Buddhism and Empire: The Political and Religious Culture of Early Tibet
... attacking the old sedentary centres: in general, this narrative is one of the most persistent myths perpetuated by Silk Road historians. In Beckwith's understanding, which I share and strive to further elaborate here, the Silk Road was simply the economy of the Central Eurasian people(s), which also included the forced military establishment and maintenance of frontier trade cities within their realms (2009, 26, 328, 342f.; cf. also Walter 2009, 69–71). If one accepts this concept of a Central Eurasian cultural complex, we would then speak of phenomena whose similarities are based on a certain " internal " relatedness. ...
... Elsewhere in Central Eurasia it explains the often only transitory nature of similar federal units. Smith's (1995, ref. in Walter 2009, 134) observation that " warrior nobilities " reinforced the ethnic identity of clans in a tribal confederation and that they rather hindered a greater unity may with some qualifications also be true of Tibet. On the other hand, there were mechanisms to overcome such regionalism. ...
... And also Beckwith' statement that the true comitatus is unknown among non- Central-Eurasian peoples I think needs to be further examined. [5] See Walter (2009, 18–36), the first to discuss some of the key CECC elements in the Tibetan context in greater detail. [6] That is, the oath of loyalty (lobanye; lit.: " near to [the lord's] side " ). ...
What Western academic literature described as ethnic or cultural Tibet in fact implies something composite and processually constructed: Tibet then often appears as a typical example for explanations of collective identity (and ethnicity). Such approaches increasingly are applied in present-day anthropology and historical studies, highlighting the historical conditions and the politically, socially and ideationally constructed features of identity. In Tibet, identity-building was strongly related to the spread of Buddhism. The new religion was introduced in the time of the Tibetan Empire (seventh to ninth century), but it was only its later spread (from the eleventh century) that led to the effective, all-embracing establishment of Buddhism in the Highlands. It was interlinked with regionally different forms of political manifestations—the founding of Buddhist kingdoms at the periphery and the emergence of monastic hegemonies in the central regions. These developments correlated with processes of conversion, which in its narrative model is described as an act of conquest, taming and civilizing the physical universe and which in theory actually never ends. Apart from considering current anthropological discussions of the phenomenon of religious conversion, this paper will include a comparative view of the history of Christianization in early medieval Europe (especially in Western Europe—the Frankish kingdom and the barbarian zones North of the Rhine and the Danube, fifth to tenth century). Inter alia this also raises questions about the initial social forces and interests promoting the new religion's adoption, and to what extent formal similarities with the Tibetan case are ascertainable in Europe.
... More than ten million people were under rule (Denwood 2008). The historical and archaeological records indicated massive population migrations along with series of military conquers by the ancient Tibetan Empire (Denwood 2008;Ming 2007), which could leave a profound legacy on the cultural and genetic diversity of human populations (Beckwith 1993;Owen-Smith and Hill 2013;Walter 2009). Nevertheless, little is known about the genetics of this cultural and military expansion of ancient Tibetans. ...
... The Balti people are Tibetic language speakers (Owen-Smith and Hill 2013). They historically practiced Tibetan writing, Bön, and Tibetan Buddhism before the arrival of Islam around the 15th century AD (Walter 2009). Our analyses of ROHs ( fig. ...
The rise and expansion of Tibetan Empire in the 7th to 9th centuries AD affected the course of history across East Eurasia, but the genetic impact of Tibetans on surrounding populations remains undefined. We sequenced 60 genomes for four populations from Pakistan and Tajikistan to explore their demographic history. We showed that the genomes of Balti people from Baltistan were comprised of 22.6% ∼ 26% Tibetan ancestry. We inferred a single admixture event and dated it to about 39 to 21 generations ago, a period that postdated the conquest of Baltistan by the ancient Tibetan Empire. The analyses of mitochondrial DNA, Y, and X chromosome data indicated that both ancient Tibetan males and females were involved in the male-biased dispersal. Given the fact that the Balti people adopted Tibetan language and culture in history, our study suggested the impact of Tibetan Empire on Baltistan involved dominant cultural and minor demic diffusion.
... transcriptions are available from the Old Tibetan Documents Online website (http://otdo.aa.tufs.ac.jp). See Dalton and van Schaik 2006: xi-xx and Imaeda 2008 on the antique and invaluable treasure trove found at Dunhuang. 2 Walter and Beckwith (2010: 296) mistakenly claim that the Lcang bu/Mtshur bu inscription is attributed to the reign of Khri Srong lde brtsan (in Richardson 1985: 92ff.), but this should be amended read Khri Gtsug lde brtsan (as should their reference to Khri Lde srong brtsan, idem: 312, n. 30). 3 See Walter 2009: xxii. The Old Tibetan Annals were found in many pieces at Dunhuang, and are now thought to constitute two versions whose dates of compilation are unknown but whose contents originate in or just after the years that they recount (see Dotson 2009: Introduction). ...
