Chapter 7 of Buddhism and Buddhists in China This is a LibriVox recording. For more information or to volunteer, please go to LibriVox.org. Recording by Philippa Willits Chapter 7 Buddhism and the Future Life Before the advent of Buddhism, the Chinese had only a vague idea regarding life after death. The Land and Water classic mentions the Duxou mountain in the eastern sea, under which spirits of the dead live, the entrance guarded by two spirits, Shendu and Yulei, who are in general control of the demons. In some parts of China, the names or pictures of these spirits are placed on the doors of a house to guard it. The Taoists early developed the idea of a western paradise, presided over by the Queen of the West, located at first in the Kunlun Mountains, and later in the islands of the eastern sea. This heaven, however, was limited to Taoist hermits and mystics. Buddhism made a complete purgatory in heaven known to everyone in China. Chapter 1 The Buddhist Purgatory This is really Buddhism's most noteworthy addition to China's religious equipment. Buddhism lays much stress upon the experiences of a soul immediately after death. Its punishments are well known to every individual. The temple of the city guardian, found in every world city, has a replica of the court in purgatory over which he presides. In the temples of Taishan, there is an elaborate exhibit of the tortures inflicted on culprits in purgatory. Every funeral service conducted by Buddhists or Taoists is intended to conduct the soul of the dead through purgatory and pictures vividly the progressive experiences from the first seventh day to the seventh seventh day. On the seventh month, on the fifteenth day, about August, a special service is held for the souls of the dead in purgatory. Furthermore, every community has a general service about October for the souls of those who died of violent death or who have no one to look after them. During the war, many services were thus held for those who died on the battlefields of Europe. At such services the scenes in purgatory are vividly portrayed by pictures and figures. The temples distribute tracts with pictures of purgatory so that women may see them and understand. On the stage are often active, powerful plays, whose scenes are laid in Hades. This propaganda is perhaps the most efficient of its kind. Purgatory is depicted as consisting of ten courts, each surrounded by small hells, where the soul undergoes punishment and cleansing. The fifth court, which may be taken as an example of the other courts, is in charge of Yen Lo or Yamma. Yamma was once in charge of the first court, but his tender heart pitted the souls who came before him and sent them back to earth. Because of this leniency he was placed in charge of the fifth court. When a soul has passed through the first four courts and it has been discovered that there is no good conduct to its credit, it is led to the fifth court and examined every seven days regarding past conduct. In order to get back to the world of men, it eagerly promises to complete various unfinished vows, such as to repair monasteries, schools, bridges or roads, to clean wells, to deepen rivers, to distribute good books, or to release animals, to take care of aided parents or to bury them suitably. But it is plainly told that the gods know its artifices and that now these unfinished tasks can never be completed. The gods have reached the unanimous opinion that no injustice is being done. Accordingly there is no appeal, but each soul is led by attendance with bulls' heads and horses' faces, to a tower whence they may see their native village. Its front is in the shape of a bow, with a perimeter of 27 miles. Its height is 490 feet. It is guarded by walls of sword-trees. Good men, whose deeds of omission are balanced by the good they have done, return to life. Only souls, judged to be evil, see their village from this tower. These can see their own families moving about, and can hear their conversation. They realise how they disobeyed the teachings of their elders. They see that the earthly goods for which they have struggled are of no value. Their plottings rise up with lurid reality. They see how they planned a new marriage, although already married, how they appropriated fields, state property, and falsified accounts, putting the blame on persons who were dead. While they observe their village, they behold their erstwhile friends touch their coffin and inwardly rejoice. They hear themselves called selfish and insincere, but their punishment does not stop here.  From this tower all passes before them as a lurid dream, and they are stricken in heart. About the fifth court are sixteen small hells where the soul is punished. In each one are stakes buried in the ground, and fierce animals. The hands and feet of the guilty one are bound to a stake. His body is opened with small knives, and his heart and intestines quickly devoured.  Besides these sixteen sorts of sinners, the Fifth Court deals with other types of wicked people, those who do not believe in rewards and punishments after death, who hinder good causes, who burn incense without a sincere heart, speak of the sins of others, who burn books that urge men to be good and worship the great dipper but persist in eating meat, those who hate men, who repeat sutras and incantations and take part in religious ceremonies but do not fast beforehand, who slander the Buddhist and Taoist religions, who know how to read but refuse to read the ancient and modern exhortations regarding rewards and punishments, who dig into graves and destroy their marks, who purposely set fire to trees and underbush or are careless with fire in their own houses, who shoot arrows at animals with the intent to kill, who urge and tempt the sick and weak to enter into contests of any kind with themselves, who throw tiles and stones over neighbouring walls, poison fish in the river, fire guns or make nets or traps for birds, who sow salt on the ground, who do not bury dead snakes very deep and thus cause death to those who dig, who cause men to dig the frozen ground in winter or spring, the vapours of earth chills such diggers to death, who tear down adjoining walls and compel their neighbours to move the kitchen stove, who appropriate public highways, lands, closed wells and stop-cutters, those who have committed any of the above sins are taken to the tower whence they can see their own village, and then are consigned to the great crying hell, rower of her that is, the fourth of the buddhist hot hells. Footnote Buddhism distinguishes hot and cold hells. In a country like India, severe cold is a serious torture, hence they go to their respective small hells. When their time has expired, they are examined in order to see whether they have any other sins which need punishment. Those who have committed any of the above sins may not only escape punishment, but may have their punishment in the sixth court lessened if they fast regularly on the eighth day of the first month, and take a vow not to commit these sins. Some sins, however, cannot be arranged for in such a way, such as the killing of living beings and hurting them, the associating with heretics, committing fornication with women and then poisoning them, committing adultery, violence, envy, or injuring the good name of others, stealing, requiting favours with hatred, and hearing exhortation but not repenting. These are major sins. Part two is social value. The social value of purgatory is quite plain from the description of the fifth court, and of the sinners who are punished therein. Purgatory is the social mirror of China, wherein the consequences of all and social acts are pictured in such a vivid way as to deter the individual from committing them. It is effective in China, not only because of the realistic presentation, but because the opinion of the community is against such acts, and in favour of repressing them on every occasion. Part three, the Buddhist heaven. Buddhism brought into China not only a fully developed purgatory, but also a heaven which all may enter. The sovereign of the western heaven is Amitabha, or in Chinese, Omitofo, with whom Kuan Yin, the goddess of mercy, is usually associated. Amitabha is explained as meaning boundless age. The original meaning is boundless light, which suggests a Persian origin with Manichaean influences. The translations of the Amitabha sutras were wholly made by natives of Central Asia. Amitabha is one of the thousand Buddhas. He is regarded as the reflex of Sakyamuni, and is connected also in his earthly incarnation with a monk called Dharmakara. This monk desired to become a Buddha. This wish he presented to Lokesh Vararaja, asking him to teach him as to what a Buddha and a Buddha country ought to be. Lokesh Vararaja imparted this knowledge. Then the monk, after meditation, returned having made 48 vows that he would not become a Buddha until all living beings should attain salvation in his heaven. The 18th vow expresses his ideal. O Bhagavad, if those beings who have directed their thought towards the highest perfect knowledge in other worlds, and who, after having heard my name, when I have obtained Bodhi, knowledge, have meditated on me with serene thoughts, if at the moment of their death, after having approached them surrounded by an assembly of monks, I should not stand before them worshipped by them, that is, so that their thoughts should not be troubled, then may I not obtain the highest perfect knowledge. A few extracts from the Amitabha viewer sutra will illustrate the Buddhist idea of life in this pure land. In the western region, beyond 100,000 myriads of Buddhist lands, there is a world, great happiness by name. This land has a Buddha called Amitabha. The living beings there do not suffer any pain, but enjoy all happiness. Therefore, it is called the land of pure delight. The land of pure delight has seven precious fountains, full of water containing the eight virtues. The bottom of these fountains is covered with golden sand. On four sides there are steps made of gold, silver, crystal and glass, precious stones, red pearls, and highly polished agates. In the pools are variously coloured, light emitting lotus flowers as large as cartwheels, delicate, admirable, odorous and pure. The Buddha of this land makes heavenly music. It is covered with gold. Morning and evening, during six hours, it rains the wonderful celestial flowers, erythrina indica. All the inhabitants of this land on clear mornings after dressing offer these celestial flowers to the 100,000 myriads of Buddhas of the regions who return to their country at mealtime. When they have eaten, they go away again. This country possesses every kind of wonderful, vericoloured birds. The white egret, the peacock, the parrot, the swarika, a long-legged bird, the kalavinka, a sweet-voiced bird. All these birds, morning and evening, during the six hours, utter forth a beautiful, harmonious sound. Their song produces the five indria, roots of faith, energy, memory, ecstatic meditation, wisdom. The five bala, the powers of faith, energy, memory, meditation and wisdom. The seven bodhyanga, the seven degrees of intelligence, memory, discrimination, energy, tranquility, ecstatic contemplation, indifference. And the eight portions of the correct path maga, the possession of correct views, decision and purity of thought and will, the ability of producing any sound uttered in the universe, vow of poverty, asceticism, attainment of meditative abstraction of self-control, religious recollectedness, honesty and virtue, and such doctrines. When all beings of this land have heard the music, they declare their faithfulness to the Buddha, Dharma and the Sangha, the Buddha, the law and the community of monks. As to those who enter this land, it says, all living beings who hear this should make a vow to be born in that land. How can they reach the pure land? All very good men will gather in that place. He whose blessedness and virtue are great can be born into that country. If there is a good man or woman who, on hearing of Amitabha, takes this name and holds it in his mind, one, two, three, four, five, six or seven days, and his whole heart is not distracted, to that man at death Amitabha will appear. His heart will not be disturbed. He will at once enter into life in the land of pure delight of Amitabha. I see this blessing and hence utter these words. Those living beings who hear these words should make a vow to be born in that land. Part four, the harmonisation of these ideas with ancestor worship. The extension of life beyond the grave in purgatory, or in the pure land and through transmigration, was readily accepted in China. Both the new ideas and the disciplines through which to realise them were eagerly adopted and have held their place to this day. In other lands the creation of a heaven and a Hades has weakened the grip of ancestor worship and ultimately displaced it. In China the opposite result has obtained, due, no doubt, to the fact that the family system, and along with it the supreme duty of filial piety, were fostered by the state and Buddhism and its teachings were permitted only in so far as they bolstered it up. Another reason lies in the agricultural basis of China's civilization, reinforced by the great difficulty of communication, which tended to make the family system dominant in China. Today the improvement of communication and the introduction of the industrial system of the West, with the individual emphasis of modern education, are factors which are weakening the family system and with it ancestral worship. End of chapter seven, Buddhism and the future life. This recording is in the public domain. Chapter eight of Buddhism and Buddhists in China. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. Buddhism and Buddhists in China by Louis Hodus. Chapter eight. The spiritual values emphasized by Buddhism in China. Near the House of Parliament in Peking is located a small monastery dedicated to the goddess of mercy, Kuan Yin. Before her image the incense burners send forth curling clouds of smoke. The walls are decorated with old paintings of gods and goddesses. The temple within its courtyard has the appearance of prosperity. Its neat reception room with its tables chairs and clock shows the influence of the modern world. Here a monk in the prime of life spent a few months recently lecturing on Buddhism to members of parliament and to scholars from various parts of China. Frequently the writer used to drop in of an afternoon to discuss Buddhism and its outlook. Usually a simple repast concluded these conversations, the substance of which forms the greater part of this section. One. The three-fold classification of men under Buddhism. What does Buddhism do for men? There are, in the world at least three classes of men. The lowest class live among material things. They are occupied with possessions. Their life is entangled in the crude and coarse materials which they regard as real. A second higher class regards ideas as realities. They are not entangled in the maze of things but are confused by ideas, ascribing reality to them. The third and highest class are those who by meditation have freed themselves from the thralldom of ideas and can enter the sixteen heavens. Two. Salvation for the common man. What can Buddhism do for the lowest class? For this class Buddhism has the ten prohibitions. Every man has in him ten evils which must be driven out. Three have to do with evil in the body, namely not to steal, not to kill, not to commit adultery. Four belong to the mouth, lying, exaggeration, abuse, and ambiguous talk. Three belong to the mind, covetousness, malice, and unbelief. Is not this entirely negative? Yes, but it is necessary, for during the process of eliminating these evil deeds, man acquires patience and equanimity. Buddhism does not stop with the prohibitions. The believer must practice the ten charitable deeds.  Not only must he not steal, but he must assist men with his money. Not only must he not give himself to lasciviousness, but he must treat all men with propriety. So each prohibition involves a positive impulse to virtue, which is quite as essential as the refraining from evil. What energizing power does Buddhism provide? First is purgatory with its terrors. The evil man, seeing the consequences of his acts upon himself, becomes afraid to do them and does that which is good. Then there is transmigration, with the danger of transmigration into beasts and insects. Again there are the rewards and the paradise of Amitabha. Moreover there is even the possibility, not only of saving one's self, but by accumulated merit of saving one's parents and relatives, and shortening their stay in purgatory. Three, the place of faith. Can any man enter the western paradise of Amitabha? Yes, it is open to all men.  On the eve of death, he may meet a good and learned teacher who, soothing and encouraging him in various ways, will preach to him the excellent law and teach him the remembrance of Buddha. But being harassed by the pains, he will have no time to think of Buddha. What hope has such a man? Even such a man has hope. The sutra says, Some good friends will say to him, Even if thou canst not exercise the remembrance of Buddha, utter the name of Buddha Amitabha. Let him do so serenely with his voice uninterrupted. Let him be continually thinking of Buddha, until he has completed ten times the thought, repeating, Nama umi to fu. I put my trust in Buddha. On the strength of his merit of uttering Buddha's name, he will, during every repetition, expiate the sins which involve him in births and deaths during eighty millions of long ages. He will, while dying, see a golden lotus flower, like the disc of the sun appearing before his eyes. In a moment he will be born in the world of highest happiness. After twelve greater ages the lotus flower will unfold, thereupon the bodhisattvas, avalokitesvaras, and mahasattvas, raising their voices in great compassion, will preach to him in detail the real state of all the elements of nature, and the law of the expiation of sins. Does faith save such a man? Yes, not his own faith, but the faith which prompted the vow of Amitabha. Amitabha's faith in the possibility of his salvation gives him supreme confidence that he will attain salvation. All he needs is to have the desire to be born in that paradise and to repeat the name of Amitabha. 4. Salvation of the Second Class How do those of the Second Class attain salvation? The men of the Second Class regard ideas as realities. They are not entangled in the maze of things, but are confused by ideas regarding them as real. These men do not need images and outward sanctions, but they need heaven and purgatory though regarding them as ideas. By performing the ten good deeds they will obtain a quiet heart, having no fear and become saints and sages. Among men saints and sages occupy a high rank, but not so among Buddhists. By merit of good works merely they enter the planes of sensuous desire, the six celestial worlds located immediately above the earth. 5. Salvation for the Highest Class And the Third Class This class has many ranks. There are those who by the practice of meditation, for dhyanas, can enter the sixteen heavens conditioned by form. dhyana means contemplation. In later times under the influence of the idea of transmigration, heavens were imagined which corresponded to the degrees of contemplation. By the practice of the four arupadhyanas, that degree of abstract contemplation from which all sensations are absent, they enter the four highest heavens free from all sensuous desires and not conditioned by form. These heavens are the anti-room of nirvana. What is the driving power in all this? It is virya or energy. 6. Heaven and purgatory Do heaven and purgatory exist? Heaven and purgatory are in the minds and hearts of men. Really, heaven is in the mind of Amitabha, and purgatory exists in the illusioned brains of men. Does anything exist? Nagarjuna says there is no production, no destruction, no annihilation, no persistence, no unity, no plurality, no coming in, and no going forth. 7. Sin Does sin exist? In the mind of the real Buddhist, sin and virtue are different aspects of the all. Sin is illusion, virtue is illusion. There is a higher unity in which they are reconciled. 8. Nirvana Do you know of anyone who attained nirvana? Yes, I have experienced it. It is not a state beyond the grave. It is a state into which one can enter here. Can you express this experience in words? Impossible. I can only indicate the shore of this great ocean. At first, I was in great distress and agony, as though carrying the illusions of the world. Then came a great peace and calm, ineffable, serene, and surpassing the power of language to express. 9. The Philosophical Background What is behind this universe? Underlying this universe of phenomena and change, there is a unity. It is the basis of all being. It is within all being, and all being rests in it. It is because of this common background that men are able to apprehend it. This universal basis we call dharma, or law. Its characteristics are that everything born grows old, is subject to disease and death, and that the teachings of Buddha purify the mind and enable it to obtain supreme enlightenment. That all Buddhas, by treading the same way of perfection, will attain the highest freedom. You speak of the Buddhist Trinity. Yes, we have the Dharmakaya. This is the essence body, the ground of all being taking many forms. Buddhas, bodhisattvas, spirits, angels, men, and even demons. It is impersonal, all pervasive. It may be called the first person. The second person is the sambhogakaya, the body of bliss. This is the heavenly manifestation of Buddha. The third person is nirmalakaya. This is the projection of the body of bliss on earth. Some identify this Trinity with that of the Christian faith. While there is a resemblance, we should note that the first person of the Buddhist Trinity, would correspond to God as the absolute or the impersonal background of universal being. The second corresponds to the glorified Christ, and the third to the historic Jesus. There is no counterpart, either to God the Father or to the Holy Spirit. Do you believe in the salvation of all beings? Yes, all have the Buddha heart. All living beings will finally become Buddhas. Then, turning to a friend of mine, the speaker said, What have you done in Buddhism? The friend answered, I have written and translated many books. I do not mean that, he answered. What work have you done? The friend confessed that he had not done much else. Then he said, Every morning when you awake, reflect deeply and profoundly upon your state before you were born. Think back to that state where your soul was merged with Buddha. Find yourself in that state, and you will find ineffable enlightenment and joy. The sun was setting behind the western hills. The blaire of trumpets sounded on the city wall. Outside of the door was the whirling sound of picking, returning home from its mundane tasks and joys. We joined the rushing, restless crowd, and still we felt the calm of another world. Has not Christianity a message of balm and peace for these sons of the East who are so sensitive to the touch of the eternal and sublime? 10. What Buddhism has to give An important government official, obliged to deal with many vexatious requests and demands, declared, I could not get through my day's work. If I did not spend an hour every day in meditation, just as Buddha did when he became enlightened, he was asked what he did when he meditated or prayed. Nothing at all. Well, about what do you think? Of nothing at all. I stop thinking when I engage in religious meditation. Life makes me think too much. I should lose my sanity if I did not stop thinking and enter into the void, once we all came and into which we are all going to drop back. His Christian inquirer was still unsatisfied by the Buddha's description of his prayer life and pressed for further details. What happens when you meditate or pray? Nothing happens, I tell you, except that I experience a peace which the passing world cannot give and which the passing world cannot altogether take away. The secret of religion is simply to realize that everything is passing away. When you accept that fact, then you become really free. The Christian world seemed to have been tremendously impressed by the slogan of the French soldiers of Verdun. They shall not pass. Perhaps the German soldiers did not pass just then or there, but the French soldiers themselves are all passing away. And everything in the world is passing away. What our Buddhist religion teaches us is let it pass. You cannot keep anything for very long, and prayer or meditation is simply to practice yourself in that thought deliberately. Oh, it is a wonderful peace when you fully believe that gospel and enter into it every day. Vanity of vanities. Everything is vanity. Why worry? We do altogether too much worrying. To pray means simply to quit worrying, to quit thinking, to enter into the indescribably passionless peace of nirvana. Here seemed to be an ardent Buddhist. When asked what he thought is the difference between a Buddhist and a Christian, he answered promptly, Yes, there is my wife. She is a very good woman. All the neighbors come to her when there is anyone sick or in trouble. So I say to her, Wife, I should think you would make a first-class Christian. But I think she lets herself be worried by altogether too many troubles. She is all the time thinking and fussing and planning. To be sure, it is mostly about other people. But then she does have the children in the house and the relatives and friends and neighbors to look after. Perhaps she really cannot be a Buddhist. Perhaps it is all a matter of temperament.  BUDDHISM AND BUDDHIS IN CHINA BY LOUIS HOLUS CHAPTER IX PRESENT DAY BUDDHISM 1. PERIODS OF BUDDHIST HISTORY The history of Buddhism in China may be divided into four periods. Buddhism entered China as we have seen in the second century BC. The first period, that of the translation and propagation of the faith, ended in 420 AD. The second period, that of interpenetration, lasted to the beginning of the Tang Dynasty, 618 AD. The third, the period of establishment, ended with the close of the five dynasties in 960 AD. The fourth period, that of decay, has extended to the present day. 2. THE PROGRESS OF THE LAST 25 YEARS There are signs of a revival of Buddhism in China. Whether this is a tide or a wave, only the future can reveal. In 1893, Dharmapala, an Indian monk, stopped in Shanghai on his way back from the Congress of Religions in Chicago. It was his purpose to make a tour of China, to arouse the Chinese Buddhists to send missionaries to India, to restore Buddhism there, and then to start a propaganda throughout the whole world. He addressed the monks of Shanghai. Dr. Edkins, the veteran missionary, acted as his interpreter. Dharmapala was surrounded by a horde of curious monks who were more interested in his strange appearance, and in the cost of his garments than they were in his great ideals. They were also feeling the iron heel of the Confucian government, and at once inquired about the attitude of the government towards such an innovation. Dharmapala did not go beyond Shanghai. Japanese Buddhists, especially the members of the Hongwanji sect, have taken a deep interest in Chinese Buddhists. Count Otani once visited the chief monasteries of China. Numerous Japanese Buddhists have made such visits. In 1902, the Empress Dowager, fired by a reforming zeal, decided to confiscate Buddhist property, and to use the proceeds for the spread of modern education. The Buddhist monasteries put themselves under the protection of Japanese monks in order to hold their property. When, by 1906, the Empress Dowager saw the consequences of her edict, she had once issued a new edict, reversing the former one, and the Japanese monks took their departure. The Japanese Buddhists have been fired by missionary zeal for China. In many of the large cities of China are the temples of the Hongwanji sect. Established primarily for the Japanese, these temples are intended to serve as points of departure for a nationwide missionary work. The 21 demands made upon China included two significant items in the last group which the Chinese refused to sign. Article 2, Japanese hospitals, churches, and schools in the interior of China shall be granted the right of owning land. Article 7, China agrees that Japanese subjects shall have the right of missionary propaganda in China. Under Japanese influence, there were established in 1907 at Nanking, under the leadership of Yang, a lay Buddhist devotee, a school for the training of Buddhist missionaries. The students were to go to Japan for further training, and the more promising ones were to study in India. This project was discontinued after the death of Yang, on account of the lack of funds. When the Republic was established, Buddhism felt a wave of reform. The monasteries established schools for monks and children. A magazine was published, which appeared irregularly for several numbers and then stopped. A national organization was formed with headquarters at Peking. A survey of monasteries was begun. The activities in lecturing and propaganda were increased. But Yuan Shi Kai issued 27 regulations for the control of Buddhist monasteries, which markedly dampened the ardor of the reformers. The World War, which accentuated the spirit of nationalism, had the added effect of stirring up Buddhist enthusiasm. There are at present signs of new activity among them in China. 3. Present Activities While Buddhism may be standing still, or even dying in certain parts of China, it is showing signs of new life in the provinces of Kang-su and Che-kang, and in the large cities. Such revival and centers, subject to the influence of the modern world, shows that Buddhism in China, as in Japan, has sufficient vitality to adjust itself to modern conditions. Let us consider some of these activities. A. The Reconstruction of Monasteries During the Taiping Rebellion, which devastated China in 1850 to 1865, the monasteries suffered with the towns. Not only were the monasteries burned to the ground, but their means of support were taken away and the monks were scattered. There are still many of these ruined monasteries in the Yangtze Valley, and in southern and western China. Quite a number of them have been rebuilt. Perhaps the most notable example is that at Changchao, which was destroyed during the rebellion. Today it is the largest monastery in China, having about 2,000 monks. In Fuquan, several new monasteries have been built in the last few decades. In the provinces of Chek-kang and Kang-su, in the large cities and about Peking, there are building activities, showing that the monasteries are feeling a new wave of prosperity. Tai-su, one of the leaders of modern Buddhism, is holding up an ideal program for Buddhism in this time of Reconstruction. He proposes that there should be 576 central monasteries, 4,608 preaching places, 72 Buddhist hospitals, and 72 orphanages. B. Accessions Regarding the number of monks, it is almost impossible to obtain any reliable figures. A conservative estimate, based upon partial returns, makes the number of monks about 400,000, and that of nuns about 10,000. The impression among the Buddhists is that the number of monks is increasing. That is quite probable in view of the rebuilding and repairing which is now in progress. More significant is the number of accessions from the learned class. Many officials, disheartened by the present confused political situation, have sought refuge in the monasteries. Some of them are now abbots of monasteries, and are using their influence to build them up. All over China, there are Confucian scholars who are giving themselves to the study of Buddhism and to meditation. Some of the Chinese students who have studied in Buddhist universities in Japan are propagating Buddhism by lecture and pen. C. Publications Quite as significant is the increase in the publication of Buddhist literature of all kinds. Many of the monasteries have printing departments where they publish the sutras needed for their own use. In addition, there are eight or more publishing centers where Buddhist literature is printed. The most famous are Yang's establishment at Nanjing, the Buddhist press in Yangqiao, and that in Peiqing. In these establishments about 900 different works are being published. The most noteworthy recent publication has been that of the Chinese Buddhist Tripitaka in Shanghai. Among these publications are a few modern issues. The Chunghua Book Company has published several works on Buddhism. Other books have been issued for the sake of harmonizing Buddhism with Western science and philosophy. In this enterprise, Japanese influence is visible. In 1921, a Shanghai press published a dictionary of Buddhist terms containing 3,302 pages based on the Japanese dictionary of Buddhism. Other works also show the influence of Japanese scholarship. Among the publications have appeared two magazines, one published at Ningpo is called New Buddhism. This is struggling and may have to succumb. The other is known as The Sound of the Seatide, now published in Hangqiao. Moreover, in all the large cities, there are Buddhist bookshops where only Buddhist works are sold. These all report a good business. This literary activity reveals an interest among the reading classes of China. Few such books are purchased by the monks. The Chinese scholars read them for their style and for their deep philosophy, but also for light and for help in the present distracting political situation of their country. Along with publication goes the spread of Buddhism by lectures in the monasteries in the cities of China. A few years ago, Buddhist sermons, however serious, were only listened to by monks and by a few pious devotees. Today, such addresses are advertised and are usually well attended by the intellectuals. Often, many women are found listening. Monks like Thaisu and Yuanying have a national reputation. Not only monks, but laymen trained in Japan are delivering lectures on the Buddhist sutras. The favorites are The Awakening of Faith and the Sudharma Pundarika Sutra. With the lectures goes the organization of Buddhist societies for all sorts of purposes. There is a central society in Peking which has branches in every province. The connection is rather loose. Buddhism has never been in favor of centralization, nor for that matter would the government have allowed it. The chief ends aimed at by these societies are fellowship, devotion, study, propagation, and service. Such societies, often short-lived, are springing up in many quarters. They meet for lectures on Buddhism or to conduct a study class in some of the sutras. Occasionally, the more ambitious conduct an institute for several months. Some spend part of the time in meditation together. Several schools for children are supported by these societies. They also encourage work of a religious nature among prisoners, distributing tracts and holding services.  