| Happy 50th Birthday, Tzu Chi! | |||||||||
| By the Tzu Chi Monthly History Compilation Project Team, Translated by Tang Yau-yang, Photos courtesy of Tzu Chi Hualien headquarters | |||||||||
Tzu Chi came into being half a century ago. Here is a brief look back at how the foundation got started. Staying True to Their Initial Commitments Tzu Chi arose among difficulties, and of course there were challenges. Its aim was to relieve suffering and spread joy. Even though there were many problems, they stayed strong to help all living creatures.
On May 14 (March 24 on the lunar calendar), 1966, Master Cheng Yen established Tzu Chi in Xiulin, Hualien County, eastern Taiwan. She was living at Pu Ming Temple, so she used that as the address of the foundation because she did not have a place of her own. The foundation started out with seven members: the Master, her three disciples, two elderly lay persons, and a granddaughter of one of the laypersons. More than a dozen other women were behind the Master too. All of them had listened to her expound the Dharma before. Wanting her to stay in Hualien, they promised that they would support her in her charitable work.
The initial vows Although there was only a small ceremony, disciples and followers packed the small hall at Pu Ming Temple to listen to the Master. “We don’t have much money and we don’t have many people, but we do have the resolve to help others. Because of our limited resources, it’s necessary that we make do with little.” She then went on to explain the intrinsic meaning of “Tzu Chi”: “The word ‘Tzu’ [compassion] means to educate the rich and to give joy, and ‘Chi’ [relief] means to help the poor and to relieve suffering. In a word, we aim to inspire the rich to give, and we aim to aid the needy, give joy, and relieve suffering.” There is much suffering in the world, the Master pointed out. Suffering exists on both physical and mental levels. By establishing Tzu Chi, she hoped to alleviate people not only of their material suffering but also of their spiritual afflictions. “People suffer when they are in need. If they lack the bare necessities, we give them material aid so that they can carry on. If they are ill, we help them get treatment. If they’re discontent, worried, anxious, or uneasy, we give them love and Buddhist wisdom to enrich their minds. This is our mission, and this is the purpose of the foundation. “Tzu Chi, with Buddhism at its core, is an organization that strives to serve the world with compassion. With the Buddha’s teachings, we awaken people’s conscience and inspire them to fulfill their potential to do good.” Ever since she became a Buddhist nun, the Master had led a most frugal life. She had nothing in the way of worldly possessions, but she still vowed to help the needy. She embarked on that path believing that her intentions were selfless and that innate love resided in everyone. She also believed that she had the strong resolve to surmount any hurdle that might come her way. She encouraged her followers with these words: “As long as you have confidence and determination, you can overcome all obstacles and recruit more people to join us in helping the needy and relieving suffering. Then a single seed of love can grow to many and eventually to innumerable.” Fifty cents a day The Master cut down a few bamboo stalks behind Pu Ming Temple in order to make coin banks. She sawed them into sections that had a knot on either end, so each section was completely sealed off from the outside. Then she cut a slot near one end. Coins could be deposited into the bamboo section through this slot. She gave one bamboo coin bank to each of the 30 women, all housewives, who had decided to join her in doing charity work. She asked them to drop 50 Taiwanese cents (about 1.2 U.S. cents) every day into it before going out to the market to buy groceries. These housewives not only gave themselves—they also spread the word in the market about how even 50 cents could aid people. A typical conversation between a homemaker and a vendor at the market might go like this: “I’ll buy 50 cents less today,” she would say. “Why do you need to be so frugal?” the vendor would wonder. “Oh, I need to save up those 50 cents.” “What good can 50 cents possibly do?” The vendor wondered about that minute amount. “A Buddhist nun has established a foundation to help the less fortunate. She suggested that each of us put 50 cents into a coin bank every day. Small amounts of money, when pooled together, can help the needy.” “Fifty cents can do that?” “Yes, the Master said small amounts of money can add up to meaningful sums.” “Then I want to help too,” the vendor would say, giving 50 cents to the housewife. “Put these into your bamboo bank for me.” The message of love resonated among vendors of all types, whether they sold vegetables, fish, or meat, and they joined in to support the foundation’s charitable mission. Vendors told other vendors, and housewives told other housewives. As word spread and more and more people participated, the program gathered momentum. The Master’s belief that there was love in everyone was proven right. With the 50-cent campaign and some of the money the Master and her monastic disciples earned from making baby shoes, 1,170 dollars (US$29.25) was pooled together in the second month of the foundation’s existence. The mission of helping the needy started unfolding in earnest.
Detractors The 50-cent campaign got off to a good start. There was no doubt about that. But there were doubters elsewhere. “These nuns hardly have enough to feed themselves. How can they possibly help others?” some sneered. “Hasn’t she always claimed that she’ll support herself?” others said, referring to the Master. “Now she apparently can’t keep this up, so she set up an organization as a means of raking in money. How clever!” Such hurtful remarks eventually made their way to the Master, who had always prided herself on being an upright person. She was understandably shocked and saddened. However, she did not feel sorry for herself, nor did the thought of going back on her commitment cross her mind. Despite being physically frail, her resolve to serve all people was firm and unwavering. She cheered herself on in the face of criticism: “I’m but an insignificant person in this world. Why should I fuss over this? If my sacrifice can help people, why lose sleep over others’ opinions?” She decided to treat disparaging remarks as fodder to help her grow, and to resolve the hurt with a heart of gratitude. “This is a warning message to me,” she told herself. “It’s teaching me that to bear the responsibility of serving all people, I have to have very strong shoulders. I must learn to be unperturbed no matter what disapproval and criticism I may face so that I can remain steadfast on this path.” The Master took heart from a passage in the Sutra of Innumerable Meanings: “The minds of all bodhisattvas are tranquil and of translucent purity, with vast, profound vows. They steadfastly hold these vows for countless eons of time.” She told herself to never waver in her aspiration to serve all people. “I must stay firm so long as I’m on the right path. However bumpy the road may be, I’ll move forward with confidence, perseverance, and courage. With that mindset, I believe no obstacles ahead will be too difficult to overcome.”
