522 hun y. lye
The Song Tiantai revivalist Zunshi emerges in these two collections
as a central figure in the spread of ghost-feeding rituals in the Song.
His Golden Garden Collection contains four ghost-feeding texts, two
liturgies and two short essays; while the Survey of Food-bestowal Ritu-
als transmits six of his texts. Of the sixteen authors represented in the
Survey of Food-bestowal Rituals, Zunshi is the most prolific contribu-
tor. His advocacy of ghost-feeding rituals is best understood against
the backdrop of a trans-sectarian campaign to reestablish elite Bud-
dhist institutions and influence in society, as well as a more specific
revival of the Tiantai tradition after a period of decline beginning in
the late Tang. As a key figure in this revival, Zunshi evidently advanced
ghost-feeding rituals as a powerful resource among the ritual reper-
toire available to him (Stevenson 1999, 377–78).
While the doctrinal reasons that informed Zunshi’s advocacy of
ghost-feeding rituals should not be overlooked, it is helpful to note
also that by Zunshi’s time, many monasteries in his area had chapels
reserved for the performance of these rituals (X. 961: 57.107b). Thus,
rather than creating and promoting a new ritual program, Zunshi was
skillfully building on a tradition already in existence. Zunshi and his
followers’ success in encouraging these rituals is most telling in the
dramatic increase of texts in Zongxiao’s Survey of Food-bestowal Ritu-
als. This collection consists of thirty-three texts of varying lengths: six
Indic texts in translation; three attributed to Nanyue Huisi
(515–577), Tiantai Zhiyi (538–597) and Zhiyuan 976–
1022) respectively; six by Zunshi; and eighteen identified with twelve
Song period figures who post-date Zunshi (X. 961: 57.102a–b).
Focusing on these ghost-feeding traditions brings to light a fre-
quently overlooked aspect of the development of esoteric Buddhism
in China: the complex process of “esotericization” that the different
traditions of Buddhism in China either participated in or resisted to
varying degrees, and this aspect deserves greater focus than has been
previously afforded. Although the study of the traditions that coalesced
around esoteric savants such as Śubhākarasiṃha, Vajrabodhi, and
Amoghavajra remains important, the more enduring impact of eso-
teric Buddhism on China can be found diffused among other Chinese
Buddhist traditions (as well as in Daoism and folk religion).
In the present case of ghost-feeding practices, we can see this issue
of esotericization developing in two directions.^ Even a cursory look
at the Method of Bestowing Drink and Food quickly reveals that the
ghost-feeding motif and method of the Flaming Mouth Sūtra is now