社交媒体与当代中国俗家佛教徒修行——基于一个信众媒介网络的考察

Social Media and the “Belonging-Oriented” Religious Practice by Chinese Buddhist Laypeople——Based on investigation on a believers’ social network

社交媒体的勃兴再度推动从"宗教在线"到"在线宗教"的网络修行模式变迁。基于对湖北省一座山林寺院的信众群体的田野研究发现,被广泛运用的微信等社交媒体编织出一个以都市佛教徒为主体的虚拟媒介网络,信众在其中开拓出新的修行方法和观念,使社交媒体成为一种中介化道场。但"在线修行"无法替代现实修行,当信众诉求从超验世界转入日常生活中的个人境界提升,媒介网络运转的根本动力源于信众内心对该寺院的归属,以及自身"宗教性"在修行实践中得到反复激发和印证。同时,随着社交媒体依赖成为当代生活的独特表征,由此聚焦目前意蕴驳杂的"修行",指向的不仅是狭义的宗教实践,更映照出部分人群抵御社会现代性症结的逻辑和行动策略。

The thriving of social media has once again promoted the transformation of online religious practice from"religion online"to"online religion".Based on field research of a group of believers in a mountain temple in Hubei Province,it was found that widely-used social media networks,such as WeChat,had formed a virtual media network mainly consisting of urban Buddhists.As a part of the network,believers developed new religious practice methods and concepts,making social media an intermediate monastery.However,"online practice"cannot replace real-life practice.When believers seek real-life personal improvement from the transcendental world,the fundamental driving force for the media networks still stems from their sense of belonging to the temple,as well as their"religiousness",which has been repetitively stimulated and attested in the religion practice.At the same time,since people’s dependence on social media nowadays has become a unique symbol of the era,the term"religious practice",which has incorporated complex implications,and no longer only refers to the literal meaning of religious practice,but also the logic and action strategies held by some people in dealing with troubles from social modernity.