Elizabeth N Tinsley
I research the worship of mountain gods at medieval Kōyasan, particularly interactional relationships between Shingon Buddhist practitioners and gods, and those between local non-monastic mountain occupants and gods. This work focuses on spirit possession, oracle texts, devotional icons, doctrinal debates, and kami-related ritual practices. I also work on religious images in Japanese postwar pulp visual culture ("kasutori"), and have research interests in Victorian Buddhism during the Anglo-Japanese Alliance.
University of California, Irvine, Assistant Professor of East Asian Buddhist Studies (Department of East Asian Studies) (August 2018 - present)
Andrew W. Mellon Fellow, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Dept. of Asian Art (Sept. 2016-2017)
Research Associate at Yokohama City University (2015-2016)
Shincho Fellow (2015-2016)
Ph.D. Religion, Columbia University (2019)
Ph.D. Buddhist Culture, Otani University (Kyoto) 大谷大学
Research Student, Tokyo University of the Arts 東京藝術大学
M.A Japanese Studies (major in Japanese Art History), SOAS (School of Oriental and African Studies), University of London
B.A/M.A History of Art, University of Cambridge
Supervisors: Kiba Akeshi, Miyazaki Kenji, Bernard Faure, Michael Como, and D. Max Moerman
University of California, Irvine, Assistant Professor of East Asian Buddhist Studies (Department of East Asian Studies) (August 2018 - present)
Andrew W. Mellon Fellow, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Dept. of Asian Art (Sept. 2016-2017)
Research Associate at Yokohama City University (2015-2016)
Shincho Fellow (2015-2016)
Ph.D. Religion, Columbia University (2019)
Ph.D. Buddhist Culture, Otani University (Kyoto) 大谷大学
Research Student, Tokyo University of the Arts 東京藝術大学
M.A Japanese Studies (major in Japanese Art History), SOAS (School of Oriental and African Studies), University of London
B.A/M.A History of Art, University of Cambridge
Supervisors: Kiba Akeshi, Miyazaki Kenji, Bernard Faure, Michael Como, and D. Max Moerman
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On exile, soul-summoning, and the retention of embodied teachings. Accounts of the mid-thirteenth century exile of monks from Kōyasan paint a bleak picture of political violence, and cynical attempts by its monastic perpetrators to justify their acts in sacred terms. However, tracing citations in their writings both to Japanese literature of the time and to ancient Chinese song cycles concerning exile and soul-summoning reveals an intense and genuine fear of the loss of teachings embodied by the banished figures who could (and indeed did) die in exile, a dangerous state for a spirit to inhabit. Losing or dispersing teachings (and spirits) severed lineages, disrupted communities, and brought about their decline. Recognising this, I reject cynical readings of the exile's laments, pinpoint a factor in the rise of textualisation of orally transmitted (embodied) teachings, and also account for the convergence of the themes of exile and "shamanic" practices in certain texts of the time in Japan.
* See link here for video of talk * https://youtu.be/_dM5b1iSZV0
The worship of Niu Myojin preceding the importation of this type of Buddhism from China would have been based around agriculture, mineral acquisition, irrigation, and ancestral reverence, and these most likely involved possession and invocation practices. We will return to the ways in which these latter were woven into the fabric of Buddhist practice and art as it developed over the centuries at Koyasan: it is my intention in this talk to show how an image -- a painting -- can be a medium through which viewer and viewed can commune and communicate. For purposes of contact, and for acquisition of aid, supernatural power, or knowledge, an otherworldly being can be just as well anchored in the material support of a visual representation as in the embodiment of a spirit-possessed human.
