Center for Buddhist Studies 2006-2007 Events
Thursday-Friday, April 26-27, 2007
Exploring Esoteric Rituals in Early East Asian Buddhism
Faculty Workshop
Tuesday, April 24, 2007, 11:00 am - 12:30 pm
Two Revivals of Buddhist Education in East Tibet
Panel Discussion
Ida and Robert Sproul Rooms, International House, UC Berkeley
Khenpo Phuntsok Namgyal
Abbot
Dzongsar Khamje Institute, Derge, Eastern Tibet
Lodre Phuntso
Principal Administrator
Dzongsar Khamje Institute, Derge, Eastern Tibet
Lama Sonam Phuntsho
Translator
The structures of modern Tibetan Buddhist monastic education are often traced to the efforts of Jamgn Kongtrul and Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo, two 19th-century scholars and innovators based in East Tibet (Kham). Considered as leaders of a movement toward nonsectarianism (Rimé), the two revived interest in many forgotten traditions of Tibetan Buddhism and shifted the emphasis of monastic education away from sectarian commentaries and back to the shared roots of the tradition. The present abbot of the monastic college at Jamyang Khyentse Wangpo's Dzongsar Monastery will discuss this 19th-century reformation and its effects upon monastic education in Tibet. This monastic college was one of many destroyed during the violence of the Cultural Revolution. It was rebuilt in the 1980's largely through the efforts of Lodre Phuntsok, a traditional Tibetan physician and the author of a history of Dzongsar Monastery. Dr. Lodre Phuntsok will relate the story of this 20th-century revitalization of Buddhism in East Tibet with a focus on the monastic college.
Co-sponsored by the Khyentse Foundation
Thursday, April 19, 2007, 5:00 pm
Numata Lecture
Koichi Shinohara, Yale University
The Wonder-working Monk Reveals Himself to be the Twelve-headed Avalokitesvara: Miracle or Esoteric Ritual?
3335 Dwinelle Hall, UC Berkeley
Yü Chün-fang in her learned study of Avalokitesvara observes that certain famous wonder-working monks were later identified with Avalokitesvara. Baozhi, for example, is said to have "peeled off his face" in front of Emperor Gao of Qi dynasty and then Emperor Wu of Liang dynasty and revealed himself to be the Twelve-faced Avalokitesvara. I will argue that this connection between figures like Baozhi and Avalokitesvara reflects a late development in Chinese Buddhism, and that the story offers us a clue to the growth of the esoteric cult Avalokitesvara, which may have spread by adopting popular cults such as those of "divine" monks.
Koichi Shinohara is the Numata Visiting Professor in Buddhist Studies at the University of California, Berkeley for Spring 2007. He is a senior lecturer of Religious Studies in the Department of Religious Studies at Yale University, where he works primarily on Buddhism in East Asia. For the past several years his work has centered around the writings of an influential commentator on monastic practices and historian Daoxuan (596-677) and his collaborator Daoshi (d.u.) at the Ximingsi monastery in the capital city. Among his current projects is the study of the cult of a deity with a terrifying appearance, Shensha or Jinja ("Deep Sand"). This cult originated in China in connection with the story of a famous pilgrim to India and later became popular in Japan, where a temple bearing the name of the deity continues to flourish outside of Tokyo.
Thursday, March 22, 2007, 5:00 pm
Phyllis Granoff, Yale University
Karma, Curse, or Divine Illusion: The Destruction of the Buddha's Clan and the Slaughter of the Yâdavas
IEAS Conference Room, 2223 Fulton Street, 6th Floor
The early Indian tradition knows of two instances of genocide in which the clan of a famous person was slaughtered. They are the slaughter of the Buddha's own clan, the Sakyas, and the slaughter of the Yâdavas, relatives of the god Krsna. This paper examines the treatment of the genocides in a range of texts, including the Pali Jatakas, Mahabharata, Bhagavata Purana, and vernacular versions of the epic from Northeast India.
