The name Hongzhou refers to the Tang dynasty province that was located in the northern part of present-day Jiangxi province (the area around Nanchang). Mazu taught here during his last years and some of his disciples also taught in this region.[2]
During the Song dynasty (960–1279), many texts were written which constructed encounter dialogues that included Hongzhou school masters as the main characters. These texts present them as iconoclastic and antinomian figures. However, modern scholars do not consider these later Song sources as reliable depictions of these historical figures.[3][4]
History
Mazu ("Master Ma") DaoyiYoumin Temple in Nanchang, Mazu's main Hongzhou monastery during his later life (which at the time was known as Kaiyuan monastery).[5]
During the life of the founder Mazu, the An Lu-shan Rebellion (755-763) led to a loss of control by the Tang dynasty, which changed the position of elite Chan Buddhism. Metropolitan Chan began to lose its status while other schools began to develop in outlying areas, led by various masters, many of whom traced themselves to Huineng.[6]
Mazu Daoyi
Mazu Daoyi (709–788) was a monk from Sifang county, Sichuan. His teachers are said to have included Reverend Tang (684-734) of Zizhou, Reverend Jin (Korean: Kim, also known as Wuxiang, Korean: Musang), and Huairang.[7] Traditionally, Mazu is depicted as a successor in the lineage of Huineng, through his teacher Nanyue Huairang. McRae argues that the connection between Huineng and Huairang is doubtful, being the product of later rewritings of Chán-history to place Mazu in the traditional lineages.[8]
In the latter half of his life, Mazu moved to Hongzhou (present day north Jiangxi), where he began taking students. First he resided on Gonggong mountain, and then he settled in Nanchang's state-sponsored Kaiyuan monastery (today known as Youmin Temple) in Hongzhou (present day north Jiangxi). During his two decade period at this monastery, Mazu's fame spread and he attracted many disciples from throughout the empire.[9]
According to Poceski, "Mazu had the largest number of close disciples (rushi dizi, literally, “disciples who entered the room”) among Chan teachers from the Tang period."[10] Some important students of Mazu include: Nanquan, Fenzhou Wuye (761–823), Guizong Zhichang (dates unknown), Xingshan Weikuan (755–817), Zhangjing Huaihui (756–815), Danxia Tianran (739–824), Dongsi Ruhui (744–823), Tianhuang Daowu (748–807), and Furong Taiyu (747–826).[11]
Poceski also notes that Mazu's disciples "come across as monks at home in their dealings with powerful officials. They appear conversant with Buddhist texts, doctrines, and practices, and proficient at preaching to monks and literati alike."[12]
Xitang Zhizang
After Mazu's death in 788, Xitang Zhizang became the leader of Kaiyuan monastery. Despite his leading role, little information on him is found in Chan sources and there is no record of his sayings. None of his disciples were influential and perhaps this is why he was neglected in later sources. After the Tang, Baizhang and Nanquan supplanted Xitang as the leaders of the second generation of the school.[13]
Baizhang Huaihai
Baizhang
Baizhang Huaihai (720–814) was a dharma heir of Mazu and a member of the aristocratic Wang clan of Taiyuan. Baizhang later came to be seen as Mazu's most important disciple, though early on, his name did not even appear in Mazu's stele inscription as part of Mazu's ten main disciples.[14] Baizhang's main center was at the remote Baizhang mountain southwest of Shimen where he taught students, including Guishan Lingyou (771–853) and Huangbo, for two decades.[15]
Later tradition attributes to Bhaizang the creation of a unique kind of Chan monasticism and the authorship of an early set of rules for Chan monastics, the Pure Rules of Baizhang (Chinese: 百丈清規; pinyin: Bǎizhàng qīngguī; Wade–Giles: Pai-chang ch'ing-kuei).,[16] but there is no historical evidence for this.[17] Indeed, according to Poceski "his traditional image as a patron saint of “Chan monasticism” is not in any meaningful way related to him as a historical person. Baizhang did not institute a novel system of Chan monastic rules that was institutionally disengaged from the mainstream tradition of Tang monasticism."[18]
Later Song dynasty texts also attempt to make Baizhang the main "orthodox" recipient of Mazu's lineage. This is a later genealogical construct by Song authors, Mazu did not have one single "orthodox" disciple, but many different disciples who spread his teachings throughout China.[19]
Other students of Mazu
Mazu's many students spread his teachings throughout China. A major center of the Hongzhou tradition was at Mount Lu, where the leading disciple Guizong Zhichang (dates unknown) and Fazang (dates unknown) built the first Chan communities on the famous mountain, like Guizong temple, which was visited by the famous poet Li Bo.[20] Other important disciples who formed communities of their own in Jiangxi include Shigong Huizang (dates unknown), Nanyuan Daoming (dates unknown), and Yangqi Zhenshu (d. 820).[21]
Huaihui and Weikuan are known for having established the Hongzhou school in the imperial capital of Chang'an. Weikuan was even invited by Emperor Xianzong to preach at the imperial court in 809 and he remained in the capital's Xingshan monastery until the end of his life, becoming a central figure of the imperial capital's religious life.[22] He was also the teacher of the famous poet Bo Juyi.[22]
Regarding the old capital of Luoyang, the best known disciple of Mazu who taught here was Foguang Ruman (752–842?). He was also a teacher of the poet Bo Juyi.[23]
Outside of Jiangxi, Yaoshan, Ruhui, Tanzang (758–827), Deng Yinfeng (dates unknown), and Zhaoti Huilang (738–820) all formed communities in Hunan, while Yanguan, Dazhu, and Damei Fachang formed communities in Zhejiang.[24] Regarding the northern provinces, Shaanxi and Shanxi received disciples such as Wuye, Zhixian, and Magu Baoche (dates unknown).[25]
As Poceski writes, the Hongzhou school heavily relied on imperial and aristocratic patronage which allowed it to quickly emerge as a major Chan tradition in the ninth century.[26]
Relationship with other traditions
Doui, a student of Zhizang and Baizhang who established the Gaji san school (迦智山) at Borimsa.
There are also links between Mazu's school and the Oxhead school. Some of Mazu's students were known to have come from the Oxhead school and others were sent to study at Oxhead monasteries by Mazu himself.[27] An inscription for Dayi, one of Mazu's students, condemns sectarianism and according to Poceski "rejects the sharp distinctions between the Northern and Southern schools propounded by Shenhui and his followers and instead argues for a rapprochement between the two." Poceski also notes that "the inscription implies that Mazu's disciples adopted a tolerant attitude toward other Chan schools/lineages and eschewed the pursuit of narrow sectarian agendas (or at least were more subtle about it)."[28]
During the mid-Tang, most other major Chan schools (the Northern school, the Oxhead school, Shenhui's Southern school and the Baotang) all died out, being unable to attract enough students and support. This allowed Mazu's school to become the dominant Chan tradition in China. The only other school which survived this period was Shitou's school, though it remained a marginal one.[29]
The Hongzhou school superseded the older Chan schools and established themselves as their official successor, the inclusive defender of Tang Chan orthodoxy which avoided the antinomianism of Baotang and the sectarianism of Shenhui's Southern school. While individual teachers like Shitou Xiqian and Guifeng Zongmi did present alternative traditions, they never rivaled the Hongzhou tradition, which remained the normative form of Chan for the rest of the Tang and beyond.[30]
Mazu's students were also influential during the spread of Chan to Korea during the pivotal period of the first half of the ninth century.[31] During this period, almost all Korean Seon monks who participated in the transmission of Chan to Korea were students of Mazu's disciples. These figures founded seven out of the Korean “nine mountain schools of Sŏn” (kusan sŏnmun).[31]
Later developments and figures
Huangbo Xiyun
By the latter Tang dynasty, the Hongzhou school's was supplanted by various distinct regional traditions (the "five houses") that arose during the instability of the late Tang and the Five Dynasties eras. The first of these was the Guiyang school of Guishan and his disciple Yangshan, but this tradition did not survive the fall of the Tang.[32]
A key figure of the third generation is Huangbo Xiyun (died 850), who was a dharma heir of Baizhang Huaihai. He started his monastic career at Mount Huangbo. In 842 he took up residence at Lung-hsing Monastery at the invitation of Pei Xiu (787 or 797–860), who was also a lay-student of Guifeng Zongmi of Shenhui's Heze school.[33] Huangbo's student, Linji Yìxuán (died 866 CE), was later seen as the founder of his own school, the Linji school, based in Hebei'sLinji temple, which remains an important tradition today after having become the dominant form of Chan during the Song dynasty.[34]
With the passage of time, some of the luster of Mazu's religious personality was transferred to Linji, and the image of the Hongzhou school was altered in ways that reflected the ideological stances of subsequent Chan/Zen traditions. This process is reflected in later mythologized constructions of the Hongzhou school's teachings and character. The mystique ascribed to Mazu and his disciples was accompanied with assorted obscurations of the Hongzhou school's history, doctrines, practices, and institutions.
