A Network of Compassion: The Transmission and Development of the Cult and Iconography of Cakravarticintāmaṇi Avalokiteśvara Across the Maritime Silk Routes

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

+X/C/V

 

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

Thank you for taking the time to review my manuscript. Your observations and suggestions have been invaluable to my scholarship. I have carefully revised the manuscript in accordance with your feedback. The note regarding the celestial beings depicted on a relief at Candi Mendut, along with other matters, has been addressed, primarily within the footnotes.

I deeply appreciate your thoughtful comments and guidance.

Best regards,

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This is a high-quality contribution. There are only a few typos and issues relating to diacritics. The sign > is used to signify that “a certain word or term is to be read as follows:”

Line 27: Padmapani > Padmapāṇi

Line 148: something went wrong with yunü

Lines 345, 361: puṣṭaka > pustaka

Line 400: Duanhuang > Dunhuang

Line 447: Debixin > Dabeixin

Line 500: Cakravarticintāmaṇidhāraṇisūtra > Cakravarticintāmaṇidhāraṇīsūtra

Line 592: Mahākaruṇagarbhadhātu > Mahākaruṇāgarbhadhātu

Line 668: specifcially > specifically

Line 670: Mahākaruṇagarbhadhātumaṇḍala > Mahākaruṇāgarbhadhātumaṇḍala

Line 701: Page numbers missing

Lines 743-744: Editors missing

Line 759: Sundstörm > Sundström

 

Nālandā is often spelled Nalanda and once Nālanda.

 

Footnotes:

Fn.3: vaisya > vaiśya; sudra > śūdra; See 2001: Yu > See Yu 2001:   

Fn.8: Cakravarticintāmaṇidhāraṇisūtra > Cakravarticintāmaṇidhāraṇīsūtra

Fn.17: Dabixin > Dabeixin

Fn.18: Hamida > Hamada; Debeixin > Dabeixin

In lines 56-58 the different names of the bodhisattva are discussed. Cakravarticintāmaṇi is also found in Sogdian (in a text from Dunhuang) as ckrβrt cyntʾmny. See Yutaka Yoshida “Sogdian literature. i. Buddhist” in Encyclopaedia Iranica online (the term occurs in the Padmacintāmaṇidhāraṇīsūtra). The Uyghurs also used the term (č(a)kr(a)v(a)rti-čintamani). The names occurs in an inscription on a temple banner, which identifies this image as this specific form of the bodhisattva. See Takao Moriyasu apud Chhaya Bhattacharya-Haesner, Central Asian temple banners in the Turfan Collection of the Museum für Indische Kunst, Berlin. Berlin: Dietrich Reimer, 2003 (p. 463). There is a considerable corpus of Avalokitśvara-related literature in Uyghur. The texts are conveniently edited in one volume: György Kara, Peter Zieme & Lilia Tugusheva, Avalokiteśvara-Sūtras: Edition altuigurischer Übersetzungen nach Fragmenten aus Turfan und Dunhuang, Turnhout: Brepols, 2022. In lines 1074 and 1092 the name of Cakravarticintāmaṇi occurs.   

That several different kinds of people are mentioned in footnote 3 does not reflect actual practice. This is only a list of possible practitioners.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

Thank you for taking the time to review my manuscript. I have carefully addressed the typos and incorporated the revisions based on your thoughtful suggestions.

Best regards,

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Review of "Network of Compassion: The Transmission and Development of the Cult and Iconography of Cakravarticintāmaṇi Avalokiteśvara Across the Maritime Silk Routes." 16 Nov 2024.

 

This is a robust survey of the deity Cakravarticintāmaṇi in its multicultural contexts from India to Southeast Asia and East Asia. Overall, I think this is a strong, well-researched, and well-written paper. It is an original contribution, especially considering the paucity of dedicated studies on the figure. The paper combines art and textual sources. It is long, but not excessive.

 

I have some comments that I made that I feel the author could consider as minor revisions.

 

"maritime silk routes" = This should be defined. I know that plenty of scholars (and museums) use this concept, but it is problematic. The "Silk Road" itself is highly problematic since it is ethnocentric and myopic, often ignoring the commodities that went eastward to China. The "maritime silk routes" are even more nebulous, since archaeological evidence indicates that ceramics were heavily traded out of China. But then what did China import? "Silk routes" are just a way of talking about Asian trade links. I'd recommend the author read this and make a judgment on whether to continue using the concept of "Silk Routes."

 

Rezakhani, Khodadad. 2010. “The Road That Never Was: The Silk Road and Trans-Eurasian Exchange.” Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East 30, no. 3: 420–433.

 

 

"Cakravarticintāmaṇi cult across the maritime silk routes"

 

The author should clarify what those routes actually have to do with the deity. What about the overland routes? Why is maritime relevant to the paper? I am not really sure how it all relates.

 

There are a lot of Chinese and Japanese terms in this paper. Names of monks too. Would be nice to see 漢字 for all of them. Please add 漢字 to everything where relevant!

 

"culminating in Japan, where Cintāmaṇicakra remains a venerated deity today"

 

Rather than frame this as a national custom, you should specify that some traditions adhere to this. Pure Land traditions, for example, probably have less of this. What about Nichiren? Japanese Buddhism is very diverse, so we might be more specific. Maybe predominately Mikkyo traditions?

 

"Esoteric Buddhist" = although this is a nauseating debate at times, clarify what this is. Tantric Buddhism = Vajrayana = Esoteric Buddhism?

 

Please add kanji to all the Chinese and Japanese titles! P. 1-2 have no kanji, then we see them finally on  p.3. Also consider the font you're using. DengXian is blocky. MS Mincho or SimSun are more professional looking.

 

"talismans"

 

What are these? 符? Consider the etymology of talisman. It has a specific meaning in Islamicate and European occult systems.

 

"In addition to such benefits, the Kakuzen-shō also provides instructions on how to 161conceive a child and alleviate difficulties during childbirth. This suggests that in Japan, 162the cult of Cintāmaṇ icakra was practised not only by elites but also by women and com-163moners."

 

Why commoners? Who would have had access to that information? I doubt it was widely known to commoners. It would have been aristocratic men who could read or access these materials with specialist monks, who then in turn employed the practices for their wives. How many common women could read kanbun?

 

"These forms spread to Southeast Asia and gained popularity during the 176Tang Dynasty in China, before being transmitted to Japan from the 8th century onwards 177(Gethin 1998, p. 268–269)."

 

This sounds like Southeast Asian forms went to Tang China and then Japan. Clarify.

 

 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

Thank you for taking the time to review my manuscript. Your observations and suggestions have been invaluable to my scholarship. I have carefully revised the manuscript in accordance with your feedback. The issues you raised regarding terms such as "Silk Roads," "esoteric," and other matters have been addressed, primarily within the footnotes.

I deeply appreciate your thoughtful comments and guidance.

Best regards,

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf