Chapter 49 Reading Dunhuang Papers Overseas

In early August 1926, Hu Shi arrived in London to attend the Sino-British Fund Committee.The main purpose of his trip to Europe this time was to attend the Geng Fund Meeting; but after a few meetings, the members of the committee dispersed.Hu Shi had nothing to do, so he stayed in London for about ten days, then crossed the English Channel and came to Paris, the capital of France.On the one hand, he wanted to have fun in Paris, and he also wanted to take a stroll in Switzerland, the "World Park"; on the other hand, he wanted to fulfill another plan of his trip to Europe, to go to the Paris library to read Chinese Dunhuang papers.

What kind of precious thing is the Dunhuang scroll? And why did you go to Paris, which is far across the ocean, to read it? It turns out that these Dunhuang scrolls can really be said to be a batch of national treasures of our country. In 1899, a Taoist priest in the Dunhuang Thousand Buddha Cave accidentally discovered a secret room behind the wall in the cave, which contained many ancient scriptures. Except for a few oldest printed copies, they were all manuscripts. There are about 20,000 volumes in total. .The oldest one was written about 1,500 years ago, and the latest one is nearly a thousand years old.The Taoist had little knowledge and didn't understand the preciousness of these scrolls at all, so he sold them as talismans to the surrounding villagers for treatment, and burned some of them.Later, M.A. Stein, an Englishman, came to Dunhuang and learned of these ancient manuscripts. He bribed the Taoist priest with a small amount of money and transported more than 6,000 manuscripts.Not long after, a French sinologist, P. Pelliot, also came, and at a cost of only a little money, he selected and shipped more than 2,000 volumes.In this way, this batch of precious cultural relics from our country was stolen to Britain and France, and became the collections of the British Museum in London and the National Library in Paris.What is now stored in the Beijing Library is only a part of their selection.

Before Hu Shi went abroad, he tried to write the first draft of "The History of Zen Buddhism in China". He wrote about the monk Shenhui and found that Shenhui played a very important role in the history of Zen Buddhism; but later people who studied the history of Zen Buddhism often ignored him and buried him.Hu Shi was determined to fight the injustice for the Shenhui.Therefore, he vigorously searched for historical materials in China, but the results were far from satisfactory. The only Shenhui works he could see were only 659 characters! Hu Shi made up his mind to take advantage of this European trip to Paris and London to read the Dunhuang scrolls. Some historical materials about the monk Shenhui can be found in the scriptures copied in the Tang Dynasty.

On August 26, Hu Shi walked into the National Library of Paris and began to read the Dunhuang scrolls.At that time, Pelliot became famous because he won a large number of precious cultural relics in Dunhuang, my country, and wrote books such as "Dunhuang Thousand Buddha Caves".Hu Shi also visited him and got his help. "He introduced to me that I have to enter the 'Book Writing Room' to read various Dunhuang manuscripts." ① Sure enough, reading Dunhuang manuscripts in Paris was very rewarding.Hu Shi recorded himself: When I arrived in Paris, within a few days, I found an unnamed volume of Quotations, which was determined to be a fragment of the Quotations of Shenhui according to the content.Later, I got circumstantial evidence from other Dunhuang scrolls (such as "Dharma Treasures of the Past Dynasties"), and I can confirm that this is the quotation of Shenhui. (Pelliot 3488)

A few days later, another long volume of quotations was found, one of which was called "Monk Heze", three times he called himself "Hui", and six times he called himself "Shenhui". It is undoubtedly the quotations of Shenhui.This volume is very long, and it is indeed a Tang Dynasty manuscript, which is the most precious. (No. P. 3047) Since then, two volumes of the ancient version of "Shenhui Quotations" have been restored. This is the most proud thing of my trip! ② Not only have I learned a lot from reading, but I also have admirers overseas.Ms. Yuan Changying, who specialized in French literature in Paris, wrote a letter to Hu Shi, saying:

There are only two heroes in my mind these days (you know that women always have heroes in their minds), one article and one weapon.It goes without saying that the literary hero is Hu Shi, and the military hero is also Chiang Kai-shek.These two heroes are the pillars of our nation's destiny! I don't have much time to meditate, but once I get one, I silently wish these two people good luck and success. ③ After reading such a letter, Hu Shi was naturally happy.However, when you are proud, you also encounter very unhappy things.One night, Hu Shi made an appointment with Fu Sinian, who was also in France at the time, to have dinner at Wanhualou.Hu Shi was a little late due to some business, so he ran into the owner of Wanhualou at the door, and he said in a low voice, "Someone upstairs scolded you with leaflets, so I stood waiting for you at the door, don't you go in?" He laughed and said, "It doesn't matter, I want to eat, and I also want to read the leaflets." He went upstairs, and Fu Sinian, Liang Zongdai and others were waiting for him, but there were no outsiders and no leaflets.We don't talk about leaflets.After eating, they walked to a coffee stand at the corner across the street, sat down and chatted, and Hu Shicai asked about the leaflets.It turned out that they were all put away for fear that Hu Shi would get angry.Hu Shi said: "I will never be angry", so he gave him a few.At first glance, it turned out that it was issued by the Paris branch of the Chinese Kuomintang in Europe, "Warning to Overseas Chinese in Europe, Please Pay Attention to the Actions of Dr. Hu Shi, Sun Chuanfang's Running Dog, in Europe". ", and he is also a member of the Sino-British Geng section, so he made such an inference.Hu Shi was busy reading Dunhuang papers from time to time, writing thousands of words of reading notes every day, and had no time to take care of such frivolous things. He only kept a leaflet in his diary, and then buried himself in reading again.

In September of this year, Hu Shi went to London again, looked through the Dunhuang scriptures collected by the British Museum, and discovered Shenhui's "Xianzong Ji". December 17th is Hu Shiman's 35th birthday, and he also spent this day studying in the museum. On the same day, he read "Forbearance and Shangdao Ordinary Saint's Epiphany and Liberation School Mind Cultivation Essentials", copied the volume "Mahayana Northern School", and read seven kinds of papers.The electric lights in the museum are not clear, and copying school books is very laborious.That night, when Hu Shi recalled his birthday, he felt very emotional:

Since leaving Beijing at the end of September last year, it has been too long since I broke up with my "book city", and I really miss him.For more than a year, I have been traveling here and there, but I have never written a well-behaved work. ... There is finally something wrong with the British Geng money matter.Besides, I just went out for a run, got a little fresh air, and got a little new stimulation, which was good for me, but I was so busy and tired that I never had a rest physically.Studying in Paris and London can be regarded as a big achievement this year.Today is my birthday, I spend all day in B． M．Reading the Dunhuang papers in Lijiao is finally the most satisfying celebration ceremony. ⑤

Altogether, in Paris and London, only three quotations from Shenhui were obtained. One volume of "Xianzong Ji" has about 20,000 words, which is 30 times that obtained in China! In addition, I also saw two volumes of "Langa Teacher Ji". Manuscripts, ⑥ and some other important Zen historical materials.The harvest is indeed rich. Hu Shi was really overjoyed that he could gain so much from reading Chinese Dunhuang papers overseas.As for why these Chinese things should be read in England and France, he didn't seem to think about it, and he didn't seem to want to think about it.