Phyllis Granoff received her Ph.D. from Harvard University in Sanskrit and Indian Studies and Fine Arts. She is presently a Visiting Scholar at the Center for Buddhist Studies, UC Berkeley (Spring 2007). She teaches at Yale University in the Department of Religious Studies and serves as the Chair of the South Asian Studies Council. Her research interests include the development of classical Hinduism, medieval Jainism, and early Mahayana approaches to image worship.
Wednesday, March 14, 2007, 4:00 pm
Understanding Tibetan Monastic Music in the 21st Century
Panel Discussion
Seaborg Room, Faculty Club
Learn more about Tibetan musical structure and theory in preparation for the evening's performance by the Gyuto Monks. Benjamin Bogin (Buddhist Studies, UC Berkeley), Keila Diehl (Anthropology, Stanford University), and Jessie Wallner (Ethnomusicology, Indiana University) will situate the monks' performance in the context of the history of Tibetan monastic rituals, including the cultural transformations that occur when a ritual is displaced from the monastery to the stage. Co-sponsored by Cal Performances, the Institute of East Asian Studies, and the Center for Buddhist Studies, UC Berkeley.
Thursday, March 8, 2007
IEAS Conference Room, 2223 Fulton Street, 6th Floor
4:00 - 4:30 pm Dorji Wangchuk, University of Hamburg
Much Ado About the Appearance and Perception of Water: Attempts Made by the Four Major Schools of Tibetan Buddhism to Resolve Ontological and Epistemological Problems
4:30 - 4:45 pm Q&A
4:45 - 5:00 pm coffee break
5:00 - 5:30 pm Orna Almogi, University of Hamburg
Does a Buddha Possess Gnosis (jñāna: ye shes)? A Dispute Among Madhyamaka Exponents in India and Tibet
5:30 - 5:45 pm Q&A
Much Ado About the Appearance and Perception of Water: Attempts Made by the Four Major Schools of Tibetan Buddhism to Resolve Ontological and Epistemological Problems
Tibetan Buddhist scholars generally tried to adhere to the doctrines of Indian Buddhism, but we do encounter philosophical theories and interpretations that are purely Tibetan, typically due to the scholars' attempts to resolve conflicts and inconsistencies found in the heterogeneous Indian Buddhist scriptures and systems. The varying Tibetan positions on the ontological status of water and the validity of its perception re intriguing examples. According to Indian Buddhist sources, sentient beings of different realms are said to perceive what is known to humans as 'water' differently. Tibetan Buddhist scholars have pondered whether there is a common and shared object of perception, and if so, what it is. Further, they consider whether any of these perceptions are valid, and if so, which and why? Wangchuk will show how scholars from the four major schools of Tibetan Buddhism came to their various conclusions and point out the possible practical (e.g. ethical) implications of such theoretical deliberations.
Dorji Wangchuk is at present a lector (Tibetology) and research scholar (Indo-Tibetan Buddhism) at the Department of Indian and Tibetan Studies, University of Hamburg. His general area of interest lies in the intellectual history and philosophy of Indo-Tibetan Buddhism (i.e. Abhidharma, Pramāna, Yogācāra, Madhyamaka, Prajñāpāramitā, Tantra, and rDzogs-chen). His most recent study, "The Resolve to Become a Buddha: A Study of the Bodhicitta Concept in Indo-Tibetan Buddhism" (forthcoming), deals with the various aspects of tantric and non-tantric Mahāyāna soteriology centering on the idea of bodhicitta ('the resolve to [attain the highest state of] awakening'). Currently he is preparing a critical edition of the *Guhyagarbhatantra, an important tantric scripture of the rNying-ma school of Tibetan Buddhism.
Does a Buddha Possess Gnosis (jñāna: ye shes)? A Dispute Among Madhyamaka Exponents in India and Tibet
A controversy concerning the existence and nature of the buddha's gnosis (jñāna: ye shes)apparently emerged in India in the 7th or 8th centuries and reached its peak in the 11th century, with the growing influence of Yogācāra-Madhyamaka, the followers of which adopted various Yogācāra theories of knowledge for establishing the conventional truth. The debate surrounding the existence of gnosis was taken up by various Tibetan scholars with great interest, and discussions of it have continued to the present day. Almogi will discuss the different positions of the Madhyamaka subschools on this issue, as presented by the 11th-century Tibetan scholar Rong-zom Chos-kyi-bzang-po, and will provide a summary of the main issues of the debate, at the center of which stands the question of how a buddha is able to act in the world for the benefit of living beings.
