Image of female roles in Manjusri stories of Chinese rendition of Taisho Taisokyo

Manjuśrī, an important figure and the most intelligent Bodhisattva in Buddhism, can be seen in many Mahayana sutras. There are many female roles in the Buddhist Sutra of Manjuśrī, some good and some evil, and some even show a wisdom beyond men.The thesis focuses on the female roles in Manjuśrī stories of Chinese rendition of Taisho Taisokyo, analyzes the text through the perspective of traditional Indian society, Buddhist theory, feminism. I aim to summarize the status and characteristics of the female in the Manjuśrī related sutras. To contrast it with the concept of traditional Indian society and theravada, and to prove that Buddhist Sutra of Manjuśrī confers on women more respect, openness and qualities of goodwill.
This dissertation includes seven chapters. The first chapter describes the motivation, research methods, structure, and literature review. Chapter 2 is divided into three parts, introducing Manjuśrī and describing the status of women in ancient Indian and Chinese society, in order to understand the social background of writing and translating these Buddhist Scriptures. Chapter 3&4 analyze the positive and negative roles of women in the Buddhist Sutra of Manjuśrī. Chapter 5 studies the metamorphoses of the female Manjuśrī, and compares them with the female in chapter 3. Chapter 6 uses narratology to examine the text, and analyzes the narrative mode of the Buddhist Sutra of Manjuśrī. Finally, Chapter 7 integrates chapters 1 to 6 into a conclusion.