AbstractHsu Ti-Shan, (1893-1941) the former Chinese department head of University of Hong Kong (from 1935 to 1941), was a famous modern Chinese writer and scholar and his literary works have been studied by scholars since his death. However, he was also generally regarded as an important religious scholar of his time; yet not much interest has been put on his religious studies. This dissertation tries to give a brief account of Hsu Ti-Shan religious studies through examining his three significant papers on Manichaeism, Taoism and Buddhism.The thesis is divided into six chapters. The first chapter includes a brief review of past research on Hsu Ti-Shan卅 religious studies and summary accounts of his view of Confucianism and his research on the relationship between Chinese medicine and Taoism. The second chapter gives a profile of Hsu Ti-Shan, especially his student life abroad, which influenced his religious studies deeply. The third chapter gives a clear description about his research on Taoism based on his paper entitled ’Taoist Thought and Religious Taoism’ (M^fclMWM^l) . This chapter includes a comparison between this paper and Hsu Ti-Shan卅 English paper ’Taoism’ so as to explore the different points of view Hsu Ti-Shan perceived Taoism.The fourth chapter examines how Hsu Ti-Shan explained the religious principles of 卅wo Roots卅and 卅hree Moments卅of Manichaeism. His paper ’The religious doctrine of Two Roots and Three Moments of Mani ’ (JlpM/^ ^kH^H ) shows that his explanation of the religious theory of Manichaeism was influenced by two famous scholars, namely, F. C. Burkitt and A. V . W. Jackson.The fifth chapter narrates briefly the contribution of Hsu Ti-Shan on Buddhism studies, focusing on Hsu卅 paper ’Buddhist Logic of Madhyamaka and Yog歊漷a- sv漮antrika before Dign殟a’ (^0|5J^ftf ^IJlMJ^lofllDM/^H 套) which provides an abundant description of how N殟漷juna and Maitreya established the logical tradition of Buddhism.The final chapter concludes the discussions from chapter 3 to chapter 5, and suggests several possible ways for further research on Hsu Ti-Shan卅 religious studies in the future.
