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The present volume selcts twenty-four of Prof. Wayman's published research
papers around the topic of Buddhist Insight, and includes only strong, well
developed papers consistent with the topic. Students of Buddhism and general
Indian religion will find here a rich offering of genuine research with the best
of sources and Wayman's own thoughtful presentations and original organization
of the information. The papers begin with "Buddha as Savior" among the latest
and end with the earliest in this volume, "Twenty one Praises of Tara.The Hindu
and Buddhist Studies illustrate Wayman's comparative approach by showing both
sides in their strong independence, and sensitively revealing their relation.
In this volume the reader will find conveniently collected twenty-four essays by the great Buddhologist, Alex Wayman, for many years Professor of Sanskrit at Columbia University. While Wayman is particularly well known for his ground-breaking investigations of the Buddhist Tantra, the articles in this collection, published in various journals between 1959 and 1980, deal with non-tantric Buddhism. Edited by George Elder, a former student of Wayman's and now Professor at Hunter College, the volume is divided into five
parts: Buddhist Practice, Buddhist Doctrine, Interpretative Studies of Buddhism, Texts of the Asanga School, and Hindu and Buddhist Studies. In his introduction Elder attempts to situate the present
volume as a non-tantric counterpart to Wayman's previous
collection of articles entitled The Buddhist Tantras: Light
on Indo-Tibetan Esotericism, but it must be said that while
that volume is given an underlying unity by its single
thematic focus, the present volume offers no such unity. It
is, quite simply, a miscellaneous collection of scholarly
articles on various aspects of Buddhism directed seemingly at
fellow specialists. Nevertheless, editor Elder is to be
commended for drawing together these articles, some published
in rather obscure journals and difficult-to-get commemoration
volumes, for the convenience of the reader. The pieces as a
whole bear witness to the relentless scholarly pursuit of
knowledge about Buddhism, as well as to a commitment to
understand and interpret Buddhism on its own terms. Included
here are a number of famous pieces ("No Time, Great Time, and
Profane Time in Buddhism, ") as well as peculiarly
idiosyncratic ones ("Secret of the Heart Sutra.") Throughout,
the interested reader will marvel at the range of erudition
and philological precision Wayman displays as he handles
Sanskrit, Pali, and Tibetan Buddhist texts with equal ease.
Wayman addresses himself to a variety of themes here:
Buddhist soteriology, monasticism, art history, meditational
practice, and doctrinal argumentation. Despite an
occasionally abrupt and even quirky style, Wayman writes with
great force. He presents a thesis, engages himself in the
polemic at hand with vigor, and declares his thesis
established. Nevertheless, it is easy to lose one's way in
the thicket of philological and technical detail that
populate these pieces, especially as the import of these
details is not always made clear. Moreover, many of the
articles seem purely descriptive, content to review large
amounts of information on a particular topic, but often
seemingly lacking in a discernable theoretical or
methodological focus.
While it is not possible to comment in detail on every
article, in what follows certain essays will be selected for
brief commentary. Part I, on "Buddhist Practice," offers four
articles: (1) "Buddha as Savior, " (2) "Ancient Buddhist
Monasticism," (3) "Aspects of Meditation in Theravada and
Mahasaka," and (4) "The Bodhisattva Practice according to the
Lato Rim Chen Mo." These articles number among the best in
the collection. In particular, the article on Buddhist
meditation presents us with a closely reasoned and
comparative account of the progress made by the meditator
through the four levels of dhyana and the four formless
attainments. Also excellent is the piece on Buddhist
monasticism, which describes in detail aspects of the
ordination and daily life of monks according to a number of
vinaya-s, and includes an examination of the major and minor
offenses and the resulting punishments.
