Document Type

Article

Publication Date

2-1-2020

Abstract

This paper is about the relationship between the famous Japanese esoteric Buddhist Kūkai and the less-famous Gomyō, who you've probably never heard of but maybe should have. My paper responds to the work of two recent scholars, Fujii Jun, who says that Kūkai was a Sanron (Japanese Mādhyamika) priest, and Matsumoto Gyoyu, who speculates about the origins of and thinking behind certain passages in Kūkai's Jūjūshinron. The paper points to the intellectual significance for Kūkai of his close relationship with Gomyō and other Yogācāra scholars of his day, and how this is reflected in the Jūjūshinron and Kūkai's thought broadly. It proceeds through three sections: (1) Kūkai's connection to Japanese Yogācāra, (2) Connections between the Jūjūshinron and the Gomyō's Chapters Summarizing Mahāyāna Yogācāra, and (3) Cosmology and panjiao and the Jūjūshinron and Chapters Summarizing Mahāyāna Yogācāra.

Share

COinS