Part 2 of 2
2.3.4.3 The Inner Studies InstituteFacing the challenges of running the Jinling printery as he envisioned, the constant disagreements with Yang’s family, and the growing economical pressure, Ouyang was pushed to free himself from the shackles of his commitment to Yang Wenhui, his family and the publishing business. In 1919 he established a new institution, the focus of which was on education and scholarship. He called it the China Inner Studies Institute or Zhina neixue yuan (Chinese). The institute was in the vicinity of the Jinling printery, so that he could continue to preside over both institutions. As mentioned in the introduction, Ouyang modeled his institution after Nalanda University, a fact that indicates the high hopes he had for his institution as a leading player in the propagation of Buddhism of his times.
The term neixue or Inner Studies is a peculiar one. Holmes Welch postulated that the term meant something like ‘metaphysics,’ which was contrasted the external studies i.e. science.82 According to Ouyang, however, there are three meanings for the notion of “Inner”: 1) uncontaminated (skt. anasrava ch. Chinese); 2) Realization (ch. Chinese); 3) the final or ultimate (Chinese). The notion of “studies” means the study of the uncontaminated, realization and the final or ultimate goal of Buddhism.83
As for the term Zhina, it was a problematic terms that was used by Japanese to minimize the importance of China. The traditional name for China, Zhongguo -- literally means the ‘Middle Kingdom’ – was not adequate anymore for Japanese who no longer saw China as the most dominant force in Asia. Zhina was the transliteration of the Western name and to use it was to treat China as an equal country, merely one among many. By adopting the name Ouyang was later criticized by Chinese nationalists. He tried to justify it by claiming that it is the transliteration of the Sanskrit term for “sacred country.” This apparently did not convince his contemporaries and in 1951 his disciple and successor Lü Cheng had to change the institution’s name to Zhongguo neixue yuan. 84
Ouyang established the Inner Studies Institute on the property of Mei Guangyuan, the brother of Ouyang’s friend and Yang Wenhui’s former disciple Mei Guangxi. The Institution was founded in autumn of 1919 and was officially opened on July, 1922. The initial funding came from donors such as Zhang Taiyan and from students’ tuition, which covered their room and board. In order to assist Ouyang with the management of the institute, his senior student, Lü Cheng, resigned his position as the principal of Shanghai’s School of the Arts, and came to Nanjing. Other former students of Yang Wenhui and people who were familiar with Ouyang’s work also volunteered to help.
According to two documents cited by Cheng Gongran, The General Regulations of the Inner Studies Institute (Chinese) and The Schedule of the Inner Studies Institute (Chinese), the Inner Studies Institute was divided into academic and administrative sections. The academic section was further divided into three: middle school, university and research institute. The university was subdivided into the Faxiang (Dharma-characteristics) department with a focus on Yogacara studies, Faxing (Dharma-nature) department with a focus on Madhyamaka85 and a department dedicated to Esoteric Buddhism.86 The research institute was responsible for sutra reading groups, lectures and other related activities.
In 1922 Ouyang was busy with the official opening of the Inner Studies Institute. A year later a series of tragedies led to another dramatic shift in Ouyang’s intellectual trajectory, a change that would seal his early Yogacara phase and start a more syncretic approach to Buddhism. Of all the tragic events of 1923, it was the death of his youngest son, Ouyang Dong, which affected him the most. Ouyang Dong spent his early childhood with his mother in Yihuang but after the death of his sister, he moved to Nanjing to live with his father. He was tutored by two of Ouyang’s disciples Chen Mingshu and Xiong Shili. Ouyang Dong was a very talented pupil and after studying with his father’s students he had good foundations in both Western and Chinese studies. In 1922 he followed Xiong Shili to Beijing. When Xiong received an appointment in Beijing University in 1923 Ouyang Dong was admitted to Tongji University in Shanghai as a student. Unfortunately his natural talent could not reach fruition. On 28 of September, 1923, he drowned while swimming. The sorrow that Ouyang experienced after the tragic death of Ouyang Dong was only worsened by the death of two of his close disciples in the following years; Xu Yiming (Chinese, 1902-1923) and Huang Shuyin (Chinese,1898-1923). Xu Yiming died on the very same day as Ouyang’s son.
The proximity of the deaths of these young people that were all dear to him shook Ouyang and he vowed to propagate Prajnaparamita’s thought. This vow was the beginning of his attempts to synthesize Prajnaparamita and Yogacara thought. In a conference that started that year Ouyang remarked: “For a long time now we, who studied together exchanged views over the Faxiang teaching, can say that we already kindled some light of understanding. I hope that now you will explore the secrets of the Prajnaparamita and turn [this light] into a torch of wisdom.”87 He instructed his students that in addition to undertaking a thorough study of Yogacara they must also probe into the true characteristics of ‘Nagarjuna studies.’ During the 20’s, which were the heyday of the Inner Studies Institute, Ouyang read thoroughly works on Prajnaparamita and Madhyamaka texts,88 which resulted in the 1928 publication of Ouyang’s commentary on the MahaPrajnaparamita sutra. This was his major work in this phase of an attempting to harmonize Yogacara with Madhyamaka thought.
The institute became a center for students and intellectuals who were interested in Buddhism, and found in Ouyang a Buddhist teacher who could speak in their language, and whose knowledge of Buddhism was more grounded in advanced research method compared with the kind of sectarian Buddhism preached by the leaders of the Sangha. Among Ouyang’s students and disciples the two most prominent ones were Lü Cheng; and the New-Confucian scholar Xiong Shili; the renowned intellectual and public figure, Liang Qichao (1873-1929); the Confucian thinker, Liang Shuming (1893–1988); and the Buddhist Studies scholar Tang Yongtong (1893-1964), a former Harvard student who was later the head of the philosophy department at Peking University.
Impressive dignitaries were among those who served as members of the board. Among them was the former premier Xiong Xiling; Ye Gongchuo, a calligrapher and artist who served as a minister in Sun Yat-sen’s government; Liang Qichao and Cai Yuanpei. Due to their influence, Ouyang and his Inner Studies Institute received funding to support the institute’s activities.