The societies are also doing publishing work. The two magazines are supported by the members of the larger societies. F. Signs of Social Ambition Social work is a prominent feature of some of these Buddhist societies. They have raised money for famine stricken regions, have opened orphanages, and assisted in red cross work. One of the largest Chinese institutions for ministering to people who are sick and in trouble is located at Hangkou. Around a central Buddhist temple is a modern built hospital, an orphanage, and several schools for poor children. It may not maintain Western standards of efficiency, but it certainly represents the outreach of modern Buddhism. Perhaps their most far-reaching advance has been made because of the realization that leaders are needed and that they must be trained. Several schools for this purpose have sprung into existence. Such schools are necessarily very primitive, and are struggling with the difficulties of finding an adequate staff and equipment and of obtaining the best hype of students. Another sign of new life has been the making of programs for the future development of Buddhism. One of the most comprehensive appeared a short time ago. For the individual it proposes the cultivation of love, mercy, equality, freedom, progressiveness, and established faith, patience, and endurance. For all men it proposes, one, an education according to capacity. Two, a trade suited to ability. Three, an opportunity to develop one's powers. Four, a chance for enlightenment for all. For society it urges the cultivation of cooperation, social service, sacrifice for the social wheel, and the social consciousness in the individual. On behalf of the country it urges patriotism, participation in the government, and cooperation in international movements. For the world it advocates universal progress, as to the universe it specifies as a goal, the bringing of men into harmony with spiritual realities, the enlightenment of all, and the realization of the spiritual universe. A Buddhist writer sums up the aims of new Buddhism as follows. Formerly Buddhism desired to escape the sinful world. Today Buddhism not only desires to escape this world of sin, but longs to transform this world of sin into a new world, dominated by the ideals of Buddhism. Formerly Buddhism was occupied with erecting and perfecting its doctrines and polity as an organization. Today it not only hopes to perfect the doctrines and polity, but desires to spread the doctrines and ideals abroad, so as to help mankind to become truly cultured. Four, the attitude of Tibetan Lamas. Not only the Chinese Buddhists, but the Lamas of Mongolia and Tibet, are feeling the impulses of the new age. Quite recently an exhibition was held in the Lama Temple at Peking, which attracted thousands of visitors. Its object was to obtain money to repair the temple, and thus to give its work a fresh impulse. That these impulses are not necessarily hostile to Christianity, is shown by a letter written by the Kurung Tsering Lama of Kokonor District, to the Reverend T. Sorensen of Sejuan. I, your humble servant, have seen several copies of the scriptures, and having read them carefully, they certainly made me believe in Christ. I understand a little of the outstanding principles and the doctrinal teaching of the One Son, but as to the Holy Spirit's nature and essence, and as to the origin of this religion, I am not at all clear. It is therefore important that the doctrinal principles of this religion should be fully explained, so as to enlighten the unintelligent and people of small mental ability. The teaching of the science of medicine and astrology is also very important. It is therefore evident, if we want this blessing openly manifested, we must believe in the religion of the Only Son of God. Being an earnest, I therefore pray you from my heart not to consider this letter lightly, with a hundred salutations. Enclosed with this letter was a poem written in most elegant language. O thou supreme God and most precious Father, the truth above all religions, the ruler of all animate and inanimate worlds. Greater than wisdom, separated from birth and death, is his Son Christ the Lord shining in glory among endless beings. Incomprehensible wonder miraculously made. In this teaching I myself also believe, as your spirit is with heaven united, my soul undivided is seeking the truth. Jesus, the Savior's desire fulfilling. For the coming of the kingdom of heaven, I am praying. Happiness to all. Five. The Buddhist world versus the Christian world. Looking back over the last twenty-five years, we see rising quite distinctly a Buddhist world growing conscious of itself, of its past history, and of its mission to the world. This Buddhist world has much more of a program than it had twenty-five years ago. Its object is to unite the Mahayana and the Hinayana branches of Buddhism, and to spread Buddhist propaganda over the world. At present, the leadership of this movement is in Japan. It is, in part, a political movement. There is no question that Christianity is not at all pleasing to the Japanese militarists. It is regarded by them as the advanced post of Western industrialism and political ambition. Quite naturally, such leaders desire to make the Buddhist world a unit. It is also a social movement. The spirit of the Japanese Buddhist has been brought to consciousness by the new position of Japan. Japan is seeking to take its place in the world as a first-rate power. By this, not only will Japan's industry and commerce profit, but its spiritual values, must also be adapted to the world. The movement, then, has its spiritual side. Japanese travelers and people are going to all parts of the world, and they carry with them the religious ideals which have been shaped by Buddhism. Buddhism in the past was one of the great religions of salvation, with an inspiring missionary message. It is, again, awakening to this task of evangelization. Under the leadership of Japanese scholars and religious statesmen, the Japanese are seeking to unite the Buddhist world so that it shall become a force in the new world. Japan is thus trying to give back what it has received in the past. At present, in Buddhist countries, there is a strong force working against this movement. Nationalism is a new force to be reckoned with. Still, even with the spirit of nationalism permeating every group, the Buddhist world is getting together and will strive to make its contribution to the life of the whole world. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Buddhism and Buddhists in China by Lewis Hodus Chapter 10 The Christian Approach to Buddhists 1. Questions which Buddhists ask Buddhists are approaching Christianity. In many places, a spirit of inquiry and interest in the Christian religion is met. It is not necessary that there should be a Buddhist world permanently over against a Christian world. The questions which Buddhists ask, missionary, indicate an interest in vital themes. Some of them are as follows. We put our trust in the three precious ones. In what do you trust? Is not your Shang Ti, named for God used in China, a being lower than Buddha, and just a little higher than a Bodhisattva? Is not Shang Ti, the tribal god of the Jews? Do you believe in the existence of purgatory? What sufferings will those endure who do not live a virtuous life? Do you believe in the reality of the western paradise? How can one enter it? There being three kinds of merit, by what method is the great merit accumulated? How is the middle and the small merit accumulated? What are the fruits of these proportions of merit, and what are they like? Tell me how to believe Christ. What kind of meditation do you perform? Is not Buddhism more democratic than Christianity, because it holds out the possibility of Buddhahood to all beings? Is not Buddhism more inclusive, because it provides for the salvation of all beings? Two, knowledge and sympathy. These questions make it plain that the worker who is to deal with Buddhists should have a broad background of general culture. He must be thoroughly humanized. He should have a good knowledge of the history of philosophy and religion, including the work of the modern philosophers. A knowledge of the life of Buddha, and of the doctrines of the Hinayana or Southern Buddhism, as well as the tenets of the Mahayana, should be in his possession. The psychology of religion should interpenetrate his historical learning. The best methods of pedagogy should guide his approach to men. Of course, he must speak the language of the Buddhist, not only the spiritual language, but his everyday patois. He will find it an advantage to know some Sanskrit. While this requirement is not very urgent at present, it will rapidly become a necessity for doing the best work. This knowledge should be interpenetrated by a genuine sympathy, that is, imagination tinged with emotion. The worker should be able to view doctrines, values and actions, from the point of view of the Buddhist and his past history. He must have a genuine interest in, and a great capacity for, friendship. The Buddhists are very human, responding to friendship very quickly. Such friendship forms a link between the man and the larger friendship of Christ. 3. Emphasis on the aesthetic and Christianity A Chinese Christian leader described his idea of a church as a place removed from the din of the street. Approached by a walk flanked with trees and flowers, and adorned within by symbols speaking to the heart of the Chinese. He longed for the mystic silence and the beauty of holiness, which would open the windows of the world of spiritual reality, and throw its light upon the problems of life. He was asked, would you adapt some of the symbols of the Chinese religions? He said, Many of those symbols are neutral. They suggest religious emotion. Their character depends upon the content which the occasion puts into them. If the content is Christian, then the symbols and emotions will become Christian. Christianity is a religion of beauty. The beautiful and architecture, symbol and ritual, expressing the spiritual universe of the past, present and future, makes a strong appeal to the Chinese heart. It may well be emphasized in the future, as never before. 4. Emphasis on the mystical in Christianity Not long ago, a Buddhist in one of the large cities of China was converted. He found great joy in the experience which revived him, and gathered into unity the broken fragments of his life. He attended church regularly, and participated in the prayer meetings. Gradually he discovered that he was not being nourished. He felt his joy slipping away from him, and his divided life reinstating itself. He went to Buddhism for consolation. He is not hostile to the church. He appreciates the help he received, but he said that he came for consolation and peace, and found the same. Hard orthodoxy and morality so familiar to him in Confucianism. While the case of this man may have individual peculiarities, it may be made the starting point for a discussion of the situation in many churches in China. The early message to the Chinese was doctrinal. The false notion of many gods had to be displaced by the idea of the One Truth. The idea of the One Truth, the false notion of many gods had to be displaced by the idea of the One True God. With this idea of the True God, a few other tenets of the Christian religion are often held as dogmatic propositions to be repeated when questions are asked. The great sin preached as the worship of idols. The second part of the Christian message is salvation by faith in Jesus Christ. This salvation is otherworldly to a large extent. The extreme emphasis upon it has made of the church an insurance society, membership in which ensures bliss in the world beyond. The third part of the message has been concerned with moral acts, abstinence from opium, liquor and tobacco in some churches, polygamy and the gross sins, attendance upon church services, contribution for the support of the church, and the refusal to contribute to idolatry have also been required. The emphasis to a large extent was doctrinal, moral and individual. The result has been a body of people free from the gross sins, but also innocent of the great virtues and individualistic in their outlook upon this world and the next. This emphasis is needed, but in addition there should be the cultivation of the presence of God and the soul by appropriate means. The Christian Church of China should develop a technique of the spiritual life suited to the East. The formation of habits of devotion should be emphasized. Intercessory prayer should be given a larger place. Contemplation and meditation should be regarded not merely as an escape from the turmoil and strife of the world, but as a preparation for the highest life of service and sacrifice. Buddhist mysticism united the whole universe and was the great foundation of Chinese art, literature and morality. This spiritual world of Christianity must likewise seep through into the very thought of Asia and inspire the new art, literature and morality, which will be the world expression of a Christian universe. 5. Emphasis on the social elements in Christianity To the aesthetic and mystical emphasis must be attached to social emphasis. Buddhism is often criticized as not being social. It is a highly socialized religion. It has had a large influence upon social life in the East. This social life is different from ours. We see its wrongs and weaknesses. Likewise, do the Buddhists see the materialism and injustice of our social life? Christianity must relate itself to the modern world, as it is rising in China, and seek not merely to remedy a few wrongs or heal a few diseases, but must release the healing stream into the social life of the East. This will be done and is being done through the church community, which has become conscious of itself, realizing its needs and wants, seeking an intelligent and systematic way to rehabilitate itself. It is not so much the external, unrelated efforts that accomplish the thing needed, but it is rather the community life stirred by ideals and fired by a new dynamic, which begins the work of Reformation. 