Conclusion

This concluding section revisits the main points raised throughout the book and argues that monastery reconstructions introduce innovations and change into what is otherwise a highly stable system. The chapter suggests that the case of monastery reconstructions can provide us with a framework for understanding change and development among Chinese Buddhists during the modern era more generally. Both destruction and reconstruction processes are proven to be ephemeral, and as new threats and disasters arise, efforts to renew monasteries must be undertaken time and time again. As the previous chapters have shown, reconstructions were expected interventions in the lifecycle of a Chinese Buddhist monastery, and records describing such reconstructions typically credit them with helping to revive the Dharma more generally.

Cultural Relics

This final chapter looks at the first seventeen years of the People’s Republic of China, during which time over a hundred Buddhist sites were repaired or rebuilt. These sites were put to use as showcases for Buddhist culture in New China and as stages for cultural diplomacy with other Asian countries that shared a Buddhist past. Two sites examined in some detail are Guangji Monastery and Yonghe Temple, both in the new capital of Beijing. A key question is how Buddhist monasteries fit into the new bureaucracy; as the cases of these two monasteries demonstrate, the reconstructions were intended to create static monuments to cultural heritage, not living religious communities.

The Post-Taiping Reconstruction

This chapter examines the destruction of Buddhist monasteries in China during the Taiping War (1850–1864) and the first post-war wave of reconstructions. The period between the end of the war and the start of the Wuxu Reforms was highly active in terms of reconstruction of religious institutions of all types in China. The chapter includes a digital humanities survey of destruction and reconstruction records drawn from digitized local gazetteers, with the focus sites of Linggu Monastery near Nanjing and Jiangtian Monastery in Zhenjiang. The chapter argues that in spite of the widespread destruction of the war, reconstruction was still undertaken at many sites, but even rebuilt sites were not free from the long-term effects of the conflict.

Introduction

This chapter surveys the state of the field of material culture and sacred spaces in Chinese Buddhism, as well as the historical development of monastery layouts. The chapter explores how both the material and the human elements were affected by destruction events, and accordingly reconstruction of a monastery inevitably addressed both spheres. A devoted and charismatic reconstruction leader, who was often an outsider to the community, typically played a crucial role in enabling the reconstruction to occur. Building upon the work of architectural historians and scholars of modern Chinese Buddhism, this chapter establishes the theoretical and methodological basis for the chapters that follow.

National Salvation

This chapter addresses the period from 1928 to 1949, spanning the Nanjing Decade and the Second Sino-Japanese War. During this era of preparation for invasion and all-out war, Buddhist monasteries come to symbolize a Chinese civilization under threat and were rebuilt in part to serve as symbols of Chinese cultural heritage. The chapter examines a number of monasteries near the new capital of Nanjing, including one transformed into a monument for the war dead, as well as Xingjiao Monastery near the wartime base of Xi’an in the northwest of China. It argues that the pressures of the war propelled Chinese Buddhist monasteries into a new level of national importance, but their perceived value was increasingly in their history rather than in any living religious community on the site.

Reconstruction in an Era of Revolution

This chapter examines Buddhist monastery reconstructions during the period from the 1890s to the 1920s, a time of internal disorder and revolution, during which religious property came under threat in a rapidly changing China. Chinese Buddhists and other religious communities had to actively defend their rights to their own property, as political and educational elites sought to seize it for use as public schools. Tianning Monastery in Changzhou and Qixia Monastery near Nanjing are examined in detailed focus studies. Both were shaped by pressures that emerged during this period of revolution, undertaking monastery reconstructions in socially, politically, and economically challenging environments, at a time in which the very livelihood of religious institutions in China was under threat.