In this talk, after discussing the content of the Record, I will look at the way in which the mondō-(“question-and-answer”)-like structure served as a means for acquiring knowledge and for constructing institutional prestige and legitimacy within the network of Kōyasan Shingon Buddhist texts, and will also address the function of this structure in practices related to contemporaneous oracles and yōgō (manifestation of a god) encounters. I will then turn my attention to the character of the deity Daishi Myōjin, from whom the oracle was issued, and who is explained in the text itself as being an amalgamation of apotheosized East Asian Shingon patriarchs and two local, territorial gods. The deification of Kōbō Daishi Kūkai (founder of Kōyasan) alone had already taken place, and involved attributions of the past lives of great Indian masters as well as the bestowal of a bodhisattva title. This fourfold entity is a development beyond that, though, and it partook of the jigi (字義) type of exegesis that Dōhan employed and that is itself characteristic of the semiotic strategies of the time in scholarly esoteric circles. The resultant character of this deity, who can also be observed in texts such as written oaths (kishōmon) and those that refer to treasure names (hōgō), and “name mantras” (myōgō shingon), and which was similar, I argue, in composition and function to other "amalgamated" divinities (e.g., Kasuga Daimyōjin of the Kōfukuji-Kasuga complex in Nara), endowed it with a particular kind of doctrinal as well as political authority.
This text appeared during a time when the phenomena of both induced and spontaneous oracular possession was not uncommon. It was also a time characterized by an increase in the production of new branch-specific teachings, ritual practices, textualized secret oral transmissions (kuden), none of which cannot be strictly categorized as "canonical" so long as we cleave to a notion of authenticity that depends upon the earliest Buddhist sutras and practices, even those of the esoteric sects in Japan. On the other hand, the Record emerges too at a time when counterfeit documents that were intended to instantiate or reinforce legitimacy of various kinds were being issued. Kōyasan was one such producer, and its texts legitimized land ownership and lineage, matters that were inextricably linked, and linked too, to the worship of and narratives round patriarchs and local gods.
Given such contexts, to determine the identity of the "author" of this oracle text that originated with a patriarch-god, was channeled through an acolyte, and was said to have been verified via yet another encounter with the god is to raise important questions about the production of sacred Buddhist texts. Was this a common procedure for producing new texts? What is/was the function of the human amanuensis (Dōhan)? What of the child monk through whom the oracle was transmitted? Why was the "transcription" necessary; what needs did this oracle address that other means could not? Perhaps we can find clues to guide us by looking to the use of earlier narratives about the earlier production/appearance/discovery of Mahāyāna/Vajrayāna texts more broadly. And yet the fact that the record itself threatens punishments for anyone who dares to question its validity behooves us to consider the reasons behind the production of new works, the criteria by which they establish their legitimacy, and the ways in which they were received and interpreted.
in the doctrinal debates (rongi) at Kōfuku-ji and Mt. Kōya, sites that borrowed from each other various elements in the performance of this important ceremony. Focusing on the period, during the preparation of the candidates for the debates, devoted to kami worship and possession,Tinsley discussed the complex interrelated identities of the major deities involved in these debates.The identities overlap, merge, and separate again, showing us that these identities (and their iconography) were modified in function of the specific concerns of the institution carrying them out at any particular time. Amidst the variation, though, Tinsley recognized that a common element in
