Wang Anshi And Buddhism

Wang Anshi is a famous political reformer, thinker and writer in the NorthSong Dynasty, whose theory, communication and poetry have a closerelationship to Buddhism. This thesis takes Wang Anshi as a case, uses thecross-subject research method and lays emphasis on the discussion aboutthe interaction between the history of Buddhism, the histories of thinking andpoetics. This is not only a deeper research of Wang Anshi, but also that ofBuddhism, as a foreign culture, during its process of localization, itsrelationship with scholar-bureaucrats in the North Song Dynasty and itsinfluence on Chinese culture. The first chapter summarizes the new trends appeared in thedevelopment of Buddhism in the North Song Dynasty under a quitemacroscopic background. These include: attitudes of emperors in the SongDynasty, if compared with those of emperors before, are more reasonable andmature; they just make use of Buddhism and control it. The intellectuals inSong Dynasty who argue against or advocate Buddhism, their opinions andtalking points are different from those before and show a trend of the mix ofthree religions. And when it comes to the South Song Dynasty, Tao-hsuch (道学 ) gets the dominant position. Buddhism influenced mostscholar-bureaucrats in the Song Dynasty. During this process, Buddhism itselflittle by little becomes secular. The second chapter researches Wang Anshi, the central character of thisthesis, his theory and communication. The emphasis is on the influence fromBuddhism over these two aspects. When we discuss the philosophy of yu-wei(有为) and the theory of xin (心) and xing (性) of Wang Anshi, on the one hand,we compare them with other schools at that time, on the other hand, we payattention to the relationship between them and Mahayana (大乘佛教),explaining the active effects that Buddhism brings into play when Wang Anshiconstructs his compatible theory system. In the past research of Wang Anshi'scommunication, people just took him as a man of Confucian or legist. Fewtalked about his communication with monks. The second section of thischapter fills in the gap. We get to know that the fondness of Buddhism byWang Anshi begins very early, and make clear the relationship between Wang 1Anshi and different sects of Zen (禅宗). In the appendix of this chapter,through the reading of 卍 Xu Tripitaka (卍续藏经), we collect the missingbook Explaination of surangama-samadhi-sutra (楞严经解), which was writtenby Wang Anshi at his old age. From this we can understand the intensiveaccomplishments in Buddhism fulfilled by Wang Anshi and at the same timethis can work as a reference for the readers who are interested in WangAnshi's Buddhism thinking. The third chapter is a special research on Wang Anshi's New ExplanationFor Three Classics(三经新义)and Word Explanation(字说). Due to the factthat the research in this field was quite weak in our country, when peoplestudied Wang Anshi's theory, they knew very little about his achievements inConfucian classics, therefore, we set a special chapter to discuss it. Ourconclusion is that Wang Anshi's classic study is mainly intended for his reformand there is little Buddhism factor in it. But his classic study is really farfetchedand strained and his wishing other people's agreement with him is harmful tothe free development of learning. The fourth chapter discusses the relationship between Wang Anshi'spoems and Buddhism. During Wang Anshi's old age, Buddhism influenced histhinking, mind and poetry style a lot. His poems got a quite different style ifcompared with those written in his early time. His writing techniques likequoting sutra, using palinode and making fun with words all get benefits fromZen and are first signs of Jiangxi poem school (江西诗派).