From the very beginning, Master Cheng Yen and her monastic disciples have abided by the rule, “If you don’t work, you don’t eat.” This tradition has lived on and become a heritage at the Jing Si Abode.
Near the end of 1964, Master Cheng Yen and a disciple, Shao Wei (紹惟), moved into their living quarters at Pu Ming Temple in Hualien, where they were allowed to live for free. The Master was then only 27 years old. Two more disciples, Shao Wen (紹雯) and Shao En (紹安), joined them later. Together, they embarked on the path of ascetic practice. They had to work hard to put food on the table for themselves. They had decided not to accept offerings and instead to live by a rule that Master Bai Zhang (百丈, 749-814), a monk in the Tang Dynasty, had established for Chan (Chinese Zen) monastic disciples: “If you don’t work, you don’t eat.” As a result, the four of them farmed a plot of land behind Pu Ming Temple to support themselves. Each morning, they would rise before four o’clock for their Buddhist morning rituals, followed by a simple breakfast. Then they gathered firewood and went to work in the field. A neighbor often came over to teach them agricultural techniques. Several aboriginal friends also brought their water buffalo and helped them plow and work the field. The Master and her disciples learned how to grow peanuts from these friends. As the buffalo walked ahead plowing the field, they would follow behind sowing peanuts. Following their friends’ instructions, the Master, carrying a basket of peanuts, dropped one or two of them into the plowed field, covered them with soil with one foot, and packed the soil down with the other. Then she took another step and repeated the same procedure. Row after row of peanuts were patiently sown in this way. Farming was hard work, but they felt grounded in making a living on their own strength.
Handiwork They tried growing different crops in an effort to lead a self-sufficient life. After some time, however, they discovered that the cost of seeds and fertilizers made farming impractical as a means of making a living. They had to do something else to get by. The Taiwan Cement Company had set up a factory in Hualien in 1962. With the cement factory came cement sacks, and it was in these that the four nuns found their next livelihood. They bought used cement sacks at 50 cents each from construction sites, which they then took apart to make into smaller bags. A cement sack had four layers of paper, stitched together by a sewing machine, to hold the heavy powder inside. The four layers could easily be separated by removing the stitch with a tug. The two inner layers were quite clean because they had not come into direct contact with the cement powder. The nuns cut up those layers, pasted them into smaller bags, and sold them to grocery stores or animal feed shops as shopping bags. The other two layers were dirtier, either from printing or contact with cement powder. The nuns would wipe these layers repeatedly to make them as clean as possible, cut them, and paste them into rectangular sacks for sale to hardware stores. They worked in a gazebo at the temple, each nun doing her job—taking the cement sacks apart, cutting them up, cleaning them, folding, and pasting. The completed bags were sold for about seven Taiwanese dollars per kilogram. Compared to farming, where they suffered a loss, this line of work finally put them in the black. However, that revenue came at a cost. Anyone who has had any experience handling used cement sacks knows that they are dusty. When the nuns took them apart to make into smaller bags, cement dust flew all around, some settling on their exposed arms and faces, even in their nostrils. The Master became concerned about the health hazards that might be associated with this operation, so she terminated the undertaking only two months after they had started. Farming could not support them, neither could making bags. Where would their next source of support be found? The third time is the charm Pressed by the need to make a living, Shao Wei, one of the disciples, thought of another possible means of livelihood. She once accompanied the Master to her mother’s place to visit and saw an older lady there making baby shoes. That lady, Mrs. Zhang Huang Que (張黃雀), was the godmother of the Master’s own mother, Mrs. Wang Shen Yue-gui (王沈月桂). ًShao Wei recalled that those hand-sewn shoes were simply adorable—perhaps they could try making them to make money. She visited Mrs. Zhang Huang to learn how to make the shoes. When she had finished learning, she took a pair with her and returned to Pu Ming Temple. Using that pair as a model, she drew seamstress’s patterns with which she and the others could cut fabric in preparation for subsequent sewing. They also asked dress-making shops for their scraps, which became their raw materials. When all was set, they embarked on this line of work in February 1966. Ping Hui-yong (平慧永), a friend of the nuns, was among the helpers. She was good with needlework. In her hands, pre-cut patterned cloths were quickly and easily sewn into shoe uppers. Others in the group quickly asked her to teach them. Besides Ping, the only other lay adult in the group was Zhuang Shi (莊是), then 71. She could have stayed in her own comfortable home and enjoyed being with her family, but having formed a deep Dharma affinity with the Master, she often brought a granddaughter and came to stay at the temple. She helped make baby shoes to help the nuns support themselves. The six of them formed an assembly line of sorts to carry out all the necessary steps that would eventually transform raw materials into finished products. They cut, pasted, and sewed; some did the uppers, some the soles. The Master did the most difficult part: binding the sole to the upper part. Despite its difficulty, she handled the task with poise and speed. The other five people could not make things fast enough for her. A pair of baby shoes normally sold for NT$3.50 (nine US cents), but the shopkeeper that bought their shoes admired their effort to support themselves and paid them $4.00 a pair out of goodwill. The nuns had finally found something with which to make a living for themselves. Their self-sufficient spirit and the “no work, no meal” rule have remained to this day a part of the heritage at the Jing Si Abode, the convent founded by the Master and the spiritual home of all Tzu Chi volunteers. |
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