The Householder Elite: Buddhist Activism in Shanghai, 1920-1956
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The Householder Elite: Buddhist Activism in Shanghai, 1920-1956 by James Brooks Jessup A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History in the Graduate Division of the University of California, Berkeley Committee in charge: Professor Wen-hsin Yeh, Chair Professor Andrew Barshay Professor Robert Sharf Summer 2010 © 2010 – James Brooks Jessup All rights reserved. Abstract The Householder Elite: Buddhist Activism in Shanghai, 1920-1956 by James Brooks Jessup Doctor of Philosophy in History University of California, Berkeley Professor Wen-hsin Yeh, Chair This dissertation is a social history of the urban community of lay Buddhist elites, known as “householders,” that vigorously pursued a mission of Buddhist activism in Shanghai during the first half of the twentieth century. The Shanghai householders were capitalists, doctors, lawyers, intellectuals and party members who chose to make a formal commitment to Buddhism and its goals of salvation yet retained their status as regular members of society with families and careers. They comprised the largest and most influential of the elite lay Buddhist communities that sprang up in cities across China during the Republican era. This study analyzes the social significance of the Shanghai householder community as it transitioned through a series of social and political upheavals from its emergence in the 1920s to its eventual demise amidst the transition to socialism in 1956. I argue that throughout these years Buddhist activism constituted an arena of civic culture in which urban elites were able to establish a durable source of moral authority and social legitimacy. 1 CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ii INTRODUCTION 1 CHAPTER 1: ASSEMBLING HOUSEHOLDERS, 1920-1927 5 CHAPTER 2: NATIONALIST GOVERNANCE 29 AND THE CHARITABLE TURN, 1927-1937 CHAPTER 3: COMMERCIALIZED PROPAGATION 49 CHAPTER 4: DEGREES OF COLLABORATION 60 IN WARTIME SHANGHAI, 1937-1945 CHAPTER 5: REJUVENATION AND DEMISE, 1945-1956 79 BIBLIOGRAPHY 89 i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Throughout the many stages of this dissertation project I was sustained and inspired by the generous support of numerous individuals and institutions. First, I owe a deep debt of gratitude to my advisor, Wen-hsin Yeh, for always sharpening my analytical vision and channeling my ideas into productive directions. Frederic Wakeman gave me essential historiographical training in his courses and shared his insights during the initial conceptualization of the project. Andrew Barshay graciously stepped in to provide valuable comments and fruitful references. Bob Sharf brought fresh perspectives and connected me to critical resources within Buddhist Studies. Beyond my committee, I received welcome support and suggestions from Michael Nylan, David Johnson, and most recently Alex Cook and Nick Tackett. I am eternally thankful to Tom Wilson for setting me on this journey and never ceasing to offer his guidance and encouragement. In Shanghai, my research was funded initially by a Berkeley Graduate Division Summer Grant, followed by a Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Abroad Fellowship, and a Dean’s Normative Time Fellowship. I received essential assistance from the adept staff at the Shanghai Municipal Archives, the Shanghai Library and the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences. I am thankful for the companionship, shared wisdom and intellectual exchanges that I enjoyed with fellow researchers Chris Leighton, Stephen Halsey, Wendy Fu, Denise Ho, Dave Luesink, Kate Merkel-Hess, Toby Lincoln, Norm Apter, Brenton Sullivan, and Tobias Smith. After conducting my research, a Blakemore Freeman Fellowship sent me to the International Chinese Language Program in Taiwan for the additional specialized language training needed for this project. Gao Yumei (“Gao Laoshi”) enthusiastically incorporated my requests and patiently imparted her precise readings of twentieth-century Buddhist literature. Chen Yung-fa welcomed me into Academia Sinica’s Institute of Modern History, where Patrick Hou and others offered endless advice. Impassioned discussions with Erik Hammerstrom, Justin Ritzinger and Bev Foulks helped to both broaden and deepen my conceptualization of the field of modern Chinese Buddhism. Back in Berkeley, my writing was generously supported by a Charlotte W. Newcombe Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship and a University Dissertation Write-up Fellowship. At the phenomenal new East Asian Library, Bruce Williams and Jianye He pointed me toward sources and tools crucial to the final development of this project. Many thanks go to Marty Backstrom, Elinor Levine, Mary Trechock, and the rest of the staff at the Institute of East Asian