The so-called "thatched cottage"? It refers to the Caotang Temple in Chengdu. According to the Southern Shu Qi Zhou Biography, "In the eighth year of the Ming Dynasty (Liu Song), Yizhou was the secretariat of Xiao Hui, and he was introduced to Shu as General Li Feng, with the same title as Feixiang and Chengdu counties. In the fourth year of Taishi, he returned to the capital (now Nanjing) with Huikai. " The Selected Works quoted Liang Jianwen's Biography of Caotang as saying, "It's a pity that you were in Shu once, but you learned from Leicizong Temple, which is also called Caotang because of its name." In other words, Zhou Qing modeled on Chengdu Caotang and built another Caotang in Zhongshan, Jiankang (now Nanjing).
So, what does the "spirit" behind the thatched cottage mean?
People are residents of the symbolic world. The residence and destination of ancient China literati are "official" and "seclusion". "Official" and "recluse" are not so much two different social identities as two completely different and incompatible personality models. The so-called "spirit", if viewed from the perspective of modern psychoanalysis, is to "acquire an independent personality model". "Official" has the personality model of "official", which, in today's words, is the personality within the system. "Hidden" has a "hidden" personality model, which is "outside the system" personality in today's words. Modern psychology has observed that the "autonomy" of personality is obvious in people. A cadre in a system, no matter what kind of person he was before, will inevitably get a habit of "institutionalization" and thinking habit once he stays in the system for a long time. If you move, you must be bureaucratic, which is what we call "bureaucracy" today. People whose personality has been institutionalized internally are unconscious, and they won't feel anything wrong. The formation of personality pattern originates from the inertia situation and environment. The so-called "within the system" is a cruel and fierce power competition field. People who come to this field to play power games must first put on the thick armor of "personality mask" to guard against the ubiquitous "backstabbing". Therefore, people who have been in the officialdom for a long time naturally have a personality trait-cheating. If an official can't practice the skill of "counterfeiting" to perfection, the chance of lying down is really too great.
On the contrary, the personality model is "concealment". Hermits are often called "real people" (such as the famous Zhu Taozhu real people in Lingquan County, Yizhou in Tang Dynasty). They live in their own spiritual world and communicate with the spirits of heaven and earth. They naturally don't need to wear the "armor" of "personality mask" and have no scruples to offend Shangguan. They are people who don't need those symbols in the influence field to arm themselves. The biggest purpose of their life is to pursue spiritual happiness, that is, freedom. Human nature always likes freedom. But why do many people choose to go to officialdom to find uncomfortable? Because some people have vanity, and some people are afraid of going hungry. If it is logical that people with strong vanity enter the officialdom to develop a personality within the system, then those who are born closer to the personality outside the system and enter the officialdom to make a living just because they are afraid of hunger will inevitably face huge internal conflicts. What Kong's Tale of Beishan reflects is the eternal conflict between these two incompatible personality patterns: if you choose to be an official, you have to face the problems of "scattered spirit and scattered ambition" and the banquet of Mei Xuan, burning clothes and splitting lotus clothes, and resisting dust and vulgarity.
There are two kinds of people in China who are inclined to the "hidden" personality and have to go to the government to make a living, or are lucky or doomed to eat this meal within the system: one is that they can't handle these two absolutely conflicting personality patterns and eventually quit the officialdom or lose their lives (such as Tao Yuanming, Ji Kang, Du Fu, etc. ), while the other kind is people who skillfully handle this conflict (such as Kong Zhizhi)
So, what is the secret of thatched cottage owner Zhou Qing to deal with the absolute conflict between "official" and "hidden"? The secret lies in the word "thatched cottage".
