Chöd (gcod), “severance” or “cutting,” is a Tibetan term referring to a cycle of Tibetan Buddhist practice and to the lineage initiated by the Tibetan woman Machik Lapdrön sometime in the 11th or 12th century. It is primarily based on the teachings of the perfection of wisdom (prajñāpāramitā) that represent the second phase of Buddhist texts that developed in India. In Tibet itself, Chöd was one of the many new sects that flourished in the second dissemination of Buddhism from India from 950 to 1350ce. Chöd has been classified as a branch of Zhijé (zhi byed) or “Pacification,” one of the eight great practice lineages that trace back to India, though no actual text on Chöd has been discovered in the early texts of Zhijé. Despite this quandary, its classification has afforded a kind of validation in being connected with the sources of Buddhism through the Indian master Dampa Sangyé.
Nevertheless, there is no doubt that Machik Lapdrön herself is the sole progenitor for the teachings and the lineage. This woman from the area of Lap in central Tibet was known as Lapkyi Drönma, “the Light of Lap.” The respectful title of Machik, “One Mother,” was added later and is shared with several other important women of the time, often leading to confusion. Lapdrön showed remarkable abilities from an early age, and later gained mastery of speed reading. This led to a job as a chaplain in a patron’s house, where she met her future partner, providing her biographers with a fascinating narrative revealing the problematic status of female masters in Tibet. The recitation of prajñāpāramitā sūtras also led to her epiphany around the parts on māra, “devil,” “demon,” or (spiritual) “death.” This, along with her visions of the bodhisattva Tārā and the important connection with the Indian master Dampa Sangyé, were the inspiration for what became one of the most widespread practices in Tibet.
The early Chöd teachings represent aspects derived from both sūtra and tantra sources. The focus is on the understanding of emptiness that severs fixation on the reification of the self and the resultant conduct based on compassion for others. The impediments that prevent such realization, called māras in Sanskrit, were a point of departure. As time went on, specific techniques and methods of practice (sādhana) accrued to this philosophy. While the main practice has remained the cultivation of insight and the enactment of separating the consciousness from the body, the post-meditation practice known as lü jin (lus byin) “giving the body” developed elaborate visualizations and ritual accouterments that came to dominate popular practice. Renowned as a charnel ground practice due to the visualized offering of one’s corpse as food for demons and other beings in situations that are intended to provoke fear, it is this that has become known far and wide as Chöd. The sources for this aspect are obscure and may well come from the surrounding culture of the Tibetan plateau, harking back to Bön and other pre-Buddhist practices. Some elements associated with shamanic practices are enacted in the Chöd rituals, despite its Buddhist soteriological assertions.
With its beautiful melodies and lurid visualizations, Chöd quickly became popular in Tibet for exorcism, healing, and other practical usages. Its followers did not establish monasteries, as the lifestyle of roaming mendicants was emphasized, but Chöd was incorporated into most other schools in Tibet. Their liturgies are drawn from the works of Lapdrön’s descendants, or from visionary experiences, or found as treasure texts (terma). As of the early 21st century, Chöd has gained popularity worldwide, with many iterations in 21st-century practice.
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Article
Kendall Marchman
Fo Guang Shan is a transnational Buddhist organization that rose to prominence in the late 20th century. Founded in 1967 by the charismatic monk Hsing Yun, who remains the face of the organization, Fo Guang Shan’s main temple and headquarters are in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. The temple has become a major tourist attraction that welcomes millions of visitors annually. Starting in the 1980s, Fo Guang Shan began building other large branch temples around the world, the first of which is Hsi Lai Temple in Hacienda Heights, California. Hsi Lai Temple, like the main Fo Guang Shan campus, has become a popular tourist destination. Fo Guang Shan, Hsi Lai Temple, and the other branches serve their communities with regular services, retreats, festivals, and youth programming that promote Buddhism as well as traditional Chinese culture. The rise of Fo Guang Shan and other Buddhist organizations in Taiwan occurred alongside the economic rise of Taiwan and its citizens. As it continued to grow, the organization developed its own schools and universities, a television station, and a publishing house in order to further spread the teachings of the Buddha.
Article
Michael H. Fisher
The history of the Mughal Empire (1526–1858) reveals much of the diversity among Muslims and the complexity of Islam as variously envisioned and as practiced in India. The empire’s ruling Timurid dynasty was patrilineally Sunni; many of its original core supporters were also Sunni immigrants or descendants of immigrants from Central Asia, especially Turks and Mongols. But Mughal emperors married women from families who were Shiʿites or who either converted to Islam in India or remained Hindus; similarly, the imperial army and administration also broadened its composition to include such families. Each individual emperor developed his own religious ideology, including Sunni, Sufistic, strongly influenced by Shiʿism, and eclectically drawing upon diverse Islamic and non-Islamic Indic traditions (i.e., Hindu devotional bhakti, Zoroastrianism, Jainism). Roughly a quarter of the Mughal dynasty’s subjects were Muslim, but these also followed an array of diverse Islamic ideologies and social and religious practices (many functioning much like “castes”). Conversely, many non-Muslim officials and subjects of the dynasty adapted its Persianate patterns of culture and belief. Over the 16th and 17th centuries, the Mughal dynasty conquered most of the Indian subcontinent (except the southern tip of the peninsula), but then its empire fragmented over the 18th and early 19th centuries. Evidence for the variety of Islamic expressions within the Mughal Empire comes from many types of sources. Imperial officials, accountants, and scribes compiled Persian-language records in detail, extent, and preservation that exceeded previous states in India. Emperors, courtiers, and authors whom they patronized created sophisticated works of history and literature that described events, rituals, and values, using Persian and also Sanskrit and regional Indian languages. Additionally, various types of material evidence have survived—including architecture, paintings, coins, weapons, and clothing—that display the dynasty’s religious expressions, values, and technologies. Muslim and Christian visitors from Central and Western Asia and Europe also wrote down their observations and assessments while traveling to the imperial court or through the Empire’s provinces. The relationships between Islamic beliefs and practices and the Mughal Empire that travelers, commentators, and historians noted and evaluated varied over time.
Article
Paul B. Donnelly
Along with Yogācāra, Madhyamaka (Middle Way) is one of the two foundational doctrinal systems of Indian Mahāyāna Buddhism, which flourished from the 3rd century ce to the final disappearance of Buddhism from the subcontinent in the 12th–13th centuries. Beginning in the 4th century, it spread to East Asia, where it became the foundation of an independent school of thought and influenced the other major Chinese Buddhist schools. It took root in Tibet beginning in the 7th century, where it served as the cornerstone of all the scholastically inclined Buddhist sects. Throughout the Mahāyāna Buddhist world, Madhyamaka has occupied a foundational position in doctrinal formulations and practices. Madhyamaka has tended to be regarded as either the supreme formulation of Mahāyāna thought, as was often the case in Tibet, or as complementary to Yogācāra, which was more commonly held in China and Japan.
The name “Middle Way” references a fundamental assumption in Buddhism that stakes a middle position between the idea that the self is an irreducible, enduring entity and one in which it is wholly reducible to the physical body and perishes after death. Though central Madhyamaka ideas, such as the doctrine of the Two Truths, Dependent Origination, and Emptiness, can be found in Nikāya Buddhism and in Mahāyāna sutras, it is in the treatises of Nāgārjuna (2nd–3rd centuries ce) that we have a fully formed and distinct system of thought that can be called Madhyamaka. In earlier canonical works, and more explicitly in the Abhidharma, this notion of middle way applied exclusively to the self (Skt ātman/Pali atta) and conceptually constructed phenomena. In Mahāyāna sutras and in Nāgārjuna works, the assertion is extended to the fundamental component parts of all existents, which are declared to be empty of intrinsic nature. In Abhidharma works, the self and other composite phenomena are said to be reducible to their fundamental parts, the dharmas (Pali dhamma), which, being irreducible, must have their own identifiable intrinsic mode of existence even if they exist dependently. According to Madhyamaka, a dharma cannot possess an intrinsic nature precisely because it exists dependently. Denying any intrinsic nature, Madhyamaka asserts that things exist only dependently, and this only in terms of conventional truth, and that ultimately, emptiness of intrinsic nature is the truth and reality of all things. Not surprisingly, such a position was contentious, and numerous interpreters attempted to elucidate this rather radical position. The question of which commentator or commentators are definitive has occupied many generations of Indian, East Asian, and Tibetan Buddhists, and the issue remains very much alive in modern scholarship on Madhyamaka. Though much of this scholarship has come from a philosophical perspective, the intent of Madhyamaka, like all Buddhist thought, is primarily soteriological in nature.
Article
Clark Chilson
“Naikan” 内観 is a self-reflective form of meditation founded by Yoshimoto Ishin 吉本伊信 (1916–1988), who developed it from a lay Shin Buddhist practice called mishirabe身調べ. After Yoshimoto used it to help prisoners in the 1950s, psychiatrists in the 1960s started to use it as a psychotherapy. Today in Japan it is the most popular psychotherapeutic method that originated in Buddhism.
Naikan involves self-reflection on three questions: What have I received from a significant other? What have I given back to that person? What troubles and difficulties did I cause that person? People doing Naikan ask themselves these questions in relation to a family member or some other person during particular times in their lives.
There are two types of the practice: intensive Naikan (shūchū naikan集中内観) and daily Naikan (nichijō naikan日常内観 or bunsan naikan分散内観). The former is done continually for a week at a Naikan training center, of which there are about twenty-five in Japan and several outside Japan in Austria, Germany, and the United States. During intensive Naikan, those doing Naikan report individually eight or so times a day their answers to the three questions to an “interviewer” (mensetsusha面接者). Daily Naikan is done as part of a person’s everyday normal routine for as short as a few minutes or as long as two hours a day. Intensive or daily Naikan is offered as a therapy at about twenty medical institutions in Japan and another fifteen in China.
Intensive Naikan is commonly done for one of four reasons. First, it is done to solve a specific problem, such as alcoholism, gambling addiction, a psychosomatic disorder, or a bad relationship with a family member. Second, it is used to train employees so they can interact better with customers and colleagues. The Toyoko Inn, for example, which has over 230 hotels throughout Japan, requires all its full-time employees to do intensive Naikan. Third, it cultivates greater self-awareness with regard to, for example, how our minds work. Finally, it is done to discover the true nature of our lives through a spiritual awakening, which commonly entails the realization of how we live due to the care of others and how we suffer because of our own self-centeredness. This final purpose is in accordance with Yoshimoto’s view of Naikan as a method for learning how to live happily regardless of one’s life circumstances. Those who do Naikan for non-psychotherapeutic purposes sometimes use the term “Naikanhō” 内観法 (Naikan method) to distinguish their aims from Naikan therapy (Naikan ryōhō) 内観療法, which is used to solve a particular problem. But regardless of whether Naikan is done for self-developmental, spiritual, or for therapeutic reasons, the Naikan method of reflecting on the three Naikan questions is the same.
