Longquan Temple: Modern-styled Chinese Buddhism
On the outskirts of Beijing’s Haidian District lies Fenghuang Mountain, a mountain endowed with lovely panoramas. In 2004, I visited a small Liao Dynasty temple, Longquan Temple, located along the ridge’s central scenic route. Like many temples no longer frequented by believers burning incense in veneration, the main gate was dilapidated.
I returned to the temple again in 2014, and the main entrance – a low, narrow gate – was still there. Inside were the ancient Liao era stone bridge and the old main hall where nothing appeared to have altered.
But opposite the bridge was a thousand-year gingko and two “cartoon monks” made of cardboard hung from the tree on a swing. At their side was a sign upon which was written “Xian Er.” On the ground stood a figure of Xian Er holding a tome entitled All Troubles are Self-inflicted. This is a new book published by the temple’s animation group.
Two monks, holding sutras in their hands, are walking through the reception room of the Mingxin Building. The bead curtain hanging at the door chances to record their figures in silhouette
If one does not enter the wooded area where the office and living quarters are cloistered, the visitor still sees an ancient, low-built, small temple. But these cartoon figures of “Xian Er” convey a huge change: a sudden explosion of creativity by an ancient religion; a modern, fashionable ambience present in a Liao Dynasty temple and the unique lifestyle of a team of new-generation monks putting into action a brand new approach to promoting Buddhism and benefiting mankind.
Temple with a Geographical Advantage
This time, when I came to conduct interviews at the Longquan Temple, my deepest impression was that secular society’s understanding of Buddhism and this temple is largely at odds with reality. In fact, many people are living with a considerable number of illusions and misunderstandings about Buddhism.
When the master shows the lay Buddhists how to use a Buddhist instrument on the platform, one lay Buddhist spares his time from listening and records the lecture with his smart phone.
I completed the registration formalities for accommodation according to the monastery’s requirements and participated in a five-section class and the group activities each day. Upon arrival, Wen Jinhua, the Culture Department’s volunteer, handed me an activity schedule. This complex schedule divided the day into seven “periods”: Morning Lesson, Vegetarian Breakfast, Vegetarian Lunch, Worship and Confession, and Evening Lesson. Besides this five-section class, there are two more sessions for work, and other times are used for cleaning and various tasks. We rose at exactly 3:55 in the morning and turned the lights out for sleep at 9:30 at night – these rules are unwavering.
Wen Jinhua heads the editing team in the Culture Department and is in charge of publishing the monastery’s cultural products, including hard copies of Ven. Master Xuecheng’s blog and microblog posts. Wen Jinhua appears to be a very plain and quiet person but, as she tells it, she has changed greatly: she used to dye her hair and wear bizarre clothing. When she made up her mind to study Buddhism, a lot of people said the gap was too great and she would not be able to endure it.
But as her daughter grew older, Wen Jinhua frequently came up the mountain to help out and eventually became a resident volunteer. “Volunteer” is not a Buddhist term. The formal title is “Lay Buddhist of the Temple” but since the meaning of volunteer is easy for the common people to comprehend, the temple has gladly accepted it.
Many would be surprised by the fact that the access control system of the temple has adopted the fingerprint recognition system. From this, people realize that many changes have taken place in this ancient temple that was previously considered secluded and outdated.
When the temple once again became the site of religious practice, some monks initially felt that this was indeed a fine, tranquil place to cultivate their Buddhist faith. But Ven. Master Xuecheng’s vision did not stop there. He wanted to establish a large-scale site where Buddhist rites were administered and any monk and lay Buddhist could practice the Dharma. He believes that at present Chinese Buddhism is badly lacking in talent, and running such a monastery must not be limited to releasing a handful of monks from the sufferings of the material world. It must cultivate monks who can take care of the world and bring salvation to others
The Longquan Temple, located on Fenghuang Mountain in the northern part of the Taihang Mountains, overlooks the North China Plain, and is just half an hour drive from Beijing. Thanks to its location, this is a site where one can exit the material world to practice Buddhism in tranquility, yet easily return to the world to work for the salvation of others. Ordinarily, it constitutes a site for spiritual cleansing that exists independently of our mundane existence and it also offers convenient access on weekends to those engaged in the art of Buddhist cultivation. Historically speaking, from the Liao through the Ming and Qing dynasties, the region that lies between Fenghuang Mountain and the Western Hills has traditionally hosted many temple complexes and the Buddhist ambience there is especially strong.
