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Holmes Welch (1921-1981)

Holmes Hinkley Welch
Chinese name: Yuchi Han 尉遲酣

Holmes Welch, who served briefly as the first Chairman of the Society for the Study of Chinese Religions, passed away on 11 April 1981 at the age of fifty-nine. Many members of the Society, who knew him personally, will share with his family and close friends feelings of shock and sorrow at this untimely termination of a life and a career. Holmes had attended the most recent meeting of the China Group of the American Academy of Religion in Dallas last November, and had seemed in reasonably good health and spirits. His passing is thus quite unexpected. We cannot adequately memorialize him here, but it is fitting that a few words should be said about his professional career and his contributions to the study of Chinese religion.

He was educated at Harvard, where much of his productive life was centered. During World War II he served in the Department of State, and from 1957-61 he was a political officer in the Consulate General in Hong Kong. Thereafter, he devoted himself to research, teaching, and other academic pursuits. Among the honors he received in this connection were a Guggenheim Fellowship (1972-73) and a Senior Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Humanities (1973-74).

The two subjects upon which his research was concentrated were Taoism and Buddhism in the present century. His first published work was Taoism. The Parting of the Way (1957) which accomplished the difficult feat of saying something fresh and important about a hackneyed topic, the Tao Te Ching. In this book the author also provided the first coherent account in English of the complex historical development of Taoism. Meager and tentative though this account necessarily was, it stood for many years as the only one for English-readers. The book has been continuously in print as a paperback since 1966, testimony to its enduring appeal.

More important as a contribution to scholarship is Mr. Welch's article on ”The Chang T'ien Shih and Taoism in China" (Journal of Oriental Studies 4.1/2. 1957-58). Traveling to Taiwan, the author interviewed the 63rd Master Designated by Heaven, last living link with the T'ien Shih tradition of the mainland. The information obtained, complemented by the author's own careful comments, is the only substantial explanation of many aspects of the subject available to us.

Holmes was also active in organizing the first two international conferences ever held on the subject of Taoism (Bellagio 1968 and Tateshina 1972). He later published a lengthy summary of the proceedings of the first conference (History of Religions 9.2/3 [Nov. 1969/Feb. 1970]); he further co-edited a substantial volume incorporating many of the papers given at the second conference (Facets of Taoism, 1979).

Although he thus started out as a scholar of Taoism, and retained his involvement in Taoist studies to the end, his greater fame derives from his investigations of modern Chinese Buddhism. The great monument to these investigations is of course the trilogy: The Practice of Chinese Buddhism, 1900-1950 (1967), The Buddhist Revival in China (1968), and Buddhism under Mao (1972). These volumes were based upon the author's extensive interviews with numerous refugee Sangha members living in Hong Kong, as well as his thorough reading in all relevant literature. The result was the first comprehensive picture of Buddhism as an institution in modern and contemporary China, a work that will certainly be the foundation for any future scholarship on this subject. Mr. Welch believed, on the basis of the research that went into this monumental study, that he had confuted the almost universally accepted stereotype of modern Buddhism as decadent or even vicious. Although the stereotype is unfortunately still all too popular, it must eventually succumb to the clear and persuasive evidence of this research. One hopes for a supplement to this'work, so brilliantly done at long distance from the mainland, which would furnish us with an equally comprehensive picture of living Buddhism in Taiwan.

Mr. Welch kept an eye always trained upon the vicissitudes of religion in general, and Buddhism in particular, during the course of political events in the People's Republic. His periodic reports may be sampled in "Buddhism under the Communists" (China Quarterly 6 [Apr-June 1961]); "Buddhism since the Cultural Revolution" (Ibid. ,40 [Oct-Dec.1969]); liThe Fate of Religion" (in Ross Terrill's The China Difference, 1979); and "Buddhism: Making the Best of Things" (Far Eastern Economic Review, Aug 15, 1980). In all of these, and other reports of current developments one finds expert familiarity with the situation, and sound background of sinological knowledge, penetrating assessments and balanced appraisals. Despite these qualities, his attitude was never that of the disinterested spectator. He openly cared for the human consequences of the political policies he discussed.

