A Study on the Sinification of Buddhism: The Acceptance of the *Tattvasiddhiśāstra 成實論 and the Demise of the Chengshi School 成實學派

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This paper delves into a crucial topic within the study of the sinicization of Buddhism, namely the reception of the "Tattvasiddhi Śāstra" in China and the rise and fall of the Chengshi School. 

The main body of the article provides a detailed analysis of the acceptance of the "Tattvasiddhi Śāstra," the development of the Chengshi School, and the reasons for its decline. The author explores the original title of the "Tattvasiddhi Śāstra," the authorship issue, and the basic versions, revealing the translation, dissemination, and revision processes that the treatise underwent within the Chinese Buddhist community. Especially when analyzing the decline of the Chengshi School, the article not only considers external criticism and challenges but also delves into the internal understanding and application of the "Tattvasiddhi Śāstra" by the school and how these factors influenced its development.

When discussing the limitations of the "Tattvasiddhi Śāstra" and the excessive estimation of the Chengshi School, the article presents insightful analysis. The author points out that the decline of the Chengshi School was not entirely due to external negation or criticism but rather due to potential flaws in the school's understanding and application of the "Tattvasiddhi Śāstra." This view challenges traditional research perspectives and provides a new angle for consideration.

Overall, the research is of high academic value and theoretical depth. The author reveals a complex and multidimensional phenomenon within the process of the sinicization of Buddhism through rigorous historical document analysis and philosophical contemplation. The argument is logically clear, and the evidence is substantial, offering a comprehensive and in-depth case study of the sinicization of Buddhism. However, when discussing the reasons for the decline of the Chengshi School, the article could further consider other potential social, political, and economic factors for a more comprehensive explanation. Overall, this is an academic article of significant contribution to the field of research on the sinicization of Buddhism.

Author Response

Reply：

Dear reviewer,

I appreciate your valuable suggestions and I am sorry for the inconvenience brought to the reviewer. Literally, it's my first attempt at submitting a paper in English. In respond to your comments, I have revised some expressions in this paper. Besides, I have adopted an English editing service by MDPI to make my paper more clear and comprehensive.

As for the bibliography and quotations, I have made corrections according to the academic standard. 

I hope my latest paper can meet the requirements of the journal.

Kind regards.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This looks like a promising paper, but I can't understand most of it. The English is incomprehensible. Here are some notes.

“the academic circle” = academic world?

 

"this treatise hereafter Tat)" = this is just confusing. You can use the full title in Sanskrit, it isn't that long.

 

Chengshi School成實學派 = is this an actual lineage from that time period?

 

成實宗 in ancient Japan, but did this exist in China?

 

Check all your diacritical marks on Sanskrit names and words.

 

Hinayana = Hīnayāna

 

Mahayana = Mahāyāna

 

"The most advantage of hermeneutics" = this is not grammatical English.

 

The greatest advantage?

 

"The most advantage of hermeneutics is that it can minimize the margin in the interpreters’ understanding of the original classic. This paper utilizes the methodology of creative hermeneutics to restore the author’s thought so as to present a philosophical innovation."

 

This is very unclear. The English of this paper needs to be heavily revised for it to make any sense.

 

"This method is particularly useful in digging the thinking mode of this treatise and carrying out the author’s unfinished philosophical task, which will be a key to answering whether Tat has a theoretical flaw or not."

 

This is also very unclear.

 

"translation (affirmative), spread (revere), revisal (skeptical)." Again, this is not comprehensible English.

 

 

"which can be an assist to some novices in Buddhism" = "assist" is a verb, not a noun. "Novice" normally refers to 沙彌 in a religious context like this, but I think you mean beginners.

 

(CBETA 2023.Q1, T55, p. 78a14-27). = this is not a clear way to cite things. Meanwhile in the footnotes we see T45, p.9a9-16. Please be consistent.

 

I simply can't follow along with this paper. It reads like a direct translation from Chinese. The author needs to entirely revise the paper with the assistance of an editor or colleague. As it presently stands, I can't understand even the introduction. What does "minimize the margin in the interpreters’ understanding of the original classic" mean?