... The inscriptions described below should therefore be read carefully, with an eye for their various expressions of the royal and religious 'self-presentation' of the empire. 4 Walter 2009: 7 5 Takeuchi 1995. 6 See Scherrer-Schaub 2002and 2012 on 'the power of the written displayed to organise and control the world' of imperial Tibet (idem: 233). ...
... For further information about periodization of Tibetan history see Cuevas (2006). 9 In detail see Walter (2009). 10 In this historical period were Tibetans one of the mightiest powers in Central Asia. ...
The paper seeks an answer to the question, if efforts of the People’s Republic of China to control the reincarnation of Tibetian religious leaders by law is just continuation of long-term Chinese policy or if it is a new way to exert the Chinese influence in Tibet.
... Kapstein ends his translation just before this difficult phrase. Walter translates: '"[as an act for] propagating the Buddhadharma, [the Btsan po ordered them] boxed to accomplish that"' (Walter 2009: 72 n. 84, his parenthesies). Thus,for Waltersgroms = "boxed,"presumably fromsgrom bu"box"thatappearsalongwith thesameprecedingyi ge brisinthepreambletothebKa' mchid (Richardson1998[1980 ...
This thesis re-evaluates Tibetan histories as intertextual literature, broadly following Ricoeur’s concept of mimesis. It then examines the portrayal of Khri Srong lde brtsan in these histories, whether as a Tibetan emperor, a Buddhist king or a tantric disciple. ----
To do this, it brings together all extant Tibetan sources on Khri Srong lde brtsan from the eighth to twelfth century. It rejects the attributed antiquity of some histories, on the basis of textual analysis. It also adds hitherto undiscovered texts to the already existing data, based on the author’s own discoveries. The thesis then describes Khri Srong lde brtsan’s imperial, royal and religious depictions as a process of metamorphosis over time. ----
Imperial texts depict him as a great Tibetan emperor (btsan po), endowed with the authority of his ancestors. The inscriptions at Brag lha mo and ’Phyongs rgyas even describe him as a bodhisattva, leading many of his subjects towards enlightenment. Post-imperial sources found at Dunhuang transform the emperor into a Dharma king. They identify him with idealised royal predecessors like Aśoka or King Tsa. Twelfth-century histories, such as the sBa bzhed and Nyang ral Nyi ma ’od zer’s Zangs gling ma, remember him as the patron and pupil of spiritually superior Buddhist masters. One Indian tantric master, Padmasambhava, even blames the king’s lack of faith for the future decline of the Dharma. These religious figures gradually displace the king as the central protagonists of his life history. ----
This thesis also uncovers the concerns that lie beneath early portrayals of Khri Srong lde brtsan. These include self-presentation, lineage legitimisation and complex relationships with the “golden age” of empire. The transformation of Khri Srong lde brtsan in Buddhist histories depends upon seismic shifts affecting Tibetan culture, including the cult of religious figures and the influx of Indian literary genres into Tibet.
... Kapstein ends his translation just before this phrase. Michael Walter translates: '"[as an act for] propagating the Buddhadharma, [the Btsan po ordered them] boxed to accomplish that"' (Walter 2009: 72 n. 84, his parenthesies). Thus, for Walter sgroms = "boxed," presumably from the noun sgrom bu "box" that appears along with the same preceding yi ge bris in the preamble to the bKa' mchid (KGT vol. 1, 373.13-15 (with divergences in Richardson 1998: 96.35-37 in square brackets): gna' da 'chad bod yul du dkond cog gsum gyi rten bcas te / sangs rgyas kyi chos mdzad pa'i lo drung gi yi ge bris pa / sgrom bu'i nang na mchis pa'i dpe' [dpe] //). ...
The Tibetan emperor (btsan po), Khri Srong lde brtsan (742–c.800), enacted state patronage of Buddhism in Tibet, not on his own, but in close collaboration with a host of his closest subjects. The role played by Spiritual Friends (dge ba’i bshes gnyen, kalyāṇamitra) is especially important to the spread and practice of Buddhism during the imperial period.The histories covered later in this contribution, for example Pelliot tibétain 149, increasingly emphasise the role of his Spiritual Friends. Gradually, Indian religious figures eclipse the Tibetan ruler as the primary agents who establish Buddhism in Tibet, and this forms part of a larger transformation of Khri Srong lde brtsan from divine emperor into disciple-king.
