Muller, A. Charles. The Sutra of Perfect Enlightenment: Korean
Buddhism’s Guide to Meditation, with Commentary by the So ̆n
Monk Kihwa.Albany: State University of New York Press,
1999.
A. CHARLESMULLERKINGSHIP
Throughout Asia, rulers channeled the rich resources
of Buddhist symbolism to reinforce their authority and
to authenticate their political imagination. Close link-
ages between Buddhism and kingship are evident even
during the time of the S ́akyamuni Buddha. When the
Buddha reached Rajagrha, capital of the kingdom of
Magadha, King Ajatas ́atru came out with his retinue
to welcome him. Later Ajatas ́atru was involved in the
first of the Buddhist councils, held at Rajagrha. King
Prasenjit of Kos ́ala also sought to identify himself with
the Buddha. He is quoted in the Majjhimanikayaas
saying, “The Lord is a Kos ́alan and so am I.”
It is apparent from the Pali texts that Buddhism for-
mulated its theoretical position on the subject early in
its history in recognition of the significance of king-
ship to the religion. B. G. Gokhale discerned three such
ideological strands. First was the theory of mahasam-
matta(the great elect), anchored in the Buddha’s nos-
talgia for tribal republicanism; second was the theory
of mutually exclusive spheres of dhamma(Sanskrit,
dharma) and ana(politics), an expression of monas-
tic skepticism about the increasingly militant Indian
monarchies; and third was the theory of an invincible
dhamma,that is, dhammaas a cosmocratic principle
underpinning the political philosophy of a cakravartin
(wheel-turning king). The second theory, however,
seems to be either a variation or extension of the doc-
trine of mahasammata,premised as it is on the supe-
riority of the tribal republican model, under increasing
pressure from the emergent centralized states. Indeed,
only the doctrines of mahasammataand cakravartin
formed the kernel of the Buddhist concept of kingship
and were invoked by rulers as sacred symbols of power.
The theory of mahasammatadepicts the gradual
degeneration of humankind from the primeval stage
of perfect purity and the consequent need for the re-
organization of society. According to this theory, the
people assembled and chose by common consent the
strongest and the finest person among them as their
leader. They asked him to perform judicial tasks on
their behalf and agreed to pay part of their produce
in return for his services. He was called raja (king)
because he brought happiness to the people, and
ksatriya (warrior) because he protected their fields.
The Buddha’s sympathy for this tribal-republican
model of the political process is evident in the con-
stitution of the SAN ̇GHAand the Buddha’s denuncia-
tion of kings as poisonous snakes or robbers violating
people’s property.
However, with the increasing growth of centralized
monarchical power, Buddhism had to grudgingly ac-
cept the “necessary evil” of monarchy. It revised its
initial principle of “tribal-republicanism” and adopted
the ideal of cakravartin, encapsulating a normative
kingship known as dhammiko dhammaraja,the king
as an upholder of the dhamma.Evidently Buddhism
sought to inject into the institution of kingship its own
conceptions and worldview. A cakravartin king was
said to possess seven JEWELS, including a wheel of di-
vine attributes that rolls unhindered and unchallenged
over the earth. The wheel’s ever-onward movement
symbolizes the ceremonial conquests of its possessor
(the cakravartin) over all the lands where it goes. The
cakravartin king of the Pali canons is paired with the
Buddha as his secular counterpart and conqueror of
the universe not by arms, but by force of righteous-
ness. He is described as generously endowed with the
ten rajadharmasof liberality, good conduct, non-
attachment, straightforwardness, mildness, austerity,
nonanger, noninjury, patience, and forbearance. The
cakravartin of the Pali texts is clearly shown to possess
divine attributes, but in China, where translators ren-
dered the term as a divine emperor with flying wheels
or a flying emperor (feixing huangdi), the supranormal
aspect of the concept became additionally clear. In
subsequent centuries Buddhism further revised its
ideas of cakravartin in ways that suggest its acknowl-
edgment of the centrality of force to the institution of
kingship. According to the new definition found in the
ABHIDHARMAKOS ́ABHASYAof VASUBANDHU(ca. fourth
century C.E.), there are four kinds of cakravartin: gold-
wheel, silver-wheel, bronze-wheel and iron-wheel, the
last one taking recourse to violence and yet entitled to
the glory of ideal Buddhist kingship.
King AS ́OKA(ca. 300–232 B.C.E.) was elevated in
Buddhist historiography as an archetypal exemplar of
Buddhist kingship because his conquests, stretching
from the Himalayas to the ocean, realized the imper-
ial ideals of ancient India, and his espousal of the
dharma and support of the san ̇gha were singular
achievements in the history of Buddhism. Several em-
inent historians of early India, notably A. L. BashamKINGSHIP