 

Also, there is a lot more scholarship on the text in question in Japanese:

 

https://cir.nii.ac.jp/all?q=%E6%88%90%E5%AE%9F%E8%AB%96

 

The bibliography is also not formatted properly. You need to pay attention to quotation marks and italics.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

The entire paper is unclear. To discuss a philosophical topic like this requires clear English, but the present version is difficult to understand.

Author Response

Reply：

Dear reviewer,

I appreciate your valuable suggestions and I am sorry for the inconvenience brought to the reviewer. Literally, it's my first attempt at submitting a paper in English. In respond to your comments, I have revised most of them in this paper. Besides, I have adopted an English editing service by MDPI to make my paper more clear and comprehensive.

Comment1：

Chengshi School成實學派 = is this an actual lineage from that time period?  成實宗 in ancient Japan, but did this exist in China?

Respond 1：

I need to explain the difference between the Chengshi School 成實學派 and the Chengshi Sect 成實宗 (or J. jōjitsu). After the *Tattvasiddhiśāstra translating by Kumārajīva, a large monks began to learn this treatise. There was no clear lineage at the beginning. Then, some of them had formed their own influence by teaching this treatise, in order to inherit legitimacy, they had established two well-known lineages, Pengcheng彭城 lineage and Shouchun寿春 lineage, both of them can be traced back to Kumārajīva. In this period, the Chengshi School both learned *Tattvasiddhiśāstra and Sanlun. In the Liang dynasty, some reputed monks, although they were not part of the Chengshi lineage, they still taught this treatise and insisted *Tattvasiddhiśāstra belonged to Mahāyāna. I refer to those who followed this treatise in these three periods Chengshi School. The third period is the most different, because they had never put this treatise in a very high position while treating it as a basis to develop other Mahāyāna ideas.

As for the Jōjitsu, it is one of the Buddhist Sects in Japan with clear lineage. It is more like the second period of the Chengshi School. Although it is one of the six Nara Schools, it is still treated as a subsect of the Sanlun Sect. Its influence was small compared to other Sects in Japan. This paper doesn’t specifically study the process of Jōjitsu in Japan, if possible, I will carry out the further research in the future as a comparison to the Chinese Chengshi School.

Comment2:

I simply can't follow along with this paper. It reads like a direct translation from Chinese. The author needs to entirely revise the paper with the assistance of an editor or colleague. As it presently stands, I can't understand even the introduction. What does "minimize the margin in the interpreters’ understanding of the original classic" mean?

Respond2:

I am really sorry for the inconvenience brought to the reviewer. And I have worked very hard to make this article clear and better. I didn’t use “tack changes” in my paper because it has been revised in so many places.

This paper attempts to explain that the demise of the Chengshi School was due to their overestimation of *Tattvasiddhiśāstra and their misunderstanding of Harivarman’s intentions. They did not accept the final target as “nirvāṇa without remainder (Skt. anupādiśeṣa-nirvāṇa) ”, and instead tried to improve and rationalize this point. It can be explained as the main cause of its demise from the perspective of doctrinal interpretations.

Comment3

The bibliography is also not formatted properly. You need to pay attention to quotation marks and italics.

Respond3:

As for the bibliography and quotations, I have made corrections according to the academic standard to make it more clear and accurate.

I hope my latest paper can meet the requirements of the journal.

Kind regards.

I hope my latest paper can meet the requirements of the journal.

Kind regards.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

I think the author conducts a very valuable research in the field given the dearth of scholarship on the Chengshi School in the English language scholarship. That is also why I would like to encourage the author to further clarify the following points: 

1 Sinification of Buddhism

In the abstract and the introduction, the author positions the Tattvasiddhi and the Chengshi school in the context of sinicized Buddhism. I was hoping to see more how this study furthers our understanding of the sinification of Buddhism. The author mentions in the conclusion that "Chengshi masters were more likely to choose a path of fusion (as I mentioned above) rather than promoting Tat’s own value." (P.9). Is this effort make their school a sinicized version of Buddhism? I would encourage the author to substantiate the claim that the acceptance of Tat and the demise of the Chengshi school indicated the sinification of Buddhism. This is particularly the case given that this school (J. jōjitsu) continued to flourish in Japan as one of the six nara schools. 

