CHAPTER 5. A SUMMARY COMPARISON OF FGS AND IKT
6.1 FGS AND IKT’ S D EVELOPMENT IN T AIWAN AND M ACAU
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social environment through adopting adequate socialization. As Master Hsing Yun coined FGS’ central idea as “engaged Buddhism”, FGS remains its other-worldly aspects (the sangha, spiritual retreat, dharma teaching) meanwhile keeps itself away from fully immersing in the secular world and opening up to the society. For Master Hsing Yun has said to his lay followers “temples are different, but the basic teaching is the same”,171 and the monasteries have the responsibility to take part in secular activities like holding dharma assembly, delivering dharma lecturers and propagation Buddhism.
For IKT, it is conscious of the importance of absorbing young members and balancing the denseness and openness, other-worldliness and worldliness. Its activities delicately include these aspects. Like, students in a mess have a dense internal attachment with IKT’s members, they live, eat and cultivate the Dao together just like the sangha. Meanwhile, these students still have social relationships with non-IKT members, which allow them a balance between internal and external attachments.
After discussing how FGS and IKT succeed as a “new” religion, I will provide a comparison of FGS and IKT in the following sessions. The comparison focuses on their development, organizational changes, doctrines, rituals and propagation tactics.
6.1 FGS and IKT’s Development in Taiwan and Macau
The revolution of 1911 (xinhai geming 辛亥革命) was a decisive turning-point in the cultural development of China. Educated elites sought ways to modernize China
171 Stuart Chandler, Establishing a Pure Land on Earth The Foguang Buddhist Perspective on Modernization and Globalization, p. 139.
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through establishing a “new” social structure and “new” cultural values (“New” here means changes that help China to face the challenge of the Western civilization and at the same time not losing the “best” of Chinese elements).172Under this circumstance, Chinese intellectuals who were influenced by Western-Christianity culture came to reevaluate Chinese religions and labelled some religions and their practice as superstitious from the Western’s point of view.
To accommodate themselves to the changing society, Buddhists and lay Buddhists started to reform Buddhism. The reformation of Buddhism began during the Republican period and gave it anthropocentric characteristics, Buddhists and lay Buddhists actively participated in philanthropies and education. 173 To those religionists who fled to Taiwan, they encountered an unprecedented opportunity to put their religious ambitions into practice. In the REST, Buddhist teaching and practices have considerable influence on contemporary Taiwanese society. Regardless of the respondent’s religious background, a majority of them believe in the concept of retribution (I-Kuan Tao 97.6%, Catholicism 95.6%, Protestantism 72.6, Others 88.9, None 71.5%), and the ancestor is the most frequently worshipped objects in Taiwan (28.8%). The REST also proves Iannaccone’s rational choice theory that people’s choice of religion depends on their accumulate religious capital. As data shows that people who identify with religion tend to claim to have the same religious affiliation since childhood (76%) and those who claim to have no religious affiliation tend to convert
172 Seiwert Hubert, “Religious Response to Modernization in Taiwan: The Case of I-Kuan Tao”, p. 43.
173 See Paul Katz’s work: 康豹，《中國宗教及其現代命運》，頁 101 – 137。
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to their respective traditional religions if an event (traumatic such as death) leads them to conversion.174
Buddhism is not an invariable belief system. It is a belief system that always absorbs and modifies itself during its interaction with local communities’ preexisting sociocultural and historical conditions. In the Republican era and from the 1920s to 1940s, the reformation of Buddhism had taken place in Mainland China and led to the formulation of “Buddhism for Human Life” by Taixu had set the tone of Buddhism reformation. Buddhism in Taiwan grasped the opportunity to reform Buddhism and shifted its focus from other-worldly to this-worldly.
Both FGS and IKT take direct responsibility for some broader social functions, through founding universities, building hospitals, helping the poor, transmitting traditional Chinese culture, providing emergency relief around the world and concerning environmental protection, they spread their influence and act out their beliefs. As Hsing Yun defines FGS as engaged Buddhism, FGS’ this-worldly reformation is not only influenced by modernism (or westernization / Christianization) but also by Chinese tradition, particularly Confucianism.175The dominant tone in those Buddhist dharma assemblies and what lay followers concern the most is the fortune of the family, to do good deeds and to gain merits. Master Hsing Yun also expresses that Buddhism should appeal to be lively, joyful and affluent.
174 Although about 15% of the respondents claimed to have no particular religious affiliation, there’s only 2% of the respondents do not follow any religious practice of worshipping or praying at all.
Yen-zen Tsai, Religious Experience in Contemporary Taiwan and China, pp. 19, 21, 71.
175 Yu-Shuang Yao and Richard Gombrich, “Christianity as Model and Analogue in the Formation of the
‘Humanistic’ Buddhism of Taixu and Hsing Yun”, pp. 224, 231.
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On the other hand, IKT is a syncretic religion that starts to spread throughout Taiwan and to other countries after 1987. While it claims five teachings will reunite in Dao, its most prominent characteristics are its conservative Confucian values. IKT embeds these values in its propagation and dharma assembly. In IKT’s dharma assemblies, lecturers or Dao transmit masters often highlight that many of the successful businessmen are IKT members, and sometimes these lecturers or Dao transmit masters are scholars. IKT can develop into such an active religious group that have millions of members because it balances its secular and heavenly aspects well.
On the worldly aspect, it affirms wealth, money-making, traditional family values and bringing honour to one’s ancestors. The affirmation of these Chinese and Confucian values is not only embedded in their presswork but also expressed explicitly in their sacred songs yibenwanli 一 本 萬 利 and doctrine (Salvation before cultivation, xiandehousiou 先得後修). On the heavenly side, it emphasizes people only need to cultivate themselves in this life, and their ultimate goal should be returning to the heaven (in their term: li tian 理天, not the same as the Christian’s notion of heaven).
What is more important is that the conservative Confucian elements it promotes help to restore and build up cultural identity.