these types of Buddhist kami worship is the superimposition of patriarch figures over these kami, turning the ceremony into a form of patriarch worship." (From Report: Andrea Castiglioni and Marco Gottardo,http://www.columbia-cjr.org/images/upcoming-events/2011_ccjr_buddhist_dynamics_in_east_asia_graduate_student_conference_report.pdf)
しかし、日本真言宗の場合、このような現象を辿ると、空海の神聖化と関係していることが分かる。日本の真言宗草創にあたり、教えは釈迦からではなく、大日如来から授けられるものであるという主張は、他宗にとって大きな問題であった。そして、中世に分派・秘伝が増えるなか、空海も神格化されていた。空海の神聖化・本地垂迹・大日の一体などの諸説も多くでてきた。大師信仰が展開するなかで、1251年の『遍明院大師明神御託宣記』(以下『託宣記』と省略する)に「大師明神」という尊格が現れる。当テキストに、この呼称は「恵果・大師・高野明神・丹生明神」という字釈が挙げられている。そして、『託宣記』に記録された尊格から下された大事は秘伝として扱われたようである。つまり、この場合、託宣は、上に述べたような啓示を通じた伝授の方法であったと考えられる。他の高野山の託宣を検討すれば、それらも秘伝として扱われていたと思われる。託宣という現象、そして文字化されたテキストを通じて、13世紀高野山における神々に対する信仰の形が把握できる。今回の報告では、その中に現れる「大師明神」の神格・信仰・意義・について述べたい。
当該時期に分派が激増し、それに伴い秘伝も多くなる中で、神の託宣も秘伝として認識されたことは、まさしく「神仏習合」の要素である。またこの時期は本格的に権門寺院として寺領を拡大するための活動が始まる時期であった。その面では、金剛峯寺道場を築くために山神から弘法大師に高野山の領域を譲られたという縁起の存在は、その時期に新たな意義があったといえる。
史料検証に際し、起請文に多くあらわれる「大師明神」という尊格を「大師ならびに明神」と解釈する従来の説は、必ずしも相応しいわけではないと思われる一方で、『遍明院大師明神御託宣記』にみられる「大師明神」の説明(記述、そして定義)は例外のほかならないとも考えられる。しかし、その時期の道範が中心となった中院流の文献である縁起、字釈・釈義としての、その神は一つの尊格という説明は典型的になってくる。また、『託宣記』にある「大師明神」、そして他の史料に見られる同神は、当該時期中院流の浄土と念仏・宝号念誦にめぐる思想とも関係があるといえる。
発表では、まず神々の託宣について当該時期の学僧の考えを簡潔に述べた後、高野山の神像の色紙に書かれた託宣を紹介する。託宣にみられる僧侶達の神に対する信仰背景に考察を加えながら、『託宣記』に現れる「大師明神」について述べたい。また、浄土思想の背景を踏まえてその尊格を考察する。そして、「大師明神」は遍明院で重んじられたことを述べ、最後に、上述した法・教えの伝授としての託宣という考えの問題に戻りたい。
*“Texts … need not solely descend through time from the historical Buddha via lineages that are fragile and easily disrupted, but are accessible via revelation as well.”David B. Gray, “Disclosing the Empty Secret: Textuality and Embodiment in the Cakrasawvara Tantra,” Numen Vol.52, Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2005:423
"
Otani Daigaku, Otani Daigaku Daigakuin Kenkyū Kiyo 27, December 2010: pp. 141-172.
The incident itself attracts exploration and explanation. In what way could a possession-oracle function to transmit religious teachings and how standard was it? How might this incident be explained in terms of Kōyasan branch history and its strategies of acquiring legitimacy? How does it relate to broader issues concerning the nature of transmission in Buddhism? Focusing on the function of the oracle, the record, and several related commentaries, this paper proposes that although this specific possession-oracle was in some ways an unusual occurrence for its community, it largely conformed to general procedures and practices of knowledge transmission and legitimization of authority in pre-modern Japan and to a broader, even orthodox Buddhist context.
On exile, soul-summoning, and the retention of embodied teachings. Accounts of the mid-thirteenth century exile of monks from Kōyasan paint a bleak picture of political violence, and cynical attempts by its monastic perpetrators to justify their acts in sacred terms. However, tracing citations in their writings both to Japanese literature of the time and to ancient Chinese song cycles concerning exile and soul-summoning reveals an intense and genuine fear of the loss of teachings embodied by the banished figures who could (and indeed did) die in exile, a dangerous state for a spirit to inhabit. Losing or dispersing teachings (and spirits) severed lineages, disrupted communities, and brought about their decline. Recognising this, I reject cynical readings of the exile's laments, pinpoint a factor in the rise of textualisation of orally transmitted (embodied) teachings, and also account for the convergence of the themes of exile and "shamanic" practices in certain texts of the time in Japan.
