Bodhisdattvas of the Forest and the Formation of the Mahayana: A Study and Trans. of the Rastrapalapariprccha-sutra

by Daniel Boucher

Bodhisattvas of the Forest delves into the socio religious milieu of the authors, editors, and propagators of the Rastrapalapariprccha-sutra (Question of Rastrapala), a Buddhist text circulating in India during the first half of the first millennium C.E. In this meticulously researched study, Daniel Boucher first reflects upon the problems that plague historians of Mahayana Buddhism, whose previous efforts to comprehend the tradition have often ignored the social dynamics that motivated some of the innovations of this new literature. Following that is a careful analysis of several motifs found in the Indian text and an examination of the value of the earliest Chinese translation for charting the sutra's evolution.

About the Author:

Daniel Boucher is the associate professor of Sino-Indian Buddhism in the Deptt. of Asian Studies at Cornell University.