The Ch'an School has contributed immensely tothe development of Buddhism in China. As the KuangHsiao Monastery in Canton was one of the chief spotsto which the Ch'an School owed its growth, it isnecessary to trace their mutual relationship duringthe period from the Southern Dynasties to the T'angDynasty in order to find out the historicaldevelopment of the Ch'an School. The following fourtopics are the main points of this article.
(1) The Bodidharma and Kuang Hsiao Monastery.According to the Ch'an School, Bodidharma was thefirst Buddhist patriarch to arrive in China. In therecord written by Ku Kuang (顧光) in memory of therepair of the Kuang Hsiou Monastery, it is said:"Bodidharma, the first Budidhist patriarch in China, came from Indian and tarried at K'o Lin (訶林)."The name K'o Lin has been identified with thepresent Kuang Hsiao Monastery.
(2) The Kuang Hsiou Monastery and the NirvanaSutra. The doctrine of sudden apprehension advocatedby the Southern Branch(南派) of the Ch'an School isrelated to the Nirvana Sutra. And the Kuang HsiouMonastery was the place where the Indian Buddhistnamed Paramartha translated the Nirvana Sutra duringthe Ch'en Dynasty. Moreover, the idea concerning theabandonment of problems in the Sixth Patriarch'sVerses (六祖傳偈法) which are contained in the SixthPatriarch's Pulpit Sutra(六祖法寶壇經)was apparentlyderived from the Nirvana Sutra.
(3) The Kuang Hsiou Monastery and the SixthPatriarch, Hui Neng (慧能). After being consecretedunder the fifth Patriarch, Hung Jen(弘忍) at the TungCh'an Monastery (東禪寺) in County Huang Mei of theprovince of Hupei (湖北黃梅), Hui Neng came to theKuang Hsiou Monastery in the first year of EmperorKoa Tsung of T'ang Dynasty (A. B. 661), where hepreached on the subject of the motion of the bannernot coming from the wind but from the human mind.His sermons won admiration for him from some IndianBuddihists. Then he was invited to preach under theBodhidruma tree within the monastery on the subjectof sudden apprehension. Buddhists from many distantplaces came to lisen and contact him. As a resultthe Southern Branch of the Ch'an School came intobeing.
(4) The noble priests of the Southern Branch ofthe Ch'an School and the Kuang Hsiou Monastery. Thesixth patriarch, Hui Neng later preached Buddhism inthe Nan Hwa Monastery(南華寺) in Ch'u Chiang(曲江) ,where he converted forty three persons to Buddihismamong whom nine were natives of the Province ofKuangtung. Some of them visited Kuang HsiaoMonastery frequently. Another frequent visitor wasHui Neng's famous grand-disciple, Shih T'ou HsiCh'ien(石頭希遷) who became the originator of the newsects of Yun Men (雲門宗), Fa Yen (法眼宗) and Ts'aoTung (曹洞宗). The priest Hui Chi (慧濟) of the WeiYang Sect(溈仰宗)of the Southern Branch of the Ch'anSchool also often came to the Kuang Hsiao Monasteryduring the reign of Hsuan Tsung of T'ang, where hepreached Buddhist doctrine to save the people. Allthese events prove that there was close relationshipbetween the Kuang Hsiao Monastery and the Ch'anSchool during the long period from the Liu SungDynasty through the end of T'ang to the Southern Hanof the Five Dynasties.
The spread of Buddhism by the Southern Branch ofthe Ch'an School was based on the principles of "fromthe mind comes the Buddhahood," "all mulfariousdoctrines cannot depart from the nature of the self,"and "temptation makes one a rogue while perceptionmakes one a Buddha." Its effects gradually reachedthe Confucianists whose studies eventually evolvedinto the formation of Neo-Confucianism in the SungDynasty. Though some of the latest followers of theSouthern Ch'an might have been prejudicial inthought, on the whole they prescribed a good remedyfor curing wickedness. Thus the importance of KuangHsiao Monastery cannot be overlooked.
