在佛教中，一般把佛法称为内道，把佛法外的其他思想信仰称为外道，而把仅以佛教为幌子、窃用佛教名义的外道称为“附佛外道”或“附法外道”。中国著名佛学家陈星桥先生说，李洪志及其“法轮功”，就是“附佛外道”的典型。
陈星桥，法名常正，法号智渊。曾任哈尔滨市佛教协会秘书长、湖北岩山佛学院讲师，现就职中国佛教协会《法音》杂志社编辑部主任。近年以来在《法音》、《内明》、《文史知识》等报刊上发表数十篇论文，揭露和批驳李洪志及其 “法轮功”。
他指出，像“法轮功”这样打着佛教旗号的伪气功和伪佛教至今仍迷惑着许多气功爱好者，不仅他们中的许多人深受其害，而且佛教也蒙受了不白之冤。
陈星桥首先向记者介绍了气功在中国的起源和发展。
他说，气功是中国一种古老的养生修炼术，分为静功与动功。气功过热，也产生了许多弊端，暴露出许多问题。一方面伪气功盛行，一些气功师贪图名利，为广收徒众，聚钱敛财，故弄玄虚，标新立异，随意夸大本门气功作用，败坏了社会风气，干扰了人们正常的工作和生活秩序。另一方面，一些气功师本身素质不高，学识不够，德行不佳，操守不严，使各种封建迷信盛行，一些反动会道门有机可乘，借气功之名大传邪法、邪教，给气功界、宗教界乃至全社会造成了混乱。正是在这种情况下，李洪志得以“气功”之名，并打着“宗教”的招牌招摇撞骗。
陈星桥说，在历史上，气功是与宗教密切联系在一起的，而在现代，它作为一种养生修炼术从宗教的迷雾中分离出来。“法轮功”就是将大量的宗教性的东西当作气功四处兜售，既搞乱了气功界，也搞乱了宗教界，是一种典型的具有民间宗教特点的“附佛外道”。
《转法轮》开篇就说：“前些年有许多气功师传功，它们所讲的东西都是属于祛病健身那一层次的。当然不是说别人的功法不好，我只是说，高层次上的东西，它们没有传。全国的气功形势我也都知道。在国内外，真正往高层次上传功，目前只有我一个人在做。往高层次上传功，为什么没有人去做呢？因为它牵扯很大的问题，牵扯的历史渊源很深，牵扯的面也很广，涉及的问题也很尖锐。它不是一般人能传得了的，因为它牵扯到要动许多功派的东西。”李洪志所谓的“ 往高层次上传功”，实际上是在做纯宗教性的工作，是要度人，而且是按照他大胆独创的“宗教”在社会上去“普度众生”。这样一来，“牵扯”的“问题”自然多而且“很尖锐”了。
陈星桥说，正因如此，李洪志极力回避自己在搞“宗教”，不得不打出气功的招牌。那么他的“气功”是怎样的一种气功呢？李洪志说：“按照修炼的说法，气要算呢，有三个层次。但真正的修炼（炼气不算），共有两大层次：一个是世间法修炼；一个是出世间法修炼。这个世间法、出世间法修炼和庙里的出世间、入世间是两回事，那是理论上的东西。我们是真正人体修炼的两大层次的变化，因为在世间法修炼过程当中人的身体都是在不断地净化，所以走到世间法最高形式的时候，身体已经完全被高能量物质代替了。而出世间法修炼，那基本就是佛体修炼了。”在这里，气功的内涵被李洪志无限扩大了，炼气、健身都在其次，关键在于修炼成佛体。
从此可以看出，“法轮功”根本不是什么气功，其实李洪志自己对迫不得已打出气功牌子也心有苦衷。他在《为长春法轮大法辅导员解法》中说：“大家知道，我们在长春初期办班的时候，我讲得也是很高的。但是，总是把气功挂在嘴上。我们今天呢，因为往高层次上传功了，就不讲这些了。这也是一个逐渐叫人认识的过程。”此后他又在《北京法轮大法辅导员会议》上建议说：“我们一上来就是在高层次上谈修炼这个问题，我们将来再不要把它说成是什么气功、气功的。”可见，李洪志只不过是在利用气功来迷惑社会，迷惑政府，结果发现也迷惑了不少自己的弟子，于是便在内部为自己“正名”。
陈星桥强调说：我们之所以反对“法轮功”这类的“附佛外道”，是因为它在盗用佛教名义、利用佛教的同时，又歪曲、污蔑佛教，使人们误以为他就是佛教，恶紫夺朱，从而阻碍人们去认识真正的佛法。李洪志的书中处处表现出对佛法理解的粗浅鄙陋，以至于稍有佛学知识的人随处可以指出常识性的错误。
（解放军报 2001年03月20日 第4版）
Chen Xingqiao: Falun Gong is a typical heretic adhering to Buddhism and pseudo-Qigong
In Buddhism, People in general called Buddhist Dharma as Inside Teachings and apart from that, the other teachings or beliefs as Outside Teachings. Meanwhile, only those heretics, which take Buddhism as their guise or usurp Buddhist terms for teachings were called Outside Teachings adhering to Buddhism or Dharma. Mr. Chen Xingqiao, a famous Chinese Buddhist scholar, said that Li Hongzhi and his Falun Gong was a typical heretic adhering to Buddhism.