Teachings
Background
According to Jinhua Jia, "the doctrinal foundation of the Hongzhou school was mainly a mixture of the tathagata-garbha thought and prajñaparamita theory, with a salient emphasis on the kataphasis of the former."[36]
Poceski also highlights the importance of buddha-nature for the Hongzhou school, though he also writes that "overall there is a disposition to avoid imputing explicit ontological status to the Buddha-nature...this is accompanied by a Madhyamaka-like stress on nonattachment and elimination of one-sided views—especially evident in Baizhang's record—that are based on the notion that ultimate reality cannot be predicated."[37]
He also argues that the Hongzhou school's doctrinal approach was an eclectic approach that drew on diverse sources, including Madhyamaka, Yogacara, the Huayan school's philosophy as well as Daoist works.[38]
Furthermore, their use of sources was "accompanied by an aversion to dogmatic assertions of indelible truths and an awareness of the provisional nature of conceptual constructs." Thus, while the Hongzhou school made use of various teachings, they were not to be seen as a fixed theory, since ultimate truth is indescribable and beyond words.[39]
Mazu's citation of various sutras indicate that his teaching drew from Mahayana sources like the Laṅkāvatāra sutra's mind only teaching (yogacara - cittamatra).[40] Other teachings of Mazu and Baizhang also quote or paraphrase other Mahayana sutras, like the Vimalakirti sutra and Prajñāpāramitā scriptures.[41] According to Poceski, "rather than repudiating the scriptures or rejecting their authority, the records of Mazu and his disciples are full of quotations and allusions to a range of canonical texts."[42] Poceski also notes that in Baizhang's record one can find numerous scriptural citations, including "obscure references and the use of a technical vocabulary that point to a mastery of canonical texts and doctrines."[43] However, even while they retained the use of scripture and demonstrated a mastery of the canon, the Hongzhou sources also demonstrate that these Chan teachers had the ability to express the insights of Mahayana in a new way.[44]
Monasticism
The Hongzhou school was a monastic tradition and as such, buddhist monasticism, with its Vinaya disciplinary code and emphasis on renunciation and simple living, is an assumed background to Hongzhou school sources.[45] The Guishan jingce (Guishan's Admonitions) provides an overview of the Hongzhou school's teachings on monastic life and ethics, which are generally follow traditional Chinese models.[46]
Non-attachment and ultimate reality
According to Poceski, at the core of the teaching of Hongzhou teachers like Mazu, Dazhu, Baizhang, Nanquan, and Huangbo is the cultivation of non-attachment, "an ascent into increasingly rarefied states of detachment and transcendence, in which the vestiges of dualistic thought are eliminated. This implies not clinging to any doctrine, practice, or experience, including the notions of detachment and nonduality. The perfection of a liberated state of mind that is free from attachment and ignorance, explains Baizhang, is predicated on the realization of the twofold emptiness of person and things."[47]
Awakening is the sudden letting go of all deluded thoughts, it is a mind that does not abide or cling to anything. Dhazu defines the "non-abiding mind" (wuzhu xin) as follows:[48]
Not abiding anywhere [means that] one does not abide in good and evil, existence and nothingness, inside, outside, or in-between. Not abiding in emptiness and not abiding in non-emptiness, not abiding in concentration and not abiding in the absence of concentration, that is not abiding anywhere. Only this not abiding anywhere is the [true] abode. When one attains this, it is called the non-abiding mind. The non-abiding mind is the Buddha mind.
Similarly, Huangbo writes that "if students of the Way wish to attain Buddhahood, they need not study all Buddhadharmas. They only need to study “non-seeking” and “non-attachment” ... Just transcend all afflictions, and then there is no Dharma that can be obtained."[49]
The Hongzhou school, like many Mahayana traditions, held that all things are permeated and encompassed by an ultimate reality which complete and perfect, and is variously termed the “One Mind”, "original mind", "truth" or “Suchness”.[50]
A key element of the Hongzhou's school's practice instructions was to let go of conceptual thoughts, which are always dualistic. The state which has let go of all views, concerns, and thoughts is called no-mind (wuxin) and was promoted by masters like Huangbo.[51] Mazu states:
The self-nature is originally complete. If only either good or evil things do not hinder one, then that is a person who cultivates the Way. Grasping good and rejecting evil, contemplating emptiness and entering samādhi, all of these belong to activity. If one seeks outside, one goes away from it. Just put an end to all mental conceptions in the three realms. If there is not a single thought, then one eliminates the root of birth and death, and obtains the unexcelled treasury of the Dharma king.[51]
Skillful means
Because of the non-duality of the ultimate reality with the everyday world, awakening is always available to all, at all times, if only we just let go. Generally though, to discover this ultimate reality, we need specific spiritual practices (i.e. skillful means, Ch: fangbian) tailored to the individual.[50] According to Poceski, these methods for liberation need to be "flexible, contextual, and nuanced" and they should not be turned into sources of attachment.[50] Indeed, every teaching or practice is a skillful means, and is only conclusive in that it helps certain people to awakening. No teaching should be seen as a dogmatic assertion.[52]
This led to what Poceski terms "the determined refusal on the part of Mazu and his disciples to commit to a narrow doctrinal perspective."[53] Mazu's school generally understood ultimate reality to be “inconceivable” (buke siyi), as "transcending conceptual constructs and verbal expressions." They thus stressed the need to avoid the reification of and attachment to religious texts, doctrines, practices, and experiences.[54] Becoming attached to these turned them into obstacles to awakening instead of useful methods. Because of this, authors like Baizhang held that the truth of a doctrine was dependent on its power to lead to spiritual awakening.[54] Thus, according to Baizhang "true words cure sickness. If the cure manages to bring about healing, then all are true words. [On the other hand,] if they cannot effectively cure sickness, all are false words. True words are false words, insofar as they give rise to views. False words are true words, insofar as they cut off the delusions of sentient beings."[54]
Ultimate though, figures like Dazhu held that eventually one needs to abandon all words and teachings: "words are used to reveal the [ultimate] meaning, but when the meaning is realized, words are discarded."[55]
"This Mind is Buddha"
Two related teachings which appear frequently in the works of Mazu and his disciplines are the statements "This Mind is Buddha" (jixin shi fo) and "Ordinary Mind is the Way."[56] These ideas are based on teachings found in the Avatamsaka sutra, as well on the doctrine of the non-duality of samsara and nirvana and Chinese Buddhist ideas, like the doctrine of the "true mind" (zhenxin) and the teachings of the Awakening of Faith.[57] The Avatamsaka states: "As mind is, so is the Buddha; as the Buddha is, so are living beings. One should know that the Buddha's and mind's Essential nature is boundless."[58]
The basic idea of the mind being buddha is that there is a true buddha mind or "a substratum of pure awareness" (Poceski) within all sentient beings, but this is obscured by passing defilements.[58] As Mazu states (echoing the Awakening of Faith):[59]
The mind can be spoken of [in terms of its two aspects]: birth and death, and suchness. The mind as suchness is like a clear mirror, which can reflect images. The mirror symbolizes the mind; the images symbolize phenomena (dharmas). If the mind attaches to phenomena, then it gets involved in external causes and conditions, which is the meaning of birth and death. If the mind does not attach to phenomena, that is the meaning of suchness.
All of you should believe that your mind is Buddha, that this mind is identical with Buddha. The Great Master Bodhidharma came from India to China and transmitted the One Mind teaching of Mahāyāna so that it can lead you all to awakening. Fearing that you will be too confused and will not believe that this One Mind is inherent in all of you, he used the Laṅkāvatāra Scripture to seal the sentient beings' mind-ground. Therefore, in the Laṅkāvatāra Scripture, the Buddha stated that mind is the essential teaching, and the gate of non-being is the Dharma-gate.
Mazu and his students were careful to indicate that this teaching should not be reified as a kind of self (atman) or an unchanging essence.[60] In other passages, Mazu states that he teaches mind is Buddha to "stop the crying of children" and that later he teaches them "it is neither mind nor Buddha" (feixin feifo) and that "it is not a thing" (bushi wu).[60] Poceski notes that in this context the "mind is Buddha" teaching serves as an introductory teaching meant to inspire confidence, which later might even be negated as one professes in one's training.[60] Likewise, Baizhang argues that all such teaching statements are provisional and must ultimately be given up.[61]
If you want to know the Way directly, then ordinary mind is the Way (pingchang xin shi dao). What is an ordinary mind? It means no intentional creation and action, no right or wrong, no grasping or rejecting, no terminable or permanent, no profane or holy. The sutra says, “Neither the practice of ordinary men, nor the practice of sages—that is the practice of the Bodhisattva.” Now all these are just the Way: walking, abiding, sitting, lying, responding to situations, and dealing with things.