At the same time, the fact that Longquan Temple possesses groups of highly qualified monks and lay devotees, and has established numerous departments such as editing, creative, animation, web site development, translation center, education, charity and engineering, is closely related to its location near Beijing. The monastic community has re-established the temple complex and carries on the Buddhist tradition; the temple’s monks educate lay Buddhist practitioners and the lay men and women spur interest in Buddhism in those around them, and they use the proximity of the capital’s location to intrigue and increase interest among devotees in other places.
Master Xianqi, who obtained his doctorate from Tsinghua University, is proofreading Buddhist texts on a computer. With the advent of a knowledge-based and specialized age, a group of highly educated elites has dedicated themselves to the noble cause of Buddhism.
These efforts engender a “butterfly effect” of sorts, and they are altering Beijing’s collective karma, bit by bit, by effecting subtle but concrete changes in the city. This system established by the monastic and lay communities is transforming Longquan Temple into Beijing’s new center of Buddhism, one that is radiating outwards nationwide and even globally.
Before I visited Longquan Temple to research this article, I took part in a Buddhist Study Group activity in Beijing that was organized by lay Buddhist practitioners. This small Study Group is part of the system of lay Buddhist practice promoted by the Longquan Temple. Their textbook is The Great Treatise on the Stages of the Path to Enlightenment, penned by the Grand Master Tsongkhapa, founder of Tibetan Buddhism’s Gelugpa, or Yellow Hat sect. This work is known as a condensed “outline” of the Buddhism.
This left me feeling a bit surprised. I asked the course instructor: To which sect does Longquan Temple actually belong?
“According to Master Xianshuang, this is the Decline Age of Buddhism,” answered the instructor. “Everyone’s root in Buddhism is rather shallow. It is as if we were only at primary or middle school level, so now is not the time to offer instruction in separate subjects. We should not distinguish between different schools of Buddhism. We are studying Mahayana Buddhism.”
Master Xianshuang is responsible for educating the lay community at Longquan Temple. When I saw him, I asked him about this issue again. “Buddhism is now in a state of relative decline in China,” he answered. “We should no longer engage in sectarian debate. Longquan Temple has indeed overcome such divisions.”
The reasons for choosing The Great Treatise on the Stages of the Path to Enlightenment as the textbook is because it is highly logical, emphasizes the unity of theory and practice, and is compatible with contemporary ways of thinking. The sequence of cultivation is clear, so the practitioner’s level can be enhanced step by step, and it stresses following a master. Nowadays, many novices believe that it is enough simply to go and pray to Buddha in a temple and read the scriptures at home. But if one has no teacher or group with which to share their studies, it is easy to go astray.
At 9 pm, when it is close to bedtime, a monk is still bowing repentances in the sweltering meditation room and his robe is soon damp with sweat. This seemingly ascetic lifestyle endows these monks with inner calmness and peace.
Nowadays, every weekend the tranquil monastery bustles with activity as lay followers from the entire country arrive early in the morning for study. Courses are held for Study Group leaders, for instructors who teach “new-generation Buddhist missionaries,” and for those preparing to serve as instructors. Everyone has donned the same deep-brown “hai qing” (a loose-fitting, long-sleeved outer robe), and is seated neatly in the prayer hall, listening to the master preaching, or reciting the Buddha’s name, chanting the Heart Sutra or The Great Compassion Mantra.
According to Buddhism, mankind has 84,000 sorts of anxieties, and the Buddhism has 84,000 methods to “cure” them. Recently, Master Xianshuang has presented the lay community with an approach entitled “worship and confession,” in other words, to pray to Buddha and repent for one’s sin in order to exterminate the sin before it “sprouts” or “bears fruit.” Thanks to “worship and confession,” many students indicate that their souls have undergone a major movement in a positive direction.
Photo provided by Longquan Temple
A Monastery Connecting the Masses
On Children’s Day (June 1, 2013), an event occurred at Longquan Temple that caught a lot of people by surprise: The Children’s Day “Animation Festival” premiered the first-ever cartoon starring the dough figurines in the temple. Made with flour, the figurines are a traditional art form unique to Chinese culture. Inspired by the art, the masters and volunteers at the temple created the dough figurine-based cartoon, “The Life of Master Xian Er --When a Young Monk Meets a Robber.”
Master Xianshu is one of the creators of the Xian Er character, and there are many tales about him circulating among the temple volunteers. He became a monk five years ago, but before that time he was a famous writer on the web, and participated in other media such as TV, and even set up his own company.
