Heart Sutra by Yan Lianke

Author:Yan Lianke
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Grove Atlantic

03 Tian Dongqing

It was time for class.

The first class of the new semester was on the significance of the Party Central Committee’s remarks on the unity, integration, and stability of different ethnic groups and local religions. The class was held in the same first-floor classroom as the previous semester. Everything was the same as before, including the seats, curtains, stage, and propaganda posters on the walls, each of which featured a portrait of a Chinese political leader along with his observations about religion. There were also the same cracks in the classroom’s cement floor. The cracks in the southern hallway formed a snakelike pattern, while the ones in the northern hallway were crosshatched like an array of crucifixes. Meanwhile, on the walls on either side of the stage, the painted depictions of the mosque and white caps of the disciples kneeling were the same as before. It even appeared that the dust was the same dust from the previous semester.

The scenery outside the window, the light in the sky, the invisible deities below the clouds, the tree branches and the birds flying back and forth over them—these birds were the same birds as before, just as the clouds were also the same clouds as before. It seemed as though nothing at all had changed. Even the bricks in the steps outside the classroom that had been yellow the previous year were still yellow this year, and very likely would still be the same shade of yellow next year. However, as the disciples and students returned to campus after more than a month of vacation at their respective churches, temples, mosques, and homes where they lived with their children, they felt everything had changed and nothing was the same. The disciples felt that the air and light were purer than before, and that all the trees were newly planted. It even seemed as though over the break someone had rearranged the beds in the dormitories.

Freshness always brings joy, and as the disciples went to class, they sang a variety of songs like birds singing in the morning. Some were singing hymns, some were listening to the Sanskrit “Great Compassion Mantra” on their cell phones, and others were singing popular tunes like “My Beloved Deskmate” and “Grandma at Penghu Bay.” By eight-thirty the classroom was nearly filled with students arriving early for their nine o’clock class. Seeing that everyone had arrived early, Director Gong arrived in person to distribute the grade reports from the preceding semester. Everyone received a single sheet, on which was printed the disciple’s secular name, religious name, title, and denomination, together with their final exam scores in each course. Each sheet, accordingly, listed the student’s required courses “Socialist Characteristics of Chinese Religion” and “Tutorials on Marxist-Leninist Religion,” as well as their electives, followed by their individual subject exam scores and their average scores for all subjects.

After everyone received their test score reports, they looked them over and beamed. Even the septuagenarian and octogenarian religious masters appeared as delighted as children.

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