Organizer: Jeong-eun Kim, University of London

Chair: Richard D. McBride, Washington University, St. Louis

Discussant: Robert E. Buswell, University of California, Los Angeles

Cults and rituals constitute an integral and important part of the Korean Buddhist tradition and its practice. Functioning at different levels and serving a wide variety of purposes, cults and rituals provide a vantage point to analyze some of the contributions of the Buddhist tradition to Korean society. The study of Buddhist ideas and an analysis of their practical application in specific cults and rituals illuminate various religious, secular, social, and political aspects related to Korean Buddhism. The papers to be presented in this panel address the characteristics of these practices during a given time, including a discussion of their types, role, and function within a social context.

Richard McBride discusses the widespread cult of dharani, or Buddhist spells, in Unified Silla (668-935) Buddhism through a detailed exploration of one dharani sutra, The Great Dharani on Flawless, Pure Light. McBride emphasizes the magical use of Buddhist spells in the context of mainstream East Asian Buddhism. Patrick Uhlmann addresses the cult of Bodhisattva Dharmodgata and the Diamond Mountains as a ritual center in the late Koryo dynasty (918-1392). He examines the promotion of this cult within the current socio-political context and its Central Asian influences. Jeong-eun Kim introduces some of the most important ritual arts of the Choson dynasty (1392–1910), using spatial terms, and discusses the role and function of the visual arts in constructing the ritual site for a mortuary ritual, Yongsanjae.

Richard D. McBride II, Washington University, St. Louis

The Great Dharani on Flawless, Pure Light (Mugu chonggwang taedarani kyong, T 1024) was deployed extensively in Unified Silla Korea (668–935) after its introduction in the early eighth century. While some scholars maintain that it provides evidence of Tantric Buddhism or the synthesis of Pure Land and Tantrism in Silla, my research suggests instead that the widespread use of the dharanis and various ritual procedures contained therein demonstrate that it was indicative of mainstream Buddhism in medieval East Asia. The language of the dharani sutra itself provides little internal evidence of conclusively Tantric elements, especially since many of the procedures and spells it describes—like most medieval Sinitic Buddhist spell literature—pretend to resolve practical religious concerns for individuals and protect states from harm, both internal and external. This is not "Tantric" Buddhism: it is practical Buddhist thaumaturgy.

Patrick R. Uhlmann, University of California, Los Angeles

The Diamond Mountains (Kumgang-san) are considered within the Buddhist tradition as the place where the Bodhisattva Dharmodgata permanently teaches the Perfection of Wisdom. While texts and material objects evidence cultic practices centered on Dharmodgata in the Diamond Mountains since the late eight century, they are too fragmentary or elusive to determine the aspects of this cult over a longer period of time. Thus, most scholars so far considered the cult of Dharmodgata merely as a local phenomenon primarily based upon the Huayan- and Prajñaparamita-literature.

However, recent scholarship and newly discovered texts enable an evaluation of doctrinal, social, and political aspects connected with the cult of Dharmodgata during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. After Korea’s submission to the Mongols, the perception of the Diamond Mountains as being located at the eastern extremity of the Yuan empire caused a large-scale promotion of the cult of Dharmodgata and the support of temples connected with it. The Yuan court regularly dispatched emissaries to the Diamond Mountains, including Central Asian and Tibetan monks, who promoted a version of the Dharmodgata cult differing from the heretofore prevalent one. A representative example is the monk Zhikong, also known as Dhyanabhadra, whose cultic activities and textual production in connection with Dharmodgata reveal Tibetan and Central Asian influences.

Jeong-eun Kim, University of London

The post war period of the seventeenth century in Korea witnessed outdoor rituals were frequently held to pray for soldiers and people killed during the wars. Yongsanjae, the ritual reenacting the Buddha’s delivery of the Lotus Sutra on Vulture Peak (K: Yongsan), is the most expansive and elaborate of all mortuary rituals. In order to symbolize the ritual site as a sacred realm and emphasize the greatness of the Buddha’s preaching, Yongsanjae is complete with all possible forms of adornments (Skt: vyuha): the primary image for worship, ritual objects and other paraphernalia associated with adorning the ritual site as well as ritual music and dance. As the first part of the ritual, toryang changom ("adornment of ritual site") delineates the ritual space and transforms the ordinary outdoor space into Buddha’s Pure Land in the minds of the audience by using the evocative symbolism of the ritual art. With their origins in India, China, and Tibet, the visual arts reveal Korea’s unique, autochthonous art and culture, distinct from those surrounding them. The paper discusses how the ritual site was sanctified according to Korean traditional aesthetics and the way in which the ritual was used to emphasize the thought and practices of the prevalent Buddhist school or beliefs.