BDK Scholarship Previous Holders

With the generous support of the BDK, I was able to conduct research on the topic of Buddho-Daoist interchange. I spent the 2007-2008 academic year investigating the conceptual and ritual bedrock shared by Buddhist and Daoist talismanic techniques, longevity-inducing elixirs, and divinatory meditations. My efforts centered on a handful of sources from the early medieval and medieval periods in China and Japan, namely Sanhuang 三皇 (Three Sovereigns) texts from the Donghshen 洞神 (Storing the Divine) section of the Daoist canon, Esoteric Buddhist sources from the Sino-Japanese canon including the Longshu wuming lun 龍樹五明論 (Nāgārjuna’s Treatise on the Five Sciences; T. 1420), and a handful of Buddhist manuscripts preserved at the Kanazawa bunkō. As a result of this research, it emerged that in many respects, “Daoism” and “Buddhism” are often quasi-arbitrary labels appended to concepts and practices that transcend sectarian boundaries and ex post facto categorizations. This is particularly true of certain elements antedating organized Daoism and the development of Esoteric Buddhism in China. The ubiquity and plasticity of these elements and their related methods guaranteed their transmission and successful adaptation to the Japanese religio-cultural context.

Title of Dissertation, date defended, department and institution

“The Three Sovereigns Tradition: Talismans, Elixirs, and Meditation in Early Medieval China.” Defended 12/2009;
PhD obtained 04/2010 from the Buddhist Studies Program, Department of Religious Studies, Stanford University, Stanford CA, USA.

Current position and contact information

Assistant Professor
East Asian Languages and Cultural Studies, Religious Studies
University of California Santa Barbara
Santa Barbara CA 93106-7075

dsteavu[at]eastasian[dot]ucsb[dot]edu>

Current research interests

Generally speaking, my current research investigates the strategies through which premodern religions and intellectual currents situate the individual in relation to the cosmos and its components, in other words, the process of composition that is ingredient to any cosmology. More pointedly, I am interested in how socio-historical contingencies shape this process and ultimately impact the production and circulation of knowledge that results from composition. I focus on the transmission of ideas and practices across sectarian, economic, and cultural boundaries. I am presently investigating the cosmological compatibility that permitted Six-Dynasties Daoists and Tang Esoteric Buddhists to absorb and elaborate on many of the notions pertaining to the cosmic body and fate (including illness) that were originally developed in Han-dynasty sources. I am particularly curious about how these conceptual compatibilities were translated into tangible substances (such as alchemical elixirs [dan 丹] and phytochemical medicines [yao 藥]), or concrete implements (such as talismans [fu 符], seals [yin 印], diagrams [tu 圖], and cosmographs [shi 式]), which fueled the motor of Buddho-Daoist interchange. I am also interested in how this interchange was articulated in medieval Japan, where the dynamics and parameters were considerably different the Chinese context.

Recent publications and talks

1. Edited Volumes and Special Issues

Transforming the Void: Embryological Discourse and Reproductive Symbolism in East Asian Religions. Co-editor, with Anna Andreeva. Leiden: Sir Henry Wellcome Asian Series, Brill (2015).

“The Literary Subversive: Writings of Resistance in East Asian History,” special issue, Medieval History Journal 17.2 (October 2014)

2. Articles and Book Chapters

“Delocalizing Illness: Healing and the State in Chinese Magical Medicine.” In Helene Basu and William Sax, eds., The Law of Possession: Ritual, Therapy, and the Secular State, 82–113. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015.
 
“Cosmos, Body, and Meditation in Early Medieval Taoism.” In Anna Andreeva and Dominic Steavu, eds., Transforming the Void: Embryological and Reproductive Symbolism in East Asian Religions, 111–146. Leiden: Sir Henry Wellcome Asian Series, Brill (i2015).
 
“Backdrops and Parallels to Embryological Discourse and Reproductive Imagery in East Asian Religions.” Co-authored with Anna Andreeva. In Anna Andreeva and Dominic Steavu, eds., Transforming the Void: Embryological and Reproductive Symbolism in East Asian Religions, 1–50. Leiden: Sir Henry Wellcome Asian Series, Brill (2015).
 
“Cosmogony and the Origin of Inequality. A Utopian Perspective from the Wunengzi.” Special issue on “The Literary Subversive: Writings of Resistance in East Asian History,” Medieval History Journal 17.2 (2014): 295–335.
 
