The Study Of Ch’an Master Pai Chang Huaihai

With the Pai chang ch’ing kuei, the Ch’an Master Pai chang Huaihai is well-known in Chinese Ch’an Buddhism history,many later scholars have appreciated him very much.In view of his impressive contribution, it is necessary for us have a study on him.This paper is a monographic study of the Ch’an master Pai chang Huaihai,which is conceived of four parts, the first part is Introduction, from the first to the third chapter is the body parts. In Introduction, this paper mainly summarizes the academic circles’view about Pai chang Huaihai,they are Pai chang’s "life textual research"review,"Zen language arts"review,"Buddha-nature of liberation"review,"Taoism breath" review,"Humanistic Buddhism colour" review,"Pai chang ch’ing kuei"review respectively; at the same time, this paper points out the innovations of the paper and some further researches which are in need in the Introduction.There are three chapters in my body part, in the first chapter,through some attentive texual research,we have a study on Pai chang Huaihai’s early life,such as his tonsure, his study on the Tripitaka,etc;in the second chaper,in the second chapter,we mainly talk about Pai chang Huaihai’s thought of Buddha-nature,his view of the language of Ch’an,and his view of teaching respectively;In the third chapter,it is a exposition of the Pai chang ch’ing kuei,in which we mainly summarize the background of its establelishment,and its main content,also its meanings.The innovations of this paper exist in combining the historical textual research and philosophical interpretation for studying Pai chang’s thoughts,in the historical textual research aspect,through consulting relevant chorographies, this paper gives a research on some puzzling things of Paichang’s early life,such as his tonsure, his study on the Tripitaka,etc,and derives some independent corresponding conclusions.In the philosophical interpretation aspect,this paper mainly combs the position of Paichang’s’"all sentient beings’have Buddha-nature" view in the history of Ch’an Buddhism,we think that if we want to have a clear understanding of Paichang’s view,we should put his view into the transition background of Pre&Post-Zen,these two trends in Zen Buddhism history have different perspectives, the most obvious difference is relied in their view towards Buddha-nature,For Pre-Zen,the Ch’an masters sticked on Huineng’s view of "wood and stone don’t have Buddha-nature",this perspective is a kind of "mindstream pattern"Buddha-nature view;for the Post-Zen,they advocate the view that is "wood and stone don’t have Buddha-nature"or "all sentient beings have Buddha-nature",this perspective is a kind of "naturing pattern " Buddha-nature view."Mindstream pattern " Buddha-nature view which is a representative of Pre-Zen emphasize the matrix, whether the matrix have the ability for apprehending the Buddhahood is very important, because wood and stone don’t have a mind like sentient beings,so they are excluded from the possibility of having Buddha-nature;but when the Buddha-nature is in discussion in post-Zen, the problem domain has been largely began to change, it isn’t getting entangled in, or satisfied with the view from matrix to discuss the question of becoming Buddha, because from that view,it’s hard to jump out the vicious circle which viewed whether there is apprehensive ability for getting the Buddhahood or not for discussing the Buddha-nature. The change of the Post-Zen’s view towards Buddha-nature is not understood by the Ch’an masters which are belonged to Pre-Zen,so that when some Ch’an masters which are belonged to Pre-Zen quoted the records of the Sutra’s saying of no wood and vegetation having become Buddha to retort the Post-Zen’s view of Buddha-nature,it is often at cross-purposes,so we can say, from the start, they are in a different levels of problems domain for discussing Buddha-nature.The reason for this, to a great degree, it is due to the Zen have gone through development process in China, that is so called Sinicization.in this process,the Chinese traditional resources especially Taoist thought resources are constantly absorbed by Zen.so at last,the Post-Zen,with the mixture of Taoism and some similar Buddhism traditional resources, had finally formed a "Zen-Tao-nature"view,under this view,we have got the post-Zen’s "naturing pattern" Buddha-nature view,which had been already divorced from Anthropocentrism color,from the view of "naturing pattern" Buddha-nature,"sentient beings" are not the middle point for getting Buddhahood,they are just moments for getting Buddhahood,since all is in equal,all is the center yet not center from the "naturing pattern" Buddha-nature view.About the view of Pai chang’s "misreading" of "all sentient beings have Buddha-nature", through this paper’s carefully taker-in, we think his Buddha-nature thought should still remain in the early "mindstream pattern" Buddha-nature view, so in essence he still has not jumped out the Pre-Zen’s perspective of Buddha-nature, his "misreading"of "all sentient beings have Buddha-nature" thought seem to be with utmost care,but does not get much echo from the post-Zen circles.Later since the post-Zen’s "naturing pattern" Buddha-nature view is of much sinicizational color,and is more suitable for Ch’an masters’taste, it was very popular among the Post-Zen circles, the saying of green bamboo and yellow flower all having Buddha-nature was their pet phrase, in its later years,Pai chang’view of Buddha-nature seems to have a slightly change, which we still need to grasp more materials for research.