Gratitude and Blessing

---to bid a farewell to Prof. Biswadeb Mukherjee

Prof. Chih-Fu Lee, 

30^th May,  2001

    Buddhist education in Taiwan began in the 1960 irregularly, not only education system was not fixed, but also Sanskrit, Pali, Tibetan and modern international languages were not included in courses.

     In 1970 and 1980, the Venerable abbots Shen Yan and Hsing Yun were invited and appointed by Dr. Shau-Foung Chang, the ex-Chancellor and founder of the  Academy of Chinese Studies at Chinese Culture University, as Directors of the Buddhist Institute and the Indian Institute respectively. At that time I was a professor of the said University, by this reason I voluntarily assisted this two Institutes and became administrator as the Chief Secretary and the Deputy Director.

  The Venerable abbots Shen Yan and Hsing Yun and myself all knew commonly the necessity to cultivate qualifying Buddhist scholars, this was because Indian Buddhism came into China in the Han and Wei dynasties, and Chinese Buddhism spread to Japan in Sui and Tang dynasties, nonetheless, the Study of Chinese Buddhism has been far left behind Japanese Buddhism in modern time. At that time, Pali and Sanskrit scholars were not available at the Institute, therefore, a wanted advertisement for such a scholar was on newspapers in India, and a Chinese friend of Prof. Mukherjee sent us his resumes and data. This is how we contacted him. He was the Head of the Dept. of Chinese Language at Viswa-bharati, which was set up by R. Tagore in Santiniketan, West Bengal. Prof. Mukherjee was awarded Ph.D. in Goettengen, Germany, and his topic was related to Buddha’s thought, and he is both good in Pali, Sanskrit and classic Chinese. With such brilliant career and majors, he certainly was an ideal and qualified teacher exactly what we needed. Through long years of correspondences  with him, he didn’t come to Taipei until 1982 eventually.

     In 1982, he first taught at Chinese Culture University for about one year and two months, and went back to India. In 1985, he came back to Taiwan and taught at Fo Kwang Shan for nearly one and a half year. Again he went back to India and continued his teaching career there. He came back to Taipei in Oct., 1992 and has taught at the Chung Hwa Institute for ten years ever since then. He still held his teaching job in India when he began to teach in the Institute, but he resigned his job by the end of 1993 simply because he likes Chinese culture and people. After his retirement, he devoted himself to the Institute, and his main contribution is in teaching Sanskrit and Pali through texts, and he was highly praised and beloved by students.

    He is a senior research scholar and persists to his major. His articles which were published in the Journal of the Institute show his unique perspectives, and they seem to be developed from his Ph.D. topic. There are a couple of examples as follows:

    The Buddha disagreed with Eternalism and  Nihilism, and most of scholars assert that what he commented include ‘Ātman’ of the Upaniṣads. However, Prof. Mukherjee points out that the term ‘attā’ used by the Buddha for criticizing the Eternalism was not ‘Ātman’ of the Upaniṣads. In other word, the Buddha didn’t criticize ‘Ātman’ of the Upaniṣads.

    In Cullavagga x 1.1 mentions the fir Buddhist Council was for changing the ‘Dharma’ and the ‘Vinaya’ together, but it is not recorded in the Mahāparinibbānasutta, for this reason, some scholars held the view that the Vinaya is a fantasy. But Prof. Mukherjee points out that in certain parts of the Vinaya it mentions chanting the ‘Dharma’ and the ‘Vinaya’ together, khuddānukhuddakāni sikkhāpadāni, Channa, the charge against Ānanda, and all of these are historical truths.

    From the consideration of the development of nibbāna thought of the Buddha, Prof. Mukherjee asserts that it is developed modified from the liberated four jhānas. To attain nibbāna is merely stood for an unhindered enjoyment of an agreeable feeling,  and it is the ‘rūpa jhānas’ which modified ‘pItisukha’ and ‘sukha’. And he then modified the ‘arūpa jhānas’ ways of self-motification, and renounced attā after he gained enlightenment, that is, to away from the feeling of enjoyment, even the feeling of non-enjoyment and non-suffering. Such kind of absolute objectiveness and full awareness toward ‘āśrava’ is called ‘bodhi’, that is, ‘cetovimutti’, which reforms the conceptions of spiritual world at the time of the Buddha.

    Furthermore, according to Prof. Mukherjee, before the Buddha, there are two kinds of meditation practiced by śramaṇas, one is not to be effected by feeling, the other is to vanish any kinds of forms in cognition and free from any conceptions of feeling. The Buddha combined these two meditation into one through which he attained nibbāna.

    In addition to his academic research achievements, he also helped and guided Mr. Lin, Kwan-Ming, a successful business, to correct Sanskrit Siddartan published by Japanese, and re-translate some of them into English and helped him to edit a number of books regarding tantra and dharani, so that the correctness and true meaning of those dharani can be truelly understood. In fact, dharani has more than one meaning, it is difficult to translate its meaning fully. This is the-called ‘Five Untranslable Principle’, a phrase coined by the Venerable Yuen Tsung. Although dharani is ‘unspeakable, unthinkable’, nonetheless, it is a good thing even to re-explain it, even one single meaning.

    Prof. Mukherjee reseach achievements have been in areas that are gravely founded upon  by Scholars of Chinese Buddhist, and this is what we have admired and depended on.