... Such was the case when Buddhism met the world of the rural Hindu gods: reincarnation ideas of old Brahmanism, and, centuries, later the godhead families of East Asian pre-Buddhist religious worlds, influenced Hinduism and Buddhist ideas changed in themselves. In Japan it was the mutual penetration and re-figuration of Shinto and Buddhism which created new religious amalgams, the same being true for the Tibetan confluence of Indian Buddhism, Tantrism, Bon traditions and Chinese spiritual worlds [11,12]. ...
For the last couple of years, particularly after the publication of the (German) book "Comparative Theology" by Bernhold Reinhardt and Klaus von Stosch, there was a significant attentiveness of this subject amongst German scholars. For many, it was the long anticipated antithesis/alternative to the pluralist theology of religions, even if it had not been devised explicitly to serve as such an alternative. For others, it has been an appropriate way to express their desire for a substantial interreligious dialogue in a theologically responsible way. This paper tries to review some of the major German contributions (being read alongside international ones) and reactions to Comparative Theology and to search for the motive behind its sudden popularity in some circles. It will also try to reconstruct the possibilities for Comparative Theology within the wider setting of the process and development of religious traditions as they grow and change in never-ending interaction and communication within the history of religions, ideas and society.
This article re-examines the history of the Mongol Empire’s rule over Tibet, analyzing the complex institutional and religious relationships between the Mongol Empire and Tibet from an innovative perspective. We find that, unlike its military conquests in other parts of the world, the Mongol Empire actually formed a kind of federation with Tibet based on Buddhism. The Mongol Empire embraced Tibetan Buddhism as its state religion and venerated the head of the Sakya school as a spiritual guide. Concurrently, the establishment of the Bureau of Buddhist and Tibetan Affairs in the Mongol capital served as a nominal governing body over Tibet, while in reality, it ensured a significant degree of autonomy for the region. Furthermore, the leaders of the Mongol Empire felt endowed with the legitimacy to conquer the world after being blessed by Tibetan Buddhism as Mahakala, the dark incarnation of Avalokiteshvara. In addition, the article also provides a detailed account of the prosperity of Buddhism within the Mongol Empire, in terms of its economic, artistic, and philosophical aspects. The discovery of this evidence is of great significance, since it not only supports reinterpretation of the historical evolution of the Mongol Empire and Tibet, but also allows us to observe the status of Tibetan Buddhism in the Mongol Empire from a new perspective, and to explore the unexpected institutional innovations of the federation reflected in the Mongol-Tibetan relationship.
The best way to decenter hegemony is to set up a market in political legitimacy. One of the best ways to do this is to introduce Buddhism into a given polity. In this chapter, I consider the theology and history of various schools of Buddhism, as well as the histories of some places where those schools have taken root, to argue that the widespread adoption of Buddhism, especially when that adoption entails the internalization of Buddhist kingship ideals by government rulers and the strong presence of a Buddhist monastic community (sangha), presents hope for decentering hegemony and enhancing liberty around the world. I also briefly compare Buddhism with other major world religions to strengthen my argument that Buddhism is among the most effective means of establishing a market in political legitimacy and thereby decentering hegemony.
Introduction. The tradition of worshipping the Russian Empress Catherine II by Buryat Buddhists as an earthly incarnation of the enlightened Buddhist deity White Tara is regarded as an established historical fact by researchers (and officials of Russia’s largest Buddhist organization ‘Buddhist Traditional Sangha of Russia’), and has never been questioned. Yet a careful analysis of Buryat written sources and Russian historical documents makes the statement somewhat problematic. Goals. The article attempts a comparative insight into a range of documentary, narrative and folklore sources in Buryat, Russian and Tibetan to clarify the issue of actual relationships between Buryat Buddhists and Catherine the Great. Results. The paper establishes that the statement insisting the title of Bandido Khambo Lama was recognized by Catherine II in 1767 goes back only to Buryat written sources — and is not corroborated by Russian historical documents. Our analysis of Russian-language sources, including letters and writings by Catherine II, makes it possible to surmise that the Empress’s attitude towards her ‘Lamaist’ subjects was dictated by her foreign policy plans in Asia and the Renaissance disregard for archaic cultures of ‘Siberian idolaters’ believed by eighteenth-century scholars to comprise Buryat Buddhists too. Insights into the surviving Buryat sources, including historical chronicles and biographies, also do not confirm the existence of a developed cult of venerating Catherine II as incarnate goddess White Tara. Nevertheless, such evidence has been preserved in Buryat song folklore and religious poetry but it should be borne in mind that, apparently, those are modern narratives dating from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It is the latter period that was characterized by the wide dissemination of the idea of the sanctity of the Romanov Dynasty in the eyes of Buddhists, which may have been backed by prominent opinion leaders of the Russian political establishment to further promote the concept of Russia’s expansion deep into Buddhist Asia.
