A Report on the Early Medieval China Workshop

Reading Philosophy, Writing Poetry: Intertextual Modes of Making Meaning in Early Medieval China

This chapter first summarizes the points the author made in an already-published article concerning the modern Western discourse on in the plural and the application of this discourse to phenomena in early medieval China. Then, turning to the singular term in its generic sense, that is, religion as a realm of concern as opposed to other realms of concern with which it sharply contrasts, he asks three sets of questions: What conceptual and terminological pitfalls arise when writing about in premodern China? How does Chinese religious history invite us to rethink his models and assumptions about religion? Did the generic notion of religion uniquely arise in the West, or are there analogues in (for example) early medieval China?. Keywords:Chinese religious history; early medieval China; modern Western discourse; premodern China; religions

Bret Hinsch. Women in Early Medieval China. Asian Voices. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, . xx,  pp. Hardcover $., ISBN -- --. Paperback $., ISBN ----. E-book $., ISBN ----. Women in Early Medieval China is an addition to the series of women in Chinese history that Bret Hinsch has published over the past two decades. As in his other books, Hinsch aptly situates women’s lives and gender discourse in their concrete social and political contexts—here, the period between the fall of the Eastern Han in the early third century and the founding of the Tang dynasty in the early seventh century, an era that historians call “the age of division” or “the age of disunion.” During this period, the north and the south developed distinct cultures, steppe customs influenced societies under the northern regimes, and the intellectual and religious landscapes flourished and diversified. Coinciding with the decline of a powerful central government and the collapse of previous social order, elites began to form larger families in order to protect common clan interests; there was a decline in Confucian learning; female chastity, although not commonly practiced, was rhetorically associated with male loyalty to a regime. Women in Early Medieval China introduces those changes as background to a vivid depiction of changes in the rhetorical, political, and social dimensions of women’s lives over this period. The eight chapters of Women in Early Medieval China cover significant aspects of women’s history during this time period: family, mothers, politics, work, religion, learning, virtue, and ideals. Chapter  delineates the changing family systems in the north and the south and their impact on women. Elite families became significantly larger and more complicated, prompting reconsiderations of family ethics. Marriage customs among northern and southern elites differed regarding remarriage, the status of concubines’ sons, and the ideal qualities of marriage partners. Elite families tended to marry within a circle of families of equal status, while marriages of daughters to lower status but richer families coincided with a new emphasis on the virtues of daughtersin -law. More writings were produced on female filial piety and spousal relations. Chapter  focuses on the intensified mother–son bond, the emerging cult of motherhood, and the growing interest in filial piety toward mothers. Chapter  introduces the ways in which women participated in politics (generally through Review©  by University of Hawai‘i Press becoming an empress or empress dowager) and how different regimes, especially the Tuoba clan, took measures to prevent that. Some empresses of both the north and the south defied the odds to become powerful figures in their own right. Hinsch also mentions several other kinds of women, such as nursemaids, Buddhist nuns, and princesses, who played a role in the palace and were close to power. Chapter  covers women’s property rights and various types of labor and economic activities in which women engaged, including housework, textile production, childcare, healing and care in the home, commerce, entertainment and sex work, as well as serfdom and slavery. In highly militarized societies, especially those in the north, women were also expected to be able to fight. Chapter  explores new roles and opportunities for women in the burgeoning Buddhist and Daoist institutions, after briefly discussing old and new elements about female deities, ghosts, shamans, and ritualists. Chapter  surveys the topic of women’s learning. During this era, women’s education was not considered inappropriate, but lacked a clear purpose and tended to be less systematic than men’s education. The most educated women were daughters of elite men. Southern women read histories and ancient texts and composed poetry, while northern women focused on practical skills. Some women were praised for their eloquence and wit. Maternal instruction and women’s advice on “character evaluation” were also appreciated. Chapter  traces how the Six Dynasties became “a critical phase in the evolution of female ethics” as a result of the interaction of several historical factors: “the decline of Confucian learning, influx of steppe culture, and the rise of Buddhism and Daoism” (p. ). Focuses of this chapter include adultery, remarriage, jealousy, and female chastity: Hinsch argues that “[t]he early medieval era marks a turning point for chastity” (p. ) in intellectual discourse...

