Criticism And Debate On Buddhism Original Enlightenment In Mordernity

The 20^th Century witnessed two fierce attacks on The thought of Original Enlightenment, the core of Chinese Buddhism's Temperament and Soul, launched within the circle of Chinese and Japanese scholars: one originating from the debate between Lv Cheng's Idea of Original Silence and Xiong Shi-li's Theory about Original Enlightenment in 1940s; the other debate being stirred by Japanese scholars Hakamaya Noriaki (跨谷宪昭) and Matsumoto Shiro ( 松本史朗) on Criticial Buddhism in 1980's. In the former contention Lv Cheng criticized Xiong Shili's Thought of Original Enlightenment on the ground of Original Silencet theory and then moved further to classify all schools of traditional Chinese Buddhism into the group of False Scriptures. In the second debate Japanese scholars involved in the wave of Criticial Buddhism believed that Tthought of Original Enlightenment and Tathaagatagarbha( 如来藏 ) Thought prevalent in Buddhism of China and Japan alike carry with themselves an essential tendency of Positivism and that the tendency was a serious deviation from Indian Buddhism and hence anti-Buddhism in spirit.The present writer does not intend to argue whether Thought of original enlightenment accords with the true Buddhism; but to examine two debates within the scope of Modernity in order to lay bare the vision of Modernity attitude of debaters hidden in Buddhist documents and reasoning.In fact the 20^th Century controversy over The Thought of Original Enlightenment has gone beyond traditional argumentation over Buddhist scriptures and demonstrated distinct features of Modernity background. In the first place Western modern thinking not only exerted influence on critical approaches of China and Japan's Buddhism studies but also supplied them with new subject material and reasoning perspectives. The debate between Lv and Xiong illustrates the hostility between QianJia School and SongMing School on one hand and the confrontation between Western Positivism and Life Philosophy on the other. The struggle between Criticical Buddhism and Topical Buddhism originated from the contradiction between Critical Philosophy and Topical Philosophy. In the second place, the rethinking of social practice heralded in by science and democracy has been one of key factors which gave rise to these debates. Lv Cheng and Japanese Criticical Buddhism believe that Thought of original enlightenment is not conducive to the assimilation of science and democracy in that some of its inherent elements tend to reconcile with social reality and blend everything. Xiong Shi-li and Mu Zong-san and Japanese Scholars in Topical Buddhism, from the perspective of original enlightenment and humanism, emphasizes the tolerating being of Soul and that science and democracy can be surpassed by. In the second place, the critique on the thought of original enlightenment within the scope of Modernity refers to the confrontation and mutual examination between disenchantmentand anti-disenchantment which stem from Modern Ration and Buddhism Ration. Becouse of. Modern Ration is established within the framework of object and subject with an emphasis on individual's rational ability to learn. It advocates the self-rule and self-determination and self-discipline of individuality while Buddhist Ration, on the basis of self-voidness, advocates inner transcendent.By examining within the scope of Modernity, we can feel the paradoxical complexities in the mind of East Asian Buddhist thinkers facing the challenge of Western Modernity. They longed for science and democracy on one hand and they were equally troubled with nihility, an inevitable result of Modernity. The critics of Original Enlightenment, embracing Modernity Thinking, hope that their critique can make Buddhism adapt to the rationalization of modernity while its advocates hope to make use of the traditional Buddhist ration and theoretical resources to rethink about and criticize and transcend Western modernity. To make a hard choice between embracing and rejection represents the complexity encountered by Chinese Buddhism.How...