Yunqi Zhuhong

Yunqi Zhuhong was born in 1535 in Hangzhou Province into a well-educated family with the surname Shen. Zhuhong was reportedly an excellent student, and passed the first level of the Imperial civil-service exams, and continued studying to the age of 32. However, Zhuhong did not pass any further exams.[2] His first encounter with Buddhism, especially the Pure Land tradition, reputedly began after he heard his neighbor intoning the nianfo.[2]

After series of personal misfortunes, starting with the death of his infant son, followed by his wife, other family losses, and failure to advance any further in the civil-service exams, Zhuhong took up the monastic life in 1566. His second wife took up lay Buddhist precepts in support. One story recounts how Zhuhong, after seeing a teacup fall and shatter, pondered the intransience of life, and decide then and there to become a monk.

By 1571 he returned to his native province after several years of traveling and studying under one teacher or another. The monastery on Mount Yunqi had fallen into ruin, but after local sponsorship, he restored the temple and assumed leadership of the local religious community. Due to his educated background, he assisted when official matters required someone who could speak Mandarin Chinese, and developed a network of gentlemen who sought his advice on spiritual matters as well.

Yunqi Zhuhong was among the first of a growing rebuttal to the influence of Catholicism in Chinese society, starting with a short work, the Tianshuo siduan (simplified Chinese: 天说四端; traditional Chinese: 天說四端; lit. 'Four Essays on Heaven'), in 1615, five years after the death of Matteo Ricci.[3] Zhuhong's polemic coincided with the political appointment of Shen Que (沈隺, d. 1624) as vice minister of rites in Nanking (Nanjing) and his initiation of an anti-Catholic campaign from official circles in 1616.

In the Zhuchuang suibi (simplified Chinese: 竹窗随笔; traditional Chinese: 竹窗隨筆; lit. 'Jottings under a Bamboo Window'), published in three sections: the Chubi (初笔), Erbi (二笔) and the Sanbi (三笔), he describes Matto Ricci as follows:[4]

Though he worships the Lord of Heaven, in reality he has no conception of Heaven. . . . According to him the Lord of Heaven is a being without form, without color or sound. One can then only conclude that Heaven is nothing more than [pure] reason. But how can [pure reason] rule its subjects, or promulgate laws, or reward and punish? He [Ricci] may be an intelligent person, but he has never learned the scriptures of Buddhists; what could be expected but that his doctrine would be wrong.

Yunqi Zhuhong portrait

Yunqi Zhuhong wrote extensively on the Pure Land Buddhist tradition both to defend it from criticism from other Buddhist institutions (primarily Chan), and to explore and clarify the teachings more.

For example, in his commentary on the Amitabha Sutra, Zhuhong wrote on the phenomenal aspect of the Pure Land, and how at the highest level, the awakened mind sees the Pure Land as it really is.[1] In so doing, Zhuhong attempted to reconcile the more traditional "Western-direction" view of the Pure Land with the more "mind-only" position frequently espoused by Chan Buddhist institutions.

In addition, in his Dá Jìngtǔ Sìshíbā Wèn (simplified Chinese: 答浄土四十八; traditional Chinese: 答淨土四十八問; lit. 'Answers to Forty Eight Questions about the Pure Land') (CBETA X.1158), Zhuhong teaches, for example, the importance of the nianfo in establishing a "resonance" with the Buddha Amitabha which leads to a mutual effect that leads to rebirth in the Pure Land. In additional to a strict, disciplined lifestyle, Zhuhong advocates the verbal form of the nianfo in particular due to the declining Age of the Dharma.[1]

Zhuhong's teachings and writings sought to reconcile various strands and interpretations of Pure Land Buddhist practice by using the concepts of principle (Chinese: 理; pinyin: lǐ) and phenomena (Chinese: 事; pinyin: shī)[1] to distinguish between Amitabha Buddha as a non-dualistic, "mind-only" concept, and Amitabha Buddha as a literal Buddha in the western Pure Land. Zhuhong felt that Pure Land Buddhism is flexible enough to account for both interpretations, depending on one's personal interpretation.[2]

For Zhuhong, the ultimate goal of Pure Land Buddhism was to attain samadhi focused on Amitabha Buddha, realizing that the Buddha was one's own mind:[2]

To contemplate the Buddha (nianfo) is to contemplate the mind (nian-xin). Birth there (in the Pure Land) does not entail birth away from here. Mind, Buddha, and sentient beingsare all of one substance; the middle stream (non-duality) does not abide on the two banks (this world and the Pure Land).

For example, the practice of reciting the nianfo works in either context, Zhuhong wrote, since a literal interpretation of reciting the nianfo would lead one to be reborn in the Pure Land, while in a mind-only context, reciting the nianfo would lead to a focused, "unperturbed mind".[2] However, Zhuhong felt that either interpretation was valid, and would ultimately lead toward Enlightenment. However, Zhuhong was more critical toward an excessive bias toward a "mind-only"/principle interpretation as it could lead to hubris and arrogance.[2]

In addition to recitation of the nianfo, Zhuhong also advocated other mainstream Buddhist practices such as chanting of the Buddhist sutras, upholding the Buddhist vows such as the five precepts, studying Buddhist teachings, practicing compassion including vegetarianism, and so on.[2]

• Carpenter, Bruce, E. "Buddhism and the Seventeenth Century Anti-Catholic Movement in China", Tezukayama University Review (Tezukayama Daigaku Ronshu), no. 54, 1986, pp. 17–26. ISSN 0385-7743
• Yu Chun-fang in Goodrich and Fang ed., Dictionary of Ming Biography, Columbia University Press, New York, 1976, vol. 1, 322–324. ISBN 0-231-03801-1