Mother of demons and Dharma protector : tracing Hārītī's worship in East Asia
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- This dissertation is a study of the worship of the Buddhist goddess Hārītī in China and Japan from the fourth century CE to modern times. Hārītī was originally a child-eating demoness who roamed the Indian city of Rājagṛha with her army of demonic children, feasting on the flesh of babies. Eventually, the Buddha kidnapped her youngest son to make her realize how much suffering she had inflicted upon countless families. In this way, Hārītī was converted and became a Buddhist deity with many personas: a fertility goddess, a protector, a healer, and a wish-fulfilling deity. In my dissertation I explore the different aspects Hārītī can assume, the various forms of her worship, and what she meant, and still means, to different groups of people. Focusing on Hārītī's ambiguity and transgressive nature (as an ex-demoness), I argue that her worship in East Asia is the result of a constant process of domestication and accommodation. Because her past as a child-eating demoness is hard to accept, Buddhists have continuously transformed Hārītī to reconcile her demonic past with Buddhist ideas of what a goddess is supposed to be: on one hand, she was transformed into a decorous fertility deity; on the other hand, Buddhists drew on her demonic powers to protect their community. As a result, the goddess is, above anything else, a powerful protector who can watch over women, children, ill devotees, monastics practicing austerities, and many more
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Form | electronic resource; remote; computer; online resource |
| Extent | 1 online resource |
| Place | California |
| Place | [Stanford, California] |
| Publisher | [Stanford University] |
| Copyright date | 2023; ©2023 |
| Publication date | 2023; 2023 |
| Issuance | monographic |
| Language | English |
Creators/Contributors
| Author | Lazzerini, Simona |
|---|---|
| Degree supervisor | Kieschnick, John, 1964- |
| Thesis advisor | Kieschnick, John, 1964- |
| Thesis advisor | Gentry, James Duncan |
| Thesis advisor | Harrison, Paul M. (Paul Maxwell), 1950- |
| Thesis advisor | Rambelli, Fabio |
| Degree committee member | Gentry, James Duncan |
| Degree committee member | Harrison, Paul M. (Paul Maxwell), 1950- |
| Degree committee member | Rambelli, Fabio |
| Associated with | Stanford University, School of Humanities and Sciences |
| Associated with | Stanford University, Department of Religious Studies |
Subjects
| Genre | Theses |
|---|---|
| Genre | Text |
Bibliographic information
| Statement of responsibility | Simona Lazzerini |
|---|---|
| Note | Submitted to the Department of Religious Studies |
| Thesis | Thesis Ph.D. Stanford University 2023 |
| Location | https://purl.stanford.edu/hj142yh1714 |
Access conditions
- Copyright
- © 2023 by Simona Lazzerini
- License
- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial 3.0 Unported license (CC BY-NC).
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