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The Making of a Savior Bodhisattva: Dizang in Medieval China |
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Ng, Zhiru (著)
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| Date | 2007 |
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| Pages | 305 |
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| Publisher | University of Hawai'i Press |
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| Publisher Url |
http://www.uhpress.hawaii.edu/
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| Location | Honolulu, HI, US [檀香山, 夏威夷州, 美國] |
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| Series | Studies in East Asian Buddhism |
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| Series No. | 21 |
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| Content type | 書籍=Book |
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| Language | 英文=English |
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| Note | 政府刊物：Published in association with the Kuroda Institute。 |
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| Keyword | 上師=Guru; 六道=Six Paths=Six States of Existence=Six Destinies=Six Directions of Reincarnation; 地獄=Hell=Naraka; 佛教人物=Buddhist; 修行方法=修行法門=Practice; 唐代佛教=Tang Buddhism; 淨土=Pure Land; 菩薩=Bodhisattva; 靜坐=Meditation; 禪修=Meditation; 轉世=輪迴=Samsara=Rebirth=Reincarnation |
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| Abstract | In modern Chinese Buddhism, Dizang is especially popular as the sovereign of the underworld. Often represented as a monk wearing a royal crown, Dizang helps the deceased faithful navigate the complex underworld bureaucracy, avert the punitive terrors of hell, and arrive at the happy realm of rebirth. The author is concerned with the formative period of this important Buddhist deity, before his underworldly aspect eclipses his connections to other religious expressions and at a time when the art, mythology, practices, and texts of his cult were still replete with possibilities. She begins by problematizing the reigning model of Dizang, one that proposes an evolution of gradual sinicization and increasing vulgarization of a relatively unknown Indian bodhisattva, Ksitigarbha, into a Chinese deity of the underworld. Such a model, the author argues, obscures the many-faceted personality and iconography of Dizang. Rejecting it, she deploys a broad array of materials (art, epigraphy, ritual texts, scripture, and narrative literature) to recomplexify Dizang and restore (as much as possible from the fragmented historical sources) what this figure meant to Chinese Buddhists from the sixth to tenth centuries.
Rather than privilege any one genre of evidence, the author treats both material artifacts and literary works, canonical and noncanonical sources. Adopting an archaeological approach, she excavates motifs from and finds resonances across disparate genres to paint a vibrant, detailed picture of the medieval Dizang cult. Through her analysis, the cult, far from being an isolated phenomenon, is revealed as integrally woven into the entire fabric of Chinese Buddhism, functioning as a kaleidoscopic lens encompassing a multivalent religio-cultural assimilation that resists the usual bifurcation of doctrine and practice or "elite" and "popular" religion.
The Making of a Savior Bodhisattva presents a fascinating wealth of material on the personality, iconography, and lore associated with the medieval Dizang. It elucidates the complex cultural, religious, and social forces shaping the florescence of this savior cult in Tang China while simultaneously addressing several broader theoretical issues that have preoccupied the field. Zhiru not only questions the use of sinicization as a lens through which to view Chinese Buddhist history, she also brings both canonical and noncanonical literature into dialogue with a body of archaeological remains that has been ignored in the study of East Asian Buddhism. |
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| Table of contents | Introduction: Problems and Perspectives
Part 1: Early Images: The Bodhisattva of This Defiled World
1. Early Scriptural Representations: Texts and Contexts
The Scripture on the Ten Wheels
The Section on the Sumeru Treasury
The Intellectual and Socio-Political Climate
2. Cultic Beginnings Reconsidered
Buddhist Records of Dizang Worship
The Sanjie jiao Connection
The Work of the Translator and Exegete Sinbang
Icons of Dizang and the Six Paths in Shaanxi Art
Rethinking the Early Dissemination of Dizang Worship
Part 2: Multiple Images: This World, Hell, and Pure Land
3. Indigenous and Accretionary Scriptures
The Scripture on Divination: From Karmic Divination to Philosophical meditation
The Exorcism Method: A Buddho-Daoist Formula for Demonology
A Ritual Manual on the Bodhisattva Dizang
The Scripture on the Bodhisattva Dizang: From Hell to Pure Land
The Scripture on the Past Vows: A Canonization of Filial Piety and Afterlife
Practices
New Scriptures, New Images of Dizang
4. Art and Epigraphy
A Princely Householder or Monk Bodhisattva?
Dizang and Guanyin as Saviors of This World
From Amitbha Triads to Rebirth in the Pure Land
Glimpses of a Bhaiajyaguru Connection?
A Ray of Light in the Ten Kings¿ Dark Courts
Guiding the Way in the Afterlife: The Bodhisattva Yinlu
Images of Dizang in Esoteric Buddhist Practices
Forgotten Images in Religious Artifacts
5. Narrative Literature
The Earliest Dizang Miracle Tale
Non-Buddhist Records
A Buddhist Compilation of Dizang Miracle Tales
The Canonization of a Buddhist Cult
Conclusion: Reassessing Dizang, Lord of the Underworld
Afterlife Practices in China
Female Practice of Filial Piety
Ritual Divination, Exorcism, and Healing
The Daoist Savior of Hells
The Cult of Mount Jiuhua
Rethinking Tang Buddhism
Appendix 1: The Scripture on the Ten Wheels: Reevaluating the Traditional Dating
Appendix 2: Antecedents of Dizang? Kitigarbha in India and Central Asia
Appendix 3: Translations of Scriptures |
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| ISBN | 9780824830458 |
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| Related reviews | - Book Review: "the Making of a Savior Bodhisattva: Dizang in Medieval China," by Zhiru Ng / Chen, Jin-hua (評論)
- Book Review: The Making of a Savior Bodhisattva: Dizang in Medieval China / Ho, Chiew-Hui
- Book Review: The Making of a Savior Bodhisattva: Dizang in Medieval China / Soucy, Alexander (評論)
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| Hits | 966 |
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| Created date | 2007.10.17 |
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| Modified date | 2021.11.05 |
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