Chinese Buddhism and the Anti-Japan War

Abstract

This article examines the attitudes and responses of Chinese Buddhists with regard to the Sino-Japanese war of the 1930s and 1940s by focusing on two figures, Taixu and Leguan. Both the Japanese and Chinese Buddhists were confronted with the same problems, such as the relation between the universalism of Buddhism and the question of nationalism, as well as the tension between the Buddhist prohibition against killing and the necessity of killing one's enemies during wartime. Taixu attempted to radically change Chinese Buddhism and establish a humanistic Buddhism. Leguan at first had a positive view of Japanese Buddhism and saw it as a possible model for modernizing Buddhism in China, but later became very critical of Japanese Buddhism and encouraged taking action against the Japanese invasion. Both struggled with the difficult problem of whether it was proper for a Buddhist to actively take up arms and fight in a war for their nation. Placing Japanese Buddhism in the wider perspective of East Asia, and such comparisons with Chinese (and Korean) Buddhists, should provide fruitful hints for rethinking modern Japanese Buddhism.