Birth in Buddhism

Recent decades have seen a groundswell in the Buddhist world, a transna-

tional movement pushing towards better opportunities for Buddhist women.
Many of the main players in the transnational nuns movement self-identify as
feminists but other participants in this movement may not know or use the
language of feminism. In fact, many ordained Buddhist women say they seek
higher ordination so that they might be better Buddhist practitioners, not for
the sake of gender equality.
Eschewing the backward projection of secular liberal feminist categories,
this book describes the basic features of the Buddhist discourse of the female
body, held more or less in common across sectarian lines, and still pertinent
to ordained Buddhist women today. The textual focus of the study is an early-
first-millennium Sanskrit Buddhist work, the Descent of the Embryo Scripture,
or Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra. Drawing out the implications of this text, the author
offers innovative arguments about the significance of childbirth and fertility in
Buddhism, namely that birth is a master metaphor in Indian Buddhism; that
Buddhist gender constructions are centrally shaped by Buddhist birth dis-
course; and that, by undermining the religious importance of female fertility,
the Buddhist construction of an inauspicious, chronically impure, and dis-
gusting femininity constituted a portal to a new, liberated, feminine life for
Buddhist monastic women. Thus, this study of the Buddhist discourse of birth
is also a genealogy of gender in middle period Indian Buddhism.
Offering a new critical perspective on the issues of gender, bodies and suf-
fering, this book will be of interest to an interdisciplinary audience, including
researchers in the field of Buddhism, South Asian history and religion, gender
and religion, theory and method in the study of religion, and Buddhist
medicine.

Amy Paris Langenberg is Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at Eckerd

College, USA.
Routledge Critical Studies in Buddhism

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Ethical Practice and Religious Reform in Nepal

The Buddhist Art of Living
Lauren Leve
Eary Buddhist Medititation
The Four Jhânas as the Actualization of Insight
Keren Arbel
Birth in Buddhism
The Suffering Fetus and Female Freedom
Amy Paris Langenberg
 Birth in Buddhism
The Suffering Fetus and Female Freedom

Amy Paris Langenberg

~~o~;J~n~~~up
YORK

LONDON
LONDON
YORK

LONDON

LONDON AND NEW YORK

First published 2017
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© 2017 Amy Paris Langenberg
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Names: Langenberg, Amy Paris, author.
Title: Birth in Buddhism : the suffering fetus and female freedom / Amy
Paris Langenberg.
Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge is an imprint of
the Taylor & Francis Group, an Informa Business, [2017] | Series: Routledge
critical studies in Buddhism | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016041740| ISBN 9781138201231 (hbk) | ISBN
9781315512532 (ebk)
Subjects: LCSH: Suffering–Religious aspects–Buddhism. | Birth–Religious
aspects–Buddhism.
Classification: LCC BQ4235 .L36 2017 | DDC 294.3082–dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016041740

ISBN: 978-1-138-20123-1 (hbk)

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For Hunter (2003–2016) to whom loving kindness and sympathetic
joy came so easily.
This page intentionally left blank
Contents

List of figures ix
Acknowledgments x
Abbreviations xiii

Introduction: Reconceptions 1
Birth has a history: A Foucauldian approach 3
The social life of Buddhist birth discourse 8
The “philologist’s meaning” 10
A critique of the secular-liberal feminist hermeneutic 12
The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra (Descent of the
Embryo Scripture) 17
For cutting, not (only) understanding 20

1 Suffering Is Birth 26
Metaphors and emergent experiences 28
Birth in many registers in the canonical discourses 31
Birth from a woman as a root metaphor for suffering in
early Buddhism 33
“Suffering is birth” in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra 37
The birth metaphor in exegetical texts 42
Sub-metaphors in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra 47
The Buddhist discourse of birth 49

2 Birth Narratives and Gender Identity 56

Physio-morality and social success in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra 57
Sense-making through narrative 62
A fetal epic 65
The wheels of karma turn slowly 69
viii Contents
3 Disgust for the Abject Womb 75
Justifications for an aesthetic reading of the disgust trope 77
Theorizations of disgust in Sanskrit poetics 81
Disgust in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra 87

4 The Inauspicious Mother 94

The Buddha’s Garbha-vakra-nti 96
Auspiciousness in South Asian religion 106
“Auspiciousness” in Buddhist birth stories 111
Auspicious protectors of Buddhist monuments 116
The rebounding violence of gender 121

5. Auspicious Ascetics 133

Suja-ta-’s oblation 138
Child-pledging 142
Monastic birth experts 146

6. Female Impurity and the Female Buddhist Ascetic 153

Mary Douglas and Buddhist blood taboo 156
Brahmans on female impurity 162
Female impurity and celibate male asceticism 163
Female impurity in Vinaya texts for nuns 167
Neither auspicious nor inauspicious and unconcerned with
ritual purity 171

Postpartum 179

Bibliography 184
Index 204
Figures

1.1 Detail depicting a birth scene from the embryology painting

commissioned as part of a set by 17th-century Tibetan monk,
politician, and physician, Desi Sangyé Gyatso, to illustrate his
Blue Beryl medical commentary. The Blue Beryl’s embryology
section frequently references the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra. 41
4.1 Second-century C.E. frieze from Gandha-ra depicting the birth of
Śa-kyamuni Buddha. 105
4.2 First-century C.E. sandstone figure of śa-labhañjika- yaks.‑ı from
stu-pa 1 at Sa-ñcı‑. 118
5.1 First-century B.C.E. Ha-rı‑tı‑ with children from
Swat Valley, Gandha-ra. 135
Acknowledgments

Just after the moment of her birth, my firstborn was so angry that she held
her breath in protest. Her brand new lungs worked: she had already tried
them out, quite loudly. But then, bloody-minded, she refused to exhale. I, like
the other ignorant and confused beings portrayed in the Buddhist texts ana-
lyzed in this volume, had long since forgotten my own birth. According to the
Indian Buddhist take on the human condition, this is probably a root source
of many of my problems. In that moment, I discovered, or rediscovered, that
the business of being born is annoying in the extreme. This key understanding
is far from the only one Isabel Rose Bagger and her brother, William Paris
Bagger, have impressed upon me. I would like to acknowledge both of them,
who have cheered me on through the long process of producing this book,
are definitely less ignorant than I, and give meaning to everything I do.
I first encountered the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra in Professor Robert Thurman’s
Tibetan class at Columbia University when David Gray, Christian Wede-
meyer, Tom Yarnall, James Hartzell, and I spent the semester reading the
embryological section of a Tibetan medical commentary in which it was
frequently referenced. My curiosity was piqued, and I eventually (very even-
tually as it turns out) chose the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra as a dissertation topic.
Not only did Professor Thurman read texts in classical Tibetan with me and
provide guidance in my early graduate years, he smoothed my way when I
returned to fulltime graduate work after a maternity-related hiatus. I am sin-
cerely grateful for his tolerant and big-hearted attitude towards my stuttering
progress through graduate school. I am also grateful to Angela Zito, who
introduced me to the world of theory, Eric Huberman, Nadine Berardi, Ted
Riccardi, and Barbara Stoler Miller, who taught me Sanskrit, and Jack Hawley,
who was a kind advisor. Thanks are also due to the American Institute of
Indian Studies, which funded the first phase of my research for this project,
and to the wonderful members of my dissertation committee at Columbia:
Chun-fang Yu, Michael Como, Vidya Dehejia and, especially, Rachel Fell
McDermott, who has become a friend as well as a valued senior colleague.
This project matured during my time at Brown University, due in large part
to the vibrant intellectual community I found there. Peter Scharf nurtured my
Sanskrit skills and supported my interest in the medical classics. The members
 Acknowledgments xi
of the Religious Studies department – Liz Cecil, Nicola Denzey-Lewis, Susan
Hardy, Tal Lewis, Hal Roth, Stan Stowers, and Donna Wulff – gave unstint-
ingly in the areas of friendship and conversation. James Fitzgerald, especially,
was an important mentor to me, hiring me to teach courses, helping me to
read Sanskrit better, providing an aspirational model for excellent and rigor-
ous scholarship, and (I know it sounds corny but) believing in me. During
part of this time, I commuted weekly to Harvard University where the
inimitable Yang ga, brilliant scholar of Tibetan medical traditions, read the
su-tra with me word-for-word. Thugs rje che, Yang ga lags!
I would like to recognize colleagues at two other institutions. Auburn Uni-
versity’s Keren Gorodeisky, Jody Graham, Makiko Mori, and Michael Wat-
kins supported this project by supporting and encouraging me. At my current
institution, Eckerd College, Davina Lopez, and Heather Vincent have enthu-
siastically shared my curiosity about the political, rhetorical, and ritual
meanings of bodily fluids, and the aesthetics of disgust. Adam Guerin and
Andrew Chittick have also been valued friends and colleagues, even though
they don’t talk with me about blood, phlegm, and other substances really
much at all.
Many of my Buddhist Studies colleagues have read sections of, exchanged
emails regarding, offered sources on, listened, and responded to papers based
on, or generously expressed interest in this project over the years it has been
in process. These include but are not limited to: Stephen Berkwitz, José
Cabezón, Alice Collett, Melissa Curley, Frances Garrett, David Gitomer,
Ann Gleig, Janet Gyatso, Charles Hallisey, Ute Hüsken, Stephen Jenkins,
Lori Meeks, Susanne Mrozik, Michael Radich, Pierce Salguero, Jacqueline
Stone, Christian Wedemeyer, and Liz Wilson. Several Buddhist Studies col-
leagues deserve special mention. Robert Kritzer’s pioneering work on the
Garbha-vakra-nti paved the way for the current study. Rob has really been the
most generous and collaborative of colleagues: sharing sources, meticulously
checking translations, and encouraging my efforts from afar. Without him,
this book absolutely would not exist in its current form. Bhikkhu Ana-layo has
also radiated extraordinary amounts of professional loving kindness in my
direction, reading drafts, suggesting sources, correcting mistakes, and guiding
me through the Pa-li literature. Vanessa Sasson is my academic home girl. Her
humor, curiosity, loyalty, wisdom, and intelligence have made everything
better, more interesting, and more fun. Natalie Gummer has been a cherished
conversation partner and intimate companion in the writing process. During a
series of ad hoc workshopping sessions at her beautiful home in Beloit, Wis-
consin, Natalie heroically read and commented on early versions of every
chapter in this book. If there is anything worthwhile in these pages, it is
because she has had a hand in it. Anything infelicitous is entirely of my own
doing. Sincere thanks are also due to Stephen Berkwitz and Dorothea
Schaefter for championing this project at Routledge.
Finally, I would like to acknowledge the unwavering support and unflag-
ging faith of my extraordinary parents, Donald and Patricia Langenberg, and
xii Acknowledgments
my beloved siblings John, Karen, and especially Julie Langenberg. I would
also like to express my utmost gratitude to Matthew Bagger, who read early
versions of various parts of this project, was an important conversation part-
ner on matters theoretical, taught me much about intellectual rigor, and
showed me what’s possible in a way that no one else could have. Since I
poured coffee on, thereby killing, his laptop during an early phase of this
project, he has sacrificed as much as anyone in the creation of this monograph.
Abbreviations

.
AN Anguttara-nika-ya
AŚ Avada-naśataka
BC Buddhacarita
CS Caraka-sam -
. hita
DN ‑
Dıgha-nikaya -
GS Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra
JA Ja-takatthavan.n.ana-
Manu Ma-nava-dharmaśa-stra
Mbh Maha-bha-rata
Mil. Milinda-pañha
MN Majjhima-nika-ya
MSV Mu-lasarva-stiva-da-vinaya
NA Na-ga-nanda
NŚ Na-t.ya-śa-stra
P. Pa-li
SauN Saundarananda
S. Sanskrit
SN Sam -
. yutta-nikaya
SS Suśruta-sam -
. hita
T. Tibetan
Vin. Pa-li-vinaya
This page intentionally left blank
Introduction
Reconceptions

Recent decades have seen a groundswell in the Buddhist world, a transna-

tional movement pushing towards better opportunities for Buddhist women.
At regular conferences held in Asian venues by the Buddhist women’s orga-
nization, Sakyadhita International, ordained and lay Buddhist women join
together across traditions and national boundaries to share experiences,
debate issues, and pool resources. The “nuns question” has also become a
topic of discussion at other transnational gatherings of Buddhist leaders. A
major concern of this movement is establishing novice and higher ordination
for women in countries where one or both are unavailable (i.e., Thailand,
Tibet, Sri Lanka, Burma, Bhutan, India, Bangladesh, and Indonesia).
Beginning in the late 1980s, fully ordained Buddhist nuns from Korea and
Taiwan began to assist in the ordination of women from Therava-da countries,
for whom ordination lineages had been lost or never established in the first
place. Ordained Therava-da women are now helping each other to hold ordi-
nation platforms and train young female monastics. For instance, Bhikkhuni
Dhammananda, one of the first Thai Buddhist women to receive bhikkhunı‑
ordination and abbess of Songdhammakalyani nunnery in Nakhon Pathom,
Thailand, has been assisting Indian and Bangladeshi women wishing to
ordain and receive Buddhist monastic training. Efforts to revive full female
ordination have met with resistance on the part of some male monastics.
Nonetheless, activist Buddhist women are beginning to gain ground. Ther-
ava-da bhikkhunı‑ ordinations are now performed regularly in Sri Lanka, India,
and the United States. In November 2014, a bhikkhunı‑ ordination was per-
formed in Thailand, though it was quickly censured by the senior monastic
council of that country (Varadhamma Bhikkhu 2015). Tibetan nuns enjoy
greater access to Buddhist education then ever before, with some now study-
ing to attain the rank of geshe (the Tibetan monastic equivalent of a terminal
degree). In July 2016, 20 nuns made history by successfully completing the
geshema degree. Remarkably, the 17th Gyalwang Karmapa, an important
young and forward-thinking reincarnate lama, has announced his intention to
begin ordaining nuns in the Mu-lasarva-stiva-da lineage in coming years, with-
out or without the approval of other Tibetan Buddhist hierarchs (“Gyalwang
Karmapa”).
2 Amy Paris Langenberg
Many would not hesitate to characterize this groundswell as “feminist,” as
it appears to exhibit typical feminist features such as resistance to “andro-
centric” and “patriarchal” institutional structures, the celebration of female
accomplishments and female leadership, and an aspiration towards gender
equality. Indeed, many of the main players in the transnational nuns’ move-
ment self-identify as feminists. But other participants in this movement,
especially nuns who do not read or speak English fluently, may not know or
use the language of feminism. During a question-and-answer session at the
2015 Sakyadhita gathering in Indonesia, the Burma scholar, Hiroko Kawa-
nami, stood up from her seat among pink-robed Burmese nuns to describe
her companions’ difficulties in trying to understand terms like “patriarchy”
and “androcentrism.” Although they pursued their meanings diligently so as
to better understand the English-language talks on offer, their English-Burmese
dictionaries did not contain such terms. Bhikkhuni Dhammananda then rose
to speak, describing similar difficulties in translating Western feminism into
the Thai language for her students. Of course, such terms require more than
an English translation to be legible. Their proper understanding presupposes
a broad familiarity with liberal feminist thought. In many cases, it is not just
the language of liberal feminism that is lacking, but its goals, worldview, and
background assumptions about the nature of personhood and liberty. As
Susanne Mrozik and Nirmala Salgado have both pointed out, many ordained
Buddhist women seek higher ordination so that they may have better access
to the Dharma, not for the sake of gender equality (Mrozik 2009; Salgado
2013). Some female Buddhist renouncers seeking access to ordination and
teachings explicitly reject a feminist identity for fear of falling under the
influence of adharmic Western culture, or being accused of such: as an ideol-
ogy associated with the West, feminism is sometimes deemed incompatible
with Buddhism (Mrozik 2009; Salgado 2013). Thus, is not clear that the
aspirations of every Sakyadhita member, or every Buddhist nun seeking
higher ordination, can be properly characterized as “feminist.” By the same
token, it must be acknowledged that Buddhist monastic women past and
present have experienced certain freedoms not available to them in lay life,
even though they must live and practice within the patriarchal structures of
monastic Buddhism, and even though such freedoms might not be easily
recognizable as such to secular liberal feminists.
These complications and questions regarding the limitations of a feminist
paradigm for understanding female Buddhist monasticism past and present
forms the background to this study, and is a thread connecting its mainly
historical concerns to the Buddhist present. Just as certain present-day female
Buddhist monastics are not feminists, the ancient Buddhist bhikkhunı‑s were
not feminists. And yet, I claim, female Buddhist monastics past and present
should be regarded as uniquely autonomous and free within their female
bodies. By my lights, this is so not only or even mainly because of the Bud-
dhist promise of enlightenment, but because of a dense discourse of the
female body that is central to female personhood in Buddhist traditions, a
 Introduction 3
discourse that simultaneously limits and opens spaces of opportunity for
women within monastic Buddhism. Central to this discourse, I argue, are
theories and descriptions of birth and the female reproductive body. These
various intertwined themes – Buddhist understandings of female embodi-
ment, a Buddhist soteriology that characterizes liberation as an escape from
(re)birth, and the limitations and opportunities women have experienced
within Buddhist monasticism – are my focus in this study.
This study is textual, not ethnographic, archeological, art historical, or
sociological. Its primary textual focus is an early-first-millennium Buddhist
su-tra, written originally in Sanskrit, that assembles in one place (and in some
cases may be the source of) various authoritative Buddhist statements about
conception, gestation, and childbirth. This text, entitled the Descent of the
Embryo Scripture, or Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, contains embryological and ana-
tomical details drawn from the field of medicine and stomach-turning
descriptions of the female body’s inner loathsomeness. It is organized around
the narrative of human birth and describes gestation week-by-week, unlike
other Indic embryologies that trace fetal development month-by-month. The
longer redactions of this text embed the Descent of the Embryo teaching
proper within the avada-na of the Śa-kya prince Nanda, a half-brother to the
Buddha whose love for his beautiful wife makes him reluctant to ordain as a
monk. Although the fifth-century Indian luminary Vasubandhu, the intrepid
Chinese pilgrim and scholar Yijing, and an assortment of Tibetan greats all
translated, studied, or made use of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra in their own
works, this text has not received much attention from modern scholars of
Buddhism. Indeed, in the absence of a proper appreciation of the birth trope
in mainstream Indian Buddhism, a lengthy treatise on the birth process is
easy to dismiss as an offbeat, quasi-medical text. The significance of the
Garbha-vakra-nti (and other similar teachings on birth) becomes more obvious,
however, once the centrality of the birth metaphor to Indian Buddhist
constructions of gender and freedom is acknowledged.

Birth has a history: A Foucauldian approach

Childbirth is an event with a high degree of tangibility. It does not occur
without sweaty pain, bloody effluvia, and raw vocalization. Its result is the
newborn baby, a tiny being, caught by midwife or physician or female elder
and then deposited onto the milk-filled breast of the mother. The physically
and emotionally intense experience of childbirth would appear to be a cul-
tural universal, an event self-evident in its meanings. We have often imagined
sex to be something just as natural and self-evident as childbirth. And yet, as
Michel Foucault has shown us, sex is not composed simply of identifiable
physiological features, acts, and spontaneous unstoppable sensations, but also
of many images, practices, rules, and feeling states that emerge from histori-
cally particular contexts.1 Like sex, birth has a history. It is something that we
imagine and describe, contain and regulate, medicalize and anaesthetize, use
4 Amy Paris Langenberg
as metaphor, use as narrative, and make into a horror movie, comedy, or
romantic idyll. Even at the apex of a painful uterine contraction, women and
their partners experience birth through a prism of metaphysics, imagery,
affect, and expectation. Thus, our knowledge and experience of birth is not
free of powerful social hierarchies and political structures. Like sex, it cannot
be reduced to a discreet physical event, something directly perceived by eyes,
ears, nose. It is rather something subject, to borrow Foucault’s poetry, to a
“process that spreads it over the surface of things and bodies, arouses it,
draws it out and bids it speak, implants it in reality and enjoins it to tell the
truth” (Foucault 1976: 72).
Buddhist canonical scriptures remind us time and time again that birth is
fundamentally unsatisfactory, a precursor to disease and death. Modern
scholars of South Asian Buddhism have generally discussed what I am simply
calling “birth,” but which in Buddhist contexts includes conception, gesta-
tion, and emergence from the womb, in terms of philosophy or ethics, or as
an element of Buddhist cosmology.2 Other than scholars of Buddhist medi-
cine,3 a relative few4 have dwelt on Buddhist descriptions of its lowly
muliebral realities. But classical Buddhist texts explicitly reference the visceral
physical and emotional realities of pregnancy and childbirth when explaining
or describing “birth,” not only its metaphysical or cosmological dimensions.
In particular, as I elaborate in the first chapter of this study, middle period
Indian Buddhists had a habit of conceptualizing suffering in terms of, and
liberation in contradistinction to, the vivid experiences associated with human
reproduction.
Pa-li discourses contain a repeated formulaic definition of birth: “The birth
-
(jati ) of various beings into the various orders of beings, their manifestation,
their descent (okkanti ) [into the womb] and sequential development [as
embryos], the appearance of the aggregates (khandha), the acquisition of the
sense faculties (a-yatana), this is called ‘birth’ (ja-ti ), monks.”5 This small text
performs a number of important definitional tasks. First, it establishes the
temporal scope of ja-ti. Birth is to refer to more than childbirth (the most
highly visible temporal marker for the event) and more than conception (the
moment from which age should be measured). It should be taken to include
the entire period spanning conception, gestation, and childbirth. Additionally,
this definition falls into two parts, though the standard text does not itself
explicitly mark the transition. The first part describes birth concretely as the
conception and manifestation of an embryo of a certain species. The second
glosses birth in metaphysical and psychological terms as “the appearance of
the aggregates” and the “acquisition of the senses.” The Sam -
. yutta-nikaya-
-
at.t.hakatha, Buddhaghosa’s commentary on the Sam -
. yutta-nikaya, marks this
transition by distinguishing between the part designated as an ordinary or
popular teaching (voha-radesana-) and the part that comprises an extraordinary
or absolute teaching (paramatthadesana-).6 The manifestation of beings among
the various karmic orders along with their residence and development inside
the womb are considered ordinary processes cognitively (if not perceptually)
 Introduction 5
accessible to anyone. Those who share in the Buddha’s wisdom, however, are
able to move beyond the view that birth is the physical and moral coming-
into-being of a concrete person and grasp its real nature – that is, the arising
of ephemeral aggregates that temporarily make a home in the sensory world.
Thus, diverse aspects or modes of sam -
. saric arising are included in this defi-
nition: the (painful biologically and socially vivid) event during which a baby
comes into the world, the karmic event that marks the exhaustion of one
bundle of causes and the initiation of a new bundle, the descent of the embryo
into and growth inside of the womb, and the subtle arising of discrete but
interconnected aggregates of thoughts, sensations, and material forms.
The various components of a Buddhist understanding of ordinary birth
evident in the Pa-li formula are also found in other texts such as scholastic
commentaries by Buddhaghosa and Vasubandhu, Maha-ya-na śa-stra texts,
narratives such as the Lalitavistara, and the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra. In these
later sources, the Buddhist account of birth is further elaborated through the
operations of metaphor and narrative. It is embellished with imagery drawn
from sewer, charnel ground, and torture chamber, harnessed to an aesthetics
of disgust, and put into conversation with the Brahmanic ritual principles of
purity and auspiciousness. Like Victorian Europe’s discourse on sex, the most
dominant (but by no means the only) thread of what I am calling the
Buddhist discourse on birth is negative and prohibitive. It teaches that the
non-descent of the recently deceased being into a new womb is the mark of
enlightenment. It portrays fetal life as highly unpleasant. It demotes lineage
propagation through the birth of biological sons.
Of course, many sublime and miraculous births are also described in Indian
Buddhist texts. In certain ja-taka tales, the Bodhisatta is conceived without his
parents’ sexual organs ever touching (Boisvert 2000; Bollée 2005). In his final
existence, he is fully formed at conception, emerges stainless and without pain
from his mother’s side at his birth, and is developmentally mature as a new-
born. Other fortunate beings take their birth in flowers or appear sponta-
neously on their mothers’ laps in the Buddhist pure lands (Harrison 1987;
Teiser 2006). In the Sama-dhira-ja-su-tra, Buddhas spew out magical bodies
from their own golden ones, wondrous forms conceived to preach the dharma
to sentient beings.7 In Maha-ya-na prajña-pa-ramita- (“perfection of wisdom”)
literature, Buddhas are said to be “born” from the maternal body of perfect
wisdom (Cabezón 1992; Ohnuma 2012: 148–154). Tatha-gatagarbha texts
substitute a transcendent Buddha-womb for the fleshy wombs of human
mothers (Radich 2015). The Gan.d.avyu-ha-su-tra includes a vision of Ma-ya-,
mother of all the Buddhas, as a wondrous jeweled palace within which the
bodhisattva dwells and receives visitors in gracious splendor (Granoff 2004).8
Such births are exceptional and serve as a contrast class to the countless
unenlightened ordinary births that comprise cyclic existence.9 With the
exception of the traditions associated with the Buddha’s birth, however,
docetic visions of enlightened beings birth (many of which are associated with
the Maha-ya-na) will not be explored in depth here. Rather, ordinary
6 Amy Paris Langenberg
parturition is the focus of this study, which argues that discursive treatments
of human birth from the body of a woman sets the terms of Buddhist gender
in basic and significant ways.
Even while prohibiting, condemning, abjecting, and seeking ways to elim-
inate or transcend ordinary birth, classical Buddhist texts portray and exist
within a varied socio-cultural and emotional landscape that centrally includes
concerns about successful and abundant childbirth. Contiguous with the cri-
tiques of ordinary human reproduction found in mainstream Buddhist texts
are descriptions of lay men and women yearning after sons and daughters,
Buddhist monks making amulets and uttering protective formulas to ease
childbirth or protect fetuses from harm, laywomen feeding the goddess Ha-rı‑tı‑
in hopes of increased fertility and safe childbirth, fathers bringing young
children to the monastery gates seeking protection from illness, and nuns con-
tinuing to bear children or lactate, despite the fact that they have gone forth
into homelessness. These narrative themes are drawn into a mature Buddhist
tradition of talking about birth that is in turns negating, baroque, humorous,
knowing, sarcastic, esoteric, scientific, disgusting, and sublime. Thus, a parti-
cular instance of what Foucault calls a “discourse,” a multiform of knowledge
that is generated by and perpetuates a certain human environment, emerges
around the topic of birth in the Indian Buddhist context.
It is my contention that this classical Buddhist birth discourse is productive
not only of soteriology and metaphysics, but also of a set of gender concepts, and
quite probably, gender behaviors and gender identities. In particular, this study
examines the ways in which the discourse of birth found in Indian Buddhist texts
generates specific gendered persons, notably the auspicious monk who is
expert in birth and the female Buddhist ascetic who has moved beyond fea-
tures central to normative South Asian femininity Asia such as cyclical purity,
feminine beauty, and auspiciousness. Who are these gendered Buddhist perso-
nages to whom the Buddhist discursive world gives birth, so to speak? What
are they like and what do they teach us about suffering, identity, and libera-
tion, when we encounter them in Buddhist texts? Furthermore, is it possible to
encounter them outside of texts? In what sense might they have existed in the
real Buddhist environments that generated the texts in which they appear?
Foucault’s theorization of power provides a framework for understanding
the process of discursively producing sexed and gendered subjectivities. For
Foucault, power is not “juridical,” not merely consisting in laws and institu-
tions that subject individuals to state purposes, not something that merely
says “yes” or “no” to sex or life or freedom. Rather, power “is the name one
attributes to a complex strategical situation in a particular society” (Foucault
1976: 93). Power is produced from moment to moment at a multiplicity of
decentralized sites. It “is everywhere; not because it embraces everything, but
because it comes from everywhere” (Foucault 1976: 93). Thus, power is
not fundamentally material or exclusively connected to the state for Foucault,
but something diffuse that operates locally. Power suffuses bedrooms, living
rooms, schools, medical examining rooms, bathrooms, and birthing rooms.
 Introduction 7
Crucial to Foucault’s theory of power is the fact that it is inherently linked
to knowledge systems. In Discipline and Punish, Foucault explains:

We should admit that power produces knowledge (and not simply by

encouraging it because it serves power or by applying it because it is
useful); that power and knowledge directly imply one another; that there
is no power relation without the correlative constitution of a field of
knowledge, nor any knowledge that does not presuppose and constitute
at the same time power relations. These “power-knowledge relations” are
to be analysed, therefore, not on the basis of a subject of knowledge who
is or is not free in relation to the power system, but, on the contrary, the
subject who knows, the objects to be known and the modalities of
knowledge must be regarded as so many effects of these fundamental
implications of power-knowledge and their historical transformations.
(Foucault 1975: 27)

Thus, it is not that political or financial power authorizes certain ideologies,

and that individuals are either subjected to or liberated from such power, but
that knowledge and power operate as one to produce “the subject who
knows.” The aim of the scholar cannot be to liberate knowledge from power,
and therefore purify it so that it becomes truth, but to understand that “truth
isn’t outside power, or lacking in power … truth isn’t the reward of free spir-
its, the child of protracted solitude, nor the privilege of those who have suc-
ceeded in liberating themselves. Truth is a thing of this world” (Foucault
1980: 131). Together, knowledge and power generate cultural forms, religious
theories, disciplinary techniques, institutions, and decide the “status of those
who are charged with saying what counts as true” (Foucault 1980: 131).
Together they determine which sorts of thoughts and bodily habits are per-
missible or desirable, which subject to repression, restraint, or censor. Toge-
ther, they produce “the subject who knows, the objects to be known and the
modalities of knowledge.”
In the case of sex, something that we moderns have often presumed to be a
basic biological urge, Foucault asserts the joined effects of knowledge and
power. He describes power arising and operating at multiple sites and in
multiple situations to produce sexuality according to the “strategical situa-
tion” of particular societies. In modern Europe, Foucault’s main historical
example in volume one of his History of Sexuality, sexuality is disciplined
along heteronormative lines. According to Foucault, modern Europe’s super-
ficially “repressive” discourse of sex gives rise to subsidiary discourses (often
medical or scientific in nature), and social technologies (methods of parenting
and education) that simultaneously call forth and seek to discipline homo-
sexuality, onanism, female sexuality, adultery, and incest. Foucault notes, for
instance, the paradoxical way an intense focus on discouraging infantile
sexuality through the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries resulted precisely in
the sexualized infantile body and eroticization of the parent–child relationship
8 Amy Paris Langenberg
so amply evident in Freud’s psychoanalysis (Foucault 1980: 120). Moreover,
without the medicalization and criminalization of same-sex behavior that
occurred in Europe during modern times, we would not have a particular
species of individual identified as “the homosexual” (Foucault 1976: 43). Ironi-
cally, that particular type of person emerges from the discourse of sex that pro-
motes heterosexual reproductivity and forbids homosexuality. Foucault quips,
“‘Sexuality’ is far more of a positive product of power than power was ever
repression of sexuality” (Foucault 1980: 120). The operations of power-knowledge
are always generative in this way, according to Foucault’s view.
Buddhist textual elaborations of the birth process are powerful. They are
features of a discursive process of hailing and disciplining Buddhist sub-
jectivities and bodily behaviors along an axis that reaches from celibate male
and female asceticism10 to the sexual pursuit of fertility. Female Buddhist ascetics,
in particular, are forceful participants in this Buddhist power/knowledge
regime, engaging in various forms of self-disciplining and sometimes breaking
into the role of critic and historian of gender, though they may never describe
themselves in this way. Even in its denigration of female embodiment, the
Buddhist discourse of birth is, I argue, constitutive of female Buddhist ascetic
agency.

The social life of Buddhist birth discourse

Although not completely absent, material records from ancient India are
limited. The types of casual, quotidian, incidental, or minor writings that
social historians often rely on to piece together social historical narratives,
especially histories of the family or of gender and sexuality, are virtually
nonexistent for the ancient period in India. Inscriptional evidence, numis-
matic evidence, and architectural remains have been useful and important, as
have certain types of writings associated with the royal courts or land
exchanges, but much of what historians surmise about religious and social life
in ancient Buddhist India is gleaned from texts with a strong religious focus.11
These are works of religious narrative, religious law, philosophy, scholastic
treatises, ritual texts, or teachings attributed to important religious figures.
Since my sources are also almost exclusively what one might call “normative”
religious texts, how could they possibly be the basis for any historical claims
about gender and social life in ancient India? On what grounds, exactly, can I
argue that they connect to the actual gendered social worlds of ancient
Buddhism in which I claim to be interested?
None of my sources are descriptive in any direct way of social forms in
ancient Buddhist India. The present study is not a social history in a strict
positivist sense. Rather, it is closer to what Foucault, following Nietzsche,
called a “genealogy,” and what other historical thinkers have described as
“critical history” (Scott 2007: 27). It is an attempt to map the emergence of a
historically specific Buddhist interpretation of human life, one that centrally
includes claims and practices regarding maleness and femaleness. Foucault
 Introduction 9
describes the coming into power of influential new interpretations of human
life as the “violent or surreptitious appropriation of a system of rules, which
in itself has no essential meaning, in order to impose a direction, bend
[humanity] to a new will, to force its participation in new game” (Scott 2007:
27). The language of force that Foucault employs may appear inappropriate
to a Buddhist context, which claims for itself gentleness and a disinterest in
worldly affairs. I contend, however, that the emergence of Buddhism in
ancient India as a major religion during the middle period, one that held the
attention of kings and wealthy men, produced large monuments, and com-
peted successfully with other religions, does mark the attempted imposition of
a new direction, a changing of the game through the “appropriation of a new
system of rules,” a shift in the history of Indian social thinking. Some of the
new rules appropriated in Buddhist contexts concerned the negotiation of
gender.
The genealogical method, which Foucault developed in Discipline and
Punish and his three-volume work on sexuality, and further articulated in
lectures and interviews given towards the end of his life, denies any telos to
history, treating it rather as a decentralized, non-progressive thing that results
from multiple mundane contingencies converging in complex causal webs. For
Foucault, the motive force of historical change is not reason, political clout,
capital, or individual human greatness, but the often prosaic daily operations
of knowledge and power. Knowledge and power operate continually and in
conjunction to produce worldviews and styles of institutional and personal
discipline. A genealogy traces the ancestry of the foundational concepts
(for instance, “man,” “woman,” “nature,” “reason,” “language,” “virtue,”
“truth”) that form the epistemological basis for worldviews and institutions,
and undergird various subjective disciplines. It is a process of searching out
the web-like operations of knowledge in relationship to power (not necessarily
explicitly accounted for in texts) that generate seemingly universal and natural
truths (what Foucault sometimes calls “epistemes”) and the historically spe-
cific types of persons who are trained to think in terms of such truths (though
they may sometimes fail to do so). According to a Foucauldian mode of
analysis, human subjectivity is not a biological universal, not the product of
rational subjective willing, and not a product of the straightforward imposi-
tion of social norms or political pressures, but is built up intricately and from
all directions through the joint operations of institutional disciplinary techni-
ques (what Foucault calls “technologies of power”) and self-technologies
arising within historically particular configurations of knowledge and power.
The present project is a “genealogy” in its attempt to link a core episteme in
ancient Indian Buddhism, one that is so submerged and foundational it has
invited little sustained attention in scholarship, to certain uniquely Buddhist
modes of gendered being. That episteme is the notion that birth is suffering.
The gendered Buddhist persons I consider include female Buddhist ascetics
who stand apart from the female reproductive body and male celibate ascetics
empowered, nonetheless, to promote fertility among the laity.
10 Amy Paris Langenberg
At the end of the day, the historical claims I venture have more to do with
possibility and availability then quotidian fact. I combine responsible philol-
ogy and due consideration of the material record with a critical analysis of
subjectivity, structural-functionalist accounts of religion, and a Foucauldian
analysis of power, knowledge, and history to produce an account of gendered
living in ancient Indian Buddhist communities that does not take a naïvely
positivist approach to history, and does not uncritically assume femaleness
and maleness, or notions of the self and its freedoms, to be human universals.

The “philologist’s meaning”

I have given an answer to the question of how reading texts can produce a
type of social history. My answer has taken the form of a theoretical framing,
but the full answer must include not only theory but also an accounting of
method. This project rests primarily upon the discipline of philology.
Although philology has been variously defined and understood, Sheldon Pol-
lock’s approach is particularly well fitted to this project. Pollock defines phi-
lology as “the discipline of making sense of texts.” He further explains that
“[Philology] is not the theory of language – that’s linguistics – or the theory of
meaning or truth – that’s philosophy – but the theory of textuality as well as
the history of textualized meaning” (Pollock 2009: 934). In other words, phi-
lology is the study of texts qua texts. In an important 2009 article, Pollock
seeks to defend philology in the face of its nearly fatal marginalization in the
humanities and in academic knowledge generation in general. In doing so, he
undertakes a historicization of philology and a frank reckoning of the state of
philological scholarship. He accuses his fellow philologists of trivializing their
own discipline by failing to properly theorize it, contending that “Twenty-
first-century disciplines cannot remain arrogantly indifferent to their own
historicity, constructedness, and changeability – this is an epistemological
necessity, not a moral preference – and accordingly, the humbling force of
genealogy must be part and parcel of every disciplinary practice” (Pollock
2009: 947).
By way of restructuring philology as a discipline, Pollock proposes three
interlocking tasks for philological scholarship, each necessary but not suffi-
cient in itself. First, there is the search for the “textual meaning.” This
endeavor, which is basic to the philological method, requires a detailed and
rigorous accounting at the level of grammar, lexicography, orthography, and
manuscript production of what the text is and what it means in all of its his-
torical phases and variations. The translation of texts and publication of cri-
tical editions are the traditional practices at this level of philological
scholarship. While upholding its vital importance, Pollock cautions against a
conservative, epistemologically naive methodology that cleaves to the “textual
meaning” alone. “Saving the world by the textual-critical elimination of lies is
an impulse associated with the heroic age of positivist philology,” he quips
(Pollock 2009: 952). He calls the second task of philology the search for the
 Introduction 11
“contextual meaning,” glossing it further, following Quentin Skinner as
“seeing things their way” (Pollock 2009: 954). He refers here to the diverse
interpretations of a text available in the tradition itself: “vernacular media-
tions – competing claims to knowledge about texts and worlds available in
past traditions” (Pollock 2009: 954). In other words, philologists cannot sail
off in search of some original true meaning or primordial Ur text, but must
look at the many meanings assigned to texts in their diverse historical settings
and applications.
Even combined, these meaning levels, the textual and the contextual, are
not sufficient. The third task of philology is the unearthing of what Pollock
terms the “philologist’s meaning.” Here, Pollock’s point is that if philologists
are going to treat the text as something historical rather than transcendent or
timeless in its meanings, and he contends uncontroversially that they should,
they cannot but simultaneously recognize their our own historical natures:

The conviction that ideas, texts, meaning, and life are specific to their
historical moment presupposes an erasure of our own historical being
that is impossible. We somehow assume we can escape our own moment
in capturing the moment of historical others, and we elevate the knowl-
edge thereby gained into knowledge that is supposed to be not itself his-
torical, but unconditionally true … We cannot erase ourselves from the
philological act, and we should not allow a space that is not there to open
up between our life and a lifeless past in which unreflexive historicism
traps the text.
(Pollock 2009: 957)

Only by thoroughly knowing the “philologist’s meaning” can the philologist

fully acknowledge his own role in the interpretive act and thereby restore the
humanity of the text. Self-historicization precipitates a vital and authentic
meeting up with the ancient and foreign other, and effectively removes ques-
tions about philology’s relevance. In such a mode of reading, “Texts cannot
not be applied to our lives” (Pollock 2009: 957).
The textual anchor for this study is the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, an early first
millennium embryological text with tenuous ties to Maha-ya-na communities
and even stronger connections to the Mu-lasarva-stiva-da Vinaya and abhidharma
tradition. I read this text against mainstream sutta/a-gama and Maha-ya-na su-tra
texts, narratives of the Buddha’s life, other Buddhist narrative traditions known
as avada-na and ja-taka, and texts from the vinaya tradition. With the possible
exception of Pa-li sutta collections, the texts I consult are closely connected
geographically, historically, or in terms of sectarian identification, all players
in more or less the same cultural field; that is, North Indian Buddhism during
the “middle period”12 spanning the Maurya and Gupta dynasties. All of the
texts I consult are loosely connected by the theme of birth.
In my reading of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, I work at all levels of Pollock’s
restructured philology, approaching my text in full awareness of its textuality.
12 Amy Paris Langenberg
I take into account its variability, and diligently pursue its textual meanings
collaboratively with other scholars, especially Robert Kritzer (2014), who has
recently produced a fine critical edition. I further engage its textuality by
explicitly addressing the way in which language shapes its meanings through
the operations of metaphor, narrative focalization, and imagery. Furthermore,
I contextualize its textual meanings within wider South Asian traditions of
interpretation, reading it against and in conversation with geographically
related texts of a similar sectarian pedigree, and more distantly related texts
that cover similar topics. Finally, I seek to maintain a level of reflexive
awareness, placing myself in conversation with the sophisticated negotiation
of gender in this text and in classical Indian Buddhist generally, rather than
encasing it in the sarcophagus of the ancient past, standing in judgment of it,
or mining it for supposedly timeless Buddhist truths. The lengthy explanation
of this project’s theoretical and methodological approaches offered here as an
introduction is part of this explicit self-reflexivity. A critical self-reflexive
approach, what Pollock calls an engagement with the “philologist’s meaning,”
is particularly germane with regard to my feminism, an issue to which I now
turn.

A critique of the secular-liberal feminist hermeneutic

I proceed from the premise that the only way to better answer the question of
what exactly is a “woman” in ancient Indian Buddhism is to look at its local
negotiation in specific sources. In particular, I make a bid for the centrality of
the Buddhist discourse of birth to Buddhist constructions of the feminine. In
attempting to understand the conceptual underpinnings and practical opera-
tions of gender in ancient Indian Buddhism from the perspective of the tra-
dition rather than through universalized, naturalized concepts like “woman,”
“female,” “motherhood,” or “equality,” this study takes heed of certain
threads of post-structural and post-colonial feminist thought. Specifically, it
acknowledges the anti-universalist, anti-identitarian interventions of Judith
Butler and post-colonial critiques of secular-liberal feminism by Saba Mah-
mood and Nirmala Salgado. In Gender Trouble, Butler questions whether
“identitarian” feminism, characteristic of the Second Wave, can claim any
basis for its assertion of unity, given the utterly contingent nature of gender.
Liberal feminists distinguish between gender and sex, arguing that gender is
culturally constructed and does not arise naturally from biological sex. At the
same time, liberal feminists make a claim for political unity on the basis of
sex/gender and the supposed fundamental universality of women’s experi-
ence.13 Butler objects to feminist claims that the experience of womanhood is
universal and comparable across cultures, historical periods, races, classes,
generations, political affiliations, or sexual orientations on the grounds that
such universalism reinstates the naturalized notions of sex as originary and
identity-forming against which feminists are struggling in the first place.
Furthermore, Butler reunifies the categories of sex and gender, but reverses
 Introduction 13
their priority and causality so as to avoid a return to the old view. She argues
that sex – our biologist understanding and experience of the sexed body – is,
in fact, a product of culture and therefore a part of gender.
Butler’s work has influenced my argument in that I pull back from an
unexamined use of the naturalized and universalized category “woman” and
seek instead to articulate the specific ways in which womanhood (and man-
hood), are built up, contended, and negotiated in a cluster of historically
contiguous Buddhist texts. These are texts that imagine, among other things,
the fertile female body, as they offer a description of conception, pregnancy,
and birth. Thus, I ask (and offer answers to) the question of how a woman is
a woman (and in some cases, how a man is a man) even at the level of the
body in Buddhist communities during the early first millennium. In this way, I
collapse sex into gender, and seek to articulate something about the gendered
forms of knowledge that produce subjective emotion, aesthetic perception,
and bodily practice in that milieu.
In taking an approach that does not assume categories such as “woman” to
be self-evident and universal, I find myself in sympathy with post-colonial
critiques of secular-liberal feminism. Saba Mahmood is a vital and repre-
sentative voice in this critique. In her study of the Egyptian women’s mosque
movement, Mahmood demonstrates the inadequacy of secular-liberal feminist
notions such as autonomy, equality, or empowerment for explaining the goals
and concerns of the women involved. She argues that the pious Egyptian
women whose viewpoint she wishes to elucidate do not think, practice, or
make ethical decisions based on the humanist beliefs that “all human being
share an innate desire for freedom, that we all somehow seek to assert our
autonomy when allowed to do so, that human agency primarily consists of
acts that challenge social norms and not those that uphold them” (Mahmood
2005: 5). Rather, through their cultivation of Islamic piety, which they often
undertake without direct male input or support, the women of the Egyptian
mosque movement strive to uphold “a discursive tradition that regards sub-
ordination to a transcendent will (and thus, in many instances, to male
authority) as its coveted goal” (Mahmood 2005: 2–3).
Women’s participation in Islamist movements is a particularly difficult case
for secular-liberal feminism, which tends to judge such women to be “pawns
in a grand patriarchal plan” or otherwise self-deceived and disempowered
(Mahmood 2005: 1–2). What Mahmood correctly characterizes as the “vexing
relationship between feminism and religion” has impacted feminist inter-
pretations of Buddhism somewhat differently, however (Mahmood 2005: 1).
Very unlike Islam, Buddhism has sometimes been the darling of American
feminists, who judge it to be one of the few major world religions that holds
out the promise of equality for women despite errors in its current and past
practices (Gross 1993; Gross 2009; Tsomo 1999). Indeed, from its inception,
the academic study of women and gender in premodern Buddhism has, as
Alice Collett and others have already pointed out, received the imprint and
imprimatur of Euro-American feminism (S. Boucher 2007; Collett 2006;
14 Amy Paris Langenberg
Collett 2009; L. Wilson 1996: 5–8). For instance, Caroline Foley Rhys Davids,
a talented philologist, one of the first scholars to write about the ancient nuns,
and a suffragist, displayed a tendency to read the ancient tradition through
the concerns of first wave British feminism. In one notable passage from an
early article, an idealistic young Caroline Foley − not yet married to her tea-
cher, the towering Pa-li scholar Thomas Rhys Davids − praises the early nuns
as “asexual rational being[s] walking with wise men in recognizing intellectual
equality on higher levels of thought” (Foley 1893: 348; quoted in Collett
2006: 72; Collett 2009: 94). But just as secular-liberal notions of freedom and
agency are inadequate for explaining the motivations of mosque movement
members in Egypt, notions of the autonomous rational self or gender equality
are an inadequate hermeneutic for understanding the Pa-li sources on the
ancient nuns’ community. As Collett notes, the ancient sources do not suggest a
high level of concern on the part of the ancient nuns for autonomy from or
equality with men, although at times their endeavors assume a form that
resembles “a kind of [feminist] rationalism” (Collett 2009: 95). Some, such as
the nun Kisa-gotamı‑, overcome female gendered emotional states (one is
tempted to call it “hysteria”) through reason, and others, like the nun Soma-,
engage in reasoned debate with male interlocutors. For the most part, how-
ever, the Pa-li texts that were the subjects of Caroline Foley’s early study depict
the ancient nuns as deeply absorbed in the problem of suffering, in the pur-
ging the cognitive impurities of hatred, desire, and ignorance through medi-
tative practice, and in the cultivation of certain types of behavioral purity
(Collett 2006: 72–73; Collett 2009: 94–96).
Recent textual scholarship on female Buddhist monasticism in ancient
India is understandably preoccupied with the historicity of the Vinaya
account of the founding of the nuns’ order, the legal status of the eight “rules-
to-be-respected” (gurudharma/garudhamma),14 and why and how Vinaya rules
differ according to gender (Ana-layo 2008b; Ana-layo 2010a; Ana-layo 2011b;
Chung 1999; Heirman 2008; Hüsken 1997; Kabilsingh 1988; Mohr and Tse-
droen 2010; Ohnuma 2006; Sponberg 1992; Strauch 2014; Tsomo 1996; von
Hinüber 2008). This preoccupation stems, at least in part, from an engage-
ment by scholars with the concerns of contemporary “Buddhist feminism.”15
“Buddhist feminism” is a term used in various Asian and Euro-American
contexts to describe the intersection of feminist thought and Buddhism in the
writings of Buddhist-feminist theologians16 like Rita Gross and Hsiao-lan Hu
and the activist efforts of ordained feminists like Venerable Karma Lekshe
Tsomo and Bhikkhuni Dhammananda. In their writings and in their speech,
some Buddhist feminists refer back to the traditional story of the founding of
the nuns’ order as an authoritative source text for efforts to promote equality
for ordained Buddhist women, and sometimes place great weight on the his-
toricity of this event.17 In general, the domains of text-based Buddhist Studies
scholarship and contemporary Buddhist feminism, though focused on sub-
stantially different goals, have a tendency to converge around issues related to
the status of women in Buddhism. Many students of premodern Buddhism
 Introduction 15
are naturally sympathetic to contemporary Buddhist feminist activism, while
contemporary Buddhist feminists may look to textual scholarship or engage
in such scholarship themselves to establish textual authorization for their
claims.18 Conversations between Buddhist feminists and academic scholars of
Buddhism result in interesting intellectual exchanges and motivate new
translations and studies. Such exchanges, if entered into uncritically, also have
the potential to engender theoretical and methodological confusion in studies
of ancient Buddhism.
Sometimes rigorous textual scholars who adopt a historical-critical
approach to texts and examine the tradition at a very high level of detail in
original languages may consider themselves to be operating outside of any
theoretical framework. As Pollock has cogently argued, however, traditional
philology is not theory-neutral. In fact, the claim that the high-quality historical-
critical study of ancient texts is sufficient for an undistorted view of the past is
itself a theoretical position historically related to the scientific positivism of
nineteenth-century Europe.19 Theoretical self-reflection must be a component
of textual studies of Buddhism’s ancient past, especially when a politically
sensitive issue like gender is on the table. But in philologically rigorous scho-
larship, premodern Buddhists or the Buddha himself are sometimes subtly
implied to be proto-feminists (e.g., Horner 1930; Walters 2014), sexism in
Buddhist texts is deemed a departure from the Buddha’s original message of
equality (e.g., Sponberg 1992), and the early community is argued to be funda-
mentally inclusive of women (e.g., Ana-layo 2014b: 138–139; Collett 2014a: 2),
without any explicit attempt to examine the fit between such research con-
cerns and premodern contexts. Some other scholarship about women and
gender in premodern Indian Buddhism is structured around an evaluation of
classical Buddhist traditions on the basis of their various negative and posi-
tive statements about, representations of, or legal constriction of women
(Gross 1993; Shaw 1994; Young 2004). In short, Buddhist Studies scholarship
on women and gender has flirted heavily with the question of whether Bud-
dhism is good or bad for women’s equality, a debate that recapitulates
secular-liberal feminist arguments with religion that are anachronistic and
arise mainly from our own concerns, not from the sources themselves. Certain
vital and revealing questions about the nature of female personhood, wifehood,
family, freedom, selfhood, the body, or suffering in the ancient Buddhist
world are in danger of occlusion when liberal-feminist hermeneutic is overtly
or covertly assumed, without sufficient critical self-reflexivity.20
Work in Buddhist Studies that argues the issue of “women’s status” or
evaluates the effects of positive or negative “representations of women”
almost inevitably defaults to assumptions about equality, autonomy, and
womanhood itself that actually arise from European humanism, a tradition in
which Asia has participated only as a result of the colonial encounter.21
Though such humanistic concepts have clearly been useful to feminist acti-
vists in Asia and abroad, appeal to feminist minded scholars, can seem nat-
ural and universal, and sometimes even resonate with certain classical
16 Amy Paris Langenberg
Buddhist formulations, they have no direct applicability to the premodern
history of Indian Buddhism and only limited applicability to the everyday
lives of many contemporary Asian nuns (Collins and McDaniel 2010; Sal-
gado 2013). European humanist traditions of articulating ideals like equality
and freedom, and the very special and historically specific conception of the
self upon which such traditions depend, amount to a sort of deep grammar in
the Euro-American academy (Asad 1993; Asad 2003; Mahmood 2005).
Informed by the work Chandra Mohanty, Saba Mahmood, Ananda
Abeysekara, Arvind-pal Singh Mandair, and other post-colonial scholars,
Nirmala Salgado’s Buddhist Nuns and Gendered Practice: In Search of the
Female Renunciant is a pioneering postcolonial critique of liberal feminist
categories misapplied in Buddhist contexts. Salgado’s research, which con-
cerns Sri Lankan sil matas (“precept mothers”) during the last several decades
(and does not consider the ancient nuns’ community), gives examples of the
misinterpretations, misunderstandings, and occlusions that ensue from an
inappropriate feminist hermeneutic, however well-intentioned. Her work,
which is based on fieldwork conducted over a number of years, looks granu-
larly at the various day-to-day material and political concerns of her subjects
in comparison with their treatment in scholarship. One of her conclusions is
that most of her subjects, if they ever consider it at all, are not likely to
understand the issue of higher ordination for women (an issue central to
Buddhist feminist efforts) to hinge on issues like freedom from patriarchal
control or the equality of women. Those who do hold strong views on the
issue of higher ordination for women are far more likely to be responding to
the micro-politics of their own communities and networks of patronage than
to any feminist imperative. Furthermore, she argues, unlike their feminist
interpreters, most sil matas do not understand their “problems” with housing,
resources, pressure from monks, or conflicts with neighbors as symptoms of
their oppression as disadvantaged third world (read: politically naïve, unedu-
cated, poor) women. They prefer to interpret their various problems with
reference to the canonical Buddhist notion of dukkha (suffering) and their
search for nibba-na (liberation from rebirth), rather than their oppression as
women.22 To apprehend the lives of these nuns through the lens of liberal
feminism, Salgado argues, is to misrepresent them, and to neglect their
“renunciant everyday” (Salgado 2013: 2). Furthermore, deploying concepts
from liberal feminism such as equality, patriarchy, oppression, and freedom
(all conceptualizations which the nuns themselves do not use) to interpret their
lives reduces them to “curative projects” (Salgado 2013: 5) and constitutes a
“repetition of the colonial event” (Salgado 2013: 50).
Salgado’s critique, presented here only in the briefest terms, is pertinent as
a cautionary model for the present study. While conceptual categories like
“woman” and “man” and the issue of freedom are certainly of central con-
cern, an attempt is made here to understand what they might mean in the
ancient Indian context. While the experience of women in Buddhist nunneries
and homes is also of interest, ideas such as equality, patriarchy, autonomy,
 Introduction 17
and oppression are not unthinkingly evoked in these pages, and the backward
projection of the liberal feminist dream is denied. In particular, this study analyzes
what it is to be female and/or a Buddhist ascetic from the perspective of ancient
Indian Buddhist ideas about childbirth and fertility, a discourse that I argue to be
central to the discursive construction of gender in ancient Buddhist texts. In
that discursive arena, humanistic notions of self, its entitlements, and its
potential for political freedom, are not relevant, nor is any broad ideal of
gender equality. Rather, freedom is articulated in terms of embodied notions
of suffering, which are themselves linked to reproductive processes. The nature of
the ancient nuns’ social, psychological, or physical “equality,” or “freedom,”
if such is to be imagined, must be regarded as particular to this conceptual
world, and as not readily apprehended along secular liberal feminist lines.
In critiquing the unthinking application of a secular liberal feminist hermeneu-
tic to ancient Indian Buddhism, I am safeguarding what Pollock terms the “con-
textual meaning” of my sources. In other words, I am suggesting that liberal
feminist notions of selfhood, womanhood, equality, oppression, and freedom
detract from the goal of “seeing things their way” if we can. I am simultaneously
summoning a degree of reflexive and critical awareness by situating myself and
other scholars in a distinctively modern tradition of feminist theorizing,
thereby making our shared feminist inheritance and our own historical moment
more explicit and visible. I am making legible the “philologist’s meaning” – my
own and that of some of my scholarly predecessors and contemporaries.
The point of these adjustments to philological and Buddhist feminist
approaches is neither to correct the mistakes of others, nor to demonstrate
how utterly different are the ancient and modern perspectives, nor to cordon
scholarship off from pressing questions that concern contemporary feminists.
Rather, the point is to seek answers to these important and pressing questions
while refusing to simply conscript the past into contemporary arguments between
feminism and religion. In fact, the ancients are brought closer when we insert
ourselves into the picture through critical self-reflection, initiating a con-
versation between equals. In acknowledging the necessarily reciprocal nature
of history-writing, we place ourselves in a better position to have our minds
changed and to show to our sources “the hospitality of ‘friendly, respectful
spirits trying to understand each other’” (Pollock 2009: 961). This séance with
the past is not a romance, and certainly not a gathering of spooky ancient
oddities, but a precious opportunity to find leverage for the questioning of the
present, in the interest of different and better futures. Since a major task of
post-colonial feminism as a theoretical approach is decolonization and a fea-
ture of responsible philology as a method is an ethic of hospitality, theory and
method conspire in these pages.

