WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY IN ST. LOUIS Department of History Dissertation Examination Committee: Steven B. Miles, Chair Daniel Bornstein Beata Grant Robert Hegel Lori Watt Living in This World A Social History of Buddhist Monks and Nuns in Nineteenth-Century Western China by Gilbert Zhe Chen A dissertation presented to The Graduate School of Washington University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy August 2019 St. Louis, Missouri ProQuest Number:13902375 All rights reserved INFORMATION TO ALL USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. In the unlikely event that the author did not send a complete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. ProQuest 13902375 Published by ProQuest LLC ( 2019). Copyright of the Dissertation is held by the Author. All rights reserved. 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Box 1346 Ann Arbor, MI 48106 - 1346 © 2019, Gilbert Zhe Chen Table of Contents List of Tables and Charts ............................................................................................................... iv Acknowledgements ......................................................................................................................... v Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 1 Toward A Social History of Chinese Monks and Nuns ............................................................... 1 The Setting: Ba County in the Qing Dynasty ............................................................................ 12 Buddhist Monks and Nuns in Ba County .................................................................................. 20 The Source: The Ba County Archive ......................................................................................... 29 Structure of the Dissertation ..................................................................................................... 38 Chapter One: Leaving the Family without Severing the Bond: Monastic-Familial Contact and Social Reproduction of Family ..................................................................................................... 41 Introduction ............................................................................................................................... 41 Sending a Young Relative to a Buddhist Temple ...................................................................... 45 Mutual Support within Natal-Monastic Families ..................................................................... 53 Buddhist Monastic Intermediaries for their Families ............................................................... 70 Monastic-Familial Contact in the Shadow of the State ............................................................ 77 Anxiety and Conflict Surrounding Monastic-Familial Contact ................................................ 86 Conclusion ................................................................................................................................ 93 Chapter Two: Keep the Incense Burning and the Lamps Lit: The Buddhist Temple Economy in the Local Socioeconomic Context ................................................................................................ 98 Introduction ............................................................................................................................... 98 Temple Transference ............................................................................................................... 102 Arable Land Endowments ....................................................................................................... 133 Coal Land Endowments .......................................................................................................... 154 Conclusion .............................................................................................................................. 173 Chapter Three: The “Licentious Monk”: Social Embeddedness, Kinship Connection, and Economic Logic .......................................................................................................................... 177 Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 177 ii False Accusation of Monk’s Sexual Transgression ................................................................ 183 Heterosexual Practices ........................................................................................................... 187 Clerical Marriage? A Case Study ........................................................................................... 196 Homosexual Practices ............................................................................................................ 211 Conclusion .............................................................................................................................. 220 Chapter Four: The “Lustful Nun”: The Intersection between Gender and Religion .................. 224 Introduction ............................................................................................................................. 224 False Accusation and the Anticlerical Stereotype .................................................................. 227 Being Entangled in the Marriage Regime .............................................................................. 236 Everyday Sexual Activities ...................................................................................................... 244 Conclusion .............................................................................................................................. 259 Conclusion .................................................................................................................................. 263 Glossary ...................................................................................................................................... 269 Bibliography ............................................................................................................................... 273 iii List of Tables and Charts Tables Table 2.1. Prices in Temple Transfers, 106 Table 2.2 Amount of Monastic Rent Deposit, 139 Table 2.3 Amounts of Rent Deposit and Rent in Kind, 141 Table 2.4. Rent, Rent Deposit, and Sale Price of Monastic Coal Mountain, 157 Charts Chart 2.1. Transfer of Longxing Temple’s Coal Seams, 165 Chart 3.1: Relationships Reconstructed for the 1868 Case, 205 iv Acknowledgements Over the past several years, I have incurred innumerable debts in completing this dissertation. First and foremost, I am very grateful to my mentor Steven Miles for continuously guiding me throughout my time at graduate school. His hard work and determination have set a great example for me to follow. His open-mindedness and encouragement have allowed me to explore the terrain of the Chinese past from different perspectives. His criticism and advice have helped me hone my intellectual skills. Without his kindness, patience, encouragement, and incisive thought I could not have finished this work. His mentorship has been one of my greatest fortunes. I am grateful to be a member of the stimulating academic community at Washington University in St. Louis. Special thanks go to Daniel Bornstein, Beata Grant, Robert Hegel, Lori Watt, who have read through the manuscript at different stages of the writing process and whose comments and suggestions were very important. Alexandre Dubé, Robert Hegel, Christine Johnson, Peter Kastor, Zhao Ma, Timothy Parsons, Nancy Reynolds, Corinna Treitel, Anika Walke, Steven Zwicker, and Tobias Zürn – among the many distinguished scholars at Wash U whom I have the honor to know – must be appreciated for their supportive mentorship of my academic and professional development. I am also fortunate to have studied with an exceptional cohort of graduate student colleagues and friends both in and outside of my home department, including Mark Beirn, Waseem Bin-Kasim, Boyi Chen, Fanghao Chen, Nan-Hsu Chen, Ruochen Chen, Taylor Desloge, Weicong Duan, Luca Foti, Hao Jin, Chenxi Luo, Trent McDonald, Michael Mendez, Justin Meyer, Adwoa Opong, Meijie Shen, Joohee Suh, Haochen Wang, Wei-Chu Wang, Brandon Wilson, Luwei Yang, Xin Yu, Chang Xu, and Sijing Zhang. v Over the years, I have presented my work on various occasions, including annual meetings of the American Academy of Religion, the annual conferences of the Association for Asian Studies, Washington University’s Dissertation Writing Group, and the Mellon Summer Seminar. I am grateful for the questions, comments, and criticisms posed by the participants. In particular, I want to express appreciation to those who have attended the Classical Chinese Reading Group and helped me tremendously in honing my translation skills. Moreover, I want to thank Linling Gao-Miles, Xia Liang, and Wei Wang who were so generous to share their homes and prepare plentiful and yummy treats. Several scholars outside Wash U have read parts of the dissertation at various stages. Thanks to Paul Katz, Y. Yvon Wang, Pamela Winfield, and Wei Wu for important readings and criticisms of a somewhat ragged manuscript.