Primary Research On The Ancient Chinese Buddhist Law

In the context of this article, the law refers to the regulation formed in manufacture and living fields of human being society and carried out by the public authority , which is a criterion of conduct with compulsion .It doesn’t mean only state law or the particular phenomenon which only in class society, and there is the law when there is human being society . Because religious power is one of the public authority, so the norm in religion is also the law ,especially the institutional religion such as Christianity, Islam and Buddhism.The Buddhist law is one of the Religious laws. First, The religious legal system is different with secular legal system. It is a general term of legal system which connected with the believers with religious faith, not connected with the nationality, residence or particular territory. Second, the Buddhist law is different with Other religious law such as Islamic law and canon law. Seeing the definition of other religious law and the stamp of the Buddhist law, the article defines the Buddhist law. The Buddhist law is the general name of the rules of the personal action of monks and nuns and the administrative regulations of the monastery, which is formulated by the Buddha or the sangha and acknowledged by the state.The ancient Chinese Buddhist law is in the context of the religious law and the Buddhist law and in the period from the Eastern Han Dynasty to the End of Qing Dynasty. There are not fusion of Buddhism and politics in ancient China which is different with AS′OKA period and some South East Asia states in which Buddhism is the state religion. The Buddhist law in ancient china is the custom law and folk law and the internal legislative power and the jurisdiction power of the Buddhist law is acknowledged by the state during each period in China but special time. The national law and the Buddhist law has the jurisdiction of monks’conduct such as killing, stealing, having sex, or misrepresenting one’s meditative powers. Besides these, other conducts of monks are guided by the Buddhist law. In the Yuan dynasty the position of the Buddhist law has been stepped up and the clerical officials guide monastery affairs, secular affairs especially criminal court actions. The law of the Yuan dynasty demands if monks ,Taoists and Confucians have issues,they are interrogated by the three clerical officials and interference of authorities is forbidded. And if monks and laymen dispute at property,clerical and secular officials will interrogate together. So, the ancient Chinese Buddhist law is the custom law and the folk law and has acquired the force of law by the state, and in some dynasty such as the Yuan Dynasty the scope of the Buddhist law enlarges to secular affairs.The chapterⅠintroduces the basic theory of the ancient Chinese Buddhist law. The Buddhist law is the general name of the rules of the personal action of monks and nuns and the administrative regulations of the monastery, which is formulated by the Buddha or the sangha and acknowledged by the state. The primitive Buddhist law is formulated by the Buddha who followed the natural law and acknowledged by the state law. The power of the Chinese Buddhist law origins from two parts: First is the establishment of the internal legislative power which inherits from the primitive Buddhist law. Because the primitive Buddhist law has the principle of“being suitable”formulated by the Buddha , so the administrative regulations of the monks and monastery has the law power as soon as it is suitable with the time and circumstances. Because of this, Baizhang commandments means Chan school’s legislative power. The second is acknowledged by the state. The internal legislative power and the jurisdiction power of the Buddhist law is acknowledged by the state during the each period in China but special time. The Yuan Dynasty had even stipulated the Buddhism monk official to the common custom business’s jurisdiction, which caused the monk official to melt the legislative power, the jurisdiction power and the religious power into a body.The Buddhist law also divides into the Buddhist legal thought and the Buddhism legal system .The legal thought is Buddhism’s basic religious doctrine which, the philosophy idea as well as value system’s synthesis in the Buddhism classics manifests, for example the equal idea, the harmonious idea, and democratic idea, causality, repentance and so on which refers in the fifth and sixth chapter. The Buddhist legal regime divides into two aspects. First is the standard clergy personal behavior’s law which in the primitive Buddhist law and Chinese Baizhang commandments ,this will be introduced in the in in chapterⅢ,ⅣandⅥ. The second is administrative regulations of the monastery which including the primitive Buddhist law’s rules such as the method how to solve the monks’controversies and divergences,also including the rules how to manage the monastery in Baizhang commandments such as administrative rules、monastery civil law and economical law which in chapterⅢandⅣ.The ancient Chinese Buddhist law has a series of legal essential factors, and it has the complete jurisprudence of law , the annotation and the commentary of legal science,the legal officials and so on. And it can be classificated in the administrative law, the civil and economic rules and regulations, the environmental protection law and the criminal law and so on. The sources of it is the Vinayapitaka of primitive Buddhism, the strict rules for monks when there is absent of complete translations of the Vinayapitaka in the period of“Transplant”and“Graft”, the Baizhang commandments in the period of sinicizatin and the stable development .The last source is the the explanatory notes and commentaries of the Dharmaguptaka school, such as Daoxuan’s Sifenlüshanfan buque