In 1927, during the KMT army’s Northern Expedition campaign, the Inner Studies Institute was affected for the first time by the socio-political events among which it operated. First, troops on the way to uproot warlords in the north camped inside the institution and interrupted the research and studies. Subsequently, the relative success of the KMT campaign damaged the financial foundation of the institute, which partially relied on donations from individuals associated with the warlords’ governments. After the Northern Expedition, the institute operated on a much smaller scale, before moving into Jiangjin (Chinese), Sichuan in 1937, to escape the Japanese invasion.
Ouyang did not live to see the reestablishment of the Inner Studies Institute in Nanjing; this happened 4 years after his death, in 1947. The institute was active for a few more years in the hostile environment of the early years of the People Republic, and was eventually closed in 1952, after more than 30 years of operation. It was one of the longest lasting Buddhist academies in Republican China.
When James Pratt visited the Inner Studies Institute he described a nice looking building with ten to fifteen students. According to the Wang Enyang’s Overview of the Inner Studies Institute, the teachers in the first two years were Enyang himself, Ouyang Jingwu, Lü Cheng, Qiu Xuming and Tang Yongtong. Lü Cheng taught Tibetan and Tang Yongtong taught Pali and the curriculum was based mainly on the study of Yogacara texts and thought, Buddhist logic and early Buddhist texts and thought.89 Between the 1922, when the institution was officially opened, and the death of Ouyang in 1943, more than 300 students studied Buddhism there, and numerous texts were published.90 Among those students we can find the pioneers of Buddhist studies in China, who taught in the leading universities of Ouyang’s day.
2.3.5 Later Developments in Ouyang’s thoughtThe forced move from a central place to a relatively remote inland town distanced Ouyang from his major donors and disciples. The Sichuan branch of the Inner Studies Institute continue to operate in Jiangjin but Buddhism and Ouyang were no longer at the heart of intellectual interest, as they were when the Inner Studies Institute operated in Nanjing during the 20’s and early 30’s.
It is the radical change in his intellectual world that constitutes the most interesting development in Ouyang’s later life. Since this dissertation focuses more on Ouyang’s earlier phase of critical evaluation of the Buddhist teaching and Yogacara studies, later stages of his career will have to be treated elsewhere. However, since these later stages are important to our understanding of the vicissitudes in Ouyang thought throughout his career, I will here briefly discuss the major shifts in his intellectual trajectory in the later part of his life.
Two developments were most dominant in his later life. The first was his move away from a critical correction of Chinese Buddhist “flaws” and the reintroduction of “true” Indian Buddhism into China, toward a more harmonious and syncretic view of the Buddhist tradition. In addition, it was a move from a more sectarian approach to Buddhism, focusing on Yogacara to a more holistic vision of Buddhism. The second development was his returning to Confucianism, almost thirty years after he renounced his ideological affiliation with the Luwang School and declared himself a Buddhist.
2.3.5.1 Ouyang’s Later Buddhist ThoughtThroughout his life, Ouyang used scholastic approach to revive ‘authentic’ Buddhism, and to criticize and correct what he saw as flaws in Chinese Buddhism. This tendency to stay away from harmonizing, and to prefer the scrutiny and precision of doctrinal analysis, began to change, as we saw earlier, after the deaths of his second son and two disciples, Xu Yiming and Huang Shuyin. A decade later, in his 60’s Ouyang began to focus on the soteriological aspects of Buddhism, to paraphrasing Gombrich’s words, he was more interested in the “how” instead in the ‘what.’91
The beginning of this shift was, again, the result of a tragic event in Ouyang’s life when his sister, Ouyang Shuzhen, died in 1926, after a charlatan who pretended to be a doctor misdiagnosed her. Ouyang wrote on the death of his sister, “On the 3rd day of the first month, when the bad news arrived, my heart was unbearably heavy, and I could not restrain myself. Since she already died, there was no point [in my reaction], how could it help my elder sister? I must continue transfer merit to her, conceal [my sorrow], control it and heal it. My chest burns, my head sweats and my eyes are dizzy. My body shivers as if I had malaria. Again and again, I cannot restrain myself and again and again I keep blaming myself.”92
It was then that more existential questions reappeared in Ouyang’s thought, and that he shifted his focus from Yogacara and Madhyamaka to sutras such as the Nirvana and Huayan Sutras.
In 1934 Ouyang promised in a letter he wrote to Chen Boyan that since his health is deteriorating, he would write the summary of the canon (Chinese) that he promised to Yang Wenhui on his deathbed, and which he indeed published in 1940 as the preface to his Essentials of the Canon (Chinese). He also promised to publish the definitive teachings of his later years (Chinese), which would outline his main view about Buddhism at his present stage. 93 He never explicitly wrote such a piece, but in the summer of 1937 Ouyang lectured to his disciples about his definitive teaching. 94 A year earlier, Ouyang published a commentary on the Sutra of the Secret Adornment (Chinese), which considered to be the actual expression of his definitive views. 95 This commentary is crucial to the understanding of his later thought. Ouyang started his commentary by saying:
The Sutra of the Secret Adornment is one of the summaries for the entire Buddhist teachings and the path for the transformation of the two bases. There are numerous gates to the Dharma, which can be divided to the three aspects of teaching, practice and fruit. The fruit aspect is delineated in the Mahaparinirvana sutra, the practice aspect is delineated in the Mahaprajnaparamita sutra and the Huayan sutra and the teaching aspect is delineated in the Sutra of the Secret Adornment. This is why it is said that it is one of the summaries of the entire Buddhist teachings.96
Only in his later years did Ouyang read and commented on scriptures from all the three aspects of the Buddhist teachings identified here: teaching (Chinese), practice (Chinese) and the fruit of enlightenment (9). While in the earlier phases Ouyang put more emphasis on the teaching aspect of Buddhism, the time was ripe in his older years to try and focus more on the practice and fruit aspects. 97
In his commentary he elaborates on the meaning of the theory of the base.
