Dr Zijie Li (李 子捷)

Li Zijie 李 子捷 achieved a Ph.D. degree in East Asian Buddhism from Komazawa University in Tokyo under the guidance of Ishii Kōsei and Matsumoto Shirō. He was subsequently elected as a JSPS Postdoctoral Fellow at the Institute of Humanities of Kyoto University, under the guidance of Funayama Tōru. He is now a Robert H. N. Ho Family Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow at SOAS University of London (Centre of Buddhist Studies), hosted by Lucia Dolce. His main research area is the history of East Asian Buddhist Thought between the 5th and 7th centuries. He is the author of Kukyō ichijō hōshōron to higashiajia bukkyō: Go—nana seiki no nyoraizō, shinnyo, shushō no kenkyū『究竟一乗宝性論』と東アジア仏教 ── 五—七世紀の如来蔵・真如・種姓説の研究 [The Ratnagotravibhāga and East Asian Buddhism: A Study on the Tathāgatagarbha, Tathatā and Gotra between the 5th and 7th Centuries] (Tokyo: Kokusho kankōkai, 2020).

Postdoctoral Research

My new postdoctoral research at SOAS focuses on tathāgatagarbha and consciousness-only, two of the most influential and debated doctrinal concepts in the history of Buddhism, both in India and East Asia. Rooted in Indian Buddhist thought, these concepts were introduced in China and further developed by Chinese Buddhist thinkers between the 5th to the 7th centuries. The proposed research project will reassess tathāgatagarbha and consciousness-only thought in the context of Japanese Buddhism in the Nara and early Heian periods (8th-10th centuries), before Kūkai (774-835) and Saichō (767-822). This focus on Japan will not only cast light on an understudied aspect of Japanese Buddhism, but also contribute to a better understanding of the reception, adaptation and reformulation of Indian Buddhism in East-Asian contexts.

Consciousness-only thought underwent important developments in China and Korea under the influence of tathāgatagarbha thought. In Indian Buddhism, tathāgatagarbha thought was closely tied to the consciousness-only concept, while in East Asian Buddhism, within the framework of the three-vehicles and one-vehicle controversy, consciousness-only was considered merely a new translation brought by Xuanzang (602-664). In my doctoral dissertation, following the Ratnagotravibhāga, I reviewed and reconsidered the tathāgatagarbha and consciousness-only theories in the context of East Asian Buddhism, especially Chinese Buddhism as it was before Xuanzang’s return. I plan to reassess tathāgatagarbha and consciousness-only thought, in the context of Japanese Buddhism, in the period before Kūkai and Saichō and during their lifetimes.

Affiliations

• JAIBS (Japanese Association of Indian and Buddhist Studies)
• JAEBS (Japanese Association of East Asian Buddhist Studies)
• JABT (Japanese Association of Buddhist Thought)
• IABS (International Association of Buddhist Studies)
• UKABS (UK Association for Buddhist Studies)
• CEBS (Centre of East Asian Buddhist Studies at Minzu University of China)