Article
The Indian Buddhist philosophers Dignāga (c. 480–540 ce) and Dharmakīrti (c. 600–660 ce) decisively influenced the course not only of Buddhist philosophy, but of Indian philosophy more generally. Having inherited an earlier philosophical tradition (the one advanced in the Buddhist Abhidharma literature) that had been largely intramural in character, Dignāga and Dharmakīrti fundamentally transformed Buddhist philosophy by advancing basically similar commitments with arguments meant to be persuasive across party lines. In doing this, they influentially theorized a family of concepts largely shared by all Indian philosophers writing in Sanskrit—a family centering on the concept of pramāṇa, which denotes a reliable way of knowing or epistemic “criterion” (as one might translate the word)—in ways that facilitated an unprecedented extent of debate among Indian philosophers of all sorts. The resultant growth in the sophistication of philosophical traditions is one of the most salient features of the mature period of classical Indian philosophy. Though there are significant differences between them, Dignāga and Dharmakīrti commonly argued in terms of a broadly empiricist sort of epistemology; this was advantageous insofar as that involves premises to which they might readily win assent, while nonetheless being conducive to the philosophical idealism they both finally upheld. Committed as they were to the basically empiricist notion that only perceptibles are finally real, both thinkers affirmed versions of the innovative sort of nominalism first introduced by Dignāga (and significantly revised by Dharmakīrti): the elusive apoha (“exclusion”) theory of meaning, which represents one of the Buddhist tradition’s signal contributions to the history of Indian philosophy. While some of Dignāga’s works were translated into Chinese and thus became influential in East Asia, none of Dharmakīrti’s was; in both India and Tibet, however, Dharmakīrti effectively eclipsed his predecessor. For generations of subsequent Indian philosophers, Dharmakīrti practically epitomized “the Buddhist position” in matters philosophical, and his works figure to this day as central to most Tibetan monastic curricula.
Article
Georgios Halkias
Buddhist literature in India and Tibet abounds with literal and allegorical references to terrestrial, celestial, and transcendent realms. Of all celestial dwellings cast along Buddhist lines, the pure land Sukhāvatī holds a prominent place in the religious, cultural, and national imagination of the Tibetans. Many centuries before the first imperially sponsored Sanskrit to Tibetan translations of the long and short Sukhāvatīvyūha sutras, Buddha Amitābha and his western abode Sukhāvatī made headway in the cosmopolitan region of greater Gandhāra. Active in the northwest of the Indian subcontinent he emerged as an influential solar deity with his own paradise in Buddhist monastic circles and enjoyed unprecedented success in his subsequent transmigration to East and Central Asia and across the Tibetan plateau.
Notwithstanding a Mahāyāna theological reading of Amitābha and his Pure Land, heliocentric metaphors and symbols informed Mahāyāna Buddhism in its encounters with Eurasian solar cults celebrating the vital force of the sun and its metaphorical transition into a spiritual life triumphing over darkness and death. Ritual invocations and creative visualizations of Amitābha-Amitāyus are noticeable in Indian Vajrayāna scriptures imported to Tibet during the postimperial transmission of Buddhism. This second wave of religious assimilation coincides with Amitābha rising to a position of retroactive primacy and exclusivity in narratives concerning Tibet’s conversion to Buddhism and in ancestral myths of the Tibetan race rescued, through his divine emissary Avalokiteśvara, from indigenous forces of malignancy. His overstated presence in Tibetan mythopoiesis bears witness to various soteriological instantiations and expressions of worship in religious art and esoteric registers. In his dual function as the lord of infinite light (Amitābha) and infinite life (Amitāyus), this Mahāyāna deity absorbed functions that had previously been attributed to a range of divinities. Over time, Amitābha and his celestial field inspired a distinct genre of Tibetan pure land literature, the demön, comprising for the most part aspirational prayers for rebirth in Sukhāvatī and tributes to his extraordinary salvific powers. Under the guise of attaining rebirth in the pure land, these popular supplications of devotional nature were supplemented by substantive commentaries elaborating on Mahāyāna practices and doctrines. Hence, the demön came to encompass a wide range of exoteric and esoteric scriptures including funereal rites, tantric rituals for extending life, and meditation manuals derived from visionary kratophanies of the deity. Sukhāvatī inspired a number of ontological possibilities, corporeal, incorporeal, and subtle interpretations derived from the pure land sutras, the tantras, and the revealed scriptures of the Nyingma school. The fusion of devotional praises, faith-based aspirations, and esoteric subtle-body practices had a profound effect in the soteriological formulation of the pure land in Tibet conceptualized simultaneously as an external after-death destination, an interiorized place of the subtle-body infrastructure culminating in the Vajrayāna practice of mind transference to the pure land, and as a sublimated state representing the immutable nature of the awakened mind.
Article
Bee Scherer
Buddhist traditions intersect with queer lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans*, intersex, queer/querying (and more) subjectivities and belongings in a multifaceted way. Queer theory (QT) can enrich Buddhist thought and practices as well as Buddhist studies by inserting a challenging method of deconstruction, troubling and resisting oppressive and harmful socioreligious scripts with regards to, and beyond, sexuality and gender. There is a nascent reception of the queering impulses within Buddhist traditions, yet QT and foundational queer theorists lack comprehensive Buddhist appraisal: Queer “dharmology” has yet to be systematically developed.