As the first comprehensive study of Buddhism and law in Asia, this interdisciplinary volume challenges the concept of Buddhism as an apolitical religion without implications for law. Buddhism and Law draws on the expertise of the foremost scholars in Buddhist studies and in law to trace the legal aspects of the religion from the time of the Buddha to the present. In some cases, Buddhism provided the crucial architecture for legal ideologies and secular law codes, while in other cases it had to contend with a pre-existing legal system, to which it added a new layer of complexity. The wide-ranging studies in this book reveal a diversity of relationships between Buddhist monastic codes and secular legal systems in terms of substantive rules, factoring, and ritual practices. This volume will be an essential resource for all students and teachers in Buddhist studies, law and religion, and comparative law.
As the first comprehensive study of Buddhism and law in Asia, this interdisciplinary volume challenges the concept of Buddhism as an apolitical religion without implications for law. Buddhism and Law draws on the expertise of the foremost scholars in Buddhist studies and in law to trace the legal aspects of the religion from the time of the Buddha to the present. In some cases, Buddhism provided the crucial architecture for legal ideologies and secular law codes, while in other cases it had to contend with a pre-existing legal system, to which it added a new layer of complexity. The wide-ranging studies in this book reveal a diversity of relationships between Buddhist monastic codes and secular legal systems in terms of substantive rules, factoring, and ritual practices. This volume will be an essential resource for all students and teachers in Buddhist studies, law and religion, and comparative law.
As the first comprehensive study of Buddhism and law in Asia, this interdisciplinary volume challenges the concept of Buddhism as an apolitical religion without implications for law. Buddhism and Law draws on the expertise of the foremost scholars in Buddhist studies and in law to trace the legal aspects of the religion from the time of the Buddha to the present. In some cases, Buddhism provided the crucial architecture for legal ideologies and secular law codes, while in other cases it had to contend with a pre-existing legal system, to which it added a new layer of complexity. The wide-ranging studies in this book reveal a diversity of relationships between Buddhist monastic codes and secular legal systems in terms of substantive rules, factoring, and ritual practices. This volume will be an essential resource for all students and teachers in Buddhist studies, law and religion, and comparative law.
This dissertation examines a Buddhist revitalization movement in the Tibetan county of Serta, in Sichuan Province in the PRC. It explores this revitalization movement as reassembled from associations of humans and nonhumans. Serta’s religious landscape was torn apart in the chaotic Maoist era. Revival in this context was precisely an act of reassembly. This research shows that the revitalization process consisted of numerous occasions in which humans, texts, landscapes, and material objects all made a difference, occasions that extended this revitalization movement into Han Chinese cities. This study is intended as a contribution to the growing literature on assemblage in anthropology, to cross-disciplinary studies of religious revival, and to anthropology of religion where issues of situating religion in materiality, relationships, and encounters have been the central focus of inquiry. More specifically in this dissertation, I explain a series of Sino-Tibetan encounters in Serta over the second half of the twentieth century. In 1952, Chinese work teams took over the region. Upon their arrival, work team cadres made great efforts to document Serta. Archival records of the time give evidence to the dramatic effects of Chinese policies on the traditional system of Serta, especially on its monastic groups. This early encounter calls attention to prophetic texts that prevailed in Serta. For at least one century, Serta had been envisioned as a mandala prone to the attack of demons. In this area, large numbers of prophecies described that when demon armies invaded Serta, wrathful gods would appear to tame the demons. Interpreting the “demon armies” as the Chinese troops, monks and nomads in Serta launched an armed resistance for taming. In the revival period of the 1980s, a new charismatic lama, Jigme Phuntsok, again deployed prophecies, this time to reassemble religion in networks of humans and nonhumans. By creatively interpreting prophecies, Jigme Phuntsok identified new religious sites, retrieved treasures, sanctified the teachings he revealed as transmitted from old saints, and constructed himself as a bodhisattva prophesied to emerge when demons are rampant. In 1987, encouraged by a few prophecies, Jigme Phuntsok began to spread Buddhism in China, still as an effort to tame demons, but through the dharma rather than weapons. In the following decades, a Buddhist network that articulated Tibetan monks and urban Chinese groups emerged from Serta. This network involved massive flows of donations, pilgrims, and Buddhist works, and it brought enormous changes to the relationship of religion and politics in this region. This project touches upon Buddhist philosophy as it explores those traditions that feature prophecies. Due to Buddhist doctrine, what violence, history, temporality, text, language, landscape, materiality, ethics, and human beings mean to monks are different from the conventional notions of the words. Thus this study of religion is a broad account of these themes in the ontological turn of anthropology. In this dissertation, I further investigate how Buddhist views intersect with the views of other groups, such as Tibetan nomads, Chinese officials, and Chinese laypeople.