6. Emphasis on the person of Jesus Christ A. As a historical character The great asset of the missionary among Buddhists is the historical person of Christ. In contrast to many of the Bodhisattvas, the saviors of the Buddhists, Jesus is a historical character. His life among men was a life of God among men. B. As the revealer God is like Christ. Christ reveals God as the complete, the perfect person. He possessed the pure spiritual personality. The chief characteristic of this personality is love. This love, conscious of itself, finds its highest joy in the well-being of others. This love of God produced human life, which, springing from the lowest form, broke through the material elements and is capable of attaining the highest development. Christ reveals to man his heavenly relationship. Man created in likeness of God stands in the highest relation of one person to another through love. He likens this relation to that of father and son. He lifts man to the fellowship with divine. Yet such a fellowship that man preserves his personality. Christ reveals man in his relation to men as a brother and the form of love which shall control the relation of man to God as well as man to man. Christ revealed and founded the kingdom, a society of the saved, dominated by the spirit of the founder and making the spirit of love and service the organizing power in the world. C. As the savior Mahayana Buddhism emphasized saviorhood. Christ is the savior of men. In Buddhism the stress is placed upon the merit of the savior and the saved. There is no question that merit has some value. Yet Christ does not save us by merit nor do we help to save one another by merit. Salvation is a moral and spiritual process. It is concerned with the biology of the soul. The salvation that we preach is not the salvation by knowledge or meditation or merit but by the interpenetration of Christ's spirit in ours by the mystic and moral union of our life with his. As Paul says, that I may know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his suffering. Yet he is not the savior of the individual alone. He saves the community, the church. Only as his spirit permeates and dominates the community does he find his true self and the real salvation. D. As the eternal Son of God. The Mahayana system does not emphasize the historicity of Amitabha or of the Bodhisattvas. Spiritual truth is the development of the soul. It is not limited by time and place. Likewise Christianity must emphasize the eternal character of Jesus Christ. The Logos existed in the very beginning. The Logos was with God. The Logos was God. To the Mahayanaist, this spiritual history is more real than any fact conditioned by time and place. The Christian worker must learn to understand the import of the Gospel of John. He must see in Jesus Christ the real light which enlightens every man. He must be able to convince himself that the Christ is the fulfillment of the highest aspirations of the Mahayana system. 7. How Christianity expresses itself in Buddhist minds In 1920 a number of Buddhist monks under the leadership of Reverend K. L. Reichelt formed a Christian brotherhood. The members of this small brotherhood decided that they must subscribe to Valves and they took the four following. I promised before the almighty and omniscient God that I with my whole heart will surrender myself to the true Trinity God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. I will with my whole heart have faith in Jesus Christ as the Saviour of the world who gives completion to the profoundest and best objects of the higher Buddhism. I will live in this faith now and ever after. I promise solemnly before God with my whole heart to devote myself to the study of the true doctrine and break holy with the evil matters of the world and show forth in my public and private life that I am truly united with Christ. I promise that I in every respect will try so to educate myself that I can be of use in the work of God on earth. I will with undivided heart devote myself to the great work to lead my brethren in the Buddhist association forward to the understanding of Christ as the only one who gives completion to the highest and profoundest ideas of higher Buddhism. I promise that until my last hour I will work so that out of our Christian brotherhood there may grow forth a strong Church of Christ among Buddhists. I will not permit any evil thing to grow in my heart which could divide the brotherhood but will always try to promote the progress of every member in the knowledge of the holy obligations laid down in these vows and our Constitution. Such men ought to make choice Christians. 8. Christianity's Constructive Values Buddhism in the course of its long history developed certain religious ideas and values which we find in Christianity. It faced the fact of sin and placed it in the heart. It diagnosed the fundamental instincts of men, sex appetite, will to achieve, and pugnacity. These must be overcome. It regards them as delusions which must be eliminated. Christianity also deals with these instincts. It is under no delusion as to their strength. There are certain tendencies in Christianity which have tried to annihilate them. The central tendency of Christianity, however, recognizing their power for good, seeks to sublimate them and make them serve the individual and society. This attitude of the two religions toward these instincts is fundamentally different. The attitude of Christianity has been justified even in Buddhist lands where the religious life of the people has followed the same line that Christianity advocates. Early Buddhism tried to dissolve man's personality. Later Buddhism corrected this and perhaps has appealed too much to the desire on the part of the individual to enter heaven which is merely a replica of the earth. Christianity starts with a personal god and holds up before the believer the goal of perfection for his own personality. It finds man without a self and confers a real selfhood upon him. Early Buddhism taught that salvation is accompanied by the individual alone. It denies the possibility and the necessity of help from a divine source. Subsequent history has proved this to have been wrong. In India Buddhism has been displaced by Hinduism and in China and Japan the Mahayana has developed the idea of salvation through another. The great stream of Buddhism has recognized that man by himself is helpless. He must have the help of a divine power in order to obtain salvation. Christianity asserts that salvation is possible only through the intervention of God. The incarnation, the life, death and resurrection of Jesus and his work in the world through the Holy Spirit on the one hand are the expression of God's solicitude for man and on the other hand correspond to the deep need which man of all ages have felt for a power above themselves. From the early stages of magic to the highest reaches of religion we find this constant factor recognized by human groups all over the world. They bear witness to a power above themselves to whom they continually appeal. In Christianity we find this main tendency enunciated most clearly. The individual cannot save himself. Mankind cannot save itself. Both must rely upon the assistance of the divine power which started this universe on its way in which is the ever-present creative force. Christianity, moreover, has established the community of believers including all classes and conditions of men. Herein each one may realize himself. Herein also he may realize the kind of community which is friendly to his highest aspirations for himself. Herein he has the opportunity to transmute the instincts above mentioned into forces which make for the larger development of his own person and the well-being of the community. Accordingly, as Christians face Buddhists they can do so with the consciousness that this great religion has been reaching out after the light which signs brightly in our Christian religion. They have the assurance not only that they have a message which brings fulfillment to the ideas of the Mahayana but also that it has prepared the way for the hearts of the Chinese to receive the highest message of Christianity. End of Chapter 10 The Christian Approach to Buddhists Recording by Scott Robbins End of Buddhism and Buddhists in China by Lewis Hodus


My name is Nargis Fazad and I teach Persian at SOA's University of London. In episode one I talked about the evolution of Persian language, illustrated by some lovely images, and we stopped at about 7th century AD. In this episode we're going to look at the Persian language in the Islamic period. I hope you'll enjoy it. I now fast forward to the image of the modern borders of Iran and I always like to remind people that the top section of Iran does look like a Persian cat as well. The era of new or modern Persian starts in the 7th century. Iran or Persia was the only country conquered by the Russian caliphs who did not lose its language to Arabic. Many other of these lands eventually lost the use of their native tongue and Arabic became not only the lingua franca but the national language of those regions, not in Iran. What the Persians did, they ditched their rather complex inadequate middle Persian Pahlavi script gradually and adopted the Arabic script for their needs and because Persian is an Indo-European language and has various letters that Semitic languages don't have, Persian created a script which is now known as the Perso-Arabic script. Iran became an integral part of the Islamic empire and very soon it really became the engine that propelled the expansion of the empire further east and Persian became the second language of the Perso-Islamic empire. Relationship of Arabic and Persian can be compared to the relationship of French and English. You know there's so many French words in the English language but they're not grammatically structurally similar and same with Persian we use many Arabic words in Persian and these are mostly related to the legal, religious, scientific discourse. Persian soon became the lingua franca of big swathes of this empire particularly in Central Asia in the Indian subcontinent which when it was the official language of the mobile court. And if we go to today, Persian is the official language of Iran where locally it's known as Farsi alongside Pashto. It is one of the two official languages of Afghanistan again locally known as Dari and in Tajikistan it's the official language of that state and known as Tajik. And you will see I've given you an example that in Tajikistan Persian is written in the Cyrillic i.e the Russian alphabet but in Iran and Afghanistan it's written in the perso-parabic script. Some images of modern publications or a typed text and here is the children's book I think you can guess what story that is, Shenil Kermesi, Little Red Riding Hood and of course Iranians love their sports and of football mad as any in the region. I now want to introduce you to the language. I normally hate not starting the teaching of Persian with an immediate introduction to this script but I need to cheat a little bit because I want to squeeze quite a lot in this talk and so I thought it might be easier for you if you have no familiarity with the perso-arabic script to follow what I'm saying if I use the latin script but I'm going to give you several clues and I'm going to highlight the familiarities of say Persian and English or German. First I need to give you some just basic information about Persian. Persian has 32 letters of the alphabet in terms of the characteristic of the language there is no gender in Persian there is no he or she no feminine or masculine and this makes it much easier to learn compared to languages where you have to work out if it's this noun feminine masculine and so on but it does make the translations of love poetry very interesting. Who is the beloved female or male doesn't matter. Persian nouns are not subject to any inflection and the rules of conjugation are very very regular and the main challenge is learning the script but even then you can