When discussing perspectives and practices regarding sexuality/ies and sex/gender in Buddhist thought and cultures, a distinct genealogy of nonheterosexual desires and sex/gender diversity emerges. Buddhist views on sexualities anchor on the psychology of desire and attachment in terms of religious philosophy and soteriology; at the social level, biopolitical regulations of Buddhist life focus on the dichotomy of celibate monastic vs. householder lay contexts. The variety of sex/gender subjectivities in Buddhist traditions include the historical stigmatized third and fourth sex/gender categories of the paṇḍaka (“gender-deficient,” usual thought of as “male-deficient”) and the ubhatobyañjanaka (“both-sexed”). However, neither category maps neatly onto contemporary queer and trans* subjectivities, leading to confusion, debate, and discretion in contemporary Buddhist cultures.
The complex picture of both surprisingly pragmatic and inclusive as well as discriminatory and hostile paradigms emerges from Buddhist thought and practices in the divergent traditions of Theravāda, East Asian Mahāyāna, Tibetan Buddhism, and in ecumenic or demi-/post-denominational forms of Buddhism and Neo-Buddhism in the Global North (“Western” Buddhism), both historically and in contemporary global-glocal-local traditions.
Queer (post)modern Buddhist subjectivities are increasingly emerging as powerful voices within constructive-critical and reflective emic modes of Buddhist thought and practice. A contemporary queer Buddhist “theology” or queer (/trans*-affirmative) dharmology can be successfully developed in a framework of five parameters: (1) reflexivity, (2) hermeneutics, (3) conceptualization, (4) signification, and (5) application. Focusing on the parameter of conceptualization, QT-immersed queer dharmology can start with the specific, “messy,” complex, contextual, ever-changing and conditioned human experiences, and interactional negotiations or be(com)ing and interbe(com)ing. A “this-worldly” (socio-saṃsāric) focus also averts the danger of spiritual bypassing and “dharma-splaining.” Instead, complex Buddhist notions such as karma and interdependence become powerful instruments of Buddhist queering, that is, challenging any normative societal script that causes suffering.
Article
Eisho Nasu
Rennyo was a Japanese Pure Land Buddhist priest and eighth head priest of Honganji (1457–1489), the central institutional complex of the Jōdo Shinshū tradition. He is often considered the “second founder” of the tradition due to his efforts in propagating the Jōdo Shinshū teachings; expanding the institution; and negotiating conflicts with the military, political, and religious authorities of the time. His prowess as an institution builder and religious teacher laid the foundations for Jōdo Shinshū to become one of the largest Buddhist denominations in Japan.
Rennyo was born as the first son of Zonnyo (1396–1457); the seventh head priest of Honganji; and was a ninth-generation descendant of Shinran (1173–1262), the founder of Jōdo Shinshū. Neither the name nor background of Rennyo’s mother is known, but it is believed that she may have been a servant attending at Honganji. When Rennyo was six years old, his mother left Honganji, perhaps because of Zonnyo’s official marriage in 1420. There are no further records of her after that time. In 1431, at the age of 17, Rennyo was ordained at Shōren-in, one of the major monzeki (noble cloister) temples of the Tendai school. Rennyo received transmission of the Jōdo Shinshū lineage from Zonnyo. At Honganji, Rennyo assisted his father’s missionary work.
In 1457, Rennyo was appointed as the eighth chief abbot of Honganji, which had been established at the mausoleum of Shinran on the outskirts of Kyoto. Under Rennyo’s leadership, Honganji began to expand its institutional reach beyond the areas surrounding the capital. However, the rapid growth of Honganji met with interference by the forces of the Tendai school on Mt. Hiei. In 1465, Honganji was destroyed by Enryakuji priests, and Rennyo was forced to retreat from Kyoto.
After leaving Kyoto, in 1471, Rennyo reestablished Honganji in the city of Yoshizaki, located on the border of Echizen and Kaga provinces (currently Fukui and Ishikawa prefectures). In order to propagate the teaching effectively to the faith communities scattered around Japan in rural areas, Rennyo wrote numerous instructional letters (ofumi, or gobunshō) in which he explained Shinran’s teaching in colloquial Japanese, and distributed six-character myōgo scrolls of Amida Buddha’s name (na-mu a-mi-da-butsu) as the main object of worship. He also reformed ritual practice by adopting the recitation of Shōshinge (The Hymns of True Faith) and Wasan (Japanese Hymns), both composed by Shinran, as a standard religious service to be performed by priests and lay followers together.
In Yoshizaki, Rennyo first put his institutional vision into practice by redeveloping the area into a religious township equipped with residences for both priests and lay followers. The town provided lodgings and other services, rapidly attracting large numbers of pilgrims mainly from the northern provinces as far away as Dewa and Ōshū (modern-day Tohoku region). His success at Yoshizaki, however, also drew him into conflicts with local religious and political authorities. In order to avoid these conflicts, he decided to leave Yoshizaki in 1475. After exploring various sites, Rennyo relocated Honganji to Yamashina, directly east of Kyoto.
Construction of the Yamashina Honganji started in 1478 and took five years to complete. The site included massive buildings of Shinran’s Memorial Hall and Amida Hall side by side, which would become the standard architectural form of the temple henceforth. Rennyo also developed the surrounding area into a jinaichō (temple-city) as he did at Yoshizaki, but on a much larger scale. In 1489, Rennyo, at the age of 75, ceded the position of head priest of Honganji to his fifth son Jitsunyo (1458–1525). Rennyo remained active in missionary work after his retirement. He directed the construction of another large temple, the Ishiyama Gobō in Settsu, Ōsaka, completed in 1497 as an outpost for further institutional expansion to the western regions.
Rennyo died in 1499 at the age of 85. His cloistered title is Shinshōin. In 1882, Emperor Meiji (1852–1912) awarded him the title of Great Master Etō (Etō Daishi).
Article
Colin Mitchell
The Safavids (1501–1722) controlled a land-based empire that comprised the modern-day nation of Iran, with extensions into Iraq, the Caucasus, and Afghanistan. The family of the Safavids originated as Sufi mystical sheikhs based in the region of Azerbaijan but were later imperialized thanks to the dynastic founder, Shah Ismaʿil (r. 1501–1524). The transition from Sufi tariqa to imperial polity was not smooth, and Ismaʿil faced external threats from the Ottoman Empire to the west, as well as internal pressure from his popular base, the Qizilbash tribal Turks who revered their shah as both a Sufi sheikh as well as a manifestation of the millenarian figure Mahdi who was popularly understood as the Muslim agent of the Apocalypse. The success of the Safavids was partly based on their ability to distance their family from such decentralized, tribal elements and seek out those constituencies that could help with regard to establishing and building legitimacy: orthodox Twelver Shiʿite jurists and scholars as well as urban Persian administrators and bureaucrats. It was Ismaʿil and his successor, Shah Tahmasp (r. 1524–1576), who proclaimed and enforced Twelver Shiʿism as the new state doctrine, thus contributing to a stark Sunni-Shiʿite division between themselves and their neighboring rival empires of the Ottomans and the Uzbeks. The apogee of the Safavid Empire took place during the reign of Shah ʿAbbas (r. 1589–1629) who, among other things, transformed Isfahan into a city of international stature with fantastic architectural patronage while at the same time enticing European merchants and traders to trade in textiles, silk, and other manufactured goods. Following the reign of Shah ʿAbbas, the Safavid Empire became less stable and more susceptible to outside elements, namely those Caucasian nobles and landed gentry who had been previously incorporated into the Safavid state as court officials, provincial governors, and ranking military officers. Concurrently, there was a rise in conservative orthodoxy among the Shiʿite religious scholars, and the previous era of open trade and strong international relations began to wane as Christians, Jews, and other minorities became increasingly targeted and persecuted. By the end of the 17th century, the Safavid court was politically isolated from the other provinces, so much so that the imperial capital was easily besieged and conquered in 1722 by an invading conglomerate of Afghan tribes.
Article
Thomas Borchert
Along with the buddha and the dharma, the sangha is one of the “three jewels,” the core aspects of Buddhism in which a Buddhist “takes refuge.” The sangha is responsible for taking care of and propagating the dharma, the teachings of the buddha. It can also be considered more broadly as the Buddhist community, which in turn can be thought of as the group of people who either take refuge in the three jewels or follow the teachings of the buddha. Given this, the sangha has generally been conceptualized in two ways. Most often, it refers to the community of men and women who have been ordained as monks and nuns under the auspices of Buddhist disciplinary teachers. At the same time, it can sometimes refer more broadly to the four-fold community of monks, nuns, laymen, and laywomen.
While the sangha may be discussed in the singular, generally speaking it is appropriate to think of sanghas in the plural. In this sense, the term refers not to an ideal community that maintains the teachings of the buddha but rather to the communal and institutional structures through which people define themselves as Buddhist and maintain their Buddhist identities. A particular sangha is revealed by interrogating the linkages (i.e., lineages) between different Buddhists, the kinds of educational structures in place to train adherents, the ways that Buddhists discipline themselves (for example, through the vinaya rules), and the ways in which external governing bodies seek to regulate Buddhist communities.
Article
K.L. Dhammajoti
Abhidharma had its origin in certain systematizing, analytical, and exegetical features found in the Sūtra, particularly, mātṛikā (summary list), abhidharma-kathā (discussion about the doctrine), vibhaṅga (“analytical exposition”), and upadeśa (exegetical elaboration). Buddhist philosophies may have been primarily initiated and vigorously elevated in the Abhidharma tradition. However, while the Abhidharma treatises undoubtedly exhibit highly developed scholastic and hermeneutical components, Abhidharma is essentially a soteriology. The Sarvāstivāda Ābhidhārmikas consistently claim that Abhidharma is truly “Buddha-word,” being the sine quo non for ascertaining the true intents of the sutras—it constitutes the ultimate authority for discerning the definite and explicit discourses (nītārtha-sūtra) of the Buddha.
Sarvāstivāda, the “All-exist School,” was undoubtedly one of the most important Buddhist schools in the period of Abhidharma Buddhism. Since its establishment around the 2nd century bce, it exerted tremendous impact, directly or indirectly, on the subsequent development of Indian Buddhism. This school possesses a complete set of seven canonical Abhidharma texts, nearly all of which are now preserved in Chinese translation, and one, the Prajñapti-śāstra, is preserved in a complete Tibetan translation. A huge compendia, The Great Abhidharma Commentary (Abhidharma-mahāvibhāṣā), whose gradual compilation must have spanned over more than half a century and was fully completed around 150 ce, is now extant only in Chinese. This compendia, encyclopedic in scope, defines the doctrinal positions of the orthodox Sarvāstivādins based in Kaśmīra, who subsequently came to be known as the Vaibhāṣikas.