“Self-nature is originally perfectly complete. If only one is not hindered by either good or evil things, he is called a man who cultivates the Way. Grasping good and rejecting evil, contemplating emptiness and entering concentration—all these belong to intentional action. If one seeks further outside, he strays farther away.”
According to Mario Poceski, this teaching is directed at monks who are engaged in daily contemplative practices,
In that context, they serve as instruction about the cultivation of a holistic state of awareness, in which the mind abandons all defilements and is unattached to dualistic concepts such as worldliness and holiness, permanence and impermanence. One of Mazu's key points is that such a mental state can be perfected within the context of everyday life. Since all things and events partake of the character of reality, they provide avenues for the cultivation of detachment and transcendence. The passage can also be read as a caution against quietist withdrawal from the world and the cultivation of refined states of meditative absorption, symbolized by the sages who follow the Hīnayāna path.[63]
As such, the "ordinary mind" is not the state of ordinary peoples' minds, but "a detached state of nondual awareness" which requires training and practice.[63] As Poceski writes, "in that context, religious practice involves a constant effort to abstain from giving rise to discriminating thoughts, which bifurcate reality into dualistic opposites and obscure the essential nature of the “ordinary mind.”[63]
As noted by Jinhua Jia, this doctrine was attacked by various Chan figures, such as by Zongmi who stated that "they fail to distinguish between ignorance and enlightenment, the inverted and the upright," and Nanyang Huizhong, who argued: “the south[ern doctrine] wrongly taught deluded mind as true mind, taking thief as son, and regarding mundane wisdom as Buddha wisdom.”[62] According to Zongmi, Hongzhou Chan's mistake was rooted in its teaching that greed, hatred and delusion, good and evil, happiness or suffering are all buddha-nature.[62]
However, Poceski argues that these critiques do not hold, since Mazu and his disciples were not speaking of the "everyday mind of ordinary people" when they used the term "ordinary mind". Rather, the "ordinary mind" is clearly said by Mazu to be without defilements and unwholesome mental states, and as such Poceski defines it as "the nondual mind, which is divested of impurities and transcends all views and attachments."[64] Poceski associates "ordinary mind" with the "no-mind" found in earlier Chan sources like the Wuxin lun (Treatise on No-mind), the Platform Scripture, and the Lidai fabao ji (Record of the Dharma-Jewel through the Ages).[64]
"Original purity" and "No cultivation"
Mazu also stated that the Buddha-nature or the Original Mind is already pure, without the need for cultivation and hence he stated that “the Way needs no cultivation”. This was because according to Mazu:
This mind originally existed and exists at present, without depending on intentional creation and action; it was originally pure and is pure at present, without waiting for cleaning and wiping. Self-nature attains nirvana; self-nature is pure; self-nature is liberation; and self nature departs [from delusions].[65]
This view was also criticized by Zongmi because he believed it “betrayed the gate of gradual cultivation.”[66]
For Mazu, Buddha nature was actualized in everyday human life and its actions. As noted by Jinhua Jia "The ultimate realm of enlightenment manifests itself everywhere in human life, and Buddha-nature functions in every aspect of daily experiences". Thus, Mazu argued:[67]
Since limitless kalpas, all sentient beings have never left the samadhi of dharma-nature, and they have always abided in the samadhi of dharma-nature. Wearing clothes, eating food, talking and responding, making use of the six senses—all these activities are dharma nature. If you now understand this reality, you will truly not create any karma. Following your destiny, passing your life, with one cloak or one robe, wherever sitting or standing, it is always with you.
