Legend of Baoguang Temple in Xindu

During the reign of Renzong in the Northern Song Dynasty, King Zhou Bei led the Maitreya Uprising.

In the Southern Song Dynasty and the Yuan Dynasty, Bailian religion was also mixed with Maitreya, and Maitreya rebelled in the next life.

The statue that embodies Maitreya's belief in the next life is Maitreya.

The Buddha statue of Maitreya is similar to the statue of Sakyamuni, that is, wearing a coat with shoulders or right shoulders, and his hands are generally tied and printed, showing a sitting position.

The statue of Maitreya generally appears in the combination of three buddhas in the Hall of Ursa Major, namely, the future Buddha Maitreya-the present Buddha Sakyamuni-the past Buddha burning the lamp (or Kaya Buddha).

Maitreya Buddha is also supported by a single body. For example, when the Northern Wei Dynasty offered sacrifices to Emperor Wen, a thirteen-cave Maitreya Buddha Cave in Yungang, Datong was cut and a reclining statue with a height of 16 meters was placed. After moving the capital to Luoyang, Longmen Grottoes were built, which contained hundreds of Maitreya statues made by Taihe, Jingming and Yongping.

In addition, there are many Maitreya statues made by the Northern Dynasties in Huangshi Cliff and Qianfo Mountain in Licheng, Shandong Province.

The most famous Maitreya Buddha statue is the Maitreya Buddha statue in Xinchang, Zhejiang, which is more than 50 meters high, and the Leshan Giant Buddha in Sichuan is 62 meters high, ranking first in the world.

A statue of Maitreya dedicated to a single body is usually in a good posture, with knees together, feet on the ground, hands touching knees or making a statement.

Maitreya's belief in the incarnation of Taoism and the statues of Maitreya Buddha and Bodhisattva are not ordinary human bodies and have no gender, so human beings can't see them.

Only Buddha and Bodhisattva can see each other.

In order to transcend the six sentient beings, Buddha and Bodhisattva must become incarnations (in the form of human or animal bodies) and show them to all sentient beings.

Since Tang Kaiyuan, the belief in Maitreya has gone from bad to worse due to the translation of Amitabha Sutra. (1) Amitabha belief has gradually become the mainstream of pure land belief, and most Buddhists want to live in the western paradise of Amitabha after their death.

During the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, people's beliefs changed, and there appeared a legend that a cloth-bag monk who claimed to be the incarnation of Maitreya did not rebel.

The cloth bag monk changed the image, identity and function of Maitreya and became a complete Maitreya in China.

Bag monk, whose name is unknown, claimed to be a native of Changting Village, Fenghua County, Mingzhou (now Ningbo, Zhejiang Province) in the late Tang Dynasty and the Five Dynasties, and later became a monk in Fenghua Lin Yue Temple.

According to the ancient books such as Jingde Lu and Biography of Song Monk, the monk was fat, frowning and paunchy.

He often carries a big cloth bag with bamboo sticks on his back, smiles and begs for alms everywhere, so he is called a "cloth bag monk".

The contract is ambiguous, lying everywhere, and often telling people good and bad, which is "effective".

He is also an expert in weather forecasting. "It will rain, just wear wet cloth shoes.

Drought means dragging clogs.

Residents use this as a test. "

He often pours all the alms in the cloth bag to the ground for the onlookers to see.

Qi's crazy behavior aroused people's great interest and became famous for a while.

On March 3, the second year of Liang (9 16, the third year of Zhen Ming), Qi came to the East Xuan of Fenghua Temple and sat on a rock and said, "Maitreya Buddha is really Maitreya Buddha, incarnating hundreds of millions; Always showing the time, people don't know. " She died peacefully.

It suddenly dawned on people that the fat monk was the incarnation of Maitreya.

Later, people buried his body in the Zhongta Buddhist Temple in Fengshan (now Jinping) in the north of the city.

It is said that he was also seen walking with a bag in other counties.

In the year of Fu Yuanyuan in the Northern Song Dynasty (1098), Zhezong conferred this title as "Master Ding Ying".

In the third year of Chongning in the Northern Song Dynasty (1 104), the abbot of the temple raised funds to build a pavilion behind the temple, and a cloth bag monk statue was built in the pavilion. Song Huizong named this pavilion "Baining", from which the statues of cloth-bag monks in the world began.

Because Lin Yue Temple is both a Buddhist place and a remote place, it has become a Maitreya Dojo.

With the spread of the theory that the cloth-bag monk is the incarnation of Maitreya, later, ordinary temples were also neutral to the cloth-bag Maitreya statue in Tianwang Temple.

Maitreya in a cloth bag is like a fat head and big ears, with a big smile and bare chest and abdomen, so it is called "Maitreya with a big belly" by the people.

Fang, a famous Buddhist expert in China, pointed out that the belief in Maitreya in cloth bags "generally meets the psychological needs of the general public" and that the monk in cloth bags "is the creation of China's overall thinking".

The cloth bag can hold all kinds of sundries and symbolize everything.

Buddhists in cloth bags, as the embodiment of Maitreya Buddha, combine the beliefs of the previous generation with those of the next generation, the concept of Indian Buddhism's birth with China's traditional concept of joining the WTO, Zen Buddhism and pure land belief.

It is no accident that the cloth-bag monk embodies the ancient people in China's pursuit of life value-auspiciousness, auspiciousness, tolerance and charity, and also embodies the sacred image of Buddhism and the spirit of helping the world, so it occupies a stable and prominent position in Buddhist temples. "(on China's belief in Maitreya).

The heavenly palace is full of Maitreya couplets. The Heavenly Palace takes Maitreya as the main statue, and usually hangs couplets about Maitreya, which have profound and endless meanings.

The most common couplet is: "a big belly can accommodate things that are difficult to accommodate in the world;" Open your mouth and laugh at the ridiculous people in the world. "Ancient and modern monks, great virtues, scholars and officials left a large number of couplets dedicated to Buddhists in the bag, including many masterpieces full of Zen machines.

For example, what is the true face of life? Always treat people with big bellies.

(Emei Mountain, Sichuan) Open your mouth and laugh, laugh at the past and laugh at the present, and laugh at everything; The stomach is big enough to hold, the sky can hold, and people can hold everything.

(Baoguang Temple in Xindu, Sichuan) You can't close your mouth when you laugh, and you can't laugh every day.