The central thesis of the school is sarvāstivāda or sarvāstitā (/sarvāstitva), which claims that all “dharmas”—fundamental realities or real entities of existence—sustain their unique intrinsic natures throughout the three periods of time. That is, whether future, past, or present, a dharma’s intrinsic nature remains the same, even though its mode of existence (bhāva) varies. This thesis was vehemently challenged by the Vibhajyavādins (Distinctionists) who denied the reality of the past and future dharmas. The reverberation of this “Sarvāstivāda-versus-Vibhajyavāda” controversy can be observed to have generated decisively significant doctrinal implications throughout the history of Buddhist thoughts.
The Savāstivāda school was also known as Hetuvāda, a “school which expounds on causality.” Kātyāyanīputra (c. 150 bce), often regarded as the effective “founder” of the Sarvāstivāda school, was credited with the innovation of a theory of sixfold causes, of which the coexistent or simultaneous causality was the most important legacy. For the first time in human history, he systematically articulated a form of causality in which the cause and its effect coexist simultaneously. This theory contributed importantly to Buddhist doctrinal development, particularly its epistemology. Mahāyāna Yogācāra had embraced it from their very inception, finding it indispensable for the establishment of many of their fundamental doctrines, including “store consciousness” (ālaya-vijñāna) and “cognition-only” (vijñaptimātratā).
Article
Mikaël Bauer
During the Nara period (710–794), the Japanese religious and political landscape saw tremendous change. A new capital was built, Chinese legal codes were implemented, and the Buddhist temples grew in size and number. Traditionally, Nara period Buddhism has been described in terms of the so-called “Six Schools.” It is certainly the case that the 8th century became the cornerstone of later doctrinal and ritual developments, but the Buddhist context was more complex and intertwined than these six forms of Buddhism.
Article
Andrew Gebert
The Sōka Gakkai is a lay Buddhist movement, originating in Japan, that bases its religious practice and worldview on the Lotus Sutra-centric teachings of the Kamakura-era priest Nichiren (1222–1282). Following Nichiren, members of the Sōka Gakkai consider the practice of reciting Namu-myōhō-renge-kyō—the Daimoku, or title of the Lotus Sutra—to a copy of a character mandala (Gohonzon) originally inscribed by Nichiren to be the fundamental means for attainment of enlightenment. Also modeling themselves on Nichiren, the membership takes an active interest in the social and political realities of this world. In Japan, this engagement has taken various forms, including electoral support for a political party made up largely of Sōka Gakkai members, and globally, as activities in the fields of nuclear disarmament, sustainable development, human rights education, and humanitarian assistance.
Founded in 1930, the organization was suppressed during World War II. In the postwar era, its rapid growth, driven by a campaign of aggressive proselytization, as well its ongoing involvement in politics, has generated considerable controversy within Japanese society. Even as the organization has matured institutionally, and in its relations with other faith traditions, an exclusive commitment by members to a single faith practice makes it an outlier within the Japanese religious landscape.
The Sōka Gakkai in Japan currently claims some 8.27 million member families, making it the nation’s largest and most active religious movement. Outside Japan, under the rubric of Sōka Gakkai International (SGI), official statistics give membership totals of 1.75 million in 192 countries and territories, with 94 organizations incorporated under local national laws. More than half of the membership outside Japan—slightly more than 1 million—are said to be in Asia and Oceania, with South Korea, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Singapore among the sites of large and active memberships. Other countries with significant national movements include Brazil, the United States, India, and Italy.
While the Sōka Gakkai was originally associated with the Nichiren Shōshū sect, long-standing tensions over the respective roles of priesthood and laity came to a head in a decisive schism in 1991, since which the two groups have pursued independent paths. Following the schism, the Sōka Gakkai has given more central emphasis to the “mentor-disciple relationship,” in particular as this relates to the first three presidents of the organization: Makiguchi Tsunesaburō (1871–1944), Toda Jōsei (1900–1958) and Ikeda Daisaku (1928–).
Article
David L. Gardiner
Many accounts place the origins of Tantric Buddhism in Japan in the hands of the two men, Saichō 最澄 (767–822) and Kūkai 空海 (774–835). (This article will use “Tantric” and “esoteric Buddhism” synonymously.) These were the founders, respectively, of the Tendai (天台) and Shingon (真言) schools, both of which contributed substantially to the early development of Japanese forms of Tantric theory and practice. Naturally, no tradition emerges from a vacuum; it always grows from existing roots and trunks to create new branches. Because the contributions of Saichō and Kūkai marked a major transition in the history of Japanese Buddhism, focusing on them is an appropriate way to frame important features of early Tantrism in Japan.
Several of the deities central to developed esoteric Buddhism in Japan were present during the Nara period (710–794), as were some of the key texts such as the Scripture of the Great Illuminator大日経 (Skt. Mahāvairocana-sūtra, Jpn. Dainichi-kyō), prior to Saichō and Kūkai’s bringing new materials back from China in 805 and 806, respectively. Significant among the new elements were mandalas, initiation or consecration ceremonies (kanjō灌頂) into ritual practice that employed them, and new texts, in particular of the Scripture of the Tip of the Thunderbolt (金剛頂経) (Skt. Vajraśekhara-sūtra, Jpn. Kongōchō-kyō) corpus, most of which had been translated into Chinese by Amoghavajra 不空 (705–774, Ch. Bukong; J. Fukū). While Saichō returned to Japan more than a year before Kūkai—and established the earliest foundation for the new Tantric tradition by performing Japan’s first kanjō and by making one of the two formal tracks for training Tendai monks a Tantric one (shana-gō遮那業)—Kūkai’s subsequent contributions had a much greater immediate impact on how the tradition unfolded.
