Master's Letter to Dharma Protectors and Friends -- 2009
Master's Letter to Dharma Protectors and Friends -- 2009 Dear Dharma Protectors and Friends, Happy New Year to you all! May fruitful harvests be yielded through earnest cultivation. In time of the arrival of a new year, I cannot help but go over the past and look into the future,which is also my chance to share with everyone last year ’s propagation works we have done. On New Year ’s Day of 2008, Jian Zhen Library was completed after two and half years of construction, thereby allowing the opening ceremony of Jian Zhen Fo Guang Yuan Art Gallery and Yangzhou Forum to take place. Yangzhou is my homeland, and it is also an ancient cultural heritage. For the past thousand years, writers and poets left behind countless fine poems and pieces of works. During the great Qing dynasty, the Huizhou merchants and salt tradesmen gathered here and allowed the city to prosper. The rich history and civilization of this city has allowed it to become one of world ’s ten most bustling ancient capitals. With the completion of Jian Zhen Library and commencement of the Yangzhou Forum, the glory of Buddhist studies and culture in Yangzhou are bound to be revitalized. Under the leadership of curator Weng Zhenjin, the Yangzhou Forum was graced by the presence ofworld renowned speakers such as novelist Er Yue He, Qian Wenzhong, Ma Rui-fang, Yu Dan, Wang Bang-wei, Yan Chongnian, Kang Zhen, Cheng Shiyan, Charles HC Kao, Yu Kuangchung, Henry Lee, and Cui Yongyuan who delivered talks on Strange Tales of Liaozhai, Records of the Historian (Shi-ji), the Analects, Tang poems, Xuanzang ’s Journey to the West and so on.
[Show full text]