Charitable activities and religious life

1. Charitable activities and religious life

2. prefatory remarks • enableVPN to Oxford

3. definitions • the voluntary giving of help to those in need who are not related to the giver (Wikipedia) • Terminology • gong 公, yi義 • types: • related to livelihood • ritual services for others than family • to be distinguished from local mutual help? • “without expecting a direct return from the recipient”

4. charity in Europe • connected to Christianity: late ME onwards in Western Europe (esp. NW Europe) • need to deal with orphans, widows and the poor in general in urban centres • innovation NW Europe: cheap urban labour force • regions which suffered from labour shortage after the great plague epidemics of 14th century • region of religious reform > (unsuccessful) reformation (Flanders, Low Countries)

5. local mutual help • hard to document historically in the absence of sources & research • not impossible through anecdotal literature (待考) • 20th century fieldwork • Japanese (Mantetsu滿鐵 etc.) • Western/Chinese (Sidney Gamble, Li Jinghanc.s.) • missionary accounts • “missionary cases” 教案 (Litzingera.o.) • bias: northern China and coastal southwest China

6. an attempt at reconstruction • late 19th early 20th century (not necessarily same as before, but maybe indicative of informal neighbourly help) • crop watching • cooperation on harvest etc. • credit societies • self-defence • societies to maintain temples & festivals • irrigation networks (LY & Southern China)

7. forms of help • state charitable institutions • expression of the paternalistic obligation of the ruler to his people • lineage organizations • mutual help for those within the same line of descent • mutual help within a village • restricted to those who were accepted as members of the village community • charity per se: • indiscriminately help of all

8. social functions of charity • alleviating social stress • symbolic expression of attitude of caring for larger whole on part of elites

9. Buddhist charity

10. circulation of gifts • In Theravada B. traditionally gifts primarily to monastic community, in Mahayana B. also to lay people • gifts managed together • to maintain Buddhist institutions • recitation & rituals for the benefit of all (incl. dead) • monasteries as shared investments/pooling resources (?) • ultimate aim: gathering merit & public standing (doing good is never invisible)

11. Buddhist merit • fundamental Buddhist concept of gathering merit 功德 by giving (to the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha) • different forms of giving: • to adorn the teachings (grotto temples, statues, wall paintings and so forth) • charity for the needy (identified recipients) • alms (entirely anonymous)

12. “Fields of merit”福田 • principal concept is planting a field of merit • different lists of very practical activities: • 佛告天帝：”復有七法廣施，名曰福田，行者得福，即生梵天。何謂為七？” • 一者、興立佛圖、僧房、堂閣； • 二者、園果、浴池、樹木清涼； • 三者、常施醫藥，療救眾病； • 四者、作牢堅船，濟度人民； • 五者、安設橋梁，過度羸弱； • 六者、近道作井，渴乏得飲； • 七者、造作圊廁，施便利處。 • maintaining the community

13. 園果 興立佛圖、僧房、堂閣 常施醫藥

14. early charity • problems of information • quantitative estimate impossible, only qualitative • normative (as above) rather than descriptive • known concrete examples (usually urban & individual/incidental) • distribution food to poor • monastic “hospitals” • inn-function of monasteries for travellers and pilgrims

15. Song-Yuan • Buddhist monks building bridges etc. (merit) • Buddhist lay believers(merit) • bridges • roads • free tea • state (northern Song): local order • medical aid • hospitals • distributing medicine • old people’s homes • homes for foundlings (including wet nurses) • distributing food aid, coffins (incidental) • private/local (southern Song): local order • (same contents)

16. religious vs. secular • religious charity clearly continued into Yuan • state and private charity Song period: were people involved only secularly motivated? • the very active lay Buddhist Su Shi founded a kind of hospital , built the nearby Su Dike on West Lake! • problem of insufficient knowledge private convictions • would be strange when (re)invention in late Ming was Buddhist inspired and earlier Song efforts would not have been religiously inspired • Water and Land Gatherings & rituals to feed the hungry ghosts can be seen as forms of charity!

17. towards secular charity?

