Buddhist Influence on Early Daoism: A Survey of Scriptural Evidence [10

Abstract

This chapter presents a preliminary survey and analysis of elements of Buddhist origin found in a selection of about 120 Daoist scriptures that can safely be assumed to be early, that is, to date from the period between the Later Han and the early sixth century. It surveys the stylistic and terminological features that form the category of formal borrowings, and the conceptual borrowings which will be treated in relation to a number of Buddhist technical expressions that frequently figure in body of Daoist texts. The chapter confines to Buddhist Mahāyāna sūtras , which seems to be the only category of Buddhist literature that has influenced the Daoist scriptures as far as style and terminology are concerned. For the purpose of description, the author distinguishes three types of borrowings: stylistic features; the use of idiomatic expressions; and the influence of transcribed Sanskrit terms and proper names. Keywords: Buddhist origin; Daoist scriptures; idiomatic expressions; Mahāyāna sūtras ; stylistic features; transcribed Sanskrit terms