When it comes to the famous temple of the Pure Land Sect in China, Xuanzhong Temple, located ten kilometers northwest of Jiaocheng County, Shanxi, should be recommended, because it is the birthplace of the Pure Land Sect and the earliest temple of the Pure Land Sect in China.

Xuan

Temple

Chinese Buddhism Pure Land Sect’s famous temple should be recommended Xuanzhong Temple , located ten kilometers northwest of Jiaocheng County, Shanxi Province, because it is the birthplace of Pure Land Sect and the earliest temple of Pure Land Sect in China.

Regarding Xuanzhong Temple, according to " Shanxi Tongzhi " and the Tang stele stored in the temple: "At that time, the sixth emperor of the Great Wei Dynasty, , Yanxing , the second year of Shibi Temple, Luanzushi first built the temple, and it was not until the first year of Chengming." It has a history of more than 1,500 years and is one of the earliest existing temples in my country.

It is located in Shibi Mountain 10 kilometers northwest of Jiaocheng County, Shanxi Province. It covers an area of ​​6,000 square meters. The stone walls on all sides are steep, with green cypresses and 3 surroundings, and the scenery is elegant. Because it is located on the hillside, surrounded by ridges and arches, the mountain is lined with stone arches like walls, so the mountain is called "Shibi". The temple is also called "Shibi Temple " because of the mountain.

This article is reprinted from "Jianshu", the author "Walking China", thank you!

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Xuanzhong Temple

Walking Chinese

2019 During the National Day holiday , I was idle, so I made an appointment with a friend, and the two families went out to play together. Not to mention the far place, I came to Xuanzhong Temple in Jiaocheng County, Luliang City.

28 years ago, in 1991, when I was in college, I was the first time I went out for a trip (Xuanzhong Temple, Guashan , Jin Temple).

We were young and energetic, confused when we encountered things, and were curious about everything new, but we didn’t like to study. We only knew that there were many Japanese tourists in Xuanzhong Temple and had a very superficial understanding of the temple.

At noon on October 4, there were fewer people and cars. We drove to Xuanzhong Temple. It happened that it was drizzling in the sky. We headed all the way to the mountains along the winding mountain road. We saw the winding mountains and ridges of the mountains and the small valleys and the small bridges flowing water and dense forests. It was indeed " The ancient temple hidden in the deep mountains and hiding , listen to the sound of the Sanskrit in the clouds."

Not long after, I turned a corner and a very unique archway stood in front of the road, with four powerful characters "Pure Land Ancient Temple" hanging high on the door frame.

looked around through the mountain gate, and the stone walls on all sides stood thousands of feet high, without desire, and the exquisite Xuanzhong Temple was located in a ditches surrounded by mountains. It really had a bit of "the mountains are covered with clouds and mist half covered with pine, and the thousand-year-old ancient temple is green and red". The clouds and mist cover the peaks and temples, which added a bit of a mysterious feeling, and also echoed "there are many beautiful colors in the Lingshan Mountains, and the empty and water are misty."

is different from when I came to Xuanzhong Temple back then. This time I have a clearer thought than last time. I always want to figure out its ins and outs.

Xuanzhong Temple is the ancestral home of the Pure Land Sect of Chinese Buddhism. It was built in the second year of Yanxing in the Northern Wei Dynasty. It was completed in the first year of Chengming and 476 AD. It has a history of 1,500 years.

The second year of Yanxing was the year after Emperor Xiaowen Tuoba Hong ascended the throne. At that time, Emperor Xiaowen was only six years old, so the actual person in power was still Empress Dowager Feng . Empress Dowager Feng was not only the guide to the sinicization of Xianbei , but also the executor of the popularization of Buddhism. It was under her promotion that Northern Wei Buddhism was able to be promoted and flourished, so Xuanzhong Temple can be regarded as a work under the rule of Empress Dowager Feng.

During the Eastern Wei Dynasty, Master Tanluan Here, he first opened the foundation of Pure Land and created the method of Pure Land; in the ninth year of Zhenguan Tang Taizong Li Shimin visited Xuanzhong Temple and named it "Shibi Yongning Temple". In the 23rd year of Kaiyuan in the Tang Dynasty, the poet Li Bai wrote the word "Spectacular" on the stone wall behind the Thousand Buddha Pavilion.

The Japanese monk Master Faran took Master Shandao's "Commentary on the Sutra of Amitabha" as the theoretical basis and vigorously promoted the Pure Land Sect in Japan. He also respected Tanluan, Daochuo , and Shandao was the ancestor. He regarded Xuanzhong Temple as the ancestor of the Pure Land Sect to worship it. This is also the reason why there were Japanese people visiting Xuanzhong Temple back then.

Yuan Shizu Kublai Khan once issued an imperial edict to protect Xuanzhong Temple. The two generations of eminent monks emerged twice. During the Republic of China, Xuanzhong Temple basically became a ruin after wars.

1949, under the direct care of the government, he allocated six funds to build Xuanzhong Temple on a large scale, making great contributions to the revival of Xuanzhong Temple.

Why is Xuanzhong Temple the second ancestral temple of Pure Land Sect, one of the eight Buddhist sects ? The actual influence on the Pure Land Dharma is far beyond the first ancestral temple Donglin Temple .

As we all know, the ancestral home of Pure Land Sect is Lushan Donglin Temple, and the founder of the founding Sect is the famous Master Huiyuan. Because there is a white lotus pond in the temple, it is called the "Lotus Society".

Donglin Temple is famous because many cultural celebrities have come and interpreted many cultural stories. The most famous ones are Huiyuan and poet Tao Yuanming and Taoist priest Lu Xiujing. The three of them interpreted the story of " Huxi Sanxia ".

However, why is Xuanzhong Temple thousands of miles away also called the Pure Land ancestral temple? What is the relationship between the two?

can be clearly stated that there is no origin between the two. If you really want to talk about the relationship, it is just that the Pure Land doctrines spread are the same.

However, it is not groundless that Xuanzhong Temple can be called the second ancestral temple of the Pure Land Sect. During the period from the late Northern Wei Dynasty to the early Tang Dynasty, three monks were successively released. They practiced and relayed for generations, and finally brought Xuanzhong Temple to the forefront of Chinese Buddhist history.

The reputation of Donglin Temple spread because there are too many literati and poets here: after Tao Yuanming and Xie Lingyun , Meng Haoran , Wang Changling , Li Bai, Du Fu , Han Yu , Bai Juyi , and even Song Dynasty Su Dongpo , Huang Tingjian and others also came.

Poems, songs and essays one by one, you pass on me and me, so that Donglin Temple is so famous that it is rarely comparable in China. In this sense, the best advertisement is literature. A masterpiece can pass on you for thousands of years.

In the ocean of Donglin Temple literature, a small wave was squeezed out:

"Farewell to the monks of Donglin Temple"

Li Bai

Donglin's farewell to the guests, the moon rises and the white apes cry.

Smile far away from Mount Lu, why bother with Tiger Creek?

"Suiting in Donglin Temple"

Bai Juyi

The lights in the scripture window are short, and the fire in the monk furnace is deep.

The rope falls on Mount Lu at night, and the wind and snow sank in the east forest.

"Sitting in Donglin Temple"

Su Shi

The sound of the stream is a long tongue, isn't the scenery of the mountain pure body?

The 84,000 verses came at night, how can you say it like a human in the future?

It can be said that the reputation of Donglin Temple seems to be a bit overwhelming. Literature and poetic snatch the limelight from monks, and literary poetry overwhelms Zen etiquette.

"The orioles sing for thousands of miles, green and red, Shui Village Mountains and Valleys and Flags ; 480 temples in the Southern Dynasties, how many towers and rain are there," Du Mu 's poem " Jiangnan Spring Quatrain " depicts the number of temples at that time. According to historical records, during the reign of Emperor Wu of the Southern Dynasties, the number of temples actually reached 2,846, and the number of monks reached more than 80,000.

In the late of Northern Qi , there were more than 20,000 temples in the entire area, with more than 2 million monks. The number of Buddhist temples also shows the popularity of Buddhism during the Southern and Northern Dynasties period.

Confucian was respected as orthodox thought, but with the demise of in the Han Dynasty and the rise of the Three Kingdoms, Confucian orthodox thought was no longer enough to be adopted by rulers. A new idea was gradually born, which is metaphysics, also known as Qingtan. Metaphysics is not like Confucianism. It is an abstract concept far away from politics and reality, and it provides a new ideological pursuit for intellectuals who escaped political struggle at that time.

"Yongjia Rebellion ", the confrontation between the south and the north officially began. Years of war, the change of dynasties, bloody storms within the royal family, fighting for power and the throne, causing complaints from the aristocratic class and ordinary people.

In this turbulent era, people urgently need to escape the cruelty of reality. Ordinary people also urgently need to seek religious comfort in the war, and also provide a strong help for the prosperity of Buddhism.

Furthermore, the doctrines of Buddhism itself, such as: the immortality of the spirit after death, the cycle of life and death, the theory of cause and effect, etc., meet the requirements of the development of the times, and have led to people vigorously building Buddhist temples and advocating Buddhism.

The prosperity of any idea cannot be separated from the praise of the rulers. Of course, the promotion of the rulers is the direct reason for the development of Buddhism in the Southern and Northern Dynasties. It can be said that it is the vigorous support of the ruling class. Rulers use Buddhism as a tool to maintain their own rule to spread it. They often give secular regimes the auxiliary government of Buddhist theocracy.

Southern Dynasty The mainstream thought was Buddhism, and the Northern Dynasty was naturally not willing to lag behind. At that time, the capital of the Northern Wei Dynasty was still in Datong . Empress Dowager Feng was able to promote Buddhism in Taiyuan because as early as 396, the Northern Wei Dynasty Dawu Emperor Tuoba Gui had seized Taiyuan from Houyan .

Therefore, Xuanzhong Temple can be regarded as a camp and post station for the Southern Wei Dynasty. The starting point of their efforts was the Yungang Grottoes in Datong, and the end point was the Luoyang Longmen Grottoes in . A large number of grottoes were excavated and the temples were built in large quantities, which affected the entire northern country.

This shows that in order to stabilize his regime, the rulers can be said to be a fuel to promote and spread Buddhism.

The Southern and Northern Dynasties was a prosperous period of Buddhism. It was not caused by a single factor, but promoted by many factors such as social economy, ideological and political aspects. Of course, to a greater extent, it can be said that it was the strong promotion of the ruling class and the time and space given to the construction of Buddhism by the rulers of the dynasty.

Editor: DOROTHY

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