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The Historical Influence of Buddhism on the World
The role and influence of Buddhism in the process of world history

It feels like standing on a commanding height and judging many viewpoints of Buddhist philosophy, which is not objective enough.

Although he may not be a staunch Buddhist believer, he stood on the opposite side of it very seriously and carefully, maintaining respect for this belief and its philosophy.

In the 6th-5th century BC, Confucianism and Taoism were formed in China. Confucianism is people-oriented, pays attention to observing the changes of life, society and nature from the perspective of people, attaches importance to the value of people, and advocates "benevolence" as the highest moral value of people. On the contrary, Taoism takes "nature" as the standard, and advocates the idea of "Taoism gives birth to one, two, three, and Taoism is natural", and advocates being in nature. The Confucian "human" standard and the Taoist "natural" standard laid the foundation and ambition of China ancient culture.

During the Western Han Dynasty, Buddhism, which was born in ancient India, was introduced to China. Buddhism takes "the liberation of all beings" as the standard, and advocates that all beings are freed from troubles, pains and samsara through practice and enter the realm of nirvana. Buddhism, as a foreign culture, finally merged into the traditional culture of China through conflict and mutual integration. Since then, China culture has formed three great masters of Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism, and the three great masters have become the themes of China's traditional ideology and culture.

Since the Eastern Jin Dynasty, Buddhist translators in China have made great efforts to translate Buddhist documents originally from India or Central Asia into Chinese, and with the help of the development of China culture such as Chinese characters, paper and printing, they have been preserved on an unprecedented scale. The Chinese translation of Buddhist scriptures is a re-creation of Buddhist translators in China and a precious heritage of China culture. When Buddhism was first introduced into China, it faced a highly developed cultural and historical background in China, and it could only rely on and seek its own way of survival and development in this cultural system. A group of Buddhist scholars have emerged in China. They have made unremitting efforts in understanding and digesting Buddhist ideas and integrating Chinese and foreign cultures, and made great contributions to the integration of foreign Buddhist culture into traditional ideology and culture.

Buddhism in China is advancing step by step along the road pioneered by these ancestors, and in the Southern and Northern Dynasties, it formed an epoch-making "positive" trend in the development of Buddhism in China. The rulers of the Northern and Southern Dynasties believed in themselves, which also promoted the development and growth of Buddhism. The emergence of temple economy shows that Buddhism has achieved considerable status in social life. But "breaking the law" also appeared. Because the secular regime is dissatisfied with the growing Buddhist temples, which affects the government's tax service and stimulates contradictions, it is not difficult to see that the social and historical status of Buddhism is not only achieved through the personal contribution of its own religious leaders, but also closely combined with the secular regime.

During the Sui and Tang Dynasties, the feudal society and culture in China reached its peak. Especially in the 100 years after the "Zhenguan rule" in the early Tang Dynasty, economic development, national prosperity and cultural prosperity were unprecedented. The prosperity and unification of the country made the rulers of this period generally adopt a more tolerant policy in religious culture, which was obviously beneficial to the development of Buddhism. At the same time, religion also played a very important role in the struggle within the ruling class. For the needs of real politics, rulers often adopt the policy of "three religions in parallel" and make more use of the relationship between the three religions to serve political unity. The kings of Sui Dynasty paid more attention to Buddhism, so Buddhism became the first of the three religions. In the early Tang Dynasty, Tang Gaozu and Emperor Taizong defined the three religions in the order of Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism, and sometimes even put Li Lao's Taoism before Confucianism. In the era of Wu Zetian, Buddhism was re-established as the first of the three religions. Later, with the decline of the Tang Dynasty, the rulers paid more attention to balancing the three religions in order to better serve the realistic rule with the three religions. Buddhism in Sui and Tang Dynasties developed continuously under the emperor's policy of three religions. In the heyday of Buddhism, the formation and development of many sects in Sui and Tang Dynasties also reflected the realistic status of Buddhism in this period.

After a series of blows, such as the suppression of Buddhism by Wu Zong in the late Tang Dynasty, the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms War, and the suppression of Buddhism by Zhou Zong, China Buddhism gradually began to decline, and its historical status was also declining. Buddhism in Song, Liao, Jin and Yuan Dynasties was still fostered and utilized by the rulers in China, but on the whole, the Buddhist situation in the heyday of Sui and Tang Dynasties is gone forever. In Yuan Dynasty, Tibetan Buddhism developed rapidly and became the ideological pillar of the rulers. However, various schools of Buddhism in Han dynasty generally embarked on the road of decline, but Buddhism penetrated into all fields of society at this time of national integration and exchange, which is worthy of recognition.

During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the feudal system became increasingly corrupt and backward, and China Buddhism was also integrated in the trend of "three religions in one". During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, with the intensification of feudal control, Confucianism became increasingly extreme and autocratic, which made the development of Taoism and Buddhism seriously stagnate and its historical status declined. The secularization of Buddhism has become the way out for the development of Buddhism in its predicament, but there is no major theoretical breakthrough in Buddhist research.

Modern Buddhist culture is closely linked with modern China society, which is not only the continuation of ancient Buddhist culture, but also has obvious characteristics in the new period. Due to the social changes and national disasters in modern China, traditional Buddhism declined obviously in modern times. However, Buddhist monks, scholars and thinkers in China, through unremitting efforts, set off a Buddhist revival movement. Master Tai Xu's "Buddhism saves the country and saves the world" initiated the revival movement of modern Buddhism. Both the National Government and the Central People's Government of New China gave great support and help to Taoism, which enabled the Buddhist culture to be revived in modern times, and the trend of "human Buddhism" became the mainstream of Buddhism. Buddhist culture is also playing an increasingly important role in the rejuvenation of the country and the nation.