Mr. Chen, also called Chang Zheng or Zhi Yuan in dharma name, was the secretary-general of Harbin Buddhist Association and lecturer of Lingyanshan Buddhist Academy in Suzhou. He is the editorial chief of Voice of Dharma, the Journal of Buddhist Association of China, and has issued dozen of articles on "Voice of Dharma", "Nei Ming" and "Cultural and Historical Knowledge" in recent years to refute Li Hongzhi and his evil cult Falun Gong.
He pointed out that the pseudo-Qigong or pseudo-Buddhism, which misused the name of Buddhism, like Falun Gong, still confused many Qigong fans. Not only some of them suffered a lot from Falun Gong, but also the right faith of Buddhism was grievously wronged as well.
Mr. Chen firstly gives the reporter introductions on Qigong's origination and development in China.
He said that Qigong was an exercise from ancient times in China to keep practitioners in good health with asceticism. It could be divided into static Qigong and dynamic Qigong. Qigong was overheated in China then, which brought out many problems concerned simultaneously. On one hand, in a flourishing of pseudo-Qigong, some Qigong masters were greedy for fame and money. In order for more followers and money, they purposely made mysteries and did something unconventional to exaggerate the function of his exercise. It corrupted social values and disturbed regular order of people's work and life. On the other hand, some of Qigong masters themselves were not qualified. With little learning and virtue as well as personal integrity, they made all kinds of feudal superstition be in vogue. Some reactionary secret societies took it as opportunity to spread evil teachings or cult. Confusions were brought to Qigong circle and religious circles as well as all societies. In this case, Li Hongzhi could be able to get his way around in the name of Qigong and signboard of religion.
Mr. Chen said that, in history, Qigong maintained close ties with religions while in modern times it was separated from religion as asceticism practice only for keeping in good health. Falun Gong itself took large amount of religious teachings as Qigong exercises for spreading, which made a mess in both Qigong and religious circles; so Falun Gong is a typical heretics adhering to Buddhism with characteristics of folk faith.
In the beginning of "Zhuan Falun", Li said that in several years before, there were many Qigong masters taught their exercises, what they taught only stay at level of getting rid of disease and keeping in good health. Certainly he didn't mean that other people's practice was not good, he just said that they failed to teach things in high levels. He knew the Qigong's conditions in nationwide as well. Inside or outside of China, masters really wanted to teach the practice in high levels, presently only he did it alone. Why were there no people to teach in high level? Because it would be concerning about credential problems, historical originations involved being deep into root, the scale concerned would be very broad as well, there involved sharp problems. It could not be taught by an ordinary figure, because it concerned the turning down in many ideas of other schools of Qigong. So-called passing on Qigong to high level by Li Hongzhi was making religious work actually. He aimed at converting people. He went to society for his converting to all living beings under "the faith" created by him. In this case, many problems would be naturally brought out while some of them would be very incisive.
Chen Xingqiao said that Li Hongzhi tried to evade that he was constructing a religion, so he was forced to hoist a signboard of Qigong. What kind of Qigong did he make? Li Hongzhi said that in accordance with sayings of asceticism, the Qi could be divided into three levels; but in real practices, there were totally two levels: one was the Qi inside the world, the other was the Qi outside the world. The practices of the Qi both inside and outside the world were different from mundane or transmundane Dharmas in Buddhism, which was theory only. The changes in two levels they experienced came from the real human body, as the human body in practice inside the world would be purified step by step, once they arrived at the highest point of practice of Qi inside the world, the human body would be completely replaced by high-energy matters. In regards to practice of Qi outside the world, it would be practice of Buddha's body. In that case, the intentions of Qigong was boundlessly broadened by Li Hongzhi, cultivation for breathing and keeping in good health would be secondary, the premier thing is cultivation for Buddha's body.
In this regards, Falun Gong wasn't exercise of Qigong at all. In fact, Li Hongzhi himself had embarrassment because he had to use the name of Qigong for his teachings. In the book "Explanation for Teacher of Falun Dafa in Changchun", he said, "as you know, when I set up exercise class in Changchun in the beginning, what I said was very high as well, but I had to keep on saying it was Qigong. We would not talk about any more as we passed on the exercises to high level at then. That was a procession for us to be known by people step by step." After that, he suggested at the meeting with Falun Dafa teacher in Beijing that they should talk about the issue of exercise in high level at very beginning, they would never say Qigong or something like that. It is clear that Li Hongzhi just took the name of Qigong to cheat the society and confuse the government. When he saw some followers of his own were confused by his tricks, he himself was hurried to correct it among his organizations.
Mr. Chen emphasized that the reason of why we fighted against the heretics adhering to Buddhism like Falun Gong, is that they misused Buddhist terms to cheat people. When they took the name and made use of Buddhism, they abused and denounced the right faith.It made people wrongly take Li Hongzhi`s sayings as that of Buddhism. The evil cult took the place of the right faith, which had obstructed people knowing the real Buddha Dharma. Li Hongzhi's books unmasked his shallow and superficial knowledge on Buddhism as well. People with a little Buddhist learnings could be able to point out his mistakes on elementary knowledge.
(People's Liberation Army Daily, March 20, 2001)