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Journal of the International Association of

Buddhist StudiesVolume 21 Number 1 1998

Copyright c 1998 International Association of Buddhist Studies

JOHANNES BRONKHORST

Did the Buddha believe in karma and rebirth?

JINHUA CHEN

The Construction of Early Tendai Esoteric Buddhism:The Japanese Provenance of Saichos Transmission

Documents and Three Esoteric Buddhist Apocrypha

Attributed to Subhakarasimha

Miriam Levering

Dogens Raihaitokuzui and Women Teaching in Sung Chan

TOM TILLEMANS

A Note on Praman. avarttika, Praman. asamuccaya and

Nyayamukha. What is the svadharmin in Buddhist logic?

CHIKAFUMI WATANABE

A Translation of the Madhyamakahr.dayakarika with

the Tarkajvala III. 137-146

YANG JIDONG

Replacing hu with fan: A Change in the Chinese Perception

of Buddhism during the Medieval Period

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ABSTRACTS

DID THE BUDDHA BELIEVE IN KARMA AND REBIRTH?

Johannes Bronkhorst

This paper addresses some methodological issues in the study of early Bud-

dhism. It criticizes approaches which give short shrift to the Buddhist tradition

itself and attribute to the Buddha points of views whose main virtue is that they

fit into a presumed continuity of beliefs linking Buddhism to earlier religions, pri-

marily Vedic religion and Jainism. It proposes to take the Buddhist texts more

seriously, and not to exaggerate the importance of continuity, given that the Bud-dhist texts criticize these other religions and emphasize the novelty and originality

of the Buddhist message. Regarding the belief in karma and rebirth the conclusion

is reached that there is no reason to doubt that the historical Buddha, too, believed

in them. However, he interpreted karma differently. Many later Buddhists con-

fused the two interpretations of karma, with consequences which have left their

traces in Buddhist literature.

THE CONSTRUCTION OF EARLY TENDAI ESOTERIC BUDDHISM:

THE JAPANESE PROVENANCE OF SAICHOS TRANSMISSION

DOCUMENTS AND

THREE ESOTERIC BUDDHIST APOCRYPHA ATTRIBUTED TO

SUBHAKARASIMHA

Jinhua Chen

During his nine-month stay in China, the Japanese monk Saicho (767-8 22)

was allegedly initiated by his Chinese Esoteric mentor Shunxiao (n. d.) into an

illustrious esoteric lineage starting from the prestigious Indian Es oteric master

Subhakarasimha (637-735). It is also believed that Shunxiao, b asing himself on

three Esoteric texts translated by Subhakarasimha (i.e., T nos. 905-7), transmit-

ted to Saicho some particular forms of Esoteric Buddhis t teachings, the core of

which is preserved in one of the two dharma-transmi ssion documents (fuhomon)supposedly written by Shunxiao to certify the esot eric transmission conducted

between himself and Saicho. This is the convent ional view regarding the roots of

Tendai Esoteric Buddhism, which has been b etter known as "Taimitsu."

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This article subjects this conventional view to a critical examination. It argues

that the two fuhomons ascribed to Shunxiao were not written by Shunxi ao him-self, but were prepared in Japan for re-interpreting the meaning, and strengthening

the legitimacy, of the initiation Saicho received from China. The three siddhi texts

attributed to Subhakarsimha were also composed in Jap an as the scriptural sup-

port for Saichos esoteric transmission. The Tendai form of Esoteric Buddhism in

the name of Saicho was not brought back from Ch ina by Saicho but was, for the

main part, created by his followers in Japan.

These negative conclusions can be turned into a positive agenda for future r

esearch of Japanese Tendai Buddhism. Scholars can turn from a fruitless sea rch

for the roots of Taimitsu in China to look more closely in Japan. Moreov er, the

study incorporated in this article might invite more scholarly atten tion to a host

of Buddhist apocrypha which, long regarded as Chinese, might have been actuallyproduced in Japan or Korea.

DOGENS RAIHAITOKUZUI AND WOMEN TEACHING IN SUNG

CHAN

Miriam Levering

This paper makes two arguments. The first is that to understand teaching about

women teachers set forth in an essay called the Raihaitokuzui by the 13th century

founder of Japanese Soto Zen, Dogen Kigen, one needs to see it in the context of

the way in which women teachers were being represented within Chinese Chanliterature that Dogen knew. All the more so given the fact that he had been in

China where this literature was well known. To understand Dogen, one needs to

know how women teaching Zen were represented in China.

The second argument is that how women teaching in Chan were represented

in Chan literature changed from quite negatively in the Tang and Five Dynasties

periods to quite positively in the Southern Sung period, that is, the 12th and 13th

centuries. I take the Transmission of the Flame texts as the principal way that

the Chan school represented itself to itself, as well as to the Emperor and the

literate world, I argue that a significant change occurs in the course of the Sung.

In the flame histories of the Northern Sung, only one woman, from the Five

Dynasties, is represented as teaching Chan. In the Southern Sung the compilers ofthe flame histories add a number of recent women teachers to their genealogies

of the flame, and represent their performance of the role of Chan teacher as a

simple matter of fact without comment. So by the time Dogen was in China

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women teaching Chan was quite an acceptable imaginative possibility, as it

had not been in the past.

A NOTE ON PRAMAN. AVARTTIKA, PRAMAN. ASAMUCCAYA AND

NYAYAMUKHA.

WHAT IS THE SVADHARMIN IN BUDDHIST LOGIC?

Tom Tillemans

In the third chapter of Dignagas Pramanasamuccaya we find, figuring in the

definition of the thesis, the proviso that the property to be proved must pertain to

that very subject (dharmin) which the proponent himself intends, i.e. the svad-

harmin. We show that there were two interpretations as to what the svadharmin

actually consisted in. One approach advocated a sort of philosophical paraphraseof arguments so that the subject would be a real entity acceptable to the proponent

himself, and the other made a rapprochement with the semantic theory of apoha,

thus yielding the position that the svadharmin in certain proofs was just a concep-

tual representation. The Dharmakirtian commentator, Prajnakaragupta, makes it

clear that both approaches existed in India. We argue that the former approach

better fits Dignagas and Dharmakirtis explanations of the term svadharmin.

A TRANSLATION OF THE MADHYAMAKAHR. DAYAKARIKA

WITH THE TARKAJVALA III. 137-146

Chikafumi Watanabe

The present paper is a translation of the Madhyamakahrdayakarika (hereafter,

MHK) with the Tarkajvala (hereafter TJ) III. 137-146 ascribed to Bhaviveka (A.D.

c. 490-570) who was one of the eight known commentators of the Mulamadhya-

makakarika of Nagarjuna (A.D. c. 150-250) and who used the formal proofs in

expounding Madhyamaka thought. The MHK consists of roughly 928 anustubh-

verses and is divided into eleven chapters. The third chapter of the MHK, Tattvaj-

nanaisana, is the most important chapter among the eleven because Madhyamaka

thought is primarily presented in this chapter whereas in the other chapters Mad-

hyakama thought is expressed through the criticism of other systems and schools.

A critical edition of the Sanskrit text and of the Tibetan text of the third chapterof the MHK was published and translated into Japanese by Yasunori EJIMA in

1980. In the same year, 1980, Shotaro IIDA published a critical Sanskrit edition of

verses 1-136 of the same chapter and of the Tibetan text of the TJ corresponding to

those verses, accompanied by an English translation of the verses and the TJ. Prior

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to those works, the TJ corresponding to verses 1-146 of the MHK was translated

by Jyosho NOZAWA into Japanese between 1954-1972.The main subject of verses 137-256 in the third chapter of the MHK and the

TJ is "the non-production of all dharmas." This is also the main subject discussed

by Madhyamaka philosophers begining with Nagarjuna, many of whom tried to

explain it by means of their own methods and to examine it from their own view-

points. The non-production of all dharmas implies the emptiness (sunyata) of all

entities in our world. The idea of emptiness, in the Madhyamika school, is basic

and very important among the Buddhas teachings. It can be said that without

understanding this idea, no understanding of the philosophy of the Madhyamika

is possible.

In this paper, I have translated verses 137-146 together with the TJ. In verses

139-146, Bhaviveka criticises the doctrine of the pre-existence of the effect in thecause in a potential state (satkaryavada), etc., advocated by the Samkhya school.

The Samkhyas claim that the effect pre-exists in the cause and is therefore self-

generated. Bhaviveka, however, criticizes this opinion.

The present English translation of the MHK was made from the Sanskrit text

edited by EJIMA and the English translation of the TJ was made from the Tibetan.

I have attempted to translated the MHK and the TJ as literally as possible but in

a form that is as readable as possible. Nevertheless, I fear that some ambiguity

has unavoidalby remained as both the style and subject matter of the textual ma-

terial are often technical and dense. This problem has hopefully been resolved

by amplifying the translation with phrases in square brackets. In addition, further

explanatory comments may be found in the endnotes.

I have consulted the Peking, Derge (sDe dge), and Cone (Co ne) editions

and made my own edition of the Tibetan text which will appear after the trans-

lation section. As is well known, however, the Peking edition is very close to

the Narthang (sNar than) edition. On the other hand, the Cone edition is close to

the Derge edition. Nevertheless, these variations among the four editions seem to

have resulted from scribal errors or spelling and punctuational changes. For this

reason, I have referred only to the Derge and Peking editions in my edition of the

Tibetan text. Moreover, I have only included the major corrections that I have

made to the text in order to avoid overly complicating the paper.

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Replacing hu with fan:

A Change in the Chinese Perception of Buddhism during the Medieval PeriodYang Jidong

Hu and fan were two medieval Chinese words with sharply contrary mean-

ings. The former is usually translated into English as barbarian, and the latter

means peaceful and Sanskrit. In the early centuries of Chinese Buddhism,

monks and translators used to call India the hu country, Buddhist scriptures the hu

books, and the language in which Buddhist sutras were originally written the hu

scripts. Later on during the Sui-Tang period, however, Chinese monks started a

campaign to replace hu with fan in their religious writings and translations. Such

a phenomenon, as understood and interpreted by the author of this paper, reveals

some important aspects of the cultural transition that took place in medieval China.

First, the shift from hu to fan was made necessary by the religious debate between

Buddhism and other native Chinese religions. Second, it was made possible by the

end of the lasting ethnic war between the Chinese and non-Chinese, the re-union

of the country, and an improving attitude of the Chinese toward foreign people and

cultures. Third, it marked the accomplishment of the domestication of Buddhism

in China.

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