In YixingHufu Town, Jiangsu Province, there is a temple that once ranked first among the top ten Zen temples in China, The Chong'en Temple of Lingshan, which is famous for the handwriting of the Qianlong Emperor of the Qing Dynasty "The First Ancestral Court in the World".
Chong'en Temple is located at the intersection of two roads in and out of Hufu Town, the Tang Provincial Line and the Zhang Lingmu Line. With its back to the Mountain and facing the continuous sea of bamboo, the mountains are green and the mountain streams are entangled, making it an excellent place for meditation.
Hu father is a typical hilly mountainous area in Jiangnan, and its territory is mostly winding hilly mountains. The mountains are not high, but the momentum is continuous. Lingshan is one of the typical places. Legend has it that a senior monk in the Tang Dynasty traveled here, saw the surrounding peaks stacked on top of each other, shaped like a lotus, so he prepared to build a Zen temple here, and in the process of digging the foundation, he found a bowl-shaped jade, and when he tapped, he sounded like a chime, so he named this mountain "Chi Shan".
The Jiangnan region has always been a thriving place for the two religions of Buddhism and Taoism. Hu's Father's Chong'en Temple was able to prosper thanks to Master Yulin of Chong'en Temple in the early Qing Dynasty. In the 17th year of Qing Shunzhi,Yulin was ordered to enter Beijing and teach the fa at the imperial court, and was praised by the dynasty as a "national teacher". After Kangxi ascended the throne, because Master Yulin was thinking of Lingshan Mountain thousands of miles away, Kangxi specially ordered his heavy subjects to accompany him, sent the master back to Hufu Lingshan, and renamed the Lingshan Monastery "Chong'en Zen Temple". Since then, the Zen Temple has flourished day by day in the north and south of the great river. By the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty, Chong'en Zen Temple had more than 200 Zen rooms and more than 400 monks, becoming the first of the top ten Zen temples in the country.
The reason why the Lingshan Zen Temple reached its peak during the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty is also inseparable from Qianlong's three visits to Jiangnan and the three patronages of the Lingshan Zen Temple. It is said that Qianlong's biological father, Chen Gelao, has been living in seclusion in the Buddhist monasteries in Jiangnan. Qianlong vowed to search the famous brakes of Jiangnan and find his biological father. The first time he went down to Jiangnan without success, before going down to Jiangnan for the second time, because he heard his mother say that his father had a black mole the size of a pea on his toe, Qianlong brought a large bundle of white cloth used by monks to tie their feet to the south. When Qianlong came to the Lingshan Zen Temple, he ordered the monks to come and receive the emperor's favor, and asked the monks to take off the old cloth on their feet and replace it with the new white cloth that the emperor had brought from the capital. Qianlong did find his biological father from the monks in the Lingshan Zen Temple, but he was limited to face and could not recognize his relatives in person, so he could only return to Beijing to report to his mother. The mother listened to the great joy and ordered Qianlong to go to the Lingshan Zen Temple again to take his birth father back to the imperial capital, so qianlong had a third trip to Jiangnan. Who knew that Qianlong arrived at the Lingshan Zen Temple, but learned that his biological father had passed away, and Qianlong was greatly sad, and wrote "The First Ancestral Court under heaven" on the spot with a royal pen to express his longing for his biological father. Today, the ink treasure of Qianlong's handwriting is still preserved at Chong'en Temple.
During the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression, after the Japanese army captured Yixing, a large fire burned the Chong'en Temple to the ground, destroying the temple that was full of incense. Today's Chong'en Temple was rebuilt in 1989 and renovated more than 70 stone pagodas of successive abbots in the depths of the bamboo forest, which is also the largest stone pagoda tomb preserved in the country. In recent years, the famous "Ten Views of Zen Temple" in the history of Chong'en Temple has also been repaired and opened to the public.
As a place of Buddhism, Chong'en Temple still retains a pure and Zen realm. The temple is open to the public free of charge and does not charge a ticket. Visitors are strictly forbidden to enter the main hall of the temple to burn incense, and pilgrims can only burn incense and candles in the square outside the temple's "Tenno Hall". In addition to the parking lot in the square outside the temple, there is no shop, and if pilgrims want to enter the incense and burn candles, they can take them at will on the cabinet where the incense candles are enshrined in the square, and do not charge a penny for incense. In this atmosphere without any commercial atmosphere, people can fully reflect the admiration for the Buddha. Such a clean and so close to nature Buddhist shrine is probably rare in China.
In Hu Father, not only does it not charge a ticket to enter the Chong'en Temple of Lingshan Mountain, and there is no money for burning incense, but you can also take a free bus shuttle when you travel to Lake Father. The free tourist bus in Hubu Town is divided into 22 stations, covering all the tourist attractions in the town, whether it is a local or a foreign tourist, sitting on the tourist bus, you can visit the entire Hu father town, of course, including the Chong'en Temple.
"One flower, one world, one leaf and one like the same", the Zen of Buddhism itself is to let people get spiritual sublimation. Relying on its long Buddhist cultural history and the beautiful environment of Hu father, Chong'en Temple can allow everyone who goes to have a "bathing heart" journey.
Travel Tips
Location: Father Town, Yixing Lake, Jiangsu Province
Transportation: high-speed rail - take the Ninghang high-speed rail to Yixing Station, the exit of the station has Hu father town specially opened "Lake Father Tourism Free Bus"
Take the bus to the bottom of Chong'en Temple