The Public Space Designs Of Zen-Buddhist Temples In Metropolitan Taichung

• Main Authors: Kuo Pang YU, 郭邦宇
• Other Authors: Lo, Shi-wei
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2015
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/31375166578209242249

碩士 === 東海大學 === 建築學系 === 103 === The Zen-Buddhist temple architecture in contemporary urban areas seems to have been influenced by the “Buddhism for Humanity” advocated by Zen master Taixu. In Taiwan, modern religious buildings dedicated to Zen-Buddhism have sprung up in practically every corner of urban neighborhoods since the lifting of Martial Law. This phenomenal trend exemplifies not only how Buddhist compassion drives city-based monks’ daily practice of Bodhisattva Precepts in a secular setting, but also how Zen institutes help widen public access to Buddhist philosophy as something both spiritually beneficial and relevant to urban living, which in turn draws attention to the issues of Buddhist temple space and its public accessibility. Considering the essence and principles of Mahayana Buddhism, urban temples should be laid out in a way that is relatively open to the public. Although the term “public accessibility” suggests the idea that a specific space is freely available to all, Buddhist institutes, in their nature, ought to enjoy their right to be autonomous and protected, which means the openness of a temple is conditional and time-based. These considerations prompted this study to examine contemporary Zen temples’ secularized layouts and extent of openness, notably how their secularization efforts address various aspects of spatial arrangements (on-premises traffic planning, functionality, visual symbolism, etc.) to attract the general public, while simultaneously adhering to the Zen-Buddhist emphasis on introspection and self-awareness, so designers and users alike can revisit the purposes of these temple projects and eventually fulfill them. After dividing 280 worship venues and locations of Taiwan’s top 10 Zen-Buddhist organizations into four types, this study selected one type, standalone and newly built temples which emerged after the 1987 lifting of Martial Law, and limited the research subjects to four such temples within Taichung City, one of Taiwan’s six special municipalities. These four subjects represent different contemporary Zen-Buddhist organizations’ development in Taichung. Based on the issue of contemporary Zen-Buddhist temples’ pursuit of secularization and their accessibility as public spaces for city dwellers, methods including data collection and space investigation, description and analyses were adopted, plus the utilization of the “Space Syntax” principle of spatial formations and software tools, to examine the underlying significance of Zen temples’ spatial designs. It is hoped that the findings from the four case studies will serve as reference for future improvements in the spatial designs of Zen temples.