This thesis deals with the marriage ritual set up by the Tibetan scholar Jamgon Kongtrul Yontän Gyatsho (1813-1899) for the wedding ceremony of the prince of Derge Chime Dakpai Dorje (’Chi med rtag pa’i rdo rje) in 1870. The introduction explains why this text is so important. The second chapter focusses on marriage among Tibetans in itself, the third chapter on the author of the text. The fourth chapter deals with the text proper and in the fifth chapter the historical and political context is explained wherein the text was produced. The sixth chapter presents a commented translation of the text and the seventh chapter contains some (brief) concluding remarks. Transliteration and the relevant text photocopy are shown in the attachments.
(Open-access pdf now available via the link below!)
This short illustrated book offers a general introduction to the physical, paleographic, and grammatical features of early Tibetan documents and writings. As a practical introduction, it emphasizes Tibetan Dunhuang manuscripts, and lays out specific methods for recording, and in many cases quantifying codicological, paleographic, and orthographic features. The approach unites digital humanities with the examination of original documents to offer scholars a working method for describing early Tibetan writings.
The book has two main sections. The first, longer section introduces methods for describing early Tibetan documents and writings, and the second, shorter section demonstrates these methods through a case study of a selection of documents. The first section consists of four parts. The first part concerns codicology in the narrow sense of the description of the physical features of a document, from its materiality to its mise en page. The second part details methods for recording the orthographic and grammatical features of early Tibetan writing, with an emphasis on quantification. The quantifiable features are often specific to 8th to 10th century written Tibetan, but many features are applicable to later writings, and the methods themselves – in particular the emphasis on quantification – can be adapted to later Tibetan writings. The third part introduces methods for describing the paleography of early Tibetan handwriting. Emphasizing ductus, it puts forward a typology of index letters, and delineates a cluster of features to be recorded in order to characterize a given scribal hand. Part four, “miscellanea,” is a very short catchall for those features that fall outside of the parameters of codicology, orthography, and paleography. Examples would be the inclusion in the text of personal names, loan words, and idiosyncratic orthographies that don’t fall under existing rubrics in part two.
The second section of the book is a case study that demonstrates the methods introduced in the first section. It describes the codicological, orthographic, and paleographic features of a selection of pivotal and fairly well-discussed Old Tibetan documents, including the Old Tibetan Chronicle and two versions of the Old Tibetan Rāmāyaṇa. The documents are presented briefly, and the relevant data is arranged in a table for ease of comparison. In the process, the case study discusses several significant markers for dating documents and writing, from paper re-use to specific orthographic features. An appendix gives a detailed description of the Old Tibetan Chronicle itself as a model for applying our methods for describing manuscripts and writings.
https://www.istb.univie.ac.at/cgi-bin/wstb/wstb.cgi?ID=92&show_description=1
Peter Schwieger (2000) has shown how Buddhism gradually became the dominant source of ethical values in Tibetan historiography by the 14th century. He states that Tibetan histories, which narrativise the remembered past, play a mythic role inasmuch as they confer constructed meaning on Tibetan culture, determine cultural self-interpretation to some extent and provide a source of normative claims concerning sociocultural interrelationships that hold true in the histories’ “present.” This article complements his analysis of the shift from a royal to a religious centre of society, by bringing theoretical insights from the field of narratology to bear on Tibetan historiography’s depiction of the emperors and their introduction of Buddhism to the Tibetan plateau.
