New Revelations from the Buddha King

First Meeting with Venerable Master Wu Ming

I first set sight on Venerable Master Wu Ming at the Seattle Tacoma Airport. At that time, he was the director of the Chinese Buddhist Association and had been invited to visit the Ling Shen Ching Tze Temple in Redmond, Washington.

At our first meeting, he was radiant with smiles and yet conveyed a dignity evocative of the images of Buddhas in temples. On the round and ruddy-complexioned face, once delicate-featured but now marked by a few streaks and small skin tags, a kindness shone through.

Venerable Master Wu Ming was not very tall and had a portly build. With a high and full forehead, his face looked like that of a Buddha.

Upon first meeting me, he said, `You and I are both of the Dragon-Flower Assembly. We are brothers.`

Later, those remarks of his met with outside criticism, `Does a round face make one a Buddha or Bodhisattva of the Dragon-Flower Assembly? Does looking alike make two people brothers?`

Causes of Our Meeting

There were of course causes and conditions which led to our meeting each other. Ven. Master Wu Ming himself said, `A long time ago, I heard the rumor of a child prodigy from the county Chiayi, and this child prodigy was Sheng-yen Lu.` (This was Ven. Master Wu Ming`s first impression of me.)

Later, two people went together to take refuge in Venerable Master Wu Ming. The Venerable asked them, `Why have you come to take refuge in me?`

They replied, `It was the child prodigy Sheng-yen Lu who recommended you to us.`

Ven. Master Wu Ming thought to himself, `This is indeed strange. I do not know Sheng-yen Lu and have never met him, yet he is referring devotees to take refuge in me.` (This was his second impression of me.)

These two impressions he had of me helped to bring about our meeting with each other. After becoming the director of the Chinese Buddhist Association and building the Hu Kuo Temple in the Los Angeles area, Ven. Master Wu Ming entertained the idea of flying to Seattle to take a look at this Sheng-yen Lu.

Meeting with me, however, in the capacity of the director of the Chinese Buddhist Association, presented some problems. There were pressures opposing the notion, not just from other Buddhist organizations, but also from within his own organization.

Ven. Wu Ming said, `Important members of the board of directors advised me that I must not come to see you. Even my own students asked me not to come.` Yet, Ven. Wu Ming also insisted, `Sheng-yen Lu has become a monk now; why not pay him a visit?`

Because of these reasons, the director of the Chinese Buddhist Association, who was also the president of the World Buddhist Monastic Society, flew by himself, without a single attendant, from Los Angeles to Seattle to visit the Ling Shen Ching Tze Temple.

When that happened, I was very touched.

A Buffer and Bridge

Although, in his heart, Ven. Master Wu Ming did not feel drawn particularly to me, he did not feel hostile towards me either.

In reality, he understood that both religion and politics are rife with struggles. Under sectarian bias, monks and nuns pursuing spiritual cultivations undergo sweeping changes. In the early years of the Chinese Republic, there were struggles between the Dharma Master T`ai Hsu Sect and the Dharma Master Yuan Ying Sect. Recently, the Chinese Buddhist Association Sect and the Fokuangshan Sect have engaged in both open strife and veiled power struggles.

Acting as a peace messenger, Ven. Master Wu Ming wanted to play the roles of a buffer and a bridge.

Why was I so controversial? The main reason was that I had claimed to be the incarnation of Padmakumara. Although people had no idea what the name represented, it was quite sufficient to have brought up all kinds of disputes.

Not so long ago, when Dharma Master Yin Shun was addressed as the `Guiding Teacher Yin Shun,` it also initiated outcries and struggles within Chinese Buddhist circle.

It was a good thing that no one had heard of Padmakumara! If I had made it known then that I was the incarnation of Amitabha, I would have been long dead.

I wanted very much to walk at the same pace as Ven. Master Wu Ming. I did not want to fly my own colors or to remain apart from the other groups without having any contact. The visit of Ven. Master Wu Ming again sparked in me the hopes of becoming part of the Buddhist community and blending in harmoniously.

When I went to Taiwan, I made two visits to Ven. Master Wu Ming`s Ocean Bright Temple. While in the United States, I paid a visit to the Hu Kuo Temple.

Ven. Master Wu Ming has often remarked to other people that, `Living Buddha Lian-sheng Sheng-yen Lu is the child prodigy from Chiayi. Living Buddha Lian-sheng Sheng-yen Lu is famous around the world.`

However, the fence erected by the Buddhist circle was very strong, and the single-handed effort of Ven. Master Wu Ming was not enough to bring it down.

The Chinese Buddhist community has long been rent by disunity, with the different elders of each order doing their own things and not interacting with each other. What was between the True Buddha School and the Buddhist community was only one part of the larger picture. The situation was so desperate that power from Ven. Master Wu Ming alone was incapable of making any improvement.

Take the following case as an example:

It was widely circulated that the three most eminent Chinese monks residing in the United States were Venerable Master Hsing Yun of the Hsi Lai Temple in Los Angeles, Venerable Master Hsuan Hua of the City of Ten Thousand Buddhas in San Francisco, and Living Buddha Lian-sheng Sheng-yen Lu of the Ling Shen Ching Tze Temple in Seattle.

