Veneration of the Buddhist Canon and National Integration in the Yuan Dynasty: Religious Policy and Cultural Convergence

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The Introduction outlines the scope of Yuan promulgation of Buddhism and the overall rationale for the project mostly with sweeping generalizations. The second part begins with Zhao Yi’s comments, Mongolian shamanism and the Buddhist concept of “merit” are discussed, with Buddhism reaching its peak of influence under Möngke Khan followed by an eventual decline in Mongol identity.   Part 3 discusses specific strategies for copying Buddhist scriptures under the Mongol rulers.  Subsections discuss the languages of such copies, including Han Chinese, Mongol, Tibetan, and Uyghur as well as administrative structures implemented to support the coping projects.  The final subsection describes the scholars appointed to facilitate these sutra copying efforts.   The fourth part of the article discusses efforts, on multiple occasions, to make printed copies of the Buddhist canon and the personnel and administrative structures set up for that purpose. The fifth section of the paper deals in similar detail with the recitation of the Buddhist canon in Imperially sponsored ceremonies throughout the Empire.   A brief conclusion ties up the three-part project and its part in Yuan efforts to unify the disparate ethnicities in the Mongol Empire.

The prose of the article is quite dense and opaque, making it difficult to read   -  not because the language is bad, but because it is packed with information that assumes a lot of facts not in evidence. In other words, the writer(s) of the article assume the reader knows a lot about the Mongol Empire and its history for example. which may not apply to the average reader of Religions Online Journal What the typical reader is more likely to relate to is also assumed by the writer(s), who for example never outline the size of the Buddhist canon that is promulgated by the Yuan imperial administration. It is clear from the article that this is a big body of txst, but what is not clear is that the Goryeo version of it, for example, runs to eighty thousand woodblock printed pages, which is a massive amount. Hence the gift of a full printed copy is in and of itself a major donation, not something that even an Imperial prince can offer to an ambassador lightly. When it comes to a handwritten copy of the whole Canon written out in gold or silver ink that too is a major undertaking, and even a recitation of the whole canon is a big project and a significant performance - the scale of which may not be made very clear by this article in and of itself. Instead, the author(s) seem to assume that the readers now the scale of such projects and how their production might actually lead to national unification simply due to their size and the number of person hours required of the performers of the tasks - whether in calligraphy, print production, or recitation. That kind of detail is not well represented in the article and so some revisions need to be recommended.  The article is good but at this point a little hard to take and may assume more than the average reader brings to the journal.

Specific small problems: In the Abstract: the phrase “with gold, and silver powders” has an inappropriate comma and the sense of the word “powders” is off.  “…using gold and silver ink in such languages as Chinese, Tibetan, …” would be more felicitous.   A clear typo is on line one of the second paragraph of Part 2 where the repeat “marvel at marvel at” appears.

 

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

 

Thank you for reading my paper in its entirety and for providing detailed and specific guidance. Your comments have greatly enhanced my reflections on the paper.

In your review, you pointed out that the information presented in this article is rather dense and may pose difficulties for general readers who are not familiar with the history of the Mongol-Yuan Empire. Your opinion is extremely important, and it reminds me that, in future revisions and when writing other papers, I must think from the reader’s perspective and convey complex historical information in a way that the majority of readers can quickly grasp.

Allow me to respond to your questions here. You noted that the article does not give an overview of the concrete scale of Buddhist canonical promulgation under the Yuan dynasty. In fact, during the Song-Yuan period, the number of woodblock-printed and manuscript copies of Buddhist scriptures were enormous. Printing techniques were sophisticated, the workforce abundant, and—with strong support from both official and private patrons—large quantities of carved and written Buddhist texts were produced.

In the official histories, collected writings, and epigraphic sources of the Yuan, there are numerous records of the printing, copying, and bestowal of Buddhist scriptures. While writing this article, I compiled a dedicated table of such entries, which clearly demonstrates both the vast quantity of Buddhist texts and the flourishing state of their production in the Yuan. I can provide this table for your reference.

As for the recitation and reading of Buddhist scriptures, when faced with so many texts, and driven by Buddhist faith and the concept of merit (gongde 功德), people at all levels of Yuan society regarded sponsoring monks to read and recite sutras as a common practice. The reading and recitation of scriptures were governed not only by specific Buddhist rituals but also by formal regulations. Moreover, monks’ recitation was not a matter of simple memorization; it involved more reading than chanting. As a merit-seeking devotional activity, this practice enjoyed long-standing popularity in East Asian religious society.

I have already revised the specific issues you identified. Your meticulous and comprehensive reading has rendered this article more rigorous and standardized.

Finally, please allow me once again to express my gratitude for your guidance. I wish you good health and every success.

 

Sincerely,

Author

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This is an excellent paper based on important primary sources as well as on reliable secondary sources. Since very little has been written on the topic related to Mongol Yuan Empire and its supportan and promotion of Buddhism, scholars interested in this topic will find this paper valuable. The paper is well structured, well written, and arugments are clear and well supported by the analysis of historical sources. It is deserves a publication.

There are very few minor editorial corrections that are needed:

Page, 2, paragraph 3: While the modern observers may marvel at marvel at the

Page 3, ( Kieschnick, (Chen2005,p.96)

Author Response

Dear Reviewer,

 

Thank you very much for your encouraging comments on my manuscript. Your words have strengthened my confidence and motivation to continue researching the history and culture of Buddhism during the Mongol-Yuan period.

I have promptly addressed the editorial issues you noted: the redundant phrase “marvel at” has been deleted, and the footnote on page 3 has been corrected. After receiving your feedback, I reread the entire article and resolved the minor discrepancies that arose from converting between traditional and simplified Chinese characters. I trust the revised version now conforms to the standards of both yourself and the journal.

Thank you again for your constructive guidance. I wish you good health and every success.

 

Sincerely,

Author