2 Chengshi masters' effort 

In the article, the author considers Chengshi masters' interpretations of the Tat as a misunderstanding of this treatise's "progressive thinking model" (P. 8), further getting themselves " entrapped themselves into the standards of Mahayana and Hi-nayana" (P8). 

What I find unclear is how the standard Mahāyāna understanding of emptiness can be demarcated from that in the Tat. Earlier on page 5, the author seems to point out that the Tat focuses too much on the objective side of experience, namely, on 境 (Skt.  viṣaya;perceptual field would be a better translation than state here) but the author does not turn back to this point. 

The Abhidharmikas do have their own theory of twofold truth and emptiness/no-self, albeit different from that in Mahāyāna (See K.L. Dhammajoti, "Chapter 3 The Sarvāstivāda School" in Sarvāstivāda Abhidharma). The Tat, according to K.L. Dhammajoti, presents a view that "inherits the early Dārṣṭāntika standpoint and repudiates the Sarvāstivāda doctrines of distinct caitta-s and saṃprayoga" (Sarvāstivāda Abhidharma, P9). This discussion would be important to this article because Tat  problematizes the Vaibhāṣika view of existence, implies a close-to Sautrāntika view, but seems to go further. The Sautrāntikas do negate the svabhāvic nature (法體) of the dharma (including both form and mind, namely, the five aggregates) but they acknowledge the essential nature of anudhātu 隨界 (namely, karmic propensity). As Sherice Ngaserin has indicated, to negate the Vaibhāṣika view of svabhāva, the Sautrāntikas like Vasubandhu in the kośa deploy the method of eliminativism (see Ngserin's dissertation, Towards a Buddhist Metaphysics of Gender). In part, as Jonathan Gold suggests in his study of Vasubandhu, it is this effort to eliminate and deconstruct that leads Vasubandhu to turn from Vaibhāṣika to Sautrāntika and eventually to Yogācāra. See Gold, Paving the Great Way: Vasubandhu's Unifying Buddhist Philosophy. If eliminativism is indeed the method, then these Chengshi masters can be considered, in parallel to Vasubandhu, as further the discussion in the Tat to harmonize Śrāvakayāna with Mahāyāna. 

3 the conclusion on Chengshi masters' misunderstanding

I would also like to invite the author to elaborate further how and why Chengshi masters' reading of the Tat counts as a misunderstanding. Do they misunderstand the nature of the text? Or do they misunderstand the Mahāyāna notion of emptiness?   

4 the demise of a school 

In this essay, the author focuses on textual studies with the method of hermeneutics, to explain the demise of the Chengshi school. While I commend this effort, I would be curious to learn if doctrinal interpretation was the only reason that led to such demise. 

In the study of the Weishi school, scholars have learnt to acknowledge other socio-historical factors in explaining the decline of this school. Over the years, scholars like Kenneth Chen attributed this decline to the complication of Yogācāra thought or the unpopularity of the five gotra theory. Recent studies by Liu Shu-Feng and Yoshimura Makoto suggest that the decline of this school has to do with state-religion relationship, especially how this school lost imperial patronage in fractional court politics. 

I do not think the author needs to change the philosophical and textual focus. I would just invite the author to think about whether doctrinal interpretation is the sole factor of this demise. 

5 minor points

The author might want to check the diacritical marks of all the sanskrit terms. 

The author might also want to check the translation of doctrinal concepts in this article to make them more in line with the common English translation. In particular, I would recommend the author not using Hīnayāna because recently, scholars in the English language scholarship have questioned the derogatory and exclusive nature of this term. A more plausible choice would be Śrāvakayāna. 

