Buddhism And The Poetics Of Six Dynasties

The Six Dynasties is an important development stage of poetics and Buddhism. During that time, the impact and penetration of Buddhism on Chinese poetics is extremely clear. This paper selects three aspects such as subject, image and category as an entry point, trying to grasp the overall impact of Buddhism to Six Dynasties poetics on the reasons, methods, processes and performances.The paper is divided into five chapters.The first chapter outlines the vein of Six Dynasties Buddhism development as well as the situation of Six Dynasties poetics development, and elaborates the history cultural context in which Buddhism affect the Six Dynasties poetics.The second chapter centrally studies the influence of Buddhism on the subject of poetics which is the"people"of poetics in Six Dynasties from many aspects. As the extraneous culture, Buddhism melted with the native culture, which brought about new thought space. As a result, the thought and mind of people and poets were built. On the above mentioned basis, the chapter mainly analyzes the infiltration of Buddhism to the thinking mode of Six Dynasties hereditary scholar class, the value of poets life and aesthetic, and the theory view and theory method of poetics. The author believes that, under the influence of Buddhism, the hereditary scholar class had gradually formed the thinking mode which was opening but tolerant, dialectical but compromised, direct-viewing but transcending. However, the infiltration of Buddhism to the thinking mode and ideological concept of poetics subject, has also brought some changes of poets'value on life and aesthetic: The"Sunya"thought of Buddhism wisdom caused the Six Dynasties poets to see through the bitter experience and dispelled the dissatisfaction in their lives. The dissemination of Buddha-nature thought promoted the poets to pursue the meaning of life and individual personality. Buddhism's idea of going beyond the world, caused the poets who were marginalized to find the mind balanced point. Therefore, those poets were infatuated with artistic creation and put much emphasis on literature esthetic, which promoted the arrival of"the literary consciousness". In addition, the Six Dynasties Buddhism also changed the literature theorists'thought structure, mixing Confucian, Buddha and Taoism together in their thoughts so that their thoughts were active, their field of vision were opened and their powers of thought were promoted. Thus the understanding to the literature and the poetry substantive characteristics was unceasingly deepened . The literature theorists, such as Lu Ji, Liu Xie and Zhong Rong, all derived nutrition from Buddhism thought consciously or unconsciously, which enabled their ideological level to obtain unceasing promotion. Their thoughts on poetics theory questions were much deeper and deeper, and their poetics ideas developed more and more deeply.The third chapter centrally studies the Buddhism influence on the"literature"of Six Dynasties poetics through the analysis of typical images. The author believes that Buddhist model images, such as mirrors, flowers, water, the moon, also blossom in the Six Dynasties poetry."Sunya"is the core implication of Buddhist mirror image. Absorbing"Sunya"of Buddhism mirror image, the Six Dynasties poets took the scenery as the independent esthetic object, created the beautiful scenery poems, and unfolded the independent unique esthetic meteorology. As the representative image of Buddhism, lotus flowers highlighted the inviolability of Buddha, the sanctitude of Buddha-nature and the gnosis of Buddhist doctrine. This kind of typical image characteristic together with Buddhism's wisdom affected lotus flower images of Wei Jin poetry on the connotation of typicalness and monotony. Along with the development of poetics and Buddhism, the poetry lotus flower images in Southern Dynasty were influenced by the Buddha-nature thought, bringing about aesthetic individuality and diversity. The Buddhism water image which represented the implication of life and death circulation, was accepted by many Six Dynasties poets. The poets used"the morning dew","the boat"and other images which are related with the water image to unfold the implication of Buddhism"life and death circulation"and the spirit of the era which surmounts the life and death diligently. The connotation of the life and death view and the life view of Buddhist water image infiltrated to the Six Dynasties poetry, enabled its water image to bring on the transcendence characteristic, and displayed simply and fresh time style in the scenery poems, which promoted the development of Six Dynasties poetry creation. Buddhist moon image had also obvious influenced on the moon image in Six Dynasties