About the Book
Bringing together contributions from North America, UK, Europe and Asia into a single volume, this book advances scholarship in Buddhist studies and celebrates Rupert Gethin’s immense contribution to the field. Essays include explorations of Buddhist teachings, scriptural studies and cover the fields of research that engage Rupert Gethin’s scholarship: Buddhist cosmology, textual translations, Abhidharma and the interface between Buddhism and modern science.
Scholars address themes associated with Buddhist thought and practice, including philosophy of mind and the relationship between artificial intelligence and Buddhist ethics. Translations and analyses of a variety of written materials span several genres and ages: Gandhari manuscripts, Vinaya commentaries, Buddhist Sanskrit imagery and Tibetan translations of late Indian texts.
To acknowledge Rupert Gethin’s important and expansive contribution to the field of Abhidharma, the book offers explorations into Abhidharma terminology, its commentaries and texts associated with early Buddhist schools. The volume also highlights the intricacies of Abhidharma, the interplay of Buddhism and modern technology, and how language shared between Pali and Sanskrit illuminates Buddhist doctrines.
Table of Contents:
Foreword
Notes of Appreciation
Note on the Translations
Buddhist Teachings: Ancient and Modern
1. Gods, Demons and Kind Spirits — Buddhist Cosmology and Meaningful Myth, Ajahn Amaro (Amaravati Buddhist Monastery, UK)
2. Moving through the Forest: Approaching Textual Representations of Buddhist Meditation like a Great Elephant, Daniel M. Stuart (University of South Carolina, USA)
3. Dharma in the Digital Age: Some reflections on Buddhism and Artificial Intelligence, Jane Compson (University of Washington, USA)
Abhidharma Studies
4. The Fourth Chapter of the Tattvartha Abhidharmakosatika: Causes for Losing Restraint, Non-Restraint and Neither-Restraint-nor-Non-Restraint. Jowita Kramer (Universität Leipzig, Germany) and Kazuo Kano (Koyasan University, Japan)
5. Exposing the Rice Ball Trick — How Pali Grammarians Transformed Grammar into a Branch of the Abhidhamma, Aleix Ruiz-Falqués (Shan State Buddhist University, Myanmar)
6. ‘Distinguishing the Composite and the Non-composite’: The first chapter of Dasabalasrimitra’s Samskrtasamskrtaviniscaya, Peter Skilling (Chulalongkorn University, Thailand)
7. Abhidhamma through numbers, Nalini Balbir (École Pratique des Hautes Études, France) and Javier Schake (École Pratique des Hautes Études, France)
8. The Milk Debt to Mother: Abhidhamma in Burmese Buddhism, Pyi Phyo Kyaw (Shan State Buddhist University, Taunggyi, Myanmar)
Textual Studies
9. Textual Entanglements: Encounters with Gandhari Manuscripts, Collett Cox (University of Washington, USA)
10. South Indian and Sri Lankan Buddhist Vinaya Traditions and Discrepancies in their Exegeses, Petra Kieffer-Pülz (Academy of Sciences and Literature, Germany)
11. One Hundred and Eight Distinctions of Craving: The *Trsna-sutra of the Samyukagama, Jens-Uwe Hartmann (Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Germany) and (Keiki Nakayama Leipzig University, Germany)
About the Author :
Paul Fuller is Lecturer in Buddhist Studies at the University of Edinburgh, UK.
Indaka Weerasekera is an independent scholar of Buddhist Studies.
Review :
‘This collection of interesting articles represents a fitting tribute to the scholarship and good character of Rupert Gethin, one of the most important British Buddhist Studies scholars of his generation. The range of topics covered by the contributions — textual studies, meditation, Abhidharma, Pali grammar, commentarial literature, and myth and cosmology — reflects Rupert’s own diverse interests, while the quality of the articles, written by some of the leading scholars in the field, mirrors the quality of Rupert’s own scholarship.’
‘This volume in honor of Rupert Gethin presents a collection of insightful essays authored by former students, colleagues, and practitioners, reflecting the extensive range and depth of his profoundly impactful scholarship in Buddhist Studies. The diversity of new scholarship included here not only significantly enhances our understanding of Buddhist traditions but also illustrates how Gethin’s brilliant work has inspired and influenced many.’
‘These collected essays celebrate Rupert Gethin as a true role model in the field of Buddhist Studies. The authoritative voices gathered in this volume testify to the breadth and depth of his scholarship focused on Pali literature and Buddhist scholasticism. Rupert Gethin indeed exemplifies how intellectual rigour combined with creativity and empathy for the living tradition can lead to an insightful and balanced exploration of the fascinating conceptual world of Buddhism in South Asia.’
‘All the authors of these papers have been influenced by interacting with Rupert Gethin, whether in-person, through his writings, or both. The book will be of interest to those drawn to exploring the intricacies of Buddhist thought on the mind, actions, and the subtleties of reality. An image which comes to mind for the interacting threads that run through the book is of rays of light refracted through layers of precisely cut jewels. Modes of textual analysis are analyzed and probed, as is the complex conditioned arising of manuscripts, the interaction of grammar, speech and meaning, syllables as representing numbers, the Abhidhamma as the Buddha’s gift to his birth-mother, how suttas with different practice emphases complement each other, and alternative ways of ways of relating to passages on such beings as devas. There is also a thread which includes ethical aspects of AI and Abhidhamma echoes in Vinaya commentaries. Most of the papers concern Abhidhamma texts or issues, but they all have the quality of precise analysis, as per the Abhidhamma, with several showing many cross-connections of conditions, another echo of Abhidhamma. Most of the papers are focused on texts, primarily Pali ones, but also some from other Mainstream schools.’
