I looked at the stupa again, next to the giant Big Wild Goose Pagoda, not even the size of its foundation. Dappled sunshine fell on it through the thick pine trees. I stared at it, thinking of the story I had just heard. I had the sensation that the stupa was expanding, billowing out into a larger dimension, until it was huge. The Big Wild Goose Pagoda embodied Xuanzang’s spirit, and the Buddhism he disseminated. It could still be a Buddhist institution carrying on the propagation – because of this ordinary monk. He did not despair perhaps because of a simple belief: if the monks were alive, Buddhism would live on, despite the total destruction of monasteries, statues and scriptures. Xuanzang built the pagoda, Pu Ci preserved it. The spirit they stood for, the faith that sustained them, the spreading of the Dharma they carried out determinedly – the hope of Chinese Buddhism.
But the young monk said there were monks who totally despaired. He showed me a stupa next to Pu Ci’s, which looked no different from the half dozen standing there, but with an inscription longer than any of the others. It read as follows:
Lang Zhao, Secretary of the Xian Buddhist Association, was born in 1893 into a wealthy family in northeastern China, came to Xian and took vows at the age of eighteen; abbot of Wolong Monastery; made donations for the aeroplane that was used to fight against the Americans and supported the Korean people; did farming and built a commune for monks and nuns who lived on their own products and wore their own woven cloth; suffered maltreatment during the Cultural Revolution in 1966 and took his own life on August 18 of that year, at the age of seventy-two, after fifty-five years as a monk.
There is something strange about this – it simply is not how a Buddhist master’s epitaph usually reads. It seems only to refer to his patriotism, not to his contributions to Buddhism. But what I found even more bewildering is the remark I have italicized near the end: he actually committed suicide – a cardinal sin, a capital offence in Buddhism. Why did he do it?
The first rule of Buddhism is not to kill any living creature, not to take one’s own life, and not to help with any killing. ‘Rare is birth as a human being. Hard is the life of mortals. Do not let slip this opportunity,’ is the advice of the Buddha. I had read that the Vinaya, the Buddhist code of conduct, forbids monks to commit suicide, in any form and for any reason. Those who do forfeit the possibility of a good rebirth, let alone that of entering the Western Paradise. What made Lang Zhao do it?
The young monk explained. Lang Zhao was a very good man. He left home out of compassion for the poor, searching for a way to end suffering. He supported the Party for the same reason – to bring about a better life for millions of Chinese. He raised money for ‘Chinese Buddhist’ – the fighter plane that Buddhists throughout China had been asked to contribute to the Korean War effort – and he went to the front line to comfort the troops. He tried hard to help the Party realize the Communist ideal of ‘paradise on earth’. He was rewarded: he was made the head of the Xian Buddhist Association, the most senior monk in the city.
But for all his efforts, he was one of the first targets of the Red Guards – August 18, 1966, the day he took his life, was when Mao received one million Red Guards on Tiananmen Square, openly showing his support for them. They would be his vanguards for the Cultural Revolution. He met some of them in person afterwards, including a girl called Binbin, meaning ‘the polite one’. Mao told her that revolution was not a gentle business and she should change her name to Yaowu, ‘with force’. There could not have been a clearer signal for the use of violence. As soon as they heard the message on the radio, the Red Guards in Xian stormed Lang Zhao’s monastery, destroying it completely. He felt a great injustice had been done: he had been so loyal to the Party; he had really tried to use Buddhism in helping to build the new China and he had allowed himself to be showcased as an example of a remodelled monk. And in the end, he was repaid for good with evil. He despaired. That very night, he killed himself.
The two monks’ stories were grim, but telling. Standing next to each other, their stupas, and lives, invite a comparison. Pu Ci was a simple man, but a true Buddhist monk; Lang Zhao was a master, but in the end shamed himself, however understandably. He was too conscious of his achievements and his sacrifices, too attached to the world and his role in it. He could not bear being reviled after all he had done, by the very people he had tried to support. He was only human. He died, and his monastery with him. Pu Ci just did what he had to do. He raised himself above all his pain and lived; he saved Xuanzang’s Big Wild Goose Pagoda and never knew he would be buried and honoured alongside it.
The queue to climb the Big Wild Goose Pagoda was long and those who came down were panting and fanning themselves vigorously, sharing their experiences up there with their friends who were content to admire it from below. They would not bother to stop and examine these little stupas. Perhaps this was why the young monk was happy to spend nearly an hour and a half talking to me. ‘The Buddha preached to those who were willing to listen,’ he said, when I apologized for taking so much of his time. ‘I’m pleased you are so keen on Buddhism. I hope all the visitors will share your interest.’
He had been enormously helpful. I had learned so much from what he told me. It was well past lunchtime and I offered to take him for a meal. He happily agreed, and chose a tiny family restaurant nearby which served nothing but noodles. While we ate, he asked why I was so interested in the stupas. Most people would come, climb the pagoda, have their picture taken and leave. I laughed and told him it was different for me. When he heard that I was going to India, his eyes lit up and he exclaimed, ‘Really? Can I come with you? Next year will be Master Xuanzang’s fourteen-hundredth anniversary. Won’t it be a great thing to do if I could follow in his footsteps too?’ But like Xuanzang, he could not get the permission from the government to travel abroad. For a moment, he looked crestfallen, but soon he cheered up. ‘You know we are doing something about Master Xuanzang too?’ I had heard a little about a Memorial Hall. ‘Have you seen the construction behind the pagoda? I’ll show you after lunch.’
Against the back wall of the monastery, builders were working away on three huge halls in traditional Chinese style. ‘We’ve always felt ashamed about not doing something special for Master Xuanzang. I am sure you understand why. Now things have changed.’ He was getting excited. ‘Just imagine. The walls will be decorated with carvings and statues by the best artists and craftsmen in China. The ones at the two ends will show the master’s life, his journey to India, his studies in the land of the Buddha, his return to Xian and his translation of the sutras. The middle one will hold the master’s statue and on the white marble wall will be carved scenes of the Tushita, the paradise of Maitreya Buddha, the Buddha to Come. This will be the fulfilment of a dream.’ He seemed intoxicated by the prospect. ‘You will end your journey here, won’t you, as the Master did? When you come back, all this will be finished. Then the visitors will learn about the real Xuanzang and all the amazing things he did. No more Monkey King rubbish,’ he said with a big smile.
It was near closing time when the young monk finished showing me the site and the monastery. There were very few visitors left. Quiet was descending on the temple and the air was full of the fragrance of flowers and shrubs. Monks walked about briskly on a security round. In the early-evening light, the pagoda looked ever more imposing, austere and majestic. It was extraordinary that it had been standing here for nearly fourteen hundred years. Now I realized its survival was far from being just good fortune.
There were four major persecutions in earlier Chinese history, two before Xuanzang, and two after him in 845 and 955. That in 845 was the most devastating and the most complete. In just one month, almost all the monasteries in the country, some 44,600, were destroyed; the entire Buddhist community, over 260,000 monks and nuns, was forced to return to lay life. It was such a heavy blow, Buddhism was yet to recover from it. The Cultural Revolution effectively demolished what was left. Duan told me a story which showed the low point that had been reached by its end. In the early 1970s, the Chinese government was looking for a rapprochement with Japan. A delegation of over a hundred Japanese monks was invited. They wanted to come to Xian, which they recognized