 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

I appreciate your valuable suggestions and I am sorry for the inconvenience brought to the reviewer. Literally, it's my first attempt at submitting a paper in English. I tried my best hard to make this article clear and better. I didn’t use “tack changes” in my paper because it has been revised in so many places. Besides, I have adopted an English editing service by MDPI to make my paper more clear and comprehensive.

Comment1: Sinification of Buddhism

Respond1:

I agree with reviewer’s point. When Kumārajīva finished the translation of this treatise, the process of Sinification of Buddhism had already begun (for the Chengshi School). Their studies and interpretations of *Tattvasiddhiśāstra are all part of Sinification. As I said, they did not follow the thinking mode in this treatise but harmonize it with other Mahāyāna ideas, like Sanlun, Nirvana. Although Jōjitsu is one of the six Nara Schools, it is still treated as a subsect of Sanlun. Its influence was small compared to other Sects in Japan.

Comment2:Chengshi masters' effort 

Respond2:

These philosophical discussions mentioned by reviewer are instructive. It’s still a difficult question that is there any possibility to harmonize Hīnayāna with Mahāyāna. Many scholars have studied this possible path and it’s quite interesting that whether the way of elimination eventually lead to the Yogācāra. However, this paper just focuses on the Chengshi masters’ effort and attempts to prove that this is impossible to synthesize *Tattvasiddhiśāstra and Mahāyāna from the perspective of the philosophical interpretations.

And I agree that “perceptual field” is more accurate than “objective”. Because in the system of *Tattvasiddhiśāstra, nothing is completely objective. Perceptual experiences are relatively true, only the status of emptiness is the absolutely truth. I will revise this part to my paper.

As for the understanding of emptiness, the difference is not in the connotation but in the process of obtaining emptiness. Harivarman, the author of *Tattvasiddhiśāstra, adopting a progressive mode, affirming the latter being through the negation of the former. Just like the its possible title“Janaka-Paraḥ-Yathābhāva” which means “Generating the truest thing”. Along with this path, the final target is to obtain the “nirvāṇa without remainder (Skt. anupādiśeṣa-nirvāṇa) ” rather than “emptiness”. The approach of the Chengshi master was false from the start. I will revise to make this point more clear in my paper.

Comment3:  the conclusion on Chengshi masters' misunderstanding

Respond3: 

I think they misunderstand Harivarman’s intentions. They did not accept the final target as “nirvāṇa without remainder” (Skt. anupādiśeṣa-nirvāṇa), and instead tried to improve and rationalize this point. They exaggerated the importance of emptiness in this treatise and omitted the final target of nirvāṇa. That is, no matter how they developed their theories, they could not escape this treatise’s progressive mode. As Jizang pointed out, it was “emptiness (skt. śūnyatā)” not “nirvāṇa” that limited *Tattvasiddhiśāstra.

Comment4:  the demise of a school 

Respond4:

Thank for the review's encouragement towards my attempt. There must be more than one reason that led to the demise of the Chengshi School. This paper utilizes hermeneutics to seek the philosophical cause of their failure. This perspective is easily to be overlooked because people tend to judge it by the trend of Sinification, of Mahāyāna. I think Chengshi masters' effort should be treated as part of it. Their attempt showed one of the possible paths of the Sinification of Buddhism.

Comment5: Minor points

Respond5:

Thanks for review’s advice. I have made corrections according to the academic standard .. As for the translation of “Hīnayāna”, “Śrāvakayāna” or “Theravāda”, the negativity of Hīnayāna is more accurate in my paper. Because the Chinese monks tended to think that Mahāyāna Buddhism is superior to Hīnayāna Buddhism during the Sinification of Buddhism. “Hīnayāna” in the tradition context of Chinese Buddhism, including Śrāvakayāna and Pratyekabuddhayāna.

Thanks so much for reviewer' suggestions. I hope my latest paper can meet the requirements of the journal.

Kind regards.

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors  Okay, this revised version looks better.    Just make sure the English copyeditor goes through the manuscript very carefully. Comments on the Quality of English Language

 Just make sure the English copyeditor goes through the manuscript very carefully.

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

I think the author has made significant improvement in the current version. The current version is publishable.