Life and Death is an important thing for the human beings at all times and all over in the world. The feelings and the philosophy of life and death have been valued and emphasized by people from ancient to modern time . Therefore the Chan religious poems on death of Song Dynasty are especially meaningful in life and death education. Chinese religious poems on Death originated from long long time ago . Although such religious poems on Death are not as popular as common poetry in Chinese history, they played a very important role because of the issue of life and death . Those religious poems also had diversely characteristic in different era. For all the Chan’s poems on death (generally written before the dying moment ) were the works regarding life and death, they were not based on the traditional Chinese religious poems on death ，but set up by the separate feature , because of the different background on thought . The Chan’s poems on death had traditionally passed down from the Western the 28th founder - Dharma , but the essentiality of the poems were differed from those of Dharma , The poems had became the ultimate life teachings to the disciples since the “Chan” was preached into China. In the East , the first poem on death was written by Chinese eminent monk Hui Neng in Tang Dynasty, The poetry on life and death was gradually developed in the schools of Qing-yuan and Nan-yue. afterward，There were five Chan Schools of Buddhism at that time . Among them , the founders of Lin-ji , Cao-dong, and Gui-yang have respectively left certain poems on death , which were regarded as great demonstration and encouragement ,as a result ,the development of the poetry on death was flourishing in Song Dynasty.The Chan’s poems on death focused on observing reflecting one’s own inner heart and nature , in order to reach the highest aim of complete relief from life and death . Hence , those poems on death of Song Dynasty announced the nature of human beings , and explained how to observe his / her original nature . As for the philosophy of life and death , the poems on death expressed the impermanence of human body and the eternity of dharma (truth of nature ) which was the main content declared by all the five Chan schools of Buddhism and seven branches. In addition , the poems on death of Song Dynasty can be reviewer from two different aspects. Outwardly , the poems form of the poems on death of Song Dynasty showed its own distinctive literary and art style. inwardly, the description or statement in the poems on death would reveal the Chan disciple’s wisdom and aesthetics , under different reality and personal experiences to deal with death. Finally , Chan’s poetry on death of Song dynasty is one part of Chinese Literature and all that learning should be feedback to life . I sincerely hope that the research will not only give another point of view of death for modern people but also enrich the perception for death .
