With the passage of time, there are many historical truths that have sunk in the long river of history. The people of later generations often misinterpreted the facts of that time under the books and the remarks of celebrities, and the one I want to talk about today struggled for a lifetime in that cruel era, and no one at that time had to carefully understand it, and some were only endlessly sad and indignant after reading yu Qiuyu's "Cultural Journey" in "Taoist Pagoda", and was extremely angry at the Taoist who sold Chinese religious scriptures.
As a result, the illiterate Wang Daoist became a sinner of history and bore the shame of a hundred years. But is this really the case?
A lifetime of many misfortunes, the Tao of Fate
Wang Daoshi, a native of Macheng, Hubei Province, whose original name was poor, grew up poor and lived by begging everywhere. At the beginning of the Guangxu Dynasty of the Qing Dynasty, he was recruited into the Suzhou Defense Battalion as a soldier, and by chance, he became acquainted with Taoism, and soon left the military defense, was ordained as a Taoist priest, and took the Dao number Fazhen. All the way to Xinjiang.
In 1897, traveled to Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes, was touched by the religious atmosphere of Mogao Grottoes, in the northern part of the south of the grotto, day and night to clean the sand and stones, offer incense, began to receive alms, and began to go out around preaching curtain, after a small savings, he built a Taoist temple in the east of the sixteenth cave of Mogao Grottoes, named Taiqing Palace, which is now the "Lower Temple".
In 1900, the fate of the Wang Daoren underwent a historic rewrite, and the Mogao Caves culture that now shocked the world really experienced a historical catastrophe in the hands of a Daoist?
Mr. Yu Qiuyu's article made the Mogao Grottoes famous in the world, but it also made the Wang Dao people stink for thousands of years, and the shameful crime was still insulted and spurned a hundred years after the Wang Dao people.
The fate of history and culture cannot withstand any turbulence, and in China at the beginning of the last century, life and death were still involuntary, and it was not easy to take care of the wealth of the whole culture. Wang Daoren is actually a helpless person who has devoted himself to preserving religious culture in the world.
Three requests to the government to protect cultural relics were refused
In 1900, after Wang Daoren discovered the mogao cave scriptures, although he was illiterate, he also knew the important value of this cultural relic.
In order to get the protection of the government, he carried two volumes of scriptures and walked more than fifty miles, and his trip was to send the scriptures to the government of Dunhuang County and give the county order Yan Ze. It is a pity that this Yan Xian Ling saw that this dilapidated and yellowed scripture was regarded as waste paper, and he really did not learn any techniques.
Wang Daoren, who was rejected by Yan Xianling, returned to the Mogao Caves to face tens of thousands of scrolls of scriptures alone, helpless but not discouraged, although he did not know the true value of these tens of thousands of scriptures, he also knew that he could not give up his protection for them.
After guarding the scriptures in the cave alone for two years, Dunhuang County ushered in Wang Zonghan of Xinzhi County, so he came to Dunhuang County, this Xinzhi County Wang Zonghan was a jinshi, heard the report of Wang Daoren, immediately led people to the Mogao Grottoes, after a review, he only took away a few scrolls of scriptures, left a sentence to preserve the cave, and then left, and there was no news since then.
Neither zhixian took specific measures to protect the scriptures, and Wang Daoren felt that this was not the way to go, so he decided to find a bigger official to report the matter. He found a donkey, carried two boxes of scripture scrolls, and rushed to Suzhou, which is today's Jiuquan. Along the way, the wind and food were open, alone, not afraid of wild beasts and bandits, traveled more than eight hundred miles, and finally found the Yandong of the armament Road Daotai at that time.
This Lord Yandong was very proud and short-sighted, and after seeing the scriptures, he only commented on one sentence, and the words on the scrolls were not as good as his words. After throwing out the scriptures, I will not talk about it again.
After three fruitless feedbacks, Wang Dao's heart was discouraged, and he was alone to guard the cave.
Later, Ye Changchi, who was then a scholar in Gansu, had a lot of research on epigraphy, and after knowing about the cave of the Tibetan scriptures, he was very interested, and asked for several ancient books and scrolls, unfortunately, this scholar did not really take measures to protect the scriptures.
In 1904, Wang Daoren had no way to solve the problem of his whole body courage and wrote a secret report to Lafayette, which made the Qing court at that time worried about internal and external troubles, and this letter from the distant frontier did not know where it drifted, perhaps it did not reach the imperial court, and it was forgotten in the corner. Wang Daoren did not receive any reply.
Helpless to sell books to foreign travelers
In 1907, Stein came to China, and by chance, he came to the Mogao Grottoes, and after traveling, he was very interested in the well-preserved Buddhist cultural relics at that time, and met Wang Daoren, the "guardian" of the Mogao Grottoes, with the help of Jiang Xiaogan.
When Stein first met the king, he saw his cowardly but sometimes cunning look, and knew that this person was not a good person. After a gradual understanding of Wang Daoren, he claimed to be a believer in Xuanzang and talked about Xuanzang Buddhism with him. The King slowly accepted Stein.
Stein repeatedly proposed the idea of buying scriptures, but although the king and Stein could talk about it, even the country's cultural relics could not be lost to others.
However, if you don't sell these scriptures, how can you get the wealth to rest in the scripture cabinet and better protect the scriptures?
Under Stein's many contacts, the King's Daoren slowly loosened. Finally agreed to sell the scripture to Stein.
This move completely pushed Wang Daoren into the evil river of selling cultural relics, and he has not been able to turn around so far.
And Stein was also called the "great thief" of stealing scriptures by later generations, and the two sang and harmonized, as if they were really really real sinners who sold cultural relics and scriptures.
Wang Daoren finally ushered in a reply from the Qing government, and when they saw that the foreigners began to pay attention to and have a curiosity about these dilapidated scriptures, they began to realize the value of these scriptures.
The Qing government ordered the scriptures to be transported to the capital, and Wang Daoren withheld some of them privately, and every time these scriptures went to a place, there was a smaller part, and only more than 8,000 copies were finally sent to Kyoto, which was the real historical catastrophe!
Greedy local officials and privately stored cultural relics and Buddhist scriptures are the important reasons for the complete disappearance of this large number of Buddhist scriptures in the long river of history.
brief summary:
The illiterate man who finally had no choice but to sell books to foreign countries, and only wanted to repair the Tibetan scripture cabinet, but he really preserved the priceless scripture that collected the wisdom of the ancients.
Stein was a great thief of scriptures, Wang Daoren was a sinner who sold scriptures, and in the end, it was these two people who preserved the orphan Buddhist scriptures in the Mogao Caves in Dunhuang, and today, decades later, people can see the supreme wisdom of Buddhist scriptures.
The reason why the Chinese people insulted the king was nothing more than that he sold the treasures of our country to foreigners, but at least those scriptures are still preserved in the world, and they can make the world feel the wisdom in them, which is more valuable than truly disappearing into the world. In the modern era when the world tends to be more and more the same, the culture of the country needs to be protected, but seeking common ground while reserving differences is also the only way to go through the historical process, and our vision and mind should not be too narrow, and we have no practical understanding of the situation and environment at that time.
It cannot be said that Wang Daoren is a hero who has protected national treasures for eons, but he is by no means a sinner of great treachery and great evil in Yu Qiuyu's mouth, experts say that Yu owes him an apology, but those who have attacked Wang Daoren owe an apology to wang Daoren who tried to protect cultural relics in a helpless and desperate environment.