Investigating the Central Eurasian theme of exile and return to power in state formation mythology, as well as Indic narratives of renouncing the throne in favour of the spiritual life, helps to clarify the processes involved in the introduction of both of these important topoi into early Tibetan biographies. Understanding the divergences between the Central Eurasian and Indic heritage of these Tibetan tales then allows for a preliminary discussion of the changing relation between religious and royal figures in early Tibetan biographical narratives. Finally, grounding these changes in theoretical discussions of types of fiction, mythology and historiography uncovers some of the narrative mechanisms which enabled a shift from status based upon kinship, military endeavour and fealty to the emperor as the highest member of Tibet to religious status drawing on Indic social structures. It will be seen that such a shift opened up the possibility that a subject of the emperor (at least rhetorically) could outshine an instantiation of indigenous divine kingship—a Buddhist cleric superior to royalty.
Landowning was a universal condition of monastic survival in late-imperial China. Some Buddhists might like to invoke the ancient ideal of begging, but when it came to running a monastery, itinerant almsgiving was inadequate. “When the eating fingers become daily more numerous, begging for food does not meet the need, so the monastery has to have property in land,” as a patron put it. Or as an abbot phrased it, “How can a monastery remain secure in the long term with only a little permanent property?” Master Hanshan Deqing (1546–1623) was blunter, declaring that “land is the foundation of a Buddhist abbey.” While the law of monastic property was almost entirely the law of the state in Imperial China, the law of the Buddha had some influence as well. Few contemporaries wrote on ownership of Buddhist property as a general topic, but many were inspired to write about theft, which is why theft will serve as my approach to the legal status of Buddhist property in the Ming Dynasty (1368–1644). Theft looms as a constant threat in the principal sources for this essay, the gazetteers compiled by monasteries to record their history and protect their assets. The monastery that did not lose a significant piece of property was as rare as the monastery that owned none at all. With property the norm and theft the fate, attachment to property was the condition.
The interrelationships between Buddhism and law in Southeast Asian history are dynamic and untidy: different legal and scriptural genres borrow from and blend into others; authority is invoked from multiple (and at times seemingly contradictory) sources; jurisdictions of monastic and lay law overlap or conflict. Multiple ideologies of law, their normative expression in texts, or their implementation in practice, are not in any straightforward sense “Buddhist,” much less “Theravādan.” These latter terms are meant to signify some sort of allegiance to the Pāli Vinaya and its Mahāvihārin commentaries. Although these literatures were deeply influential, Southeast Asian historical discourses of Buddhism and Law, and indeed even “Buddhist law” in its strongest definition as Vinaya, must be approached as works-in-progress, as contingent convergences, effects of an ongoing dialogue between legists and changing textual, intellectual, and religio-political horizons. This article examines laws governing the inheritance of monastic property and discourse about such law, expressed in the two principle vernacular and Pāli genres of written law in circulation in seventeenth-century Burma: Vinaya and dhammasattha. Calling into question any strict divide between lay and monastic legal spheres, it shows that monastic inheritance did not fall under the exclusive jurisdiction of Vinaya, and also that Vinaya laws regulating monastic partition were appropriated by dhammasattha for application to the lay community. The former point underscores the need to historicize Vinaya practice and theory as part of broader legal-textual cultures. The latter point addresses the degree to which Vinaya might serve as a source of non-monastic law in Southeast Asia.
Tibet is distinct within the Buddhist regions of Asia for its claims to have developed religious laws. The rulers of its early empire civilized their people by creating laws on the basis of Buddhist principles—or so it is claimed by the writers of Tibetan historical narratives. In fact, the earliest Tibetan laws were not linked in any significant way with Buddhist principles, even after the religion had been firmly established in the region. In this article I explore why and how the idea of Buddhist law first emerged, examining its development through a number of texts from the empire (sixth to ninth centuries) and the immediate postimperial period (tenth to twelfth centuries). It turns out that more ideological accounts of Buddhist law were developed only as the structures of the empire were collapsing. Nevertheless, they do seem to have resonated with at least one, tenth-century ruler. These narratives set the scene for a long series of historical accounts in which the idea that Tibetan law was based on Buddhist principles took hold—an idea that was maintained well into the twentieth century.
As the first comprehensive study of Buddhism and law in Asia, this interdisciplinary volume challenges the concept of Buddhism as an apolitical religion without implications for law. Buddhism and Law draws on the expertise of the foremost scholars in Buddhist studies and in law to trace the legal aspects of the religion from the time of the Buddha to the present. In some cases, Buddhism provided the crucial architecture for legal ideologies and secular law codes, while in other cases it had to contend with a pre-existing legal system, to which it added a new layer of complexity. The wide-ranging studies in this book reveal a diversity of relationships between Buddhist monastic codes and secular legal systems in terms of substantive rules, factoring, and ritual practices. This volume will be an essential resource for all students and teachers in Buddhist studies, law and religion, and comparative law.