All dharmas relay on the basis (i.e. asraya); one must transform the two bases in order to become a Buddha. Illusion and awakening rely on the [basis of] suchness; defilement and purity rely on the [basis of] storehouse consciousness. To transform illusion to enlightenment one achieves bodhi, to transform defilement into purity one achieves nirvana…why do we have to transform both of them when we transform the basis? Because substance (Chinese) and function (Chinese) are different, bodhi is the function while nirvana is the substance.98
The theory of the basis and the way to achieve it correlate to the two later aspects of Buddhism i.e. practice and the fruit. Later in his commentary, Ouyang argued that among the two fruits of bodhi and nirvana, the one that epitomize the ultimate goal of all dharma gates is the nirvana with no reminder (Skt. anupadhisesa nirvana Ch., Chinese) a concept which stood at the focus of Ouyang’s interest in his later years.99
2.3.5.2 Ouyang the ConfucianOuyang’s shifting away from and returning to Confucianism is fascinating, and merits a scholarly attention that unfortunately goes beyond the scope of this dissertation. I will leave the lengthy treatment of Ouyang’s Confucianism for another occasion and give a brief summary so this important phase of his life will not be absent from this dissertation.
As we saw above, Ouyang preferred Buddhism over Confucianism because it provided better answers to the “questions of life and death;” but why did he return from Buddhism to Confucianism later in life? Ouyang’s first Confucian work was published in October 1931. The work entitled Readings in the 11 themes in the Analects (Chinese).100 In this work we already see most of the views about Confucianism that Ouyang will continue to expound in his later Confucian writings. In 1932 he published his commentaries on the Zhongyong (Readings in the Zhongyong, Chinese) 101 and the Daxue (Reading in the Wang Yangming commentary on the Daxue, Chinese).102 Later that year he also published his work on Mencius (Readings in the Ten Themes in the Mencius, Chinese).103
A small number of central themes are at the focus of concern for Ouyang’s research into Confucianism. First, Ouyang argues that we must distinguish between the real Confucianism of Confucius and his disciples in the pre Qin-Han period and the “fake”, highly metaphysical and mythological Confucianism that has developed since the Han. This was a criticism shared by many Qing dynasty evidential research scholars beginning with Gu Yanwu (Chinese,1613-1682) and Li Shugu (Chinese, 1659—1733), through Ouyang’s generation and the campaign against Confucianism in the 20’s. Second, however, what is unique about Ouyang was the links he perceived between “real” Confucianism and Buddhism. For example, he believed that since the post-Qin commentators were unreliable, the gateway to Confucianism must therefore lie in Buddhism, more specifically in the Prajnaparamita literature. This was the second most important feature of Ouyang’s late Confucian thought, i.e. his attempt to harmonize the essences of Buddhism and Confucianism.
His continuing work on Buddhism did not conflict with his work on Confucianism; on the contrary, they were complementary. While the crux of Confucianism appeared in the Daxue as “illuminating the lofty virtue in society” (Chinese); the crux of Buddhism was appeared in the Diamond sutra as to “lead people into the stage of nirvana with no reminder” (Chinese). 104 As Ouyang saw it, while their essences were the same, their function was different. Confucianism was designed to help cultivate the moral character in society while Buddhism had the role of liberating individuals and leading them to individual salvation.
Another interesting feature of Ouyang’s Confucian writing was the timing of his delving into Confucianism. Although early signs of the reemergence of his treatment of Confucianism emerged already around the middle of the 20’s, his first Confucian publication on the Analects appeared a month after the September 18th incident (see footnote 108) and was closely connected to the socio-political predicament of China and to the Japanese invasion to China. Evidence for this link between Ouyang’s Confucian thought and China’s political upheaval can be found in most of his Confucian writings. For example, Ouyang’s preface for his commentary on the Zhongyong ends with the lamentation, “Alas, [Lu] Xiangshan, society is in great upheaval, and the Confucian teaching is about to wither. How can I get to those people and meet with them shortly?”105 Or when he says in his preface to his sub-commentary on the Daxue and Wang Yangming’s commentary on it, “When the state is having a big calamity, the people help it by themselves; when there is a way to cross the road, the people figure it out by themselves. When a strong neighbor is swallowing their state, the people will rise up by themselves and fight against the invader.”106 As happened in his early years, Ouyang saw answers to China’s quandary in the Confucian teaching, but it was not in the traditional Song-Ming Neo-Confucian thought, but a return to the original message of Confucius and Mencius.
2.3.6 Later Years and DeathTragedies continued to haunt Ouyang throughout his life. The next series of sad events occurred in 1940. In June 1940 his wife and companion of many years passed away because of sickness. A month later, his oldest son, Ouyang Ge, was executed by Chiang Kai-shek.
Ouyang Ge (1895-1940) had a successful career and was a source of pride for his father. After the death of his siblings Ouyang Ge assisted and supported his father’s Inner Studies Institute. When he was twenty years old he graduated from the naval officers’ academy in Wusong and joined Sun Yat-sen. After the death of Sun in 1925, Ouyang Ge, who held a right wing ideology, joined the Chiang Kai-shek faction in the KMT. In 1926, he took part in the Zhongshan Warship Incident, and was subsequently punished for his part in the incident.107 Later, he was promoted and served in several warships as a commander, was promoted to a rank of general in the navy, and even served as a high ranking officer advisor to the government.
Ouyang Ge’s career suffered a serious set back when following the anti-Japanese sentiments of “September 18th Incident”108 and the “January 28th incident.”109 During the battle following the January 28th incident, nineteen army posts, which came under attacked by the Japanese, asked the navy for assistance. Ouyang Ge, who commanded the navy at that time, had just signed an agreement in Nanjing with the Japanese navy delegate, which prevent “mutual hostilities.” Being loyal to the agreement, Ouyang Ge refused the calls for help. Ouyang Ge also retreated from the Madang battle in 1938,110 wishing to preserve his power. In addition, he was charged with allegations of corruption and was finally arrested. In 1940 he was executed in Chongqing. By now Ouyang had lost all his relatives and his four grandchildren were all studying outside China. He remained lonely, depressed and bitter, but was still active both in running the Inner Studies Institute and in writing.
