BEYOND IDEOLOGY: RELIGIOUS THOUGHTS AND CULTURAL PRACTICES IN LETTERS BETWEEN FENG ZIKAI AND MASTER GUANGQIA IN SOCIALIST CHINA 1950s-1970s.

• Author: Zeng, Qilin

1. Introduction

   Feng Zikai and Master Guangqia in Singapore not only fulfilled the behest of their teacher Master Hong Yi to complete and publish the masterpiece Protection of Life, but also actively promoted the development of religion during the People's Republic of China (P.R.C.) era. There are a total of 665 published letters between Feng Zikai and others after 1949. The letters between Feng and his youngest son Feng Xinmei made up 180 of these letters, only 4 more than the letters between Feng and Master Guangqia.(Feng 2016). (1) Therefore, this essay focuses on the letters between Feng, Master Guangqia and other intellectuals in the P.R.C. 1950s-1970s, as well as on his overseas religious practices during the socialist era in order to investigate how Feng's overseas cultural practices helped him broaden his means of cultural expression and encourage the development of religions in socialist China. To begin with, I would like to explain and analyse the main theories and keywords involved.

   A typical representative example of Feng's private creations in the P.R.C. is the letter. The letters that Feng wrote to intellectuals between the years 1950 and 1970 are unique because they were written in the middle of the 20th century but were not released to the public until after his passing. These set them apart from the mainstream creations in Maoist China. Such private writings offer opportunities for examining his attitudes and emotions, as well as extending the multiple connotations of literature.

   The letters, publications and related cultural practices centred on religions in the P.R.C. in this essay should be regarded not only as productions of literature, art, and religion but also reflections of a set of values or a structure of feelings that registered a social episteme. The publications and cultural practices complicate the interactions between religion, the self, and the world. During the P.R.C. period, waves of literary and artistic practices that sought to identify individual options in the face of atrocities emerged. Through exploring the specific example of Feng's religious thoughts and his related cultural practices during this period, this essay sheds light on a new dimension of understanding the relationship between the Chinese contemporary literary-historical environment and intellectuals.

   In this essay, I discuss Feng's letters, overseas publications, and cultural practices to stress the need to consider the crucial roles of personalized private writings and communications amidst the turbulent cultural circumstances in the Maoist era. Such an approach takes account of the recent scholarly emphasis on the sentiments and poetics of selfhood that inform the historical moments in a different light. Scholars conducting research on intellectuals in the turbulent cultural environment have paid substantial attention to intellectuals' reactions, options, and text strategies (Wakeman 1985, Fu 1993, Huang 2005). Nicole Huang's research emphasizes Zhang Ailing's adoption of a highly personalized text strategy to intervene in politics (Huang 2005). I would like to apply this research perspective to explore Feng's letters to further discuss whether this could be regarded as a textual strategy and rhetorical method and to understand how he achieved inner reflection and maintained his pursuit of self through creations.

   In the field of space studies, research has not been limited to only geographical space. Scholars have also extended their attention to cultural space. Walter Benjamin raised the idea that some rebellious behaviours of intellectuals in the capitalist era might have caused them to be regarded as secret agents by the regime. In other words, under the control of coercion, intellectuals developed ways to stretch their cultural space (Benjamin 2008). Lefebvre brought social relations into the discussion on the concept of space in his research and established a connection between space, social relationships, production relations, and related networks (Lefebvre 1991). The years of 1949-1975 was a period during which the Cold War took place and Feng retained close contacts with intellectuals from Hong Kong, Singapore, and Japan. As the Cold War extended its reach to the cultural field, it became gradually regarded as 'a clash of ideas and cultures similar to military and strategic conflicts' (Westad 2007: 5). Using these approaches, this essay will examine Feng's letters and cultural practices in a transnational framework, and study communist cultural and diplomatic policies as well.