The ’ go ba'i lha – usually translated with “personal protective deities” – are often approached as an integral part of Tibetan popular or folk religion. Typically five in number, these gods are said to be born with an individual, to reside in his or her body, and to protect various facets of his or her existence. As for the etymology of ’ go ba'i lha , while “protective deities” is the dominant translation, it remains a highly communicative and contextual gloss of ’ go , whose attested meanings do not include “to protect”. The present contribution offers a new analysis of the verb ’ go based on attestations in Old Tibetan texts from Dunhuang from the ninth and tenth centuries. In doing so, the article not only proposes a new etymology of ’ go ba'i lha , but also touches on the changing relationship between Tibetans and their gods over time.
Introduction How do we understand the contexts within which notions of law were developed in early Buddhism? We first need to localize early Buddhism within the geography of the Indian subcontinent. We can then turn to traditions of codification that were in dialogue with one another, remembering that Buddhism was not an isolated phenomenon. Next we will contextualize these traditions in terms of the key economic, political, and social developments that characterized the region at the time. Historians attempting to reconstruct the milieu of early Buddhism have drawn on a variety of sources. These include texts considered to be part of the early Buddhist Pāli canon, later Vedic and post-Vedic Brahmanical works in Sanskrit, as well as a range of archeological evidence. The latter includes finds from explorations and excavations at sites associated with early Buddhism and elsewhere, along with some of the earliest inscribed material. Not all the sources tell the same story, nor have scholars approached them with the same sets of questions. Consequently, our understanding is fragmentary in more ways than one. This is a limitation that we need to acknowledge at the very outset.
Introduction The study of the relationship between Buddhism and law in Japan has developed only in the twentieth century. The pioneering work of scholars like Miura Hiroyuki and, especially, Hosokawa Kameichi, attempted to understand Japanese Buddhism within larger historical contexts, but it was not until recently that more extensive examination was undertaken. Given the limited amount of existing scholarship, the lengthy span of Japanese history, and the restrictions of space, this overview is primarily concerned with the developing relationship between Buddhism and law in the medieval era (ca. 950–ca. 1600 CE), providing only a brief consideration of the other historical periods. Buddhism and Law in Early Japan The Ritsuryō code of 718, patterned partially on Tang legal codes, issued a set of specific guidelines for the behavior of Buddhist monks and nuns in its seventh section entitled “Laws for Monks and Nuns” (sōniryō). While prohibiting acts not directly discussed by the Buddhist precepts, such as military training or action, the code also clearly intersected at points with the Vinaya, such as subjecting those who make false claims of enlightenment to civil law. In each temple, three monk administrators (sangō) were to keep the monastic register and oversee any changes in status, such as a monk’s or nun’s decision to return to lay life as well as other petitions, most of which required record keeping and government notification; they were, moreover, required to mete out the punishment for infractions – typically, labor on monastery grounds.
Introduction Law relating to Buddhism in the last period of imperial rule in China embodied much of the legal fabric of earlier periods and, with its unambiguous emphasis on the state control of religion, foreshadowed future legal developments in the Republican and Communist periods. The present chapter surveys the main features of law relating to Buddhism from the Qing Dynasty (1644–1911) through the subsequent era of the Republic of China (1911–49) to the People’s Republic of China (1949 to the present day). The Qing state sought to contain and control both Buddhism and Daoism through a statutory framework, the Penal Statutes and Sub-statutes of the Great Qing (Da Qing lü, hereafter Qing Code), which was largely inherited from the Ming Dynasty. Adopted in 1646, the Qing made only minor changes to their predecessors’ code and added some sub-statutes. Additionally, a number of administrative decrees and orders were published either in the vast and elaborate Qing Administrative Code or in the departmental rules of the Six Boards, particularly those that were concerned with Buddhism, namely the Boards of Civil Office, Revenue, Rites, and Punishments.
Introduction This chapter explicates an act of monastic regulation recorded in stone by a powerful Sri Lankan Buddhist king, Parākramabāhu I (1153–86). Stone inscriptions like this one (and parallel incised metal and palm-leaf texts) exemplified the shared form of legal declarations throughout premodern Sri Lanka and much of South Asia. They typically open with an invocation championing the political legitimacy and religious outlook of the responsible monarch or other official, proceed with an operative portion detailing the background and specific political-legal act each concerns, and conclude with an enforcement clause, and aspiration for success. Thousands of such documents still exist today as a major source for the study of premodern South Asian law. In form, King Parākramabāhu I’s inscription is typical of such documents. It invokes the king’s royal splendor and Buddhist ideology, proceeds with the regulations themselves, and concludes with enforcement clauses (although not, in this record, a final aspiration). Yet this was not just any inscription. As detailed below, this inscription enacted momentous changes in the Sri Lankan religious community of Parākramabāhu’s day and gave birth to a regulatory genre that lasted for hundreds of years. The inscription broadcasts its own significance: It is incised on a 13ʹ 3ʹʹ × 9ʹ 9ʹʹ rectangular rock face in the center of Parākramabāhu’s most famous monument, called Gal Vihāra (“Rock Monastery”), flanked on either side by colossal Buddha images exquisitely carved from a single rock outcropping fifty-six meters long.
