Table of Contents
- WORKSHOP > CFA Doctoral school: “Chinese Writing
and Lexicography in Medieval China”
- Announcing the publication of Buddhism, Law & Society,
Vol. 2 – 2016-2017
WORKSHOP
> CFA Doctoral school: “Chinese Writing and Lexicography in Medieval China”
by Ben Van
We are pleased to announce the
following Doctoral School at Ghent University: “Chinese Writing and
Lexicography in Medieval China.”Date: October 8th – 12th, 2018
Venue: Het Pand (Ghent University)
Description:
This Doctoral School (DS) will focus on several key questions concerning medieval Chinese writing practices and manuscript culture, in addition to providing an introduction to important historical lexicographical material. Part 1 (three days) will be taught by the main instructor of the DS, Imre Galambos (Cambridge University). Several aspects of medieval Chinese writing and manuscript production will receive special attention, with a focus on Dunhuang manuscripts. Part 2 (two days) will be taught by Christoph Anderl (Ghent University), dealing with historical lexicographical material.
Thanks to the generous support of the Tianzhu foundation, we are pleased to award up to 800 Euros in travel remuneration for 5 International PhD students. This money can be used for travel or accommodation costs. To apply for this travel grant, please send a one-page cover letter and your CV to Christoph.anderl@ugent.be. The selected candidates will be notified by August 1st, 2018.
Tentative schedule
Monday, October 8th
09:30: Welcome of the participants by the Doctoral School organizers (Christoph
Anderl, Ann Heirman)
* 10:00 – 12:00: General introduction to Chinese writing (Imre Galambos)
12:00 – 13:30: lunch break
13:30 – 15:00: Introduction: Aspects of writing practices in Dunhuang
manuscripts (Imre Galambos)
15:15 – 16:45: Dunhuang manuscripts containing writing exercises / “schooling”
manuscripts (Imre Galambos)
Tuesday, October 9th
10:00 – 12:00: Outside influences in Chinese writing (Imre Galambos)
12:00 – 13:30: lunch break
13:30 – 15:30: Segmentation and presentation of Chinese texts / text readings
(Imre Galambos)
Wednesday, October 10th
10:00 – 13:00: Aspects of “standard and variation” (Imre Galambos)
13:00 – 14:00: lunch break
14:00 – 17:00 Discussion / meetings with students, Q+A / presentation of a
selection of PhD projects on writing (Imre Galambos, Christoph Anderl)
Thursday, October 11th
* 10:00 – 12:00: Chinese medieval lexicography: An introduction / presentation
of the Ghent Database of Medieval Chinese Texts (Christoph Anderl)
12:00 – 13:30: lunch break
13:30 – 15:30: The structure and contents of the 10th century “Buddhist”
dictionary Longkan shoujing (Christoph Anderl)
Friday, October 12th
* 10:00 – 12:00: Reading of selected passages of the LKSJ (Christoph Anderl)
12:00 – 13:30: lunch break
13:30 – 15:00: Phonophoric elements in the classification system of LKSJ
(Christoph Anderl)
15:15 – 17:00: Final discussions with students / short presentations of PhD
researcher projects (Christoph Anderl, Ann Heirman)
* Lectures also suitable for a more general audience
Announcing
the publication of Buddhism, Law & Society, Vol. 2 – 2016-2017
by Rebecca Redwood French
We are pleased to announce the publication of the second
volume of Buddhism, Law & Society
VOLUME 2 – 2016-2017
CONTENTS
Rebecca
Redwood French – Editor's Introduction
Jens W.
Borgland – “Undetermined Matters: On the Use of Lay Witnesses in
Buddhist Monastic Procedural Law”
This
paper investigates one aspect of Buddhist monastic procedural law set forth in
the aniyata (“undetermined”) section of the Prātimokṣa/Vibhaṅgas of the extant
monastic law codes (vinaya). Here we find rules concerning how to handle cases
in which a monk is accused by a trustworthy female lay follower (upāsikā) of
having stayed alone in a secluded place with a woman. These rules have hitherto
received comparatively little study, most of which has focused on the
(Theravāda) Pāli vinaya. By examining the aniyata rules and their canonical
commentaries in all six extant vinayas, I show that the treatment of these
rules in the Pāli vinaya is not representative of Buddhist monastic law in
general, and that the commonly held notion that any punitive legal action taken
against a monk at the very least requires that he acknowledge the act, if not
the offense with which he stands accused, is in need of revision. This paper
further shows that there are significant differences between the Tibetan and
Chinese translations of the Vibhaṅga of the Mūlasarvāstivāda vinaya (MSV), and
so contributes to recent investigations into multiple MSV traditions. It also
discusses some differences and similarities between the different vinayas,
especially common elements between the Sarvāstivāda, Mūlasarvāstivāda and
Mahāsāṃghika vinayas.
Vesna
A. Wallace – “The Interface of Mongolian Nomadic Culture, Law and
Monastic Sexual Morality”
In
traditional Mongolian nomadic society, which had its own culturally embedded
dimensions of sexuality and highly flexible rules regulating social life, the
monastic institutionalization of sexuality was a long process that has been met
with resistance to this day. Mongolian Buddhists’ lenient attitude toward
sexual desire also found its support in the Buddhist tantric teachings, as it
has been often pointed out by contemporary monks in Mongolia in their response
to the critics of their sexual conduct. A study of various laws instituted in
Mongolia from the seventeenth to the early twentieth centuries reveals a
variety of ways in which different governing bodies sought to negotiate the
problem of monks’ sexual misconduct through their prohibitive and penal
measures.
Richard
W. Whitecross – “Of Texts and Drama: Delivering Justice in Bhutan”
This
paper presents a short history of the development of legal texts in Bhutan with
some analysis of how the later texts reflect the globalized language of the
rule of law refracted through recent attempts to anchor and legitimize
Bhutanese court process with cultural imagery. It then moves to a discussion of
religious cultural imagery and its recent fascinating use in the legal system, a
change that has occurred in just the last twenty years. This imagery in the
form of huge masks in the courtrooms comes from a key drama enacted throughout
Bhutan at the annual tshechu (religious festivals) depicting the judgement of
the dead by Yama, Lord of the Dead. The paper argues that the role and meaning
of religious belief and its presence in the judicial sphere needs to be
examined and re-examined in each context for its presence and use. Building on
Brown (2015) the paper argues that we need to consider the different worldviews
expressed in different periods, as reflected in the texts examined, when we
consider the complex interrelationship between Buddhism and law in Bhutan.
Petra
Kieffer-Pülz – “Translocal Debates and Legal Hermeneutics: Early Pāli
Vinaya Texts in the Adjudication of Sīmā Procedures, c. 1200–1900 CE.”
From
the 5th/6th c. ce onwards Vinaya condensations replaced the study of the
monastic law code (Vinaya) and its commentary, the Samantapāsādikā, in the
daily curriculum of the monks of the Theravāda tradition in present-day Sri
Lanka. Directives in the royal ordinances (katikāvata) of Lanka dating from the
12th/13th and 18th c. ce regarding the texts to be memorized by young monks
show that, in addition to the condensations, the katikāvatas themselves were an
issue in the education of the monks. Thus it seems that the Vinaya and its
commentary were pushed into the background. In the present contribution I try
to show that this attitude in daily life does not reflect the situation in
crises of the Buddhist community, when it becomes necessary to prove specific
issues by authoritative statements. In such cases the most authoritative
source, that is, the monastic law code which is considered the “Word of the
Buddha,” the fully Enlightened One, by tradition, came into play again,
together with the commentary considered to include the information from the
earliest commentaries that as it was understood were included already in the
1st saṅgīti. In two challenging legal disputes concerning Buddhist monastic
boundaries (sīmā) I will show that in the attempt to solve the legal disputes,
the monastic law code and its commentary served as the last resort.
Ann
Heirman – “Withdrawal from the Monastic Community and
Re-ordination of Former Monastics in the Dharmaguptaka Tradition”
At the
apex of Buddhist monasticism are its fully ordained members—Buddhist monks
(bhikṣu) and nuns (bhikṣuṇī). The texts on monastic discipline (vinayas)
indicate that some monks and nuns, at certain points in their lives, may choose
to withdraw from the saṃgha (monastic community). The vinaya texts from every
tradition attempt to regulate such decisions, as well as the re-ordination of
former monastics. In this paper, I focus on the Dharmaguptaka tradition, the
vinaya of which has become standard in China and neighboring regions. My
intention is to answer intriguing questions raised by Petra Kieffer-Pülz in her
study on the re-ordination of nuns in the Theravāda tradition, which appeared
in the first volume of this journal (2015–2016): which options are available to
monks and nuns who wish to withdraw from the monastic community; and is it
possible for them to gain readmission to the saṃgha? I also address a third
question: what does this imply for the Dharmaguptaka tradition? My research
focuses on the Dharmaguptaka vinaya, and on the commentaries of the most
prominent Chinese vinaya master, Daoxuan (596–667 ce), whose work lies at the
heart of standard—and contemporary—understanding of vinayas in China.