Studies for their constant and consistent assistance over the years. Within the History Department, Mabel Lee always provided indispensible help and attention, not to mention levity, on the many occasions when they were needed. I also benefitted immensely from writing groups, informal conversations and fellowship with John Danis, Shakhar Rahav, Wennan Liu, Edna Tow, Cyrus Chen, Glenn Tiffert, Charlotte Cowden, and Matt Mosca during his stay at Berkeley. I owe immeasurable thanks to my family, Carol, William, Peter, Barbara, and Alex for their unflagging and unhesitating support, without which nothing would have been possible. Finally, to Enzii and Muffin who gave me the strength to see this project through to the end. ii INTRODUCTION Most of the large cities in China have at least one Chü-shih Lin (Forest of Laymen), the name given to the regular meeting places of the laymen… As the chü-shih are often men of considerable learning as well as faith and piety, they sometimes exhibit a more profound understanding of Buddhist philosophy than many of the monks and nuns. To this learning they add active observance of the teaching that the utmost compassion should be shown to all sentient beings… The chü-shih is usually a cultured person. He prefers to wear the dignified Chinese gown of blue, grey or bronze-coloured silk, and by his habits and gestures, exhibits his fondness for and understanding of the traditional culture of his country. He is often a poet or painter as well as a philosopher and metaphysician, and may be something of a historian or possess a knowledge of Chinese herbal medicine in addition… To see the chü-shih gathered together at a meeting, the rich colours of their gowns blending together, their fans fluttering in response to a hundred charming gestures, and the quiet benevolence of their facial expressions, creates a picture not easily forgotten.1 John Blofeld’s portrait of a particular type of Chinese Buddhist, the “chü-shih” (p. jushi 居士), was based on his own avid observation of religious life in China during the 1930s and 1940s. As Blofeld’s description implies, the jushi—which I translate as “householder(s)”—were neither the monks and nuns who left their families behind to take up the disciplined spiritual life of the monastery, and nor were they the common worshippers who occasionally offered incense to the Buddha as they would to any other Chinese deity. By contrast, the householders made a formal commitment to Buddhism and its goals of salvation yet retained their status as regular members of society with families and careers. Blofeld’s portrait aptly captures the distinctive cultural air of the householder as conveyed through habits, gestures, expressions, and dress. Although he apparently intended to portray them as an authentic vestige of an ancient and timeless China, the householders observed by the British writer were in fact products of a new age. The urban elites of early twentieth-century China who chose to become householders did so amidst political revolution, economic industrialization, modern warfare, and the fundamental changes that these brought to society and culture. It was the entrepreneurs, doctors, lawyers, party officials, and so forth who developed new organizations and institutions to form themselves into activist religious communities in cities across the country. The largest and most influential of these householder communities was located in Republican China’s premier modern metropolis of Shanghai. This dissertation reconstructs the historical experience of the Shanghai Buddhist householder community across four decades of political and social upheaval, from its emergence in the 1920s to its eventual demise in the 1950s. Twentieth-century Buddhist householders have primarily been studied within the growing field of scholarship on Chinese Buddhism in the Republican era (1912-1949). Influenced by the Christian missionary reports that preceded them, the earliest works in this field—most notably by Holmes Welch and Wing-tsit Chan—characterized the Buddhist developments of the period as a “revival” defined by a general reorientation from other- 1 John Blofeld, The Jewel in the Lotus: An Outline of Present Day Buddhism in China (London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1948), 57-59. 1 worldliness to this-worldliness.2 One major component of what might be called the “Reformation” thesis was to interpret the rise of an organized householder movement as a shift in religious leadership from the clergy to the laity. Although Welch—whose monumental trilogy on twentieth-century Chinese Buddhism has done more to open up the field than any other piece of scholarship—criticized the so-called “revival” for taking a secularizing path leading Buddhism toward its “eventual demise as a living religion,” he nevertheless declined to challenge the idea that such a reorientation