In 1942, Ouyang wrote his last work, Readings in the Heart sutra (Chinese), in which he continued to develop his synthesis of the teaching, practice and fruit of Buddhism. Lü Cheng tells us that Ouyang focused on this short sutra during the last years of his life. He said: “In 1940, Ouyang’s family was hit by tragedies. He took an oath to cultivate a meditation of recitation on the Heart sutra through which he could taste the flavor of delusion and truth. He constantly did so, hoping to attain enlightenment. After 3 years he began [to grasp it] and his sublime words were preserved in his Readings in the Heart sutra. This was his last exquisite work.”111
A few months later, in February 1943, Ouyang, who was 73 years old and frail, became ill. A relatively mild cold deteriorated into pneumonia, from which his frail body could not recover. He died on February 23 in the Sichuan branch of the Inner Studies Institute in Jiangjin, where he was buried.
2.3.7 Evaluations and CritiqueOuyang won many admirers, as well as enemies and adversaries. Despite the fact that he was admired for his erudition and his teaching skills, Ouyang had a notorious reputation as an irritable man. Holmes Welch, for example, dubbed him as a man with a “prickly personality.” He tells how once Ouyang was invited to a dinner in which Liang Qichao (who was his disciple) was the guest of honor. When Ouyang realized that Liang received the guest of honor seat while he received the secondary seat, he decided to leave. It was only after the seats were rearranged and he was given the seat of honor that he was willing to stay. 112
Jiang Canteng also adds an anecdote on Ouyang’s temper, “When Lü Cheng first came to ask for instruction from the master, he presented him with a pact saying, ‘I vow to be with the teacher for the rest of my life.’ When the war with Japan broke out, the Inner Studies Institute moved to Sichuan to avoid the chaos, and they resided in Jiangjin. Lü Cheng came with the master and took care of his daily life needs. [Now], Ouyang was a man with fiery disposition and hot temper. Once, when Ouyang became very angry, everybody including Lü Cheng could not bear it. He then thanked the teacher and asked for permission to leave. But after Lü left, Ouyang did not have anyone to care of his everyday needs and share his hardships. Soon after, Ouyang became severely ill. He remembered the pact that Lü had gave him and that still existed, and sent someone to inform Lü Cheng in person that he must return. After Lü Cheng received the letter he returned to Jiangjin immediately. He bowed before Ouyang, and the master bowed back, then they both shed tears. Since that [incident] Lü Cheng was never even a step away from the master’s side.”113
But despite his personality, there were many who greatly admired him. Shen Zengzhi for example, wrote about the big crisis of the time, and thought that it could be corrected with self-purification and compassion. Commenting on Ouyang’s institution he said: “Sons and daughters of good families, elders and Bodhisattvas are all developing the wisdom of Mañju&ri and practicing the vows of Samantabadhra; can I be unhappy about it and not help him?”114 Zhang Taiyan said about his “friend Ouyang Jingwu:“ “[Ouyang] Jingwu thinks that Buddhism is declining, and his views are deep and transcend those of ordinary people. [Since] he does not wish to hold the secrets concealed, [he therefore] imitated the Buddha’s ‘empty-fisted’115 approach.”116
We already saw that Liang Qichao became a disciple of Ouyang. In 1922 he spent two months in Nanjing before taking on a teaching position in Tianjin. During that time he frequented in the Inner Studies Institute to listen to Ouyang’s talk. Before he left he wrote Ouyang a letter in which he said, "Master Ouyang: I attended your lectures for two months and what you have taught was immeasurable. I only hoped to hear more of your compassionate instruction in order to further establish my good roots…[although I have to go back,] I believe that, throughout my life, the benefits I received from the permeation (xun, Chinese) of your teaching will never be exhausted.”117
Another example is the well known Chinese philosopher Tang Junyi (Chinese, 1909-1978), who said about Ouyang that “this man caused you to be immediately inspired” and “I, personally, have a great admiration for these two men (i.e. Liang Qichao and Ouyang Jingwu) for their position about what is means to be an upright person.”118
More important than the different opinions on Ouyang’s personality, were the different opinions on Ouyang as a thinker and on his contribution to Chinese Buddhism and Chinese intellectual history at large. Here, again, we find a range of opinions, from supporters to those who opposed him bitterly. At the extreme end of Ouyang’s critics, we can find Buddhist conservatives such as the Pure Land master Yinguang (Chinese, 1861—1940) who, feeling threatened by Ouyang’s reactionary Buddhist position and the challenge he posed to the Sangha, said about Ouyang that he “is a great king of devils”.119 Taixu was another Buddhist opponent, whose different approach to Buddhist modernity will be treated at greater length in the chapters below; he was also critical of Ouyang’s rejection of the “flaws” he found in Chinese Buddhism.
But thinkers such as Tang Junyi demonstrated that reactions to Ouyang’s thought went beyond the limited circles of Buddhism. Those who objected to Ouyang often criticized his contribution to the “Indianization” of Chinese thought. This argument was by no means new. Blaming Buddhism for “contaminating” Chinese thought was as old as the introduction of Buddhism into China. In the modern period, the dominant voice in this direction came from the influential intellectual Hu Shi.120 In his book, Cheng Gongrang cites the famous historian Chen Yinke who said: “The Buddha’s teaching recognized no [obligation to a] father and no [obligation to the] ruler. It contains not a single principle that does not conflict with Chinese traditional thought and existing systems;” further “As [in the case of] the vijñaptimatra of Xuanzang, although it shook the hearts of his contemporaries, it reached a sad end. Even though nowadays there are people who follow [Xuanzang] and ignite again those dead ashes, I suspect that in the end, they will not be able to revive [the Yogacara teaching].”121
Another famous scholar who thought that Ouyang was not Chinese enough was Wing-tsit Chan. He said, “Ouyang deserves credit for raising the intellectual level of modern Chinese Buddhism. But his movement runs in the wrong direction. Aside from the fact that he looks to the past and defends the past, in modern Chinese religions his is the only movement toward particularization. All other schools, whether Buddhist or not, aim at synthesis.” While Ouyang was “wrong” enough to try and understand the system of vijnaptimatra on its own term, without synthesize it with other Buddhist teaching, Chen, with a palpable relief, tells us that later, “the Idealistic tide was being reverted toward the glorious spirit of synthesis in Buddhism.”122
It was this move towards “particularization,” that is, Ouyang’s insistence on doctrinal precision and the understanding of Buddhism on its own terms that characterized Ouyang’s innovative approach to Buddhism. His critical study of Buddhism as a tradition based on its Indian texts, doctrine and systematic presentation rather than a reliance on faith, experience or texts composed in China, were in sharp contrast to the Buddhism he saw around him in his time. As a product of the evidential scholarship of the Qing dynasty, he was an inspiration to a generation of young Buddhists and non-Buddhists scholars, and a challenge to Buddhists that now had to defend Chan, Huayan and Tiantai with a more philosophically and doctrinally sound answers.
2.3.8 SummaryIn sum, it is evident from Ouyang biography that the story of Ouyang’s intellectual development and his unique contribution to both Chinese Buddhist and Chinese intellectual history are closely related to the time that he lived in, and the socio-political and existential uncertainties of the period.
Ouyang’s career was influenced by external dynamics, but it was also affected by his tragic life story. Ouyang was a thinker that went against the tide on several fronts. As such, he had enemies, and lacked popular support. Consequently, he appealed neither to the mainstream Buddhists nor to the younger, pro-Western studies, intellectuals. But even though it persists among a relatively small elite movement, his impact has by no means disappeared. As we will see below, his heritage continues to live and is debated among both enemies and supporters.
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Notes:26 Cheng Gongrang, Studies in Ouyang Jingwu's Buddhist Thought.
27 Revive Confucianism by means of Buddhism.
28 Ouyang Jingwu, "Reply Letter to Wei Siyi [Chinese]," in Collected Writings of Master Ouyang [Chinese, (Taibei: Xinwenfeng Press, 1976) ], 1554-55.
29 Xu and Wang, A Critical Biography of Ouyang Jingwu [Chinese] (Nanchang Shi: Bai hua zhou wen yi chu ban she, 1995).
30 The bagong exam was less prestigious than the imperial exams and was designed to find young talents to serves as teachers in imperial institutions.
31 The debate between the “New” and “Old” Text schools is a long one, and goes back to the Han dynasty debate about which canon was genuine the “old” canon was argued to be the “real” canon of the pre-Qin burning of the Confucian classics, rediscovered during the Han. The “new”canon was the canon used in the early Han, and was supposed to be a reconstruction of the old canon. Modern New Text thinkers, such as Kang Youwei and the early Liang Qichao, relied on the Gongyang commentaries on the Spring and Autumn Annals (Chunqiu) to reject the cyclical historiography and to propagate a more linear historiography that would allow and call for reform. The New Text thinkers were also well known for introducing more “religious” elements into Confucianism, for example, by interpreting Confucius as semi-messianic prophetic leader.
32 Cheng Gongrang, Studies in Ouyang Jingwu's Buddhist Thought, 13.
33 One can see this, for example, in the foreword that he wrote to his uncle’s autobiographical “The Trivial Records of My Encounters” (Chinese) in which he supplement his uncle’s account with his own memories of Ouyang Yu.
34 Cheng Gongrang, Studies in Ouyang Jingwu's Buddhist Thought, 29, 39.
35 Gong Jun, "Three Propositions in Ouyang Jingwu's Thoughts [Chinese]," Zhexue Yanjiu [Chinese] 12 (1999), 51.
36 For example, Zhang Zhidong’s willingness to accept Western studies subordinated to the traditional Chinese curriculum under the well known formula of “Chinese studies as the essence and Western studies for practical or functional purposes” (Chinese) or the reform movement of Kang Youwei and Liang Qichao to which Ouyang was exposed through his friend Gui Bohua.
37 Gui Bohua’s original name was Gui Mingzu and he came from Jiujiang County in Jiangxi. Later he moved to Nanchang for his studies. He was an enthusiastic supporter and activist in the reform movement led by Kang Youwei and Liang Qichao. After the failure of the reform movement and with Cixi’s army trying to capture its participants, Gui Bohua hided for a short time. Later he traveled to Nanjing and studied Buddhism with the “father” of Buddhist revival in modern China Yang Wenhui (more on Yang Wenhui below). In 1910, he went to Japan to study esoteric Buddhism and befriended Zhang Taiyan. He died in Japan in 1915.
38 The Shimonoseki treaty was a major blow to the Chinese pride. Among other requirements the treaty forced China to accept Japan as a colonial power, and turn Korea over to be a Japanese protectorate after more than a millennium of subordination to the Chinese emperor. China also had to open four more treaty portsl to allow Japan to build there factories owned by Japanese and to pay Japan indemnity for the losses Japan suffered as a subsequence of the war.
39 This defeat, which resulted in heavy losses to the Chinese forces, forced the Qing government to accept the treaty of Shimonoseki in April 1895. It became clear now that despite the self-strengthening efforts of the previous decades, China was not on the right track. As Jonathan Spence put it, the result of the Sino-Japanese war was a “dark conclusion to the brightest hopes of the era of self-strengthening” see Jonathan Spence, The Search for Modern China (New York: Norton Press, 1990), 224. China could not face the might of the Western imperial forces, but now even the Japanese, which were always considered to be subordinated to the rule of the Chinese emperor, joined the growing number of imperial forces that threatened the existence of China.
There is a direct link between the rude awakening of the Qing intellectuals and the birth of the Reform Movement of 1898. Chinese intellectuals reacted immediately after the signing of the Shimonoseki treaty with protests and demands for reforms. When such a reform was finally offered by the young emperor Guangxu, it found many young supporters like Gui Bohua.
40 The miscellaneous teachings that Ouyang refers to probably relates to the traditional education that he receive in his childhood, especially the teaching of the orthodox Chengzhu School.
41 Lü Cheng, "A Brief Biography of My Teacher Mr. Ouyang [Chinese]," in An Anthology of Materials from Chinese Buddhist Thought [Chinese], ed. Shi Jun et al (Beijing: Zhonghua Shuju Press, 1983), 354.
42 Ouyang refers to the six who were executed by the Imperial regime after the fall of the Reform Movement.
43 See Ouyang Jingwu, "Gui Bohua's Biography in Jingwu's Poetry and Prose Collection [Chinese]," in Collected Writings of Master Ouyang [Chinese] (Taibei: Xinwenfeng Press, 1976) , 1855. Cheng Gongrang plausibly argues that Gui Bohua was exposed to Buddhist ideas even before returning to his hometown, through his interaction with the reform movement Cheng Gongrang, Studies in Ouyang Jingwu's Buddhist Thought, 33. Most of the intellectuals that were involved with the reform movement Tan Sitong, Kang Youwei or Liang Qichao for example all had deep interest in Buddhist practice and thought.