Shayne
Clarke – “The Unique Nature of the Mūlasarvāstivādin Law Code
for Nuns”
On the
basis of an examination of twenty-seven textual witnesses of the section on
nuns’ conduct (Bhikṣuṇī-vinayavibhaṅga) in the monastic law code (Vinaya) of
the influential north Indian Buddhist school known as the Mūlasarvāstivāda
(Mūlasarvāstivāda-vinaya), I argue that a distinct Bhutanese recension is
discernible. Found in six of the twenty-seven witnesses—sTog and Shey Palace
manuscripts, and four Bhutanese manuscripts (Chizhi, Dongkarla, Gangteng, and
Neyphug)—this recension resolves many of the inconsistencies present in the
most commonly consulted editions of the Tibetan translation of the Bhikṣuṇī-vinayavibhaṅga.
The discrepancies between these two recensions are of considerable interest
and importance given that these recensions differ significantly in terms of the
presence and absence of certain rules, frame stories, and legal analyses for
nuns.
The
present article is divided into eight sections. In the first section, I discuss
a number of characteristics that make the Mūlasarvāstivāda-vinaya unique among
the corpus of extant Buddhist monastic law codes: its linguistic diversity, the
sheer volume of canonical texts, the enormous number of commentarial treatises,
and the sometimes seemingly insurmountable philological challenges. In the
second section, I provide a brief overview of the corpus of canonical Tibetan
Buddhist texts devoted to rules for nuns (Bhikṣuṇī-vinayavibhaṅga, Bhikṣuṇī-prātimokṣa,
and Ārya-sarvāstivādi-mūla-bhikṣuṇī-prātimokṣa-sūtra-vṛtti). Here too I discuss
the unique position of the Mūlasarvāstivāda-vinaya as the only monastic law
code preserving frame stories and canonical legal analyses—word-commentaries,
casuistries, exception clauses, and discussion of mitigating and aggravating
factors—for nuns’ rules which are common to both female and male monastic
orders. I also briefly discuss the unique situation of the lack of
correspondence between the Tibetan Bhikṣuṇī-vinayavibhaṅga and the Bhikṣuṇī-prātimokṣa,
first noted by the Tibetan polymath Bu sTon rin chen grub (1290–1364).
In the
third section, I outline the sources used in the present study, and discuss
their historical relationships. In the fourth section, I provide an overview of
the idiosyncratic numbering system employed in the Tibetan Bhikṣuṇī-vinayavibhaṅga.
I also outline one of the key inconsistencies in this text: the fact that the
section said to contain 180 pāyantikā rules for nuns contains considerably more
than the stated number. In the fifth section, I cite a number of examples of
differences between what are ostensibly the same rules in the Tibetan Bhikṣuṇī-vinayavibhaṅga
and the Tibetan Bhikṣuṇī-prātimokṣa. In the sixth section, I examine a number
of irregularities related to the 72 shared pāyantikā rules for monks and nuns
in order to demonstrate the existence of a distinct Bhutanese recension, one
which is considerably closer to the normative Mūlasarvāstivādin tradition of
the Indian disciplinarian Guṇaprabha (c. 5th–7th cents.) than the text found in
other manuscripts and xylographs that are regularly consulted in the study of
Indian and Tibetan female monasticism. The conclusion (seventh section) is
followed by an Appendix (eighth section) listing details of the twenty-seven
witnesses of the Tibetan Bhikṣuṇī-vinayavibhaṅga surveyed herein.
CALL
FOR PAPERS
Buddhism,
Law & Society is the first interdisciplinary academic journal to focus
on relationship between Buddhism, law, and society. The scope of the journal is
broad. Buddhism and its many social and legal manifestations are a central area
of interest for the journal, as are the state’s legal relations to Buddhist
actors, institutions and texts. We invite articles on jurisprudence,
philosophy, procedure, local community practices, ethics, and social sanctions,
both historical and contemporary, as they relate to Buddhism and law in society
in Asian and global contexts. The journal welcomes submissions from legal
practitioners as well as academics in a wide variety of disciplines in the Humanities,
Social Sciences and Law and will consider publishing panels of papers from
conferences, geographically specific areas, festschrifts and symposia. Articles
are published electronically on a rolling basis and compiled into a print
volume at the end of each year.
For
more information, visit the journal website: http://www.law.buffalo.edu/beyond/journals/buddhism.html.
Or,
email us:
Josh
Coene, Managing Editor, editor@buddhismandlaw.org;
Petra
Kieffer-Pülz, Articles Editor, kiepue@t-online.de;
Rebecca
R. French, Editor, rrfrench@buffalo.edu.
Rebecca
Redwood French
School
of Law, SUNY BUffalo
Back to topPlease help
us keep H-Net free and accessible. $25 from each of our subscribers would fund
H-Net for two years. Click here
to make a tax-deductible donation online.
