1. Dignity & Discipline: Reviving Full Ordination for Buddhist Nuns. Edited by Thea Mohr and Jampa Tsedroen. Wisdom Publications, 2010. 333 pages. $18.95. 2. Lori Meeks, University of Southern California.
摘要
This carefully edited volume is the product of the historic “International Congress on Buddhist Women's Role in the Saṅgha,” held on July 18–20, 2007, at the University of Hamburg. Bringing together scholars, vinaya (monastic law) experts, and Buddhist clerics from around the world, the congress, which featured His Holiness (H. H.) the Dalai Lama as its main guest, offered a series of thorough, well-reasoned, and intellectually rigorous arguments in favor of the restoration of the bhikkhunī [full-fledged nuns'] saṅgha in the Theravādin and Mūlasarvāstivādin traditions. A selection of those papers were then edited and revised for inclusion in this volume (conference papers not included in the volume may be accessed here: www.congress-on-buddhist-women.org).
Comprehensive in scope and well organized in presentation, the book features an introduction, seventeen essays, and a transcription of H. H. the Dalai Lama's address to and dialogue with invited participants in the congress. The essays are written from diverse perspectives and by authors representing a wide range of institutions, both religious and academic. Scholars of Buddhism are likely to view much of the book as a primary source: although a number of individuals representing the secular academy contributed to the volume, most of the essays—though extremely scholarly in content—were written by Buddhist monastics, and with a Buddhist audience in mind.
The volume offers rare insight into the doctrines and monastic laws that contemporary Buddhist clerics are drawing upon in their efforts to restore the bhikkhunī saṅgha in places where it does not presently exist or is not currently recognized by male monastic authorities. As the book's title suggests, its contributors focus on …