see that this script has come down from an original source and again as soon as you discover the common denominators and if you twist certain letters that you're already familiar with you know turn them clockwise anti-clockwise then the mystery diminishes and the learning will become a lot easier. So another characteristic of the Persian Arabic script is that the short vowels are not normally written in. Now what do I mean with that so if you have two solid letters two consonants let's say in English you have the p and a t okay if you just put them next to each other well it's very hard to work out what is this word is it pat is it put pet pit pot what is it so you do really need those short vowels and if not just in the shape of vowels o a e then you need to have some diacritic some little markers that will enable you to read it. Persian and Arabic do not use these markers of course you have them when you're starting to learn this script like you have training wheels when you're learning to ride a bicycle but before long these are removed and you might make a few mistakes but the beauty of Persian is unlike English where p and t can make so many words in Persian they would make maybe maximum of two words so when you learn them then you just increase your list of words you're not going to get modeled up another feature of Persian similar with very many languages is that the ruler of the verb the agent of the verb the subject comes first and the verb concludes a sentence so the order is subject object verb the action comes right at the end and full stop so if you are ready to take those on board let's read a little bit of Persian now can you get your eyes used to reading these Latin letters from right to the left that's the direction of the Persian language as is Arabic so the short vowels all the lowercase letters will soon be deleted the solid letters the consonants are in the capital letter and the long vowels like an or not an a or an e not an a these are written in and are never deleted and the long or which is almost you know verging on to an o sounds like I don't know what word can I say like you know or as an honor you know the long arm so have a go at reading this I'll give you 10 seconds very good salam a universal manner of greeting only enough in countries that became Muslim converts if I'm not mistaken two Arab friends don't greet each other with salam it perhaps has a more of a religious calling connotations they say ahlans ahlans but in Iran in many more new Muslim countries we use salam for just a very quick way of greeting so here I am salam now can you read this this is how I greeted you when I started this talk can you go right to the left shall we have a go together naam me man narges ast the verb right at the end naam do you recognize anything there can you spot the familiarity between these Persian words and the English word or you're quite right name what about man man mean I or my for example and asked what about asked what verb does that sound like the German east is ast so what could this mean the verb is at the end but let's look at naam me man I'll give you a clue may not work forever but for a short while with the elementary person if you read the person from left to right if you like you put a drop down menu you read it from left to right you get the English remember you then put the verb in the right order because English is a subject verb object you say I saw my friend last weekend while in Persian we will say I my friend last weekend saw so naam me man can we read this from left to right my name is narges what about the next bit naam me for me man farzad ast what about this one let's put a drop down menu here drop just put the English underneath these words man my family name my family name my surname is farzad what's that little air doing there when you listen to Iranian speakers you might put so many of the words seem to end with a little air rhyming with cafe for example this little air is a vocal link that holds a noun like name or house or friend keeps it vocally linked to its possessor like my name naam me man like an apostrophe if you like and to its other attributive characteristics to an adjective for example so it's like saying name of mine my name and my family name i'm going to be a bit nosy and ask about you naam me to she asked to again in many languages a second person singular person is a to or a thou or you Persian unlike English but like very many languages has a plural second person uh so we can use that for really when i'm talking to when i'm referring to you which is more than you one person you several person or four more you a very polite you so chi again can you think of some european languages qi qi qi question words for who or what what am i asking you naam me to she asked what is your name a note my question word my interrogative it's gone where the answer should be unlike English question was usually in english they usually start the um a question word don't you wear wear you who is that person what color is um this um jumper for example but in person it goes where the answer be so you will say i can say naam me to Melanie asked naam me to philip asked i can then use a polite plural uh you naam me so ma she asked that's how i would ask you i wouldn't be so presumptuous to call you to just yet you will remain the formal uh very respected show ma let's talk about nationalities a bit normally you can add an e to the name of the country and you get the nationality a little bit like i am that you can add to countries you know america american um you know australia australian and so on iran iranian in english in person we add an e the names of these countries if they happen to be part of our world and existence for a long time they will have kept their names so you know we have miss for egypt we're not going to use the word egypt but for newer countries we've taken the french pronunciation of their names so for example germany in iran would be all mon so but for our purpose here we add an e to the name of the country and we get the nationality so i'm going to tell you a little more about me can we read it together and remember i'm now just making these vowels these short vowels going to disappear man man iranian custom man iranian custom now you remember that asked which was is well that's for a third person verb ending now i'm saying i am look at another similarity what if we start reading this from left to right the doer of the verb man is always repeated at the end of the verb every person verb has a little ending who tells you who's done it you can look at that a little later at another time but here if you read this this has some i am look let's read this from left to right i am iranian now i'm going to remove these vowels and i'm just going to put a little little diacritic there a little sign there that you know that m in order to say man i has to be followed with a little a man iranian custom and when i remove this then you may get a bit of a shock but hopefully by that stage you will know what man is you're not going to say man or man so you will remember this is man iranian and you will have learned this word as custom the word who's tomb for example doesn't exist or his tomb doesn't exist and if you make a mistake and read it differently well an iranian or a persian speaker will say for goodness sake why did you learn your persian and they will correct you this um rarely happens you will soon soon get used to this let's move on let's do a little bit more reading a european word is in there can you read this i'll just give you a second or two remember barcy persian daddy goes from right to left always remember that so you need to read this or does it is from right to left okay let's read it long ball all all partimone man or partimone man dar which city is this london persian way of saying london or partimone man dar london ast let's go from left to right my apartment dar is a preposition meaning in or at my apartment is in london and here i'm just going to remove these vowels there which i've put them here in a in a lowercase e and i'm just going to give you a tiny little hint of it so you know that the word is apartimone not aparto man this east days because that's my vocal link is my apartment vocally needs to link to man and here can you read this one a universally recognizable name alex angelesi ast a british person an english person is known as someone from english time alex angelesi ast angelesianity what does that mean in english very good alex is english and here i've just put a little marker and gradually those training markers will be removed and this will be alex alex angelesi ast let's expand our words let's look at this one again take a few seconds to read them right to left and keep those long vowels alex really alex not an a and alex norme modare man mariam ast time for another characteristic feature of person actually it applies to arabic too there are no words in person that start with two consonants in a minute you'll see an example of how that can go wrong in person we cannot say unless you know we've lived in a country for a long time and used that language for a long time it's very hard for a person speaker or an arabic speaker to say words that start with two solid letters say for example blue you have the bl and then to say you know brown or stop or street that's three consonants we have no problem with pronouncing this solid back-to-back consonants later on in the word with no problem saying empty but a word like stop or smith or street is quite hard because we're used to having a vowel and then consonants or a consonant vowel consonant so you might next time if somebody's just arrived from iran or an arabic speaking country you listen to them and they might say you know oh mr smith i'm very pleased to see you because sm has to be split or i'll see you outside russell's square tube station station in itself would be hard it would become a station probably another feature of person which arabic doesn't have this problem we do not have words with t h so the is very hard for us we have to really pause and focus and say this is a t h i must pronounce it as a the therefore words words that so many languages use if it has a t h in person these become a d sometimes a t but often a d armed with that which relation am i talking about here should we read it one more time nomi madara man mariam asked let's go from left to right who is madara or pedar mother and father the d really is the t h that you have in english so my mother's name and here that little link the vocal link really comes through as an apostrophe in english my mom's name what's her name mariam of course the biblical virgin Mary but also the name of a flower what about this one might need to think about the word not just in english in german too take a second to look at this nomi duhtare man setare asked duhtar but that's real you really want to clear your throat does that sound like a german word for daughter sounds like close enough to the english as well so what about this my daughter's name what is her name look at this little short vows if you ignore them reading right to left what is this absolutely it's star so my daughter's name is not star the english pronunciation setare where the word toro comes from do you know any girls called toro very popular name and i believe you have toro in Sanskrit as well so setare is split because the two consonants don't feature in person i have a setare let's see find that little more about my mom modare man dar tehron asked modare man dar tehron asked remember what dar was of course the monaman dar landanas in oat where is my mom modare man dar tehron asked my mom is in tehron and here i am removing the short vowels for a little while i give you these diacritics and then i'll take them off completely and here is modar modare man dar tehron asked i want to show you a bit of the script now so and i'm still going to write it in the Latin script going right to the left but time really for you to see the real script too so i was saying that really you read the person construction from left to right while you translate it into english and you get the right order and similarly you can read the english you know now an adjective for example noun possessor from right to left and you get the passion so we have a little drop down menu and you put the english word underneath so here is nom here nom i'll put name underneath that here is my man i'll write my underneath and farsi as rostbecha farsi from right to left nomi man in glisi as chap beroz from left to right my name let's add a bit to this and remember we can't do teh here we are can you have a go at this going from right to left nomi barodare man who's this one my brother's name my brother's name let's add another bit to this and here we have nomi duster huber man my good friend's name nomi duster huber man and you realize i hope that all this word nom duster huber all mine my friend is mine my good friend is mine so the name of my good friend is like the apostrophe so almost every word sounds like it's ending with a like a cafe let's take a break again and get ready for episode three when we will look at some of the characteristics of the Persian language and see whether i can make it just a little bit easier for you in order to take the first steps in reading Persian take care bye for now


