to one medieval writer of the Digambara sect, the Bud-
dha himself had originally been a Jain monk who aban-
doned the true path because of his inability cope with
its rigorous demands. Buddhism’s claims to be non-
violent were rejected on the grounds that Buddhism
lacked Jainism’s radical analysis of reality as composed
of embodied, eternally existing souls, and the Bud-
dhists, whether renouncers or laity, were portrayed by
their vegetarian opponents as habitual meat eaters.
MAHAYANABuddhism’s teaching of S ́UNYATA(EMPTI-
NESS) was stigmatized by the Jains as promoting a brand
of illusionism where no ethical values could hold sway,
while the bodhisattva’s supposed postponement of en-
lightenment to aid others’ attainment of the goal was
deemed to be illogical because it entailed a possible sit-
uation in which all beings could be in a state of libera-
tion at one and the same time, thus voiding the realms
of rebirth and liberation of any distinct meaning.
In the light of these differences, it might appear dif-
ficult to locate areas of interaction or mutual influence
between the two traditions. However, a consistent Jain
interest in Buddhist learning can be seen in the use of
the term basket(pidaga) to refer to their scriptures (like
the Buddhist expression tripitaka) and the fact that the
titles of several Jain works are modeled on Buddhist
originals. Particularly noteworthy is the eighth-century
teacher Haribhadra, who wrote several works in which
he pointed to soteriological similarities between Jain-
ism and Buddhism. From the doctrinal perspective, it
is likely that the Jains borrowed the term pudgala
(atom) from Buddhism, where, at least among the Sar-
vastivadins and the Vatsputryas, the term carried the
sense of the individual perceived as an aggregate. As
for ritual, a Buddhist text on mantras, the Vasudha-
radharanl(The Magic Formula of the Goddess Vasud-
hara), has been used by the Jains of Gujarat for the last
three centuries.
Certain aspects of early Buddhist meditation prac-
tice that relate to the suppression of bodily and men-
tal activity and the senses suggest some sort of external
influence, most likely Jain, since such techniques are
otherwise said to have been rejected by the Buddha.
The Buddhists also appear to have been obliged to con-
sider the nature of the Buddha’s omniscience in light
of the Jain claim that Mahavra and other enlightened
people were, as a result of the purification of their souls
from karmic accretion, literally “all-knowing” with re-
gard to all constituent elements of the universe in every
temporal and spatial location simultaneously. Omni-
science was ascribed to the Buddha in the early texts
only in respect to aspects of the religious path. Later
Buddhism attributed to him the capacity to know all
objects, but only individually, each at one time.See also:Hinduism and Buddhism; Karma (Action)Bibliography
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our of I. B. Horner,ed. L. Cousins, A. Kunst, and K. R.
Norman. Boston and Dordrecht, Netherlands: Reidel, 1974.
Bronkhorst, Johannes. “The Buddha and the Jainas Recon-
sidered.” Asiatische Studien/Etudes Asiatiques49 (1995):
333–50.
Dundas, Paul. The Jains,2nd revised edition. London and New
York: Routledge, 2002.
Jaini, Padmanabh S. Collected Papers on Buddhist Studies.Delhi:
Motilal Banarsidass, 2001.
Tatia, N. “The Interaction of Jainism and Buddhism and Its
Impact on the History of Buddhist Monasticism.” In Stud-
ies in History of Buddhism: Papers Presented at the Interna-
tional Conference on the History of Buddhism at the University
of Wisconsin, Madison, August 19–21, 1976,ed. A. K. Narain.
Delhi: B. R. Publishing, 1980.PAULDUNDASJAPANBuddhism in contemporary Japan exhibits several dis-
tinctive characteristics. In a country that sometimes
prides itself on having achieved a secular society of the
sort predicted for modernity by Max Weber, the Bud-
dhist religion often seems marginal to contemporary
Japanese culture. Yet surveys of the populace reveal
that a large majority (roughly 75%) identifies itself as
Buddhist. These same surveys indicate that an even
larger majority sees itself as Shinto, suggesting that, at
least for many Japanese, being Buddhist does not nec-
essarily entail exclusive allegiance to the religion. In-
deed, it is sometimes said that Japanese are born Shinto
(i.e., receive blessings from a Shintoshrine at birth)
and die Buddhist (receive Buddhist funeral and memo-
rial services). The division of spiritual labor here tells
us something not only about the fluid character of
religious identities but about one of the primary func-
tions of Buddhism in contemporary society. If Bud-JAPAN