Buddhism, history and power: The Jewel Translucent Sutra and the formation of Mongol identity (Anda, China)

This dissertation investigates the Buddhist conversion of Mongolia as seen in the biography of Altan Khan (1508–1582). The dissertation takes the study of conversion beyond the traditional lineage framework and explores how narratives and rituals of national and imperial identity appropriate Buddhism. In addition, by focusing on the Buddhist conversion of the Mongols and their representation of it in relation to the multinational Qing (1636–1911), this work provides a clearer picture of Buddhism under Qing rule.; Based on Qing-period sources, scholars have accepted that the Manchu emperors used the concepts of Buddhist imperial rule to incorporate the recently converted Mongols into the Qing empire. A recently discovered pre-Qing Mongolian history of Altan Khan and his conversion to Buddhism, which presents a new perspective on Mongol concepts of rule, Buddhist identity, and their relation to Mongol identity challenges this scholarly consensus. This source throws into sharp relief the transformations that ideas of Buddhism and the state underwent as boundaries of the community shifted.; This dissertation provides an intellectual history of the Mongols' representation of identity formation through a critical edition of this early Mongol history; and on the basis of it, offers a re-interpretation of Buddhism in Qing period works. The first part investigates the changing cult of Genghis Khan, in relation to the Mongol nation and political rule. The second part explores the concept of the Qoyar Yosu (or dual custom of church and state), and the disjunctures it created between pre-Qing and Qing Buddhist identity in Mongolia. The final part explores how Mongol Buddhist identity developed during the 19th century into both trans-ethnic Buddhist Qing and local Mongol identities.; This investigation of the Mongols' self-representation of their Buddhist national identity renders untenable previous concepts of the Mongol conversion and Qing rule. Mongol identity and its relation to Buddhism was never static, but was continually being re-negotiated as boundaries of communal and national identification changed.