Portable space

"Oh my god, it's a good thing this temple is at the foot of the mountain. If it's at the top of the mountain, I'm sure I'd be exhausted." The fat man said while wiping his sweat.

Yang Wanli looked at the trembling flesh on his body, shook his head and said, "You should find a way to reduce it."

The fat man didn't care too much and said, "I don't want to lose any weight. This figure can be whatever it is. Why do men care about their figure? This is also very good. It looks kind, isn't it? As the saying goes, kindness makes money. This is the appearance that makes money. If you lose weight, won’t you be going bankrupt.”

Yang Wanli smiled wryly. He just saw that the fat man's body was too heavy to go up the mountain, so he suggested a word, but he didn't expect the fat man to have a lot of fallacies.

Some people say that Songshan Mountain is a peak of Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism, which has its unique cultural connotation.On Mount Song, the Taoist Zhongyue Temple and the Confucian Songyang Academy also occupy a place.

"Why is there such a stone tablet here?" Yang Wanli asked.

Few people can answer this question.

On the stone tablet in front of the Shaolin Temple, there is a portrait of Lao Tzu, Confucius and Sakyamuni in one.Just like the three lives of Tathagata, do the three of them also represent the past, present and future of mankind?However, as a mountain, Songshan should be the only one in the history of Buddhism, just like Taishan is the only one in the history of Confucianism.

Although Mount Wutai in Shanxi, Mount Emei in Sichuan, Mount Putuo in Zhejiang, and Mount Jiuhua in Anhui are also known as China's four famous Buddhist mountains, they have been incensed for thousands of years, but they are only Manjusri, Samantabhadra, Avalokitesvara, and Ksitigarbha. The dojo of the Great Bodhisattva, and these four great Bodhisattvas are only the disciples of Sakyamuni, but Bodhidharma is different. He is the No.20 eighth-generation direct disciple of Sakyamuni, and he is the authentic successor of Buddhism.Just like only one son of a founding emperor can become emperor, the other sons can at most have one prince.From this point of view, the significance of Bodhidharma's stay in Shaolin Temple is very significant in the history of Chinese Buddhism.

The door of Shaolin Temple doesn't stand out, and the words "Shaolin Temple" on it don't look majestic and domineering.It's just that the three big characters are said to be Kangxi's personal inscriptions. Kangxi is the same as Qianlong. Their fonts do not have a strong skeleton, but they have a sense of flesh and blood.Kangxi's father, Shunzhi, and grandmother, the Empress Dowager Xiaozhuang, both believed in Buddhism, and they had a lot of influence on Kangxi when he was young.Presumably this kind of flesh and blood typeface is more suitable for the artistic conception of Shaolin Temple than the sharp and domineering typeface.

However, it is always a small disappointment.

The fat man shook his head and said, "Is this the famous Shaolin Temple? I have been hearing about it before, and I thought it was a holy place, majestic and solemn like Mecca. I didn't expect it to be like a temple in the south of the Yangtze River during the Ming and Qing Dynasties." It's an inconspicuous private house. Why do you feel a little petty?"

People who don't know much about the faith of Buddhism will be disappointed with this mountain gate, because it is not as majestic as the "No. [-] Ancient Temple in the World" sign at the bottom of the mountain.

Zhang Taiping shook his head slightly and said: "What do you think the gate of Shaolin Temple looks like?"

"What do you mean, even if there is no luxurious building, at least this mountain gate should be a little more decent, after all, it's just a facade, isn't it?" said the fat man.

"There seems to be no such thing as luxury in Buddhist teachings." Zhang Taiping said, "Do you think the word Qingdeng Ancient Buddha is really just a word?"

Fatty really didn't know much about Buddhism before, so it is naturally impossible to know the teachings and history of Buddhism.

Zhang Taiping also had some understanding of Buddhism due to his previous life’s body, and continued: “In the late Eastern Han Dynasty, Mahayana Buddhism was introduced to Songluo. ‘Cheng’ means vehicle, Theravada Buddhism talks about self-liberation, and Mahayana Buddhism talks about Purdue All living beings. The first Han monk was named Zhu Shixing, who studied Mahayana Buddhism, and the earliest Shaolin Temple was built because of him.”

The fat man asked strangely: "Didn't you say that the patriarch of Shaolin is Bodhidharma?"

"When Bodhidharma came to Shaolin Temple, Shaolin Temple had been seated for 30 years. The reason why Bodhidharma is called the patriarch of Shaolin is because Bodhidharma is the first propagator of Zen Buddhism in the world." Zhang Taiping said .

