Text | Watermelon
Editor|Watermelon
preface
As one of the three major religions in the world today, the influence of Buddhism is undoubted. In China, Buddhism, on the other hand, has spread almost all over the country and holds a very high status in the minds of many Chinese. From a foreign religion to its current prosperity, Buddhism in China has experienced nearly a thousand years.
Buddha
In the process, Buddhism has ushered in its own glorious moments, but it has also experienced lows and even suppression at different times, and suffered major blows. Among them, the Huichang Annihilation Incident initiated by Tang Wuzong has to be mentioned.
The economy is the direct cause of the prosperity and destruction of Buddhas
1. The temple embezzled a large amount of the state's property
As a dedicated place for Buddhist believers to live and practice, temples are of great importance to monks. However, from the point of view of the temple itself, it is an institution that does not carry out any productive activities, which leads to the government, in order to guarantee its existence, it must not only give it rich financial support, but also give it a series of political and economic privileges.
The prosperity of the temple
In addition, donations from all walks of life cannot be ignored for the temple, the main body of this donation includes both the princes and nobles, as well as the majority of the middle and lower class ordinary people, and these together constitute the main economic source of the temple. However, with the development of time, the temple's economy gradually began to develop in an unhealthy direction, until the time of Tang Wuzong, this trend has become more and more bad, and even seriously threatened the Tang government, and finally created its own tragic fate.
On the one hand, because of its various political and economic privileges, temples are completely pixiu who only buy money and do not pay money, which is enough in itself to obtain enough wealth for their lives. But it is precisely because of these privileges that they begin to do whatever it takes in order to accumulate more wealth.
Buddha
They not only seized land from peasants and annexed large amounts of land by various means, but also carried out a series of commercial activities, from which they made a lot of profits. Especially in the area of land annexation, after realizing the unique status of the temple, many princes and nobles at that time chose to join forces with it to exploit and oppress the peasants.
Under such circumstances, the taxes that the Tang government was able to collect decreased year by year, causing huge losses to its finances, which was something that every ruler of the dynasty could not endure.
On the other hand, in the process of land annexation activities in the temple, many former peasants were also forced to become tenant farmers serving the temple, forced to accept their exploitation and oppression, which led to the decline of the population that the Tang government could directly control.
A monk with brocade clothes and jade food
At the same time, for the vast number of peasants, seeing that they work all day but still cannot meet the needs of life, the monks meditate and chant sutras but eat their brains full of fat.
Faced with such an imbalance in reality, even if they did not join the temple from their own intention, they would also make such a choice in order to survive, which once again caused a decrease in the available labor force in society. In ancient times, population was the most important resource, which fundamentally shook the foundation of the Tang government.
2. The war made Tang Wuzong urgently need a lot of money
As a more accomplished emperor in the middle and late Tang Dynasty, Tang Wuzong carried out drastic reforms to the Tang Dynasty during his reign, including war.
Sectional make
Since the Anshi Rebellion, the Fanzhen Jiedu Envoy has become a major problem for the central government of the Tang Dynasty. Although the Tang Dynasty still maintained a superficial unity through a series of political mediation methods, many local envoys actually maintained a relatively independent posture, especially the three towns of Heshuo - Lulong, Chengde and Weibo.
Emperor Wuzong's reign coincided with the death of Liu Congjian by the Zhaoyi Jiedu, and his nephew Liu Shu attempted to follow the example of the three towns of Heshuo and inherit the local post of Jiedu envoy on his own. In the face of this demand, if the Tang Dynasty government agrees, it will inevitably cause other knots to cause a chain reaction; If the Tang government refused, then Liu Shu would most likely raise troops.
A prosperous scene before the war
Under this difficult situation, Liu Deyu, who was the prime minister at the time, argued hard and insisted on choosing to go to war against Liu Shu. Although the war ended with the victory of the central government of the Tang Dynasty, effectively maintaining the dominance of the central government of the Tang Dynasty throughout the country, the large amount of wear and tear caused by the war was also a lot of pressure on it.
As early as before quelling Liu Shu's rebellion, the Tang Dynasty had already fought a protracted large-scale war with the Uighurs in the north, almost completely annihilating them, which had already dealt a huge blow to the Tang Dynasty at that time.
Tang Wuzong who is worried about money
Coupled with other wars, large and small, the financial reserves of the central government of the Tang Dynasty fell sharply, which was undoubtedly extremely dangerous for a huge empire. Therefore, obtaining more wealth became the goal of Tang Wuzong, and it was also a necessary means to maintain the continued operation of the entire Tang Dynasty.
It was in this social environment that the attack on Buddhism became the main means of blood transfusion for the Tang Dynasty by Emperor Wuzong of Tang. During his reign, Emperor Wuzong of Tang successively issued edicts to destroy the temples and ordered the monks to return to the laity, "The Imperial Ancestral Department inspected 4,600 temples in the world, 40,000 in Lanruo, and more than 260,000 monks and nuns", "Annexed Buddhist monasteries in the world, four monasteries in Shangdu, 30 monks, one monastery in Shangzhou, and more abolished in Xiazhou..."
Destruction of temples
Under this series of measures, a large number of laborers were freed up to go to the fields to cultivate and contribute tax revenue to the development of the country. The demolition of the temple not only directly provided a lot of wealth for the Tang government, but also greatly reduced the burden of the Tang government to provide for the temple, and eventually expanded the sources of fiscal revenue, supplemented the revenue of the state finance, and the centralized power of the Tang Dynasty was also strengthened.
Emperor Wuzong of Tang took measures to consolidate his rule
1. Chongdao suppressing Buddhahood is conducive to strengthening one's personal prestige
In Chinese society, the matter of name was extremely important, especially by the ancient feudal rulers. In order to show his uniqueness and enhance his legal rationality for ruling over the whole world, the rulers of the Tang Dynasty chose to posthumously consider Laozi as their ancestor and made him Emperor Taishang Xuanyuan.
The religion born in China, Taoism, many theories in its teachings are directly derived from the Taoist doctrine created by Lao Tzu, and Lao Tzu is therefore regarded as the incarnation of Taishang Laojun in Taoism and has a very high status.
Emperor Taishang Xuanyuan
Therefore, since the founding of the Tang Dynasty, Taoism has always been regarded as the state religion and has been respected by the Tang Dynasty government. Although other religions occasionally flourished briefly in the history of the Tang Dynasty, the status of Taoism itself remained unchanged and was still recognized by the rulers of the Tang Dynasty.
In contrast, Buddhism, as an alien religion, was introduced to China from the Eastern Han Dynasty to the Tang Dynasty, but the fact that it was an outsider remained unchanged. For regimes that need to prove their legitimacy in name, Buddhism has become a substitute ghost.
Taoist Taoist temple
In fact, before Emperor Wuzong of Tang, Emperor Taiwu of Northern Wei and Emperor Wudi of Northern Zhou had already highlighted the great Guangzheng of their own regimes by suppressing Buddhism. Although Tang Wuzong was Han, and the Tang Dynasty was indeed a serious Han regime, because Tang Wuzong did not ascend to power through normal means, this added a bit of dishonor to his accession to the throne.
Under such circumstances, Tang Wuzong's requirements for highlighting the legitimacy of his rule were not low, and advocating Taoism and disparageing Buddhism became an effective means for him to achieve this goal.
In addition, throughout the history of the Tang Dynasty, many emperors are loyal fans of Taoism, especially the immortality advocated by Taoism, and even wise as Emperor Taizong of Tang had to pin his hopes for life on it, and Tang Wuzong Li Yan himself was no exception.
Support Taoism
For the Taoist priests, Tang Wuzong gave what can be said to be quite generous treatment. Although these Taoist priests themselves have no ability and are completely unable to meet Tang Wuzong's pursuit of immortality, it is precisely with Tang Wuzong's excessive preference for Taoism and some tricks to confuse the people that they finally succeeded in becoming officials and knights, and one by one enjoyed extremely high status.
In fact, the occurrence and specific operation of the Huichang annihilation of Buddha was also carried out with the help of Taoist priest Zhao Guizhen. From this point of view, Buddhism seems to be quite innocent.
2. An important means of eliminating political opponents
In ancient times, when the level of science and technology was not high, people's understanding of nature at that time was in a rather shallow stage, which led them to have a stronger identification and trust in feudal superstition.
The science of weeds
During the period of Tang Wuzong, the Taoist priest who was deeply trusted by Tang Wuzong at that time remembered to pass on such a proverb: "When the eighteenth son of the Li family is lucky, there will be a black-clothed son of heaven to manage the country." Among them, Li's eighteen alludes to Tang Wuzong, and Changyun alludes to both the prosperous national fortune of the Tang Dynasty and the name of Tang Wuzong's Huichang year, and black clothes were one of the representative attire of monks at that time.
Under these circumstances, Tang Wuzong's vigilance against Buddhism naturally increased again, lest someone appear to replace him. It is worth mentioning that Tang Xuanzong came to the throne after the death of Tang Wuzong, and during his reign, he vigorously supported the development of Buddhism, which showed a earth-shaking change from the previous action to destroy Buddhism.
Tang Wuzong
summary
In general, the reason why Tang Wuzong launched such a large-scale Buddha extermination event is based on realistic considerations, and Tang Wuzong's own psychology is also an important reason for the emergence of this activity. Although religion can play a role in maintaining the rule of the current regime to a certain extent, when its power is overdeveloped, it will cause great turmoil and instability for the entire country, as was the case with Buddhism during the Tang Wuzong period. Coupled with the Tang Dynasty's long-standing tradition of respecting Taoism, the debasement of Buddhism became an effective means for Tang Wuzong to maintain the stability of the Tang Dynasty at this time, and also created another rare prosperous era in the late Tang Dynasty.