Orna Almogi is currently an adjunct lecturer for Tibetan Studies at the Department of Indian and Tibetan Studies, University of Hamburg. Her major areas of interest are the different concepts of Buddhahood found in the various Indian and Tibetan Buddhist scriptures as well as doctrinal and historical issues related to the rNying-ma school of Tibetan Buddhism, particularly those surrounding the eleventh-century scholar Rong-zom Chos-kyi-bzang-po. She is also interested in Tibetan literature in general and worked for the Nepal-German Manuscript Preservation Project and its follow-up project, the Nepalese-German Manuscript Cataloguing Project, for six years, and was responsible for the publication of the CD containing the preliminary list of the Tibetan material microfilmed by the project in Nepal.
Friday, March 2, 2007, 12:00 - 2:00 pm
Richard M. Jaffe, Japanese Religion, Duke University
Buddhist Material Culture and the Construction of Pan-Asianism in Pre-War Japan
IEAS Conference Room, 2223 Fulton Street, 6th Floor
Late-nineteenth and early twentieth century Japanese Buddhism was marked by a wide-ranging fascination with Buddhist origins in India. This Indian turn in Japanese Buddhist circles manifested not only in elite academic scholarship, but also in Buddhist art and architecture. In this paper the speaker considers the early twentieth century artistic and architectural production of Ito Chuta and Otani Kozui to deploy Indian and Southeast Asian Buddhist art as part of the effort to create a universalized Japanese Buddhism.
Co-sponsored by the Center for Japanese Studies.
Wednesday, February 21, 2007, 7:00 pm
Panel discussion
Contemplation and Education - Landscape of Research
Chapel at the Pacific School of Religion - 1798 Scenic Avenue, Berkeley
This panel discussion will feature Father Keating (Christian elder and monk, founder of Centering Prayer Movement); Venerable Tenzin LS Priyadarshi (Buddhist contemplative and Chaplin at MIT); and Doctor Tobin Hart, Ph.D., (Professor of Psychology, University of West Georgia). The panelists will talk about the insights to contemplative practice, current research, and the practical and natural role of contemplation in life-long learning, including formal education.
Co-sponsored by the Institute for Buddhist Studies, Graduate Theological Union, The Impact Foundation, The Prajnopaya Foundation-MIT, and Contemplative Outreach.
Friday-Saturday, February 9-10, 2007
Does Humor Belong in Buddhism?
Toll Room, Alumni House
The Buddha Shakyamuni is said to have asked, "How can anyone laugh who knows of old age, disease, and death?" Despite the severity of this rhetorical question, Buddhists through the centuries and across cultures have incorporated humor into their religious lives. The literary, ritual, and artistic traditions of the Buddhist world contain a variety of humorous and comedic elements that challenge the representation of Buddhism as a humorless doctrine of detached austerity. As a result of this image of Buddhism, scholars have tended to view humorous elements of Buddhist texts and practices as anomalous or marginal rather than as vibrant and vital aspects of Buddhist traditions. This workshop will explore the role of humor in Buddhism from early canonical theories of humor and the unexpectedly robust comedy of the rules for monks and nuns to the outrageous behavior of tantric gurus and Zen Masters. Confirmed participants include Benjamin Bogin (UC Berkeley), Jacob Dalton (Yale University), Georges Dreyfus (Williams College), Janet Gyatso (Harvard University), Charles Hallisey (University of Wisconsin), Natasha Heller (UC Berkeley), Donald Lopez (University of Michigan), Reiko Ohnuma (Dartmouth College), James Robson (University of Michigan), Gregory Schopen (UCLA), Robert Sharf (UC Berkeley), George Tanabe (University of Hawaii), and Alexander von Rospatt (UC Berkeley).
Detailed program information is available at http://ieas.berkeley.edu/events/humor
Thursday, February 1, 2007, 4:00 - 5:30 pm
Susan Whitfield, Director, International Dunhuang Project, British Library, London
The Discovery of Buddhism on the Silk Road
IEAS Conference Room, 2223 Fulton Street, 6th Floor
The Eastern Silk Road's Buddhist ruins and relics are now well-known. Yet in the late nineteenth century they were still hidden by the desert sands. It was the curiosity of scholars such as Stein which led to their discovery and the start of scholarship in this area. Just as Buddhism traveled from India through Central Asia, so the rediscovery of its sacred sites made the same journey. This lecture will tell the story of the scholars and their finds and consider how far - or how little - we have traveled in our own journey of understanding Buddhism in this region.
For more information, please contact: Kimberly Carl, kcarl@berkeley.edu.
Co-sponsored by The Electronic Cultural Atlas Initiative, Berkeley China Initiative, Caucasus and Central Asia Program, Center for Chinese Studies, East Asian Library, and Institute of East Asian Studies.
Thursday, January 25, 2007, 5:00 pm
Jinhua Chen, Associate Professor, Department of Asian Studies, University of British Columbia
Reading Chinese Buddhist Monastic Hagiographies: A New Approach
IEAS Conference Room, 2223 Fulton Street, 6th Floor
Scholars have developed various approaches to the study of Buddhist monastic hagiographies and biographies, each of which have their merits and demerits. This talk explores a new approach that promises to be more balanced and productive; it seeks to preserve the merits of older approaches while at the same time avoiding their shortcomings.
Jinhua Chen teaches East Asian Buddhism at the University of British Columbia. His research covers monastic historiography and biography, state-church relationshipin medieval China and Heian Buddhism.
Co-sponsored by the Center for Chinese Studies, UC Berkeley.
Thursday, December 7, 2006, 5:00 pm
Oliver Freiberger, Assistant Professor, Department of Asian Studies, University of Texas at Austin
The Heart of the Buddha's Message? The Middle Way and Other Disputed Concepts in Early Buddhism
IEAS Conference Room, 2223 Fulton Street, 6th Floor
This talk will explore divergent voices and views in early Buddhist literature in order to raise a fundamental question: is there a central core to early Buddhist doctrine, and are we able to identify it? The talk will focus on the pivotal teaching of the Middle Way among other important topics. The Middle Way may be viewed as a rhetorical tool that was used in certain Buddhist circles to attack not only non-Buddhists but also different factions within the Buddhist community.
Oliver Freiberger teaches Asian religions, in particular Buddhism, and method and theory of religious studies at the University of Texas at Austin. His research interests include the early history of Buddhism in India, asceticism, and comparison in the study of religion. He has published a book on early doctrinal interpretations of the Buddhist monastic order and co-edited three volumes on various topics in the history of Asian religions (a fourth one is in preparation). A volume on Asceticism and Its Critics, edited by Dr. Freiberger, was recently published. His current research focuses on the comparison of ascetic beliefs and practices in India and early Christianity.
Thursday, November 9, 2006, 5:00 pm
John McRae, The University of Tokyo
Comparing the Buddhisms of East and Southeast Asia: A World Historical Perspective
IEAS Conference Room, 2223 Fulton Street, 6th Floor
In preparing a general survey of East Asian Buddhism, I have avoided telling parallel stories of separate national traditions in favor of an integrated macro-regional perspective. The oral presentation was inspired by a brief stint teaching in Thailand, which led me to compare the Buddhisms of East and Southeast Asia, with attention to geographical, anthropological, and political features, all undertaken with a world historical perspective.
John R. McRae did his Ph.D. under Stanley Weinstein at Yale and has taught at Cornell and Indiana Universities. Currently a visiting scholar at The University of Tokyo, he will be teaching a course on early Chinese Chan at Komazawa University in Tokyo beginning in April 2007.