Monks Yao, Qin and Tianzhu went to Chang 'an to establish Caotang Temple and translate Buddhist scriptures, among which Zhonglun, Bailun and Twelve Luns became the theoretical basis of the three major Buddhist schools. After that, the three schools were composed of monk lang and layman (the author of the three schools, but it has been lost). The Caotang Temple built by Zhou Qing in Zhongshan and the nearby qixia temple have also become another ancestral home of the three major schools of Buddhism, which makes people wonder whether the Caotang Temple in Chengdu is between Chang 'an Caotang Temple and Nanjing Caotang Temple in terms of Buddhist inheritance. )。 The core idea of San Lun Zong is to unify "emptiness" and "being" in the middle view. In our view today, the profound Buddhist theory is of great practical significance for solving the internal "personality" conflict of people like Zhou Qing. What can a person who follows his conscience do when he comes to the cruel environment of officialdom and witnesses cruel things? "Biography of Zhou Qing in Southern Qi Dynasty" records: "Emperor Ming of Song Dynasty was quite eloquent and led him into the temple to get close value. What the emperor did was outrageous and he dared not show his remonstrance. In chanting, I was blessed by karma and the emperor stopped it. " -this is called tact. The theoretical preparation enough to achieve this flexibility is the so-called "single-minded, empty and false" in Buddhism.
In the Tang Dynasty, a man who couldn't handle the absolute conflict between "being an official" and "being a hermit" came to Caotang Temple, where Zhou Yong had stayed in Chengdu, and set up a thatched cottage. This man is Du Fu, a great poet.
When we read Du Fu's Autumn Wind Breaking the Cottage, we will feel how bleak Du Fu's situation in Chengdu is. However, we forget that Yanwu, who was a friend of Du Fu during our southern tour, is, in today's words, "the best friend of the provincial party secretary". Can we imagine a "close friend of the secretary of the provincial party Committee" living in a hut today, still blown by the autumn wind? In fact, Yanwu just wanted to pull Du Fu back into the system (Du Fu was out last time because he was lying with a gun). Du Fu is self-aware of his own personality. He knows that his "thatched cottage spirit" is incompatible with officialdom. You can "only ask an old friend to provide food", but you don't want to get too involved with officialdom. However, when Yanwu served as our reporter for the second time and pulled Du Fu into the system to be the "Minister of Industry", Du Fu finally failed to resist the temptation of Mi Lu and gave in. Something happened soon, because he didn't like Yanwu's bureaucratic style, and he called names after drinking: "Yan Tingzhi (the father) has this son!" ! According to some historical data, Yanwu pretended not to care, but secretly murdered. Fortunately, Yanwu's wife tipped him off and Du Fu had to leave Chengdu. It can be seen that although Du Fu is a great poet, his poems are immortal, but he did not read the Buddhist scriptures translated by Kumarajiva in Caotang Temple, and he did not understand the truth of "taking a vacation with all his heart", which made the wine willful and made things come to this step! The evaluation of Du Fu's character in the Book of the New Tang Dynasty is: "Open-minded and unruly, good at talking about what's going on in the world, lofty and irrelevant". Today, anyone who is in the officialdom will make a positive judgment after reading this evaluation: "Du Fu is too unsuitable to mix in the officialdom".
Today, the Caotang Temple in Chengdu has been completely regarded as a part of "Du Fu Caotang". Few people know that Caotang Temple has a spiritual connection with Kumarajiva and Zhou Qing in Buddhism (Zhao Qian, a famous Chengdu person in Qing Dynasty, wrote a book on the tablet of Caotang Temple to illustrate this idea, but the tablet was not there. )。 Even few people know that the "thatched cottage spirit" that Kong Zhijue used to scold the false hermit is the spirit of Du Fu's personality-the spirit of the true hermit. Du Fu is remembered as a "patriotic poet" in the narration of tourist attractions. Of course, the scenic spot belongs to the "institution" site today. The thatched cottage museum "within the system" never imagined that the thatched cottage temple was actually restored and turned into an "educational base for personality outside the system to enter the system". Kong is also an official, who has handled the contradiction between "official" and "hidden" well. No matter for him or Zhou Qing, the "spirit of thatched cottage" is very mild, because they have accepted many concepts of Buddhism and Taoism, and they all regard the world as "false". But Du Fu is different. He hasn't read many Buddhist books and takes the world too seriously. Finally, he was misled by the "Caotang Spirit". As he commented on himself in his own poem: "Jianghan thinks of returning to the guest, and Gan Kun is a corrupt scholar."