The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra (Descent of the Embryo Scripture)

The Buddhist discourse of birth is distinctive, both in content and in its social
and psychological impact in Buddhist societies, but Buddhists in early first
18 Amy Paris Langenberg
millennium India did not live, think, and compose in cultural and intellectual
isolation. The way in which Indian middle period Buddhists understood the
birth process was informed by and informative of the numerous non-Buddhist
theories of their predecessors and non-Buddhist contemporaries. For instance,
Buddhist embryological theories can be related indirectly to Vedic death rites,
which involve the ritual building of an intermediary body for the deceased so
that he may pass from the limbo world of the pretas (ghosts) safely into the
world of the ancestors. As each day passes, a new part of the preta’s inter-
mediate body is believed to grow in manner reminiscent of the growth of and
development of the fetus: first the head, then the shoulders, the torso, legs,
bowels, skin, hair and so forth until the constructed body reaches completion
on the tenth day (Knipe 1977; Sayers 2013). The karma doctrine, so central
to Buddhist birth stories, is also described in Jain and Brahmanic philoso-
phical treatises, law books, and narrative literature. And, by the first few
centuries of the first millennium, ancient Indian medical theorists had pro-
duced a sophisticated literature that included an extensive account of con-
ception, gestation and birth, a tradition of thought that imbricates Buddhist
birth texts like the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, the textual focus of this study. The
Buddhist discourse of birth cannot be fully appreciated in isolation from this
wider South Asian context, but not because Buddhists simply absorbed ideas
through an unconscious process of symbolic or philosophical mimesis. In
order to fully comprehend its impact upon gender in Buddhist societies, the
Buddhist discourse of birth must be regarded as something more or less
intentionally constructed, passionately defended, and subtly imbued with
meanings vital to the ideals of Buddhist monasticism. Indeed, from the point
of view of history writing, not much can be gained from painting ancient
South Asia (a vast cultural field and major civilizational force) with a broad
brush. Though I point out resonances with Vedic or village ritual traditions,
-
Ayurveda, Sanskrit aesthetics, or non-Buddhist religious narrative when it
seems important to do so, I often leave the recounting and analysis of con-
tiguous South Asian traditions of thinking about and ritualizing birth to col-
leagues working in adjacent fields, and train my gaze instead on traditions
surrounding birth that self-identify as Buddhist.
The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, or Descent of the Embryo Scripture, comes down
to us in three Tibetan and three Chinese translations of what were, according
to current philological research, most likely four original Sanskrit versions.23
No Sanskrit version has survived, though apparent quotations do occur in
several extant Buddhist scholastic works in Sanskrit.24 Quotations from or
references to the text also appear in Chinese translations of yet other scho-
lastic treatises.25 These references allow Robert Kritzer, a scholar who has
studied the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra over a period of two decades, to propose
that it was in circulation by the middle of the second-century C.E. (Kritzer
2014: 3). The earliest Chinese translation, the “Womb-Dwelling Su-tra” (Pao-t’ai
ching) by Dharmaraks.a, which is based on a short version of the text, dates to
either 281 or 303 C.E. (Kritzer 2014: 3). Two other translations were made
 Introduction 19
during the Tang dynasty, one by Bodhiruci, the other by Yijing. The former
was apparently based on a second version of the short Descent of the Embryo,
the latter on a long version of the text. Two Tibetan translations based on
Bodhiruci and Yijing’s Chinese texts respectively were produced during the
early ninth century in Dunhuang. The only Tibetan translation made from a
Sanskrit original occurs in the Ks.udrakavastu of the Tibetan Mu-lasarva-sti-
va-da-vinaya and also dates to the ninth century. This last is the longest ver-
sion of the text we have in any language. Kritzer has recently completed an
exhaustive comparative study of all Chinese and Tibetan translations and
produced a critical edition and translation of the Tibetan Ks.udrakavastu
text. I gratefully rely upon his invaluable and excellent edition as my primary
source for this complex textual tradition, but will supplement my analysis of
his critically edited text with references to my own 2008 translation of the
longer Dunhuang text (Kritzer 2014; Langenberg 2008).26
Although the fifth-century Indian scholar Vasubandhu, the Chinese pilgrim
and scholar Yijing, and a series of Tibetan scholars such as Gampopa,
Tsongkhapa, and Desi Sangyé Gyatso all translated, studied, and/or quoted
the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, this text had not received that much attention from
modern scholars of Buddhism until Kritzer began his work.27 Kritzer attri-
butes its obscurity in part to the fact that no such text exists in the Pa-li tra-
dition, and so has not been emphasized by contemporary Therava-da teachers
and scholars. Kritzer also suggests that it has probably escaped the notice of
those scholars who study the Maha-ya-na in India because it has not survived
in Sanskrit, and, while sometimes categorized as a Maha-ya-na su-tra, does
not display any distinctive Maha-ya-na features. It is even possible that the
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra may have been subtly shunned as somehow unsavory or
unsuitable, dealing frankly and unflatteringly, as it does, with female innards.28
Tibetologists and scholars interested in Asian medicine have been more aware
of this text than other American and European scholars of Buddhism, mainly
because of its role in the Tibetan and Chinese Buddhist medical traditions
(Choo 2012: 194–202; Garrett 2005: 36–37; Garrett 2008: 29–30, 136; Sal-
guero 2014: 56–57, 74–76; Gyatso 2015: 98).29 Specialists in abhidharma have
also paid some attention to this text (Yamabe 1996; Yamabe 2013). Recent
interest in gender and sexuality in Buddhism and the resulting focus on Bud-
dhist descriptions of the female body (for which the Garbha-vakra-nti is an
excellent source) has also brought some scholars to this text, or to texts that
cover similar territory (Choo 2012; Faure 2003: 81–90; Kritzer 2004; Kritzer
2009; Ohnuma 2012: 134–164; L. Wilson 2011; L. Wilson 2013).
There is perhaps another reason the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra has, until
recently, not received extensive study. Without proper attention paid to the
manner in which basic Buddhist truths have been expressed in the canonical
texts and elsewhere through the idiom of the human life cycle an entire
lengthy treatise on the birth process strikes us as peculiar and marginal.
Without a proper appreciation of the centrality of the birth trope in main-
stream Indian Buddhism, it can be dismissed as an offbeat quasi-medical text
20 Amy Paris Langenberg
and, therefore, not important in and of itself, unless one’s interests lie in the
field of Buddhist medicine, or odd corners of abhidharma philosophy. If it is
recognized, however, that Buddhist canonical and metaphysical texts under-
stand suffering in terms of birth, and in fact contain passages that render
birth from a female womb equivalent to and the source of the whole mass of
human suffering, it becomes obvious that a Buddhist ascetic is likely to ima-
gine himself to benefit from a detailed analysis of the birth process. Thus,
when viewed within the context of the full Indian Buddhist discourse on birth,
it is possible to see the Garbha-vakra-nti not as a marginal text, but as a com-
pelling and creative elaboration of a topic absolutely central to the Buddhist
path, and as indirectly related to important Maha-ya-na doctrines such as
tatha-gatagarbha and dharmaka-ya (Radich 2015).
The authors and redactors of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra were obviously
familiar with many Buddhist traditions. The Garbha-vakra-nti contains quota-
tions or near quotations from both the Maha-parinirva-n.a-su-tra and the
Sam - - 30
. yuktagama/Sam . yutta-nikaya. Its vinaya setting connects it to the Bud-
dhist narrative tradition. And it includes discussion of the antara-bhava, a
topic important to the abhidharma genre. This and the fact that, as Kritzer
and the Nobuyoshi Yamabe have shown, it is referenced in some early Sar-
va-stiva-da abhidharma texts as well as in the Abhidharmakośabha-s.ya, suggest a
close association between it and the Sarva-stiva-da abhidharma tradition
(Kritzer 2013; Yamabe 1996; Yamabe 2013). Robert Kritzer’s meticulous text-
historical studies of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra trace these various directions of
influence (Kritzer 1993; Kritzer 1997; Kritzer 1998; Kritzer 2000a; Kritzer
2000b; Kritzer 2012; Kritzer 2013; Kritzer 2014). My work focuses instead on
what this erudite, emotionally intense, and influential middle period text has
to teach us about the centrality of the Buddhist discourse of birth, and how
that discourse facilitates a deeper understanding of gender in premodern
Indian Buddhism.

For cutting, not (only) understanding

Foucault said that, “[genealogical] knowledge is not made for understanding;
it is made for cutting” (cited in Scott 2007: 28). He was deeply concerned with
the ways in which individuals become subject to power in society and the
power of critical thought to disrupt the processes of conditioning and dis-
cipline he had so meticulously described in his earlier works. The later Foucault
describes thought – the ability to distance oneself from received mentalities
and ideas enough to examine them critically – as a form of freedom: “Thought
is not what inhabits a certain conduct and gives it its meaning; rather, it is
what allows one to step back from this way of acting or reacting, to present it
to oneself as an object of thought and to question it as to its meaning, its
conditions, and its goals. Thought is freedom in relation to what one does, the
motion by which one detaches from it, establishes it as an object, and reflects
on it as a problem” (Foucault 1988: 117). The discursive world that formed
 Introduction 21
around the insight “birth is suffering” represented an innovative way of think-
ing, one in which older ways of gendered acting and being were established as
objects and reflected on as problems. This way of thinking offered alternative
modes of freedom and personhood to the women who engaged this discursive
world through its disciplinary traditions. It hailed monastic women to a mode of
agentive, intentional, and gender-radical living, even in the absence of notions
like “equality,” “autonomy,” or “freedom from oppression.”
Throughout this study, I use the term “Buddhist birth discourse” to refer
collectively to many interlocking themes in classical Indian Buddhist discus-
sions of human birth, which I describe at length in the following chapters.
These include the metaphor “suffering is birth” (Chapter 1); the image of
birth as an epic adventure in which a male pilgrim wanders through a female
wilderness (Chapter 2), a cultivated sense of disgust towards the processes and
experiences of birth (Chapter 3), the assertion that birth is not auspicious
(Chapter 4), and a tangible ambivalence regarding monastic participation in
rites of fertility and child protection (Chapter 5). The indelible impurity of the
female body is also a central component of the middle period Indian Bud-
dhist discourse of human birth (Chapter 6). A major thesis of this study is
that the Buddhist birth discourse, so seemingly negative for women, is better
viewed as supportive, even constitutive of the institution of female monasti-
cism, and of monastic women themselves, in a range of ways. To put it suc-
cinctly, the classical Buddhist discourse of birth gave rise to a religious system
that supported women in substituting Buddhist forms of discipline that
deemphasized their role as reproducers for modes of cultural disciplining
(definitional to North Indian womanhood at the time) that placed stress on
their cyclical impurity, auspiciousness, and sexual desirability. Although it has
undoubtedly undergone great change in local contexts and as a result of mod-
ernization, some aspects of this Buddhist mode of understanding the female
body, its sufferings, and its freedoms have surely survived in contemporary
female Buddhist monasticism.
Ultimately, ancient Buddhists’ efforts to make use of the contours of the
human birth process to understand human life, death, and freedom were acts
of world-building and world-peopling. And what a world Buddhist birth dis-
course helped to create and to people! – a world encompassing the yaks.‑ı-
adorned gates of Sa-ñcı‑, the gendered disciplinary traditions recorded in the
vinaya, the traditions of female practice recorded in the Therı‑ga-tha-, and the
embryological epic of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra. But if we are going to be sensi-
tive, attentive, and respectful scholars of Buddhist history, we cannot just
abide in wonder as we come to understand and appreciate these achievements
from the past. When we become self-aware and self-reflexive historians, the
knife blade of Buddhist ways of thinking about gender and bodies and suf-
fering is likely to slice into our own historical time and space as well, packed
as it may be with fibrous things such as biomedicine and secular liberal fem-
inism. The slit it opens affords a new critical perspective on the gendered
personhood of female monastic heirs to Buddhist tradition, and, because this is
22 Amy Paris Langenberg
a hospitable conversation among equals, on mainstream secular femininities
and feminisms as well.

Notes
1 Later in his life, Foucault is quoted as saying “Sexual behavior is not, as is too
often assumed, a superimposition of, on the one hand, desires which derive from
natural instincts, and, on the other hand, of permissive or restrictive laws which
tell us what we should or shouldn’t do. Sexual behavior is more than that. It is also
the consciousness one has of what one is doing, what one makes of the experience,
and the value one attaches to it” (quoted in Strenski 1998: 354).
2 Sanskrit terms for these phenomena include ja-ti, janman, garbha-vakra-nti, upapatti,
and pratisam . dhi.
3 For instance, Salguero (2014) and Gyatso (2015).
4 Notable exceptions include Choo (2012), Kritzer (2004), Kritzer (2009), Garrett
(2008), and Boisvert (2000). Radich (2015) is also an important exception.
Radich’s perceptive analysis of docetic Buddhologies in middle period Indian Bud-
dhism takes note of how problematic the idea that enlightened beings underwent
conception, gestation, and vaginal birth was considered to be.
5 DN ii.306, MN i.50, MN iii.249, SN II.12.i.2.
6 Bodhi (2000: 726). Pa-li commentaries also make an analytic distinction between
summutisacca (truth obscured) and paramatthasacca (ultimate truth) (Collins 1982:
18–20).
7 Sama-dhira-ja-su-tra 7.16. See Vaidya (1961).
8 In the Pusa Chu Tai Jing (“Bodhisattva Womb Su-tra”), the fetal Bodhisattva con-
verses with a series of interlocutors on a range of Maha-ya-na themes (including empti-
ness, the bodhisattva path, and the importance of sama-dhi ) while dwelling in Ma-ya-’s
womb. This text exists only in Chinese. Its provenance is uncertain (Legittimo 2006).
9 In the Aggañña-sutta (DN 27) the Buddha describes his disciples, sons of the
Dhamma, as “born of his mouth.” DN iii.85. Walshe: 409.
10 I use the word “ascetic” to refer to all varieties of Buddhist renouncers, making no
distinction between more and less rigorous types. As Oliver Freiberger has pointed
out, early Buddhist texts criticize extreme forms of asceticism of the type practiced
by the Buddha and his companions prior to his enlightenment and also record monks
performing these very same practices. Hence, Freiberger draws a distinction
between “ascetic” and “monastic” Buddhists (Freiberger 2006). I make no such
distinction here, as it is not relevant to my argument. All Indian Buddhist mon-
astics, whether monks of the forest or of the town, must refrain from sexual con-
tact and put a stop to the production of children, at least in theory. These are the
features of the ascetic path most germane to this study.
11 Gregory Schopen’s work on the Mu-lasarva-stiva-da-vinaya in relationship to other
works in the Indian Buddhist textual corpus and the material record is an excellent
example of successful scholarship on social life in ancient Buddhist India.
12 Schopen uses the term “middle period” because he wishes to avoid the distortions
introduced by referring to this period as “the Early Maha-ya-na Period,” a more
traditional way of periodizing Indian Buddhism. Schopen argues that scholars’
dependence on Chinese translations of Indian Buddhist texts has led them to
exaggerate the influence of Maha-ya-na texts and doctrines in India during this
period (Schopen 2005). Ali refers to this period as the “early historical period.” I
follow Schopen’s usage in this study.
13 Some radical feminists reject trans women’s rights to use women’s bathrooms or par-
ticipate in political events organized for women. These “terfs” (trans-exclusionary
radical feminists) do not accept the female status of trans women, who they claim
 Introduction 23
have assumed the socially subordinate position of woman by choice, a luxury not
available to biologically female, female-socialized cisgendered women (Goldberg
2004).
14 The eight heavy rules include recommendations that nuns pay respect to monks no
matter how junior, that they conduct disciplinary hearings in front of both assem-
blies, that they refrain from challenging monks verbally, etc. They are generally
understood to ritually and legally subordinate nuns as a group to monks as a
group. The rules vary somewhat in different sectarian traditions.
15 Collett notes an historic tendency in Euro-American scholarship on the early
Buddhist women’s community to focus only on a limited number of Pa-li source
texts rather than working widely and deeply across South-Asian Buddhist textual
record. According to Collett, the most overworked text of all is the Cullavagga
episode from the Pa-li Vinaya that recounts the founding of the nuns’ order. This
cramped use of sources has narrowed the scope of scholarship on the early nuns’
community (Collett 2006: 61–63; Collett 2009: 106).
16 Although there is not supposed to be any theos in Buddhism, the term “theology”
is often applied to writers who make normative claims about Buddhism. Kay
Koppedrayer offers the following useful description of feminist theology: “The
work of feminist theologians, always more than commentary, is to interrogate the
teachings and practices of a religious tradition to determine how it has treated its
members. When found to have come up short with regard to women, the tradition
cannot be called true to itself (as a reflection of God). Feminist theologians
undertake critique and analysis from within, which allows both identification with the
religious tradition under scrutiny and seeking expression of the capacity and agency of
women. Feminist theologians work to ensure that women’s voices, bodies, and
subjectivities find their place within the religious tradition” (Koppedrayer 2007: 123).
-
17 For instance, Ayya- Tatha-loka-, a senior American-born Therava-da bhikkhunı‑ and
founder of Dhammadharini Vihara in Penngrove, California, who has served as
preceptor at bhikkhunı‑ ordinations, posted the following on Facebook on June 23,
2016: “It has been highlighted to my mind several times this past week that the
harmful, damaging and wrong idea ‘the Buddha never wished to have bhikkhunis’
or ‘the Buddha was coerced into having a Bhikkhuni Sangha’ is being spread
around related to the Maha-paja-patı‑ Gotamı‑ Foundation of the Bhikkhuni Sangha
story. I am sorry to hear and read of this. This is a wrong inference and dis-
respectful to the Buddha.Those who are knowledgable and have studied the Bud-
dha’s teachings widely should not ever think so.” See https://www.facebook.com/a
yya.tathaaloka/posts/10206308907749349, accessed June 26, 2016.
18 Notable public occasions for this type of collaboration include biennial interna-
tional meetings of Sakyadhita International (founded in 1987) and the 2008 con-
ference in Hamburg on the subject of higher ordination for women, attended by
several prominent unordained Vinaya scholars as well as prominent monastic lea-
ders and scholars (Mrozik 2009). Some ordained men and women involved in the
ordination issue, for example, Karma Lekshe Tsomo, Bhikkhu Ana-layo, and
Jampa Tsedroen, are also active scholars who publish in scholarly journals and
teach in academic settings.
19 In her article, “Historio-Critical Hermeneutics in the Study of Women in Early
Indian Buddhism,” Collett makes a distinction between humanistically and
philologically trained scholars of Buddhism. She attributes inaccuracies or biases
in studies of women and gender in Buddhism to a superficial, biased, or too
narrow use of texts, which she appears to associate with training in the huma-
nities (presumably Religious Studies?) (Collett 2009). However true Collett’s
observations about the need to look at a broader range of texts, many scholars
within the field of Religious Studies would approach the problem somewhat dif-
ferently. Rather than viewing a humanistic approach as inherently problematic,
24 Amy Paris Langenberg
and better philology as the best answer to bias and inaccuracy, these scholars
would be more likely to consider a clear social scientific, humanistic, critical metho-
dology as essential to better analyses of women and gender in ancient Buddhism.
Responsible, rigorous, and accurate use of texts is, of course, a prerequisite for
good work in Religious Studies.
20 Perfumed Sleeves and Tangled Hair, a 2016 monograph by Rajyashree Pandey
about women in medieval Japanese Buddhism, makes an argument similar to the
one I make here regarding the necessity of reflecting on the conceptual categories
we employ when studying gender in ancient and medieval Buddhist societies.
21 See Salgado (2013: 21–48) for an extensive, chapter-long critique of the mis-
application of secular-liberal feminist categories in Rita Gross’s Buddhism After
Patriarchy, Tessa Bartholomeusz’s Women Under the Bo- Tree, and Wei-yi Cheng’s
Buddhist Nuns in Taiwan and Sri Lanka.
22 Collins and McDaniel provide a different perspective on similar issues based on
research they have done among mae chis in Thailand. Several of the mae chis they
interviewed were highly qualified educators of Pa-li and abhidhamma. Most of the
mae chis whose views Collins and McDaniel report expressed the opinion that
becoming a bhikkhunı‑ would not result in higher educational opportunities, or
higher status. In fact, many expressed the view that they are equal to bhikkhus,
whereas bhikkhunı‑s are actually below bhikkhus in status. Some did complain,
however, about the low stipends they receive, but did not seem to connect this to
their ordinational status, despite the fact that bhikkhus receive nearly twice as
much as they monthly. Collins and McDaniel do not specifically employ a post-
colonial framework in this article, though they do suggest that the ordination issue
is of more concern in the “international, globalized Buddhist world” than it is
locally (Collins and McDaniel 2010: 1379).
23 For a detailed history of the text, see Kritzer (2012); Kritzer (2013); Kritzer (2014: 3–10).
24 Namely, the Abhidharmakośabha-s.ya andYoga-ca-rabhu-mi. See Kritzer (2013: 749,
751, 754, 757, 761) for a detailed analysis of specific passages.
25 The Pañcavastukavibha-s.a-śa-stra (Wu-shih p’i-p’o-sha lun, T. 1555), Vibha-s.a- (A-p’i-ta-mo
ta p’i-p’o-sha lun, T. 1545), and Sam - - -
. gharaks.a’s Yogacarabhumi (Xiuxing daodi
jing, T. 606) (Kritzer 2014: 3). Kritzer (2013) provides a supurbly detailed study
of quotations from the su-tra found in these various texts surviving in Chinese
translation. See Yamabe (2013) for some observations regarding the relationship
.
between the Yoga-ca-rabhu-mi attributed to Asanga, other Yoga-ca-ra texts extant in
- - -
Chinese, and the Garbhavakranti-sutra. The embryological section of the Xiuxing
daodi jing is translated in Choo (2012: 219–221).
26 The longer Dunhuang text, translated into Tibetan from Yijing’s Chinese transla-
tion of the longer version of the su-tra (entitled the Ju-t’ai ching) is number 57 in
the Tohoku Catalogue of the Tibetan Buddhist Canon. Its Tibetan name is Dga
‘bo la mngal na gnas ba bstan pa or “Teaching to Nanda on Dwelling in the
Womb.”
27 Franz Hübotter translated Dharmaraks.a’s Pao-t’ai ching in 1932, but without
much commentary or analysis (Hübotter 1932). Lalou, De Jong, and Skilling also
have made some comments regarding this text (de Jong 1977: 29–30; Lalou 1927:
240; Skilling 1997: vol 2, 94, n. 12). Japanese scholars, especially Nobuyoshi
Yamabe, have been more aware of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra and its importance
than European scholars, in part because Japanese Buddhology has generally
emphasized the Sarva-stiva-dan tradition, with which the su-tra is affiliated, more
than Euro-American Buddhology. Kritzer’s work is influenced by Yamabe’s scho-
larship. Yijing’s Chinese translations of the longer version of the su-tra appear in
both the Ratnakut.a su-tra collection, and in the Mu-lasarva-stiva-da-vinaya in the
Taisho- Tripit.aka. Both of these versions have been translated into Japanese. See
Kritzer (2014: 118, n. 794 and 795) for references.
 Introduction 25
28 It is reported to have been excluded from a 1983 volume of translations from the
Maha-ratnaku-t.a compendium of Maha-ya-na sutras (even though it is traditionally
included in that collection) for just this reason (Chang 1983). Personal communication
with Robert A. F. Thurman in fall, 2006.
29 The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra is considered an authoritative source on embryology by
Tibetan medical scholars (Garrett 2008: 136). The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra is a major
source text for Desi Sangyé Gyatso’s discussion of conception, gestation, and birth
in his commentary on the Tibetan Four Tantras, entitled the Blue Beryl (Vaid.u-rya
Sngonpo).
30 For details, see Kritzer 2014: 101, n. 710, 58, n. 272, 99, n. 689, 103, n. 732, 116, 129.
1 Suffering Is Birth

During the middle to late first-millennium C.E., the following Sanskrit stanza
(known from stone inscriptions, a terracotta tablet, and some gold plates)
made the protective force of a core Buddhist insight available to the people of
Malaysia, Borneo, and Java:

Through ignorance, karma is accumulated;

Karma is the cause of rebirth.
Through wisdom, karma is not accumulated;
In the absence of karma, one is not reborn.
(Skilling 2014: 61)

Aside from the “stanza on causation” (known to scholars as the “Ye

dharma-” stanza, also inscribed in Indic languages on clay seals, stu-pas, and
images),1 this is the most widely attested text in the Sanskrit-using regions of
early Southeast Asia (Skilling 2014: 61). Although its presence at Buddhist
sites on peninsular Malaysia and beyond would have served mainly a ritual
rather than a didactic purpose, it is, in Peter Skilling’s phrasing, a “signature
text,” a condensed rasa of the Buddha’s Dharma (Skilling 2014: 59). Included
in its triad of super-real truths (karma, ignorance …) is the hard fact of birth.
Although this Southeast Asian text has no known South Asian source, it
captures something of the essence of the classical South Asian Buddhism that
was imported as a prestige culture to the early kingdoms of Southeast Asia.
The trope of birth suffering pervades texts from early and middle period
Indian Buddhism. Consider this poetic observation by the great fifth-century
scholar Buddhaghosa: “As budding toadstools always come up lifting dust on
their tops, so beings are born along with ageing and death” (Buddhaghosa
1976: 226). Here, Buddhaghosa quotes an idea that is ubiquitous in the Pa-li
discourses: birth, a product of ignorance, is the direct antecedent of old age
and death. In the Dı‑gha-nika-ya’s Maha-pada-na-sutta, Prince Vipassı‑, the
bodhisatta of a previous world age, cries, “Shame on this thing called birth,
since to him who is born old age must manifest itself!” (DN ii.23; Walshe
1987: 208). According to the Sam - -
. yutta-nikaya’s Pat.iccasamuppada-sutta, the
Buddha taught that: “With birth as condition, aging-and-death, sorrow,
 Suffering Is Birth 27
lamentation, pain, displeasure, and despair come to be. Such is the origin of
this whole mass of suffering” (SN ii.1; Bodhi 2000: 533). In the same collection,
the nun Ca-la- declares to the deceiver, Ma-ra, that:

For one who is born there is death;

Once born, one encounters sufferings –
Bondage, murder, affliction –
Hence one shouldn’t approve of birth
(SN i.132; Bodhi 2000: 226)

Such ideas, that birth is the direct antecedent to decay and death, that it is
the origin of “this whole mass of suffering,” that it is to be transcended, are
basic to Buddhist conceptualizations of suffering and freedom. Birth, ration-
ally defined, poetically rendered, firmly denounced, is a central preoccupation
in Indian Buddhism, and acts as an anchor in its system of symbols and
concepts.
A number of mainstream Indian Buddhist texts offer descriptions of the
process of birth and rebirth, often in the form of expositions of the dependent
arising (S. pratı‑tyasamutpa-da; P. pat.iccasamuppa-da) doctrine. These texts clo-
sely link the sam -
. saric problems of impermanence and suffering to a phenom-
enological accounting of the human life cycle that takes ordinary birth as its
dramatic fulcrum. This pattern is evident in the early sutta/a-gama tradition,
preserved in the Pa-li and Chinese canons, and is picked up in scholastic
commentaries and treatises. Such physically and psychologically detailed
accounts of human birth and childhood tend to be treated in scholarship as
examples or illustrations of but not as themselves centrally constitutive of
Buddhist explanations of the causal processes that produce suffering (Gethin
1998: 149–159; Hirakawa 1990: 51–54; Lamotte 1988: 35–40; Warder 1970:
105–115). Here I offer another perspective: that birth is not just an example
of suffering; rather, at times human suffering is actually conceptualized using
the experience of birth from the womb of a woman in Indian Buddhism.
Although the conflation of birth and suffering is not the only episteme
operating in the vastness of classical Indian Buddhist traditions, I argue that
it is one of the important ones that “define the conditions of possibility of all
knowledge” in South Asian Buddhism, especially knowledge about gender.2 This
chapter begins to situate the quasi-medical and richly descriptive Garbha-vakra-nti-
su-tra, which takes physical birth as its special focus, in the larger middle
period Indian Buddhist context, where the metaphorical use of birth to con-
ceptualize suffering and liberation is pervasive. The very survival of this text
in several redactions demonstrates that the detailed knowledge of the con-
ception and gestation of a child within the womb of a woman and that child’s
subsequent emergence into the world was of no small importance to Indian
Buddhist thought. Its reprise of a variety of birth themes also present in other
classical Buddhist texts indicates that there existed a recognizable Buddhist
discourse on human birth, of which this text can be viewed as an authoritative
28 Amy Paris Langenberg
compendium. Indeed, I construe the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra as a mainstream,
necessary, and not very surprising product of core Buddhist notions about
suffering and embodiment, not a specialist discourse isolated within the marginal
realms of forest asceticism or the arcane medical sciences.
By demonstrating the centrality of the birth metaphor to the Buddhist
vision of suffering and salvation found in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra and else-
where, my ultimate goal is to carve out a window that gives onto distinctive
Buddhist constructions of gender. The tradition foils a simplistic approach to
the topic as it appears to simultaneously demonstrate a great liberality
towards women and a fierce misogyny. As a first step towards untangling this
conundrum, this chapter begins to articulate the ways in which the meta-
phor “birth is suffering” sets the terms for conceptualizing femaleness (and
maleness) in Indian Buddhism.

Metaphors and emergent experiences

I have several times used the word “metaphor” to describe the Indian Bud-
dhist intuition that suffering and birth are to be understood in terms of one
another. Colloquially, metaphors are understood to be figures of speech in
which one thing is described or understood in terms of another, often very
unlike, thing. “She is a peach,” or “That class is a snooze” are both meta-
phoric expressions of this type. Here, however, following George Lakoff and
Mark Johnson’s useful discussion of metaphorical thinking in their 1980
work, The Metaphors We Live By, I use the term “metaphor” in a more
substantial way to signify how one concept is “structured, understood, per-
formed” in terms of another, unlike concept (Lakoff and Johnson 1980: 5).3
According to Lakoff and Johnson, the process of metaphor does not stop at
the level of language but involves perception, conceptualization, and practice
as well. They take the example of the metaphor “argument is war” to illus-
trate their theory. While participants in arguments understand that arguments
and physical fighting are two different things, they use concepts drawn from
fighting to understand and even practice argument. They view argument as
being like a war, one in which there are shows of force, strategies, shoring up
of defenses, attacks, retreats, ideas about honor and fair play, winners, losers,
surrenders, and stalemates. Certain of the emotions that accompany fighting
(aggression, excitement, anger, fear, panic) also come with arguing. Also, just
as wars (traditional wars, at least) are patterned, arguments also comprise a
system of concepts, practices, and outcomes. Hence, war, taken as a gestalt,
provides a means of structuring another cultural practice – that is, argument.
As Lakoff and Johnson point out, however, the metaphoric structuring of
argument in terms of war is only partial. Not all of the conditions and
experiences of war apply to arguing.
Lakoff and Johnson are not objectivists. That is, they do not subscribe to a
simplistic version of the view that physical experiences are basic and comprise
the raw material for metaphor. They argue: “Cultural assumptions, values,
 Suffering Is Birth 29
and attitudes are not a conceptual overlay which we may or may not place
upon experience as we choose. It would be more correct to say that all
experience is cultural through and through, that we experience our ‘world’ in
such a way that our culture is already present in the very experience itself”
(Lakoff and Johnson 1980: 57). Nonetheless, even within this non-objectivist
view, they feel that the human body plays an important role in the process of
metaphor. As Lakoff and Johnson argue, “we typically conceptualize the
nonphysical in terms of the physical – that is, we conceptualize the less clearly
delineated in terms of the more clearly delineated” (Lakoff and Johnson 1980:
59). Love, for instance, a complex and sometimes elusive experience, can be
conceptualized in terms of the movements of the heart. The notions of social
superiority or intelligence or pride can be conceptualized using the very
human experience of possessing a head that occupies the uppermost portions
of our bodies.
The experience of being a human body moving through space and time
provide many of the rudimentary concepts clearly delineated enough to
themselves act as referents for metaphor. Lakoff and Johnson call such fun-
damental notions (object, substance, container, prototypical types of causa-
tion, in/out, front/back, top/bottom) “emergent concepts,” presumably
because they emerge from our experience more or less directly without much
help from metaphor (Lakoff and Johnson 1980: 56–76). In keeping with their
non-objectivist approach, however, Lakoff and Johnson characterize many
types of natural experiences, even physically powerful experiences such as
pain or sexual desire, as partly emergent and partly metaphorical because the
metaphorical function plays a structuring role in the conceptualization,
understanding, and affective performance of that experience. In this, their
thinking resonates with Foucault’s position on sexuality.
The discussion of metaphor offered by Lakoff and Johnson provides a route
for exploring the Buddhist idea that “birth is suffering.” As mentioned above,
when this phrase occurs as such within Buddhist texts, it is generally followed
by several other statements such as “sickness is suffering,” “old age is suffer-
ing,” and “death is suffering.” For this reason, it has usually, and quite sen-
sibly, been interpreted to mean that birth is an instance or subcategory of
suffering. While such an interpretation is obviously not wrong, it is impover-
ished. It obscures the way “birth is suffering,” or, to use the more typical
English word order, “suffering is birth,” operates as a high-order metaphor,
functioning like the other complex metaphors Lakoff and Johnson describe in
conceptualizing a less clearly delineated experience (suffering) in terms of a
more clearly delineated experience (conception, gestation, and childbirth),
nourishing itself on symbolic meanings and resonances drawn from the cul-
tural and social arena it occupies, highlighting certain aspects of suffering,
and obscuring others.
The wide importance and structuring role played by the birth metaphor in
Indian Buddhism thought and practice, and its distinctiveness to Buddhism,
can be better appreciated if we begin with a more common but contrasting
30 Amy Paris Langenberg
metaphorical use of birth. According to our own commonsense, as well as
some religious accounts of creation, “creation is birth,” or, in other words,
creation can be conceptualized in terms of the conception, gestation, and
birth of a human child. Lakoff and Johnson suggest that, at a fundamental
level, the structure of human pregnancy and birth lends itself to several basic
metaphorical understandings of “making” or “creating,” including the idea
that objects are held within and then emerge from containers (“mammals
developed out of reptiles” or even “he extracted the meaning from the
words”) and the idea that a substance (maternal nutrients), goes into an
object, thereby creating it (“the water turned into ice”, “the foal grew into a
horse”) (Lakoff and Johnson 1980: 74–75). The structuring metaphor, “crea-
tion is birth,” is at work in many expressions that we use unconsciously, such
as: “Edward Teller is the father of the hydrogen bomb,” “Our nation was born
out of a desire for freedom,” or “His experiment spawned a host of new theories”
(Lakoff and Johnson 1980: 74).
In Brahman texts such as the R.g-veda, the Ma-nava-dharmaśa-stra, and
others, birth is employed as a structuring concept for cosmic creation. From
the Ma-nava-dharmaśa-stra, we learn that at the beginning of creation:

That One – who is beyond the range of senses; who cannot be grasped;
who is subtle, unmanifest, and eternal; who contains all beings; and who
transcends thought – it is he who shone forth on his own. As he focused
his thought with the desire of bringing forth diverse creatures from his
own body, it was the waters that he first brought forth; and into them he
poured forth his semen. That became a golden egg, as bright as the sun;
and in it he himself took birth as Brahma-, the grandfather of all the
worlds … After residing in that egg for a full year, that Lord on his own
split the egg in two by brooding on his own body. From those two halves,
he formed the sky and the earth.
(Manu 1.7–9, 12–13; Olivelle 2005: 87)

Here, cosmic creation is explained in terms of sexual reproduction. In Brah-

man religious thought, the metaphor of sex, gestation, and birth is also
employed to conceptualize other processes, such as the ritual of Vedic initia-
tion, the sacrificial fire, and even the a-tman’s self-reflexive quest to know
(Jurewicz 2000; Lubin 1994). All of these processes (initiation, sacrifice, self-
knowledge) overlap conceptually, in part because of the shared metaphor of
birth. Though other metaphors, such as eating and cooking, are also called in
to do important work in structuring ritual and philosophical conceptualizations,
the metaphor “creation is birth” occupies a central place in the Brahmanic
worldview.
The metaphoric use of birth in Buddhist thought contrasts with this more
typical Brahman deployment of the same. The structure of human birth is
put to work in conceptualizing and explaining not primarily the creation of
the human world, but the origin of suffering, which is considered to be
 Suffering Is Birth 31
creation’s essence. For instance, the 12 causal links of dependent arising
(pratı‑tyasamutpa-da) explains how suffering, which is the most important
thing to know about the nature of creation, unfolds, not in a general sense,
but in the life of a person. As is well known, this formula mentions birth
specifically at several points and can be understood in its entirety as a descrip-
tion of the rebirth process. The Brahmanic use of the metaphor “creation is
birth” follows commonsense and has many counterparts in other cultural
systems. The Buddhist metaphor, which we might amend to “suffering is
creation is birth” is, however, more unusual.
Although the creation of children from women’s bodies (birth) has a brutal
physical aspect and is a fact of human biology, it is not what Lakoff and
Johnson call an “emergent experience.” It is, rather, a complex, historically
and culturally specific experience that mixes the physical, the emotional, and
the cognitive, and is understood in terms of various other experiences that are
themselves grounded in particular historical moments and cultural contexts.
Foucault describes sexuality in a similar manner, excavating layer after layer
of discourse in order to see how it is put together from historical moment to
historical moment. In Lakoff and Johnson’s terms, we can apprehend this
complexity of experience by analyzing the branching chains of metaphors that
inform a particular group’s understanding, conceptualization and perfor-
mance of it. The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, for instance, informs us variously that
not only is suffering like birth, but conception is like spirit possession, gesta-
tion is like a hero’s journey, the embryo is like a balloon, the embryo is like a
mirror, a newborn baby is like a torture victim, the womb is like a prison or
cesspool, karma is an embryological wind, the vagina is a pressing device, the
mother is a torturer, and so forth. In a Derridean regress, the birth metaphor
contains other sub-metaphors, which themselves refer metaphorically to yet
other concepts and ideas. I believe these chains of linked meanings lay winding
trails that lead from Buddhist notions of suffering, freedom, and the path, to
Buddhist social and cultural practices regarding nuns, women, and female
bodies. Before following this trail, however, we must first explore the higher order
metaphor “birth is suffering,” and a few of its more important sub-metaphors
in more depth.

Birth in many registers in the canonical discourses

In the canonical discourses,4 birth ( ja-ti ) appears at the head of a conventional
list of experiences that define the un-satisfactoriness of human existence. We
learn in formulaic explanations of the first “ennobling truth” (ariyasacca) of
suffering (dukkha) found in the Pa-li Dı‑gha-nika-ya, the Majjhima-nika-ya, and
elsewhere that “birth is suffering (ja-tipi dukkha-), ageing is suffering, death is
suffering, sorrow, lamentation, pain, grief, and despair are suffering” and so
forth.5 Such passages sometimes include the following definition of birth,
already quoted in the introductory chapter: “The birth ( ja-ti ) of various beings
into the various orders of beings, their manifestation, their descent (okkanti )
32 Amy Paris Langenberg
[into the womb] and sequential development [as embryos], the appearance of
the aggregates (khandha), the acquisition of the sense faculties (a-yatana), this
is called ‘birth’ (ja-ti ), monks.”6 This same definition of birth ( ja-ti ) also
appears in the context of teachings on dependent arising (pat.iccasamuppa-da),
of which birth is the eleventh item in the standardized list of twelve, located
between “becoming” (bhava) and “aging-and-death” (jara-maran.a).7
As is clear from the above stock definition of ja-ti, birth doesn’t always refer
to birth from a human womb. The discourses have a standard presentation of
four types of birth: egg-born (an.d.aja-), caul-born ( jala-buja-), moisture-born
(sam - - - 8
. sedaja), and spontaneously born (opapatika). The teachings of depen-
dent arising and the four noble truths apply to all such “born” beings, only
some of which are human. Furthermore, it may be important to recognize a
distinction between ja-ti in relationship to the four ennobling truths and ja-ti
within the context of dependent arising. In the former context, birth really is
viewed as suffering itself. In the latter context, the emphasis is placed on birth
as the condition for death, and as something that is conditioned by ignor-
ance.9 In certain contexts, ja-ti can refer to the coming into being of non-
sentient things. The Ariyapariyesana--sutta (MN 16), an important discourse
recounting the future Buddha Gautama’s search for awakening, states that the
noble (as opposed to ignoble) path is when “someone being himself subject to
birth, having understood the danger in what is subject to birth, seeks the
unborn supreme security from bondage” (Ña-n.amoli and Bodhi 255; MN
i.162–163). Here, that which is subject to birth (ja-tidhamma) is defined as
“acquisitions” (upadhi ), including wife and children, male and female slaves,
goats and sheep, and cattle and horses, but also gold and silver, which can
hardly be said to have been born in the biological sense (Ña-n.amoli and Bodhi
254; MN i. 162). This broad sense of birth as referring to temporary beings
and things coming into being (only to pass away) is further developed in
abhidhamma exegesis which explains it as the momentary arising of phenomena
in general (Ana-layo 2008c: 94).
Early Buddhist theorizations of birth sometimes focus on the earth-bound
physical and psychological processes of birth but at other times encompass the
attenuated metaphysical truths of rebirth. On the one hand, passages on the
four yonis (matrixes of birth) include brief quasi-zoological accounts of how
each process of birth works. For instance, the yoni that pertains to mammals
(including humans) is characterized by the presence of a birth caul covering
the fetus (Boisvert 308–309). On the other hand, technical discussions of the
various types of “noble persons” (stream-winners, once-returners, non-returners,
and arhants) found in the Pa-li discourses differentiate between various levels
of nobility based on whether or not (among other things) the “fetters that bring
birth” (uppattipat.ila-bhika-sam
. yojana) have been eliminated. This determines whe-
ther the noble being in question will be born again in the desire realm or in one of
the Brahma- worlds as a staging area for final release (Somaratne 1999: 141–142).
Thus, discussions of birth and rebirth (ja-ti, gabbha-vakkanti, upapatti, uppatti,
uppajjana) in early sources slip up and down various referential axes – human
 Suffering Is Birth 33
to nonhuman, sentient to insentient, biological to cosmological – without
necessarily calling attention to these various registers.
Birth, then, is a complex, nuanced, and highly productive concept in early
Pa-li sources. Human birth from a woman’s womb is not the exclusive, the
most philosophically deep or subtle, or the most technically precise meaning
of ja-ti (or uppatti or upapatti or gabbha-vakkanti ). Still, the grand Buddhist
theorization of birth and rebirth touches human lives viscerally around the
socially weighty and biologically vivid events of conception, pregnancy, and
childbirth. While Buddhist thinkers theorized all manner of birth, they wor-
ried and poured emotion into trying to understand, conceptually frame, and
manage human birth. Ordinary human birth within and from the body of a
woman is a psychologically, aesthetically, and ethically significant meaning of
ja-ti or garbha-vakra-nti, one that is eventually developed through a thick poe-
tics within the narrative and su-tra literature of Indian Buddhism. If the goal
of the Buddhist path is to become one who is unborn (aja-ta),10 has destroyed
birth (khı‑n.a- ja-ti ),11 has abandoned the flow of births (ja-tisam - ‑
. saro pahıno),
12
- - 13 -
and escaped birth ( jatiya parimuccati ) as is stated in the Pali discourses, and
if “birth” necessarily encompasses the very local, physical, and socially rele-
vant experience of conception and development within, emergence from the
bodies of human women, then, in an important sense, the Buddhist path is
defined in terms of and against the reproductive bodies of women, not just
against the flow of phenomena generally or repeated rebirths in the abstract.

Birth from a woman as a root metaphor for suffering in early Buddhism

An important early source of the pat.iccasamuppa-da doctrine, the “Great
Discourse on Origination” or Maha-nida-na-sutta (DN 15), laments the peo-
ple’s incomprehension of dependent arising, which has resulted in their
becoming “like a tangled ball of string, like knotted thread, [matted] like
coarse grass and reeds, unable to pass beyond loss, unhappy states, woe, and
the round of birth-and-death.”14 There, the Buddha treats birth as the ful-
crum for the entire process of sam -
. saric becoming, picking up the thread of
causation precisely at the juncture between birth and aging-and-death. The
- -
opening sortie of his teaching to Ananda reads: “‘If Ananda, there were no
birth at all, anywhere, of anybody or anything: of devas to the deva-state, …
of humans … of quadrupeds … of reptiles to the reptile state [etc.], if there
were absolutely no birth at all of all these beings, then, with the absence of all
birth, the cessation of birth, could ageing-and-death appear?’ ‘No, Lord.’
-
‘Therefore, Ananda, just this is the root, the cause, the origin, the condition
for ageing-and-death – namely, birth’” (Walshe 1987: 224). Ageing-and-death,
the beginning point of the unfolding drama of rebirth, is one highly evident
state of woe, the direct cause of which this text foregrounds: birth (ja-ti) into
one of numerous yonis (wombs). Although several orders of beings are
mentioned in this opening statement, in general the sutta overwhelmingly
concerns itself with human existence.
34 Amy Paris Langenberg
The 12 nida-nas (“causes”) of the dependent arising formula convey an
analysis of ignorance, suffering, and rebirth that is ostensibly specialized and
precise rather than conventional and expedient, but canonical discourses on
dependent arising include descriptive passages that provide a phenomen-
ologically and psychologically lusher account of how sam -
. sara unfolds (Mejor
1997: 127). Such accounts, in which conception and parturition give way to
infancy, childhood, youth, maturation, and finally old age and death (all of
which comprise “this whole mass of suffering”), serve to flesh out, as it were,
the abstractions of the dependent arising doctrine. The “Great Discourse on
.
the Destruction of Thirst” (Maha-tan.ha-sankhaya-sutta, MN 38),15 a sophisti-
cated analysis of the human condition that includes explanations of the con-
ditionality of consciousness, the four types of “foods” (a-ha-ra) that support
existence, and the causal factors of dependent arising, includes an accounting
of conception, pregnancy, and childbirth, and the developmental sweep of
childhood and youth:

Monks, it is a three-fold coincidence that results in the descent into the

womb. When there is the union of the mother and father, the mother is
not in a fertile period (utunı‑), and the gandhabba (intermediate-state
being) is not present, then there is no descent into the womb. When there
is the union of the mother and father, the mother is in a fertile period, but
the gandhabba is not present, there is no descent into the womb. When
there is the union of the mother and father, the mother is in a fertile
period, and the gandhabba is present, this three-fold coincidence results in
descent into the womb.16 With great trepidation, the mother holds that
embryo in her belly for nine or ten months, a heavy burden. When nine
or ten months have passed, the mother gives birth to that heavy burden
with great trepidation. Once born, she feeds it with her own blood just
the same, for what [is called] “blood” in the noble Vinaya is mother’s
milk, monks.
(MN i.265–266)17

There follows a short but charming section describing the toys and games
(somersaults, tip-cat, toy cars, toy bows and arrows) the child will enjoy once
his faculties develop. This concrete, even affecting, description of the human
experience of birth and infancy then transitions into a psychological portrait
of the human life cycle. When the child becomes a youth, we are told, he fully
enjoys the “five cords of sensual pleasure” (pañca ka-magun.a). He will
experience and then engage a range of likes and dislikes, which in turn will
feed the series of grasping or rejecting behaviors that will make up his life.
The result is what is called “becoming,” a complex state of being and
acting that lays the foundations for his next birth, his next death and so on
round the wheel of sam - 18 - -
. sara. Similarly, the Mahanidana-sutta (DN15) inserts
a small description of the birth process into its discussion of dependent
arising:
 Suffering Is Birth 35
-
“Ananda, if consciousness (viñña-n.a) were not to enter the mother’s womb
(ma-tukucchi ), would a name-and-form (na-maru-pa) be constituted?” “It
-
would not be, lord.” “Ananda, if consciousness, once it descended into
the mother’s womb, were to depart, would the name-and-form be reborn
-
to this state?” “It would not be, lord.” “Ananda, if the consciousness of
such a tender young boy or girl baby were to be severed, would name-and-
form increase, grow, or develop?” “It would not be, lord.” “Therefore,
-
Ananda, this only, namely consciousness, is the cause, the basis, the
source, the condition of name-and-form.”
(DN ii.63)19
.
Like the Maha-tan.ha-sankhaya-sutta text cited above, this passage illustrates
several of the causal links of dependent arising (consciousness and mind-and-
form, in this case) in terms of the realia of gestation and pregnancy. In Lakoff and
Johnson’s terms, both texts display metaphorical thinking, utilizing a more clearly
delineated set of images and ideas (a narrative about birth) to conceptualize a
less clearly delineated idea (the causal processes of dependent arising).
The description of infancy in the Devadu-ta-sutta (MN 130),20 or discourse
on the “Divine Messengers,” can also be seen as a deployment of the birth
topos to evoke the essence of human suffering through metaphor. The conceit
of the “divine messengers” is similar to the four signs (sick man, old man,
dead man, renouncer) described in many traditional accounts of the Buddha’s
biography, the apprehension of which prompts the bodhisattva to go forth
into homelessness. Here, however, King Yama uses the examples of a baby, an
old person, a sick person, a robber, and a dead person in order to bring about
an experience of disenchantment in the mind of a sinner, and to warn him of the
grave karmic retribution he is sure to experience as a result of his evil deeds.
In his description of a small baby’s plight, Yama focuses attention on its impure
state: “Listen, man! Haven’t you ever seen a tender baby boy lying up there in
the human world, steeped in his own excrement and urine?” (MN iii.178).
Yama implicitly likens the helplessness of the newborn to the pathos of the
aged, the squalid suffering of the invalid, the unspeakable punishments
endured by the captured criminal, and the repulsive state of the body as it
begins to decay after death. All are to be regarded as harbingers of the truth
about cyclic existence and the karmic mechanism that drives it. But the new-
born infant has a particular lesson to teach in the Devadu-ta-sutta − that his
state of humiliation, filth, bewilderment, and total helplessness are endemic to
cyclic existence. 21 In the absence of wisdom, not many rise much beyond this
state of wallowing impotently in filth, and all return to it repeatedly. “Listen,
pal!” exclaims Yama in the discourse, “Didn’t it ever occur to you, such a
discerning and mature man, that ‘I too am subject to birth! I have not gone
beyond birth! Surely I had better do good things with [my] body, speech and
mind?’” (MN iii.179).22
Just as helplessness in the face of the chaos, discomfort, and impurity – all
features of the birth experience – are one prototype of human suffering,
36 Amy Paris Langenberg
enjoying a measure of control over the biological processes of rebirth is a
hallmark of the enlightened state in Pa-li narratives. Several ja-taka stories
describe the bodhisattva engaging in reproductive processes in a manner that
.
demonstrates mastery. In the Ma-tanga-ja-taka (JA 497), the can.d.a-la bodhi-
.
satta, Ma-tanga, becomes an ascetic and develops powers that enable him to
impregnate his high-caste wife without polluting her merely by touching his
thumb to her navel. In the Sa-ma-ja-taka (JA 540), the bodhisattva himself
is conceived by means of the same extraordinary method. In yet other ja-takas
(the Alambusa--ja-taka JA 523 and Naḷinika--ja-taka JA 526), the bodhisattva is
an ascetic who impregnates does when they eat grass and water mixed with
his spilled seed (Boisvert 304–305). In all of these cases, the bodhisatta, whe-
ther father or fetus, appears to circumvent the ordinary processes of sexual
reproduction. Hagiographies of Gautama Buddha also very often describe his
garbha-vakra-nti and that of his son, Rahula, as taking place without parental
sexual contact (Hara 2009: 219–222).
The Milinda-pañha, which depicts a conversation between the Indo-Greek
king Milinda and a Buddhist monk, Na-gasena, contains a section entitled the
Gabbha-vakkanti-pañha (“Questions about the descent of the embryo”) (Mil.
124–130; Horner 1996: vol. I, 172–182). In it, Na-gasena attempts to reconcile
the extraordinary nature of such pregnancies as one reads about in the ja-taka
.
with the canonical rule taught in the Maha-tan.ha-sankhaya-sutta and elsewhere
that three conditions must be met for conception (the mother must be fertile,
the parents must conjoin, and the gandhabba must be present). Na-gasena
explains the does’ pregnancies by arguing that their consumption of the bod-
hisattva’s seed counts as union of mother and father, although the sexual
organs are not involved.23 He also argues that, because karma guides the
gandhabba’s descent into the womb, those who possess abundant wholesome
roots (ussannakusalamu-la-), such as the Bodhisatta, can be born into which-
ever situation and according to whichever method (yoni ) they choose. This is
the case with Sa-ma, who, residing in heaven as a devaputta, is petitioned by
Sakka to descend into the womb of the female ascetic Pa-rika-. Pa-rika-’s part-
ner, the male ascetic Duku-la, is then instructed to merely touch her navel with
his thumb during her fertile season. Sa-ma is thus properly accommodated
upon his descent since, if contact of thumb to navel is counted as conjunction,
the three conditions are met (Hara 2009: 233–234; Horner 1996: 178; Boisvert
2000: 306–307).
This view, that awakened beings can to some extent control the birth pro-
cess, is also alluded to in the Sangı‑ti-sutta and the Sampasa-danı‑ya-sutta of the
.
‑
Dıgha-nikaya, which contain the tradition of the “four ways of descent into
the womb” (a trope also found in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra and discussed in
abhidharma texts such as the Abhidharmakośabha-s.ya): descending, abiding,
and being born without awareness; descending with awareness but abiding and
being born without awareness; descending and abiding with awareness, but being
born without; and descending, abiding, and being born with awareness (DN
iii.231, Walshe 1987: 493; DN iii104, Walshe 1987: 419). Advanced beings are
 Suffering Is Birth 37
able to maintain lucid awareness during all three phases of the birth process.
Although these suttas do not explicitly say so, later versions of the bodhi-
satta’s nativity story suggest that he did indeed maintain full awareness and
substantial control over the processes of entering, dwelling within, and exiting
the womb. Extraordinary beings, if they are to be reborn at all, do so in a
masterful and controlled manner.
As Michael Radich has demonstrated in his study of the origins of the
tatha-gatagarbha doctrine, some Indian Buddhist traditions explicitly deny the
reality of the Buddha’s conception, gestation, and birth (Radich 2015: 105–159).
For instance, the Maha-parinirva-n.a-maha-su-tra, which Radich places in the
second century C.E., contains a passage in which the Buddha declares himself
to have no actual relationship to the inappropriately sexual processes of birth,
whatever appearances may suggest:

At times I show myself entering into my mother’s womb in Jambudvı‑pa,

and let my father and mother think of me as their child; and yet, ulti-
mately, this body of mine is not engendered by lascivious copulation. For
countless kalpas, I have already been far removed from all lascivious
desire … I [only] show myself entering into the womb, in order to con-
form with the ways of the world. Gentle sir, I [only] show myself being
born from my mother Ma-ya- in the Lumbinı‑ grove here in Jambudvı‑pa.
(quoted in Radich 2015: 116)

The doctrinal developments (studied by Radich) that follow from this denial
is, I suggest, a more developed manifestation of a deep Buddhist logic evident
in earlier sutta/a-gama literature, one that holds uncontrolled and unconscious
ordinary birth from a female womb to be a foundation of human suffering,
and conscious mastery of birth processes to be a mark of wisdom.