View on practice
While many traditional sources have seen the Hongzhou school as completely subitist, and as rejecting all gradual practice (a critique leveled by Zongmi), Poceski writes that "a closer look at the relevant textual sources reveals that terms and ideas associated with subitism are not nearly as prominent within the Hongzhou school's teachings as later generations of Chan teachers, writers, and scholars have presupposed."[68] The term 'sudden awakening' only appears once in the records of Mazu, and refers to the experience of a person with superior capacity.[68] Likewise, it only appears once in Baizhang's record, and not in a saying attributed to him.[68]
Poceski also notes that while certain critiques of gradual methods are found, they generally center on critiques of mechanical cultivation as well as reification of and attachment to specific methods or skillful means. Tthey also do not outright reject spiritual cultivation per se.[69] Indeed, Mazu criticizes such a rejection in a sermon that states "if one says that there is no need for cultivation, that is the same as ordinary people".[70] Likewise Baizhang's record also criticizes the view that since one is Buddha one does not need to practice:
To attach to original purity and original liberation, to consider oneself to be a Buddha, to be someone who understands Chan [without actually engaging in practice], that belongs to the way of those heretics who [deny cause and effect] and hold that things happen spontaneously.[71]
Regarding their discussions of monastic training and spiritual cultivation, many gradual training elements can be found in the sources of the Hongzhou school.[72] In one example, Baizhang used the simile of washing a dirty robe to explain how one should study. Similarly, Mazu urges the keeping of pure precepts and the accumulation of wholesome karma, and Da'an's record uses the ox-herding pictures as a way to explain gradual progress on the path.[73] Indeed, according to Poceski, "a central theme in Baizhang guanglu is Chan practitioners' progression along stages that constitute a path of practice."[74]
These three progressive stages are explained through the "three propositions":[75]
At the first stage, one cultivates non-attachment from everything. Poceski describes this as "when encountering all sorts of situations and coming in contact with various phenomena perceived though the senses, he is aware of their innate characteristics and is able to ascertain their purity or defilement. Yet, while adept at making such distinctions, he distances himself from everything and gives up all grasping and attachment."
At the second stage, one “breaks through the good mind” cultivated at the first stage and one abandons dwelling in peaceful state of detachment. Baizhang states: "once one does not grasp anymore, and yet does not abide in nonattachment either, that is the intermediate good." Poceski notes that in this stage one "abandons the subtle form of spiritual clinging to the state of nondiscrimination and nonattachment." Poceski adds that "while at this stage the mind is disengaged from the habitual tendency to discriminate and attach to dualistic opposites, and there is attendant reflectivity that prevents reification and dwelling in nonattachment, there is still a subtle sense of self-awareness, as the practitioner is aware of himself as being someone who has relinquished all attachment without being stuck in an unadulterated state of nondiscriminating awareness."
The final step entails freeing the mind from the most subtlest hindrances, "the last vestiges of attachment and self-centered awareness"..."he must not even give rise to discernment or awareness that the subtlest forms of attachment have been forsaken." As Baizhang describes it: "once one does not abide in nonattachment any more, and does not even engender any understanding of not abiding in it either, that is the final good".
This model is similar in some ways to Huayan school contemplative models, such as the three general discernments of Dushun'sFajie guanmen (Discernment of the Realm of Reality), and the six categories of contemplation found in Fazang's Wangjin huanyuan guan (Discernment of Ending Falsehood and Returning to the Source).[76]
Meditation
Hongzhou school sources don't contain much sustained discussion on the topic of meditation. Some sources contain explicit criticisms of certain forms of meditative practice (but most of these appear in later unreliable sources).[77] One passage by Mazu states:
If one comprehends the mind and objects, then false thinking is not created again. When there is no more false thinking, that is acceptance of the non-arising of all dharmas. Originally it exists and it is present now, irrespective of cultivation of the Way and sitting in meditation. Not cultivating and not sitting is the Tathāgata's pure meditation.[77]
Some scholars, like Yanagida Seizan think that this passage shows Mazu rejected formal sitting meditation. However, according to Poceski, "the passage simply asserts that the originally existing Buddha-nature does not depend on the practice of meditation or any other spiritual exercise—in itself, little more than a sound doctrinal statement. Mazu's position is echoed in canonical texts, most notably the Vimalakīrti."[78] As such, Poceski argues that this passage is best read "as a warning against misguided contemplative practice and advice about the proper approach to spiritual cultivation."[79]
Poceski writes that "this interpretation is reinforced by Guishan jingce, which indicates that the monks at Guishan's monastery (and presumably monks at other monasteries associated with the Hongzhou school) engaged in a regimen of traditional monastic practices, of which meditation was an integral part."[79] Furthermore, Dayi's Zuochang ming (Inscription on Sitting Meditation) "resents the practice in fairly conventional terms."[79] Therefore, the lack of attention to meditation in Hongzhou sources is likely to be because their meditation methods were "not that different from those of other contemplative traditions, such as early Chan and Tiantai," though this does not mean they did not interpret them in a unique way according to their other teachings."[79] One well-known story depicts Mazu practicing sitting meditation (dhyana, chan), but being chided by his teacher Nanyue Huairang, comparing seated meditation with polishing a tile to make a mirror.[80] According to Faure, this story is critiquing "the idea of "becoming a Buddha" by means of any practice, lowered to the standing of a "means" to achieve an "end"."[80]
Texts
Some of the main Tang dynasty sources which contain the teachings of the Hongzhou masters have been translated into English, and include the following:[81]
Cheng-chien Bhikshu [Mario Poceski] (1992). Sun-Face Buddha: The Teachings of Ma-tsu and the Hung-chou School of Ch'an;
Cleary, Thomas (1978). Sayings and Doings of Pai-chang;
Blofeld, John (1987). The Zen Teaching of Instantaneous Awakening: Being the Teaching of the Zen Master Hui Hai, Known as the Great Pearl
Blofeld, John (1994). The Zen Teaching of Huang-po on the Transmission of Mind.