BOOK REVIEWS ALAN K. L. CHAN and YUET-KEUNG LO, eds., Interpretation and Literature in Early Medieval China. Albany, NY: SUNY Press, 2010. vi, 288 pp. US$80 (hb). ISBN 978-1-4384-3217-5 ALAN K. L. CHAN and YUET-KEUNG LO, eds., Philosophy and Religion in Early Medieval China. Albany, NY: SUNY Press, 2010. v, 375 pp. US$80 (hb). ISBN 978-1-4384-3187-1 With the publication of these two volumes, Chan and Lo have deeply enriched our understanding of early medieval China (220–589 CE). This is the first attempt to assemble an English language conference volume that focuses on both the intellectual and religious history of early medieval China—an incredibly significant era in which Confucianism lost its ideological monopoly, Daoism emerged as an organized religion, and Buddhism became a permanent fixture on China’s cultural landscape. Besides redirecting our focus to this neglected but momentous period, these volumes include a number of outstanding contributions that recast how we should envision early medieval assumptions and values. The good news is both volumes contain insightful articles on Chinese religion. Negatives include the existence of two volumes rather than one, a weak thematic coherence, and their neglect of Confucianism. On the whole, however, these volumes will considerably benefit specialists in pre-modern Chinese culture. These volumes emerge from two conferences, one in Singapore and the other in Shanghai, sponsored by the National University of Singapore. The Philosophy and Religion volume has eleven chapters: five of which concern Xuanxue 玄學, two on Daoism, two on Buddhism, one on reclusion, and the final essay addresses fate. The Interpretation and Literature volume contains nine chapters. The first four treat literary culture. Chapters 5, 6, and 7 discuss literary aspects of Daoism and Buddhism. Chapters 8 and 9 discuss motifs in popular narratives. Since over half of the essays in Interpretation and Literature are about religion, one wonders why two volumes are necessary. The editors explain that, The project was conceived as a multidisciplinary venture. Scholarship does not grow well in insularity; our plan was to bring together in a single book fresh studies on early medieval Chinese philosophy, religion, literature and interpretation, not only to deepen our understanding of these topics but also to open up a view of the interconnections of the early medieval Chinese intellectual enterprise. However, a single volume proved unworkable, given the constraints that publishers face. Still, some of the essays may fit just as nicely in this or in the companion volume. (Interpretation and Literature, pp. 1–2). # Society for the Study of Chinese Religions 2015 DOI: 10.1179/0737769X15Z.00000000021 Journal of Chinese Religions, 43. 1, 89–118, May 2015 Thus, the decision to make two volumes was based on the overabundance of essays, resulting in a somewhat arbitrary thematic division. The quoted text above also indicates that these volumes should be judged based on their success in deepening our understanding of the connections between early medieval philosophy, religion, and literature. A striking contribution made by the Philosophy and Religion volume is that it recasts how we view the philosophical ruminations of the Xuanxue (Learning of the Mysterious Dao 道) movement. Four out of the five essays on this philosophy demonstrate that, rather than being theorists who were solely concerned with metaphysical questions, He Yan 何晏, Wang Bi 王弼, and Xi Kang 嵇康 were also intensely concerned with political and ethical issues. In fact, their discussions of ontology informed their vision of how political order should be instituted. In the volume’s opening essay, “Sage Nature and the Logic of Namelessness,” Alan Chan demonstrates that He Yan perceived wu 無 (nothing, non-being) as a nameless, complete, and harmonious energy source that produces all phenomena in a balanced and ordered manner. The sage embodies wu; thus, he is also harmonious, unbiased, and complete. If he becomes ruler, then all things will be well-ordered because he will choose the right people to administrate. For He Yan, sages are born, not made. In the absence of a sage, the best one can do is to select excellent men as officials. In a much more opaque essay, “Tracing the Dao: Wang Bi’s Theory of Names,” Jude Soo-Meng Chua notes...

ROBERT FORD CAMPANY, Signs from the Unseen Realm: Buddhist Miracle Tales from Early Medieval China. Kuroda Institute Classics in East Asian Buddhism. Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2012. xix, 300 pp. US$65.00 (hbk). ISBN 978-0-8248-3602-3 This book is a comprehensive study and annotated translation with commentaries of Mingxiang ji 冥祥記, a collection of Buddhist miracle tales compiled at the end of the fifth century CE by Wang Yan 王琰. The largest compilation of its kind from early medieval China, Mingxiang ji is a treasure trove of written records of the Chinese Buddhist experience as lived and told by contemporary devotees from a broad social spectrum. Written and compiled in the long-standing Chinese narrative tradition of zhiguai 志怪 (accounts of anomalies) collections, Mingxiang ji offers a largely lay-oriented, communal perspective that is distinct from those of ‘‘elite’’ genres such as scriptures, hagiographies, and theological treatises. Campany’s groundbreaking study of Mingxiang ji as a zhiguai collection does an exemplary job of employing the genre of zhiguai as a rewarding source of research for medieval Chinese Buddhist history. Specifically, this book presents a fascinating case study of Buddhist zhiguai collections as a sinicized expression of the Buddhist worldview. In Campany’s words, ‘‘Miracle tales are, among other things, a means of sinicization via historiography’’ (p. 37). As such, this book is an important contribution to the fields of medieval Chinese religions, historiography, and literary history. Campany’s study features a substantial introduction that situates Mingxiang ji in the broader contexts of the history of Chinese Buddhism, the Chinese tradition of historiography, and the author’s life and times. Specifically, Campany points out the collective, communal, lay-oriented nature of the miracle tales as reflecting on widespread religious practices and attitudes of the society, which are distinctive from orthodox Mah ay ana teachings. The introductory chapter investigates the particulars of early medieval Chinese Buddhist culture by way of an analysis of the narrative discourse of the miracle tale, including its generic conventions, recurrent tropes and archetypes (such as the figure of the ‘‘spirit monk’’), common themes (such as rebirth and devotion to bodhisattvas), and Chinese adaptations of Buddhist practices (such as the abstinence ceremony and strict vegetarianism). According to Campany, the main thematic concerns of the tales in Mingxiang ji are not the fundamental Buddhist tenets such as enlightenment, non-duality, emptiness, or the Mahayanist pursuit of the bodhisattva path. Rather, the tales are preoccupied with avoiding karmic retributions (baoying 報應) in life and reaping rewards in the afterlife. Campany’s introductory section and story commentaries show that, far from being empty, the Chinese Buddhist universe as reflected in Mingxiang ji is full of spiritual forces miraculously responsive (ganying 感應) to human desires and deeds. Pervasive throughout the collection is a literal and materialist approach to Buddhist scriptures, icons, and ritual objects, which are regarded as sacred objects with magical efficacy. Monastic laxity is often the target of criticism in the tales. Competitions between Buddhism and other indigenous Chinese cultural practices—such as Confucian ancestor worship, the Daoist pursuit of immortality, and local sacrificial cults—are frequently the driving force of narrative in the collection. Some miracle tales reflect how traditional religious beliefs and practices are absorbed by the Buddhist discourse, such as in items 67, BOOK REVIEWS 65 71, 86, 99, and 124, where the power of the indigenous spirit-medium (wu 巫) is co-opted to validate the Buddhist worldview. In other stories, Buddhist miracles are themselves co-opted to serve a secular agenda. For example, item 63 features two Buddhist monks transmitting a divine decree to legitimize a dynasty. As Campany points out, that Buddhist miracles are presented in Mingxiang ji as ‘‘signs from the unseen realm’’ is ultimately in keeping with the traditional premise of zhiguai literature, where cosmic anomalies are regarded as heavenly portents. At the same time, Campany also observes that many Buddhist miracle tales display an anxious urge to claim the foreign religion as indigenous to China itself. Collectively, these Buddhist miracle tales as zhiguai stories dramatize in narrative form the dynamic assimilation of one religious culture by another. The translations that comprise the second part of the book are based on modern...

The Great God of the Five Paths, Wudao dashen 五道大神, in charge of rebirth in the Five Paths, has been one of the prominent otherworld bureaucratic deities in Chinese popular religion since the early medieval period. Wudao first appeared obscurely in certain Chinese Buddhist versions of the Buddha’s biography, yet there is no mention of the deity in any Indic sources. As later medieval accounts record a popular sacrificial cult of Wudao outside of Orthodox Buddhist circles during the early medieval period and modern anthropological reports confirm that the deity was worshiped as a deity of popular religions rather than a Buddhist one, previous scholarship has been inclined to assume these parallels as possible evidence that a non-Buddhist sacrificial cult of the deity dated back to the early medieval era. This paper attempts to re-approach two issues related to the deity: its origin and the early development of its cult in early medieval China, before the Tang dynasty (618–907 C.E.). It first demonstrates a possible origin of the deity and its possible formation through a comparative research on the evolution of the various versions of the Buddha’s biography in both Indic and Chinese contexts. A close examination of early medieval textual and archaeological sources, along with later medieval sources claiming the existence of a non-Buddhist sacrificial cult of Wudao dating back to the early medieval period, also reveals that Wudao was always presented or considered in a Buddhist-related context during the early medieval period, whereas primary later accounts of an early non-Buddhist cult are not supported by substantial evidence and were probably propagandistic stories made up by vegetarian reformist monks of the Tiantai School 天台宗 during the Song dynasty.