44 Ibid., 1856.
45 Holmes Welch, The Buddhist Revival in China, 2.
46 Yang Wenhui was one of Ouyang’s biggest influences and was arguably the most important figure in late Qing Buddhism. His fame came for the depth and breadth of his study of Buddhism, for his novel approach to Buddhist education, for introducing new forms of Buddhism back into China, for his propagation of Buddhism through his printery, and for training the next generation of intellectuals who made Buddhism the foci of their intellectual pursuits. Since much has been written on Yang and in order to keep Ouyang at the center of this study, I will here discuss only the aspects of Yang Wenhui’s life that are relevant to Ouyang’s own biography. For more on Yang Wenhui see Gabriele Helga Goldfuss, "Binding Sutras and Modernity: The Life and Times of the Chinese Layman Yang Wenhui (1837-1911)," Studies in Central & East Asian Religions 9 (1996), 54-74. Gabriele Helga Goldfuss, Vers un bouddhisme du xxe siècle. Holmes Welch, The Buddhist Revival in China. (Especially the first chapter); Chen Jidong (Chin Keitoo), Shinmatsu bukkyo no kenkyu: yo bunkai o chushin to shite [Chinese] (Tokyo: Sankibo Busshorin, 2003).
47 Lü Cheng, A Brief Biography of My Teacher Mr. Ouyang, 354.
48 See Cheng Gongrang, Studies in Ouyang Jingwu's Buddhist Thought, 42. see also Xu and Wang, A Critical Biography of Ouyang Jingwu, 48.
49 A synonym for the Yogacara teaching.
50 Lü Cheng, A Brief Biography of My Teacher Mr. Ouyang, 354.
51 One of the students who studied under Yang Wenhui at that time was Taixu the well-known reformer monk. Cheng Gongrang quoted Taixu who said that Ouyang was also among Yang’s student in the short-lived Jetavana Vihara academy. Cheng argues that it is impossible because Ouyang was with his friend Li Zhengang on Jiufeng Mountain and could not be in Nanjing. By the time Ouyang decided to give up the farming ideal the Jetavana Academy was already closed (see Cheng Gongrang, Studies in Ouyang Jingwu's Buddhist Thought, 58).
52 Yang refers here to the Western Paradise of Amit!bha or in other words when the master died.
53 [Chinese]
54 "The Origins of the Sutra Exhibition in the Inner Studies Institute [Chinese] in Miscellaneous Writings [Chinese]," in Collected Writings of Master Ouyang [Chinese] (Taibei: Xinwengfeng Press, 1976), 1457.
55 Cheng Gongrang adds that besides Ouyang, there were two others who could be natural candidates. One of them was Gui Bohua who was at Japan at that time and had become interested in Esoteric Buddhism; and the other was Mei Guangxi, who worked for the government, and therefore could not dedicate all his energies to propagation of Buddhism.
56 The importance that Yang Wenhui saw in the publication of the Yogacarabhumi is another indication of the growing significance of Yogacara teaching in Yang Wenhui’s later thought.
57 See Holmes Welch, The Buddhist Revival in China, 9.
58 Ouyang had a leading role in the intended association but it was not only his idea. He shared it with a few friends who shared his vision, such as Li Duanfu and Li Zhenggang.
59 Holmes Welch, The Buddhist Revival in China, 34.
60 Holmes Welch, The Buddhist Revival in China, 34.
61 An attempt in 1911 by some reformer monks headed by Taixu and and another revolutionary monk named Renshan to take over Jinshan monastery and turn it into a modern school, a bold attempt that ended up with a scrimmage that damaged the Sangha’s reputation (see Ibid., 29-33).
62 Ibid., 34.
63 Xu and Wang, A Critical Biography of Ouyang Jingwu, 50.
64 He did however encourage his students to study Sanskrit and Tibetan.
65 See Antonino Forte, Political Propaganda and Ideology in China at the End of the Seventh Century: inquiry into the nature, authors and function of the Tunhuang document S.6502, followed by an annotated translation (Napoli: Istituto universitario orientale, Seminario di studi asiatici, 1976). See also Chen Jinhua, "More Than a Philosopher: Fazang (643-712) as a Politician and Miracle Worker," History of Religions 42, no. 4 (2003): 320-58.
66 See Robert Gimello, Chih-Yen, 602-668 and the Foundations of Hua-Yen Buddhism, 352-415.
67 As a foundational Mahayana teaching, Yogacara of course never really disappeared from China. It continued to be a “provisional” teaching, a teaching which aim was to explain the Buddhist teaching and make it accessible for people who cannot grasp the more “perfect” teachings. Its vocabulary also continued to be part of the more “perfect” Chinese teachings, especially this of Huayan. In Ming dynasty, there was a small scale Yogacara revival however it did not last long and its impact was limited, especially due to the failure of the scholars involved to learn the tradition systematically as early Republic figures like Ouyang did. see Wu Jiang, "Buddhist Logic and Apologetics in Seventeenth-Century China: An Analysis of the Use of Buddhist Syllogisms in an Anti-Christian Polemic," Dao: A Journal of Comparative Philosophy 2, no. 2 (2003): 273-89.
68 The eight are: (1) the *Mahayana satadharma prakasamukha sastra by Vasubandhu (³FK¥A T45.1870); (2) the Trimsika by Vasubandhu (Chinese T31.1586); (3) the Alambana pariksa by Dign!ga (Chinese T31.1624); (4) the commentary on the Alambana pariksa by Dharmapala (Chinese); (5) the System of the Six kinds of [Sanskrit] Compound (Chinese) from the Huayan jing suishu yanyi chao (Chinese, T36.1736sby Chengguan; (6) the *Nyayapravesa-sastra by Samkarasvamin (Chinese, T44.1840); (7) the Three Parts of Syllogism by Xuanzang (Chinese X53.0861); (8) and the Verses on the Structure of the Eight Consciousnesses by Xuanzang (Chinese, Root text can be found in Putai’s T45.1865)
69 X51.0824.0297a06- 454a05. This is a Ming dynasty work that attempt to explain the Cheng weishi lun based on works from late Tang to early Ming.