Introduction This chapter provides a brief overview of the relationship between Buddhism and law in Korea from transmission in the fourth century CE through the change of dynasties at the turn of the fourteenth century. Given the wide scope of time and the dearth of previous scholarship on this subject, this chapter can do little more than sketch the broad contours of the multifarious ways that Buddhist ideas, texts, institutions, and individuals intersected and interacted with secular law in Korean history. It begins with a consideration of the initial patterns in the transmission of Buddhism and written law to Korea, which roughly coincided, and then examines different aspects of their interconnections as the relationship developed over time. Although Buddhism and law were closely intertwined through much of this period, distinctions were gradually drawn between them leading to greater divergences and the increasing subordination of the former to the latter. Political changes in the late fourteenth century produced an onslaught of laws and legal measures designed to strip the monastic community of much of its property, rights, prestige, and power. The evidence suggests, however, that from a Buddhism and law perspective, the legal tools needed to suppress and marginalize monastic institutions had already been put in place much earlier. In other words, the radical reorientation in saṅgha-state relations at this time did not alter the fundamental structure of the relationship between Buddhism and law, although it did substantially change its character. This suggests that, while the relationship of Buddhism to law was closely related to the relationship of Buddhism to the state, the two were neither identical nor interchangeable.
Some edited volumes are self-explanatory and others need a substantial introduction to the material; the latter is the case with this volume. While the title is intriguing, many readers will need a guidebook to explain much of what they are encountering here. And it is well worth the effort as the material is some of the most exciting and unorthodox both on legal systems and in Buddhist Studies. Therefore, the task of this introduction to the volume is to provide readers with a road map to define the object of study, and to offer ways to think about the field of Buddhism and Law. This introduction is divided into three main sections: Buddhism, Law, and Buddhism and Law. The first, Buddhism, presents a brief account of the life of the Buddha before turning to an examination of dharma, a fundamental term in Buddhism that has long been translated as law. A discussion of Buddhist monasticism and some of the misconceptions that have surrounded the place of the monastic community in society comes next, followed by a consideration of the Vinaya, the canonical Buddhist law codes that have served to regulate the religious life of Buddhist monasteries. Buddhist traditions also possess a wealth of other legal texts and materials, most of which reflect attempts to devise supplementary rules and regulations that fit local conditions, and these are introduced last.
The early Tibetans belonged to the Central Eurasian Culture Complex and had a feudal hierarchical society focused on the btsanpo (“emperor”). By around 600 ce they had built a large state that included much of the southern and eastern parts of the Tibetan Plateau, and by the mid-7th century were a world power. For two centuries they contested control of Central Asia with the Tang Chinese, the Turks, and the Arabs. At their height in the late 8th century they ruled over a vast territory stretching from the Ordos to Afghanistan and from the southern Tian Shan (T'ien Shan) to the lower Himalayas. They adopted Buddhism from their neighbors and developed a literate Buddhist civilization. The empire collapsed at the same time as most of the other empires of the early Middle Ages, for the same economic reasons.
Revue d’Etudes Tibétaines Number 15, November 2008
The Tibetans inherited from India a complex array of tantric meditative and ritual practices, which they in turn systematized. That led to the development of a number of influential formulations of the tantric path, which are central elements of Tibetan Buddhism. The tantric traditions of Buddhist practice arose in India in a Mahāyāna Buddhist framework, and they inherited the rich tradition of Mahāyāna speculation on the path to awakening. The most influential presentation of the Mahāyāna path in Tibet is Atisa's Lamp for the Path to Awakening (Bodhipathapradīpa). Tibetan Buddhists interested in undertaking spiritual practice are instructed to first engage in “preliminary practices” (sngon ‘gro), which is followed by the advanced stage of practice involving the very complex visualization practices known as “deity yoga” (lha’i rnal ‘byor).
ResearchGate has not been able to resolve any references for this publication.