When I met Master Xianshu, I mentioned his earlier work experience. But he seemed uninterested, and he was more eager to speak about how Buddhism changed his life. “Buddhism is not theory. It is a method for overcoming life’s misery. Each person’s life has its own trajectory –marriage, raising children, and holding down a job that may not be satisfying but is necessary. A person knows that this dry, boring life may be problematic, and one will have to face illness and death. One will be confused: Is this all there is to life? But he is unable to unburden himself of this existence. ”
In this master’s eyes, our earlier conception of Buddhist was negative, but this is an illusion, a misunderstanding. In fact, a genuine Buddhist’s heart is full of creative impulses, and he can utilize the Buddha Dharma to free himself from suffering.
In the animated cartoon, Xian Er sets up a recruitment stall to recruit monks in front of the temple. At first, there is a crowd of candidates, but when they hear they must eat vegetarian food, remain celibate, and that “a day without labor means a day without food,” they all flee, résumés in hand. But such are the rules the temple lays down for its monks, based on Buddhist precepts.
Says Xian Er’s master: “The true man who is determined to transcend the material world and liberate himself, and is also determined to return to the material world for the salvation of others – only he can enter the monkhood!” These resounding words are both a superior summary of a monk’s essence, and a huge shock for the secular misperceptions.
Actually, long before promoting Buddhism via animation, Longquan Temple had been spreading the word via the web, and having great influence. The temple’s Ven. Master Xuecheng was the first monk on the Chinese mainland to launch a blog. At first, he simply posted some of his essays but later his disciples uploaded bits and pieces of insight gained in their practices. They gathered them together into collections, and eventually published more than one hundred books based on blog content.
Since 2006, the temple has launched a succession of blogs, micro-blogs in nine languages, traditional Chinese culture web sites in Chinese, English, Japanese and Korean, and online Buddhism study institutes, thereby becoming a window through which overseas believers can become familiar with Chinese Buddhism and traditional culture.
Some people might not understand why a Buddhist temple promotes the faith with such fanfare via the Internet and cartoons. In this regard, Ven. Master Xuecheng has an unusual viewpoint: “Buddhist culture is rooted in society, so we need to look at the development of Buddhist culture from the perspective and needs of all of society, even globally. That is to say, how its development can best coincide with the dependent origination of the times and benefit humankind, rather than seeing things from Buddhism’s own standpoint. That would be equivalent to developing Buddhism simply for Buddhism’s sake.”
Sitting upright, maintaining good manners, holding an alms bowl and eating without noise is the way monks have their lunch. Although no meat or fish is allowed, condiments such as chili sauce, vinegar and soybean sauce are used to flavor meals.
Buddhism stresses transmission, and transmission requires dissemination via modern methods – something that modern people love to see and hear. In the process of dissemination, innovation and creativity are called for. All sorts of brand-new concepts, ideas and forms can be absorbed by Buddhism.
To commemorate the fifth anniversary of the restoration of religious activities at Longquan Temple, Master Xianshu filmed a documentary, The Five-year Road to Bodhi. He interviewed many monks of earlier times, including many doctorate holders and university professors. For this reason, it came to be known as the “Buddhist temple with the strongest scientific research capability.” All of these highly talented “monks” in the temple were inspired to join by Ven. Master Xuecheng. In fact, he himself holds an M.A. from the Buddhist Academy of China, and also received an honorary doctorate in education from Thailand’s Buddhist Chulalongkorn University.
It is because of this group of highly talented “monks” that the ancient temple has continuously been able to absorb the latest modern technology. Both in terms of its ability to grasp the dependent origination of the times and as a leader in contemporary development, Longquan Temple has grasped the pulse of our times, and has gradually developed into the capital’s new center of Buddhism.
A Temple with Global Vision
My experience of monastic life was actually rather challenging. We lived in a dormitory with no private toilet stalls. The shared washroom area only permits eight people to shower at once, and it is not open every day. The large dining hall feeds several hundreds at a time. There is no meat, and seasonings like garlic and spring onions are off limits, so there is no way to cook food that people living in the world outside would consider tasty. And everyone must often leave the temple complex to labor.