18. background to charity • differences charity • from Buddhist perspective • from state perspective • from Neoconfucian perspective • presently standard view: Buddhist (religious) charity evolved into largely secular charity • similar the in West: Christian (or Christian socialist, do not forget Judeo-Christian origins Marxism/ socialism) • but: is there a “secular” world in premodern China? • and: to what extent did this new charity really become fully secular (same applies to Western situation)

19. Li Gong: secular or not • 1659-1733 • famous for classicist lifestyle in which he tried to stay faithful to the Analects and other classic works • Worship and religious beliefs • burned incense (much later than Analects) • visited his parents and his natal mother on 1st and 15th days • maintained all kinship rituals and paid respect to graves of acquaintances • gathered relatives at 清明 for sacrifice of animals and music • also set up paper spirit tablets 紙位 for relatives in female lines without descendants (of at least two different family names) on New Year's day • kept a Ledger of Merit and Demerit • supported ritual suicide by widows (rather than remarriage) • hardly just a secular classicist philosopher

20. the charitable movement (1) • one large movement of performing shan善, institutionalized in generic “charitable gatherings” 善會 and “charitable halls” 善堂 • Setting Free Life Gatherings (fangshenghui放生會) => charitable movement, in terms of: support group and audience (the local gentry elite) • internal organization • combination of moral education with moral acts • change: from preserving animal life to saving human life • conspired by growing Neoconfucian interest in human life

21. Shanghai Guilin

22. the charitable movement (2) • Buddho-Daoist inspiration • 祩宏1535–1615 introduces DaoistLedgers or Merit and Demerit 功過格 • Morality Books善書, e.g. 太上感應篇 (Daoist inspiration), later Buddhist and cultic versions of morality books (e.g. 陰騭文，關聖帝君覺世真經) • bureaucratic procedures • Community Compacts 鄉約

23. activities • taking care of orphans (Keeping Infants Halls 留嬰堂or Nourish Infants Halls 育嬰堂) • taking care of widows to prevent remarriage • prevention of cremation and making available free burial • alleviating famine (esp. late Ming, taken over by state during Qing) • In service of Confucian values, though often initiated first by elites with primary lay Buddhist identity • But: to what extent had this become a Confucian movement?

24. again: secular or religious • Zhang Cai張才(fl. late Ming) • founder Restoration Academy • moral lecturer in “secular” hall • devout worshipper Lord Guan • Shi Chengjin石成金(fl. 1660) • Yangzhou Nourish Infants Hall • active lay Buddhist (influential commentary on Jin’gangjing) the • popularizerof Buddhist and Confucian values among non-literate people (in baihua) • Liu Shanying劉山英 (1733-1806) • official who became active lay Buddhist at circa 40 years of age. • active in charitable works, including a large public cemetery in Huzhouin the late eighteenth century and the publication of a Buddhist inspired morality book. Efforts continued by his, who was also a lay Buddhist ánd a conscious Confucian official • his own 信心應驗錄 reprinted by pp with Buddhist background as well • In all 3 cases: religious context not clear from the sources directly dealing with the charitable activity

25. 佛緣之印度為甚廣也

26. 傳家寶

27. moral rearmament • increase “Confucian” values does not mean secularisation, but moral rearmament • reliance on specific deities a source moral values: Wenchang, Lord/Emperor Guan, Lu Dongbin, and so on • late 18th century onwards spirit writing movement starting out in eastern Sichuan • during 19th century fusion with practice of reciting the Saintly Edict 宣講聖諭 inYunnan • developed into the new religious movements of early 20th century

28. 内鄉縣衙門宣講聖諭

29. 宣講聖諭 in Yunnan：洞經音樂

30. other forms of religious charity

31. missionary charity • Christian charity in China as much part of Chinese history as other forms • foundling homes (source misunderstanding) • medical mission (beginning with eye surgery, took off in 20th century) • educational mission (to enable often illiterate converts to read the Bible, took off in early 20th century)

32. Daoist charity • True Man Wu (Fujian) • popular cult since 11th -12th century, strong Daoist links • Quanzhou elite developed it into venue for dispensing free medicine from 1878 onwards • Liu Yuan 劉沅 (1768-1855) (Sichuan) • founder influential Daoist-Confucian family tradition of teachers • found inspiration in texts that we conventionally label Confucian and Daoist • himself advocated Daoistritual for the common good • sixth son added charitable activities (namely the free distribution of grain, clothes and medicine; the provision of coffins and burial land; setting free life, as well as not eating bovine and dog meat)

33. 清 1878 Quanzhou gentry and merchants founded an Office for Dispensing Medicine in the local 花橋慈濟宮, on basis of myth of True Man Wu (Tao 夲)

34. 20th century and after

35. Taiwan & mainland • with you!