人間佛教的出世觀—以《阿含經》為主

Abstract

As I understand, Master Yinshun’s thought of Humanist Buddhism is the Buddhism reflected in the early Buddhist literature, namely the Pali Nikayas and Chinese Agamas. However, people misunderstand the idea of “Transcending the world” taught in these early literatures as leaving this physical world. As a result they think that Buddhism is other worldly, not for this human world. In this paper I intend to clarify this point by using textual evidences found in the extant Pali Nikayas and Chinese Agamas, which are considered by most Buddhist scholars as the early Buddhist literature. According to these Buddhist literatures, the Buddhist idea of transcending the world is while living in the physical world transcending all worldly matters. The Buddhist idea of transcending the world is explained in terms of the five aggregates and the five strands of sense desire, which are the total human experience. According to Buddhist philosophy, the five aggregates, which consist a sentient being, are the objective referent of identity view while the five strands of sense desire are the field of passion and desire where one’s lust, hatred and delusion come into full operation, so both are sources for suffering. The former is about us and the latter is about the world where we live in. So transcending the world means transcending these two kinds of world with which we attach ourselves. Hence Early Buddhism is humanistic.