“A Brief Overview of the Role of Intellectuals in Resistance.” Special issue on “The Literary Subversive” Writings of Resistance in East Asian History,” Medieval History Journal 17.2 (2014): 195–206.
 
“The Many Lives of Lord Wang of the Western Citadel: A Note on the Transmission of the Sanhuang wen (Writ of the Three Sovereigns),” Journal of the International College for Postgraduate Buddhist Studies 13 (March 2009): 109–161.

3. Review Articles

“Taking Form in Response to Stimulus: Recent Publications in Taoist Studies, A Field in Motion.”Asiatisches Studien/Études asiatiques 63.4 (2013): 1081–1101.
 
“Recent Publications in Daoist Studies,” Cahiers-d’Extrême Asie 17 (2008) [2010]: 341–355.

Thanks to generous support from Mr. Numata and the Bukkyō Dendō Kyōkai, I spent the 2012-2013 academic year conducting dissertation research at Tōyō University, one of four Tokyo universities forming a consortium for the study of Buddhism.

My project was an investigation of statements on food (shi 食) in Chinese Buddhist leishu 類書, texts that resemble encyclopedias. I focused my attention on Yichu’s 義楚 (10th c.) Shishi liutie 釋氏六帖, a non-canonical work that arrived to the present day as a rare woodblock-print edition held at Tōfukuji in Kyoto, Japan. Translating and analyzing Yichu's citations on food, I found that they tend to frame eating as a skilled activity and emphasize the merit-building power of making offerings of food. The theme of vegetarianism is present but overshadowed by other concerns, which was something of a surprise. My research helps illustrate how Buddhist knowledge of food oriented practitioners toward not only moral self-cultivation, but also physiological benefit.

Title of Dissertation, date defended, department and institution

“Skilled Eating: Knowledge of Food in Yichu’s Shishi liutie, a Buddhist Encyclopedia from Tenth-Century China.” Defended March 2015, Department of Asian Studies, University of British Columbia.

Current Affiliation

Sheng Yen Postdoctoral Fellow in Chinese Buddhism 2016-2018
Center for Buddhism and East Asian Religion (CBEAR)
80 Claremont Avenue
Columbia University
New York City, NY 10027
USA

rt2627[at]columbia[dot]edu

Current research Interests

I research Chinese Buddhism and Chinese food history, as well as longevity patterns in Chinese history. My aim is to better understand relationships between food practices and the moral structures of premodern society. Specifically, I use Buddhist encyclopedias to analyze the way ideas about food evolved over time or settled into normative patterns that traveled in literary form through time and space. My historical focus is on texts compiled in the 10th-13th centuries, from the end of the Tang, through the Five Dynasties, and into the Song period. Around this time, newly developing print technology allowed an unprecedented volume of written works to be published and circulated, providing a broad base for scholarship on China's religious and social history. My pilot study of longevity patterns in Chinese history suggests that tonsured Buddhists enjoyed better longevity than the general population, an intriguing finding that has stimulated my interest in pursuing further research on long-lived Chinese Buddhists and their food practices.

Recent publications and talks

“Buddhist Method as Medicine: The Chan Materia Medica and its Ming-Dynasty Elaboration.” In Buddhism and Healing: A Sourcebook, edited by C. Pierce Salguero. Forthcoming in 2017.

"Rustic Recipes for Nourishing Life: Lin Hong’s Shanjia qinggong from Song China.” Association for Asian Studies Annual Conference, Seattle, WA, USA, 31 March-3 April, 2016.

"Media Chains and Reading Methods: Illustrating Strengths and Limitations of Digital Media with a Non-Canonical Tenth-Century Chinese Buddhist Encyclopedia." Paper, Print, and Cyberspace: The Perspective of a Global Network for the Multimedia and Interdisciplinary Studies of Buddhism and East Asian Religions, a workshop held at the University of British Columbia, 4-5 October 2015.

"Four-Foods Doctrine in Chinese Buddhism: Non-Cartesian Nourishment?" Buddhism and Wellbeing: Therapeutic Approaches to Human Flourishing, The 5th Annual Tung Lin Kok Yuen Canada Foundation Conference, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, 28-30 May 2015.

“Skilled Eating: Chinese Buddhist Perspectives on Food and Morality.” 2014 Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Religion (AAR), San Diego, CA, USA, 22-25 November 2014.

