長期以來，中國婦女佛教信仰課題一直未受注意，近十餘年來，學者開始撰文討論，頗能凸顯其重要性。本文是筆者討論兩宋菁英家庭婦女佛教信仰之上篇。在此文中，筆者先討論伊沛霞（Patricia Ebrey）在其暢銷書《深閨之內：宋代婦女的婚姻與生活》中的〈虔信之妻〉一節，希望澄清及修正伊沛霞之某些觀點。由於伊沛霞的〈虔信之妻〉一節，可代表討論宋代婦女佛教信仰生活的先驅之作，其觀點雖然簡略，但已塑造了宋代菁英家庭婦女及其修行佛教之形象。在檢驗伊沛霞之觀點後，筆者發現她的立論過程有不少因誤讀原文及史料運用上不平衡所造成之缺失。故本篇先討論她隨意列舉之20 位婦女之「佛教生活」，指出其例證之不足，並詳述她們修行佛教之原由及方式。筆者接著於伊沛霞所舉之14 位北宋婦女信佛事例外，增補了109 位婦女信佛事例以補充其不足，說明北宋中、上層社會婦女，在不同家庭婚姻之背景下，所作之不同及多樣之佛教修行。並檢視婦女母家及夫家之宗教性向，並以之為脈絡，查考其佛教修行取向，此皆為討論婦女之婚姻及宗教生活之〈虔信之妻〉一節所忽略。在討論伊沛霞之觀點後，本文並以大乘菩薩理想之「六度」或「六波羅蜜」中之「五波羅蜜」為析論架構，詳述婦女虔信程度之高下及修行之多樣性。分析之結果，除「忍辱」一項因同為儒家及道教信仰者共修之德行而不論外，123 位北宋婦女在其他波羅蜜之修行情況，大致可得以下百分比：布施12%、持戒18%、精進84%、禪定6%、智慧22%。雖然此數據未必可精確地表示多樣多彩的北宋婦女佛教生活，但仍可顯示其修行層次深淺高低之不同。此外，本文豐富之例證，可進一步確證北宋婦女在戮力操持繁重家務之情況下，實享有相當程度之宗教自主權。 This is the first part of my article on women’s piety towards Buddhism in Song times, a topic barely touched upon until recently. In this portion of my article, I first discuss the “Pious Wives” section of Patricia Ebrey’s widely circulated book, The Inner Quarters: Marriage and the Lives of Chinese Women in the Sung Period, in hopes of clarifying and modifying some of the major points discussed in the section. As these points represent Ebrey’s pioneering, albeit cursory, discussion of pious wives in Western language, they have already shaped a general image of Song women, particularly women of elite families, and of what they did to show their piety towards Buddhism. A close scrutiny of them results in the finding of some errors arisen from the misreading of original texts and the limited and imbalanced citation of sources. In this article, I outline the twenty examples of Song women’s piety that Ebrey randomly selects from numerous commemorative texts produced in the Song. I point out the insufficiency of these examples and delineate why and how Song elite family women actually practiced Buddhism. I cite 123 commemorative texts to supplement the sixteen examples that Ebrey uses for her discussion, address the extent to which women dedicated themselves to Buddhism, and argue the existence of diverse practices of Buddhism among women in the Northern Song––an important fact that is unheeded in Ebrey's “Pious Wives” section. I also contextualize their religious orientation by looking into religious practices of their natal and spousal families, which Ebrey fails to take note of even though she is supposed to, given “marriage and the lives of women” being the very purpose of her book. My discussion and analysis is built upon the framework of five of the “Six Paramitas or Six Perfections, i.e., bushi (giving; dāna), chijie (morality; ?īla), jingjin (vigor; vīrya), chanding (meditation; dhyāna) and zhihui (wisdom; prajñā), which constitute what is known as “the Bodhisattva ideal.” The renru (patience; k?ānti) paramita is set aside with special note because the effort is not exclusively Buddhist but is inherently Confucian and Taoist. This classification leads to the following findings, which take into account some individuals’ embodiment of more than single perfection: of the 123 Northern Song women, 12% were involved in bushi, 18% in chijie, 84% in jingjin, 6% in chanding, and 22% demonstrated zhihui. While this quantitative schema may not accurately represents the variegated colors of Northern Song women’s devotions to Buddhism, it helps to reveal the different levels of religious piety demonstrated by the middle-and upper-class women who were portrayed as pious. On the other hand, my discussion supported by ample evidence further confirms the significant amount of religious autonomy that women from elite families of the Northern Song were able to enjoy, amidst the daunting household chores they took upon themselves to perform.