“Suffering is birth” in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra

The early Buddhist conceptualization of human suffering in terms of ordinary
birth from a female womb reappears greatly embellished in the early first
millennium text, the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, which has the Lord Buddha pro-
claim succinctly that, “Abiding [in the womb] is sickness. Emerging [from the
womb] is old age and death” (GS 251.10–11). The deeply problematic nature
of the birth experience is the central theme and message of this text. Accord-
ing to the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, not only is birth a subcategory of suffering, it
is the hermeneutical key to understanding suffering in general and achiev-
ing a state free from suffering. The longer versions of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra
convey this message more or less directly through the conceit of the Nanda
frame story. There, the Buddha instructs the reluctant monk Nanda and 500
other monks in the teaching called Descent of the Embryo in order to aid
them in the elimination of passion, anger, and ignorance. After explaining in
detail the causes of conception, the nature of the intermediate state being
38 Amy Paris Langenberg
(antara-bhava), the reasons conception may fail to occur, and the relationship
of the intermediate state being to the mother and father’s sexual fluids, the Buddha
succinctly explains the reason for this information’s relevance, and the impor-
tance of the detailed 38-week embryology that is to follow. His comment
repeats the basic arguments of Prince Vipassı‑ and the nun Ca-la-:

Nanda, I do not praise the conception of a life even a little bit. I do not
praise the conception of a [new] life for even one moment. Why is that?
The conception of life is suffering. In the same way that even a little
vomit stinks, Nanda, even the momentary conception of a tiny life is
suffering. Nanda, a being for whom there is the arising of material form,
establishment [in the womb], development, emergence [from the womb],
sensation, intellect, volitions, consciousness, indeed, any being at all that
is established, develops, and emerges, is miserable. Abiding [in the womb]
is sickness. Emerging [from the womb] is old age and death. Nanda, for
this reason, what profit is there for the one lodged in the womb, craving
life so deeply?
(GS 251.3–12)24

Although it adds some extra seasoning, this statement about the undesir-
ability of birth makes the same basic point as multiple passages from the
sutta/a-gama literature; namely, that no being who is born escapes illness, old
age and death, and that babyhood, youth and maturity are no picnic either.
While impermanence and attachment can be indexed as the underlying
shared metaphysical properties that makes birth reducible to death, the con-
cepts of impermanence, the constructed nature of all things, and ignorant
attachment are not evoked here as the root cause of suffering, nor in other
such passages. Rather, the identity of misery and birth in the womb is
emphasized, often by means of the language of disgust and impurity.
In the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, a lengthy discourse of more than 50 printed
pages in English translation,25 birth suffering is a dark miasma that poisons
all stages of life, especially those in which the young child is dependent on
his mother’s kindness and physical support. The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra reprises
the canonical “infant as divine messenger” theme but moves well beyond the
brief description of infantile degradation and helplessness found in the Devadu-ta-
sutta. According to the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, the newborn’s sensitivity makes
even the softest of cloths and the warmest of hands unbearably uncomfortable
and harsh when he is first received upon his birth. Any air movement or
sunlight, any resting place or bodily contact, causes the baby acute distress.
According to the text, his suffering is similar in nature and degree to that of a
flayed ox preyed upon by biting insects, or that of a leper who, his afflicted
skin already oozing and decayed, is scourged with a whip (GS 294.4–198.6).
Thus, the mother, who tenderly bathes, swaddles, and rocks her beloved
newborn succeeds only in unknowingly causing him the most searing sorts of
pain. Her attempts to nurture the child with her own body through
 Suffering Is Birth 39
breastfeeding are interpreted here as a further source of degradation.
Mother’s milk, according to the Garbha-vakra-nti (which, like the Pa-li source,
cites the vinaya as the source for this gloss) is actually “the filth of her own
blood” (rang gi khrag gi dri ) (GS 298.3–4). Furthermore, shortly after
birth, the infant’s body is set upon by 80,000 parasitical worms that colonize and
nibble at every organ, bone, and tissue. A variety of presumably disease-causing
demons also attack the body right away (GS 298.9–309.2). “Therefore,
Nanda,” the Buddha quips, “In the midst of sam -
. sara, what profit is there in
greatly desiring life at the risk of so many miseries?” (GS 298.5–6)
As bad as it is, the suffering of the newborn is merely the tip of an enor-
mous jagged iceberg, according to the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra. The text extends
the horizons of the suffering backwards in time to include the embryo and
fetus at every stage of development, culminating in the full-term baby’s dra-
matic and often fatal journey down the birth canal. For instance, a fetus in
the first embryonic stage at week one (T. nur nur po, S. kalala) is characterized
as a “barb (T. zug rngu, S. śalya) [lodged] in the womb, dwelling within a
filthy, putrid, blazing bog, its entire bodily sense organ suffering, having
become greatly pained, oppressed, and terrified, having a consciousness with
the sole flavor of suffering” (GS 252.3–6). The embryo’s unhappy state is
described in identical terms for weeks two through four (during which time it
progresses through three other stages)26 and continues for the entire preg-
nancy. The text gives an account of the week 27-stage fetus’s experience that
is worth quoting at length:

Nanda, in the case of a male, he crouches on the right side of the

mother’s belly, covering his face with both hands and facing his mother’s
spine. [Located] underneath the stomach and above the intestines, he is held
down by the stomach and held up by the intestines, lodged there as if
bound in five places or pinioned by a stake. Nanda, in the case of a
female, she crouches on the left side of the mother’s belly, covering her
face with both hands and facing her mother’s abdomen … .27 Nanda, if
the mother eats a lot, it harms the fetus, and if she eats too little it also
harms the fetus. Similarly, if the mother eats food that is too greasy,
coarse, heavy, salty, pungent, sour, sweet, bitter, spicy, or tart, it will harm
the fetus. If she has sex, runs, moves rapidly, jumps, swims, by taking part
in activity she will harm the fetus. If she [sits] near the fire or kneels
down, the fetus will be harmed. Therefore, Nanda, being lodged in the
mother’s womb is a fierce, intense, harsh, and unpleasant misery. Nanda,
if even virtuous people in what are considered happy realms experience
such suffering, what need is there to even mention hell beings who have
fallen into evil realms of misfortune? It is not possible to even give an
example of their suffering. Therefore, Nanda, what profit is there for the
one lodged in the mother’s womb to desire life?
(GS 283.3–286.2)
40 Amy Paris Langenberg
Here, as in the account of the newborn’s experience, the mother is described
as unknowingly inflicting painful tortures on the fetus even when performing
the most ordinary, indeed, expected and necessary, sorts of activities.
This Buddhist tale of unwitting maternal brutality and fetal suffering con-
-
trasts sharply with the story told in a roughly contemporaneous Ayurvedic
-
medical classic, the Caraka-sam . hita. There also the fetus suffers: “Just as the
violent movement of the current carrying sticks and stones would batter a
tree standing in the flood plain during the rainy season, in the same way
the humors harm the embryo trapped in the womb.”28 According to the
Caraka-sam -
. hita, however, the mother is not complicit in the fetus’s trouble,
but protects and nurtures it during the painful and difficult process of
development:

As soon as the embryo’s senses are established, feelings invade its mind.
At that point, the embryo quickens and takes as its object whatever was
experienced in its previous life. The learned call this “feeling with two
hearts” (dvaihr.dayya). Its heart, which is born of the mother,29 is inter-
connected with the mother’s heart by channels carrying nutritional fluids.
Therefore, the emotion of both mother and fetus pulses along those
channels. Keeping two-heartedness in mind, people do not like to dis-
regard the wishes of the fetus; the embryo could be destroyed or
deformed as a result of disregarding its wishes. Satisfying the mother’s
every desire is the same as satisfying the needs of the embryo. Therefore it
is prudent to diligently provide a pregnant woman with whatever she
desires or needs.
-
(CS Śa-rı‑rastha-na 4.15; Trikamji Aca-rya 1981: 319)

While the Buddhist version of this relationship emphasizes the disconnection

and antipathy between mother and fetus (who is referred to as a foreign body
lodged inside the mother’s womb like a barb), the Caraka posits a physical
and psychological web of connection that enables the mother to express and
facilitate the satisfaction of fetal needs and desires. Mother and child are
understood to form a prenatal partnership. In both versions, the fetus suffers,
but in the Buddhist version, the fetus suffers alone and friendless.30
According to the Garbha-vakra-nti, by the 37th week, the fetus is developed
enough not only to suffer, but to form distinct ideas about its predicament. It
forms “three unmistaken ideas”: the perception of filth, the perception of foul
odors, and the idea of escaping (GS 290.6–7). If it is fortunate, it will be well
positioned at 38 weeks to successfully exit the womb without incidence,
though even then it will experience severe pain during the process of emerging
from its mother’s body. If it is unfortunate due to past negative actions, it may
become lodged with its head facing up or sideways, and, unable to emerge
from its mother body, it will die, be dismembered by the midwife, and
removed part by grisly part. “Nanda,” says the Buddha, “birth is a misery”
(GS 294.2).
 Suffering Is Birth 41

Figure 1.1 Detail depicting a birth scene from the embryology painting commissioned
as part of a set by 17th-century Tibetan monk, politician, and physician,
Desi Sangyé Gyatso, to illustrate his Blue Beryl medical commentary. The
Blue Beryl’s embryology section frequently references the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra.
Source: Catalog # 70.3/5468; courtesy of the Division of Anthropology, AMNH.

This lesson about the nature of birth, conceived, according to the text, as a
way of solidifying callow Nanda’s grasp of the fundamental Dharma, approaches
the matter through exceptionally vivid and often medically precise descrip-
tions of pregnancy and childbirth in all of its phases. The Garbha-vakra-nti-
su-tra does allude at times to the ideas that birth is existential suffering
because it leads right back to death, moral suffering because it exposes one to
the unmerciful machinations of karmic law, and metaphysical suffering
because it is not enlightenment. It’s loudest message, however, is that birth is
suffering because it is a long, painful, and humiliating process that brings one
into close contact with many repellent bodily fluids, exposes one continuously
to noxious odors, and places one in a highly vulnerable and intimate rela-
tionship of dependence on a heedless woman. Not only is its audience to
understand that birth is an example of suffering, it is also to understand that
human suffering in its essence takes the shape of human birth. Therefore, in order
to understand suffering (and freedom from suffering) one must understand
the birth process.
This core Buddhist message, what I am referring to as the master metaphor
“suffering is birth,” is present in the overall structure of the Garbha-vakra-nti
text. After all, just as the “four ennobling truths” or “dependent arising”
teachings are offered as fully sufficient accounts of the Buddha’s Dharma in
other contexts, here the teaching on “descending into the womb” is offered as
an antidote to Nanda’s ignorance and future suffering. It apparently contains
all that Nanda needs to know and understand in order to conquer profound
ignorance. Moreover, while the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra does not explicitly do
so, its extensive narration of the way in which ignorant desire and past
actions drive the intermediate state being (gandharva) to the womb to arise as
an embryo, which then develops into a fetus with a full complement of sense
42 Amy Paris Langenberg
faculties and is born, could easily be mapped onto the standard 12-fold list
describing the dependent arising of sam -
. sara. The obstetrical narrative receives
the greatest emphasis and takes up the overwhelming majority of textual
space, but the su-tra does eventually close the circle, bringing the newborn
through infancy, and then through childhood, adolescence, adulthood, and all
the way to death. It structures this abridged account of the remainder of the
human life cycle around the notion of “the ten states of life”:

Nanda, in one hundred years of life, he will experience ten various states.
In the first state, he will be a little baby lying on its back. In the second
state, he will be a naturally playful child. In the third state, he will be a
sexually active youth. In the fourth state, he will become strong and full
of ambition. In the fifth state, he will acquire wisdom and self-confidence.
In the sixth state, he will become attentive and innately discriminating. In
the seventh state, mature, he will reach his level. In the eighth stage,
mature, he will become like a king. In the ninth state, an old man, he will
become decrepit because of aging. In the tenth state, his lifespan will run
out and he will die.
(GS 309.4–310.1)31

The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra embraces but moves beyond the metaphorical ten-

dencies of the sutta/a-gama tradition in explaining the idea of dependent aris-
ing, dropping all mention of the 12-fold formula in favor of an extremely full
and evocative treatment of human development.
The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra’s intense, dramatic, even bloated treatment of
conception, embryology (which will be described more fully in the next
chapter), childbirth, and the early moments of infancy, brought into high
resolution through the introduction of medical detail, pushes birth to the
forefront of the reader’s mind, and forces an imaginative encounter with the
reality of suffering through the processes and sensations of human reproduc-
tion. In placing the highly complex metaphor “suffering is birth” at the center
of its presentation of the Buddhist path, the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra picks out
for special emphasis certain aspects of human suffering (its connection to
embodiment, its special connection to women and their bodies, its presence
in the very first moments of life) and obscures other aspects (its connec-
tion to death, old age, and sickness, its connection to intentional actions, its
gender-neutrality).

The birth metaphor in exegetical texts

Later exegetes of teachings found in the canonical sutta/a-gamas and the
.
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra – abhidharmists such as Vasubandhu, Asanga, and
Buddhaghosa – carried on the earlier traditions of:
 Suffering Is Birth 43
1 regarding knowledge of conception, gestation and birth as highly relevant
to questions of suffering and release; and
2 articulating suffering and freedom from suffering in terms of birth and
non-birth.

As Kritzer and Yamabe have both indicated through textual comparison,

abhidharma authors were aware of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, and influenced
by its description of the birth process (Kritzer 2013; Yamabe 2013). The
Sarva-stiva-da-influenced Yoga-ca-rabhu-mi, a mid-first-millennium encyclopedic
account of the Maha-ya-na Buddhist yoga practice called yoga-ca-ra cites that
text by name. Although the Yoga-ca-rabhu-mi’s account of birth, located in the
Manobhu-mi (“Section on Mind”), does not include a week-by-week embryol-
ogy, it does closely describe the process of and requirements for successful
conception, studding its account with yoga-ca-ra terminology. We are told, for
instance, that:

When the passion of the aroused father and mother reaches an intense
level, finally thick seed is released. At that point, a drop of semen and a
drop of blood are manifest. Then, their two drops of semen and blood
coalesce in the mother’s womb and, binding together as a creamy sub-
stance, they abide as a single lump, like cooked-down milk being cooled.
This, the a-layavijña-na, which contains all seeds, which gathers together
all [karmic] ripenings, and which appropriates for itself a physical basis,
pervades … That intermediate being (antara-bhava), which has perverted
thoughts, perishes together with the lump of creamy semen and blood.
The moment [the lump of semen and blood] perishes, due to the [special]
capacity of that consciousness that contains all seeds, another corre-
sponding lump of semen and blood, mixed with the gross elements of
sense faculties in a subtle state, arises [as a being] possessing sense facul-
ties. To the conscious being established in this state is affixed [the
descriptor] “conception” (pratisam . dhi ). This is the stage of kalala.
.
(Asanga 1957: 24.1–10; Yamabe 2013: 649–651)32

Yamabe ponders the level of detail found in the Manobhu-mi description of

the birth process. “One may well wonder,” he muses, “how all those rather
cumbersome descriptions were relevant to meditators” (Yamabe 2013: 601).
His conclusion is that this lesson in the temporariness of existence, this con-
templation of birth as the symbol and expression of this fact, is preparation
for formal meditation. I submit that, in addition to its pragmatic and educa-
tional usefulness for yoga-ca-ra meditators, the Manobhu-mi’s elaborations of
the birth process are powered by the pervasive Buddhist metaphor “suffering
is birth.”
Vasubandhu, author of the scholastic compendium the Abhidharmako-
śabha-s.ya, understands the doctrine of dependent arising in terms of the pro-
cesses of human birth and maturation in a manner that closely resembles the
44 Amy Paris Langenberg
.
metaphoric moves of the Maha-tan.ha-sankhaya and Maha-nida-na-suttas. He
explains that the twelve causal links of pratı‑tyasamutpa-da can be interpreted
in terms of three separate existences or two separate existences of a being,
depending on how they are divided. In the case of the former, links one and
two (ignorance and mental formations) apply to a previous existence, links
three through ten (consciousness, name-and-form, the six senses, sense contact,
feeling, thirst, grasping, and becoming) to the present existence, and links 11
and 12 (birth, and old-age-and-death) to a future existence. The middle eight
links are pertinent, Vasubandhu argues (and here he references the Maha-ni-
da-naparya-ya-su-tra, a Sanskrit parallel to the Maha-nida-na-sutta) only to a
“complete person” (paripu-rin), a denizen of the desire realm (ka-madha-tu)
such as a human being (Vasubandhu 1967: 130–132). He also explains that
the Buddha had the intention in his discourse on pratı‑tyasamutpa-da of
teaching what is called the a-vasthika or “developmental” interpretation of the
dependent arising doctrine (Vasubandhu 1967: 133).33 This particular inter-
pretation, one of four modes of interpreting the dependent arising doctrine
mentioned by Vasubandhu, is defined as “the 12 states as they apply to the
five personal constituents (skandha).”34
Conforming to the a-vasthika mode of interpretation, Vasbandhu expands
on the second interpretation of pratı‑tyasamutpa-da (in terms of just two exis-
tences) at some length. In this interpretation, steps one through seven refer to
a past existence (ignorance and mental formations, which are in a state of
defilement) and its effects (the arising of consciousness, name-and-form, etc.).
Steps eight through 12 refer to the causes that will determine the future exis-
tence (thirst, grasping, and becoming) and the future existence itself (birth,
old-age-and-death). He glosses the nida-na of “consciousness” (vijña-na) as “the
five personal constituents (skandhas) in the mother’s womb (matuḥ kuks.i) at
the moment of relinking (pratisam . dhi)” (Vasubandhu 1967: 131; Vasubandhu
1988: 402). The “name-and-form” (na-maru-pa) nida-na designates the personal
constituents of the embryo at the time when only its mental and tactile sense
faculties are functional. When the fetus grows big enough to possess all six
sense faculties, Vasubandhu considers it to have reached the stage called the
“six sense faculties” (s.ad.a-yatana). It stays in this stage until it experiences
“contact” (sparśa) of sense faculty, sense consciousness, and sense object. At
this next stage the child seems to be newborn and experiencing the full sen-
sory world for the first time, although the text is not entirely clear on this
point.35 The stage of contact lasts until the child is able to distinguish the
causes of pleasure from the causes of pain, at which point he enters the stage
corresponding to “sensation” (vedana-). This stage apparently extends until
the beginnings of sexual maturity as Vasubandhu identifies thirst (tr.s.n.a-) as the
awakening of desire for pleasure, especially sexual union (maithuna). Grasp-
ing (upada-na) and becoming (bhava) consist then in running after pleasures
and sex, and the existence that arises from such behavior. Vasubandhu then
arrives again at birth ( ja-ti ), (which he quickly explains as taking place after
death, the inevitable outcome of human becoming). Although the language is
 Suffering Is Birth 45
not particularly vivid, the descriptive detail not extensive, it is noteworthy that
Vasubandhu’s exegesis of dependent arising in this section relies on a compact
account of human embryology, birth, and developmental maturation. Here
Vasubandhu follows what his school believes to have been the Buddha’s
intention by explaining the meaning of dependent arising in terms of the
human narrative.36 In other words, Vasubandhu, a scholar with an excellent
grasp of Buddhism’s philosophical apparatus, thinks “metaphorically” in his
account of human misery, conceptualizing the genesis of suffering mainly in
terms of the contours of the human experience.
In the section of Vasubandhu’s text just previous to the one discussed, the
conceptual linking of suffering and birth is quite explicit. Commenting on a
root verse concerning the effects of karma on the life stream, Vasubandhu
describes what happens when, due to a variety of causes and conditions, a
fetus dies and is cut out of the mother’s body by a knife-wielding midwife:

If … the embryo dies at some time, due to faults in the mother’s activities
of taking food or living and due to (the embryo’s) crimes of previous
karma, then women knowledgeable in such things or those who care for
children, having smeared their hand with heated clarified butter, oil,
ground śa-lmalı‑ paste, or something else, and having attached a sharp,
thin knife to it, and having introduced the hand into that place that is like
an excrement-hole, a cruelly foul-smelling, dark pool of ordure, the home
to many thousands of families of worms, permanently oozing, constantly
in need of care, drenched in semen, blood, mucus, and impurities,
decayed, steaming, and slimy, terrifying to behold, covered by a thin,
perforated skin, the great ulcer-like wound in the body, produced from
the result of previous karma, and having cut (the embryo) limb by limb,
they pull it out.37
(Vasubandhu 1967: 130; translated in Kritzer 2013: 757)

This passage, which Robert Kritzer has established to be an unattributed

quote from the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, is sandwiched between more sober dis-
cussions of the ana-tman and dependent arising and, according to Kritzer,
appears out of step with the surrounding material (Kritzer 2004). Indeed, the
passage is dramatic, almost hysterical in its descriptions of the impure female
womb, streaming with foul effluvia, the site of dismemberment and death.
From the perspective of the master trope in Indian Buddhist thought that
explains suffering in terms of birth, however, such a passage is quite in keep-
ing with the anthropomorphic discussion of dependent arising that directly
follows. In both cases, the physical and psychological facts of human birth
and maturation are considered to be highly germane to any exegesis of the
causal arising of suffering.
The elaborated metaphor, “suffering is birth” further explains the birth
process in terms of sub-metaphors, such as the idea that “birth is spirit
possession.” This sub-metaphor is a key focus of both canonical and
46 Amy Paris Langenberg
exegetical Buddhist explanations of the rebirth process. The so-called gand-
habba (S. gandharva) is the bridging entity made up of karmic impulses
(themselves born of ignorance) that enters the semen and blood of the par-
ents. Sometimes, as in the Maha-nida-na Sutta, the word viñña-n.a (S. vijña-na) is
used in place of gandhabba for the entity that descends into the womb to invi-
gorate the embryo.38 Abhidharma authors further develop the theory of the
gandhabba/gandharva. 39 In the Therava-da tradition, no material base carries
consciousness from deathbed to womb. Rather, consciousness gives rise to itself
from one moment to the next, even across the abyss of death and rebirth, prodded
onwards by volitions (P. saṃkha-ra, S. sam.ska-ra). As Buddhaghosa describes it,
the continuity of a life-stream is a sort of high-wire act. He notes, “While, as a
continuous process, it is being pushed by craving and flung forward by forma-
tions, it abandons its former support, like a man who crosses a river by hanging
on to a rope tied to a tree on the near bank” (Buddhaghosa 1976: 567).40 As is
evident from the above quoted Manobhu-mi passage, however, the Sarva-stiva-da
and Yoga-ca-ra schools, along with certain other schools,41 provide the re-linking
consciousness with a full complement of personal constituents (skandha),42
including a provisionary body (ru-pa), during the process of rebirth, and lengthen
its journey to seven days, or 49 days or, however long it takes to meet the
appropriate causes and conditions for rebirth. This subtle-bodied form of con-
sciousness is usually called the “intermediate state of being” (antara-bhava),43 and
was a subject of controversy between the various early Buddhist schools.44 In his
study of the subject, Alex Wayman observes whimsically that the difference
between those sects that uphold the antara-bhava and those that deny it was,
“partly temperamental, to wit, those rejecting the state preferring to have rational
control of Buddhist doctrine; and those accepting the state willing to allow
mythological exuberance” (Wayman 1974: 237–238).
Wayman is not mistaken in noticing a certain narrative license in descrip-
tions of the antara-bhava. We are told in the Abhidharmakośabha-s.ya, for
instance, that the intermediate being destined for a human rebirth is a fully
developed homunculus with the dimensions of a child of five or six years of
age who survives by feeding on scents. Intermediate beings of the divine
realms (ru-padha-tu) are also fully developed (sampu-rn.aprama-n.a) and are said
to wear clothing out of modesty (apatra-pyotsadatva-t).45 A fascinating story
the abhidharma authors tell about the antara-bhava concerns the Oedipal pas-
sions that drive it to unite with the sexual fluids of its parents. Drawn by
desire, the antara-bhava attempts to elbow aside the same-sex parent and par-
ticipate in the act itself with the opposite-sex parent. This story is the origin
of the Manobhu-mi’s comment regarding the “perverted thoughts” (vipar-
yasta-lambana) of the antara-bhava, which results in its union with the fluids of
its parents in its mother’s womb at the moment of conception.46 An effective
way to characterize the differences between the Therava-da and Sarva-stiva-da
accounts of the intermediate state is to reference their metaphorical choices.
.
As Steven Collins has noted, Therava-da accounts of the bhavanga mind
.
explain it in terms of flowing water, as in the “stream of bhavanga”
 Suffering Is Birth 47
.
(bhavanga-sota) (Collins 1982: 248–249). Schools that recognize the antar-
a-bhava, on the other hand, commit themselves to the metaphor of the gandharva,
a heavenly creature of Vedic provenance. In Vedic cosmology, gandharvas are
divine scent-eating beings associated with fertility who occupied the inter-
mediate realm between heaven and earth and serve as “gods of transfer,”
carrying things form one realm to the other (Ana-layo 2008b; Collins 1982:
210–211; Wijesekera 1945).
It would not surprise Lakoff and Johnson to know that abhidharma texts
from the wider Sarva-stiva-da corpus such as the Yoga-ca-rabhu-mi and the
Abhidharmakośabha-s.ya achieve precision of meaning not in spite of but in
full accordance with the device of metaphor. Their authors have very specific
information to convey about the nature of suffering and the means of escape
from suffering. This information vitally includes “cumbersome” details about
the nature of the birth process because the suffering of human beings in
sam -
. sara is centrally conceptualized in terms of the birth process in their tra-
dition. In fact, the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra would have been an important and
well-thumbed volume in these abhidharmists’ libraries. For Vasubandhu and
his colleagues, topics such as conception, gestation, and childbirth are medi-
cal only in the sense that the Buddha was a physician. For them, to describe
the processes of birth is to draw a technically precise map to the haunted
landscape of sam -
. saric experience, with its many crumbling overhangs and
sucking swamps, through which the practitioner must make his pilgrim’s
progress.