Song dynasty sources
According to Mario Poceski, traditional accounts that rely on Song dynasty sources like the Jingde chuandeng lu (Jingde [Era] Record of the Transmission of the Lamp; c. 1004) depict the Hongzhou school as a revolutionary and iconoclastic group that rejected tradition and embraced antinomian practices. In Song texts "we find portrayals of Mazu and his disciples as iconoclasts par excellence, who transgress established norms and subvert received traditions. A well-known example of such radical representations is the story about Mazu's disciple Nanquan (748–834) killing a cat."[82]
Some of these apocryphal “encounter dialogue” (ch: jiyuan wenda, jp: kien mondō) stories depict the Hongzhou school making use of "shock techniques such as shouting, beating, and using irrational retorts to startle their students into realization".[83][84] Earlier scholars like D. T. Suzuki and Hu Shih relied on these sources and saw the Hongzhou school as a radical departure from traditional Buddhism.[84]
During the Song dynasty, the "yü-lü" ("record") genre also developed,[85] the recorded sayings of the masters, and the encounter dialogues. The best-known example is the Lin-ji yü-lü.[web 1] It is part of the Ssu-chia yü lu (Jp. Shike Goruku, The Collection of the Four Houses), which contains the recorded sayings of Mazu Daoyi, Baizhang Huaihai, Huangbo Xiyun and Linji Yixuan.[86] These recorded sayings are well-edited texts, written down up to 160 years after the supposed sayings and meetings.[87]
an unreflective reliance on the Song texts—especially the iconoclastic stories contained in them—is problematic because we cannot trace any of the encounter dialogues back to the Tang period. No source from the Tang period indicates that there was even an awareness of the existence of the encounter‐dialogue format, let alone that it was the main medium of instruction employed in Chan circles. The radicalized images of Mazu, Nanquan, and other Chan teachers from the mid‐Tang period make their first appearance in the middle of the tenth century, well over a century after their deaths. The earliest text that contains such anecdotes is Zutang ji (compiled in 952), and the iconoclastic stories became normative only during the Song period. Accordingly, we can best understand such records as apocryphal or legendary narratives. They were a focal element of imaginative Chan lore created in response to specific social and religious circumstances and served as a centerpiece of an emerging Chan ideology. By means of these stories, novel religious formulations and nascent orthodoxies were retroactively imputed back to the great Chan teachers of the Tang period. The connection with the glories of the bygone Tang era bestowed a sense of sanctity and was a potent tool for legitimizing the Chan school in the religious world of Song China.
Influence
Mazu is perhaps the most influential teaching master in the formation of Chán Buddhism in China.[89] When Chán became the dominant school of Buddhism during the Song dynasty, the Tang period of Mazu's school became regarded as the "Golden Age" of Chan.[90] Numerous stories and texts were written celebrating these figures, many of them apocryphal.[88]
The "shock techniques" found in many of these apocryphal stories became part of the traditional and still popular image of Chan masters displaying irrational and strange behaviour to help their students achieve enlightenment.[91][92] Part of this image was due to later misinterpretations and translation errors, such as the loud belly shout known as katsu. In Chinese "katsu" means "to shout", which has traditionally been translated as "yelled 'katsu'" - which should mean "yelled a yell"[web 2]
The stories about the Hongzhou school are part of the Traditional Zen Narrative which rose to prominence in the Song dynasty, when Chán was the dominant form of Buddhism and received the support of the Imperial Court and the elite literati.[91]
According to modern scholars like McRae, this idea of a "golden age" of iconoclastic and radical Chan masters was mainly a romantic invention of later Song Buddhists:[4]
...what is being referred to is not some collection of activities and events that actually happened in the 8th through 10th centuries, but instead the retrospective re-creation of those activities and events, the imagined identities of the magical figures of the Tang, within the minds of Song dynasty Chan devotees. [4]
Criticism
The Hung-chou school has been criticised for its radical subitism.
