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The corridor-enclosed cloister characterized Buddhist monasteries during the Sui and Tang periods. This architectural form was first introduced by Emperor Liang Wudi from the palace and continued to prevail until the eleventh century, when a gradual transformation occurred, resulting in the corridor evolving into a long, narrow image hall. This paper examines the ritual and pictorial programs of the Sui-Tang Buddhist corridor to gain insight into this transformation and its ceremonial significance. Specifically, it explores how the corridor was empowered by the state-sponsored maigre feast as a place of worship and how the monastic community of a particular school appropriated the space to celebrate an unbroken dharma-transmission lineage from the Buddha to a specific group of Chinese patriarchs. Lastly, the paper aims to comprehend the adaptation of the corridor into an image hall, which was influenced by political and religious shifts in the eleventh century when Buddhist monasteries were no longer designated as the ritual arena for the state-sponsored maigre feast. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the utilization of the mantra of light and its associated maṇḍala practices by Wang Hongyuan 王弘願 (1876–1937), a Chinese Buddhist during the Republican Period, and his adherents, which has not yet been noticed by previous scholars. With the import of esoteric Buddhist doctrines and practices from Japan, the mantra of light, which was a rarely used mantra in pre-modern China, gained renewed significance. This led to the widespread adoption of the ritual practices of this mantra by Wang Hongyuan and his surrounding Buddhist groups in early modern China. The rituals of this mantra were used as a supplement or substitute for near-death Pure Land practices. This paper presents Pure Land Buddhist practices intertwined with esoteric Buddhist elements or "esoteric" approaches to Pure Land rebirth in modern Chinese Buddhism which have been overlooked by previous scholars. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Three Japanese Buddhist scriptural manuscripts related to the practice of calling back the soul are kept in Nanatsudera, Hōbodaiin in Toji, and Kōshōji, respectively. They show complex lineage connections that have been discussed little. This paper discusses the relations between the two sutras contained in the three manuscripts, traces their respective origins, and analyzes how Japanese authors transformed the apocryphal sutras into a liturgical text. Both the Nanatsudera and the Hōbodaiin manuscripts consist of the Sutra on Calling Back the Soul, while the Kōshōji manuscript comprises the Duxing Sutra. All of them were classified as Buddhist apocrypha written by Chinese authors. While the two sutras share similar text structures and the use of words, their contents reveal remarkable differences. The Sutra on Calling Back the Soul focuses mainly on how to release the souls of the dead and how to prevent fulian (reconnection with the dead), while the Duxing Sutra focuses on the healing of diseases and the alleviation of disasters through the restitution of the souls of the living. The Sutra on Calling Back the Soul has exerted a long-lasting effect in Japan where it was paraphrased into a liturgical text for the removal of disasters and the prolongation of life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]