Li Tongxuan's (635--730) Thought and His Place in the Huayan Tradition of Chinese Buddhism.

详细信息   

• 作者：Koh ; Seunghak.
• 学历：Doctor
• 年：2011
• 导师：Buswell, Robert E., Jr.,eadvisor
• 毕业院校：University of California
• ISBN：9781124987019
• CBH：3483183
• Country：USA
• 语种：English
• FileSize：15456300
• Pages：330

文摘

This dissertation explores diverse facets of the Chinese Huayan tradition by analyzing the thought of the lay exegete Li Tongxuan 635--730). Although Lis ideas have been considered idiosyncratic and even heterodox from the standpoint of the "orthodox" five Huayan patriarchs, we should not restrict our perspective to this narrow framework. As a lay scholar who had a strong practical orientation, Li had a solid literary background in indigenous Chinese philosophy and applied this knowledge to the explication of the newly translated eighty-fascicle Flower Garland Sutra Dafangguang fo huayan jing, Avatam&dotbelow；saka-sutra ). Thus his exegesis is characterized by practicality and concreteness on the one hand and marked by originality and intuitiveness on the other hand. Because he has firm faith in the identity between the Buddhas wisdom and sentient beings ignorance, he opposes artifice that aims at escaping from the mundane realm. For him, the realm of enlightenment is not differentiated from that of delusion. Based on this insight into the one true dharma realm yi zhen fajie), Li criticizes the gradual approach to enlightenment and upholds the notion of the simultaneity of cause and effect. In order to account for our present state of ignorance, however, he defines the foundation of sentient beings, namely, the immovable wisdom budong zhi), as devoid of intrinsic nature. Due to the elusive and flexible nature of wisdom, sentient beings are not aware that they are endowed with buddha-nature but can aspire for enlightenment when they encounter the condition of suffering. Just as the immovable wisdom that has no intrinsic nature is considered to depend upon the condition of suffering, the dharma-body is understood to resort to the great wishes and vows for its manifestation. Thus he emphasizes the role of dedication Skt. parin&dotbelow；amana) in Buddhist practice and puts the greatest value on bodhisattvas salvific activities in the mundane realm. In his exegesis the final chapter of the Flower Garland Sutra is understood to exemplify his thesis that buddhahood may be attained in a single lifetime. Lis doctrinal-classification schemata serve to assure the practitioners of this subitist vision. The ten teachings and the ten themes enumerated in his doctrinal-classification schemata are summarized into the pair of the true teaching and the provisional teachings. Whereas the provisional teachings relegate buddhahood to a remote realm, the true teaching clarifies the non-dual nature of delusion and enlightenment and upholds the prospect of sudden awakening. Therefore, he directs his criticisms to scriptures that deny the aseity of the present human condition. Lis correlative thinking and his Sinitic interpretation of the scripture are also predicated on this vision of the one true dharma realm, in which the distinction between the spatial realms of China and India no longer applies. Thus he discloses the religious dimensions underlying the directional and numerical references of the scripture by referring to a specifically Chinese framework. Besides this originality in the interpretation of the scripture, contemplation of gem-like radiance baose guangming guan) demonstrates the concreteness of his soteriology, in which practitioners experience sudden expansion of their minds and realize the dharma realm that is united with their own minds. While Kojima Taizan takes note of these peculiarities in presenting his thesis of a different Huayan lineage on Mt. Wutai, I suggest here that it is rather hasty to place Li in the Mt. Wutai tradition. Although Li was forgotten for several decades after his death, his thought and practice were widely accepted later by Chinese Linji Chan masters and lay Buddhists. His ideas also inspired the scholar-monks of Korea and Japan who had a strong practical orientation. Scholars have revealed how his philosophy and soteriology affected these later developments, but left unexplored many other facets of Lis thought and practice. This dissertation is an effort to address the overall structure of Lis ideas and to determine his place in the East Asian Buddhist tradition.