Women in Buddhism

"In seeking to explore the interrelationships between, and mutual influence of, varieties of sexual stereotypes and religious views of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition, Women in Buddhism succeeds in drawing our attention to matters of philosophical importance. Paul examines the 'image' of women which arise in a number of Buddhist texts associated with Mahayana and finds that, while ideally the tradition purports to be egalitarian, in actual practice it often betrayed a strong misogynist prejudice. Sanskrit and Chinese texts are organized by theme and type, progressing from those which treat the traditionally orthodox and negative to those which set forth a positive consideration of soteriological paths for women. . . . In Women in Buddhism, Diana Paul may be forcing our consideration of the problem of female enlightenment. Thus the main purport and accomplishment of her scholarship is revolutionary."—Philosophy East and West

"Provides a panorama of the everyday life of the people, with a focus in on one key issue, namely, the changing ideas vis-à-vis women of a literate elates. . . . A beautiful anthology."—Parabola

"Paul has turned out a volume that will most certainly be applauded by scholars of Buddhism; and rightly so. . . . This is a book worth owning."—Religious Studies Review

"Although Paul ostensibly wants to provide an anthology of annotated texts (most of them translated by her directly from the Sanskrit and Chinese originals), her general introduction as well as the introduction to the several chapters, combined with the texts themselves, add up to a major thesis. . . . [She] is concerned with the question of how Buddhist egalitarianism came to terms with its even stronger heritage of misogyny, and she examines the problem of the point of view of Mahayana texts."—Numen