Sub-metaphors in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra

The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra builds up its thickly layered conceptualization of
suffering through a combination of “emergent experiences” and sub-metaphors
that resonate with the wider symbolic world of Indian Buddhism and ancient
South Asia. For instance, the first part of its basic account of conception,
versions of which we have already encountered in Pa-li suttas and the Milinda-
pañha, reads, “Nanda, if one asks how (a being) enters the womb or does not
enter the womb, it is like this, Nanda: If the father and mother are lustful and
come together, if the mother is fit and in her period,47 and if a gandharva is
present and wishes to enter [conception will occur]. Nanda, as for this term
gandharva, it is a synonym (T. tshig bla dags, S. adhivacana) for a being of
the intermediate existence.”48 The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra further elaborates
the gandharva metaphor as follows. In order for the gandharva to enter the
mother’s womb, a compatibility must be established. According to the text,
a number of karmic determinants must align. For instance, the gandharva
(T. dri za)49 cannot be of high social status (T. dbang che bar grags,50 S.
maheśa-khya) if the parents are not, and the parents cannot be of high social
status if the gandharva is not. The parents must have produced the proper
stores of merit to have a child, and the gandharva must have accumulated the
appropriate volitions to deserve that particular couple as its parents. Finally,
48 Amy Paris Langenberg
the gandharva must produce the proper male or female thought. In other
words, if it will be a boy, it must desire to push its father out of the way and
unite with its mother. If it is to be a girl, it must desire instead its father.51
The gandharva manifests as a subtle-body entity within the vicinity of the
copulating parents, aided by its ability to fly through the air and see any dis-
tance with its divine eye (divyacaks.us). If it is to be born as a man or a god, it
will be golden in color. It resembles the being it will become and so will be
humanoid in appearance in the case of human birth (Kritzer 2013: 40; Lan-
genberg 2008: 216). Driven by the force of karma and unwisely desirous of
entering the womb, the gandharva is visited by sensations of warmth or sun-
light or wind or rain, or it hears a storm or a noise like a great crowd of
people. It then suddenly has the idea that it is entering a palace, or mounting
a throne, or entering a hut or a grove of trees, or a chink in the wall. All of
these sensations and thoughts are said to correlate to its past experience and
the karma it has accumulated (GS 237.2–238.6).52
This metaphoric conceptualization of conception picks out certain aspects
of the experience: namely, the importance of the gandharva’s karmic person-
ality, its conscious quality, its psychological independence from its parents,
and its simultaneous dependence on their bodies. It also introduces a poten-
tial confusion, as the fetus may appear to auditors to be an independent uni-
tary entity, like an a-tman. In order to nuance the fetus’s status vis-à-vis his
parents’ fluid contributions to conception (here glossed as “impurity”) the
authors of the Garbha-vakra-nti add:

Having been born there, the body manifests as a first-stage embryo (nur
nur po). Nanda, the body of the embryo is considered to be neither
apposite to the impurity (mi gtsang ba) of the parents, nor anything
other than the impurity of the parents. Nonetheless, Nanda, dependent
on the impurity of the parents itself, empowered by an assembly of causes
and conditions, the body of the embryo comes to be. According to this
view, semen and blood amount to nothing more than just a basis and
support [for the embryo].
(GS 238.9–239.2)

The text then resorts to a series of similes to further emphasize the complexity
of the causal process that results in a pregnancy, and the utterly contingent
nature of the embryo’s personhood. The embryo for instance, is said to be like
a worm feeding upon a blade of green grass. Just as the worm is not the same
as the grass upon which it feeds, nor entirely different from the grass upon
which it feeds, the embryo is neither the same nor entirely different from the
parental seed. Just as the worm grows in dependence on the green grass and
takes on the same color as the grass, the embryo arises in dependence on the
parental fluids, and, presumably (although the text doesn’t explicitly say so)
takes on some of the physical characteristics of its parents’ ru-pa sequences
(GS 240.10–241.4). The text also produces other similes (a confectioner who
 Suffering Is Birth 49
blows boiled sugar into an artful shape, the sprouting of a viable seed planted
in moist fertile soil, a dung fire started by focusing sunlight with a crystal) to
emphasize the fact that the embryo is produced from an entire assembly of
causes and conditions, and not from “the father’s loins” (pha’i rked ),53 the
“mother’s womb” (ma’i mngal), its own consciousness, or karma each by itself
(GS 249.4–5).
Besides the image of the gandharva, and the similes invoked to capture the
complex causality of conception, another large metaphor (or rather an amal-
gam of linked metaphors) holds sway in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra and bears
directly on the question how Indian Buddhist treatments of birth shape
Indian Buddhist constructions of gender. I will characterize the linked meta-
phors in this amalgam as “the mother is a torturer,” “gestation and birth are
hell realms,” and “the womb is a disgusting sewer.” The first two of these
three have already been documented in the above discussion about the text’s
equation of birth and suffering and will be further explored in Chapter 4.
It is enough here to note that throughout the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, the fetus’s
experiences are explained using the language of torture, burning, and death.
The mother’s body is blazing chamber of pain in which its sufferings occur.
The mother’s actions do nothing to relieve but only exacerbate its sufferings,
even after the traumas of gestation and childbirth are over. The metaphor,
“the womb is a disgusting sewer,” which will be further explored in Chapters 3
and 6, conceptualizes the female body as a repulsive place of utmost filth, “a
dark hole, very disgusting like a toilet, foul smelling, heaped up with filth,
home of many thousands of types of worms, always dripping, continually in
need of being cleaned, vile, always putrid with semen, blood, filth, and pus”
(GS 330.6–331.2). It is just such a description of the womb that Vasubandhu
quotes in his Abhidharmakośabha-s.ya.

The Buddhist discourse of birth

As we have seen, early Buddhist discourses (sutta/a-gama) focus not infre-
quently on birth ( ja-ti ) as a portal onto the landscape of human suffering.
Authors of exegetical texts like the Abhidharmakośabhas.y.a and the Milinda-
pañha also explain and narrate birth as part of their efforts to shed clear light
on the Dharma. Read against this background, the Garbha-vakra-nti, disgust-
ing, dramatic, peculiar though it may be, is nothing more than a fuller ela-
boration of an important Buddhist topic. That the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra is
best read as an (admittedly flamboyant) compendium of a traditional Bud-
dhist teaching about birth is supported by the many familiar themes and
tropes it encompasses: for instance, the three requirements for conception, the
Oedipal drama of the antara-bhava, the four methods of entering the womb;
the embryological sequence of kalala, arbuda, peśı‑, ghana, and praśa-kha; the
suffering of the newborn; and the arc of the human lifecycle from birth to old
age and death. It follows that its vivid descriptions of the foul female vagina
and womb, and of the embryo cooking like a pudding therein, were not
50 Amy Paris Langenberg
necessarily the product of ascetic excess alone, as has sometimes been sug-
gested. Rather they were the logical extension of perspectives on birth in
relationship to suffering and liberation that are absolutely central to the
Buddhist path.
In his 2015 monograph, Michael Radich also explores the central proble-
matic of birth in classical Indian Buddhism but in relationship to the tatha--
gatagarbha doctrine. Radich speaks as I do of attempting to elucidate a “root
metaphor” related to the problematic of birth. He also uses phrases like
“imaginative logic” and “far-reaching pattern” in reference to the under-
pinnings and origins of the tatha-gatagarbha doctrine (Radich 2015: 105).
Radich’s special concern is the problem posed to Buddhist thinkers by the
Buddha’s experience of the birth process in coming into this world for the final
time. Radich observes, “Buddhism was embarrassed by the fact that the
Buddha had a mother” as “it was not appropriate that the Buddha underwent
conception, gestation, and parturition in the usual physical manner” (Radich
2015: 143). In response to this troubling element of the Buddha’s biography,
certain narratives propose what Radich terms “material-miraculous” solu-
tions in which the Buddha only appears to undergo ordinary birth but actu-
ally undergoes an extraordinary birth that is static, pure, and without pain. (I
will return to these themes in Chapter 4). The tatha-gatagarbha texts Radich
explores take a slightly different tack in response to the docetic need to deny
the Buddha’s conception within and birth from the fleshly womb of Ma-ya-.
For this fleshly womb, they substitute a “soteriological-transcendent womb.”
This is the tatha-gatagarbha, the real and true womb of the Buddha found
within every sentient being. More interested in Buddhist views of the body in
general than Buddhist gender per se, Radich’s careful, rich study of what he
calls “docetic Buddhology” in a range of middle period su-tra texts, especially
the Maha-parinirva-n.a-maha-su-tra, supports the claim that the association of
birth with suffering was central to classical Indian Buddhist conceptions of
liberation.
The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra tells a story of birth, rich in detail and emotion,
that emphasizes the suffering of the fetus and the cruelty of existence in the
mother’s body. The relationship of male to female throughout the birth pro-
cess grounds the Buddhist root metaphor, “suffering is birth.” In Buddhist
accounts of ordinary birth, the child, to whom is attributed endearing
thoughts and anxieties, is implicitly and quintessentially male, while the
mother and host of the gestation process is a nameless, thoughtless female.
This gendered metaphor operates like other metaphors that humans use. That
is, it draws its resonance from the cultural and social environment in which it
operates, one that often speaks of women as fickle and immoral, and deems
sons to be more desirable and important than daughters. Furthermore, it
obscures certain dimensions of human suffering, even as it illuminates others.
Aspects of human suffering that are obscured through the operations of this
metaphor include the non-gendered quality of existential human suffering,
and the very real physical dangers the birth process holds for mothers.
 Suffering Is Birth 51
Aspects that it picks out for special attention and focus include: existential
suffering as a male experience, the female body as a site of suffering, torture,
impurity, and mental confusion for the fetus, and the causal relationship
between female sexuality/fertility and male suffering. As subsequent chapters
will illustrate, this Buddhist discourse of birth, ruled by the master metaphor
suffering is birth, contributes significantly to shaping classical Buddhist
knowledge traditions and deployments of social power, especially with respect
to gender.

Notes
1 Ye dharma- hetuprabhava- hetum - tatha-gataḥ hyavadat tesa-m ca yo nirodha
. tes.am
. . .
evam - dı‑ maha-śramanaḥ. “The states that have arisen from a cause, their cause
va
. .
the Tatha-gata proclaims, as well as their cessation. This is the teaching of the
Great Ascetic” (translation by Skilling 2014: 59). Thousands of clay seals, minia-
ture stu-pas, and images dating from approximately 600–1200 C.E. and inscribed
with this phrase (or its equivalent in Pa-li) have been found at Indian Buddhist sites
and are described in Buddhist sources as dharmaśarı‑ra or dharma relics of the
Buddha (Boucher 1991).
2 In The Order of Things, Foucault submits that “in any given culture and at any
given moment, there is always only one episteme that defines the conditions of
possibility of all knowledge, whether expressed in a theory or silently invested in a
practice” (Foucault 1971: 168). Later Foucault allows for several epistemes to
operate simultaneously (Foucault 1980: 197).
3 For another recent use of Lakoff and Johnson in Buddhist Studies scholarship, see
Salguero (2014: 67–95).
4 For matters of convenience and ease of access, I refer mainly to the Pa-li sutta
collections throughout this section. The date of the “closing” of the sutta section of
the Pa-li Tipit.aka has been the subject of scholarly debate. At one extreme, certain
Buddhist traditions date the discourses (suttas) to the first communal recitation
(sangı‑ti ), said to have occurred shortly after the Buddha’s death. At the other,
.
Gregory Schopen has argued that the discourses as they have come down to us
cannot be reasonably dated to any time earlier than Buddhaghosa and Dhamma-
pa-la (approximately the fifth and sixth centuries C.E.) (Schopen 1985). A similar
argument is also furthered by Tilmann Vetter. His argument is evaluated in Ana--
layo 2012. Arguing on the basis of the discourses’ content and linguistic features,
however, several scholars have challenged this second view. In a recent summary
account of these issues, Ana-layo has constructed his own convincing case for the
first-century B.C.E. as the closing date of the Sutta Pit.aka. By this time, he suggests,
Buddhist communities in India and Sri Lanka had already begun to turn to nar-
rative and abhidharmic genres in order to express new approaches to doctrine and
practice (Ana-layo 2012). Without taking a position on the exact century in which
the Pa-li Sutta-pit.aka was “closed,” for the purposes of this study I will follow
Ana-layo in assuming the discourses to represent the tradition at a generally early
stage, with the ja-taka/avada-na collections, abhidharma treatises, and commentaries
both reflecting and constructing a more developed form of Indian Buddhism.
Where they affect the argument, possible late interpolations will be noted. The
Sanskrit tradition of the a-gamas, which parallel the first four nika-yas of the Pa-li
discourses, are available through translations made in the fourth and fifth centuries
in China. Some are also available in Tibetan translation in the Kanjur. As the Pa-li
versions are available in accessible editions and translations, however, they will
52 Amy Paris Langenberg
form the basis of the current remarks. Though one does not want to underestimate
the importance of the differences between Chinese translations of the Sanskrit
a-gamas and the Pa-li sutta collections, it is useful to note Étienne Lamotte’s general
observation that the two textual corpora are largely similar (Lamotte 1988, 155–156).
Where they impact the argument, variations between Pa-li and Chinese versions of
individual text will be noted.
5 MN i.48, MN ii.249, DN ii.305, Vin. i.10; AN i.176; iii.416
6 DN ii.305, MN i.50, MN iii.249
7 MN i.256 ff, DN ii.31–35, ii.55–64, SN ii.1–3. According to Marek Mejor, the Pa-li
suttas record an early formulation of the dependent arising doctrine. Within the
wider Sanskrit Buddhist context, several versions of the teaching appear under the
conventional rubric Pratı‑tyasamutpa-da-su-tra, all of which claim the buddhavacana
(su-tra) status. Mejor writes, “With the Therava-dins the text of the Su-tra has pre-
served its more primitive formulation, while with the Sarva-stiva-dins it has evolved
and acquired its developed form in the Pratı‑tyasamutpa-da-a-di-vibhanga-nirdeśa-
.
su-tra” (Mejor 1997: 130). For an English translation of this su-tra text (from the
Tibetan), see Sopa (1984: 137–140). This “developed form” of the teaching
appearing in the Sanskrit tradition is streamlined, compact and mostly dispenses
with the narrative details about birth found in the various Pa-li sources. Narrative
features are, however, included in Vasubandhu’s explanations of pratı‑tyasamutpa-da
in the Abhidharmakośabha-s.ya, as I discuss later in this chapter. A commentary
attributed to Vasubandhu on the Pratı‑tyasamutpa-da-a-di-vibhanga-nirdeśa-su-tra
.
- ‑ - - -
sutra, the Pratıtyasamutpadavyakhya, extant in Tibetan and in a single fragmen-
tary manuscript from Nepal, has unfortunately received minimum scholarly atten-
tion. Only 20 percent of the text has been critically edited (by Yoshihito Moroji)
and no English translation exists (Griffiths 1996).
8 The four types of yonis or generational processes, if you will, are mentioned at DN
iii.230, MN i.73, and Mil.128–129. MN 12 differentiates womb-birth from other
types by the baby’s act of tearing and escaping from its fetal caul (vatthikosa). Yoni
here refers both to vessel of generation and means of generation.
9 Ana-layo 2013c provides a comprehensive discussion of ja-ti based on early Indian
Buddhist sources.
10 MN i.163. MN i.167.
11 MN i.139
12 MN i.139
13 SN i.88
14 DN ii.56. My translation with reference to Walshe (1987: 223).
15 This sutta has a parallel (Madhyama-a-gama 201) at Taisho I 766b-770a. The sutta
and a-gama versions do not differ significantly with respect to the passages discussed
here (Ana-layo 2011a: 251–256).
16 The three conditions for conception are also listed at MN ii.156 and Mil. 123. This
formula is standard and is repeated in abhidharma, vinaya, and avada-na contexts.
For a detailed list of references see Ana-layo (2011a: 254, n. 242) and Hara (2009:
220–221).
17 This passage has a parallel at Ekottarika-a-gama 21.3. The Chinese text seems to
understand the mother’s readiness (one of the three conditions for conception) in
terms of sexual interest rather than cyclical fecundity (utunı‑). A number of addi-
tional conditions that prevent conception are listed, most of which concern sexual
disinterest on the part of either mother or father. At the conclusion of the dis-
course, the Buddha advises that “all those who wish to overcome Sam -
. sara ought to
search for skill in means to make the three conditions end. Thus, Bhikkhus, you
should train” (Huyên-vi, Boin-Webb and Pa-sa-dika 2003: 76–77).
18 MN i.266–267. Bhikkhu Bodhi and Bhikkhu Ña-n.amoli 2005: 358–359.
19 My translation with reference to 1987: 226.
 Suffering Is Birth 53
20 Chinese parallels are Madhyama-a-gama 64 at Taisho I 503a-506a and Ekottarika-
a-gama 32.4 at Taisho II 674b- 676b.
21 The Ekottarika-a-gama version of this particular passage describes the newborn’s
incoherent and misunderstood appeals to its parents to rescue him from his filthy
state. The Pa-li commentary on this passage also takes special note of the baby’s
discomfort and inability to appeal effectively to its parents for help (Ana-layo 2007:
16, n. 4; 17, n. 5).
22 My translation with reference to Bhikkhu Bodhi and Bhikkhu Ña-n.amoli (2005:
1030).
23 Samantapa-sa-dika- i.213.30ff provides a systematic accounting of seven possible
modes of conception, collected from stories like the Sa-ma-ja-taka and an incident
from the Vinaya (iii.205–206) in which the monk Uda-yin’s former wife inserts a
cloth smeared with his semen into her vagina and becomes pregnant. The seven
include: “bodily contact (ka-ya-sam . sagga); (second) by holding a cloth (cola-
gahan.a); (third) by drinking the impurity (asuci-pa-na); (fourth) by touching the
navel (na-bhi-para-masana); (fifth) by seeing the form (ru-pa-dassana); (sixth) by
sound (sadda); (seventh) by smell (gandha)” (Hara 2009: 228). Laughing, addres-
sing, thinking, and touching are mentioned as modes of special conception that do
not involve the sexual organs at Mil. 127 (Hara 2009: 233–234).
24 Unless otherwise noted, all translations are my own, in consultation with Kritzer’s
translation and my own 2008 translation of Tohoku 57. Tohoku 57 is often worded
a bit differently than the Ks.udrakavastu text. As an example, this particular pas-
sage reads: “As for the aggregates of name and form taking birth in despised
realms of existence, I do not praise this situation at all even for one moment. Why
is that? The one who is born in the realms of cyclic existence suffers greatly. A
puddle of vomit, no matter how small, still stinks. You should know that anyone
born in cyclic existence, even a small creature, will suffer. The five aggregates so
eagerly seized are form, sensation, intellect, volition, and consciousness. All these
contain birth, existence, growth, degeneration, and destruction. Birth is suffering.
Existence is sickness. Growth is degeneration, destruction, old age, and death.
Because of this, Nanda, any wise man, having tasted existence in this ocean of
cyclic existence, will experience unbearable suffering upon lying down in his
mother’s womb” Bka’ ’gyur (stog pho brang bris ma), vol. 37 (Ga) 399b.3–400a.1.
25 Kritzer’s translation of Tohoku 6, the version of the text found in the Mu-la-
sarva-stiva-da-vinaya Ks.udrakavastu, excludes the frame story about Nanda and
Sundarı‑ and runs to 69 printed pages in length including extensive footnotes
(Kritzer 2014: 37–108). My translation of Tohoku 57, the longer of the two Dun-
huang translations, includes the Nanda frame story and runs to 52 typed pages in
length (Langenberg 2008: 208–259).
26 The stages are mer mer po (S. arbuda), nar nar po (S. peśı‑), gor gor po (S. ghana).
The Tibetan words for these stages are not consistent from text to text. The tradi-
tion of recognizing four progressive stages of the embryo is also found in early
canonical sources, namely the Indaka-sutta in theYakkhasam . yutta of the
Sam -
. yutta-nikaya, which -
contains a mini-embryology (SN i.206). The Sanskrit
terms are also found in Ayurvedic medical classics but are used differently. For details
see Boisvert (2000); Garrett (2005: 42–43); Kritzer (2014: 51, n. 219).
27 The girl baby also is described as stuck between the stomach and intestines as if
bound or pinioned.
-
28 CS Śa-rı‑rastha-na 2.30 (Trikamji Aca-rya 1981: 305).
29 -
Here, “mother-born” (matr.ja) means born of the mother’s reproductive fluid.
-
30 For comparative studies of Ayurvedic and Buddhist accounts of fetal life see
Kritzer (2009); Langenberg (2008: 163–194).
31 The passage on the “ten states of life” is thematically linked to two other con-
tiguous passages that provide further temporal perspective on the human life span.
54 Amy Paris Langenberg
One offers a calculation of the number of seasons, months, fortnights, and days
experience in a life span of 100 years. The other calculates the number of meals
consumed during a full life of 100 years.
.
32 Asanga (1957: 24.1–10); Yamabe (2013: 649–651). Yamabe’s translation with
substantial modifications.
33 According to Hirakawa, the a-vasthika interpretation was emphasized by the Sar-
va-stiva-dins. Hirakawa, 178. While he does not identify his view in terms of sect,
Sopa observes, “Whereas for Buddhism pratı‑tya samutpa-da in general represents a
ground theory through which alone the genesis, etc., of things both animate and
inanimate can become adequately explicable, the special theory of the twelve
members of dependent origination refers only to the genesis of the living sentient
individual in sam -
. sara and his potential release. Thus the teaching of the twelvefold
chain provides a special teaching of misery and its origin” (Sopa 1984: 134–135).
34 Vasubandhu (1967: 133). The other three modes of pratı‑tyasamutpa-da are: instan-
taneous (ks.anika) – all 12 nida-nas arising in an instant of experience; prolonged
(pra-kars.ika) – the causal series operating over three lifetimes; and serial (sam .-
bandhika) – the chain of cause and effect. Vasubandhu explains that dependent
arising is also understood be both momentary and serial at the same time (Vasu-
bandhu 1988: 405). In other words, every moment is simultaneously a complex
web of cause and effect, a cause, and an effect.
35 La Vallée Poussin adds the words “which begins at birth” to his translation of the
passage on contact (Vasubandhu 1988: 403). Vasubandhu’s text does not specify
the age of the child.
36 Buddhaghosa makes a similar but not identical move when he follows up a long
and complex discussion of the relinking consciousness (which ends with a state-
ment denying that a self transmigrates), with a narrative of “the normal process”
of a man dying (Buddhaghosa 1976: 567).
- -
37 The Ayurvedic classic, the Caraka-sam . hita, also includes a passage describing fetal
death in utero. This passage contrasts dramatically with the one cited here as it’s
entire focus is the practicalities of humanely treating the mother (Selby 2005: 265).
38 Akira Hirakawa explains that consciousness (vijña-na) is used interchangeably with
gandharva because while “the other aggregates are also present in very subtle forms
at this moment … since consciousness is the dominant aggregate, it is used to
represent this stage in a person’s life.” This view appears to be based on the Sar-
va-stiva-din view of gandharva and its function (Hirakawa 1990: 176–177). On
viñña-n.a and gandhabba in Pa-li sources see Wijesekere (1945 and 1964).
39 The Therava-da position, articulated in Buddhaghosa’s comprehensive work, the
Visuddhimagga, understands the rebirth as dependent on a special moment of
consciousness called the relinking consciousness (pat.isandhi-viñña-n.a). This relink-
ing consciousness, which can be identified with the gandhabba/ viñña-n.a of the sutta
texts, follows immediately upon and is conditioned by the object of the previous
life’s last moment of consciousness, with no intervening state or time lapse. Bud-
dhaghosa describes the crowding of the mind at death by significant past actions.
Out of this intense state, in which the actions of the past are retasted, the rebirth
consciousness that is the seed of the next life arises. In some cases, a past action
presents itself at the mind door during death, but in others, apparently when no
very significant or weighty (garuka) action occurred, a “kamma sign” appears at
the mind door such as an auspicious object presented by a family member to the
dying person or some symbol of the individual’s characteristic activities during life.
In other cases, a “destiny sign” appears in anticipation of the dying person’s next
birth destination. One going to hell, for instance, might receive a vision of flames
or a metal cauldron; one destined for the heavens might see pleasure groves, pala-
ces, or wishing trees (Buddhaghosa 1976: 561). One destined for a human existence
 Suffering Is Birth 55
sees the mother’s womb, which, according to another commentarial text, takes on
the false appearance of a woollen slipper (Buddhaghosa 1976: 832, n. 24).
40 The relinking consciousness that spans that unsupported chasm from death to life
.
is classified as a form of bhavanga mind, a special sort of stop-gap consciousness
that occurs when no other intentional sorts of consciousness are present and that
guarantees personal continuity within and across lifetimes (Collins 1982: 238–247).
.
Rupert Gethin characterizes the bhavanga as a sort of moral ledger sheet sum-
marizing the deeds of past lives, which then determines the basic nature of a
person from conception until death. Only during the disruption of death and
.
rebirth does the bhavanga change its register. It is still an intentional type of mind
because it has an object that is constant throughout a single life span – that is, the
dispositions defining that individual life, and to which that individual returns
between moments of thought and perception (Gethin 2005).
41 According to Alex Wayman, the other ancient sects (besides the ones discussed
here) that upheld the antara-bhava were: Pu-rvaśaila, Sammatı‑ya, Va-tsı‑putrı‑ya, and
late Mahı‑śa-saka. The schools that denied the antara-bhava besides the Therava-da were:
Vibhajyava-da, Maha-sa-nghika, early Mahı‑śa-sika and, apparently, the Dharmaguptaka
.
(Wayman 1974: 227).
42 The five skandha (Pa-li: khandha) are: body (ru-pa), feelings (vedana-), perceptions or
ideas (sam - - -
. jña), volitions or mental formations (sam
. skara), and consciousness (vijñana).
For a book-length discussion of the skandha/khandha, see Hamilton (1996).
43 The Manobhu-mi refers to it as a-layavijña-na.
44 A record of the Therava-da rejection of the antara-bhava is found in the Pa-li
Katha-vatthu, located in the abhidharma basket of the Tipit.aka. Robert Kritzer
provides an overview of other non-Therava-da sources for the anti-antara-bhava
position at Kritzer (2000b: 237–239). He discusses the position of the Maha-vibha-s.a-
(a major second-century abhidharma text of the Sarva-stiva-da school) in detail in
Kritzer (1997). See also Lin (2011) and Bareau (1927).
45 Abhidharmakośabha-s.ya III.13–14. Vasubandhu (1988: 391–393).
46 The account can be found in the Maha-vibha-s.a, the Abhidharmakośabha-śya, the
Manobhu-mi section of the Yoga-ca-rabhu-mi, and the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra (Yamabe
2013: 641–644).
47 The Garbha-vakra-nti elaborates on the vicissitudes of female fecundity, common
physical causes of a couple’s failure to conceive, and various diseases of the womb
(GS 230.4–234.4). For details, see Kritzer (2013: 8–9).
48 Kritzer’s translation (Kritzer 2014: 39–40, GS 228.6–9).
49 Tohoku 57 uses the term bar ma do’i srid pa (S. antara-bhava) instead of dri za
(gandharva) in these passages.
50 Literally, “renowned as greatly powerful.” Tohoku 57 uses the phrase cho rigs
btsun, “of noble paternal lineage” (GS 44, n. 177, 178).
51 The latter idea receives its fullest treatments in the Tohoku 57 Tibetan translation
of the text from Dunhuang, and in various Sarva-stiva-da abhidharma texts (GS 44,
234.4–235.5; Langenberg 2008: 218–219). In Tohoku 57, this passage is at Stog
Palace Kanjur, vol. 37, Dkon tsegs Ga 396b.7–397a.6. This passage has a parallel
in the Yoga-ca-rabhu-mi. For details, see Kritzer (2013: 11–14).
52 Similar passages occur in the Vibha-s.a-, the Yoga-ca-rabhu-mi, and the Abhidharma-
kośabha-s.ya. For details, see Kritzer (2013: 16–20).
53 Kritzer’s translation (Kritzer 2014: 49). Some other versions of the text read rkyen
(“cause”).
2 Birth Narratives and Gender Identity