Thursday, November 2, 2006, 5:00 pm
Vesna Wallace, Associate Professor, Department of Religious Studies, UC Santa Barbara
The Interplay of Buddhism and Law in Pre-communist Mongolia
IEAS Conference Room, 2223 Fulton Street, 6th Floor
Since the early 17th century until 1918, religious Buddhist and secular laws in Mongolia frequently and in various degrees fused into a single system of jurisprudence, thus invariably influencing each other. In her presentation, Professor Wallace will discuss the ways in which these influences shaped Mongolian Buddhism and legal consciousness of the Mongols.
Vesna Wallace is an Associate Professor in the Department of Religious Studies at UC Santa Barbara. Her research interests focus on the comparative analysis of the Buddhist traditions of South Asia, Tibet, and Mongolia. Recent publications include The Kalacakratantra: The Chapter on the Individual Together with the Vimalaprabha (2004) and The Inner Kalacakratantra: A Buddhist Tantric View of the Individual(2001). She has also published a series of articles on Indian tantric Buddhism and produced three documentary films on contemporary Mongolia. Her latest book The Kalacakratantra: The Chapter on Sadhana is in press at Columbia University.
Friday, November 3, 2006
Graduate student conference, Stanford University
Thurday, October 5, 2006, 5:00 pm
Catherine Bell, Santa Clara University
"Do Buddhists Believe? Not Exactly the Same Old Question"
IEAS Conference Room, 2223 Fulton Street, 6th floor
Drawing on a larger book project on the issue of belief (using religious studies and anthropology methods), Bell picks up the argument in which Donald Lopez found the concept neither natural nor universal. For Lopez, Buddhism has suffered the effects of a collision with Christian and Western colonial categories like "belief." New work in cognitive theory, even when assessed by anthropologists active in the field, like Maurice Bloch, suggests more nuanced attempts to mediate universality as we need it as scholars and particularity as we experience it in the cultural materials we study.
Catherine Bell is the Bernard J. Hanley Professor of Religious Studies and former chair of the Department of Religious Studies at Santa Clara University. She has written two books on ritual, Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice (1992) and Ritual: Perspectives and Dimensions (1997), with a forthcoming edited volume, Teaching Ritual (Oxford/AAR Series), as well as many articles on manuscript and printed texts in Chinese popular religion. She is currently on leave to complete a book entitled Believing.
Saturday, September 30, 2006, 6:30 pm
"Milarepa"
Wheeler Auditorium, UC Berkeley
From the producers of The Cup and Travelers and Magicians comes the true story of Tibet's greatest saint, Milarepa. In this account of his early life, we encounter the forces that propelled him onto the path to enlightenmentbetrayal, magic, demons, vengeance and awakening. Directed by Tibetan Lama Neten Chokling Rinpoche, this film is of interest for anyone concerned with the cycle of violence and retribution consuming today's world.
6:30 pm Screening of Milarepa, Wheeler Auditorium
8:00 pm Q & A with the Director, Neten Chokling Rinpoche
9:00 pm Benefit Reception
Please call 877-697-2998 or order tickets online.
Co-sponsored by the Conservancy for Tibetan Art and Culture.
Thursday, September 7, 2006, 5:00 pm
Paul Harrison, Visiting Professor, Department of Religious Studies, Stanford University
The Riddle of Tabo: The Origin and Fate of a West Tibetan Manuscript Collection
IEAS Conference Room, 2223 Fulton Street, 6th Floor
The surviving fragments of an enormous manuscript library in the West Tibetan Monastery of Tabo, founded in 996 C.E., confront researchers with many problems and challenges. How and when was this huge collection produced? Who or what was responsible for the unbelievable state of damage and disorder in which it was found at the start of the 20th century? The work of cataloguing these sacred remains, much of it carried out "in the field" at Tabo, casts new light on the development of the Buddhist canon, and on the history of West Tibet, the cradle of the Tibetan Buddhist renaissance in the 10th-11th centuries.
Paul Harrison was until recently Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Canterbury in Christchurch New Zealand. During the Fall and Winter Quarters he will be a Visiting Professor at Stanford University. His research interests include the history and literature of Mahayana Buddhism (especially Mahayana sutras), the study of Sanskrit Buddhist manuscripts, and the development of the Tibetan canon.