poetry. The implication of Buddhist moon image disseminated to the Six Dynasties poetry, caused its moon image to highlight the time implication of"sadness but non-pain". The implication of Buddhist moon image infiltrated to the Six Dynasties poetry, made its moon image to sprout the metaphysical implication. The implication of Buddhist moon image affected the Six Dynasties poetry, caused its moon image to strengthen the symbol implication of noble personality.The fourth chapter mainly inspects the relations between Buddhism's important categories, such as"Sunya","Se","Spirit", and the Six Dynasties poetics. Buddhism "Sunya" category expedited the formation of "Sunya" category in aesthetics, which drew the attention on the "nobeing"(not non-existing)of Chinese esthetics, and strengthened the pursue to implication in Six Dynasties poetics."Se"category of Buddhism manifests the ontology that"Se"and "Sunya" are not two matters and the methodology of"viewing Sunya by Se". The ontology promoted the integrity of traditional"beauty"and"simplicity"which had deep Buddha meaning. The esthetic prevailing custom of developing beautiful and simple style simultaneously formed. The ontology also affected the Six Dynasties poetry creation, which was"sound and color opening greatly". The scenery poem and the palace poem were prosperous. At the same time, the methodology of poetics idea of renewal and development, promoted the theory of"feeling-of-the-things"to change into the theory of"viewing-directly". Thus, a new area of poetics fundamental research was explored."Spirit"had been a Chinese native category before Buddhism coming to China. The connotation of Buddhist"Spirit"category was quite rich and unique. It directly promoted the Chinese poetics"Spirit"category to develop. Buddhism believes that "Spirit" was the Buddha which can be independent from physical and spiritual bodies, which is certainly ideal and absurd. But the great attention and profound interpretation to the spirit phenomenon of Buddhism, not only enriched Chinese "Spirit" but also hastened the birth of the Aesthetic category of "Spirit", strengthened the characteristic that Six Dynasties poetics attached great importance to "Spirit", and changed the development journey of Chinese native"Spirit"category.The fifth chapter emphatically inspects the new nature and the new category, such as"Yun","Lv"and"Taste"which derived from Buddhism culture's involvement in Six Dynasties .The chapter studies the Buddhism factor during the formation and development of important category of Six Dynasties poetics. It revealed the relation between Buddhism and poetics theory in Six Dynasties time together with the fourth chapter. The author believes that the development of Buddhism and its thought subtly affected the category significance evolution of"Yun": The discovery of sound implication benefited from Buddhist sutra translation; the stress on graceful implication was certainly related to the nirvana Buddha-nature; the meaningful implication was influenced by the Buddhism language paradox view."Lv"is another important category in Six Dynasties poetics. The diffusion and popularity of Buddhism promoted the"Lv"category to develop from Wei Jin"sound rhyme"to"classical Chinese poetry rules"of Southern Dynasty. The reading Buddhist sutra aloud drew people's attention to study the"sound rhyme", which promoted the Chinese poetics to pursue the esthetic"Lv"consciously and creatively. It was demonstrated in the invention of Chinese four tones, also in the construction of Yong Ming Style. The new esthetic law which emphasized on the harmony of form's meaning and meaning's form was closely related to the"sound harmony"of Buddhism. The formation and development of the"Taste"category in Six Dynasties poetics was also influenced by Buddhism thoughts, which lied in protruding the"Taste"of esthetic, urging the connotation of"Taste"category to evolve taste from native diet culture to philosophy taste, then converting the taste from its philosophy taste to artistic taste and poetics taste; finally from the taste of literary talent to the taste beyond the words.This study found that the impact of Buddhism on the Six Dynasties poetics was profound and comprehensive, and it directly impacted on the development direction and development ways of the Six Dynasties Poetics. The complicated process of Buddhism impact on Six Dynasties poetics, was the process that Buddhism gradually blending with Chinese Poetics and Chinese culture. It inspires our study on contemporary poetics to focus on research of Buddhist culture, and it also warns us that we should focus on cultural exchange and cultural integration in constructing current poetics and cultural building, avoid the simply cultural transplantation.