* See link here for video of talk * https://youtu.be/_dM5b1iSZV0
The worship of Niu Myojin preceding the importation of this type of Buddhism from China would have been based around agriculture, mineral acquisition, irrigation, and ancestral reverence, and these most likely involved possession and invocation practices. We will return to the ways in which these latter were woven into the fabric of Buddhist practice and art as it developed over the centuries at Koyasan: it is my intention in this talk to show how an image -- a painting -- can be a medium through which viewer and viewed can commune and communicate. For purposes of contact, and for acquisition of aid, supernatural power, or knowledge, an otherworldly being can be just as well anchored in the material support of a visual representation as in the embodiment of a spirit-possessed human.
In this talk, after discussing the content of the Record, I will look at the way in which the mondō-(“question-and-answer”)-like structure served as a means for acquiring knowledge and for constructing institutional prestige and legitimacy within the network of Kōyasan Shingon Buddhist texts, and will also address the function of this structure in practices related to contemporaneous oracles and yōgō (manifestation of a god) encounters. I will then turn my attention to the character of the deity Daishi Myōjin, from whom the oracle was issued, and who is explained in the text itself as being an amalgamation of apotheosized East Asian Shingon patriarchs and two local, territorial gods. The deification of Kōbō Daishi Kūkai (founder of Kōyasan) alone had already taken place, and involved attributions of the past lives of great Indian masters as well as the bestowal of a bodhisattva title. This fourfold entity is a development beyond that, though, and it partook of the jigi (字義) type of exegesis that Dōhan employed and that is itself characteristic of the semiotic strategies of the time in scholarly esoteric circles. The resultant character of this deity, who can also be observed in texts such as written oaths (kishōmon) and those that refer to treasure names (hōgō), and “name mantras” (myōgō shingon), and which was similar, I argue, in composition and function to other "amalgamated" divinities (e.g., Kasuga Daimyōjin of the Kōfukuji-Kasuga complex in Nara), endowed it with a particular kind of doctrinal as well as political authority.
This text appeared during a time when the phenomena of both induced and spontaneous oracular possession was not uncommon. It was also a time characterized by an increase in the production of new branch-specific teachings, ritual practices, textualized secret oral transmissions (kuden), none of which cannot be strictly categorized as "canonical" so long as we cleave to a notion of authenticity that depends upon the earliest Buddhist sutras and practices, even those of the esoteric sects in Japan. On the other hand, the Record emerges too at a time when counterfeit documents that were intended to instantiate or reinforce legitimacy of various kinds were being issued. Kōyasan was one such producer, and its texts legitimized land ownership and lineage, matters that were inextricably linked, and linked too, to the worship of and narratives round patriarchs and local gods.
Given such contexts, to determine the identity of the "author" of this oracle text that originated with a patriarch-god, was channeled through an acolyte, and was said to have been verified via yet another encounter with the god is to raise important questions about the production of sacred Buddhist texts. Was this a common procedure for producing new texts? What is/was the function of the human amanuensis (Dōhan)? What of the child monk through whom the oracle was transmitted? Why was the "transcription" necessary; what needs did this oracle address that other means could not? Perhaps we can find clues to guide us by looking to the use of earlier narratives about the earlier production/appearance/discovery of Mahāyāna/Vajrayāna texts more broadly. And yet the fact that the record itself threatens punishments for anyone who dares to question its validity behooves us to consider the reasons behind the production of new works, the criteria by which they establish their legitimacy, and the ways in which they were received and interpreted.