Zen is "quiet contemplation", and Buddhism calls quiet meditation as meditation.Bodhidharma proposed a new method of meditation, negating the ladder level of practice in Indian Buddhism and practicing for many generations, advocating that everyone has the Buddha nature, that is, the original nature, and everyone has the innate wisdom of becoming a Buddha, that is, Bodhi. Everyone can become a Buddha through the realization of Buddha-nature, although it is hard to know when it will happen.The reason why sentient beings fail to become Buddhas is because they are not aware of their own nature.Once the mist is cleared to see the blue sky, and the mind is clear to see the nature, the self-nature is the Buddha, turning the Buddha into an ordinary person who can see with eyes.

"The teaching of Zen is enlightenment in tranquility. All other things outside of the body are illusions, even the body is a stinky skin. How can this temple be built magnificently?"

Except for Ye Ling, the others all looked at Zhang Taiping with strange expressions.

Yang Wanli stared and asked: "Brother Zhang has also studied Buddhism?" Zhang Taiping, who can be regarded as a standard rough guy at a glance, can say such a lot of Buddhist Zen. Surprised a few people.

"It's not about research, it's just that I learned something in my spare time." Zhang Taiping said.

The fat man scratched his hair and asked puzzledly, "Do you read Buddhism?"

"Why?" Zhang Taiping asked with a smile, "Why not?"

"No, it's not. It's just that it feels weird." The fat man looked at him strangely and said.

Zhang Taiping ignored his eyes and said: "If you are interested, you can also take a look. I think you are fat and fat, and you must be destined to that Maitreya Buddha or Huanxi Buddha."

This was a joke that the fat man said himself when he was at the foot of the mountain, but if he was really asked to study Buddhism, he would not do it to death. He shook his head and said, "Forget it, I am destined to roll around in the world of mortals ordinary people have nothing to do with Buddhism."

After a short rest, I met the tourist group outside the temple gate at the gate of the temple.

The tour guide was using a loudspeaker to introduce the gate of the temple to a group of tourists. When he finally entered the gate, he said: "When visiting the Shaolin Temple, you must not step on every threshold, because in Buddhism, the threshold of the temple is very particular. It is said that It would be unlucky to step on the threshold of a temple or a Buddhist hall; it is also said that the threshold is made of the forehead of Sakyamuni, if you step on it, you will be disrespectful to the Buddha." After finishing speaking, he stepped over carefully.

Zhang Taiping and the others followed this group of tourists for the time being. With the previous reminder, they naturally wouldn't step on the threshold for no reason.

After entering the temple, the first thing that catches the eye is rows of ginkgo trees. The one in the middle is the largest, vigorous and powerful, covering most of the courtyard like a canopy.

A girl among the first group of tourists asked, "Can I take pictures here?"

The tour guide nodded and said, "You can take pictures here."

It is estimated that this group of young tourists wanted to take pictures a long time ago, but they did not take any action because they were concerned that this is a Buddhist pure land. Now they all scattered to take pictures after hearing this sentence, only a few people left. Listen to her explanation beside the tour guide.

The tour guide continued: "The ginkgo trees in the Shaolin Temple are all male and female. Only the largest one in the middle is a single ginkgo tree. It has been around for more than 1500 years. It only blooms but does not bear fruit. It is called the Arhat tree. Unmarried young men and women must not take photos with this ginkgo tree."

A young couple who had just stood in front of the huge ginkgo tree and were about to take a group photo stopped when they heard the words of the tour guide, and asked in confusion, "Why?"

The tour guide put his hands together with a smile and replied: "This is a Buddhist holy place, and the Buddha will see it if he is alive. I don't need to say what this single ginkgo tree represents."

The young couple put away their cameras, and others stopped taking pictures in front of the 500-year-old bachelor.

"Why are there so many holes in the tree?" A person asked the guide.

"Try putting your fingers along the edges of these holes," said the tour guide with a smile in his sweet voice.

Some curious boys immediately put their fingers into these holes, just enough to accommodate their fingers, and someone said in amazement: "Could it be that someone poked it out with a finger?"

The tour guide nodded: "These small holes on the ginkgo tree are said to be left by monks in Shaolin Temple practicing one-finger flick and two-finger flick of Vajra."

"Isn't this a bit exaggerated?" The boy punched the tree with his fist, and immediately felt great pain, and he said incredulously, clutching his fist.The other young people also gathered around and looked at and touched the tree body carefully. They felt that the tree body was extremely hard, even if it was not easy to pierce it with a dagger, how could it be that these holes were poked out with fingers.They all expressed disbelief.