Lives of Early Buddhist Nuns: Biographies as History
Alice Collett
Abstract
Alice Collett’s book is the most comprehensive study of women in Pāli Buddhism since the publication of I. B. Horner’s seminal Women under Primitive Buddhism in 1930. Collett’s focus is different to Horner’s, in that she uses biographies as a foundation for discussion and exploration of the lives of Buddhist women. An innovation in Collett’s work is that she attempts to discuss differences between Pāli canonical and commentarial literature. Both prior to and following the publication of Horner’s work, it has been standard practice to use the commentaries to augment understanding of the canon, ... More
Alice Collett’s book is the most comprehensive study of women in Pāli Buddhism since the publication of I. B. Horner’s seminal Women under Primitive Buddhism in 1930. Collett’s focus is different to Horner’s, in that she uses biographies as a foundation for discussion and exploration of the lives of Buddhist women. An innovation in Collett’s work is that she attempts to discuss differences between Pāli canonical and commentarial literature. Both prior to and following the publication of Horner’s work, it has been standard practice to use the commentaries to augment understanding of the canon, but Collett seeks to emphasize the differing social worlds, and historical and geographical milieu out of which each of these genres of literature were born. Focusing on these differences, and assessing each genre on its own terms, Collett concludes that the Pāli canon, contrary to how it has been presented previously, is more favourable to women. In this volume, biographies of six of the best-known Buddhist nuns of the early tradition are presented in Part I, along with an introduction to this literature. In Part II, the author investigates themes from the biographies—female teachers, notions of beauty and adornment, family, class, and marriage, and so on—and explores both the struggles and hardships, and the inspirational aspects of the lives of early Buddhist nuns seen though these biographical accounts.
Keywords:
women,
early Indian Buddhism,
Pāli texts,
biographies,
Buddhist nuns
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2016 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780199459070 |
| Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: April 2016 |
DOI:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199459070.001.0001 |
Authors
Affiliations are at time of print publication.
Alice Collett, author
Teacher in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies, York St John University, UK.
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