Article
Ulrike Roesler
The Bka’ gdams pa (pronounced “Kadampa”) emerged as a distinct tradition of Tibetan Buddhism in the 11th century ce. The most common understanding of the name in Tibetan sources is that this tradition taught the complete word of the Buddha (bka’) as explained in the instructions (gdams) of the Indian teacher Dīpaṃkaraśrījñāna (982–1054). This is sometimes specified as referring to his instructions on the graded path (lam rim) toward Buddhahood that were later adopted and propagated by the Dge lugs pa (pronounced “Gelugpa”) school, beginning with Tsong kha pa’s (1357–1419) influential Lam rim chen mo. It is commonly assumed that during the 15th century, the Bka’ gdams pa were absorbed into Tsong kha pa’s reform movement of the “new Bka’ gdams pa” (bka’ gdams gsar ma), later known as the Dge lugs pa, but further research is needed on this issue.
Dīpaṃkaraśrījñāna, also known by his Indian honorific title Atiśa[ya] or Adhīśa, was invited to western Tibet by its rulers and arrived there in 1042. At the request of King Byang chub ’od (984–1078), he composed his famous “Lamp on the Path to Awakening” (Bodhipathapradīpa; Tib. Byang chub lam sgron), which became an important model for Tibetan works on the graded path to awakening. He then accepted an invitation to central Tibet where he spent the rest of his life. He passed away in Snye thang near Lhasa in 1054.
Several of Atiśa’s Tibetan students played an important role in the development of Buddhism on the Tibetan plateau. However, it is his student ’Brom ston Rgyal ba’i ’byung gnas (pronounced “Dromtön Gyelway Jungnay,” 1004–1064) who is traditionally regarded as the founding father of the Tibetan Bka’ gdams pa lineage since his students became instrumental in spreading the Bka’ gdams pa teachings in central Tibet. In addition to the lam rim, they became famous for their instructions on “mental purification” or “mind training” (blo sbyong, pronounced “Lojong”), which is meant to free the mind from attachment to the ego and generate the attitude of the “awakening mind” (Skt. bodhicitta). Lam rim and blo sbyong became highly popular doctrinal and didactic genres and have had an impact on Tibetan Buddhism far beyond the Bka’ gdams pa and Dge lugs pa traditions.
The Bka’ gdams pa are often perceived as a tradition with an emphasis on monasticism and Mahāyāna ethics, rather than on yogic and tantric practice. However, it should be kept in mind that Dīpaṃkaraśrījñāna himself had grown up in the tantric traditions of Bengal. His work on the stages of the path to awakening includes instructions on tantra, but states that tantric practice may not contradict the vows taken (thus excluding antinomian practices for monastics). The early Tibetan Bka’ gdams pa masters take the same stance and promote the idea that Pāramitānaya (i.e., non-tantric Mahāyāna Buddhism) and tantra have the same validity and lead to the same goal, thus trying to strike a balance between the two approaches.
Article
Albion M. Butters
Longchen Rabjam (Klong chen rab ’byams pa, 1308–1363/1364) is regarded as one of the most important figures in the Nyingma (Rnying ma) school of Tibetan Buddhism. He is especially renowned for his writings on Dzogchen (Rdzogs chen), or the Great Perfection, and his revelations and codification of the various Nyingtik (Snying thig) or Seminal Essence cycles, penned in a clear, direct, and often poetic style. Longchenpa also wrote in depth on Buddhist philosophy, in particular exploring the nature of the two truths through a Madhyamaka lens, and the soteriological significance of the respective paths in the Buddhist tradition, from Sūtrayāna to Mantrayāna. His overall oeuvre, from which hundreds of texts survive, evidences a practical effort to provide students and readers with a wide range of entry points to awakening, depending on their respective inclination and ability. Longchenpa has historically been respected as both a scholar and a yogi, accorded by tradition with the rare title of Omniscient One (Kun mkhyen). He began his studies at an early age, studied with the great masters of his time at Samye (Bsam yas) and Sangpu Neutok (Gsang phu ne’u thog), and received ascetic tutelage from his guru Kumārādza (1266–1343). Through focus on the Vima Nyingtik (Bi ma snying thig) and Khandro Nyingtik (Mkha’ ’gro snying thig) cycles, receiving visions and discovering treasure texts (gter ma), his connection to his previous reincarnation as Pema Ledrel Tsal (Padma las ’brel rtsal, 1291–1315) was revealed. Even though the political tumult of 14th-century Tibet forced Longchenpa to leave for Bhutan, he was able to continue to write and build monasteries. Longchenpa returned home for the final years of his life, which were alternately spent in retreat or giving teachings to large audiences seeking wisdom from the famous master. Over the centuries, the majority of his literary corpus was preserved, and due to the attention of later Nyingma lamas such as Jigme Lingpa (’Jigs med gling pa, 1730–1798) and Mipam (Mi pham, 1846–1912), his legacy was ensured. The timeless writings of Longchenpa comprise a rich treasure for Tibetan scholars and Buddhist practitioners alike.
Article
Sven Bretfeld
Theravāda Buddhism is a neologism denoting a variety of historically connected religious traditions. Today these traditions are predominantly spread in Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, and parts of Vietnam. More recent communities in other parts of the world (e. g., Europe, the United States, India, Nepal, Australia) are directly or indirectly connected to the traditions of these countries by migration or adaptation processes. These local varieties do not constitute a homogeneous entity. Nevertheless, the use of a common denominator is justified by their interconnected religious histories and a common stock of liturgical, ritual, exegetical, and narrative traditions.
