A Night of Autumn Wind, Yellow Leaves Across the Mountains

Doctor zhou November 1, 2021

After lunch, I went for another walk to the Medicine King Temple on the hill behind the neighboring village. Last night an autumn wind blew through, and my hometown felt as if it had entered autumn overnight; yellow leaves covered the hills and plains. Beijing may already be carpeted with fallen leaves, but in Hubei, deep autumn only truly arrives after such a gust of autumn wind.

Before I even reached the Medicine King Temple, I heard chanting coming from afar. I was quite surprised—could there be monks conducting a ceremony in the temple? Approaching, I saw that indeed monks were performing a ritual. The temple, which had not a single monk two days earlier, had suddenly and miraculously acquired several monks and lay practitioners. Four monks each had their assigned duties, lined up on both sides of the Mahavira Hall; behind them five or six female lay practitioners in haiqing robes knelt on cushions, chanting along with the monks. Ten or so people chanting in unison in this quiet valley made for quite a sight.

This was the first time in my life I had seen a proper Buddhist ritual near my own village. Just as I was delighting in it, the chanting in the temple suddenly turned into the melody of the Journey to the West theme song, "Dare to Ask Where the Road Leads." I thought I had misheard; I calmed down and listened carefully. No doubt about it—the monks were repeating, over and over, precisely the melody of "Dare to Ask Where the Road Leads." After that ended, a Huangmei opera tune followed. As for which sutra they had adapted into these melodies, I cannot say.

I have heard monks chant in many temples across the country, but I have never heard such interesting chanting. As I listened, I could not help but hide aside and laugh. I asked a familiar Dharma teacher on WeChat whether she had heard this kind of chanting; she was also amused and said it was Huangmei opera. She told me that local small temples have many regional ways of chanting during rituals, with all sorts of flourishes.

I had not imagined such a thing before, but actually it fits well with the Buddha's own intent. The Buddhist canon records that the Buddha's disciples asked him what language they should use when teaching in various places. The Buddha told them to communicate with believers in the local dialect and to integrate Buddhist thought with local culture. Therefore Buddhism has always emphasized localization in its spread; only when the people delight in Buddhist practices can Buddhism achieve its missionary effect.

I do not like authority and solemnity, so I readily accept this creative chanting method, full of rural flavor and contemporary sensibility. Famous temples guard their reputations too carefully, fearing that believers will accuse them of not tending to proper duties; they would not dare to undertake such innovation against the world's disapproval. It is precisely these uncrowded small temples that need not worry about gossip. Once a person or organization develops the fear of censure, it inevitably takes the road of dogmatism. As everyone knows, the flip side of tradition and orthodoxy is rigidity and stiffness.

After feasting my ears, I climbed the stone steps to the small temple halfway up the mountain. It was still empty; the floral chanting from the Mahavira Hall below could no longer be heard, and the monks who had finished the ritual had driven off in their cars. Many fallen leaves covered the steps up the mountain, carpeting the hillside with a rich autumn feel. My Tang-dynasty colleague—Sun Simiao, who left behind the great TCM work Qianjin Fang and was later honored as the "Medicine King"—now enjoys very little incense among us locals, but the villagers pooled money a few years ago to make this place beautiful. Now all of this is for me alone to enjoy; how could I not be content?

That morning I saw news that Beijing, for epidemic prevention, was asking residents who had gone out to postpone their return. At the dinner table I joked with my father that it is truly easy to leave Beijing but hard to return. The countryside is so interesting that I have no desire to go back to Beijing at all; this is just the opportunity to linger at home a while longer. I have not spent a winter at home for many years; the damp, cold Hubei winter is a distant memory for me. Perhaps this winter I will have the chance to experience here at home the life of warming oneself by stamping one's feet.

On the way down the mountain, I saw wild ramie growing all over the slopes. When I was a child, hemp products were in fashion and hemp prices were frighteningly high; every household grew hemp, and we children helped strip hemp bark. Back then it was hard to find a single stalk of wild ramie in the countryside. Now hemp fabrics are worthless, and the stands of wild ramie in the mountains go unnoticed. This is so much like human reality: when a person has use, the guests fill the hall; when they have no use, the doorstep is deserted.

This reminds me of Zhuangzi's famous doctrine of the useful and the useless. Trees that are too "useful" and trees that are too "useless" both fail to live out their natural years: the former are cut down for their market value, the latter are cut down for being worthless and taking up space. Only the trees that lie between the useful and the useless can live freely. In that case, for the rest of my life I will be a person who lies between the useful and the useless—neither someone of no value, nor contending for the exalted positions that everyone scrambles for. Wandering freely between heaven and earth—is that not also joyful?

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