70 More on the Ming dynasty revival of Yogacara in the next chapter.
71 The ten branches are: (1) the *Mahayana satadharma prakasamukha sastra by Vasubandhu (Chinese); (2) the *Pañca-skandha-prakarana by Vasubandhu (Chinese, T31.1612); (3) the *Arya sasana prakarana by Asanga ( Chinese, T31.1602); (4) the Mahayanasamgraha sastra by Asanga (Chinese, T31.1594, Xuanzang translation); (5) the Abhidharmasamuccaya by Asanga (Chinese, T31.1605); (6) the Madhyantavibhaga bhasya attributed to Maitreya (Chinese, T31.1600); (7) the Vimsatika sastra by Vasubandhu (Chinese, T31.1590); (8) the Trimsika sastra by Vasubandhu (Chinese) (9) Mahayana-sutralamkara sastra attributed to Asanga or Maitreya (Chinese, T31.1604), (10) the Fenbie yuqie lun attributed to Maitreaya (Chinese, did not survive only mentioned in other sources).
72 The Yogacarabhumi was the main focus of Ouyang’s studies at that time. It was also the main focus of others who dedicated their career and intellectual pursue to Buddhism; people like Han Qingjing (see Cheng Gongrang, "Analysis of the Characteristics of Han Qingjing's Buddhist Thought [Chinese]," Pumen Xuebao [Chinese, 1 (2001), 147-166. or Zhang Taiyan who studied this sastra while he was in a Manchu jail from 1903-1906 (see Shimada Kenji, Pioneer of the Chinese Revolution: Zhang Binglin and Confucianism (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1990).
73 This would change with Ouyang’s disciple and student Lü Cheng (Chinese, 1896-1989), who, in addition to his native Chinese, had also good command of Sanskrit, Tibetan and Japanese. Lü Cheng’s contribution to Buddhist studies is still largely ignored and unrecognized and he is certainly worthy of further scholarly attention.
74 See Ouyang Jingwu, "Another Response to Chen Zhenru [Chinese]," in Collected Writings of Master Ouyang [Chinese] (Taibei: Xinwenfeng Press, 1976), 1591.
75 Text such as the *Pañcaskandhaprakarana the Mahayanasa'graha sastra or the *Buddhabhumisutra sastra and so on.
76 Lü Cheng, "A Brief Biography of My Teacher Mr. Ouyang, 355.
77 Here is the account of Yang Wenhui’s granddaughter from her autobiography: “Believing that he did not have long to live, Grandfather (i.e. Yang Wenhui) called together his pupils and members of the family to arrange his affairs. The Buddhist Press was assigned to a board of three men, Chen Xian (who had taught me at Wuchang) in charge of finance and management, Chen Yifu in charge of external relations, and Ouyang Jian in charge of editorial work. He reaffirmed his previous will that the Yanling Xiang property was to go to the Press, but that his family had the right to veto the sale of the property by the management. His pupils Kuai Ruomu and Mei Guangxi proposed that a separate house should be erected by subscription for the Yangs to live in. But Father did not want any public funds to be raised for the benefit of the family. After much discussion, an arrangement was made which has lasted to the present time. The westernmost courtyard was to be made into a shrine and tomb for my grandfather, and various branches of the family were to take turns in living in that courtyard to take care of the shrine. The next row of courtyards were for the rest of the family to use. The eastern half of the premises, including the front door at 49 Yanling Xiang, was for the use of the Press, except that all the woodblocks for printing the books were housed in a courtyard behind the shrine courtyard”. Chao Buwei Yang, and Chao Yuen Ren, Autobiography of a Chinese Woman, Buwei Yang Chao (New York: The John Day Company, 1947), 90-91.
78 See Holmes Welsh, The Buddhist Revival in China, 319. In another of her works, Yang Wenhui’s daughter describes an argument between Gui Bohua, Ouyang Jingwu and Yang Wenhui when the two disciples wanted to move the printery to Jiangxi and Yang refused. Cheng Gongrang argued that this is impossible because Gui Bohua was around that time in Japan (Cheng Gongrang, Studies in Ouyang Jingwu's Buddhist Thought, 91), but regardless of whether this fact was true or not there is little doubt that mentioning this fact reflects bitter feelings on both sides.
79 Shen Zengzhi (Chinese, 1850-1922), a renowned poet, calligrapher and scholar in the late Qing, a Jinshi graduate who served in the imperial department of foreign relations (zongli yamem). In 1901 he was appointed the president of the Shanghai’s Nanyang Univerity (which later became Jiaotong Univerity). He had a broad interest in both Western and Chinese traditional learning, after the collapse of the Qing also immersed himself in the study of Buddhism. For more see Ge Zhaoguang, “There was no Such a Man in the World: The Forgetting Shen Zengzhi and his Scholarship [Chinese],” Dushu 9, no. 2 (1995): 64-72.
80 Holmes Welch, The Buddhist Revival in China, 57. In his book Welch questioned whether Ouyang and others even knew about this federation, mainly because Taixu had some tension with Ouyang and some other listed.
81 Holmes Welch, The Buddhist Revival in China, 204.
82 Holmes Welch, The Buddhist Revival in China, 319.
83 See Ouyang Jingwu, "Discussing the Research of the Inner Studies” [Chinese]," Neixue neikan 2 (1924): 1-3.
84 Holmes Welch, The Buddhist Revival in China, 319.
85 Although the term Faxing (Chinese) was used in China most often to refer to the tathagatagarbha teaching here, maybe deliberately, Ouyang uses this term to denote the Madhyamaka teachings.
86 Ouyang’s choice of Esoteric Buddhist department is interesting. Ouyang was known as an avid opponent of the more religious dimensions within Buddhism and yet he dedicated a whole department to the study of this highly ritualized and esoteric school. His reason was, of course, the fact that he modeled his institution after Nalanda University in which, according to the sources on which he relied, the study of Esoteric Buddhism was a part of the curriculum.
