In tears, Lee Jung-tai (李榮台), a historian and the daughter-in-law of late Buddhist clergyman Lee Ying-pin (李應彬), yesterday recounted the history of the Puantang (普安堂) lay Buddhist monastery, while calling on the government to save the building from a forced demolition scheduled for today.
Following a 15-minute drive along a narrow road into the mountains on the outskirts of Tucheng District (土城), New Taipei City (新北市), a sign that reads “Puantang” finally appeared on the left side of the road, with stairs and a traditional Chinese arch behind it.
The arch was blocked with a line of tape, and a police car was parked in front of it.
It takes another 15 minutes to walk to the entrance of the Puantang complex. However, the gate was closed yesterday.
“We have always welcomed visitors, but we are keeping the gate closed because we are afraid that someone may come to vandalize the building,” Lee Jung-tai said.
Puantang is scheduled to be torn down today, as the Cih-you Temple (慈祐宮) in Sinjhuang District (新莊), New Taipei City, registered ownership of 300 hectares of land in the area in the 1970s, saying the land was presented to the temple during the Qing Dynasty by two Chinese settlers.
However, Puantang disputed the claim, citing historic documents and saying that the two settlers only donated 10 hectares of land to the temple.
However, the New Taipei District Court ruled in favor of the temple, giving it the right to tear down the buildings on the land.
The Puantang complex is made up of a traditional brick house and a two-story modern concrete house, and is surrounded by trees, bushes and flowers.
“The brick house was home to the first Han Chinese settlers in the area, who arrived more than 200 hundred years ago. Originally a mud brick house, the building was rebuilt with stone bricks more than 100 years ago,” Lee Jung-tai said. “The settlers brought statues of immortals, including the Taoist Goddess Matsu and the Buddhist Bodhisattva Avalokistevara, and placed them in this house. Later, the house was turned into a place of religious worship, and the lobby became the prayer hall, while the other rooms were turned into dormitories for clergy and followers.”
Lee Jung-tai said the roof of the brick house was hit and damaged by a falling rock about 10 years ago, and the statues were moved to the two-story building.
“However, the couplets carved in wood and the ones hanging on either side of the door are original,” she said.
Lay Buddhism was once the most popular religion among Han settlers and their descendants in Taiwan throughout the Qing Dynasty and Japanese colonial periods.
However, with the promotion of Japanese Buddhism during the Japanese colonial period and the arrival of Chinese Buddhist masters after World War II, many lay Buddhists converted to orthodox Buddhism.
Besides the building and ancient statues, Puantang also holds many centuries-old religious instruments that are seldom seen nowadays.
“This is an instrument that clergy used to convey the messages of immortals,” Lee Jung-tai said, holding a V-shaped horizontal wooden instrument with a round vertical stick attached to it.
“A clergyman would put sand on the table, and ‘write down’ what he perceived from immortals with the instrument in some sacred script, and another clergyman would stand next to him to ‘interpret’ the writing,” Lee Jung-tai said.
Since Lee Ying-pin was a famous artist and sculptor, the monastery also kept many his masterpieces in drawing and sculptures.
“Puantang is an important site to trace the development of the Hsientien School [先天派] of lay Buddhism, and the only remaining lay Buddhist monastery in northern Taiwan,” Lee Jung-tai said. “Look at the historical buildings, the centuries-old statues and religious instrument, the sculptures and drawings by Lee Ying-pin, and the beautiful and peaceful atmosphere. How hardhearted would you need to be to flatten this place?”
“I’m determined to defend this place. I’m willing to sacrifice my life to protect it,” she said.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching