The Culture Characteristics And The Enlightenment Of The Taiwan Contemporary Buddhist Building

During Ming Dynasty (1368A.D.-1644A.D.), the Buddhism was introduced intoTaiwan by immigrants from the South Fujian province. After hundreds years’development, the Buddhism in Taiwan is becoming increasingly popular. Especiallyafter1987, the Buddhism culture in Taiwan has taken the fundamental reform,expressing the features of secularization and modernization. With such tendency, theBuddhist architectures in Taiwan are changed as well. Except for the construction ofmodern Buddhist temples, many Buddhist colleges and settings, and other institutionsand organizations which are closely related to modern social life are established,including social education and charity etc. Therefore, they aim to closely connectpeople’s daily life with Buddhist doctrines.The author of this paper has a strong interest in the Buddhist culture, and alwaysconcerns about the Buddhist architectures and Buddhist culture. The author wasexchanged to Taiwan by school in2012. During that time, the author did a lot ofresearches on many local Buddhist architectures in Taiwan. Compared with theBuddhist architectures in the mainland, the author figures that Buddhism develops quitewell and more popular in Taiwan than in mainland. In addition, there are a huge numberof Buddhist architectures in Taiwan, with more mature functions and forms of theBuddhist architectures than in mainland. Therefore, the author generated the idea ofstudying the modern Buddhist architectures in Taiwan.This paper picks up the modern Buddhist architectures in Taiwan as the subject,which refers to the Chinese Buddhist temples and other relevant architectureconstructed in Taiwan after1987, including exhibition halls and Buddhist colleges. This paper wishes to provide new ideas for the modernization of Buddhist architectures inmainland by studying the modern Buddhist architectures in Taiwan. On the one hand, itcan satisfy the practical needs of the design of modern Buddhist architectures on thepractical level; on the other hand, it can explore the heritage and innovation of Buddhistarchitectures on the theoretical level.At present, the economic development of mainland has reached up to a relativelyhigh level. However, the cultural lost which aroused by the breakage of traditionalculture and the shock of western culture is becoming more obvious with thedevelopment of society, and it is becoming more serious than before. At the same time,because of the rapid pace of modern society and competing mechanism, people alwaysfeel heavy spiritual burden, and always pursuing a kind of spiritual relief in theireveryday living space. Therefore, in the regard of the current modern mainland, thearchitectures which can truly reflect the Buddhist spiritual connotation are urgentlyrequired. However, most style of Buddhist architectures in mainland are still the form ofpseudo-classic architecture in the primary period. In addition, the design is apparentlyon the exploration stage.That is to say, through studying the modern Buddhist architectures in Taiwan, thispaper discusses the method of satisfying the sangha’s demand, and the requirement ofsociety, times, and region, especially the way to reflect the spiritual connotation ofmodern Buddhism. In addition, it is significant to pursue that vocabulary of architectureforms which have the ear significance.This paper collects and arranges the whole developing process of the Buddhistarchitectures in Taiwan after the martial law. And this paper mainly studies the moderntransformation of Buddhist culture in Taiwan which in turn exerts an influence on themodernization and socialization of modern Buddhist architectures in Taiwan. Based onthe practical cases of modern Buddhist architectures in Taiwan, this paper collectsliterature review on the Buddhist architectures in Taiwan, and arranges its developmenthistory. In addition, this paper concludes the features of Buddhist cultural transformafter the martial law in Taiwan in1987. Taking advantage of the model as fromBuddhist culture to Buddhist architecture, from two angles of influence exerted on theshape of Buddhist architectures, including the change of social functions and the transformation of Buddhist theories, this paper analyzes the influence on the modernBuddhist architecture in Taiwan after the modern transformation of Buddhist culture inTaiwan, analyzes the features of modern Buddhist architectures in Taiwan, anddiscovers the cultural connotation of Buddhism.At the end, by comparing the modern Buddhist architectures in the mainland and inTaiwan, this paper gives a conclusion to the reason of the new forms of modernBuddhist architectures in Taiwan. This paper believes that the design of Buddhistarchitecture should follow the development of the time, correctly recognize history, payattention to the reality, turn to the basic architecture theories, stick to innovation andcarry out design strategies based on the modernization of Buddhism. In addition, thispaper wishes to provide some suggestions to the future modernization course ofBuddhist architectures in mainland by studying the modern Buddhist architectures inTaiwan.