In the last chapter, I argued that the metaphor of human birth, extensively
elaborated in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, is central to mainstream Indian Bud-
dhist conceptualizations of suffering and freedom. Metaphorical thinking is
not, however, tidy and self-contained. It has a branching and nesting logic
that constantly defers meaning to yet other, often metaphorical, ideas. For
instance, even the comparatively simple metaphor “she is a peach” relies on
cultural and aesthetic meanings associated with peaches to convey its sense.
She may be a peach in that “peaches are sweet,” a statement that connotes
meanings beyond the simple fact of high sugar content. Similarly, the orangey
pinkness of peaches feels gendered in modern Euro-American contexts. This
hidden complexity of meaning makes what Lakoff and Johnson call a
“metaphor” similar to what Foucault calls a “discourse” – that is, it is a cul-
turally and historically grounded web of ideas, principles, words, and symbols
that establishes the terms of what is possible to know, to think, and to do.
What I am calling the Buddhist master metaphor “suffering is birth” references
meaningful ideas or images from contiguous Buddhist and non-Buddhist
texts, symbols, mythic narratives, and ritual traditions. For instance, the suf-
fering fetus in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra is portrayed as if he were a character
in his own ja-taka and avada-na story, journeying through the landscape of
sam - - - -
. sara. Focusing on the resonances between the Garbhavakranti-sutra and
- -
jataka/avadana-style Buddhist narrative highlights a relatively positive aspect
of the rebirth process in Indian Buddhism – namely, that death and rebirth
can sometimes be a moment of transformation for the better. It also affords a
view of the complex gender logic of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra from a different
angle.
In addition to, and as an enriching complication to, its metaphorical
equation of birth and profound human suffering, the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra
inculcates its readers into a narrative understanding of how birth determines
identity, status, and appearance for good and for ill. It does so in passages
that explicitly discuss the effects of good and bad karma on identity forma-
tion. It also does so implicitly by spinning what can be characterized as an
epic tale about the fetus who is gendered male and journeys through a sam .-
sa-ra that takes the form of a woman’s reproductive organs. Additionally,
 Birth Narratives and Gender Identity 57
several recensions of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra embed this core narrative
within a frame story – that of the Buddha’s half-brother, Nanda. Both stories,
that of the fetus and that of handsome Nanda, have been considered avada-nas
(Hahn 1997; Ks.emendra 1959). Like other avada-nas and ja-takas, both
convey key information about the moral dimensions of the rebirth process in
relationship to beauty, social position, and gendered embodiment.

Physio-morality and social success in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra

Text-historically, the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra is connected to the avada-na cate-
gory of Buddhist literature. Comparative studies indicate that many avada-nas,
literally “cuttings” or “snippings,” were pruned from the sprawling Mu-la-
sarva-stiva-da-vinaya, the source for the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra redaction used in
this study (Kritzer 2014). Both major genres of Buddhist story-telling, ja-taka
and avada-na, are recognized by scholars to be relatively old types of Buddhist
teaching, though edited collections such as the Ja-takatthavan.n.ana- and the
Avada-naśataka belong to a later period than, for instance, the sutta/a-gama
literature (Appleton 2010a: 51–53; Ohnuma 2007a: 35–36, 39). The category
of ja-taka (literally, “having to do with birth”) is mentioned in lists of scrip-
tural types found in early layers of the Pa-li canon. Sanskrit Buddhist lists of
scriptural types mention avada-na as well as ja-taka (Lamotte 1988: 143–147).
The distinction between these two genres has been extensively debated in the
scholarly literature.1 While the historical details of this debate are not perti-
nent here, recent discussions of these issues by Reiko Ohnuma and Naomi
Appleton provide a useful framework for thinking about the way that the birth
process is put to the task of theorizing social and moral identity in Buddhist
narratives, both in general and the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, in particular.
Both Appleton and Ohnuma define the ja-taka genre as previous birth
stories of the Buddha. In other words, in order for a ja-taka to be a ja-taka, one
of its characters, whether the protagonist, a secondary character, or a
bystander, must be identified as the Bodhisatta (S. Bodhisattva). Appleton
meticulously traces the development of the ja-taka genre, which reaches it apex
with the composition of the Ja-takatthavan.n.ana-, the well-known fifth- or
sixth-century commentary on the collection of ja-taka verses located in the
Pa-li Khuddaka-nika-ya (Appleton 2010a: 41–64). According to Appleton’s
argument, the hallmark of the mature ja-taka genre is its illustration of the
Bodhisatta’s long and arduous path to Buddhahood and its articulation of
that path in terms of the ten perfections (Appleton 2010a: 85–108). Avada-nas,
on the other hand, are, by Appleton’s analysis, stories about morally sig-
nificant actions in general. In other words, they are illustrations of the moral
law of cause and effect (karman) but need not mention the Bodhisatta.
Ohnuma makes much the same points about how ja-taka and avada-na are to
be distinguished, but focuses her discussion in particular on a distinction
between “perfections” (modeled in ja-taka), the cultivation of which allows
one to approach Buddhahood, and “devotions” (encouraged in avada-na), the
58 Amy Paris Langenberg
sincere practice of which allows one to earn karmic merit.2 Ja-taka and ava-
da-na so differentiated are ideal types. In actuality, many ja-takas appear to
have only marginally to do with the Bodhisatta’s quest for perfection.
This line of analysis suggests two different ways in which the concept of
birth ( ja-ti ) is characterized and linked to identity-formation in Buddhist nar-
rative contexts. In the ja-taka context, repeated birth provides the temporal
scope for the Bodhisatta’s gradual acquisition of the perfections. Without the
opportunity afforded by repeated embodiment, the Bodhisatta would not have
been able, as the author of the Ja-takatthavan.n.ana- has it, to bring “to fruition
over a long time the endless conditions for bodhi” (Appleton 2010a: 41). Only
by repeatedly walking among us, traversing, as it were, sam -
. sara, is the Bod-
hisatta thought to have been able to perform the magnificent deeds and hone
the insights that eventually led to his awakening. Therefore, to the extent that
any more ordinary person aspires to emulate the Bodhisatta, he or she should
regard repeated birth as providing the temporal arena in which perfection can
be instantiated.3
Despite their generally negative and anxious attitude towards the birth
process, the authors of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra also make the claim that
birth and rebirth can present an opportunity to perfect spiritual knowledge.
According to the text, spiritually advanced beings (those endowed with
wisdom, mindfulness, and virtue) descend into the womb, reside in the womb,
and exit from the womb, all without suffering damage to their memory or
awareness. Sustained awareness enables them to fully comprehend and
remember the horrific nature of the womb and the unbearable squeezing pain
involved in vaginal birth. Armed with this sobering knowledge, they reenter
the sam -
. saric world undeceived as to its suffering nature, and galvanized to
put a permanent end to birth (Kritzer 2014: 89–96; GS 322.5–354.4).4 In this
context, then, physical birth itself (as opposed to repeated rebirth in general)
can be, for the exceptional few, an opportunity for honing insight and shoring
up resolve.
From the point of view of the avada-nas birth is an opportunity for moral-
social advancement rather than spiritual freedom. According to Ohnuma and
Appleton, the avada-na genre exists primarily to narrate the relationship between
acts and fruits, especially the fruit of future desirable or undesirable birth
destinations. In these sorts of stories, birth is described as a transition during
which one’s merit (earned through virtuous and devout acts) causes one to be
born into a desirable cosmic realm (human or heavenly), into a desirable
social location (as a rich man, a high caste man, a king), into a desirable body
(male, handsome, strong), or near a teacher of the Dharma (in the time of the
future Buddha Maitreya). Although such narrative texts fit within a larger Bud-
dhist discourse that seeks an end to birth, they also exhaustively, enthusiastically,
and sometimes even optimistically explore the mechanism of repeated birth as
it functions within the ordering framework of karmic law.
Work on Buddhist ethics by John Powers and Susanne Mrozik clarifies the
connections between virtue, embodiment and social status (Mrozik 2007;
 Birth Narratives and Gender Identity 59
Powers 2009a; Powers 2009b). In Buddhist ethical thinking, past sins and
virtues are marked on the body. Despite his passionate attachment to Sun-
darı‑, for instance, Nanda is described in the Garbha-vakra-nti’s frame story as
golden in color and possessing 30 of the 32 marks of a great man as a result
of past offerings to a pratyekabuddha. Mrozik calls the Buddhist notion that
virtue is expressed through embodiment “physiomorality.” Buddhist notions
of embodiment are, in turn, linked with Buddhist cosmology: men, gods, and
hell beings possess different physical attributes and experience different levels
of pleasure and pain. Within the human realm, differential virtue is expressed
through beauty, strength, health, caste, and gender. Each of these is linked in
more or less straightforward ways to status in human society. Thus, the
embryological process, during which sex, beauty, and other physical attributes
emerge, is as much a moral and social ripening as a physical transformation.
The idea that good actions result in various forms of social and physical
advantage, including the attainment of the male status, is plainly and explicitly
stated in the sutta/a-gama tradition,5 but it is more accessibly evoked through
the story-telling of the ja-taka and avada-na genres. In the Maha-na-radakassapa-
ja-taka (JA 544), for instance, the beautiful and wise princess Ruja-, apparently
an exceptional person, recollects her recent past births, and also displays
foreknowledge of seven that are yet to come. She recounts her own birth his-
tory in an effort to cure her father, the king, of his fatalistic tendencies. In the
distant past she was born, it seems, as a blacksmith’s son who colluded with
an unsavory friend to seduce other men’s wives. That smith’s son was then
reborn as the only son of wealthy merchant’s family in Kosambı‑. The mer-
chant’s son enjoyed every advantage, but rather than indulging in sensuality
he devoted himself to virtuous deeds, learning, and religious fasting. As a
result of past negative deeds, however, when he passed on, he arose in the
Roruva hell, where only unimaginable suffering was to be had. That hell
being then passed away and was reborn successively as a gelded billy goat, a
male monkey castrated by own his father at birth, an ox, and finally a human
child who was neither male nor female, all in consequence of the acts of
adultery mentioned above. At this point, the merit earned as a pious and
virtuous merchant’s son in Kosambı‑ came to fruition and she is born first as a
heavenly nymph, then finally as herself, the princess Ruja-. According to the
ja-taka, she expects to be reborn five more times as a beautiful, revered, and
virtuous woman, before finally regaining a male body in heaven for, as she
notes, “Being born as a man is exceedingly difficult to achieve” (Fausböll
1877: vol. 6, 238). Later, she adds, “Whoever wants to be a man again and
again, birth after birth, should forsake other [men’s] wives like a person with
clean feet avoids the mud” (Fausböll 1877: vol. 6, 240).
Concluding her lesson regarding the supreme law (uttaridhamma), Ruja-
remarks to her powerful and affluent father that, “Whoever possesses glory in
the world and every complete pleasure has undoubtedly behaved very well in
the past. All beings own [their own] separate karmic endowments” (Fausböll
1877: vol. 6, 240). That the upward climb (or downward slide) on the ladder
60 Amy Paris Langenberg
of karma and rebirth includes changes in social and political status in addi-
tion to endowments of wisdom and virtue is indicated in Ruja-’s own story.
Her past virtue brings her honor in the world, where she enjoys the status of
noble lady. Eventually, her virtuous acts and correct views also will restore
her to a masculine form. Here, as in many Buddhist stories, what we might
distinguish as socio-political and moral hierarchies are not differentiated.
Rather, good fortune in the world (wealth, political power, beauty, male pri-
vilege) is taken to encode past virtue; worldly misfortune (poverty, enslave-
ment, powerlessness, gendered subordination) to encode past misdeeds. In her
understanding of the “supreme law” of moral causation, Ruja- clearly con-
nects the male human form with virtue, and sexual “thirdness” (the neutered
male, the sexually ambiguous child), as well as the female form, with moral
stain.6 Although it raises many issues, including the spiritual status of ani-
mals, this story also supports the point that, in avada-na-like tales, the concept
of “birth” (ja-ti ) often has to do not only with taking a new physical form, but
also with assuming a new morally coded social state. It represents an oppor-
tunity for social advancement or regression, whatever its other spiritual uses
and dangers might also be.
It could be argued that taking the Maha-na-radakassapa-ja-taka as an exam-
ple introduces a distortion or bias into this discussion as far as the issue of
gender is concerned. As Appleton points out, very few stories in the corpus of
Therava-da narratives tell of sex change during rebirth; sex identity is constant
across lifetimes in the vast majority of ja-takas and apada-nas (Appleton 2011:
43–47). For instance, past life stories in which the Buddha-to-be is portrayed
as female are extremely rare.7 Ruja- herself, it turns out, is eventually reborn
-
as the Buddha’s disciple, Ananda, a mildly gender-fluid figure associated with
the concerns of women, so in that sense her eventual change of sex back to
male is not as decisive as it could be. As Appleton documents, theories
explicitly linking sex change to good or bad karma are a feature of somewhat
later (fifth century) commentarial layers of the Therava-da tradition.8 It
should also be noted that sex is not soteriologically decisive in the Therava-da
tradition. Both men and women can become arhants (though, as in the
Maha-ya-na, only men can be fully enlightened Buddhas).9 According to
Appleton, however, though there is less soteriological relevance, and though it
is not explicitly stated, the few birth stories involving sex change that do exist
in the tradition do implicitly recognize its moral significance.10 As in the case
of Ruja-, moral misdeeds, especially the pursuit of other men’s wives, are the
cause of unfortunate rebirths, including female rebirth. For the purposes of this
discussion, then, the point of view expressed in the Maha-na-radakassapa-ja-taka
is not exceptional or biased, but is a narrative expression of an unstated
moral theory of gender that becomes explicit in commentaries.
Socially mediated metrics such as wealth, beauty, power, and gender, are
integral to the mainstream Indian Buddhist analysis of merit in relationship
to birth. As Mrozik points out, “much of Buddhist practice [for instance, the
practice of giving or da-na] centers on materializing a virtuous body in future
 Birth Narratives and Gender Identity 61
rebirths” (Mrozik 2006: 23). Nanda’s story, which, as explained above, forms
the frame for the Garbha-vakra-nti teaching proper, also follows the conven-
tions of the avada-na genre in reinforcing the notion that past virtuous action
is related to beauty, maleness, and other forms of social advantage through
the mechanism of rebirth. Nanda, whose name literally means “Happy,” is
well-born, wealthy, and fantastically good-looking. He is also, needless to
mention, a man. He adores his wife, Sundarı‑, enjoys every worldly advantage,
has easy access to all worldly pleasure, and is understandably reluctant to join
his older brother, the Buddha, in the homeless life. Nanda also, however,
displays signs of spiritual greatness, despite his bad attitude towards renun-
ciation and his obsessive love for Sundarı‑. This reluctant monk is golden in
color like his fortunate older brother, tall in stature, and bears 30 of the 32
marks of a great man. In addition, we learn that, had he not eventually
become a renouncer (after a series of concerted efforts on the part of the
Buddha), he would have achieved a status consistent with great political and
economic power: that of wheel-turning emperor. The monks are confused,
and ask the Buddha to please explain how it is that a man so sunk in the
pursuit of sensual pleasure, so seemingly blind to the Buddha’s teachings,
enjoys beauty, good fortune, and easy access to the Dharma. The Buddha
responds by narrating several tales from Nanda’s past lives in which he com-
mitted good deeds, and served the needs of enlightened beings (Langenberg
2008: 251–259).
The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra’s embryology, in particular, offers a clear and
explicit presentation of birth’s socially coded physio-moral logic. According
to a passage occurring in the text immediately after an embryological moment
(week 27) in which the fetus takes on distinct physical traits, one who is
grasping and ungenerous and does not listen respectfully to his teachers but
instead commits negative actions of body, speech, or mind, will, if fortunate
enough to be born in the human realm, display whatever assemblage of phy-
sical traits and characteristics are despised in his particular social milieu. If
tallness is admired, he will be short. If thinness is admired he will be fat. If a
fair complexion is admired, he will be dark. And so forth. Furthermore,
“whatever little bit he accomplishes in the world through body, speech, and
mind, none of that will be acceptable or delightful in the world” (GS 278.6–283.6
Kritzer’s translation at 2014: 68).
As Susanne Mrozik and John Powers have argued, Indian Buddhists devel-
oped to a high level the idea that virtues are displayed on the body (Mrozik
2006; Mrozik 2007; Powers 2009b). The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra’s embryology
participates in this mode of thinking about virtue. By contrast, the relation-
ship between past virtuous or sinful actions and present physical appearance
-
or defect is more distant in Ayurvedic discussions of fetal development. In
fact, the embryological chapters in Suśruta and Caraka dwell on the effect of
mothers’ behavior and experiences on their children’s appearance and tempera-
ment.11 Birth defects such as deafness or idiocy are said to arise from physical
injury to the parents’ sexual fluids as a result of behavior or congenital
62 Amy Paris Langenberg
disease.12 Karmic explanations for physical makeup and disease are also some-
-
times present in Ayurvedic medical texts but are usually not foregrounded. In
the passage noted above, on the other hand, the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra argues
for a direct relationship between individual moral history, the physical attri-
butes developed in the womb, and the social environment into which he will
be born. Offering a view consistent with that of the Maha-na-radakassapa-
ja-taka, this passage demonstrates how a person rises and falls in the world
through the processes of rebirth and embryology, which together function as a
mechanism for translating a person’s moral and spiritual qualities into
particular physical and social identities.

Sense-making through narrative

So far I have discussed the ways in which the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra is text-
historically related to, and displays insights about, the spiritual and moral
functions of the birth process similar to the Buddhist narrative traditions of
ja-taka and avada-na. But as the poet Ks.emendra appears to have recognized
by including the garbha-vakra-nti story as an avada-na in his Avada-nakalpalata-,
the authors of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra proper didn’t just rehearse and vali-
date the basic lessons about karma, social position, and physical beauty
available in Buddhist birth stories. The text they wrote is itself a compelling
birth story, one in which the fetus plays the protagonist’s role.
In fact the Garbha-vakra-nti is related to an extensive premodern South
Asian tradition of narrating the fetal lives and births of great religious heroes
such as Maha-vı‑ra (Bollée 2005; DeClercq 2009), Kr.s.n.a (Couture 2009), and
of course, the Buddha (Bollée 2005; Sasson 2009). Fetal tales about ordinary
men are also present, although these are usually generic, like the Garbha--
vakra-nti itself. In these accounts of ordinary fetuses, the fetus is the object of
special pathos, a sinful person suffering the consequences of his actions as he
traverses the matrix of discomfort, impurity, and inchoate longing that is the
female womb, finally achieving a dubious release at birth. Birth, according to
these texts, is definitely a case of out of the frying pan and into the fire. One
of the best-known Brahmanic examples of this genre is a text roughly con-
temporaneous with the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra known as the Garbhopanis.ad or
“Upanis.ad of the Embryo.”13 Here, after undergoing the nine-month journey
of gestation, the fetus still recalls all of his past births and enjoys full knowl-
edge of his own good and evil deeds. He cries out in dismay at his unfortunate
and uncomfortable predicament, and resolves to do better as soon as he escapes
from his mother’s body. Sadly, the birth canal crushes him and he falls into a
swoon as he is born, losing all of his in utero clarity and resolve:

“And after having seen thousands of wombs before, I have eaten diverse
foods, I have drunk from so many breasts! I have born and I have died,
moving continually from birth to birth. I have committed both good and
bad deeds toward others; because of those bad deeds I burn alone, while
 Birth Narratives and Gender Identity 63
those who enjoyed the fruit of my good deeds are gone. Alas! Plunged in
a sea of grief, I see no remedy. If I am freed from the womb, I will take
refuge in Maheśvara, the one who ends all evil, the one who gives free-
dom from the fruit [of the act]. If I am freed from the womb, then I will
take refuge in Na-ra-yan.a, the one who ends all evil, the one who gives
freedom from the fruit [of the act]. If I am freed from the womb, then I
will study the Sa-m . khya-Yoga, which ends all evil, which gives freedom
from the fruit [of action]. If I am freed from the womb, I will meditate on
the eternal brahman.” But, when he reaches the opening of the womb, his
spirit is crushed by a mechanical constraint and he is barely born when,
touched by the wind Vais.n.ava, he loses all memory of past births and
deaths and can no longer distinguish good deeds from evil ones.
(Kapani 1989: 179)

The hard-earned wisdom of the fetus in the womb and his tragic loss of
knowledge in the last moments of his journey due to either the crushing
action of the vagina or the stupefying effect of Vis.n.u’s ma-ya- (delusion) is a
common shared element of South Asian fetal narratives. Several of the 18
major Sanskrit pura-n.as contain descriptions of the fetus and they almost all
forefront this drama of knowledge and forgetting.14 Comparing the Buddha’s
birth story to these sources, Minoru Hara argues that the Bodhisattva’s unu-
sual birth from Ma-ya-’s side can be explained as a strategy to avoid attributing
to him the amnesia associated with a journey down the birth canal (Hara
1980). The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra also addresses the issue of forgetting in its
long section on four ways of entering, dwelling within, and exiting the womb
(Kritzer 2014: 322.5–354.4). One could say, then, that birth stories, whether
of a magical conception in a pot of ghee, or a torturous one in the womb
of a woman, form a sub-genre of religious narrative in South Asia, one with
its own conventions and themes. The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra belongs to this
South Asian sub-genre.
Narratives, religious or otherwise, operate on two levels: plot (what hap-
pens) and discourse (how what happens is presented). (In this context, the
term “discourse” is employed in a narratological rather than Foucauldian
sense.) As anybody who has either told or heard a story knows, it is possible
to tell the same story in two very different ways. The story of pregnancy and
birth relayed in, for instance, the 1995 Hollywood comedy, “Nine Months,” is
utterly distinct from the story relayed in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, despite the
fact that they follow the same narrative arc (conception, gestation, and birth)
and contain a similar cast of characters (mother, father, fetus). Many elements
contribute to “discourse,” including who narrates the story, who the imagined
audience is, what speech idiom is used, whether the narrator is omniscient or
has a limited knowledge of events, whether the narrative has authority or is
unreliable, what the medium of expression is, shifting objects of focalization,
and so forth. Through the operations of plot and discourse, narratives do
things. They reveal aspects of experience we can’t directly know on our own.
64 Amy Paris Langenberg
They allow us to empathize with people very unlike ourselves. They can be a
sort of time travel machine into the past or the future. And they often
advance persuasive visions of what constitutes good (and bad) character,
heroism, virtue, and human thriving.
According to literary theorist, Jonathan Culler, literary theorists and phi-
losophers debate the relationship between narrative and knowledge. Is narra-
tive “a fundamental form of knowing” or is it a “rhetorical structure that
distorts as much as it reveals” (Culler 1997: 94)? A slightly different but rela-
ted set of questions is raised by the philosopher, Martha Nussbaum. She asks:
are form and content so interfused that certain truths can only be expressed if
the appropriate style and medium is used? Are certain ethical views about
what the world is like and how we ought to inhabit it, only expressible by
means of the rich textures and characterizations of narrative? Isn’t a good
answer to Plato’s question about, “how one should live?” simply that we
should “live as good characters in a good story do, caring about what hap-
pens, resourcefully confronting each new thing” (Nussbaum 1990: 3)? One
way to respond to these types of questions, Culler suggests, would be to
somehow access knowledge that is free of narrative, and then discover some
basis for judging the verity of such knowledge. But, he concludes:

Whether there is such an authoritative knowledge separate from narrative

is precisely what’s at stake in the question of whether narrative is a source
of knowledge or of illusion. So it seems likely that we cannot answer this
question, if indeed it has an answer. Instead we must move back and
forth between awareness of narrative as a rhetorical structure that pro-
duces the illusion of perspicacity and a study of narrative as the principal
kind of sense-making at our disposal.
(Culler 1997: 39)

Cultural theorists have taken note of the various ways in which narrative
naturalizes and normalizes society’s expectations by encouraging an intense
emotional identification with certain characters, moods, and, principles. On
the other hand, they note the ways in which narratives can provoke social cri-
ticism by exposing what lies beneath accepted social forms. In these ways and
many others, narratives both manipulate and enlighten, sometimes simulta-
neously or alternately. Perhaps it is more legible to propose that, while good
stories, are not the best medium for abstract, universal, or absolute statements
about truth, they excel at making pragmatic, aesthetic, and emotional sense
of the world through a sensitive exploration of particulars. Thus, just as
Lakoff and Johnson argue for the centrality of the metaphor in human con-
ceptualizing, expression, and experience, Culler and Nussbaum suggest that
the narrative mode is primary in moral thinking and pragmatic sense-making.
The Indian Buddhist tradition recognized the special understanding to be
gained from “making sense” of birth through narrative. From the point of
view of total freedom, birth is held to be negative and undesirable in Buddhist
 Birth Narratives and Gender Identity 65
soteriology. From the point of view of Buddhist ethics, however, not all births
are equally negative, or negative in the same way. Fine distinctions should be
drawn, and, for ancient Indian Buddhists, it was in the narrative genres of
avada-na and ja-taka especially that they were so drawn. As Appleton and
Ohnuma have noted, on the face of it, the moral knowledge to be found in
birth stories has generally to do with the workings of moral causality
(karman) and the winding path to Buddhahood. Working in the Buddhist-
inflected Tibetan medical tradition, Frances Garrett has argued that embry-
ologies work as “narrative epistemologies,” or tales in which elements are
included because they tell a story that seems true (Garrett 2005; Garrett
2008). In other words, she believes that the sense-making function of narrative
is put to work in describing the birth process, producing various Tibetan expres-
sions of the true state of things and the best path to take. The Garbha-vakra-nti-
su-tra also makes use of the thrust and energy of story-telling, selecting
from a range of available plot elements and making certain narrative choices
in order to tell a particularly true-feeling story about gender and other types
of social identity. The protagonist of this tale is obviously the fetus, and it
is with him that the reader is meant to identify. The mother and her body
are simultaneously the setting of the story, the main antagonist, and the
fetus’s only companion. The father is a minor character, present only at
conception.

