Sīmās: Foundations of Buddhist Religion

Carbine, Jason A. (編); Davis, Erik W. (編)

作者

Carbine, Jason A. (編) ; Davis, Erik W. (編)

出版日期

2022

頁次

400

出版者

University of Hawai'i Press

出版者網址

https://uhpress.hawaii.edu/

出版地

Honolulu, HI, US [檀香山, 夏威夷州, 美國]

資料類型

書籍=Book

使用語言

英文=English

附註項

Jason A. Carbine is professor and C. Milo Connick Chair of Religious Studies at Whittier College in Whittier, California.

Erik W. Davis is professor of religious studies at Macalester College, in Saint Paul, Minnesota.

摘要

Human-fashioned boundaries transform spaces by introducing dualisms, bifurcations, creative symbioses, contradictions, and notions of inclusion and exclusion. The Buddhist boundaries considered in this book, sīmās—a term found in South and Southeast Asian languages and later translated into East Asian languages—come in various shapes and sizes and can be established on land or in bodies of water. Sometimes, the word sīmā refers not only to a ceremonial boundary, but the space enclosed by the boundary, or even the markers (when they are used) that denote the boundary.

Sīmās were established early on as places where core legal acts (kamma), including ordination, of the monastic community (sangha) took place according to their disciplinary codes. Sīmās continue to be deployed in the creation of monastic lineages and to function in diverse ways for monastics and non-monastics alike. As foundations of Buddhist religion, sīmās are used to sustain, revitalize, or reform Buddhist practices, notions of identity, and conceptualizations of time and history. In the last few decades, scholarly awareness of and expertise on sīmās has developed to a point where a volume like this one, which examines sīmās across numerous cultural contexts and scholarly fields of inquiry, is both possible and needed. Sīmā traditions expressed in the Theravāda cultures of Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka constitute the dominant focus of the work; a chapter on East Asia raises questions of historical transmission beyond these areas. Throughout contributors engage texts; history; archaeology; politics; art; ecology; economics; epigraphy; legal categories; mythic narratives; understandings of the cosmos; and conceptualizations of compassion, authority, and violence.

Examining sīmās through multiple perspectives allows us to look at them in their contextual specificity, in a way that allows for discernment of variation as well as consistency. Sīmā spaces can be both simple and extremely intricate, and this book helps show why and how that is the case.

Frontmatter i
Contents v
Acknowledgments vii
Conventions ix
Abbreviations xi
Introduction: Buddhist Sīmās across Time and Place / Jason A. Carbine and Erik W. Davis 1
1 Sīmā Basics from Buddha to Burma / Nagasena Bhikkhu and Kate Crosby 18

PART I HISTORIES: STONES, PLACES, PEOPLE
2 Rituals Set in Stone: Tracing the Archaeological Evidence for the Sīmā Stone Tradition in Southeast Asia / Stephen A. Murphy 41
3 The Development of Ordination Platforms (jietan 戒壇) in China: The Translation and Interpretation of Sīmā in East Asia from the Third to Seventh Centuries / Thomas Newhall 66
4 Reflections on the Boundary Markers and the New Buddhist Lineage: The Mahā-sīmā at Wat Rajapradit Sathitmahasimaram by King Rama IV (r. 1851–1868) / M. L Pattaratorn Chirapravati and Arthid Sheravanichkul 110
5 Changing Sīmā, Changing World / Anthony Lovenheim Irwin 125

PART II CONTEMPORARY PRACTICES: FOCUS ON CAMBODIA
6 Lines of Influence around Cambodia’s Buddhist Temples / Alexandra Kent 149
7 Regenerating Ancient Sīmās: A Study of Buddhist Places of Worship in Rural Cambodia / Satoru Kobayashi 177
8 Sīmās as Assemblages of Territorial Imagination in Cambodia / Erik W. Davis 202
9 Stones of Spirits and Kings: Negotiating Land Grabs in Contemporary Cambodia / Courtney Work 229

PART III TEXTUAL TRADITIONS: CREATING, EMBRACING, DEFENDING BOUNDARIES
10 Analysis of Sīmās (Boundaries) / John A. Marston, Chhuon Hoeur and Elizabeth Guthrie 263
11 King Rāmādhipati, Prime Minister U Nu, and the Kalyāṇī Sīmā: Constructing and Overcoming Others / Jason A. Carbine 297
12 Flawed or Deliberately Altered Readings? Two Quotations from the Vajirabuddhiṭīkā in the Sīmālakkhaṇadīpanī / Petra Kieffer-Pülz 326
Bibliography 339
Contributors 371
Index 375

ISBN

9780824888855 (hc); 9780824891077 (pbk); 9780824891121 (ebook)

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