This dissertation examines Japanese conceptions of and devotional attitudes toward Śākyamuni (the historical Buddha) during the twelfth to fourteenth centuries. It focuses in particular on a new interest in Śākyamuni that arose in the twelfth century, and argues that this interest was a response to two developments: the appearance of the belief that the world had entered Buddhism’s final age, and the increasingly acute sense that Japan existed at the periphery of the Buddhist world. These two developments evoked in some clerics a sense of distance from the origins of Buddhism and a feeling of helplessness since the final age was a time when soteriological progress was thought to be particularly difficult. Japanese Buddhists were thus faced with a problem: how to proceed given these disadvantageous circumstances? Some clerics found comfort in theories about the Buddha Amida’s ability to take humans away from this world to his pure land, while others turned instead to the Mahāyāna Buddhist idea that humans are born enlightened (and thus need not worry about their personal salvation after all). The monks and texts at the center of my research instead looked to Śākyamuni in an attempt to reconnect with the source of the Buddhist tradition, thereby countering the inevitable decline of Buddhism by linking themselves to, and in some cases recreating, the imagined golden age that Śākyamuni and his Indian environs represented.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, Los Angeles, 1984. / Vita. "List of characters": leaves 355-360. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 361-384).

"Age of Scripture" charts the first-millennium emergence of new bodies of scripture within three major South Asian religious communities and considers intellectual responses to their rapid proliferation. This period witnessed an explosion in the production of textualized teachings attributed to the Buddha, Śiva, and Viṣṇu. These new corpora resemble one another in important ways, and their rise to prominence contributed to a shared sense of what it meant for a text to be "scripture." This study examines how these texts were conceptualized and analyzes them with reference to the actual practices employed in their production. In other words, it considers what it meant for these communities to attribute a definite text to a divine or awakened figure — whether the Buddha, Śiva, or Viṣṇu — and seeks to uncover how the notion of divine authorship, broadly defined, relates to the ways in which human beings actually produced and transmitted sacred texts. It shows that a similar set of presuppositions governed the creation of divine words across different communities, enabling comparable outcomes among Buddhists, Śaivas, and Vaiṣṇavas. After setting out the text-historical shape of this period, "Age of Scripture" considers the intellectual-historical reaction to these corpora. It analyzes, first of all, Mīmāṃsā attempts to deny the validity of these new texts through an anti-pluralistic philosophy that establishes, at least in theory, the Veda as the sole source of scriptural authority. And, second, it reviews various attempts to contend with Mīmāṃsā’s challenge, especially through rationalized defenses of pluralism.

宋黎昀. / "2011年9月". / "2011 nian 9 yue". / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2011. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 130-135). / Abstract in Chinese and English. / Song Liyun. / Chapter 第一章： --- 導論 --- p.1 / Chapter 一. --- 論文之背景和目的 --- p.1 / Chapter (一). --- 背景 --- p.1 / Chapter (二). --- 研究目的 --- p.5 / Chapter 二. --- 文獻回顧 --- p.7 / Chapter (一). --- 民族性與商業 --- p.7 / Chapter (二). --- 商品化與「本真性」 --- p.13 / Chapter (三). --- 宗教與商業行為 --- p.18 / Chapter 三. --- 田野地之選擇與研究方法 --- p.23 / Chapter (一). --- 田野點的意義所在 --- p.23 / Chapter (二). --- 研究方法 --- p.25 / Chapter 四. --- 本論文之結構安排 --- p.29 / Chapter 第二章： --- 「藏族街」在成都 --- p.31 / Chapter 一. --- 成都的少數民族 --- p.31 / Chapter 二. --- 成都的藏族 --- p.32 / Chapter 三. --- 成都與藏區的地緣關係及往來淵源 --- p.33 / Chapter 四. --- 「藏族街」生意的發展歷程 --- p.40 / Chapter 五. --- 「藏族街」在成都 --- p.47 / Chapter (一). --- 成都大眾眼中的「藏族街」 --- p.49 / Chapter (二). --- 政府眼中的「敏感地帶」 --- p.50 / Chapter (三). --- 當地社區漢人對「藏族街」藏人的看法 --- p.53 / Chapter 六. --- 藏族商人之間的關係 --- p.59 / Chapter 七. --- 城市的邊緣人 --- p.60 / Chapter 八. --- 小結 --- p.63 / Chapter 第三章： --- 佛教道德觀與藏族商人的商業行為 --- p.65 / Chapter 一. --- 藏地經濟之變遷 --- p.66 / Chapter (一). --- 80年代以前的藏族社會經濟 --- p.66 / Chapter (二). --- 80年代以來市場經濟體系下的藏地經濟 --- p.69 / Chapter 二. --- 藏傳佛教藝術品買賣當中的禁忌 --- p.76 / Chapter (一). --- 對佛像生意的爭議 --- p.76 / Chapter (二). --- 其他禁忌物品 --- p.81 / Chapter 三. --- 佛教道德對商業觀念的影響 --- p.83 / Chapter 四. --- 「積德」的行為 --- p.86 / Chapter 五. --- 分析和小結 --- p.88 / Chapter 第四章： --- 何為「正宗的」藏傳佛教藝術品 --- p.91 / Chapter 一. --- 與尼泊爾的貿易網絡 --- p.91 / Chapter 二. --- 藏族商人對其產品「正宗性」的建構 --- p.99 / Chapter (一). --- 尼泊爾產品與藏地、 漢地產品的區分 --- p.100 / Chapter (二). --- 藏式風格與漢式風格的區分 --- p.102 / Chapter (三). --- 宗教用品與旅遊紀念品的區分 --- p.104 / Chapter 三. --- 有區分的本真性概念 --- p.114 / Chapter 四. --- 小結 --- p.120 / Chapter 第五章： --- 結論 --- p.121 / Chapter 一、 --- 族群性與商業之間的關係 --- p.121 / Chapter 二、 --- 商品化和「本真性」的建構 --- p.125 / Chapter 三、 --- 宗教對商業行為的影響 --- p.127 / 參考文獻 --- p.130