Annotated Bibliography Of Chinese Buddhist Apocrypha

In the field of Buddhist studies, the study of Chinese Buddhist apocrypha has been carried out for centuries. Though overlooked and even belittled by the academic circle in the past, apocryphal scriptures are gaining more and more importance as the study of the history of Chinese Buddhism deepens. The birth of apocryphal scriptures is a phenomenon deserves paying attention to. It directly reflects how the Chinese accepted Indian Buddhism, to what extent did they accept, as well as the transformation of Buddhism under the influence of Chinese culture. The Chinese Buddhist apocrypha serve as important witnesses of cultural exchanges and cultural transmission in the course of Chinese history.Most of the Chinese Buddhist apocryphal scriptures had been lost, except for a few scriptures which had been regarded as authentic and had been collected in the Buddhist canon, and a few scriptures which had been handed down from the folks. The lost of scriptures was a pitiful thing to happen in the course of development of Chinese Buddhist studies. Fortunately, we found some apocryphal scriptures among the ancient Buddhist manuscripts recently discovered in Dunhuang, Japan and Korea. These newly discovered manuscripts greatly enrich the database of Buddhist scriptures, and are of great value to scholars studying the actual development of Chinese Buddhism. However, as the manuscripts are scattered in repositories in different countries, it is difficult for scholars to access the apocryphal texts. Even though some of the scholars have already studied ancient catalogues of Chinese Buddhist apocrypha to some extent, there is still no satisfactory result in the systemization of the original apocryphal texts. The present thesis is going to add a piece to the puzzle. In addition, although some of the apocryphal scriptures exist as extant anonymous texts in the Buddhist cannon, they receive little processing and are not readily accessible. This thesis also aims at collecting as much anonymous texts as possible in order to facilitate the study of the subject.The main body of this thesis is an annotated bibliography of Buddhist apocrypha. Through collecting and systemizing corresponding information on the apocrypha, I want to make it easier for scholars to access the texts and facilitate their research on the subject. Combining other scholars'previous studies and my own research findings, this annotated bibliography covers the date of composition, disappearing date and other basic information of each apocryphal scriptures, so that readers could get a basic idea about the scriptures and their contents. For extant apocryphal scriptures, I am going to record their existing contents, basic conditions, variety versions of each extant texts and the systems of the variety versions.