(1998). Strange Writing: Anomaly Accounts in Early Medieval China. Early Medieval China: Vol. 1998, No. 1, pp. 159-166.

Publication de l'allocution du president de l'American Oriental Society prononcee lors du XXVe congres de la societe en 1995, constituant un examen des denrees alimentaires et des boissons preferees des chinois au debut de la periode medievale, revelees par les textes litteraires et pratiques de cette periode

The Reception of Zuo Si’s “Poems on History” in Early Medieval China

This chapter explores in what ways and to what extent the ancestral rites were practiced in early medieval China (AD 100-600), as well as how these ceremonies were connected to the conveyance of political legitimacy. It provides an idealized vision of the forms and activities of ancestral worship that the various Ru theoretical works articulated. The chapter briefly examines the ancestral rites put into effect by the Han dynasty's imperial family. It focuses on how early medieval statesmen from the various dynasties attempted to and eventually succeeded in assimilating the emperor's sacrificial regime to the Ru ritual codes. Although realizing that many China specialists object to the word Confucianism for a host of reasons, the chapter has shown that, on the basis of textual evidence, during the early medieval period, the sacrificial rites were increasingly based on the prescriptions found in the Ru texts. Keywords: ancestral worship; Confucianism; early medieval China; political legitimacy; Ru ritual codes

Mountains were among the most important sacred geographical spaces in early medieval China thanks to the widespread building of Buddhist temples and Taoist abbeys in the mountains. They were sanctified both in imagination and in reality in the early medieval era. Accordingly, spatial studies have been conducted along these two dimensions. The former dimension deals with the numerous abodes of sages and immortals, while the latter examines Buddhist and Taoist monks and the stone chambers and temples or abbeys in which they practiced self-cultivation. In the case of Mount Tiantai, an imagined system of immortals’ mountain abodes had emerged as early as in the middle of the Eastern Jin dynasty. A specific immortal was Wang Ziqiao, the Perfected of Mount Tongbai, who had authority over the Jinting palace and administration. The imagining of immortals’ abodes not only helped the Taoists determine the locations of Taoist abbeys, but also inspired monks who hoped to practice self-cultivation with the help of the powers of mountain gods and immortals. In a sense, this was a process in which knowledge of the immortals shaped the landscape of Buddhist temples and Taoist abbeys.

134 Journal of Chinese Religions hybridized ones like Ji Dakui’s (that employ Buddhists and Daoists, but only in utterly figurative roles). So, the logic of ritual juxtaposition (trying all possible solutions at the same time) also has its limits, and a history of rain-making where local religious leaders rather than officials play the central role might further enrich our understanding of state-society relations to the extent that they were built around rituals. The issue of religious leadership raises the related issue of miracles. Snyder-Reinke carefully avoids the word (it is absent from the index), but it does come immediately to mind to this reader (and presumably, others) when thinking about rain-making. And miracles, in turn, point to charisma—this notion is also carefully avoided (even though mentioned in note 34 of chapter 6). But it was largely through such public performances as obtaining rain that charisma was built and styles of leadership were tested and validated.23 Who the leaders in Chinese local society were/are, and how their authority and their charisma are sustained, is one fascinating avenue for research that this most stimulating book opens. VINCENT GOOSSAERT, Groupe Sociétés, Religions, Laïcités (CNRS-EPHE), Paris, France Sacred Economies: Buddhist Monasticism and Territoriality in Medieval China MICHAEL J. WALSH. New York: Columbia University Press, 2010. xii, 237 pages. ISBN 978-0-231-14832-0. US$50.00, £34.50 hardcover. What did it mean to be a Buddhist monk or nun in medieval China? From the standpoint of Michael Walsh’s Sacred Economies, it meant much the same as assuming any other role in Chinese society: engaging in processes of production, consumption, and exchange, negotiating complex webs of social hierarchies, and working to ensure the ascendency of one’s particular social group. Walsh counters the time-honored Weberian stereotype of monastics as otherworldly ascetics, arguing along lines recently developed by Robert Campany that eremitism was most fundamentally a social construct.24 Walsh emphasizes that Buddhist monks and nuns were always just as bound to the socio-economic realities of 23 See the special issue on charisma in China in Nova Religio, 12(2), 2008. 24 Making Transcendents: Ascetics and Social Memory in Early Medieval China (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 2009). Book Reviews 135 material existence as to the ideal ontologies of their doctrinal communities. Here we see the Buddhist clergy in the trenches of commerce, haggling in market stalls and negotiating tenancy rates with dollar signs in their eyes, just like members of any other corporate institution. For a corporate institution is exactly what the sangha was, in Walsh’s estimation, and its primary material basis was the monastery: “a social and physical structure that defined, imposed, and maintained sets of social values, and sought to acquire and distribute capital— economic, cultural, or otherwise—in a competitive manner” (p. 6). But what distinguished the sangha from any other social group, and the monastery from any other institution, was its instantiation of a particularly Buddhist mode of commodity exchange. This was the exchange of soteriological currency known as merit, which according to Walsh was expressly commodified by Chinese Buddhists for use in acquiring all sorts of economic capital, especially landholdings. In the traditionally agrarian society of China land was gold, and through its acquisition Buddhist monasteries could most effectively increase their wealth and prestige and ultimately establish supremacy over competing social institutions. Walsh outlines the contours of this central argument in chapter 1, which otherwise provides the relevant theoretical backdrop for the book’s key analytical categories (“sacred space”; “cultural capital”; “religiosity”; the “gift”; etc.). Here as well Walsh argues that economic and salvific aims were entirely complementary within a Buddhist monastic context, given that these aims ultimately necessitated one another. As such, one can emphasize the socio-economic activities of monks and nuns “without detracting from the fact that devotion to the Buddha and promotion of the Dharma were still the first orders of business in the sangha” (p. 15). Chapter 2 details the history and imagery of the main exemplum of Walsh’s study, Tiantong monastery 天童寺 in Zhejiang 浙江 province, which was established in the early fourth century and...

