U320/U520 Buddhism in Central Asia

Spring, 2009

Christopher Beckwith

DESCRIPTION

This course covers the schools and sects, physical and functional institutions, and influence of Central Asian Buddhism. It also includes historical coverage of the spread of Buddhism into Central Asia from India, and from India to China, and of the doctrinal developments that affected Central Asian Buddhism. We will focus on the Sarvastivada school, which dominated most of Central Asia. It developed early in northwestern India and Central Asia under Graeco-Bactrian and Indo-Greek influence. Its adherents supposedly maintained ‘everything really exists’, contrary to one of the central tenets of Buddhism in general, and were obsessed with a ‘scientific’ analysis of everthing. They developed new methods of critical thinking and argumentation which were fundamental to the rise of science in the Middle Ages.

Textbooks

Charles Willemen, Bart Dessein and Collett Cox 1998. Sarvāstivāda Buddhist Scholasticism. Brill.

Richard Robinson, The Buddhist religions. Belmont, CA, 2005

ADDITIONAL Readings

A reading list of sample passages from representative original documents, and some additional studies, will be distributed in class. All readings are in English.

COURSE REQUIREMENTS

The grade will be determined by attendance, doing the readings, a quiz, and a short paper.