87 Cheng Gongrang, "The Characteristics of Ouyang Jingwu's Biography, Career and Buddhist Thought [Chinese]," Yuan Kuang Buddhist Journal [Chinese, 12, no. 4 (1999): 175.
88 Texts such as the Dazhidulun or the Mulamadhyamaka karika
89 Wang Enyang. “Overview of the Inner Studies Institute [Chinese],” Neixue neikan 2 (1924): 189-191.
90 See Xu and Wang, A Critical Biography of Ouyang Jingwu, 91.
91 See Richard Gombrich, How Buddhism Began: The Conditioned Genesis of the Early Teachings (London; New York: Routledge, 2006), 4, 16.
92 Ouyang Jingwu, "The Inner Studies Institute Instruction Book, Part 1 [Chinese]: Instruction on Buddhist Compassion [Chinese]," Neixue neikan 3 (1926): 47.
93 Ouyang Jingwu, "Reply Letter to Wei Siyi [Chinese]," in Collected Writings of Master Ouyang [Chinese] (Taibei: Xinwenfeng Press, 1976), 1550-51.
94 Lü Cheng, "A Brief Biography of My Teacher Mr. Ouyang, 356.
95 Ouyang Jingwu, Reply Letter to Wei Siyi, 1553.
96 Ouyang Jingwu, The Sutra of the Great Vehicle Secret Adornment [Chinese] in Essentials of the Canon [Chinese]," in Collected Writings of Master Ouyang [Chinese] (Taibei: Xinwengfeng Press, 1976), 1011-12.
97 Ouyang started to read those sutras and write about them when he was 56 after the death of his older sister in 1926. This process continued throughout his older years. (see Xu and Wang, A Critical Biography of Ouyang Jingwu, 196-7.)
98 Ouyang Jingwu, The Sutra of the Great Vehicle Secret Adornment, 1022-23.
99 Generally speaking anupadhisesa nirvana refers to final liberation in which the body does not exist and there is no more karmic residue.
100 Ouyang Jingwu, "Readings in the 11 themes in the Analects [Chinese]," in Collected Writings of Master Ouyang [Chinese] (Taibei: Xinwenfeng Press, 1976), 3029-3132.
101 Ouyang Jingwu, "Preface to Readings in the Zhongyong [Chinese]," in Collected Writings of Master Ouyang [Chinese] (Taibei: Xinwenfeng Press, 1976), 2995-3001.
102 Ouyang Jingwu, “Reading in the Wang Yangming commentary on the Daxue [Chinese],” in Collected Writings of Master Ouyang [Chinese] (Taibei: Xinwenfeng Press, 1976), 2963-2994.
103 Ouyang Jingwu, "Readings in the 11 themes in the Analects [Chinese]," in Collected Writings of Master Ouyang [Chinese] (Taibei: Xinwenfeng Press, 1976) , 3029-3132.
104 See his preface to the Sutra of the Great Vehicle Secret Adornment, Ouyang Jingwu, “The Sutra of the Great Vehicle Secret Adornment (Chinese) in Essentials of the Canon [Chinese]," in Collected Writings of Master Ouyang [Chinese], (Taibei: Xinwengfeng Press, 1976), 1011-1066.
105 Ouyang Jingwu, "Preface to Readings in the Zhongyong [Chinese]," in Collected Writings of Master Ouyang [Chinese] (Taibei: Xinwenfeng Press, 1976), 3000.
106 Ouyang Jingwu, "Preface to Readings in the Zhongyong, 2967.
107 A coup that was organized by Chiang Kai-shek in order to damage the alliance between the communists in the KMT and Wang Jingwei, the KMT leader of that time. The Zhongshan was a warship headed by a communist commander name Li Zhilong. On the pretext that Li was planning a coup against Chiang, Chiang, together with several of his loyal officers, Ouyang Ge among them, arrested Li Zhilong and declared martial law in Canton. They arrested the local communist leaders, among them Zhou Enlai, and forced them to go through ideological training. Later, in order to appease the Russians, Chiang had to fire a few of the people involved, and among them was Ouyang Ge (Spence, The Search for Modern China, 344).
108 The event that led to the Japanese occupation of North East China. On September 18, 1931 the Japanese army set off explosives on a railway line outside of Mukdan and used the skirmish that followed to open a full-scale attack on the Chinese forces. The result was the lose of Manchuria to the Japanese (Ibid., 391-2).
109 A battle fought between Japan and China in Shanghai in 1932 followed by an aggression of the Japanese army the killed many innocent Chinese civilians (Ibid., 393-4).
110 Another naval battle along the Yangtze River that took place on June 28, 1938 next to Madang in Anhui province.
111 Lü Cheng, A Brief Biography of My Teacher Mr. Ouyang, 356.
112 Holmes Welsh, The Buddhist Revival of China, 120.
113 Jiang, Canteng. Controversies and Developments in Chinese Modern Buddhist Thought [Chinese] (Taibei: Nantian Press, 1998), 559-560.
114 Quoted in Xu and Wang, A Critical Biography of Ouyang Jingwu, 73-74.
115 Chinese (Skt. acarya-must) refers to the empty fist of the Buddha, a gesture Buddha used in his last sermon before he died to tell his beloved cousin and attendant Ananda that the Tathagata holds nothing in his closed fist. This gesture indicated that the Buddha revealed all and hid nothing from his disciples (see Mahaparinibbana Sutta DN 16). Zhang is probably quoting the Yogacarabhumi-sastra (Chinese) (T30.1579.763.b9-10)
116 Quoted in Xu and Wang, A Critical Biography of Ouyang Jingwu, 74.
117 Ibid., 78.
118 Tang Junyi, "Intellectual Trends in the Early Republic and the Course of My Philosophy Studies [Chinese]" The Hong Kong Overseas Chinese Human Culture Weekly [Chinese, 2/12/1968.
119 Holmes Welsh, The Buddhist Revival of China, 119.
120 See Hu Shi, The Indianization of China: A Case Study in Cultural Borrowing.
121 Cheng Gongrang, Studies in Ouyang Jingwu's Buddhist Thought, 124.
122 Chan, Wing-tsit. Religious Trends in Modern China (New York: Columbia University Press, 1953).