佛舍利崇拜的地理困境与感应舍利之起源——对佛教偶像崇拜历史分流之认识

The Geographical Predicament of Worship of the Buddha Sarira and Origin of Inductive Sarira: Cognition of Historical Divergence of Buddhist Idol Worship

在不同的历史时期和地理空间内,对"佛舍利"崇拜的意义是具有差异性的。"舍利供养"在由印度大陆经过中亚传播到中国的历程中,经历了"纪念性供养"、"塔供养"和"感应舍利供养"三个具有不同内涵的发展过程。这个过程是随着佛教传播的地理范围的扩大,释迦作为一个历史人物的"灵骨"的不断被分,一直到了"分无可分"的地步,于是脱离了"八王分舍利"、"阿育王再分舍利"的"灵骨"分流轨道,衍生出通过感应或祈请的方式得到舍利的方法。至此,"舍利崇拜"的内涵已经发生了潜移默化的变化,由"纪念"、"怀念"、"崇拜"发展成"证明"佛教或佛法合理性的一种工具性手段。

There were differences among the meanings of worship of the Buddha sarira in different historical periods and geographic spaces.The offerings of sarira went through three stages of commemoratory offerings,pagoda offerings,and offering of inductive sarira in the course of broadcasting from India to China by way of Central Asia.In this course,with the geographical extension of spread of Buddhism,the sarira of Sakyamuni as a historical personage was continually divided till the state of nothing to be divided.Then it got out from the divergence path of'the eight kings dividing the sarira'and'Ashoka dividing the sarira again',and the way of obtaining sarira by induction or prayer was derived.With this,the connotation of worship of the Buddha sarira had subtly changed,i.e.developing from commemoration,yearning,and worship to a kind of means to prove the legitimacy of Buddhism or Buddha dharma.