Buddhist Culture and Filial Piety of Females in Tang Dynasty
Date Issued
2015
Date
2015
Author(s)
Lee, Hsiao-Hsuan
Abstract
This article aims to talk about relation between Chinese Buddhism and female filial piety to parents. The first chapter elaborates on the differences between the concepts of filial piety in Confucian and Buddhism theories, especially on that of daughters to parents. Many descriptions on filial piety in Confucian theories focus on son-to-father relations with emphasis on respect, while those of Buddhism feature the role of Mothers and requiting to parents. The second chapter discusses influence and relation of Buddhism funeral culture to the filial piety activity of some female Buddhists or their sons and daughters. Some female Buddhists refuse to be buried together with their husbands and on the other hand request to be buried as members of their blood father’s families, which is a manifest of how powerful the filial piety is as the ultimate social value to strongly weigh against personal religion believes. In addition, readings from the tomb of Upāsikā show that builders of towers for Mothers are mostly daughters. One of the reasons would be that belief in Buddhism is shared by parents and children in such families for generations, which make the funeral choices of the parents acceptable. In addition, when females face dilemma of choice between Confucian and religion, they tend to bravely pursue religious goal, and males otherwise. The third chapter discusses the filial piety of Buddhist nun who tend to maintain frequent interaction with their families on their monastic life. Under influence of monastic piety, daughters of some families will be asked to become nuns in temples upon death of elders to prey for their ancestors.
Subjects
Chinese Buddhism
female
filial piety
funeral
Buddhist nun
Up?sik?.
Type
thesis