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Inventing Chinese Buddhas: Identity, Authority, and Liberation in Song-Dynasty Chan Buddhism |
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Author |
Buckelew, Kevin (撰)
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Date | 2018 |
Pages | 348 |
Publisher | Columbia University |
Publisher Url |
https://www.columbia.edu/
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Location | New York, NY, US [紐約, 紐約州, 美國] |
Content type | 博碩士論文=Thesis and Dissertation |
Language | 英文=English |
Degree | doctor |
Institution | Columbia University |
Department | East Asian Languages and Cultures |
Advisor | Faure, Bernard R.; Yang, Zhaohua |
Publication year | 2018 |
Keyword | Song Dynasty (China); History; Mahayana Buddhism; Zen Buddhism; Chinese – Religion |
Abstract | This dissertation explores how Chan Buddhists made the unprecedented claim to a level of religious authority on par with the historical Buddha Śākyamuni and, in the process, invented what it means to be a buddha in China. This claim helped propel the Chan tradition to dominance of elite monastic Buddhism during the Song dynasty (960-1279), licensed an outpouring of Chan literature treated as equivalent to scripture, and changed the way Chinese Buddhists understood their own capacity for religious authority in relation to the historical Buddha and the Indian homeland of Buddhism. But the claim itself was fraught with complication. After all, according to canonical Buddhist scriptures, the Buddha was easily recognizable by the “marks of the great man” that adorned his body, while the same could not be said for Chan masters in the Song. What, then, distinguished Chan masters from everyone else? What authorized their elite status and granted them the authority of buddhas? According to what normative ideals did Chan aspirants pursue liberation, and by what standards did Chan masters evaluate their students to determine who was worthy of admission into an elite Chan lineage? How, in short, could one recognize a buddha in Song-dynasty China? The Chan tradition never answered this question once and for all; instead, the question broadly animated Chan rituals, institutional norms, literary practices, and visual cultures. My dissertation takes a performative approach to the analysis of Chan hagiographies, discourse records, commentarial collections, and visual materials, mobilizing the tradition’s rich archive to measure how Chan interventions in Buddhist tradition changed the landscape of elite Chinese Buddhism and participated in the epochal changes attending China’s Tang-to-Song transition. |
Table of contents | List of Figures iii Acknowledgments v
Introduction: Discerning Buddhas in China 1 How to recognize a buddha 1 Buddhas, buddhahood, and the making of Chan identity 5 Shifting paradigms of authority in Chinese Buddhist history 35 Methodological considerations: performance, identity, discernment 45 Chapter overview 58
Signs of Authority and the “Marks of the Great Man” 63 Great men with unusual bodies: Huangbo Xiyun and the “marks of the great man” in Tang-dynasty Chan 65 Immanence, invisibility, and the uṣṇīṣa in Song-dynasty Chan 80 Encountering Chinese buddhas: “marks of the great man” and the negotiation of authority 91 Conclusion 106
The Heroic “Great Man” 109 “Towering and majestic” 112 The “great man” and the rejection of specialized excellence 122 Three of a kind: general, minister, Chan master 127 Martial heroism, exemplary models, and state power 140 Conclusion 151
Buddhahood, Sovereignty, and the Chan Master 153 The Chan master as cosmic sovereign 156 Rivals for buddhahood on the battlefield of encounter dialogue 178 Killing the Buddha, carrying out the command: sovereignty and the vanishing point of authority 192 Conclusion 201
The Consistency of a “Great Man” 203 The sovereign self 206 Possessed by the words of another 219 Authenticity and artifice 232 The gender of buddhahood 242 Conclusion 258
Farming, Rusticity, and the Chan Work Ethic 262 Baizhang Huaihai and the advent of “farming Chan” 265 Aesthetic rusticity and Chan identity 274 Herding an ox, being an ox 284 Conclusion 299
Conclusion: A Discerning Age 306 Figures 315 Bibliography 325
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DOI | https://doi.org/10.7916/D81Z5MKZ |
Hits | 713 |
Created date | 2021.12.11 |
Modified date | 2021.12.11 |
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