xingshichao which are abridgements and emendations to the Four-Part Regulations.The chapterⅡexpounds the general situation of Buddhist history. The development of the ancient Buddhism law has close connection with the Buddhism and also with the politics, the economy and the culture of the social circumstances. The author indicated Buddhism’s historical development with the historical axis. The abscissa axis is the outside forces which Buddhism develops. The Buddhism developed under the gameplaying of Taoism and intelligentsia. The former represent the power of the other religion , and the latter represent the power of the culture. The ordinate axis is the Buddhism own growth path which went though three stages: the“Transplant”and“Graft”stage, the stage of sinicization and the stable development stage. The classification of these three stages is according to the characteristic of the Buddhist development. The Interactions of these powers form the characteristic of Chinese Buddhist law. Compling with Chinese society and making the suitable change is as a read line to the development of the Buddhism law ,which forms the characteristic of sinicization.The chapterⅢintroduces the Buddhism temple administrative law emphatically. First introduced the monk rolls system’s basic content: Monks’ classification and origin and so on. Next, the Buddhism temple’s administration system is that the abbot is the pinnacle of a pagoda, the deacon is in the middle of the pagoda and the monks in the base. It includes many rules in monastery such as the public administration rules,the rules of forests,the rules of monastery-operated schools in which learn Chan and Buddhist scriptures,the rules of monastery-operated hostels which opened their doors free of charge to travelers,the rules of monastery-operated home for the aged monks and nuns, the rules of monastery-operated hospitals which opened to the sicked monks and nuns. The second part is the monastic rules to tornsure which are interlinked in manyaspects with the clerical certificate system. Besides this,the Buddhism law and the state law are interlinked in many other aspects, especially in three systems: the system of sthavira, vihara-svamin, and karma-dana、the system of monks’officials、three hierarchical system such as the“Five Mountain and Ten Monasteries”network.The chapterⅣintroduces the Buddhism civil law and the economical law which including the monastery land and house law, monks’personal property law,the monks’inherit law as well as the social phenomenon that monks have wives. The income derived from the goods donated by the faithful, together with the interests from the fair, leasing,usury,the Inexhaustible Treasuries,constituted the capital for the property of the monastery. Just like French scholar J.Gernet’s conclusion that the Buddhist sangha was responsible for the introduction of modern capitalistic practice in China, with its productive use of interest. The temple has the supervisory system, the accounting system, the tax revenue system and solicits donations the system. Using the cases to analysis interaction between the Buddhist law and the state law. The important part is to analysis how to evade the Vinaya prohibitions of primitive Buddhism in monastery land, monks’personal property and the development of commerce of monastery.The Theory of“Conditioning Cause”in Primitive Buddhism and On the Buddha - nature remaining in all wheate are similar with the Deep Ecology theories. The Deep Ecology movement is based on the main point that the human and non-human life on earth has intrinsic value. The value of non-human life forms is independent of the usefulness these may have for narrow human purposes. The concept of protecting animals in Buddhism is based on the fact that animals have the capacity for suffering or experiencing happiness. Besides this, people will sooner or later be reward for killing animals. The Buddhist law rule peoples’conducts with the causality and have the rules of protecting animals which are the similar with the animal welfare law.The chapterⅥintroduces the Buddhist criminal law. The compulsory standard mainly manifests in three aspects: First is“the nature”crime called the parajika sins—killing, stealing, having sex, or misrepresenting one’s meditative powers—result in expulsion from the order and also be punished by the state law which is analysised by the case of Qing Dynasty in the article. The second category of sins but parajika sins which can be pufified by the repentance. Using the repentance as the method of purifying sins is determined by the characteristic of the Buddhism. The third method of punishing sins is the punishment of the hell which is similar with the punishment of the natural law. The hell punishment has the binding force to the Buddhist, for it is the extension of the present world and also the supplement of not punishment in the present world. By the hell punishment, it may achieve equal and just.The chapterⅦis the article conclusion part and mainly discusses two questions which are Buddhist law’s sinicization and the influence to the current law. These two questions especially the fist one is the red line of this article. The sinicization of the Buddhist law in China manifests in the legislative power, the legislative technology, the legislative idea and the legislative form. The ancient Chinese Buddhism law follows the social rules and created with the time and circumstances, so it can be studied by the modern laws in the legislative technology, the legislative ideas sch as the democratic idea, the capital idea, the hard-working, thrifty and charitable idea, the idea of harmoniously with the nature; the repentance idea and so on. And all these ideas can be used by the modern laws which are similar with the ancient Chinese Buddhist law in legislative concept and the practice of law.