27. THE IMPACT OF TRANSLATED ESOTERIC BUDDHIST
SCRIPTURES ON CHINESE BUDDHISM
Richard D. McBride IIThe influence of esoteric Buddhist scriptures on Chinese Buddhism
is a matter of considerable opinion and debate. Although scholarly
writings on esoteric Buddhism in East Asia have appeared for nearly
a century, there has been no true consensus among scholars about
what constitutes “Esoteric Buddhism.” Some classifications have been
ahistorical and sectarian classifications and, despite their inherent
problems, have dominated the field of inquiry until the end of the
twentieth century (e.g., Ōmura Segai 1918, Lü Jianfu 1995). The fun-
damental divide is between what scholars mistakenly assume and what
they can safely assume about the influence of tantric or esoteric Bud-
dhism in China. In other words, the scholarly community has not yet
adequately dealt with such seminal questions as: Should the modern
scholarly classification “esoteric scriptures” include the vast collec-
tion of dhāraṇī sūtras translated prior to the eighth century? And was
the impact of these new sūtras felt empire-wide, or was it primarily
centered on the imperial court? Because scholars working in the field
are divided over the answers to fundamental questions such as these,
many of the influences I describe below need to be reviewed with a
more clearly defined and critical apparatus that is devoid of problem-
atic teleologies.
The primary problem facing researchers is the general lack of con-
clusive evidence on how Chinese monks, exegetes, and laypeople
responded to these new scriptures from India that outlined the proce-
dures for powerful rituals. Simply stated, the literary and art-historical
materials that allow such a rich picture to be drawn of earlier and later
periods of Chinese Buddhism do not exist in the same abundance for
the eighth and ninth centuries (Berger 1994). Nevertheless, evidence
suggests that these scriptures stimulated innovations in Buddhist doc-
trine, contributed to the already widespread Chinese interest in ritual
practices, reemphasized the relationship between the state and the
Buddhist church, promoted worship of new forms of Avalokiteśvara,
and contributed to rapprochement between Buddhism, Daoism, and