My research project at IIAS investigates stories of King Ajātaśatru/Kūṇika of Magadha in Indian Buddhism and Jainism, particularly focusing on those legends related to his kingship in religious and/or political dimensions. This study forms one part of a monograph I have been working on. The monograph intends to provide a systematic examination of Indian Buddhist legends of Ajātaśatru and an overall comparison with legends of Kūṇika (counterpart of Ajātaśatru) in Jaina sources. It explores how stories of this figure can illuminate our understanding of Indian Buddhist ethics, soteriology, and discourses on kingship, and what we can learn from his stories about the shared narrative heritage of Buddhism and Jainism, as well as the unique properties of each religion.
Given that the Indian narrative traditions of King Ajātaśatru/Kūṇika have come down to us chiefly through written texts and are only scarcely preserved in artistic or archaeological findings, the vast majority of sources to be used in this project are therefore from Buddhist and Jaina literature, dating roughly from a few centuries BCE to the twelfth-thirteenth centuries CE, and covering a very wide geographical region. The Buddhist sources include both the texts preserved in an Indian language (Sanskrit or Pāli) and those which are extant only in Chinese and/or Tibetan translations. The Jaina sources include both Śvetāmbara canonical texts written in Ardhamāgadhī and post-canonical texts (such as commentaries, sub-commentaries, Jaina purāṇas, etc.) written in Jaina Mahārāṣṭrī or in Sanskrit.
The project comprises two stages. Each stage focuses on one aspect of the kingship of Ajātaśatru/Kūṇika. The first stage is devoted to examining stories about his religious devotion, and the second stage devoted to examining stories about his military violence. In doing so, my purpose is not to restore the historical Ajātaśatru/Kūṇika, but to understand the changing forms and meanings of his stories as they passed through different texts and contexts, as well as the underlying motives that drove ancient Indian Buddhists and Jainas to compose these stories. In particular, it is hoped that this project will contribute to our understanding of Indian Buddhist and Jaina attitudes towards kingship and the relationship between state and religion.
My fascination with Indian religious narratives goes back to the days when I was learning Sanskrit as a postgraduate in Peking University (2005-2008). In October 2012, I received my doctorate from Cardiff University, with a dissertation titled “From Perdition to Awakening: A Study of Legends of the Salvation of the Patricide Ajātaśatru in Indian Buddhism”. From October 2012 to December 2014, I worked as a postdoctoral fellow at the Department of Indian Philosophy and Buddhist Studies, University of Tokyo. So far I have published the following papers on stories of Ajātaśatru/Kūṇika:
- 2014. “Stories of King Bimbisāra and His Son Ajātaśatru in the Cīvaravastu of the Mūlasarvāstivāda-vinaya and Some Śvetāmbara Jaina Texts.” Indo Tetsugaku Bukkyōgaku Kenkyūインド哲学仏教学研究 / Studies in Indian Philosophy and Buddhism 21: 21-49.
- 2014. “The Story of the Previous Life of Ajātaśatru/Kūṇika in Buddhist and Śvetāmbara Jain Texts.” Journal of Indian and Buddhist Studies 62, no.3: 109-114 (1173-1178).
- 2014. “Violence, Virtue and Spiritual Liberation: A Preliminary Survey of Buddhist and Jaina Stories of Future Rebirths of Śreṇika Bimbisāra and Kūṇika Ajātaśatru.” Religions of South Asia 8, no.2 [28 pages in press].
- 2014. Review of Michael Radich’s Book ‘How Ajātaśatru Was Reformed’. International Journal of Asian Studies 11, no. 2: 213-216. [A more detailed version may be found at http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=38350]
- Forthcoming. “Some Notes on the Sanskrit Fragments of the *Ajātaśatrukaukṛtyavinodanā-sūtra and Their Extant Parallels.” In Max Deeg (ed.), Religions and Religious Texts on the Silk Road. Lumbini: Lumbini International Research Institute.