Reaearches in Indian and Buddhist Philosophy:

Essays in Honour of Professor Alex Wayman

Reviewed by Edwin Gerow

The Journal of the America

Vol.117 No.1

Pp.225-226

Jan-March 1997

COPYRIGHT 1997 American Oriental Society

           This Festschrift, dedicated to one of the most original and 
            controversial scholars of our day, contains a number of important 
            papers by a distinguished panoply of Indianists. The papers testify, 
            in their seriousness, to the respect in which the honoree is held. 
            The selection is unusually wide-ranging. The papers are grouped into 
            five sections, three of which are "Buddhist" (on "Karma," on 
            "Dependent Origination," and on "Miscellaneous" subjects), one each 
            "Jain" and "Hindu." With a perhaps tongue-in-cheek sense of Buddhist 
            notions of "order," the "miscellaneous" section begins the volume - 
            and here are found some of the best papers, including those of Andre 
            Bareau, on Asanga's list of the asamskrtadharmah; Hajime Nakamura, 
            on "The Seven Principles of the Vajjian Republic"; and Michael Hahn, 
            who provides an extensive and very circumspect critique of Mark 
            Tatz's views on Candragomin. The three substantial papers on karma 
            are by Shinjo Kawasaki, Had Shankar Prasad, and T. R. Sharma. 
            Particularly worthy of note are the three on "dependent 
            origination": Akira Hirakawa's on the relation between dhatu and 
            pratityasamutpada; Collett Cox's lengthy review of the treatment of 
            that notion in Sarvastivadin abhidharma texts, and George R. Elder's 
            discussion of it in Buddhist Tantra. Padmanabha Jaini and M. A. 
            Dhaky grace the Jaina section with essays on Bhavasena (with text 
            and translation of his Bhuktivicara) and the Dasavaikalika Sutra. 
            The "Hindu" section is quite amorphous - again, an ironic comment? - 
            but mostly devoted to "Hindu" exegetical questions: K. K. Raja 
            discusses the many similarities in the Buddhist and Mimamsa views on 
            laksana; Kamaleshwar Bhattacharya treats (very succinctly, even 
            secretively) the grammarians' treatment of supposedly otiose 
            possessive suffixes on already "possessive" bahuvrihi compounds; an 
            extremely informative essay by R. C. Dwivedi emphasizes the relative 
            independence of Kasmira Saiva "advaita" vis-a-vis Samkara's mainline 
            "advaita" - Dwivedi notes, inter alia, that there is no evidence 
            that Abhinava either knew of Samkara's work or accepted the Brahma 
            Sutras as authoritative; an essay by the editor, R. K. Sharma, 
            follows, on " Language and Metaphor in Indian Stotra." Even Ayurveda 
            gets its due, with a note by Bhagwan Dash (curiously unattributed, 
            except in the table of contents) on pitta and agni. A long article 
            by R. V. Joshi on aham-artha closes the volume. 
            A biography and bibliography of the honoree are appended. The 
            presentation of the volume is unusually soignee. A jarring note 
            (given the prevailingly international cast of contributors to the 
            volume) is provided by a letter from Murray Emeneau, one of Wayman's 
            teachers at Berkeley, regretting that he cannot contribute, which is 
            here published as a "blessing" (p. xi). 
            E.G.