The debates between Daoists and Buddhists in the early Tang and the Chongxuan teaching of Daoism: A study of Daoxuans Ji gujin Fo Dao lunheng (T 2104) (German text, China)

Subject of the thesis are the debates between Buddhists and Daoists at the court of the early Tang described in Daoxuans Ji gujin Fo Dao lunheng, T 2104, 3–4.; We present an annotated translation of nine debates with an introduction into the institutional and historical background.; Subjects of research: (1) Formal aspects and regulations of the court debates. With the information about the rules and regulations of the court debates translated it was possible to reconstruct an outline of the regular proceedings of an interreligious court debate. (2) Conventions of rhetoric. Buddhism introduced into China some of the conventions of debate developed in India. We introduce some of the texts translated into Chinese that deal with these conventions. The analysis of the debates shows that the Buddhists were familiar with these texts.; We analyze rhetoric and logic in the debates: yinming logic, the logic of reductio ad absurdum, the prasanga method introduced into China with Madhyamika-Buddhism, the use of analogy and the use of quotations. (3) Chongxuanxue and Court Daoism. The Daoists participants in the debates can be considered representatives of the ‘chongxuanxue’.; The development of chongxuanxue is analyzed as part of the formation of ‘Gentry-’ or ‘Court-Daoism’, considering its role in integrating Daoism, its function in the context of inner-Daoist conflicts as well as in the confrontation with Buddhism in the environment of the gentry and the court.; The analysis covers not only the issue of the introduction of the philosophical method of the logic of the tetra lemma into the interpretation of the Laozi, but also the role of the chongxuan interpretation for the introduction of Mahayanistic sotenological notions of salvation through understanding into the reading of the Laozi—thus proving that those soteriological notions were always part of Daoism.