   Using materials collected from letters, magazines, newspapers, government documents, archival materials, Feng's artworks, and bibliography, this essay demonstrates that the study of the letters, creations, cultural practices, and interactions of intellectuals can help map out some of the cultural interactions between cultural productions, intellectuals, and politics. An examination of Feng Zikai helps to address the necessity of rethinking the living status of intellectuals and their networks critically in the context of mid-twentieth-century socialist China. The following questions will be asked: What were Feng's cultural practices from abroad at the time? How did he broaden Master Hongyi's religious ideas and promote religious development in socialist China? How did Feng's use of overseas cultural practices during the socialist era help him develop his feelings and poetics of selfhood and keep his links abroad? What provocations, expressions, and experiments does he make in response to the Maoist era's historical tempos?

2. The continuation of Master Hongyi's religious thoughts: Feng Zikai's overseas cultural practices in socialist China

   After being introduced to the text by Master Hongyi, Master Guangqia read Feng Zikai's Yuanyuan Tang Essay Collections in 1931. Feng Zikai and Master Guangqia began to write letters to each other in 1937 (Feng 2016: 153). Both of them were deeply influenced by their teacher Master Hongyi. Religion is an important aspect of the cultural practices and interactions between them.

   In the early days of New China, Feng and Master Guangqia actively worked on the proposal for the construction of the Master Hongyi Memorial Hall. Feng mentioned the construction of Master Hongyi's memorial stone tower in his letter dated 6 June 1955 to Master Guangqia. He showed his appreciation for the official support for rebuilding temples in the nation and praised Master Hongyi's Hupao Stone Tower for being well reconstructed. He also expressed his wish for Master Guangqia to return to the country and experience the scenes of flourishing religious development soon (Feng 2016: 167). He continuously updated Master Guangqia on the construction progress of the memorial hall from 1955 to 1959, ending with 'the memorial hall still has no hope' (Feng 2016: 182).

   The letters related to the construction progress of the memorial hall in these four years shed light on several points that are worth discussing further. The first of these is the attitude of the authorities towards the Master Hongyi Memorial Hall. In Feng's letter in June 1955, he mentioned that the government built Master Hongyi's stone tower, rebuilt Hupao Temple and Jing'an Temple, and turned Hupao Temple into a part of the West Lake Scenic District. However, the masses were too busy to build the memorial hall. Furthermore, the government would not subsidize the construction. Feng had to raise money from Master Hongyi's students in Shanghai and Hangzhou for the construction. He hoped that Master Guangqia could raise funds from overseas as well (Feng 2016: 168-169). Although Master Guangqia managed to raise funds in Singapore and Hong Kong (Feng 2016: 171), and Feng tried his best to apply for permission to build the memorial hall, the authority expressed no clear opinion or strong support for it. "... Yesterday, Wu Mengfei said that he had contacted the government in Hangzhou. According to the reply, the construction has not been implemented and must be postponed. Though we got approval from the Political Consultative Conference, the government in Hangzhou failed to support the construction immediately" (Feng 2016: 177-178). In 1959, Feng and Master Guangqia clearly stated that the proposal for construction was a failure and that they would refund the donors. "If the construction of the memorial is still hopeless in the next year, I will refund the donors as we have planned previously" (Feng 2016: 181). The second point is that although Master Guangqia and Feng had actively raised funds, the plan for the memorial still failed. This may have something to do with the modest and unsupportive attitude of the government towards the construction at that time. Moreover, the nationwide cultural environment and the attitude towards religion then should also be taken into consideration. Feng's letter mentioned that monks were busily participating in various political studies and conferences, and that the Buddhist interface in China was completely different from that in the past. During the period, the studies of political thought and cultural policies were promoted throughout the country, even in the religious field, and monks were regarded as an important part in the ideological reform revolution.

   In the early 1950s, when the newly established nation of the P.R.C. was facing domestic complications and the tremendous task of construction, Zhou Enlai said that 'the turbulent domestic political environment and the international Cold War require our party to consolidate and develop the masses' unity to the maximum. To strive for the completion of the democratic revolution, we should unite all the forces that we can, and overcome all the difficulties that we are facing. People should fight together against imperialism and construct socialism' (Zhou 1992: 173-189). In this context, religious clergy was also considered as one of the important forces to be...