Monks and volunteers at the temple are not salaried, but they do not pay for food, lodging, items used in rites such as candles and incense, or for their instruction. After I had been in the temple for a few days, I often forgot where I had put my wallet. Establishing this sort of discipline and daily routine is also a part of educating the monks and lay devotees. In the dormitory to which I was assigned, there were eight bunk beds, but only four were occupied. Myself aside, there was the mother of one of the temple masters, and an overseas Chinese mother and her daughter who had come from Italy. The pair, who appeared quite unaffected, were natives of Wenzhou in Zhejiang Province. The mother was surnamed Yang.
The mother and daughter looked quite ordinary, but in fact they had hosted several Europe-bound Buddhist delegations from the temple in the past. The mother lives in Italy’s Prado where there are many Wenzhou natives. They have a self-established Buddhist Study Group for believers and they have dubbed it “The Lay Person’s Wooded Retreat.”
In the kitchen, volunteers are busy helping prepare alms meals. In recent years, the Longquan Temple has gained more and more attention, along with growing number of Buddhist followers coming to take part in alms meals. Today, as more believers frequent the temple, its various undertakings have flourished.
One year when they learned that a multi-religious delegation would be coming from China, they went to greet it. It happened that the Buddhist delegate was Ven. Master Xuecheng. The next day he discovered that only two of the members of the Prado-based Study Group had undergone formal Buddhist conversion rites, so he conducted the rites for them. Later, this tiny Italian Buddhist Study Group established a branch of this temple outside Beijing. But Yang and her daughter were not satisfied with their studies in Italy, so they came all the way to the capital of their home country to study at Longquan Temple.
When Master Xianshuang discussed the topic of spreading the faith abroad, he said that one important factor that motivates temple residents is the lack of faith among overseas Chinese. This makes it very difficult for them to integrate into mainstream society where they live. Their progress encounters bottlenecks; they suffer from depression and social problems that cannot easily be resolved. Frequent overseas trips undertaken by the temple’s representatives indeed suggest a “manna” much yearned for by overseas Chinese.
Of course, when propagating the Dharma abroad, those of overseas Chinese are not the sole targets; transmitting it to every race and nationality is the masters’ ideal. In order to offer guidance to those neophytes with an affinity for Buddhism, the temple has opened micro-blogs and hosts religious gatherings in various languages.
One day I meet a Canadian in the temple corridor. His Chinese name is Lin Wenfeng, and he is a volunteer in the temple’s Translation Department who handles French and English translation. He sported a thick beard and was holding a string of prayer beads in his hand. He adores the temple. He likes the lush vegetation and fresh air, and the relaxed ambience among people in the temple. He says the masters and lay people here all smile, and this makes him feel good.
Temple residents all practice a method of: “Observe the merits of others, and always remember their acts of kindness.” This signifies noting the good points of others, especially those of people whom one does not necessarily like. This method ensures that conflicts do not easily arise, and that one is not easily troubled by others’ missteps. This explains the reason why Lin Wenfeng can notice the smiles from people’s heart in here.
Lin Wenfeng also learned about the concept of environmental protection here, because the masters tell him that trees, flowers and animals should all be protected; human beings should not hurt them through carelessness. I assume he is referring to the precept that “all sentient beings are equal.”
Another foreigner who has come to the temple is named Han. When he arrived, he was not a Buddhist. His impressions are that the temple buildings are very beautiful, the chanting during the morning and evening lessons are very pleasant to hear, the volunteers are enthusiastic, and the temple complex orderly. But, in his opinion, when the monks attend class, barring female lay devotees from entering is not a good thing.
However, this is a misperception. During each of the five sections in the day, female lay devotees attend lessons separately, and male lay devotees are also not permitted in the area where resident monks are attending class. At other times, men and women are allowed to enter the main hall and seat themselves on the east or west side, according to gender. This is an ancient tradition; it seems that misunderstandings abound.
A lay Buddhist from Zhejiang Province, an inheritor of ancient Chinese methods of paper-making and block printing, decided to donate Buddhist canons printed using this ancient technique. To mark this donation, the temple held a special ceremony. During the ceremony, the young masters filed into the main hall, and several hundred lay Buddhists who attend classes at the temple were seated on either side of the hall. When the young masters strode confidently into the hall, they exuded a very appropriate sense of dignity. From that image, we can see that there is hope for the future of Buddhism.
Speaking of the impression the public has of Buddhism as out of step with modern society, Master Xianshu said: “In the past, people saw that worshipers of Buddha were all old, so they became prejudiced, imagining that Buddhism is about old people who eat vegetarian and recite Buddhist verse. But Buddhism is an infinite wisdom. As Buddhists, reversing this sort of impression is our responsibility.”
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