in the doctrinal debates (rongi) at Kōfuku-ji and Mt. Kōya, sites that borrowed from each other various elements in the performance of this important ceremony. Focusing on the period, during the preparation of the candidates for the debates, devoted to kami worship and possession,Tinsley discussed the complex interrelated identities of the major deities involved in these debates.The identities overlap, merge, and separate again, showing us that these identities (and their iconography) were modified in function of the specific concerns of the institution carrying them out at any particular time. Amidst the variation, though, Tinsley recognized that a common element in
these types of Buddhist kami worship is the superimposition of patriarch figures over these kami, turning the ceremony into a form of patriarch worship." (From Report: Andrea Castiglioni and Marco Gottardo,http://www.columbia-cjr.org/images/upcoming-events/2011_ccjr_buddhist_dynamics_in_east_asia_graduate_student_conference_report.pdf)
しかし、日本真言宗の場合、このような現象を辿ると、空海の神聖化と関係していることが分かる。日本の真言宗草創にあたり、教えは釈迦からではなく、大日如来から授けられるものであるという主張は、他宗にとって大きな問題であった。そして、中世に分派・秘伝が増えるなか、空海も神格化されていた。空海の神聖化・本地垂迹・大日の一体などの諸説も多くでてきた。大師信仰が展開するなかで、1251年の『遍明院大師明神御託宣記』(以下『託宣記』と省略する)に「大師明神」という尊格が現れる。当テキストに、この呼称は「恵果・大師・高野明神・丹生明神」という字釈が挙げられている。そして、『託宣記』に記録された尊格から下された大事は秘伝として扱われたようである。つまり、この場合、託宣は、上に述べたような啓示を通じた伝授の方法であったと考えられる。他の高野山の託宣を検討すれば、それらも秘伝として扱われていたと思われる。託宣という現象、そして文字化されたテキストを通じて、13世紀高野山における神々に対する信仰の形が把握できる。今回の報告では、その中に現れる「大師明神」の神格・信仰・意義・について述べたい。
当該時期に分派が激増し、それに伴い秘伝も多くなる中で、神の託宣も秘伝として認識されたことは、まさしく「神仏習合」の要素である。またこの時期は本格的に権門寺院として寺領を拡大するための活動が始まる時期であった。その面では、金剛峯寺道場を築くために山神から弘法大師に高野山の領域を譲られたという縁起の存在は、その時期に新たな意義があったといえる。
史料検証に際し、起請文に多くあらわれる「大師明神」という尊格を「大師ならびに明神」と解釈する従来の説は、必ずしも相応しいわけではないと思われる一方で、『遍明院大師明神御託宣記』にみられる「大師明神」の説明(記述、そして定義)は例外のほかならないとも考えられる。しかし、その時期の道範が中心となった中院流の文献である縁起、字釈・釈義としての、その神は一つの尊格という説明は典型的になってくる。また、『託宣記』にある「大師明神」、そして他の史料に見られる同神は、当該時期中院流の浄土と念仏・宝号念誦にめぐる思想とも関係があるといえる。
発表では、まず神々の託宣について当該時期の学僧の考えを簡潔に述べた後、高野山の神像の色紙に書かれた託宣を紹介する。託宣にみられる僧侶達の神に対する信仰背景に考察を加えながら、『託宣記』に現れる「大師明神」について述べたい。また、浄土思想の背景を踏まえてその尊格を考察する。そして、「大師明神」は遍明院で重んじられたことを述べ、最後に、上述した法・教えの伝授としての託宣という考えの問題に戻りたい。
*“Texts … need not solely descend through time from the historical Buddha via lineages that are fragile and easily disrupted, but are accessible via revelation as well.”David B. Gray, “Disclosing the Empty Secret: Textuality and Embodiment in the Cakrasawvara Tantra,” Numen Vol.52, Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2005:423
"
Otani Daigaku, Otani Daigaku Daigakuin Kenkyū Kiyo 27, December 2010: pp. 141-172.
The incident itself attracts exploration and explanation. In what way could a possession-oracle function to transmit religious teachings and how standard was it? How might this incident be explained in terms of Kōyasan branch history and its strategies of acquiring legitimacy? How does it relate to broader issues concerning the nature of transmission in Buddhism? Focusing on the function of the oracle, the record, and several related commentaries, this paper proposes that although this specific possession-oracle was in some ways an unusual occurrence for its community, it largely conformed to general procedures and practices of knowledge transmission and legitimization of authority in pre-modern Japan and to a broader, even orthodox Buddhist context.