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This electronic thesis or dissertation has been downloaded from the King’s Research Portal at https://kclpure.kcl.ac.uk/portal/ Food and Craving in Early Buddhist Monasticism focusing on Pali Literature Kong, Man-Shik Awarding institution: King's College London The copyright of this thesis rests with the author and no quotation from it or information derived from it may be published without proper acknowledgement. END USER LICENCE AGREEMENT Unless another licence is stated on the immediately following page this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International licence. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ You are free to copy, distribute and transmit the work Under the following conditions: Attribution: You must attribute the work in the manner specified by the author (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work). Non Commercial: You may not use this work for commercial purposes. No Derivative Works - You may not alter, transform, or build upon this work. Any of these conditions can be waived if you receive permission from the author. Your fair dealings and other rights are in no way affected by the above. Take down policy If you believe that this document breaches copyright please contact [email protected] providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate your claim. Download date: 27. Sep. 2021 Food and Craving in Early Buddhist Monasticism focusing on Pali Literature Thesis submitted for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) King’s College London (UNIVERSITY OF LONDON) By MAN-SHIK KONG 2016 1 Abstract This thesis examines the relationship between early Buddhist monastics and food; beliefs about food’s function in the world; how food was regulated; and how Sangha practices responded to the social context and lay expectations of renouncers. I base my study on early Buddhist literature, mainly in Pali. I make extensive comparison between the six extant vinaya. I draw on the earliest layers of commentarial literature in Pali and Chinese. I explore how the relationship between Buddhist monastics and food changes, examining developments in selected Mahāyāna sūtra. Chapter One establishes key views on food by examining the cosmology of the Aggañña Sutta. This reveals that Buddhism accepts the practical need to eat for physical and spiritual health, but regards as problematic the craving for it, its production and its storage. I use understandings of anatomy to unravel the relationship made between food and lust. Chapter Two looks at the initial rejection of ascetic food restrictions by the Buddha, justifications for not eating after noon, reasons for permitting certain ascetic food restrictions, and narratives warning of the dangers of craving for food. Chapter Three is an indepth comparison of the pācittiya food rules and their origination stories in the six extant vinaya, examining how food gathering and acceptance was regulated in response to practical concerns including donor expectations of renouncers. Chapter Four looks at additional food rules for nuns that sought to avoid the transition of traditional female involvement in food preparation into the Sangha. Chapter Five examines meat and dairy products – the reasoning behind their inclusion in early Buddhism and their exclusion in some Mahāyāna texts. Chapter Six looks in detail at the radical difference in the meditation on the repulsiveness of food between its northern and Theravāda transmissions. 2 CONTENTS Acknowledgements 4 List of Tables 7 Introduction 9 Chapter One: Early Buddhist Cosmology and the Nature of Food 40 Chapter Two: The Decision to Eat 81 Chapter Three: Vinaya Regulations concerning Food 125 Chapter Four: Additional Food Rules for Nuns 188 Chapter Five: Prohibited Foods 227 Chapter Six: Meditation Practices Related to Food 276 Conclusion 320 Abbreviations 334 Bibliography 336 Appendix 358 3 Acknowledgements I would like to thank my primary supervisor Prof. Kate Crosby for her extensive advice and help for my research and for my life in London. I thank her for the extensive hours that she put in to responding to and revising my writing, as well as furthering my research ideas. She broadened my academic horizons in relation to Theravāda Buddhism and other disciplines related to my research. I thank her for her attempts to train me in accuracy and deeper investigation. I especially thank for her patience and consideration for my research. I also greatly appreciate her warm- hearted treatment of my family, especially my two sons. I similarly thank my secondary supervisor, Dr. Andrew Skilton, who took over after the departure of Prof. Xinzhong Yao for Renmin University. Dr. Skilton warmheartedly helps foreign students, providing much useful advice on research work. He co-organised the Buddhist studies writers’ forum at King’s and I learnt many things about Ph.D. thesis work from him. Like Kate, he put in many hours improving my writing often at very short notice, particularly as the deadline for submission approached. I would not have been able to complete this thesis on time without him. During my time as a Ph.D. student at SOAS and Kings, I also had the pleasure and benefit of knowing Dr. Pyi Phyo Kyaw, who always kindly answered my troublesome questions about academic and daily lives. She provided substantial help in all aspects of studying and living in the UK. She provided an excellent training session on academic referencing and offered guidance through the bureaucracy of submission. I also thank her for the way she treated my sons with great kindness and affection. Two others have helped me behind the scenes: Piers Messum laboured on my articulation and English in the early days of my research studentship, while Richard 4 Arundel tackled my English writing towards the end, supporting my supervisors. I thank them both. I wish to acknowledge my deep gratitude to Dr. Jung-Su Lee, who has always encouraged me throughout the difficulties of my life in a foreign country. He supports me in everything, whether in my academic or daily life. He was never reluctant to send me materials for my research from S. Korea, greatly facilitating my research. I would similarly like to express my gratitude to Dr. Ja-rang Lee for her useful advice for my research. She readily helped me whenever I asked, especially when I asked for Japanese materials for my research. I thank the Temple Food Division of the Jogye Order for giving me useful information and materials for my research in spite of my continuing criticism of its direction and activities. I also thank the staff at the Temple Food Division for supporting and helping my research, especially You-Shin Kim and So-Young Choi for their endless support and help. I greatly thank the Korean nuns who are temple food experts for their kindness and useful information on temple food, especially Bhikkhuni Hong Seung, who helped my research on temple food, telling me invaluable stories and providing useful information about the history of Korean temple food; also Bhikkhuni Bup Song, who greatly encouraged my research on temple food. My two examiners Prof. Koichi Shinohara of Yale and Prof. Paul Dundas of Edinburgh showed extraordinary diligence, patience and kindness in their examination of my thesis and the viva voce examination, which they also conducted with great efficiency only a month after submission. I would like to apologise to them for any shortcomings in my attempts to correct the thesis in accordance with their suggestions or for failing to understand any of the points they made in the viva. I could not have hoped for more informed or considerate examiners. 5 Finally, but most importantly, I thank my family. I owe many things to my parents in law, Kuk-Eung Chang and Hyun-Ja Yang. They have supported me for everything in studying and living in London. I am greatly indebted to my wife and two sons who must have endured lonely and boring times without their husband and father. I am greatly grateful to my wife, You-jean Jang, who has supported and has dealt with every problem caused in daily life both without and by her husband. I thank all three for accompanying me here to London. I think I should pay my greatest gratitude to my mother who has sacrificed everything for me and continues to do so even now. My thanks to all those I mention here, for enabling me to complete this research. I appreciate for their help and affection wholeheartedly. Man-Shik Kong, King’s College London, September 2015. 6 List of Tables 1.1. The Eighteen Elements. ....................................................................................................... 43 1.2. The classification of the state of food in the Aggañña sutta. .................................................. 48 1.3. The classification of food in the Apidamo shunzhengli lun. ...................................................... 49 1.4. The classification of food in the Yuqie shidi lun. .......................................................................... 50 1.5. the Classification of food in the Quishi jing (起世經). ..................................................... 52 1.6. The relationship between human beings and nature in the Sāmmitīya. .......................... 57 1.7. Immorality and decrease of life span. ............................................................................... 59 2.1. The Buddha-to-be’s ascetic practices relating to food. .................................................. 69 2.2. Ascetic