Popular Buddhist Texts from Nepal Narratives and Rituals of Newar Buddhism

Abstract

A missionary religion originating in sixth-century B.C.E. India, Buddhism profoundly influenced the historical development of all major Asian civilizations. At the center of this tradition is a compelling spiritual vision and a path that leads to enlightenment; but underwriting Buddhism’s pan-regional expansion over the millennia, was an equally compelling popular tradition that motivated householders to support the monastic elite and to commit themselves to taking refuge in the Triratna (Three jewels): the Buddha, the dharma (teachings), and the samgha (monastic order). Most Buddhists have been farmers, artisans, or merchants, not monks or intellectuals. While Buddhism attracted ascetics with myriad meditative regimens and philosophers with vast doctrinal discourse, Buddhism’s mainstream traditions were those that cultivated the great majority of the population: exemplary stories that defined living rightly in the world and rituals designed to help householders realize the good and spiritual life. The goal of this book is to help illustrate this assessment and, by so doing, to suggest correctives to the ahistorical and idealized portrayals of Buddhism that have been conveyed, often unintentionally, by both academic writers and modern exponents. To accomplish this, I utilize research among the Newar Buddhists of Nepal to explicate how five important vernacular texts have been incorporated into this community. These Newar case studies from a Himalayan oasis of Indic Buddhism yield several sets of data: they illumine how certain popular and ritual texts contributed to a Buddhist’s religious life; they serve as paradigms regarding the pragmatic adaptation of the faith, particularly (but not limited to) societies adhering to Mahayana Buddhism; and finally, in highlighting a host of comparative or historical issues that arise, the discussion seeks to advance the understanding of Newar Buddhist history as well. This book responds to the need for locality-specific research in religious studies. Scholarship on Buddhism has been dominated either by philological-textual studies that usually have left texts unrelated to their community context(s) or by ethnographic studies that have often neglected local literati and their domesticated vernacular literatures (Cabezon 1995; Gomez 1995b). The result has been either highly idealized portrayals of Buddhism based upon a small elite’s philosophical definitions and disputations or more anthropological representations with cursory concern with a society’s doctrinal awareness or textual culture. The texts presented in this study arose from my earliest ethnographic fieldwork in Nepal (1979–82) when I attempted to collect and read many “working texts” published by local pandits pertinent to my much larger effort of researching modern Buddhism in the Kathmandu Valley. Hundreds were located and several have already been published either separately (e.g., Lewis 1989b 1994a) or as sources for thematic studies (e.g., 1993c 1996a). The five texts in this volume were among the many I worked through with my teachers and informants as I sought to learn Newari and to survey the labyrinth of surviving practices. In pursuing the study of this vernacular literature on popular Buddhist narratives and rituals, I was finding the confluence of my own training in classical and Nepalese languages, the history of religions, and anthropology; in so doing, I came to realize the value of highlighting this vast and universal textual genre that has remained largely ignored by scholars specializing in the study of Buddhism. Over the last decade, the various disciplines comprising Buddhist studies (textual, historical, and anthropological) have converged in recognizing that the field needs to direct further attention to vernacular texts, ritual studies, and local expressions of devotion (e.g., Hallisey 1995b; Bowen 1995; Obeyesekere 1991; Strong 1992; Hoffman 1992). This book addresses the need for interdisciplinary scholarship, dialogue, and research in order to make progress in constructing Buddhist history with much more rigorous sociological and cultural imagination.