Fast forward to the end of the year.Hu Shi left England for America.On the seagoing ship sailing in the Atlantic Ocean, he hurriedly wrote "Miscellaneous Notes on Overseas Reading", reporting to readers the several materials and gains he got.After returning to China, he compiled and finalized the posthumous writings of Shenhui brought back from Paris and London, and wrote a very detailed "Biography of Master Heze Shenhui", which was compiled into "Shenhui Monk's Posthumous Collection" by Shanghai Asia East Library is published. ⑦In the preface, it says: Shenhui is the seventh patriarch of the Southern Sect, the commander-in-chief of the Southern Sect's Northern Expedition, the founder of the new Zen, and the author of the "Tan Jing".In the history of Chinese Buddhism, there is no second person whose contribution and influence are as great as his.Such a great figure has been buried for a thousand years, and almost no one in later generations knows his name.Fortunately, his quotations were buried in the Dunhuang Grottoes. After 900 years of obscurity, there are still 20,000 words preserved. Today, after returning from overseas, they have been rediscovered. Knowing in detail his great achievements in fighting for the legal system of Zen, we have to overthrow the false history of Zen made by Daoyuan Qisong and others, and rewrite the early history of Nanzong: Isn’t this the most important thing for us to rule the history of Chinese Buddhism? Should I feel relieved? ⑧① See the manuscript of "Hu Shi's Diary", Taipei Yuanliu Publishing Co., Ltd., December 1990, Volume 6, August 26, 1926 (Supplementary note to the third edition); Hu Shi in " The Preface to the Collection of Monk Shenhui also said: "I would like to take this opportunity to express my deep gratitude to many friends. I am most grateful to: Dr. Lionel Giles from the British Museum in London, and Professor Paul Pelliot from Paris. Without them If you are eager to help, I will not get these materials." See "Recent Works on Hu Shi's Studies", Volume 1, Shanghai Commercial Press, April 3, 1937, Volume 2, pp. 292-293.

② "Overseas Reading Miscellaneous Notes".This article was originally written for the magazine of the British Student Union, and was later compiled into "Three Collections of Hu Shi's Essays".For the citation, see the third edition of the book, Shanghai Yadong Library, June 1931, Volume 4, p. 539. ③ Yuan Changying wrote a letter to Hu Shi on December 18, 1926, see "Selected Letters from Hu Shi", Beijing Zhonghua Book Company, May 1, 1979, Volume 1, p. 412. (Third Edition Note) ④ See the manuscript of "Hu Shi's Diary", Volume 5, the leaflets attached after September 18, 1926, and the supplementary notes on December 30, 1940. (Third Edition Note) ⑤ Ibid., Volume 6, December 17, 1926. (Third Edition Note) ⑥The two manuscripts of "Langa Teachers' Records" were photocopied by Hu Shishi from time to time, and brought back to China. He wanted to sort them out and print them, but they were never printed. In 1931, North Korea's Jin Jiujing was borrowed, proofread and printed as a final version, and Hu Shi wrote "The Preface to the Records of the Teachers of Langa".This preface is included in Volume 1, Volume 2 of "Recent Works on Hu Shi's Studies". ⑦ "The Collection of Monk Shenhui", published by Shanghai Yadong Library in December 1930, also known as "The Collection of Master Heze Shenhui".Among them, there are four volumes of posthumous collections and four postscripts, and a volume of "Master Heze's Shenhuiyu" collected in Volume 28 of "Jingde Biography of Lantern Records" is appended; "The Biography of Heze Master's Shenhui" written by Hu Shi is printed at the beginning of the volume. ⑧ "Preface to the Collection of Monk Shenhui", see "Recent Works on Hu Shi's Studies", Volume 1, Volume 2, p. 292. Hu Shi's textual research and evaluation of the monk Shenhui, as well as other works on the history of Zen, naturally inevitably contain errors and arbitrariness; people also have different opinions on Hu Shi's theory of Zen, and their evaluations are very different.Generally speaking, those who focus on the study of "Zen", such as the Japanese Suzuki Dazhuo, said that "Hu Shi didn't understand Zen at all"; while those who focused on the "history" of Zen mostly affirmed Hu Shi's textual research.For example, in Mr. Fan Wenlan's "Compendium of General History of China", he described the dispute between the north and the south of Zen in the Tang Dynasty, which is quite consistent with Hu Shi's views.Readers can refer to. ("Compendium of General History of China", revised edition, Volume 2 of Part 3, Section 2 of Chapter 7, People's Publishing House, November 1, 1965, pp. 601-640)