Part II, "Buddhist Doctrine," occupies the largest section of
the book and contains eight articles: (5) "The Sixteen
Aspects of the Four Noble Truths and Their Opposites," (6)
"The Mirror as a Pan-Buddhist Metaphor-Simile," (7) "The
Buddhist Theory of Vision," (8) "Dependent Origination--The
Indo-Tibetan Tradition," (9) "Nescience and Insight According
to Asanga's Yogacarabhumi," (10) "The Twenty Reifying Views
(Sakkayaditthi)," (11) "Who Understands the Four Alternatives
of the Buddhist Texts?" and (12) "The Intermediate-State
Dispute in Buddhism." In these articles Wayman displays his
passion for the intricate details of the Buddhist Dharma. The
article on pratityasamutpada, in particular, is a tour de
force of explication concerning what is perhaps the "deepest"
doctrine of Buddhism. The articles on the Reifying views and
the Catuskoti are both masterpieces of compression and
exposition and will repay careful scrutiny.
Part III contains articles under the rubric of
"Interpretative Studies of Buddhism" entitled: (13) "No Time,
Great Time, and Profane Time in Buddhism," (14) "The Role of
Art among the Buddhist Religieux," and (15) "Secret of the
Heart Sutra." The first of these is an extended meditation,
heavily influenced by Eliadean categories, on the nature of
time. The last piece is a curious and, in many ways, rather
successful exercise which sets itself the task of compoing
"an Asian-type commentary" on the famous Perfection of Wisdom
text. Entitling his commentary "Explaining the Difficulties,"
Wayman attempts to construct an explanatory gloss that will
initiate the reader into the mysteries of this celebrated and
concise Sutra.
Part IV of the book is given over to "Texts of the Asanga
School" and contains: (16) "The Sacittika and Acittika Bhumi,
Text and Translation, " (17) "Asanga's Treatise, the
Paramartha Gatha," and (18) "Asanga's Treatise on the Three
Instructions of Buddhism." Each of these essays reproduces a
transliterated Sanskrit text accompanied by a translation,
sometimes interspersed with Wayman's own remarks. The first
of these deals with the stages of meditational accomplishment
known as "with thought" and "without thought," each of which
is examined from a number of points of view. The second text
contains an early version of Yogacara philosophy, while the
last deals with the three categories of Buddhist training:
Morality, Meditation, and Wisdom.
The last section of the book is entitled "Hindu and Buddhist
Studies" and contains articles dealing with (19) "Two
Traditions of India--Truth and Silence, " (20) "The
Hindu-Buddhist Rite of Truth--An Interpretation, " (21)
"Significance of Dreams in India and Tibet," (22) "The
Significance of Mantras, from the Veda down to Buddhist
Tantric Practice," (23) "The Goddess Sarasvati--from India to
Tibet, " and (24) "The Twenty-one Praises of Tara, a
Syncretism of Saivism and Buddhism." These are among the most
interesting and suggestive pieces in the collection, perhaps
because we here find Wayman ranging rather more freely and
interpretively over his materials. The first essay claims to
uncover two related though quite different traditions
centering respectively on the muni-s, those who have taken a
vow of silence, and those who speak out the truth, satya.
This typology allows Wayman to make interesting distinctions
between, for example, the teachings of the Brhadaranyaka and
Chandogya Upanisad-s. An equally suggestive and wide-ranging
article examines various typologies of dreams, as well as
their classification and interpretation. The longest and
perhaps most intriguing investigation in this section, on
mantra-s, takes Wayman back into the area of Tantric studies
in which he is so adept. The book is made easier to handle by
the inclusion of a rather long and detailed index. In short,
this is a collection which all interested scholars will want
to add to their libraries and which may be used profitably by
graduate students, and even perhaps by instructors of
undergraduate classes on Buddhism who might wish to expose
their students to the best in Buddhological research. About the Author:
Alex Wayman, presently Professor of Sanskrit, Columbia
University, New York, is in the forefront of Western Buddhist scholarship by his
series of books in Buddhism. He has authored a hundred articles that came out
originally in journals or honorary-type volumes in various countries. A number
of his essays on Tantra were collected in a volume, the Buddhist Tantras. He has
the title professor Emeritus of Sanskrit, effective July 1991. Among his awards
are the honorary D.Litt at Nalanda University, India.
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