Buddhist influences on the sacred axis of the capital during Medieval China (220–907) underwent a process of starting with little impact during the era of Eastern Han, Caowei, and Western Jin (220–317) to a more prominent influence from the late Southern and Northern Dynasties (386–589) to early Tang (618–907), peaked during the reign of Wu Zetian (690–705), and roughly returned to the layout patterns from the late Southern and Northern Dynasties to early Tang after the death of Wu Zetian. As maintained below, the process appears complex in terms of the interaction between Buddhism and political space throughout early Medieval China. There are roughly two modes of integration and interaction between Buddhist buildings and ritual buildings with Buddhist influences and the political axis of the capital: the first mode can be regarded as a typical mode after its establishment in the late Northern Wei Dynasty. This mode exhibits major Buddhist influences, particularly regarding the huge scale of monasteries and pagodas, and the location of high-rise pagodas as landmarks flanking the political axis of the capital. The second mode should be regarded as an atypical mode occurring during the late period of Emperor Wu of the Liang (464–549, r. 502–549), the period of Northern Qi (550–577), and the reign of Wu Zetian. At this point, Buddhist buildings and imperial ritual buildings with Buddhist characteristics and symbolic meanings were placed directly on the political axis of the capital, close to or located at the core of the palace. This practice was a sign that the influence of Buddhism in the political culture and ideology of the entire empire during these eras of Emperor Wu of the Liang, the Northern Qi, and the reign of Wu Zetian had reached their culmination. Architecture reflected the most intuitive embodiment of an external visual form in presenting the most symbolic image of power. With the decline of political enthusiasm for advocating Buddhism, Buddhist and related buildings no longer occupied the political axis of the capital. Various forces majeure such as natural fires, demolition, and reconstruction by subsequent rulers also led to the demise of Buddhist influence on the pollical axis of capital architecture in subsequent eras.

Previous articleNext article No AccessReviewsManichaeism in the Later Roman Empire and Medieval China: A Historical Survey. Samuel N. C. Lieu, Mary Boyce Gerald BonnerGerald Bonner Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Speculum Volume 63, Number 2Apr., 1988 The journal of the Medieval Academy of America Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.2307/2853270 Views: 2Total views on this site Citations: 1Citations are reported from Crossref Copyright 1988 The Medieval Academy of AmericaPDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:Kenneth Klein Bibliography of Western Works on Early Medieval China (1981-1993) Part 2: Philosophy, Religion, and Tunhuang, Early Medieval China 1995, no.11 (Jul 2013): 135–144.https://doi.org/10.1179/152991095788305873

(1994). The Scholar-Official and His Community: The Character of the Aristocracy in Medieval China. Early Medieval China: Vol. 1994, No. 1, pp. 60-83.