Scripture hall education leaves lad in dead end

Zheng's difficult time came one year later, after his mother transferred him to a stricter scripture hall in Hebei Province, deeming the previous one "too loose." His new home in the mountains had no motor road connecting it with the outside world. The schoolhouses were undecorated; there was no tap water, flush toilet, bathhouse or heating. Students were prohibited to communicate with each other nor were there any villages nearby to provide a point of contact. Such a life experience seemed gloomy to a 12-year-old boy.

His teachers made them get up to chant scriptures as early as 4:30 AM even in winter. Apart from his own voice, the roaring wind outside and wood crackling in the fire pit were the only sounds. The boy was even prevented from going home for a family reunion at Spring Festival one year.

Zheng said that the hardships in life were not as difficult as the perplexity in seeking knowledge. The scripture hall he attended resembled a Buddhist monastery. The texts read were mostly Buddhist sutras, although traditional Chinese classics were also part of the syllabus.

Teachers made them recite scriptures without explaining their meaning. Zheng challenged this, arguing that recitation without knowing the meaning was pointless; however, the teachers opposed him, saying that "more knowledge leads to more obstacles."

Some of teachers had previously taught in public primary schools, while others were Buddhist practitioners, so agreement was difficult for them. Zheng remembered one teacher required them to labor all day, whereas another demanded the time should be used only for scripture recitation, and they fought.

In 2012, when Zheng had almost finished reciting all the scriptures in the required book list, religious rituals became even stricter and more meticulous. For example, students had to pay homage to Buddha, clap their hands to scare off sewage-dwelling demons before entering a toilet, and stage "salvation ceremonies" for insects they had accidentally stepped on.

Zheng and his fellow classmates began to raise more doubts about the education program, believing that scripture reading was bound to narrow their future path in life. Education should not be like this, he argued.

But Pei Zhiguang, one of the teachers, apparently seemed ready for such mistrust to materialize. "Our students aren't trained to be teachers; instead, they are trained to govern the nation," he said. According to his ideas, students attending scripture halls would either become great philosophers, entrepreneurs or politicians, although in reality, business or political knowledge were not taught in the scripture halls.

It might have been a little too late when Zheng and people like him realized scripture reading was a dead end at a time when they were close to adulthood, knowing nothing except general knowledge on morality and having no field experience.

The now 19-year-old Zheng decided to return to the ordinary education system, but his road back proved difficult, too. He had to take the college entrance exams for self-taught students but his English level was even lower than that of a primary school pupil. Everything had to be learnt from scratch.