When Ven. Master Hsing Yun first arrived in Los Angeles, Ven. Master Hsuan Hua of San Francisco did not give him a wholehearted welcome. Many people knew in their hearts that it was, in fact, Ven. Master Hsuan Hua who had dealt a painful blow to Ven. Master Hsing Yun. (The immigration department of the United States received a secret complaint that the monastic order of Ven. Master Hsing Yun was not made up of authentic monks and nuns, as real monks and nuns would always be dressed in the three monastic robes.)

During my first years in the United States, I was accused by a monastic group in the United States of `narcotics trafficking.` (This history is kept on file with the customs department and one may refer to this material in my book, Hsi-ya-t`u te tung-y?(The Cold Damp of Winter).

I was falsely accused of `peddling in narcotics.` But, truthfully, during the fifty-two years that I have lived in this samsara, I have never even once seen illicit drugs.

Ever since Hsing Yun`s chief disciple, Ven. Hui Sung, came to take refuge in me, the relationship between Hsing Yun and me has become so strained that the kind of plans Hsing Yun has for me could only be carried out clandestinely. I based my open criticism of him on reason and logic.

This is the Chinese Buddhist community. Things are not any different, whether one is in Taiwan or in the United States.

There is no need to talk anymore about Venerable Master Hsuan Hua. As for Venerable Master Hsing Yun, what I have learned from Hui Sung is too horrific for one`s ears.
The Personal Deity of Venerable Master Wu Ming

Someone asked me which deity is Ven. Wu Ming`s Personal Deity. Without giving this question any thought or investigation, I immediately replied, `Kuan Yin Bodhisattva.` Why is it so?

The mantra that Ven. Wu Ming constantly chants every day is the `Great Compassion Dharani.` He also constantly chants this verse:

`Kuan Yin Bodhisattva,
Entering into permanent Samadhi at Potalaka,
Opens herself completely to all who have affinities with her.
Searching out cries of help,
She delivers the lost crowds.
Thus the name the One who has Seen into Self-Mastery.`

At the Ocean Bright Temple and Great Compassion Temple where Ven. Master Wu Ming is the abbot, the principal deity enshrined is the Kuan Yin Bodhisattva. In Ven. Master Wu Ming`s own words, whenever he chants the Great Compassion Dharani, he enters immediately into a state of buoyant ease. The continuous chanting sound of the Great Compassion Dharani seems to continue automatically without any effort from him, like a rein-free horse or a gushing river, to the point where he can hardly contain it.

Whenever Ven. Master Wu Ming runs into any crisis, he chants the holy epithet of Kuan Yin Bodhisattva and the Great Compassion Dharani. One time, while he was at the Fa Hua Temple in Hangzhou, China, he prayed silently to Kuan Yin, `As the Bodhisattva manifests herself in billions of bodies in myriad majestic forms, please bless me with an image to help me in my mind focus practice.`

Several days later, Ven. Master Wu Ming had a dream in which a majestic Kuan Yin appeared to him. Since then, for more than twenty years, the image has been indelibly imprinted on Ven. Wu ming`s mind as he constantly meditates on it.

Then, twenty-some years later, an abandoned bronze Kuan Yin statue weighing more than five hundred fifty pounds was found in storage in a run down guild hall. The person in charge of the guild thought of Ven. Master Wu Ming and had the statue sent to him as a present.

When Ven. Master Wu Ming took a look at the bronze statue, he found to his astonishment that it was the same holy image that had been bestowed on him in his dream.

Ven. Master Wu Ming said, `The supplication I made twenty years ago materialized itself twenty years later. It is as much a mystery as it is a psychic response from the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas.`

That Kuan Yin Bodhisattva is the Personal Deity of Ven. Master Wu Ming is beyond any doubt. Yet, there was a puzzle. I had met with Ven. Master Wu Ming on three occasions and, every time, I had noticed that behind him stood a Kuan Yin that had been burnt and fragmented beyond recognition.

I was startled, but I was afraid to ask about it. It was a puzzle I kept in my mind for quite some time: why was there a burnt Kuan Yin standing behind Ven. Wu Ming? There must be a special reason for it. I went over books written by Ven. Wu Ming and finally found my answer. On page 243 of his book, Jen-en-meng-ts`un (Dreams of Kindness and Grace), there was the following account:

`The lay Buddhist Mr. Ying Li-jen wrote me a letter from New York, asking if I could send the holy statue of the Thousand-Armed Kuan Yin enshrined at the Great Compassion Temple to New York, so that the Buddhists there could pay homage to her. So I had the Kuan Yin statue packed and transported to Kaohsiung. There it was placed aboard the cargo ship Fu P`ing and sent off to New York. The three and one half foot statue was sculpted of sandalwood and had twenty-four arms, with each hand holding a different implement and an eye painted on it.

`But, an unfortunate accident happened. On arrival at the harbor, the Fu P`ing collided with the Norway tanker `Balin` and caught fire. As a result, the holy statue of Kuan Yin went up in flames.`

After reading the above passages, I exclaimed to myself, `How intriguing this is!`

My observation using `discriminatory awareness` completely made sense after reading this account written by Ven. Master Wu Ming. The twenty-four armed Kuan Yin had been following Wu Ming for a long time. When Wu Ming decided to send her to New York, she was reluctant to leave and had returned to follow him again.

An Appendix: Chaos in the Taiwan Buddhist Community

I do not want to make any subjective comments about the chaos found in the Taiwan Buddhist community. One only needs to read the following news report published by the (Chinese) World Journal on September 17, 1996.

[Taipei News Bureau] Yesterday was the first meeting of the Buddhist Reform Discussion, whose goal is to seek conformity within the Buddhist community. An audacious plan was put forward to set up an organization called the National Federation of Buddhist Societies which would have power over all Buddhist temples, venues, and groups in Taiwan. In the proposal put forth by a venerable, such a plan would be modeled after the Catholic system, with the federation and its president enjoying the same positions as the Vatican and the Pope respectively. Under this proposed federation, various committees would be set up to administer the general affairs of the whole organization. All properties would be shared and all resources would be subjected to a unified distribution.

If this plan materializes, it will have a tremendous impact on and completely revamp the traditional modes of life in the Taiwan Buddhist community where, for over one hundred years, each group has been surviving on a mountain-stronghold mentality, raising its own resources individually.

Venerable Master Ching Hsin, director of the Chinese Buddhist Association, pointed out that the proposition was an `ideal` that needed to be addressed by elders from all Buddhist groups. But, as some venerables present also pointed out, groups who are currently in positions of strength, such as the Chung Tai Ch`an Temple, Fokuangshan, and Buddhist Tzu Chi Foundation did not attend yesterday`s convention, making it questionable if they would lend support in the future to a scheme to bring all groups into conformity.

Venerable Master Ching Hsin explained that the main purpose for holding this reform discussion was to bring some conformity and consensus to the Buddhist community. Currently, there are outbreaks of all kinds of chaos within the Taiwan Buddhist community, and Venerable Master Ching Hsin attributes this to the lack of a powerful centralized organization. When every group acts on its own and ignores affairs contributing to the development of the whole Buddhist community, then the entire community suffers and is not able to synchronize harmoniously with the rest of the society.

Dharma Master Hung Yin, president of the Buddhist Youth Cultural Foundation, pointed out at the meeting that, with the new laws going into effect which pertained to civic groups, the Chinese Buddhist Association had already lost a portion of its governing power over the large number of individual Buddhist groups in the country. To address these crises, he proposed that a Federation for Chinese Buddhist Groups be established so that regular meetings could be held to discuss important issues within the community.

The director of the Buddhist Youth Society, Dharma Master Ching Yao, also proposed specifically that a Chinese Republic Buddhist Association be set up. Patterned after the Catholic model, the director would be like the Pope, the board of directors would be equivalent to the cardinals who have the power to elect the Pope, with various committee members ministering to the welfare of everyone in the community. There would also be a spokesperson for public relations and the make-over of the image of Buddhism. This proposition was met with approval from many other venerables.

In Ching Yao`s opinion, at the time of his nirvana, Shakyamuni Buddha passed the teaching of the Buddhadharma onto the monastic group. It is, therefore, the responsibility of the monastic order to make sure that the right dharma would prevail to help sentient beings uproot their suffering and attain happiness. Therefore, the establishment of a central Buddhist church of real power and strength is necessary. Marrying doctrines with administration, such a central organization would create another high point for modern Buddhism by eradicating existing drawbacks and bringing in new benefits.

Venerable Master Ching Hsin pointed out that the first prerequisite for the founding of a powerful central church is to have financial resources. Therefore, issues pertaining to the establishment of a stable financial resource for a central church became another important item of discussion, e.g., increasing sources of revenue and channels of investment, setting up an insurance system to provide for aging monks and nuns as well as for smaller temples which cannot exist on their own, and the proper distribution of such resources. These are specific roles which a centralized church structure can perform very well. Feeling the call of such a mission, Venerable Master Ching Hsin decided to organize this discussion to seek a consensus within the community.

Later, participants broke into smaller groups to discuss specifics of financial management within Buddhist groups. The moderator, Dharma Master Ching Yao, pointed out that in Taiwan all temple properties are registered under the name of the temple abbot. This has created a problem because, when the abbot passes away, property that has been built up by the Buddhist community is inherited by the family members of the deceased abbot. People who wish to propagate the Dharma have to fund-raise to build another temple. Master Ching Yao suggested adopting the Christian and Catholic way of turning over to the central church immovable properties, such as the real estate of the temples. This way, Dharma masters do not have to worry about building temples, as the venues would be provided by the central agency, and daily provisions and health service of monastic members would be administered by their orders, freeing them to devote themselves to the dissemination of the Buddhadharma. This plan would be one way of addressing the unequal distribution of resources within the Buddhist community.

However, some Buddhists present also pointed out that, since individual temples are now self-contained profit units, it would be very difficult for them to donate their properties to a central church, especially in view of the current legislative restrictions. Unless laws are changed, it would be hard for the reform to take place.

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