In a letter to the undersigned, dated 2 July 1980, Holmes remarks that the article on ”The Chinese Art of Make-Believe" (Encounter 1968--a piece that does not happen to deal wi th rel igion) "is my best popular article, the thing on Dharma scrolls is my best sinological article." The latter, a complex study entitled "Dharma Scrolls and the Succession of Abbots in Chinese Monasteries" (T'oung Pao 50.1/3, pp. 93–149. [1963]) is indeed a work of scholarship in the best sinological tradition. It is another major contribution of the author, our only exposition on the method by which doctrinal and administrative authority has been transmitted in accordance with the tradition of Chinese Buddhist monasteries.

I have attempted here to give some sense of high quality, the substantial quantity, and the range of scholarship for which Holmes Welch will be remembered. It should be added that one of his most outstanding achievements is a literary style that makes all of his writing not only equcational, but pleasurable, to read.

Laurence G. Thompson
in: Society for the Study of Chinese Religions Bulletin, 9:1, 126-128. (1981)
To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1179/073776981805308477

 

PDF: The Practice of Chinese Buddhism, 1900–1950
by Welch Holmes
[Harvard East Asian Studies, Number 26.] Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. 1967. xxii, 568. p.

PDF: Taking Welch and The Practice of Chinese Buddhism into the 21st century,
by Brian J. Nichols
Studies in Chinese Religions, (2017) 3:3, 258-280.

Monks sit in the meditation hall during summer. Each monk holds a piece of split bamboo to cool his hands. Chiao Shan, Chen-chiang.
The Practice of Chinese Buddhism, 1900-1950
by Holmes Welch, Harvard University Press, 1967, 65. p.

PDF: The Buddhist Revival in China
by Welch Holmes
[Volume 33 of Harvard East Asian series], Harvard University Press, 1968.

PDF: Buddhism under Mao
by Welch Holmes
[Volume 69 of Harvard East Asian series], Harvard University Press, 1972. xviii, 666 p.

PDF: Taoism: the parting of the way
by Welch, Holmes

PDF: Buddhism under the Communists
China Quarterly, v.6, 1961.04-06, pp. 1-14

PDF: Dharma Scrolls and the Succession of Abbots in Chinese Monasteries
T’oung Pao v.50 n.1-3. (1963), pp. 93-149

Contents:
Introduction 93
Monastery Scrolls 96
Private Scrolls 115
Variants 119
Selecting the Worthy 129
The Names of Monks 136
Conclusions 141
Appendix: The Repository of the Right Dharma Eye 147

PDF: The Reinterpretation of Chinese Buddhism
China Quarterly, v.22, 1965.04-06, pp. 143-153

PDF: Buddhism since the Cultural Revolution
The China Quarterly, No. 40 (Oct. - Dec., 1969), pp. 127-136

PDF: Facades of Religion in China
Asian Survey, Vol. 10, No. 7 (Jul., 1970), pp. 614-626

台北修覺宮(照片右方為第六十三代天師，左方為作者尉遲酣)
Chueh-Hsiu Temple in Taipei,Taiwan。(Celestial Master Chang LXIII was on the right and Holmes Welch the left.)
Holmes Hinkley Welch was a man of many talents who made his academic mark with trenchant studies of Taoism and Buddhism in China.
He interviewed with Celestial Master Chang LXIII twice in 1958 and wrote “The Chang T'ien Shih and Taoism in China"，which was published in the
Journal of Oriental Studies 4 (1957–1958) (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 1960), pp. 188-212.

The Holmes Welch Collection at University of Wisconsin Madison
https://search.library.wisc.edu/catalog/9910223186902121
http://leavingfortherisingsun.blogspot.com/2016/05/the-holmes-welch-collection-at.html

Holmes Hinkley Welch (1921-1981) was a twentieth century eminent scholar on modern Chinese religions, especially Buddhism. After Welch's death, his family donated his library collection to Memorial Library, the University of Wisconsin-Madison. This collection includes different materials and media, among which are hundreds of photographs, where most have never been published or circulated. In an effort to make these photographs more accessible, a digitization project of selected photographs is underway.

The collection of digitized photographs is mostly about religious life in China and Hong Kong, between the 1930s and 1960s. The images capture different aspects of the Chinese Buddhist monastic life as well as Chinese Buddhist architecture.

The other images in this collection portray village and city lives, street scenes, and Chinese architecture.

Revisiting the revival: Holmes Welch and the study of Buddhism in twentieth-century China
by Erik Hammerstroma and Gregory Adam Scott
Studies in Chinese Religions, Volume 3, 2017 - Issue 3: 197–203
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/23729988.2017.1380938