Northern Wei Wutaishan: an outside view of centres and peripheries

ABSTRACT

This study is an attempt to look at Wutaishan from an outside, non-Chinese, non-Buddhist perspective in order to imagine its possible religious significance to the Taugast, the group originally from beyond the northern limits of Chinese civilization who came to be known in China as the Northern Wei, when they first began to pay attention to what was then a mountain not strongly associated with Buddhism, or even Daoism. Though the amount of textual material on this period is very limited, it is suggested that the caves of Wutaishan were already regarded by these northern outsiders to China as possessing a religious significance, a significance ultimately relating to conceptions of northern peoples that also continued to exert an appeal on Mongols in later periods. Archaeological study that might further clarify this hypothesis will need to bear in mind that Wutaishan has been both at the centre and at the periphery of more than one culture and indeed thereby perhaps played an important role in mediating cultural conflict.

KEYWORDS:

• Wutai
• Taugast
• Emperor Xiaowen of Northern Wei
• Qingliang shanzhi

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. Pozneyeff, “Review of D. Pokotiloff,” 181–182.

2. Di Cosmo, Ancient China and Its Enemies, 93–158.

3. See the introduction in Chen Yangjiong 陳扬炯 and Feng Qiaoying 馮巧英, eds., Gu Qingliang zhuan, Guang Qingliang zhuan, Xu Qingliang zhuan, 3.

4. Holmgren, Annals of Tai.

5. Holmgren, Annals of Tai, 63.

6. Itabashi Akiko 板橋暁子, “Tō Shin shoki no shūen to tenka kan” 東晋初期の周縁と天下観, 255–285.

7. On the career of this remarkable person, see of Holmgren, “The Harem in Northern Wei Politics, 398–498 ad,” 84–92. For the ethnic and cultural background of her family, now see most importantly also Abe, Ordinary Images, 180–183.

8. See Barrett, “Stūpa, Sūtra and Śarīra in China,” 18. The affirmation that this was the first time the monastery was built is in the Gu Qingliang zhuan, 1, 15 in the edition of Chen and Feng cited above, n. 3; the citations I make from the Fayuan zhulin 法苑珠林 14 and 39 derive from writings by Daoxuan 道宣 (596-667), whose view of the remoter history of Wutaishan, as Chen and Feng remark in their introduction, was clearly ahistorical, though he does also preserve eyewitness evidence of what could be seen there in his own day. We return to this matter below.

9. Caswell, Written and Unwritten, 19.

10. For Huixiang, see Lin, Building a Sacred Mountain, 60, and n. 46, 228 for more detailed studies. The references to sources on the stone pagodas by Daoxuan (see note 7, above) are not provided in my 2001 article, but see Daoxuan, Xu Gaoseng zhuan 續高僧傳 25, p. 665a23-24, in T. 50, no. 2060; Daoxuan, Ji Shenzhou sanbao gantong lu 集神州三寳感通錄 2, p. 422c12; 3, p. 424c28-29, in T. 52, no. 2106; cf. Daoxuan lüshi gantong lu 道宣律師感通錄,p. 437a29-b1 in T. 52, no. 2107. Lin, Building a Sacred Mountain, 234, n. 22, shows that Daoxuan’s informant visited in 661 and 662.

11. Thus to the references concerning these structures suggested in my original study may now be added the work of Stanley K. Abe, Ordinary Images, 123–171; portability is mentioned on 123.

12. My 2001 study perhaps did not bring out clearly enough the possibility of Buddhist or Buddhistic rulers using this form of relic distribution as a way of establishing for themselves their own sacred space, and in a subsequent attempt at articulating these ideas for a wider readership in Barrett, The Woman Who Discovered Printing, not enough attention is given to the territorial aspects of the process of distributing Buddha relics in printed form. But the seventh century model of Buddhist territoriality would have been an Aśokan one; this model is unlikely to have been so clear to Xiaowendi in the fifth century.

13. See Twitchett, “The Monasteries and China’s Economy in Medieval Times,” 536.

14. Birnbaum, “Secret Halls of the Mountain Lords,” 120–121.

15. Birnbaum, “Secret Halls of the Mountain Lords,” 121, n. 14.

16. Birnbaum, “Secret Halls of the Mountain Lords,” 123, n. 23; 124, n. 27, n. 28.

17. Stein, The World in Miniature, 54–58, 72–74, 197, affords some good examples of this.

18. One notes that somewhat surprisingly cave heavens do not figure at all prominently in the fourth century Baopuzi 抱朴子. For the early southern scriptures on this topic as they eventually were transmitted to late sixth century North China, see Lagerwey, Wu-shang pi-yao, 50, 55, 77, 93.

19. Note the very uninformative biography of Kou Qianzhi 寇謙之 (365-448) cited from the Southern Dongxian zhuan 洞仙傳 in Li Yongsheng 李永晟, ed., Yunji qiqian 雲笈七籤 110, 2412, and cf. on this source Penny, in Pregadio, ed., Encyclopedia of Taoism, 373.

20. See Verellen, “The Beyond Within,” 283.

21. For these Chinese perceptions, see Lin, Building a Sacred Mountain, 61–62.

22. See Pearce, “Nurses, Nurslings, and New Shapes of Power,” 304.

23. Skaff, Sui-Tang China and Its Turko-Mongol Neighbours, 113.

24. Kessler, Song Blue and White Porcelain on the Silk Road 11–12, n. 45, explains the relationship of his text to published and unpublished Chinese research, in response to a review of mine pointing out the lack of clarity as to the derivation of the material used. I am most grateful to Dr. Kessler for his clarification, which entirely removes my puzzlement, and apologise if my remarks seemed to imply malpractice on his part, which was not at all my intention.

25. Kessler, Empires Beyond the Great Wall, 69–87; see also Skaff, Sui-Tang China, 113, which gives the reference for Chinese publication of the 1980 find, and for earlier research, Holmgren, Annals of Tai, 80, n. 8.

26. Charleux, Nomads on Pilgrimage, 349–368. I am very grateful to Dr. Charleux for alerting me to the significance of her research.

27. Charleux, Nomads on Pilgrimage, 361–362.

28. Charleux, Nomads on Pilgrimage, 363.

29. Among Buddhist cave temples one naturally thinks of the famous Ajantā Caves, but these on the scale that they now exist seem to be contemporary with Yungang rather than an earlier source of inspiration: cf. the summary of Singh, An Introduction to the Ajantā Caves. Caswell, Written and Unwritten, 76, points to clearer influences at Yungang from Udayana.

30. Wang’s version of the text is used for example in Birnbaum, “Secret Halls of the Mountain Lords”, 124, n. 26, as well as by Chinese scholars.

31. Li Fang 李昉, ed., Taiping yulan 太平御览 45.3a-4b (Sibu congkan 四部丛刊, series 3, Seikadō bunko 静嘉堂文庫 Song ed.). Li Daoyuan’s book is the only source mentioned at the head of this entry, but comparison with some other topographical entries in the same section suggest that anonymous materials appended to like entries elsewhere do not always derive from the initial source given.

32. For a discussion of the relevant sources in English, see Inagaki, T’an-luan’s Commentary on Vasubandhu’s Discourse on the Pure Land, 17–37.