In the first two chapters of his book Anarchy in the Purse Land, Justin Ritzinger conducts a thorough investigation into the teachings and philosophies of Taixu, a renowned twentieth century Buddhist thinker1. Primarily, he focuses on Taixu’s early anarchist origins and explores how they influence his later work as a transnational Buddhist revivalist2. This blog post will briefly investigate the consequences of this contextual influence, along with others, for Taixu’s work toward the transnationalisation of Buddhism, ultimately concluding that Taixu’s Chinese cultural background in both anarchism and Chinese Buddhist thought is heavily influential in his later teachings outside of China.
Ritzinger’s assessment of Taixu’s anarchist influences conflicts with the generally accepted scholarship about the topic, which usually minimizes these origins as inconsequential in Taixu’s later works. Ritzinger points out that Taixu’s own autobiography, in accordance with this general consensus, implies that his early anarchist and revolutionary experiences were little more than “youthful indescretions,” which Ritzinger works to refute in his chapters2. Anarchism, Ritzinger stipulates, largely contributes to Taixu’s later Buddhist works, in which he condemns economic inequality and seeks to revolutionise with the ultimate hope of forming a utopian society2.
This portrayal of Taixu, as someone who was very much molded and guided by the context in which he developed his ideas, is crucial to consider as we understand the influence he had as a transnational Buddhist outside of China. Elise DeVido specifically explores Taixu’s influence on the Buddhist revival in Vietnam3.
Leaders and followers of Confucianism and Buddhism have, over the course of several centuries — if not millennia — contributed substantially to cultural amalgamation and assimilation in East and Southeast Asia. Taixu’s work as a transnational Buddhist demonstrates another example of this phenomenon, with DeVido arguing that the revival of Buddhism in Vietnam would not have occurred to the same extent without his crucial participation2. She refutes the idea that a general trend of “Chinese cultural influence” in Vietnam allowed it to reflect developments in Chinese Buddhism, asserting instead that Taixu’s reforms, writing, and visits to Vietnam were necessary for the revivalist movement to occur2.
The Chinese influence on Taixu’s teachings in Vietnam was strong, as DeVido points out that the thinker “expected that China would become the leader of the Buddhist nations in Asia,” and thus worked to proliferate Chinese Buddhist texts, reforms, and teachings throughout other countries2. Taixu’s revivalist goals, notably influenced by his anarchist background, were profoundly impactful in Vietnam. One of Taixu’s widely read writings there, “How to establish Buddhism for this world” heavily stressed his utopian views, encouraging his audience to follow his teachings to “make this world into the Pure Land”2.
Taixu’s movement and methodology was formulaic for modern Vietnam, as DeVido explains that many influential generations of monastics were engendered during Taixu’s revival.
Ultimately, Taixu’s widespread impact in transnational makes Ritzinger’s conclusions about Taixu’s prominent anarchist influences all the more interesting and consequential. The Vietnam example shows not only the significance of Taixu’s role in the Buddhist revivalist movement that occurred there, but clearly reflects the anarchist ideological undertones that Ritzinger identifies in Taixu’s teachings.
- Ritzinger, Justin. Anarchy in the Purse Land: Reinventing the Cult of Maitreya in Modern Chinese Buddhism. (Oxford Scholarship Online, 2017), Ch. 1-2. [↩]
- Ibid. [↩] [↩] [↩] [↩] [↩] [↩] [↩]
- DeVido, Elise. “The Influence of Chinese Master Taixu on Buddhism in Vietnam” in Journal of Global Buddhism 10, (Directory of Open Access Journals, 2009), pp. 413-458. [↩]