Presidential Candidate of the Labour Party, Peter Albi, on Tuesday announced that Akin Oshutoku, a former aide to President Obasanjo, as the new director general of his campaign cancelled. Oshutoku replaced the former DJ of the Obidachi campaign organization, Donyokupi, who announced his resignation in the letter last Tuesday following a federal high-cut ruling in Abuja that convicted him of violating the Money laundering Act. The letter was addressed personally to the presidential candidate of the Labour Party. Oshutoku became the south-west leader of the party after he defected from the People's Democratic Party to the Labour Party in August 2022. The Labour Party national chairman, Julius Saburi, announced the appointment, and according to Peter Albi, his campaign manifesto will enable a new Nigeria to be built. Nigeria is one's opportunity to work, Nigerian youths are energetic and talented and can compete with youths globally, having in that space. The right says that as long as Nigerians are suffering, every Nigerian is suffering, it can be a rich man in a poor environment. So if somebody has said as long as they're home and they're not in their houses, Nigeria is not in their houses, that's not the marketing because I've said it before, as long as there is a security in the north-east, there is a security in Nigeria, as long as there is a security in the north-west, there is a security in Nigeria, as long as there is a security in the south-east, there is a security in Nigeria. Hello, hope you enjoyed the news. Please do subscribe to our YouTube channel and don't forget to hit the notification button so you get notified about fresh news updates.


Welcome to Part 8 of this eDesign Suite video series. In this episode, you will learn how to use the new digital power workbench. This tool helps you develop digital power converters faster. It covers all the essential aspects of the design process, achieving your power efficiency target, reaching desired closed-loop performance, generating firmware code ready to be used in your solution. Load the eDesign Suite page and select Power Management Design Center. Click Digital Power Workbench. For this tutorial, let's choose the STM32-G474RE Vienna Rectifier topology, where the design of the power and control system of the PFC rectifier can be complex. It is typically used in high-power three-phase power factor correction applications, such as DC fast chargers for electric vehicles or industrial chargers. A default configuration is immediately available. The dashboard gives you a preview of the design with a fully annotated schematic and bill of materials, VODI diagrams and efficiency plots. Here you can customize and refine your design and evaluate the outcome of each modification. The converter specifications section shows the microcontroller part number, the circuit topology implemented, the input operating voltage range of the AC section for the single phase, the output voltage and power level of the DC output section. Clicking the ST Reference Design button gives you the related product folder on ST.com. There you will find all the resources needed to evaluate the characteristics and performance of our reference design. The Operating Conditions section allows you to modify nominal operating conditions to suit your design requirements or if you want to evaluate design performance for differing operating scenarios. The Actual section displays actual parameter values calculated for the specified operating conditions. They include average and RMS currents for diodes and transistors and phase AC input current. The dashboard also shows an editable board schematic of our Vienna PFC project. You can use the schematic to customize semiconductors and passive components according to your design requirements. Customization can be applied to inductors, silicon carbide diodes and silicon carbide MOSFETs, output capacitors and input and output signal conditioning blocks. Click this link to design the auxiliary power supply. From the range of solutions, choose the appropriate auxiliary topology and configuration to supply the different blocks of the Vienna power converter. At the bottom of the dashboard you'll find a current Bode diagram showing the current regulator magnitude and phase margin performance. This diagram is useful for assessing loop stability of the power factor correction. Next, the Semiconductor Efficiency diagram helps you visualize the performance of diodes and MOSFETs across the whole power range from 0 to 15 kilowatt. The colored lines represent semiconductor efficiency. The green line represents efficiency at the operating voltage value. The blue line at the minimum voltage value, 185 volt. The red line at the maximum voltage value, 265 volt. And finally, a plot of the power losses for each phase of the design. Open it to see all conduction and switching losses in the diodes and MOSFET sections. The Bill of Materials section lists the different components with their characteristics and part numbers including the selected ST microcontroller, diodes and MOSFETs, boost conductors and output capacitors. Click this link to access the Digital Power Vienna Design Wizard where you can fully customize your design project based on specific requirements. All sections of the Design Wizard are editable. Start with the IO specification step. Choose your AC input voltage and frequency from a list of presets or set a minimum and maximum input voltage range. You can also specify DC output voltage and power levels and the tool automatically estimates an output current value accordingly. In the general constraints section, you can specify nominal input voltage, power factor target, average efficiency target, switching frequency. E-Design Suite suggests a default value in gray for any of these parameters based on the default operating conditions of the design. When you type in a different value, the wizard suggests the range of acceptable values. Let's now turn our attention to the power stage. Let's choose boost inductors and output capacitors that match our project requirements. In the boost inductor section, the inductance value is calculated from the desired peak-to-peak maximum current ripple. You can also enter the wire resistance value. Correctly defining these values is critical because they affect many design parameters. If we modify the inductance value, the tool automatically updates the related current ripple value. In the output capacitor section, we can specify both the desired output voltage ripple and a commercial output capacitance value close to the value suggested by the tool. Based on our specification, the tool calculates and updates the output voltage ripple and ripple percentage. In the power switch section, E-Design Suite automatically selects a silicon carbide MOSFET that best fits the initial project specification. Based on this selection, you can review various design parameters, including drain source breakdown voltage, drain current, maximum drain source on-resistant, and switching dynamic parameters. A diagram shows all MOSFET losses due to conduction and switching issues. Click the MOSFET part number if you wish to select a different power switch. The tool recommends the best power switch based on your design specifications and uncalculated AVG losses, but you are free to select a different part number. E-Design Suite will automatically recalculate all losses. The process is similar for the boost diode selection step, which completes the power section part of the configuration process. Use the part number suggested by the tool or select another one. Let's now have a look at the control stage. The first control block in this stage is the sensing section. It is split into four blocks. Input voltage sensing, input current sensing, output voltage sensing, output current sensing. All the modifications applied to the control stage will be reflected in the generated firmware. The input voltage sensing section is based on a specific circuit we have designed around the TSV911 wide band width operational amplifier. Click the link here if you want to learn more about this device. You can modify any of these parameters. E-Design Suite automatically refreshes the whole project and updates all relevant fields. The input current sensing, output voltage sensing, and output current sensing sections follow the same logic. All these sections provide links to pages on our website where you will be able to learn more about the solutions and specific devices selected. Let's now move to the wizard sections pertaining to digital regulation. Since we're dealing with a PFC, we need to manage control blocks for current compensation and voltage compensation. The current compensation section allows you to customize closed-loop targets such as band width and phase margin values. E-Design Suite suggests PI regulator behavior by updating KP and KI accordingly. The effect of any modification is also reflected in the BODY plot. The same procedure applies to the voltage loop where the band width's target is different. The firmware protection section allows you to define operating thresholds such as input over current protection threshold, input over voltage protection threshold, and under voltage protection, output over voltage protection threshold, all of which will be implemented in the firmware. Moving on to the Firmware Additional Settings section. Here you can enable debug testing procedures and customize your MCU configuration. You can evaluate how your solution behaves under open-loop conditions or when only enabling the current loop control. You can modify current thresholds for the inrush current phase or the burst control phase. You can also set parameters for the PLL routine. Finally, you can enable the telemetry section that allows designers to monitor additional parameters. You can download the firmware project once you have completed all the design steps and modifications. Two files are generated. The IOC file enables all required STM32 peripherals. It is an STM32 Cube MX project file based on the Vienna Rectifier Expansion Pack that enables the generation of ready-to-compile digital power project files for supported tool chains. STM32 Cube IDE, IAR Embedded Workbench for ARM, and ARM Keel MDK. The STM32 Cube expansion enables the generation of firmware code for a Vienna Rectifier hardware topology solution. The STM32 Cube MX software development tool uses these two files to generate the source code that you upload to the STM32 microcontroller. Be sure to configure STM32 Cube MX with the Vienna Rectifier Expansion Pack before you load the IOC file in STM32 Cube MX. This is the STM32 Cube MX interface for uploading the IOC and Expansion Pack files. Select Install Remove Software Package. First, upload the pack files selecting the ST Microelectronics tab. Then upload the IOC file. The STM32 Cube MX interface confirms that the IOC and pack have been uploaded. A list of customizable parameters is available with documentation. To generate the firmware code, go to the Project Manager interface and click Generate Code. This is the firmware code generated by STM32 Cube MX. You are now ready to upload it to the STM32 MCU.


