中国文化概要 Lecture 13 Religion.docVIP

Lecture 13 Religion Four Major Religions in China Buddhism Daoism Islam Christianity (Catholicism and Protestantism) Government’s Policy Regarding Religion in China The policy regarding religion in the first constitution(1954) and the version (1982) states: “Citizens enjoy freedom to believe in religion and freedom not to believe in religion and to propagate atheism.” Buddhism Siddhartha Gautama乔达摩?悉达多, known by the titles Sakyamuni释迦牟尼 (the sage of the Sakya family) and Tathagata 如来佛(the follower of truth), founded Buddhism in India in the sixth century B.C. About the Founder of Buddhism Buddhism is said to be founded in India in the 6th century B.C by Siddhatha Gautams, the son of a nobleman and member of the Kshatriya caste 刹帝利种姓near the present borders of India and Nepal. At age 29 he was confronted with the sights of a senile old man, a sick man, a corpse, and a wandering ascetic. With eyes opened to aspects of life newly revealed to him, he broke from the material world and became an ascetic. But six years later, he gave up mortifying the body as futile and plunged into deep meditation and mystic concentration that at last brought him enlightenment under a botree (pipal)菩提树. Four Noble Truth 1. The noble truth of suffering: sorrow is the universal experience of mankind, and everyone is subjected to the trauma of birth, of sickness, decrepitude and death; 2.The noble truth of the origin of suffering: desire; 3. The noble truth of the cessation of that craving: removal of desire 4. The noble truth of the way that leads to the cessation of suffering: that desire can be systematically abandoned if one follows The Noble Eight-Fold Path The Noble Eight-Fold Path 四圣谛：苦谛，因谛（集谛），灭谛，道谛 八正道： 正见，正思维，正语，正业，正命，正精进，正念，正定 Right Knowledge, Right Aspiration, Right Speech, Right Behavior, Right Livelihood, Right Effort, Right Mindfulness, Right Absorption. Aim of Buddhist By following the Noble Eight-Fold Path, the Buddhist aims to attain “nirvana涅槃”, a condition beyond the lim