Guifeng Zongmi (圭峰 宗密) (780–841), an influential teacher-scholar and patriarch of both the Chán and the Huayan school claimed that the Hung-chou tradition believed "everything as altogether true".[93] Zongmi writes:
Hongzhou school teaches that the arising of mental activity, the movement of thought, snapping the fingers, or moving the eyes, all actions and activities are the functioning of the entire essence of the Buddha-nature. Since there is no other kind of functioning, greed, anger, and folly, the performance of good and bad actions, and the experiencing of their pleasurable and painful consequences are all, in their entirety, Buddha-nature.[94]
According to Zongmi, the Hongzhou school teaching led to a radical non-dualistic view that believed that all actions, good or bad, are expressing Buddha-nature, and therefore denies the need for spiritual cultivation and moral discipline (sila). Zongmi's interpretation of the Hongzhou doctrine would be a dangerously antinomian view, as it eliminates all moral distinctions and validates any actions (including unethical ones) as expressions of the essence of Buddha-nature.[95]
While Zongmi acknowledged that the essence of Buddha-nature and its functioning in the day-to-day reality are but difference aspects of the same reality, he insisted that there is a difference. To avoid the dualism he saw in the Northern Line and the radical nondualism and antinomianism of the Hongzhou school, Zongmi's paradigm preserved "an ethically critical duality within a larger ontological unity",[96] an ontology which he claimed was lacking in Hongzhou Chan.
Chang, Garma C.C. (1992), The Buddhist teaching of Totality. The Philosophy of Hwa Yen Buddhism, Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass Publishers
Dumoulin, Heinrich (2005a), Zen Buddhism: A History. Volume 1: India and China, World Wisdom Books, ISBN9780941532891
Dumoulin, Heinrich (2005b), Zen Buddhism: A History. Volume 2: Japan, World Wisdom Books, ISBN9780941532907
Faure, Bernard (1997), The Will to Orthodoxy: A Critical Genealogy of Northern Chan Buddhism, Stanford University Press
Gregory, Peter N. (2002), Tsung-mi and the Sinification of Buddhism, University of Hawai’i Press, Kuroda Institute, (originally published Princeton University Press, 1991, Princeton, N.J.), ISBN0-8248-2623-X
Heine, Steven (2008), Zen Skin, Zen Marrow, Oxford: Oxford University Press
Kasulis, Thomas P. (2003), Ch'an Spirituality. In: Buddhist Spirituality. Later China, Korea, Japan and the Modern World; edited by Takeuchi Yoshinori, Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass
Lopez, Donald S., Jr., ed. (1993). Buddhist Hermeneutics. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.((cite book)): CS1 maint: multiple names: editors list (link)
Chappell, David W. "Hermeneutical Phases in Chinese Buddhism". In Lopez (1993).
McRae, John (2003), Seeing Through Zen. Encounter, Transformation, and Genealogy in Chinese Chan Buddhism, The University Press Group Ltd, ISBN9780520237988
Poceski, Mario (2010), Monastic Innovator, Iconoclast, and Teacher of Doctrine: The Varied Images of chan Master Baizhang. In: steven Heine and Dale S. Wright 9eds.), "Zen Masters", Oxford University Press
Schuhmacher, Stephan; Woerner, Gert, eds. (1991), The Shambala Dictionary of Buddhism and Zen, translated by Michael H. Kohn, Boston: Shambala
Yampolski, Philip (2003a), Chan. A Historical Sketch. In: Buddhist Spirituality. Later China, Korea, Japan and the Modern World; edited by Takeuchi Yoshinori, Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass
Further reading
Jia, Jinhua (2006), The Hongzhou School of Chan Buddhism in Eighth- through Tenth-Century China, State University of New York Press
Pocescki, Mario (2007), Ordinary Mind as the Way: The Hongzhou School and the Growth of Chan Buddhism, Oxford University Press
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