodhisattvas of the type that we later see. Later in the sutra the bodhisattvas appeared. It was a sequential thing. In the beginning, it tells us that everybody was an arhat.
Humanistic Buddhism: Holding True to the Original Intents of Buddha-Chapter Two: The Humanistic Lifestyle of Buddha
The Buddha lived an extraordinary life. Growing up as the gifted Prince Siddhartha, he mastered the Five Sciences and Four Vedas at a young age. Life inside the palace meant he could have all he desired, including the power to reign over his kingdom. Despite this, he instead drew his attention to the forces of impermanence experienced in life and society such as the significant issues of suffering caused by birth, old age, sickness, and death; discrimination of the caste system; the oppression of power; wealth disparity; and the weak preyed upon by the strong. All these signs of inequality amongst living beings left him perturbed and perplexed.
Humanistic Buddhism: Holding True to the Original Intents of Buddha-Chapter Three: The Core Concepts of Humanistic Buddhism
When the Buddha taught, he constantly acknowledged the different aptitudes of his disciples and amended his approach. Yet, he always taught according to the same set of core concepts. For example, the teachings of suffering, emptiness, impermanence, and selflessness are commonly recognized as the earliest Buddhist teachings. In later periods, Buddhists were encouraged to practice the Six Paramitas, aspire for the Four Immeasurable States of Mind, and realize the Four Universal Vows.
Humanistic Buddhism: Holding True to the Original Intents of Buddha Foreword
“What is your faith?” A asks B. “Humanistic Buddhism.” Answers B. “If your faith is Buddhism, then it’s just Buddhism. Why add ‘Humanistic’?” Asks A again. “Because the founder of Buddhism, Sakyamuni Buddha, was not a god but simply a human being. The uniqueness of Buddhism is that it was founded by a human being, that is why it is called Humanistic Buddhism.”