    As for personal relationship with Prof. Mukherjee, he stayed with my family for nearly two months the first time when he came to Taipei for teaching in Chinese Culture University due to financial shortage of the Institute at that time. Fortunately, easily adjusts himself to new environment, and likes to talk and share his experience. He seems to favor mysticism quite a lot, and likes to discuss those matters and persons, and couldn’t help to stop talking often until late night.

    I am not a intelligent person, and do not believe there are bad persons in this world. For this reason, I was cheated by my dearest and trustful friend and relative twice, and was forced to lend money from other people by paying high interest. When Prof. Mukherjee learned this news, he told me not to worry and tried to lend me money without any interest. I appreciated his kindness and friendship, but I didn’t accept  his offer. His kindness, warmness and sincerity truly impressed me.

    Prof. Mukherjee and I are on the age to retire, still we are in good health, and have our own research projects after retirement. The Institute already decided to appoint him as the Honorary Research Fellow in India to honor his contribution and achievement. Finally, I would like to present my sincere gratitude and best wish to him with famous poem written by a Chinese classic poet Su, Tung Po---‘May I wish you to live a long life, and share the bright moon thousand miles away.’

感謝與祝福

－－歡送穆克紀教授

李志夫  

2001.05.30  

1960年代台灣的佛教教育時辦時停，也沒有一定的學制，梵、巴、藏文，及現代國際語言之教育均未列入教育課程。

1978、1980年聖嚴與星雲兩位大法師先後受中華學術院創辦人張曉峰先生之聘，分別擔任佛學與印度研究所所長，本人因在文化大學任教，所以就義務地協助兩所之行政工作掛名為主任祕書、副所長。

培養高深佛學研究人才是聖嚴、星雲兩師及本人之共識，因為印度佛教遠自漢、魏傳入；從隋、唐傳到日本。而今中國佛學人才差距日本甚大。本所當時，尚無梵、巴文之師資，所以便在印度登報徵求師資，穆教授便是應徵的學者之一。因其為現職印度泰戈爾所創立國際大學中文系所主任；在德哥廷根大學得的博士學位；論文寫的是佛陀思想；又精通梵、巴文；亦通曉漢文等優秀條件，當然就是我們所企求的理想師資。

穆教授在1982年初次到台，在文化大學任教約一年兩個月，然後返印復職。 1985年他再次抵台，在佛光山叢林學院任教約一年半後便返回印度。1992年10月，他應聘到台北中華佛學研究所任教，至今已整整十年之久。他初在本所任教時，其印度教職仍未退休，1993年底，穆氏因對中華文化及人民之喜愛而毅然決然辭去其印度之教職。他將他退休後的精華歲月均貢獻給本所。他為本所培育了梵、巴語基礎人才，深受研究生的愛戴。

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他任教本所時所發表的論文均成一家之言，都是繞著他博士論文的餘緒在發展，他是一位堅守專業的學者。茲舉例說明如下：

佛陀是反對「常論」與「斷論」的，一般學者認為他批評的「常論」，當然也包括著奧義書的ātman；而穆教授在論文中卻指出「常論」與「斷論」之我(attā)並非即奧義書的ātman換句話說，佛陀並未批評奧義書的ātman思想。

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關於「小品」(Cullavagga)×1.1所記載為了合誦「法」與「律」而舉行第一集結的提議，在《大般涅槃經》卻支字未提，於是，有學者就認為「小品」就是虛構的。而穆氏則指出：律藏中一段記載有傳統「法」與「律」的合誦，小小戒、闡那、向阿難舉罪等，都是真實的歷史事件。

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從佛陀本人涅槃思想發展次第看，穆氏指出是從解脫四禪加以修正而來的。先求涅槃，旨在「自在地享樂」，是以修「喜」、「樂」的有色禪；後來，又修正了苦行者的無色禪的方法，成道之後便捨去了我(attā)；拒絕樂受(Vedana)，乃至不苦不樂之捨受。這樣對於有漏(āīrava)之絕對客觀的和完全的了知稱為覺悟(bodhi)，亦即心解脫(Cetovimutti)改革了當時的精神世界。

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根據穆氏，佛教前之沙門主要修習兩種禪法：一為修不被感受影響之自在；一為消除形相空間之知覺，滅除受想。佛陀則合二者為一達成涅槃。

穆氏除了其學術研究成果之外，亦指導青年企業家林光明居士將日本出版的梵文悉曇加以修正，並將其中有些譯成英文，並助林居士編輯出版了數本有關梵文密教及陀羅尼咒語的書籍，使人能了解其原意大意為何。其實咒語有多意，很難譯其全義；此為玄奘大師所說「五不翻」的原因之一，雖然是「密不可宣」的咒語，能釋出一意一味也是好的。

穆教授所研究之領域，也正是中國佛學學者所少觸及的部份，也是我們所景仰、倚重之所在。

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就本人與穆氏私誼談，由於當時本所的經費拮据，就屈居我家地下室與我家人共同生活將近兩個月。好在他能隨遇而安，而且善談，他是一個神秘主義的受好者，談異人奇事，每至夜深不能自己。

因本人個性愚鈍，不信人間真有壞人。曾兩度為至親至信人士所騙，一時不得不向人借高利貸。穆氏聞知累勸：願以無息借我暫時周轉。雖均為我婉謝，但益見其盛情感人。

穆教授與我都是已屆退修的年齡，但我們身體尚健，退休後還有自己要作的研究工作。而本所另聘請穆教授為「印度特約研究員」。最後，借用中國詩人蘇東坡的名句：「但願人長久，千里共嬋娟」。