Associate Professor KURAMOTO, Hisanori
Associate Professor KURAMOTO, Hisanori
- Academic Degree
- Ph.D. in Humanities and Sociology, The University of Tokyo
- Expertise
- Historiography of Chinese thought and culture
- Research Theme
- Buddhist history during the Six Dynasties, Sui, and Tang Periods
Buddhist history during the Six Dynasties, Sui, and Tang Periods
This research project is an attempt to construct a Buddhist history that is neither a sect-based history of theology nor a political history by dynasty, by going beyond printed Buddhist canons and official histories to consider stone inscriptions such as epigraphs and contemporary records of statue creation as well as ancient manuscripts preserved in Dunhuang and Japanese temples. In concrete terms, I intend to use the characteristic of regionality possessed by stone inscriptions to place emphasis on the relationships between Buddhism at central locations like Chang'an and Luoyang and Buddhism at peripheral regions as I study the intellectual standpoint of monks at key temples and the human networks of monks and lay figures in other regions. Activities carried out at temples—including lectures on sutras, penitence and other rituals, and practices like sculpting—are spaces for network formation, and I intend to consider the ideas and human networks arising in these spaces with regard to the balance between the three types of learning—vinaya, samadhi, and prajna.