“ Zen honzō to En Chūdō no Zenmon honzō ho: Zen honzō no genkei to shindai ni okeru ryōsha no kondō 『禪本草』と袁中道の『禪門本草補』―『禪本草』の原形と清代における両者の混同―” (“The Chan bencao and Yuan Zhongdao’s Chanmen bencao bu: The original text of the Chan bencao and confusions between the two during the Qing dynasty”). Tōyōgaku kenkyū 東洋学研究, vol. 50 (2013):149-161 (396-384). Tōyō University, Tokyo, Japan.

"Food and Efficacy: Porridge, Milk, and Beans in the Shishi liutie, a Buddhist Encyclopedia from Tenth-Century China." 17th Congress of the International Association of Buddhist Studies (IABS), Vienna, 19 August 2014.

"Longevity in China: Integrating Statistical and Textual Inquiries." Association for Asian Studies Annual Conference, Philadelphia Downtown Marriott, Philadelphia, PA, USA, 30 March 2014.

"Apotropaic Plants and Intrinsic Efficacy: Revisiting Kuwa (Mulberry) in Japanese Cultural History." Centre for Japanese Research Lunchtime Lecture Series, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada, 13 November 2013.

"Lexicon or Encyclopedia? Assessing Yichu's Non-Canonical Shishi liutie from Tenth-Century China." 2013 International Graduate Students' Conference on Buddhism and Chinese Religions, sponsored by the International Center for Studies of Chinese Civilization (ICSCC), Fudan University, Shanghai, China, 12 August 2013.

"Sacred or Profane? Spatial Frames in Yichu's Shishi liutie, a Buddhist Encyclopedia from Tenth-Century China." Space That is More Than Space: New Perspectives on Buddhist Sacred Sites in East Asia, a workshop held at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada, 2 August 2013.

“Food and Eating in the Shishi liutie, a Buddhist Encyclopedia from Tenth-Century China.” Buddhism Discussion Group, Tokyo, Japan, March 10, 2013.

“The Normative Force of Recipes: Food Writing from Thirteenth-Century China in Historical and Ethnological Perspective.” Ninth International Conference on Environmental, Cultural, Economic, and Social Sustainability, International Conference Center, Hiroshima, Japan, January 24, 2013.

“The Flavor of Meditation: Botanical Metaphor and Religious Efficacy in the Chan Bencao of Song China.” Association for Asian Studies Annual Conference, Sheraton Centre, Toronto, Canada, March 17, 2012.

“Pure Offerings: Buddhist Moral Themes in Lin Hong’s Shanjia qinggong.” Legacies of Taste: An International Conference on Food Narratives in China: School of Chinese, The University of Hong Kong, December 17, 2011.

“Modeling Materia Medica: Interactions Between Lay Intellectual and Buddhist Forms of Knowledge in the Chan Bencao and Related Texts.” The Ninth International Symposium Sponsored by UBC Tzu-Chi Buddhist Forum, Lay Buddhism: An Old Issue Viewed in New Perspectives, Vancouver, BC, Canada, March 25, 2011.

I initially collected primary and secondary materials (in particular Japanese articles and monographs) on topics related to astrology, astral deities and calendrical science in East Asia. I was especially interested in finding extra-canonical works, documents and specimens of art related to the Buddhist practice of astrology in China and Japan. It was with all these materials in hand that I could start tracing out an accurate chronology for the development of Buddhist astrology in China. I discovered that many of the purported authors of relevant texts are misattributed, leading to numerous misunderstandings even in modern scholarship. I also looked at the influence of foreign astrology in Tang and Heian-era literature as well as the East Asian art record. I published many of my findings in a Japanese article.

Title of Dissertation, date defended, department and institution:

"Buddhist Astrology and Star Worship in the Tang Dynasty" To be defended September, 2018. Institute for Area Studies (Humanities), Leiden University.

Current Affiliation:

PhD Candidate, Leiden University.

j.kotyk@hum.leidenuniv.nl

Current Research Interests:

Astrology in Asia, Religions in the Tang Dynasty, Buddhist Chinese, Lexicography.

Recent publications and talks:

Kotyk, Jeffrey. “Kanjiken no bungaku ni okeru saihō-senseijutsu no yōso: tōzai bunka kōryū ni okeru Bukkyō no yakuwari” 漢字圏の文学における西方占星術の要素：東西文化交流における仏教の役割 [Elements of Occidental Astrology in Literature of the Sinosphere: a Role of Buddhism in Eurasian Cultural Exchange]. Bukkyō bungaku kenkyū 佛教文學研究 19 (2016): 85–110. http://repo.komazawa-u.ac.jp/opac/repository/all/35666/