Eun-su Cho
趙恩秀
Eun-su Cho (趙恩秀) is a professor of Buddhist Philosophy at Seoul National University in Korea. She received her Ph.D. in Buddhist Studies from the University of California and was an assistant professor in the Department of Asian Languages and Cultures at the University of Michigan before she joined SNU in 2004. Her research interests include Indian Abhidharma Buddhism, Korean Buddhist thought, and women in Buddhism. She has written articles and book chapters, including "Wŏnch’ŭk’s Place in the East Asian Buddhist Tradition," "From Buddha’s Speech to Buddha’s Essence: Philosophical Discussions of Buddha-vacana in India and China," "Re-thinking Late 19thCentury Chosŏn Buddhist Society," and "The Uses and Abuses of Wŏnhyo and the ‘T’ong Pulgyo’ Narrative." Recently her article titled “Repentance as a Bodhisattva Practice—Wŏnhyo on Guilt and Moral Responsibility” was published in Philosophy East & West (2013). She co-translated the Jikji simgyeong into English, and edited a volume Korean Buddhist Nuns and Laywomen – Hidden Histories and Enduring Vitality (SUNY Press, 2011). She was the founding director of the International Center for Korean Studies at SNU in 2007-2008, had served as the chair of the Editorial Subcommittee of the MOWCAP (Asia/Pacific Regional Committee for the Memory of the World Program) of UNESCO in 2007-2009, and was the elected president of the Korean Society for Buddhist Studies (Bulgyohak yŏn’guhoe) from 2012-2014. (Source Accessed Nov 27, 2019)
Library Items
Currents and Countercurrents
Soon after the inception of Buddhism in the sixth or fifth century B.C.E., the Buddha ordered his small band of monks to wander forth for the welfare and weal of the many, a command that initiated one of the greatest missionary movements in world religious history. But this account of a monolithic missionary movement spreading outward from the Buddhist homeland of India across the Asian continent is just one part of the story. The case of East Asian Buddhism suggests another tale, one in which the dominant eastward current of diffusion creates important eddies, or countercurrents, of influence that redound back toward the center. These countercurrents have had significant, even profound, impact on neighboring traditions.
In East Asia perhaps the most important countercurrent of influence came from Korea, the focus of this volume. Chapters examine the role played by the Paekche kingdom in introducing Buddhist material culture (especially monastic architecture) to Japan and the impact of Korean scholiasts on the creation of several distinctive features that eventually came to characterize Japanese Pure Land Buddhism. The lives and intellectual importance of the monks Sungnang (fl. ca. 490) and Wonch’uk (613–696) are reassessed, bringing to light their role in the development of early intellectual schools within Chinese Buddhism. Later chapters discuss the influential teachings of the semi-legendary master Musang (684–762), the patriarch of two of the earliest schools of Ch’an; the work of a dozen or so Korean monks active in the Chinese T’ient’ai tradition; and the Huiyin monastery. Source: University of Hawai'i Press
In East Asia perhaps the most important countercurrent of influence came from Korea, the focus of this volume. Chapters examine the role played by the Paekche kingdom in introducing Buddhist material culture (especially monastic architecture) to Japan and the impact of Korean scholiasts on the creation of several distinctive features that eventually came to characterize Japanese Pure Land Buddhism. The lives and intellectual importance of the monks Sungnang (fl. ca. 490) and Wonch’uk (613–696) are reassessed, bringing to light their role in the development of early intellectual schools within Chinese Buddhism. Later chapters discuss the influential teachings of the semi-legendary master Musang (684–762), the patriarch of two of the earliest schools of Ch’an; the work of a dozen or so Korean monks active in the Chinese T’ient’ai tradition; and the Huiyin monastery. Source: University of Hawai'i Press
Buswell, Robert E., ed. Currents and Countercurrents: Korean Influences on the East Asian Buddhist Traditions. Honolulu: University of Hawaiʻi Press, 2005.
Buswell, Robert E., ed. Currents and Countercurrents: Korean Influences on the East Asian Buddhist Traditions. Honolulu: University of Hawaiʻi Press, 2005.;Currents and Countercurrents;Tien Tai;History;Zen - Chan;Pure Land;Currents and Countercurrents: Korean Influences on the East Asian Buddhist Traditions
Wŏnch'ŭk's Place in the East Asian Buddhist Tradition
Wǒnch'ǔk (613–696) was an influential Korean expatriate scholar-monk active during the seventh century in T'ang dynasty China. Considering his impact on contemporary Chinese Buddhist thought as well as on later Tibetan and Japanese Buddhist developments, it is surprising that Wǒnch'ǔk has yet to receive the attention he deserves from the academic world, including Korean scholarship. Possible explanations for this neglect are the complexity of his philosophy and the fact that one of his major works, Haesimmilgyǒng so, a commentary on the Saṃdhinirmocana-sūtra (The Sūtra of the Explanation of Profound Mysteries), has not been preserved in its entirety.[1] Moreover, Ch'eng wei-shih lun shu, or Sǒngyusingnon so in Korean, his commentary on the Ch'eng wei-shih lun (Vijñaptimātratāsiddhi-śāstra; Treatise on the Completion of Consciousness-Only)[2]—probably his most representative work—has been lost. Despite this dearth of extant materials, what does remain unequivocally demonstrates Wǒnch'ǔk's impact on Chinese interpretations of Indian Yogācāra theories, an area of doctrine that was the subject of fervent contention among noted Sinitic scholiasts. Wǒnch'ǔk stands at the juncture between the period dominated by the translation of Indian and Central Asian Buddhist texts and the era when "Chinese Buddhism" coalesced into a distinct tradition. Given the diverse notions of "Chinese" identity evident during the cosmopolitan T'ang dynasty, during which China subsumed many different cultures and territories, I am also interested in exploring how a figure like Wǒnch'ǔk can be viewed as representing a more abstract notion of "Sinitic" identity. (Cho, introductory remarks, 173)
Cho, Eun-su. "Wŏnch'ŭk's Place in the East Asian Buddhist Tradition." In Currents and Countercurrents: Korean Influences on East Asian Buddhist Traditions, edited by Robert E. Buswell Jr., 173–216. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2005.
Cho, Eun-su. "Wŏnch'ŭk's Place in the East Asian Buddhist Tradition." In Currents and Countercurrents: Korean Influences on East Asian Buddhist Traditions, edited by Robert E. Buswell Jr., 173–216. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2005.;Wŏnch'ŭk's Place in the East Asian Buddhist Tradition;Yogācāra;Wŏnch'ŭk;Eun-su Cho; 
Affiliations & relations
- Seoul National University, Korea · workplace affiliation
