In ancient times, the emperor drank the bowl of water, and ordinary people had to offer it to feel face. If the emperor mentions a word, this can blow for a lifetime.
During the thousands of years of feudal history, ordinary people did not have the opportunity to go around the palace in their lives. It was in 1912, after the fall of the Qing Dynasty, that ordinary people ushered in such an opportunity.
As the place where the emperor worked and lived during the Ming and Qing dynasties, the Forbidden City had not been visited by ordinary people for hundreds of years, and the feudal rulers felt that this was the best preservation of the royal face.
Even if Feng Yuxiang later drove Puyi out of the palace, setting off a new chapter in ordinary people's visit to the Forbidden City, not everywhere in the Forbidden City can be visited, including a Buddhist hall, which has not been opened to the public for hundreds of years.
In addition, every four or five o'clock in the afternoon, the Forbidden City began to forcibly close to drive people, and over the years, some strange legends about the Forbidden City are no longer few.
Some people say that it is because the Forbidden City, as the palace of the feudal emperor, because the killing atmosphere is too heavy, and he stays in the Forbidden City at night, worried about accidents...
There are many legends, what the facts are, and no one has come to give the right answer. Putting aside other strange rumors, let's talk about today, why has this Buddhist hall in the Forbidden City never been open to the public for hundreds of years?
Among these emperors, Puyi is undoubtedly the closest emperor to the toiling masses, and this secret can only be obtained from him.
Why was the Yuhua Pavilion built
The above-mentioned place, which has not been open to the public for hundreds of years, is the Yuhua Pavilion, the largest of the dozens of Buddhist halls in the palace, and it is also the Buddhist hall of Tibetan Buddhism.
Built in 1749 AD, it echoes the Yuhua Pavilion in Nanjing. However, the Yuhua Pavilion of the Forbidden City will not produce the hazy feeling of smoke and rain in the Nanjing area.
Yuhua Pavilion is a pavilion-style building, which looks like three floors on the outside, but in fact it is a four-story structure inside, which is what we usually call the structural characteristics of "three outside and four inside".
Mainly to visit these Buddha statues of Tibetan Buddhism, according to the four arrangements of things, actions, yoga, and supreme yoga stipulated by Tibetan Buddhism, the most critical point is that only the emperor can enter.
So, the Manchus originally believed in shamanism, but why did Qianlong spend so much money to build a Buddhist hall in Tibetan Buddhism?
In my opinion, this has something to do with the ruling ideology of the Aisin Ghora family. First of all, as a small number of nomads, after they entered the Central Plains, they were in charge of such a large country.
The most important thing is that the country is also a multi-ethnic, multi-faith country, which means that if the Aisin Ghora family wants to manage the country well, they have to accept the impact of different cultural traditions.
Therefore, Tibet was part of China, so naturally the Qianlong Emperor also had to respect and understand their culture. In this way, such a Buddhist hall was built in the Forbidden City, so that in addition to learning and worshiping oneself on weekdays, it could also strengthen one's own rule at the cultural and ideological level.
This is the real meaning of Qianlong's construction of the Buddhist hall.
Why is the Yuhua Pavilion not visited?
One of the reasons why the Yuhua Pavilion is not allowed to be visited is that I think it is to keep the Buddhist hall quiet and solemn. After all, most of the bustling crowds come to visit the Buddhist hall with the idea of playing, which goes against the original purpose of the Buddhist hall.
Secondly, because the Buddha statue of Shakyamuni placed in the Buddhist hall is quite precious, exquisite in craftsmanship, and is not open to the public, it is to beware that the bustling crowd will corrode the cultural relics and avoid damage to the cultural relics.
But when Pu Yi heard so many rumors and various speculations from the people around him, he couldn't help but tell the truth of the matter.
In fact, tourists are not allowed to visit, not because the Buddha statue is expensive, nor because of the protection of faith, but because there are three Buddhas of joy placed on the fourth floor of the Yuhua Pavilion.
According to Pu Yi, only the emperor would visit and worship inside before the big marriage, and learn about men and women by the way, but Pu Yi further explained that this matter was purely redundant.
After all, before the big marriage, the emperor was not ignorant of the affairs of men and women, they were cultivated in an all-round way from birth, even if they were not interested in this matter at first because of age, but they inevitably had contact with some palace maids with ulterior motives.
Therefore, visiting and learning about the Buddha of Joy before the big wedding is just a ceremony.
However, the tourists who come and go, including some young couples and some underage children, openly present these things in front of everyone, which is really a little inappropriate, that is, Yuhuage has always refused to visit outside.
postscript
The ancients were so tactful, why did Tibetan Buddhism put the affairs of men and women above the shrine? Anyone who knows Tibetan Buddhism knows that the Buddha of Joy belongs to the tantric Buddha-figure, symbolizing desire for heaven and love for the gods.
The male body represents the Dharma, the female body represents wisdom, and when the goddess wraps her legs around the male god's waist and puts her arms around the male god's neck, it represents the unity of law and wisdom.
It also represents the tantric doctrine of "double practice for men and women". In fact, these things are not shameful and invisible, but it is only due to the influence of traditional culture that the Yuhua Pavilion has been protected in this form.
And you get the idea?