Study On The Developments Of Huayan Sect In Modern Times(1840-1949)

HuaYan sect as extremely local characteristics of Buddhism, it hasexperienced1500years of wind and rain course. It’sgolden developmentwas in the early and mid Tang dynasty, such as the five masters of ZhiYan,FaZang, CengGuan, ZhongMi were all born during this period. Butduring" the Huichang Calamity " of the late Tang dynasty, it had forcedthe continuous development of HuaYan sect stagnate. In the Song dynasty,although there were also monks wanted to revitalization of the HuaYansect, but at the moment the Zen and the Confucianism were flourishing,beside the HuaYan theory are rather complicated to learn,so monks whowanted to study Buddhism got away from it. It was difficult to reappearthe glorious age of Tang poetry meteorology. Yuan, Ming and qingdynasties Buddhism developmented overall decline, especially in theMing and qing dynasties the development of Buddhism based on to thepolicy of the restrictions, which made HuaYan sect more weaker.After the opium war, the rule of the Qing dynasty graduallydecline, Buddhism at this time had gradually got rid of the limit of power.The Buddhism development of this period presented unprecedentedprosperity, a large number of Buddhist classics and printing circulationwere back from overseas. That meaning Buddhism was about to flourish.Buddhism sects gradually transformed into each other and lay Buddhisteven become the typical characteristics of this period. In this specialhistorical period of the development of the modern Buddhism, HuaYansect also from near failure to grow stronger. A large number of excellentHuaYan monks appeared at this time, they assembed the theory, publishedthe scripture, founded school for monks,etc.They hoped use these ways torevive HuaYan sect in morden time, such as YueXing, YingCi, ChangXing, CiZhou, ChiSong, KeDuan, ZhiGuang, AiTing, NanTing,were play an important role in the process of the development of modernHuaYan sect. YueXia as the leader of the modern HuaYan sect, in1900hefounded "buddhist in AnHui province" in ying jiang temple.This is theearliest modern buddhist school. He also founded HuaYan University inShanghai. Master CiZou is famous for its interpretation of Huayanscripture. He spead the ‘avatamsaka sutra forty’ about four times, the‘avatamsaka sutra eighty’ about three times, eighty volumes ‘Hua YanXuanTan’ about three times and so on. In addition, he also with JiangWeiqiao, collated and releaseed the ‘HuaYan Shu Chao’. Masters ofCiZhou, ChiSong, KeDuan were positive contribution in motivated othersects. The CiZhou master combined JingTu and HuaYan ang interpreted"YuanJie chanting" practice, ChiSong master combined Shingon-shu andHuaYan as Chinese "XianMi" shingon; ChangXing, ZhiGuang, AiTingand NanTing founded monk school admired by the later generations.ChangXing assisted to found ‘MinNan Buddhist Institute’. ZhiGuangfound JiaoShan monk school, AiTing and NanTing founded institute ofZhuLin monk school and GuangXiao monk school, they then fanned outof Hong Kong and Taiwan.Therefore the Huayan monks which represented by YueXia mastermade HuaYan sect gradually grow. In that time,modern HuaYan sectseems to have a repeat of the flourishing prosperity. Not for long,however, in modern HuaYan sect was in its development peak, theoutbreak of the Anti-Japanese War in1937interrupted its developingprocess, thus caused it on the fate of decline again and had neverrecovered. Still, at the same time of revival of the the modern Buddhist,HuaYan monks had trained a large number of talent. They also providedthe theoretical support of fusion modern Buddhism sect, so althoughmodern HuaYan sect eventually decay, but it had helped push the developing of modern Buddhist.