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Buddhism and the Chinese Tradition

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 July 2024

William Th. de Bary
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Extract

Probably the most momentous experience in the contacts and mergings among civilizations in the Far East—one shared by China, Japan and Korea—is the introduction of Buddhism from India. This is, of course, a subject on which much has already been written, and even when narrowed to China alone its complexities do not lend themselves readily to summary treatment. Ideally one should have a clear conception of what “Chinese Buddhism” and the “Chinese tradition” represent before proceeding to discuss their interrelations. The most that we can hope for here is that by examining specific points of contact or friction batween Buddhism and the more articulate spokesmen of Chinese tradition some reciprocal identification may emerge.

Type
Research Article
Information
Diogenes , Volume 12 , Issue 47 , September 1964 , pp. 102 - 124
Copyright
Copyright © 1964 Fédération Internationale des Sociétés de Philosophie / International Federation of Philosophical Societies (FISP)

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References

1 Japanese National Commission for UNESCO, Tokyo 1960.

2 1) perception of the concrete; 2) non-development of abstract thought; 3) emphasis on the particular; 4) conservatism expressed in exaltation of antiquity; 5) fondness for complex multiplicity expressed in concrete form; 6) formal conformity; 7) tendency toward practicality; 8) individualism; 9) esteem for hierarchy; 10) esteem for nature; 11) reconciling and harmonizing tendencies.

3 Cf. Fung Yu-lan, A History of Chinese Philosophy, Vol. 1, Princeton 1952, p. 130; E. R. Hughes, The Great Learning and the Mean in Action, New York 1943, pp. 126 ff.; Thomas Berry, "The Spiritual Form of Asian Civilizations" in de Bary and Embree (ed.) Approaches to Asian Civilizations, New York 1963.

4 Cf. E. J. Thomas, Early Buddhist Scriptures, London 1935, pp. 30-31.

5 Liu-tu chi ching 7 in Taisho daizokyo, III, 39ab, from manuscript translation by Arthur E. Link.

6 Tsukamoto, op. cit., p. 201.

7 Nakamura, op. cit., p. 186.

8 Heinrich Dumoulin, S. J., A History of Zen Buddhism, New York 1963, pp. 94-96.

9 Ibid., p. 104.

10 "A Reappraisal of Neo-Confucianism" in A. Wright (ed.), Studies in Chinese Thought, Chicago 1953, pp. 81-111; "Some Common Tendencies in Neo-Confucianism," in A. Wright and D. Nivison (ed.), Confucianism in Action, Stanford 1958, pp. 25-49.

11 Cf. Galen E. Sargent, "Tchou Hi contre le Bouddhisme" in Mélanges publiés par l'Institut des Hautes Etudes Chinoises, I (1957), pp. 42-43.

12 Cf. A. C. Graham, Two Chinese Philosophers, London 1958, pp. 84, 88.

13 Ibid., p. 85.

14 See note 9.

15 Lin-chi Hui-chao ch'an-shih yü-lu, in Taisho daizokyo, XLVII, 498a, from manuscript translation of Philip Yampolsky.

16 Dumoulin, op. cit., p. 12.

17 Cf. Leon Hurvitz, Chih I, Columbia Ph. D. Dissertation 1959, pp. 366-367.

18 Taisho daizokyo, XXXVII, p. 273a.

19 Nakamura, op. cit., p. 248.

20 Cf. W. T. de Bary, W. T. Ch'an and B. Watson (ed.), Sources of Chinese Tradition, New York 1960, p. 533.

21 Cf. Hsiang-shan hsien-shen ch'üan-chi (SPTK), 2/2ab Letter to Wang Shun-po, translation adapted from Siu-chi Huang, Lu Hsiang-shan, New Haven 1944, p. 154, and Fung Yu-lan, A History of Chinese Philosophy, Princeton 1953, Vol. II, p. 578.

22 See G. E. Sargent, op. cit., p. 11 ff.

23 See W. T. Ch'an, "How Buddhistic is Wang Yang-ming?" in Philosophy East and West, XII, No. 3 (October 1962), pp. 205, 212-213.

24 See p. 107, note 1.

25 Lin-chi Hui-chao ch'an-shih yu-lu, in Taisho daizokyo, XLVII, 498c. From manuscript translation by Philip Yampolsky.

26 Cf. de Bary, Ch'an and Watson, op. cit., pp. 530-531, 556-557, 559.

27 Cf. A. Wright, Buddhism in Chinese History, Stanford, 1959, p. 93.

28 Cf. Edward Conze, Buddhist Texts through the Ages, London 1954, p. 131.

29 My colleague, Mr. Pei-yi Wu, points out a similar thought in Mo Tzu, "Universal Love" Part III, where however the verbal parallelism is not quite so close: "I have heard that to be an enlightened ruler under heaven one must serve the interests of the people first and his personal interests last. Only then can he be an enlightened ruler." (Mo Zzu, "Chien ai" 3, p. 26, 1. 39-40. [Harvard-Yenching Index edition No. 21]

30 Dumoulin, op. cit., pp. 26-27.

31 Technically speaking this misrepresents the Buddhist view, which insists upon non-attachment even to the state beyond good and evil. So strong, however, is the Confucian sense of moral choice and life commitment that it allows no middle ground here.

32 Cf. Fung Yu-lan, op. cit., II, p. 617. Adapted from the translation of Derk Bodde.

33 Huang, op. cit., p. 73.

34 Nakamura Hajime, "A Brief Survey of Japanese Studies on the Philosophical Schools of the Mahayana" in Acta Asiatica, Bulletin of the Institute of Eastern Culture, Tokyo 1960, Vol. I, p. 66.

35 Dumoulin, op. cit., p. 26. Nakamura seems to believe that such a connection does exist but not on the logical plane. "Japanese scholars… assert that the wisdom of Non-Dualism constitutes the keynote of the whole Mahayana; that the selfless deed of donation harmonizes with the fundamental conception of Buddhism, and that Buddha's supreme wisdom is transformed into his great compassion." Cf. Nakamura, Ibid., p. 66.