Zen, or meditation, refers to meditation in Buddhist practice. Meditation, precept-keeping, charity, humiliation, diligence and consciousness are called "six degrees", which is the basic kung fu of becoming a Buddha and an important transitional link in the three studies of "abstinence, determination and wisdom". Lin Qingxuan, as a Buddhist, is a vegetarian, recites scriptures and worships Buddha, but he said, "I want to be eccentric in my mind, but I still do the cause of joining the WTO, that is to say, I don't want to lose my humanity." [7] "The Buddhism I believe in does not exist to cut off our life experience or our relationship with life. On the contrary, the Buddhism I believe in is to deepen our life experience and make our relationship with life more harmonious and complete. " This shows that Lin Qingxuan's prose creation pays attention to real life and observes, feels and expresses life with Buddhist ideas. This is his "Zen prose", and its characteristics can be summarized as Buddhist and human; It is full of religious color and literary interest, both argumentative and lyrical; It not only inherits rich cultural media, but also has the connotation of modernity. Facing the reality of modern society, "Zen thinking prose" often intervenes, analyzes and comments, reflects and praises it, so it has the connotation of modernity.
The ideological content of Lin Qingxuan's Zen prose can be roughly summarized as the following aspects:
(1) Praise for the good side of the world.
As a religious form, Buddhism undoubtedly has the ideological tendency of avoiding the world and being born, transcending the world of mortals and "dying in bliss". However, Lin Qingxuan believes that the ideal of going to the pure land cannot be understood as "isolating the world" or "abandoning the world", and that people should practice in the world, and "there is bodhi in the world of mortals". Therefore, his "Zen prose" always exaggerates, praises and sublimates the beautiful side of the world. Because "I Buddha has compassion" gives birth to infinite love, he praises fraternity-the spirit, behavior and people of fraternity. His declaration of fraternity is: "People should not be afraid of love. Although love binds us and makes us burn, it is our worry, but it is also love, which also strengthens us, achieves us, surpasses us and leads us to the path of Bodhi."
He praised human affection, saying that maternal love is "the permanent revetment of our hearts" (The Case of Mind Protection), and missed his father's special care for himself (Looking forward to his father's love). He praised childlike innocence: "Children are innocent, without prejudice, knowledge and judgment. They are only natural, or in the clear eyes of children, we will feel that they are like a flower or a leaf in the universe, and their tears are just a drop of dew on the leaf in the morning." ("My Aunt Ye Sui Xiang")
Children are images that often appear in his works, and the author finds many pure and beautiful qualities from children. He even said, "The child is my Zen master. He was born as my child to educate and inspire me." He meditated with children's words and deeds, which reminded me of Li Zhi's "The Theory of Childishness" and Feng Zikai's essays and cartoons.
Lin Qingxuan also praised the simple life, such as "Qing Huan": "When one can taste the fragrance of wild vegetables better than the delicacies of mountains and seas, or one can see the taste more attractive than diamonds in the stones on the roadside, or one can feel more moved by listening to the sound of birds singing in the forest than carrying a birdcage, or even realize that a quiet pot of oolong tea can cleanse the soul better than a noisy dinner ... these are' Qing Huan'." Qing Huan is good because it has no desire for life. It pays no attention to material conditions, but only to the taste of the soul.
(2) Reflection on the disadvantages of reality.
As mentioned above, Lin Qingxuan was influenced by Feng Zikai, Xu Dishan and others during the May 4th Movement, but unlike them, Lin Qingxuan, after all, is a contemporary person, and his Buddhist thoughts in his prose are more optimistic about the "earthly Buddhism". Reflection on the shortcomings of reality is also the outstanding performance of "human nature".
Environmental pollution, money first, indulgence in life, violent temperament, these are the ugly ends of modern life and modern people, all of which Lin Qingxuan is concerned about. As a Buddhist, he is full of anxiety and sadness, but with tolerance and expectation, and with the great wish of "being universal to all beings", "praying that all beings can realize in the world, gain wisdom in life, and turn their troubles into bodhi" and "can wake up a little more and have less dreams". (preface to phoenix eye bodhi)
Lin Qingxuan won the first prize in the Chinese Literature Award for his work "Twilight Bodhi", in which he wrote about "some worrying qualities of the city". The street scene at dusk witnessed by the author was full of feelings for the urbanites who were "suspicious, anxious, hurried and confused" and "ignorant", but at the end, the author was "grateful for the shortcomings of this world, so that we could not be vigilant and grateful for the city. We are born as sentient people, not heartless things, so that we can rely on the warmth of love to get out of the cold or chaotic or dirty or hurried helpless or ignorant ferry and find an endless source of life. "
(3) Perception of nature.
In nature, the sun, moon and stars, rainbow and white clouds, drizzle and breeze, high mountains and flowing water, flowers, birds, insects and fish all made Lin Qingxuan feel something. He wrote in "Introduction to Cool Bodhi": "Just looking at the simple life of Manghua, I am full of emotion. In fact, my life is full of such emotion, a vein of fallen dead leaves, a pebble texture rounded by a stream, a lonely moon accidentally broken out of a dark cloud, a grass that has been crushed and struggled to stand up, and a petal that has just fallen and picked up with fragrance ..., I hope. They drift into my heart with the wind ... "From nature, I realized philosophy and Zen, and observed and expressed nature with Zen eyes, which made Lin Qingxuan's prose description of nature have a unique Zen interest, which is somewhat similar to the prose poems of Indian poet Tagore.