Prior to the 20th century theravāda (or theriya, theravaṃsa) was understood as a nikāya, an institutionalized monastic lineage primarily defined by a specific system of ritual and legal regulations for monks and nuns (the vinaya). This specific lineage became increasingly associated with Sri Lanka during the first millennium ce, while its Indian origins became obscure. Like many other nikāyas, the Theravādins were not uniform in their doctrinal, ethical, and liturgical orientations. The dynamics of local acculturation and active participation in the translocal networks of the ancient “Buddhist World” produced multiple religious expressions and attitudes within the Theravāda monastic lineage through the centuries. Doctrinally, these could range from an exclusive Pāli-based Śrāvakayāna (“Hīnayāna”) approach to the promotion of so-called Mahāyāna and Vajrayāna texts and practices. A series of royally enforced monastic reforms in the 11th and 12th centuries in Sri Lanka strengthened a certain “conservative” camp of the saṅgha and enforced an exclusivist vision of a Theravāda “orthodoxy,” purified from what this group deemed to be inauthentic adulterations of the Buddha’s teaching. This impulse yielded a powerful—though not unchallenged—impact on the further development of Buddhist monasticism in Sri Lanka and, somewhat later, in Southeast Asia. Ultimately they shaped much of the modern ideas about the characteristics of Theravāda Buddhism.
During the first half of the 20th century the nikāya name Theravāda was detached from its technical monastic meaning and became reinterpreted as a type of Buddhism, idealizing the doctrinal content of the canonical scriptures of this lineage—the so-called Pāli Canon—as a binding belief system for all “Theravāda Buddhists,” monastic or lay. In anachronistic extension of this typology, the compound “Theravāda Buddhism” was further understood as the most ancient, or even “original,” form of the Buddhist “creed.”
The adjective form of Theravāda is Theravādin, which can also be used as a noun to denote a follower of Theravāda.
Article
Solomon George FitzHerbert
In both eastern Tibet and in Mongolia, the Buddhist cult surrounding the figure of Ling Gesar (Gling ge sar) or Geser Khan in Mongolian versions is an outgrowth of Gesar’s standing as the eponymous hero of an elaborate oral epic tradition. Today, the epic and the Buddhist cult exist side by side in a relationship of symbiosis. Gesar’s sanctification as an enlightened being—as the combined manifestation of the Three Bodhisattva Lords and as an “emissary” or “manifestation” of Padmasambhava—whose tricksterism is enacted on behalf of the forces of goodness, justice, and the White Side in its perennial battle against the forces of evil, injustice, and the Dark Side—is both an outgrowth but also a source of nourishment for the epic tradition as it has continued to adapt and develop up to our own times.
The Gesar/Geser epic, in all the three main regions in which it survives (eastern Tibet and its neighboring regions, the Mongolic regions as far west as Kalmykia, and Ladakh and neighboring regions), is a living and mobile tradition of oral recitation and improvisation. The available textual corpus of this epic is very large, though none of it is very old (the oldest available epic texts in Tibetan are from the 17th century and in Mongolian are from 18th century). Thanks in part to sustained state patronage in the PRC, there are now over 200 published volumes of non-duplicating Gesar epic narrative and song, mostly from eastern Tibet. A lot of this material is of a directly oral provenance. Many modern volumes are the direct transcriptions (with some editing) of the oral repertoires of contemporary bards, some of which have been very lengthy. To take one example, the recorded repertoire of the bard Samdrup (Bsam grub) (1922–2011) was over 3,000 hours long, much of which has now been published. As for literary versions, the authors of Gesar epic texts often make explicit the debt that their tellings owe to oral renditions that they have heard. The mid-18th-century author of the famous Horling Yülgyé (Hor gling g.yul ’gyed), for example, mentions that he based his telling on the oral repertoires of “some twenty bards,” several of whom he cites by name. Due to the heterogeneity and sheer volume of this available textual corpus, it is hard to make categorical assertions about the relationship between Buddhism and the epic tradition, since that relationship varies from version to version. However, some general observations may be offered. In the ritual cult devoted to Gesar that evolved from the epic tradition, matters are somewhat clearer. In the ritual texts devoted to Gesar—which are mostly offering texts—the unruly polyphony of the epic (many bards, many characters, many perspectives) is replaced with a neater integrated vision, in which the hero is praised as a totalizing culture hero and enlightened lord—a hero in every register, both worldly and spiritual, both chivalric and shamanistic.
Article
Chris Hatchell
Tibetan religious traditions contain a variety of practices and discourses that involve the eyes: epistemologies that investigate the act of seeing, ritual uses of visual arts, literary references to light, and meditative practices of looking and visualization. Tibetan traditions also use practices of “vision,” where luminous scenes appear spontaneously to the eyes. Insofar as Tibetan Buddhists have extensively theorized these visionary experiences and identified them as important methods of attaining Buddhist goals, they can be thought of as constituting a kind of “visionary” Buddhism.
Visionary practices in Tibetan religion can be placed on two interconnected registers: those having practical or this-worldly benefits, and those that are viewed as leading to liberation. In the first category, vision is commonly found in practices related to prognostication, mediumship, and textual revelation. The second category is more characteristic of tantric yogic practices related to Kālacakra and the post-tantric movement known as the Great Perfection. In these cases, practitioners use sensory deprivation to induce complex visions. Such visions are described variously as being expressions of emptiness, expressions of one’s own mind, or the “lighting up” of an omnipresent awareness. Recognizing the nature of these visions is seen as part of the path to enlightenment.
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