Remember for for vision we had perception of motion, perception of depth. So, we are up to the high level now perception of sound. Now, way back near the beginning of the course you may recall um Stevens power law which takes the magnitude of a stimulus and and maps it to the perceived um magnitude of the stimulus. So, um let me make sure I get that and it should be fine. So, let me change that just a little bit let us say um P the perceived magnitude of the stimulus is some constant times the magnitude and there is some exponent there. So, M is the magnitude of stimulus and P is the perceived magnitude. And so, one very simple example in the perception of sound where this becomes important is loudness at a pure tone of let us say 3000 hertz. So, in this particular case we get a plot like this where the exponent is 0.67. So, this is the magnitude of the stimulus and the perceived magnitude of the stimulus. So, in other words if you double the magnitude of the sound it does not necessarily get perceived as being double the magnitude. In fact, it is significantly less than that. So, as as the sound pressure waves get louder and louder the incremental amount of extra loudness that we perceive is significantly less. So, this is ends up being a nice example of Stevens power law in the context of audio perception um. Here is another um interesting um result in the perception of sound you can talk about loudness as a function of frequency. I will just use some rough idea of the plots here. So, we put frequency here um it is in log scale, but I am not going to worry about the exact um coordinates. I just want to show you that there is a interesting shape to the plot. So, here is what I do I I take a sound at um fixed amplitude or fixed dB fixed ah decibels at 1 kilohertz right. So, I have sound at I have a 1 kilohertz tone and you get a custom if you are participating in this experiment you get a custom to the loudness of that and now you listen to a tone at a different frequency and you are asked to turn the loudness up or down until it sounds like it is just as loud as this base tone. Does that make sense? So, you just trying to compare and say ok I have I may have a sound at 2000 hertz this one is at 1000 hertz I may have a sound at 2000 hertz and I have to tune it so that it seems like it is just as loud. But in terms of decibels we can measure scientifically exactly whether or not it is the same loudness level. And so, in this particular case um the curves end up being quite interesting I guess I will just draw there is like some kind of plot like this let us say. So, it ends up being non constant. So, I just want to say that we have very unusual perception of equal amount of loudness it varies as a function of pitch. So, this would be a um equal perceived loudness contour. And finally, as I um I am not finally sorry, but next as I mentioned before um very early in the course there is adaptation. So, it may be the case that um perceived loudness over time generally decreases. This also happens throughout the day for us I I do not know about you, but when I wake up in the morning um I am very sensitive to sounds if I was suppose was listening to some music the night before had it at a certain volume level. I wake up the next morning and I think wow I had it that loud how could that be you know. So, it seems to take some time for us to adjust to um or adapt to loudness levels throughout the day. So, adaptation as well um here is another interesting result pitch perception and this makes use of a powerful idea from a psychophysics which is called just noticeable difference I need to point this out. So, right before getting into pitch perception let me mention just noticeable difference just noticeable difference or J and D. So, the question is in that case if I have a stimulus and I have the ability to change its magnitude how much do I have to change the magnitude by before you notice there is a difference right that is the question what is the smallest amount reason ah it is different now. I could do this in many ways I could do this by slightly changing colors you know I could do this by changing brightness levels in um in um in the case of of vision right I could do this by changing the pitch I could do this by changing the amplitude. So, a lot of cases where I have a linear stimulus let us say and I just want to ask the question when do you notice that it is different right that I have done something different to it. So, this is a just noticeable difference and um here is one interesting general result called Weber's law which if I look at the um the change in the magnitude of the stimulus divided by the overall magnitude of the stimulus. So, and let us say delta m is the just noticeable difference that was obtained through some experiment and suppose delta m is this small change that was the just noticeable difference anything smaller would not be perceived then um Weber's law says that this amount delta m over m um is a constant right which means that if I were to all of a sudden cut the um the overall magnitude of the stimulus in half then the delta t would cut in the delta m sorry would cut in half as well. So, it is really the um the percent difference let us say in the in the in the um stimulus magnitude that seems to be at the thresholds of perception um. So, this is a common law that seems to occur very frequently in these types of just noticeable difference experiments. Let me go back to the case of pitch perception and mention this interesting experiment which I find this result surprising. So, you start off with a pure tone you have a um center frequency. So, I generate a pure tone and I will make a logarithmic scale here. So, I will put it at 100,000 and 10,000. So, I start off here with a pure tone I generated at that frequency and then we start varying the frequency and we try to determine when you the the subject can actually tell that it is a different tone right. So, I may give you random tones and I ask you to press a button is this the same or different? The time over? In in what in what sense? Oh I think it is very interesting observation. So, so that is right you may not um if I if I present to you a stimulus today and then we come back tomorrow when I say is this at the same level um I bet that would make a much larger delta m. So, so that is that is reasonable um. So, this as it is formulated does not it is not saying a delta m is going to be the same across all of these. So, let us just hold time fixed and then say this law holds and and most of the time in these kind of experiments the one stimuli one stimulus is presented right next to the other a temporally. So, they are very short in time, but you are right your ability to remember how close those were um that ends up that ends up involving memory let us say yeah in in these types of experiments usually it is one and then the other um, but that is a very good point. So, in this particular experiment here what we have is the um the differential threshold in other words the delta m and what I find surprising. So, we have like 0.1 hertz here 1 hertz 10 and 100 certainly a lot of room for my axes here I will put it on this side um. The plot is about like this which means that when we are in the range of a few 100 hertz we can perceive a tone difference of 1 hertz that is quite incredible I mean it is amazingly sharp. So, but then as the frequencies get higher it gets more difficult. So, I find that really interesting alright um. So, these are just some basic audio perceptions you know I cannot talk about things like um perception of scale or perception of the shape of objects and things like that right we do not have these kind of this level of complexity as we have for vision, but um this gives some idea of perception it also is remind you of something that is very important which um I encourage you to look up more about this I do not have enough time in this course, but um yeah to look up psychophysics which is the science of connecting stimulus to perception right you want to we want to understand we have a stimulus coming in we want to understand the perception coming out. If you are building virtual reality systems it is very important to understand what the user is going to perceive based on the stimulation that you are providing and. So, there is there is an entire field literature devoted to this and entire um methodologies for designing experiments that involve human subjects. So, that you get the right results out you do not have artificial bias and um other problems that are introduced right. So, so this is worth looking up and studying um um in conjunction with this course especially if you are interested in doing user studies to develop to determine whether or not um you have done the right thing right or done something sufficient for your task or whether or not you have made a comfortable virtual reality experience alright.