The article analyses anthropological ideas of one of the schools of religious Taoism – Quanzhen/Longmen – in the aspect of identifying and considering the Buddhist elements of these ideas. For the school of Quanzhen, from the very moment of its appearance, there was a tendency toward religious syncretism/synthesis, the desire to unite the principles and practice of Taoism, Buddhism, and Confucianism. The main source for the analysis was the text of the 17th century Long men xin fa (“The Law of the Heart-Consciousness [according to the Tradition] Longmen”), which outlined the views of Wang Changyue, master of the Taoist school Quanzhen/Longmen, and also included a number of basic texts of the Quanzhen school, which outline the views of the founder and masters of the school of the first generation. The article discusses the two components of the School’s anthropological representations in which Buddhist influence is most clearly manifested: soteriology and the concept of human activity. The Buddhist doctrine of “activity/action” (karma) was incorporated into the representation system of the Taoist school Quanzhen. The «soteriological» statements in the Quanzhen/Longmen texts also often include Buddhist expressions that function in the texts in parallel with typically Taoist formulations.
Keywords: Taoism, Buddhism, Quanzhen, Longmen, Long men xin fa, anthropology, soteriology, activity, karma, “the Body of the Law/Dharma”
DOI: 10.22250/2072-8662.2019.2.56-65
About the author
 |
Pavel D. Lenkov – PhD (History), Assistant Professor at the Department of the History of Religions and Theology, Faculty of History and Social Sciences, Herzen State Pedagogical University of Russia; 48 Moiki R. emb., St. Petersburg, Russia, 191186; This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. |