A fetal epic
Although the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra includes a large amount of medical ter-
minology and data, and scholars believe that the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra’s
Buddhist authors were aware of the medical traditions recorded in Caraka’s
and Suśruta’s compendia, the narrative of the embryo contained in the
-
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra is very unlike these Ayurvedic accounts in its level of
detail, its selection of plot elements, and the tone of its discourse.15 Although
week-by-week embryologies are commonplace in Tibet, the one found in the
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra is the earliest and only such embryology known in
classical India. All other roughly contemporaneous Indian accounts either
map the fetal changes month by month, as do the Caraka and Suśruta com-
pendia, or do not attempt to time them at all. In general, apart from a basic
vocabulary and working knowledge of bodily structures, the Garbha-vakra-nti
-
embryology shares little in common with its Ayurvedic contemporaries. In fact,
-
the major attributes of the Ayurvedic embryologies; namely, the gender-coded
shapes of the early embryo, the simultaneous manifestation of the body’s struc-
tures in the third month, the inception of the “two-hearted” (dvaihṛdayya) state in
the fourth month, and the instability of fetal life-force (ojas) in the eighth month,
are absent from this su-tra. The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra is more clearly influenced
in its narrative choices by Buddhist soteriology and psychology. Working as
story-tellers, its authors select from a range of possible plot elements, and craft
the discourse of their text in order to narrate a riveting Buddhist story of human
66 Amy Paris Langenberg
becoming, one that emphasizes the pathos and isolation of the implicitly male
fetus, the painful and humiliating nature of gestation and birth, and the incommo-
diousness of the maternal host. According to the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, the story
goes as follows.16
The embryo spends its first week lying in the upper part of the womb and
looking like a blob of rice porridge. The climate of the womb is torrid, caus-
ing the one-week-old embryo to experience unbearable suffering as if being
-
fried in a hot skillet. Unlike the Ayurvedic embryo, the Buddhist embryo is
endowed with the faculty of mind, the sensation of touch, and physical vital-
ity at conception. Therefore, it is capable of experiencing pain from the
beginning. In the second week, the embryo takes on the consistency of thick
yogurt or cold butter. In the third week it elongates and resembles a worm. It
continues to endure the discomfort of sweltering temperatures. In the fourth
week, the embryo takes on the solid, roundish form of a millstone. A special
wind arises that temporarily eases the heat and burning sensations it has
endured. In these first few weeks, the embryo progresses through four stages,
named according to their shape and consistency: kalala (jelly-like), arbuda
(long and roundish), peśı‑ (narrow and fleshy), and ghana (compact and
round).17 These terms are also used in the medical tradition, but in a different
way. Caraka describes the embryo in its first stage as kalala and employs the
remaining three terms to label the three shapes that correspond to the three
genders, male, female and neuter. The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra follows the Bud-
dhist sutta/a-gama tradition of using these terms in sequence to describe the
embryo’s first four stages of growth.18 The absence of clear gender coding of
the fetus allows it to be generically human, that is to say implicitly male.
In week five, the embryo develops the five bumps that are the beginnings of
its arms, legs and head. In week six, its upper arms and thighs grow. In week
seven it develops hands and feet and is said to resemble a collection of pearls
or a cluster of bubbles. In week eight, its fingers and toes appear. In the
-
Ayurvedic medical texts, these events occur later, in month three, which is
when all the structures of the body simultaneously manifest in miniature.
Week nine brings the opening of the nine bodily orifices: two eye holes, two
ear holes, two nostrils, one mouth, the anus, and the urethra. No vaginal
opening is mentioned. During week ten, the embryo solidifies further. Also,
the tenth week wind blows on the embryo, causing it to inflate “like a skin
bag” or, as we would say, like a balloon. The 11th-week wind twists itself
around as the mother moves about, forcing the orifices and cavities of the body
to enlarge. In the 12th week, the intestines develop, overlapping at the navel,
along with many small channels. This is the embryonic digestive system. The
12th-week winds also create the vital points or marman, which are places on
the body particularly sensitive to injury. The 13th week, brings the fetus’s first
experiences of hunger and thirst, and the food ingested by the mother begins
to nourish its body. Weeks 14 and 15 bring further development of the ela-
borate system of channels described above. The week 16 wind sets up the
main sense organs and the area of the heart, which, in the ancient world, was
 Birth Narratives and Gender Identity 67
viewed as the seat of the breath. Thus the basis for inhalation and exhalation
is also established in week 16. The text explains further that, just as the potter
fashions a pot in accordance with his wishes using a lump of clay and a
wheel, karma’s wind creates the sense organs and the basis for breathing
according to the fetus’s dispositions. In weeks 17 and 18, the winds purify the
senses like, the text analogizes, an industrious child cleaning a dusty mirror
with oil, ash, and fine sand, or a fierce wind blowing and scattering a cloud to
the four directions so that the sun and moon might shine. In the 19th week,
sight, hearing, smell and taste are firmly established. The fetus is endowed
with the tactile and mental senses at conception, so all six senses are now
operational.
From week 20 onwards, the embryonic winds build up the plastic elements
of the body just as a sculptor builds up a shape or a plasterer coats a wall. All
the bones are formed in week 20. In week 21, the muscles are generated.
Week 22 brings the generation of the fetus’s blood. In week 23, newly formed
skin encases the fetus. The week 24 wind adds pigment. In week 25, a
wind arises that purifies the fetal flesh and blood. In week 26, body and head
hair as well as nails are generated. In week 27, the hair and nails are
completed.
In week 28, the fetus, who has been suffering in the cramped malodorous
womb, squeezed between the mother’s stomach and intestines and feeling as if
he has been trussed up and pierced through with a sharp wooden lance, gen-
erates the “eight misperceptions,” perhaps as a fantasy of escape from his
extreme discomfort. He mistakenly believes himself to be sitting in a house,
on a mount or vehicle of some kind, in a pleasure grove, in a palace, in a
garden, on a throne, by a river, or by a pond. In week 29 and 30, the skin
color, hair and fingernails of the fetus develop further. In weeks 31 through
34, he grows bigger. In week 35, all of the primary and secondary limbs of the
body are completely formed. In week 36, the fetus generates the desire to exit
the womb. In week 37, he also generates the “three correct perceptions” of
uncleanness, smelliness, and darkness. In week 38, the birth winds arise,
rotating the fetus and forcing it down and out of the womb.
In summary, the fetus begins as a viscous blob that hardens and gels like an
egg yolk frying in the pan. In a cartoonish and undignified manner, the fetus
then develops five bubble-like protrusions and is blown up like a balloon. One
imagines him bloated and ungainly, careening around the fetid confines of the
womb. The continued growth of the fetus, relentlessly impelled by one karmic
wind after another, is a sustained and painful process characterized by grow-
ing sensory acuteness and ever worsening mental and physical discomfort. If
the fetus survives all of these difficult, bewildering, and unpleasant transfor-
mations, and manages to make it down the birth canal without fainting dead
away, or suffering dismemberment at the hands of a panicky midwife, he then
faces the ministrations of mothers, grandmothers, and nurses who, despite
good intentions, torture his excruciatingly raw and tender body with their
efforts to bathe and swaddle him and humiliate him with offerings of mother’s
68 Amy Paris Langenberg
milk, a filthy substance derived from blood. Though the fetus’s journey is
epic, involving extreme sufferings, drastic transformations, and the traversing
of worlds, the fetus does not triumph, but merely endures. The fetus is the
protagonist, but, like all epic heroes, his ability to control his situation is
limited. He is buffeted, quite literally, by the winds of karma.
The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra does account for the conception of a girl (versus
a boy) child,19 and briefly mentions differences in how male and female fetu-
ses situate themselves in the womb.20 Still, there is good reason to view the
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra’s protagonist, the fetus, as implicitly or generically
male. For starters, he develops only nine orifices, not the ten one finds on the
female body. Also, for what it is worth, the fetus is referred to throughout the
text as mngal na gnas pa, “the one who dwells in the womb.” The “pa” placed
at the end of this compound word to transform the verb gnas (“to dwell”) into
a noun (“one who dwells”) is, according to a range of Tibetan-English and
Tibetan-Tibetan dictionaries, really the male agentive particle.21 Nowhere in
the text is the feminine particle “mo” substituted for “pa.” Of course, the
grammatically male does not always correspond to what would be con-
sidered the socially or biologically male, but often functions generically. In
Pa-li sources, for instance, the vocative plural bhikkhave (which is almost
always translated as the plural vocative “monks” in English-language sour-
ces), is inclusive of bhikkhunı‑s, suggesting that the teachings were not pri-
marily directed at a male audience as standard English translations have
implied (Collett and Ana-layo 2014). Still, as feminist theorists interested in
language have argued, language is socially constructed and gendered gram-
matical markers do inscribe and communicate subtle cultural and political
messages.
Perhaps more significantly in this case, the frame story indicates that the
ideal reader or auditor is a man like Nanda. Nanda’s primary mental obses-
sion focuses initially on his wife Sundarı‑ and shifts eventually to a fantasy
about heavenly maidens. When Nanda’s unsettled state of mind continues
even after he leaves his wife for the monastery, conflicts with his fellow
monks, with whom he is living in single-sexed community, result. Nuns do
not enter into the drama and no attempt is made to flip the gender direc-
tionality by, for instance, introducing a female version of Nanda in the form
of a side story. According to narratologists, narrative is a mediation process
“which does not present the world as it really or objectively is, but as it is
‘filtered’ through a human or human-like (a narrator’s or a character’s) mind”
(Galasek 2015: 4). Narratologists call this filtering function “focalization.” In
the long versions of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, both Nanda and the fetus
function as the focalizing moment through which the process of birth is to be
perceived. They are thus identified with each other. Drawn into the drama,
the reader imagines himself embroiled in similar circumstances. Because of
the su-tra’s narrative imperatives, an audience consisting of Nanda and his
companions requires an implicitly male fetus.22
 Birth Narratives and Gender Identity 69
The androcentric perspective of the text is also evident in its obtuse treat-
ment of the mother’s vulnerability and pain in pregnancy and childbirth. A
pregnant mother’s very real risk and discomfort is mentioned only once, in
relation to a breech birth in which the baby dies and must be removed piece
by piece. Otherwise, women’s discomfort, illness, exhaustion, or susceptibility
to life-threatening complications during pregnancy go unmentioned. This is in
-
contrast to the more well-rounded birth narratives of the Ayurvedic classics,
which give much advice on how to assist the pregnant or laboring woman.
Granted, producing śreyası‑ praja- (the very best of offspring) for the benefit of
the husband’s lineage is the stated goal in those texts. Still, mother and child
are considered to share heart-feelings and concern for the mother’s wellbeing and
-
detailed accounts of how to achieve her comfort are central to Ayurvedic
accounts of the birth process (Selby 2005). By contrast, maternal suffering
and pain do not concern the authors of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, whose
emotional focus is riveted on their story’s adventuring protagonist, the fetus.
In fact, at the moment of birth itself, the text describes even the well-positioned
fetus’s terrible suffering as “greatly severe, greatly harsh, and greatly unbear-
able” (GS 293.8–294.1, Kritzer’s translation at 2014: 73) but insists that “its
mother will not once experience a severe, harsh, unbearable, and unpleasant
sensation of suffering” (GS 293.6–7, Kritzer’s translation at 2014: 73). It is
the suffering of the fetus, trapped in an agonistic relationship with its mother,
that is the great drama in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra. Just as the earliest portions
of the human life cycle are intensively magnified in this text but youth, middle
life and beyond do not receive detailed attention, the fetus’s subjective
experience of his grotesque and tragic situation is accentuated while the mother’s
experience in pregnancy and childbirth is largely ignored. When the mother
does appear as a subject, she is a torturer, prison warden, or mistress of the
sewer-like abode in which the fetus must dwell, not a generous and concerned
sustainer of fetal life. Narrative techniques function in these various ways to
place the fetus at the center of the human story. While typical human con-
ception, gestation, and birth provides a basic plot structure, other authorial
choices (temporal distortion, the choice of the fetus and Nanda as the foca-
lizing moment, the selective erasure of the mother, the reveling in gro-
tesquery) contribute to the creation of a textured, forceful narrative, with a
particular message to deliver regarding, among other things, the gendered
nature of the sam -
. sara.

The wheels of karma turn slowly

As we have seen, the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra differs in content and tone from
-
Ayurvedic accounts of birth, though it has often been treated as a medical text.
Despite its medical content, it is more similar to the Buddhist narrative
traditions of avada-na and ja-taka in that it treats the birth process as germane
to identity-formation rather than the safe production of healthy offspring.23
In the Garbha-vakra-nti, as in other ja-takas and avada-nas, past actions are
70 Amy Paris Langenberg
transformed via the mechanism of karma into present life situations, which
are themselves calibrated according to set hierarchies of social position,
spiritual attainment, and gender. The subtleties of the Garbha-vakra-nti birth
narrative − its use of characterization, focalization, temporal distortion, per-
spective, etc. – delivers information regarding what it is to be a person jour-
- -
neying through sam . sara. These two narrative modalities – the sutra’s story
about birth as the mechanism by which past moral actions become present
social identities, and its deeply gendered fetal epic – operate together to nat-
uralize gender dimorphism, hierarchically place the male above the female,
link the female body to suffering, and render the spiritual adventurer proto-
typically male. By staging and narrating the tale of birth, then suffusing it with
pathos, the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra builds investment in basic structural infor-
mation about the nature of maleness and femaleness, and the relationship
between the two.
Scholarly explanations for suspicious and negative accounts of the female
body of the type found in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra sometimes hold that such
attitudes towards women’s reproductive anatomy were a result of cultural
factors external to Buddhism proper, or that the contingencies of asceticism
made such negativity psychologically necessary.24 Here I offer a third expla-
nation. Buddhist legal thinkers recognized and honored women’s claims to the
monastic life and its fruits.25 As feminist scholars have noted, Buddhist phi-
losophers also recognized that their special understandings of the self worked
against essentialist understandings of male superiority and opened the path of
religious attainment to women.26 Both of these discourses, the legal and the
philosophical, posed a potential challenge to normative social distinctions
between men and women. In the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, something like a nar-
rative biology steps into the breach to defend social and moral differences
between men from women. In it, women are the antagonists, men the prota-
gonists; women are the stage, men the actors; women are the torturers, men
the victims; women are sam -
. sara, men the seekers of freedom; women are the
dangerous wilderness, men the wandering heroes; women are morally
impaired, men are morally gifted, and so forth. The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra’s
vivid story-telling, and more direct expressions of commonplace avada-na
wisdom regarding gender and rebirth in both the body of the text and its
frame-story, communicate a foundational Buddhist logic of gender. Accord-
.
ing to this logic, while women can be legally recognized as sangha members,
while they may lay legitimate claim to Buddhist soteriological goals, and while
they may even hope to be reborn as men in a future existence, the wheels of
karma turn slowly, and women’s social, moral, and physical endowments set
them apart from men in ways that are not easily or quickly overcome.27 It
makes sense that Buddhist institutions could better afford to admit and
accommodate women if such leniency did not also challenge the perspectives
of a prestigious male ascetic tradition or counter naturalized gender norms.
The pseudo-medical discussions of the female reproductive body found in the
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra constitute and support the gender normative. In
 Birth Narratives and Gender Identity 71
summoning up through plot and discourse a compelling vision of moral-
cosmological inferiority and rapacity of women, the epic tale of the suffering
fetus journeying through a bloody female terrain inscribes a logic in which
women can still be placed below their male counterparts in Buddhist society,
despite the primordial purity of their minds.

Notes
1 For an overview of and relevant citations regarding scholarly writings on this issue,
see Appleton (2010a: 3–8); Ohnuma (2007a: 35–48).
2 Ohnuma argues this distinction is related to a temporal contrast between the world
without institutional “Buddhism” in which the bodhisattva lived most of his lives,
and the world with institutional “Buddhism” that the Buddha’s lay supporters and
disciples occupy. Whereas the bodhisattva’s slow path to perfection as illustrated in
the ja-taka was arduous and relatively unsupported (and included such heroic acts
as self-mutilation), the characters featured in the avada-na tales have access to the
powerful merit field of the Buddhist monastic community. Hence, they are able to
benefit spiritually from comparatively simple ritual acts of giving (Ohnuma 2007a:
40–46).
3 Jeffrey Samuels and Naomi Appleton have argued against the view that the bod-
hisatta path is absent from mainstream Buddhism. Focusing on the texts and tra-
ditions of Therava-da Buddhism, both demonstrate that some Therava-da Buddhists
aspired to tread the bodhisatta path, and that Therava-da texts, especially the
commentarial traditions associated with ja-taka collections, articulate this path
(Appleton 2011; Samuels 1997). For a text-historical analysis of the genesis of the
bodhisattva ideal in the early discourses, see Ana-layo (2010b).
4 In other words, while ordinary beings enter the womb in the state of confusion just
described, more exalted beings, such as wheel-spinning kings, stream-enterers, and
bodhisattvas, enter, occupy, and depart the womb with varying degrees of clarity.
Similar teachings appear in the Vibha-s.a-, Abhidharmakośabha-s.ya, and the Yoga--
ca-rabhu-mi (Kritzer 2000a). This passage does not appear in the Pao t’ai ching.
Different versions of this teaching list the four methods in different orders.
.
5 Cu-ḷakammavibhanga-sutta at MN iii.203–206; Kosalasam . yutta at SN i.93–95.
6 Appleton also notes what she describes as “confusion between, or explicit connec-
tions between, the social, ethical, and soteriological realms” (Appleton 2011: 47).
7 In none of the birth stories collected in the Ja-takatthavan.n.ana- is the Bodhisatta
female (Appleton 2010b: 109–110). A few stories of the Buddha’s previous life as a
woman can be found in other traditions. Ru-pya-vatı‑, whose avada-na occurs in the
Divya-vada-na, Haribhat.t.a’s Ja-takama-la-, and Ks.emendra’s Avada-nakalpalata-, is the best
known of these (Mrozik 2006; Ohnuma 2000). A medieval Therava-da tradition also
tells of Gotama Buddha’s previous rebirth as a woman (Derris 2008; Jaini 2001).
8 P.V. Bapat examines the theory of sex change in commentaries to the Vinaya
(Bapat 1957). Appleton also cites the commentary to the Dhammapada as a place
where sex change is explained (Appleton 2011: 46).
9 MN iii.66. Bhikkhu Bodhi and Bhikkhu Ña-n.amoli 2005: 929.
10 Examples include the Maha-na-radakassapa-ja-taka, the Kusana-li-ja-taka, the story of
the nun Isida-sı‑ from the Therı‑ga-tha-, and a reference to a figure called Gopika- in the
Sakkyapañha-sutta from the Dı‑gha-nika-ya. All cited in Appleton (2011: 43–47).
11 CS Śa-rı‑rastha-na 4.15–19, 8.21. SS Śa-rı‑rastha-na 3.18–28.
12 CS Śa-rı‑rastha-na 3.17, SS Śa-rı‑rastha-na 4.30.
13 The date of this text is uncertain. It is classified as an Atharvan upanis.ad, which,
as a group, are relatively late; however, some scholars have suggested that it is of
72 Amy Paris Langenberg
greater antiquity than the other upanis.ads in this category. It is likely con-
temporaneous with or older than the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra (Kapani 1976, 1989;
Keswani and Bhide 1965).
14 Ma-rkan.d.eya-pura-n.a 11.13–20. Translation at Doniger (1988: 98). See also Agni-
pura-n.a 369.23–27. Some pura-n.ic accounts of birth show possible signs of Buddhist
influence. At Vis.n.u-pura-n.a 6.5.9, for instance (supposed to be one of the earlier
Pura-n.as dated C.E. 300–500), we find a stock of images almost identical to those of
the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra in its description of the cramped and disgusting nature of
the womb: “The living creature that has a very delicate body becomes encased in
abundant filth inside the embryo, where he is enveloped by the membrane and his
back, neck, and bones are all twisted out of shape. As he grows, he suffers greatly
from the excessively acrid, bitter, spicy, salty, and burning hot food (that his
mother has eaten). He can’t stretch out his own limbs or contract them or anything
else, and he is squashed on all sides, lying there in the feces and urine and slime.
Though he is unable to breathe, he is conscious, and he remembers his hundreds of
former births. Thus, he sits there in the womb bound by his own karma, and very
miserable. As he is born, his face is smeared with feces, blood, urine, and semen,
and his bones and sinews are hurt by the wind of procreation. He is turned head
downwards by the powerful winds of childbirth, and he comes out from his
mother’s stomach bewildered by pain. He faints, and when he is touched by the
outside air he loses his understanding, and is born” (Doniger 1988: 100). The
Garud.a-pura-n.a, a somewhat later work, also speaks of the fetus trapped in a well
of bodily excretions, fed on by parasitic worms, and suffering from the acrid, bitter
and acidic diet of the mother. See Garud.a-pura-n.a 6.27, translation at Basu and
Wood (1974: 24). Many of these elements, absent from the older Brahman and
-
Ayurvedic descriptions of birth, are found in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra. In light of
the argument mounted in the previous chapter, as well as the looming textual tra-
dition of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra itself, it may be the case that tales of the suf-
fering fetus were originally a Buddhist trope, borrowed and adapted to
Brahmanical purposes. The point of this analysis is not to make an historical or
comparative argument, however, and these remarks should be taken as speculative.
15 Caraka and Suśrut.a themselves are largely in agreement regarding the major land-
marks of embryonic development. Both list the views of a variety of venerable reli-
gious teachers on the matter. One master believes that the head is formed first since it
is the basis of the senses. Another says the heart is formed first because of being the
seat of the mind. Another says the navel is formed first since it is the source of nutri-
tion. Another suggests the hands and feet as they enable the embryo to locomote in
utero. Yet another asserts that the trunk must originate first as it houses all of the major
organs and is the central structure to which the limbs and head attach. SS Śa-rı‑rastha-na
3.30. CS Śa-rı‑rastha-na 6.21. Both Caraka and Suśrut.a describe a process of gradual
hardening during the first two months in which the jelly-like embryo congeals and
takes on a shape that reflects its gender. According to Caraka, a dense mass, called a
ghana, indicates a male embryo. A narrow, fleshy mass, called a peśı‑, indicates a
female embryo. A long, roundish mass or arbuda indicates a neuter embryo. Suśrut.a’s
account of the first two months is the same although he speaks of pin.d.a instead of
ghana, employing the term ghana, “hardened” to describe instead all embryos during
the second month. In the third month, Caraka and Suśrut.a agree that the embryo
develops the five protuberances that will later become arms, legs and head. Also during
the third month, all other bodily structures manifest in minute form (except those that
only appear at puberty such as beards and breasts). CS Śa-rı‑rastha-na 4.14. In the fourth
month, bodily structures become more distinct. The fetus’s heart, the seat of con-
sciousness, develops, causing it feel desire. This is the beginning of pregnancy long-
ings for the mother, what Caraka calls the “two-hearted state” (dvaihr.dayya). Both
Caraka and Suśrut.a are succinct in their descriptions of months five, six, and seven,
 Birth Narratives and Gender Identity 73
mentioning only the further development of the intellectual and physical faculties of
the child. In the eighth month, both assert that the fetus’s ojas, a kind of vital
physical energy circulating in the body with the blood, becomes unsteady and has
a tendency to pass back into the mother’s body. A premature delivery in the eighth
month is considered dangerous for this reason and the eight-month-old fetus is
also considered particularly vulnerable to demonic attack. According to Caraka
and Suśrut.a, normal delivery takes place during the ninth or tenth months.
16 The embryological sequence is at GS 252.3–294.2. Find an English translation at
Kritzer (2014: 51–73). For the Tohoku 57 version see Bka’ ’gyur (stog pho brang
bris ma), vol. 37 (Ga) 400a.1–407b.7. See Langenberg (2017) for a translation of
the embryological sequence of Tohoku 57.
17 The Tibetan terms used in Tohoku 57 for the first three stages are mer mer bo, nur
nur bo, ltar ltar bo, and mkhrang ‘gyur (hardened). The various redactions of the
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra are not consistent in translating the Indic Buddhist embry-
ological terms (kalala, arbuda, peśı‑, and ghana) into Tibetan (Kritzer 2014: 51,
n.219). See Boisvert (2000) on Pa-li sources for kalala, etc.
18 SN i.206. “Then the yakkha Indaka approached the Blessed One and addressed
him in verse: ‘As the Buddhas say that form is not the soul, how then does one
obtain this body? From where do one’s bones and liver come? How is one begotten
in the womb?’ ‘First there is the kalala; from the kalala comes the abbuda; from
the abbuda the pesı‑ is produced; from the pesı‑ the ghana arises; from the ghana
emerge the limbs, the head-hair, body-hair, and nails’” (Bodhi 2000: 305).
19 The sex of the child is determined by its karma in this Buddhist context. The
actual mechanism of sex determination is its karmically determined passion for
the opposite sex parent, and feelings of competition with the same sex parent. In
the Caraka-sam -
. hita, by contrast, sex is determined by the potency of one parental
sexual fluid over the other. CS Śa-rı‑rastha-na 2.12.
20 The boy child sits on the right side of the womb. The girl child sits on the left side
of the womb. This is mentioned in the description of the twenty-seventh week of
gestation. Also of note is the fact that, according to the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra,
immediately upon emerging from its mother’s body, the newborn’s first thought is
“A girl is born” or “A boy is born” (GS 294.4–5).
21 See http://www.thlib.org/reference/dictionaries/tibetan-dictionary/translate.php.
22 In her study of gestation as a metaphor for the Buddhist path, Reiko Ohnuma
draws a similar conclusion regarding the status of the fetus in Indian Buddhist
treatments of pregnancy imagery. In the several “metaphorical pregnancies” she ana-
lyzes, including the pregnancy simile in the Tatha-gatagarbha-su-tra and the image
of prajña-paramita- (perfect wisdom) as a mother that gestates Buddhas, the
embryo or fetus is prototypically noble, heroic, and male (Ohnuma 2012: 159).
23 In her study of Tibetan Buddhist embryological texts, Frances Garrett also argues
against viewing Buddhist embryological texts primarily as examples of Buddhist
medicine. Rather, she suggests, Buddhist embryology “is most fruitfully a religious
topic” (Garrett 2008: 153). Garrett does not focus on the issue of Buddhist
embryology as Buddhist gender construction but her uncoupling of embryology
from purely medical concerns supports my interpretation collaterally. She does
include a useful discussion of Tibetan Buddhist medical discussions of pregnant
women. She comments on the “striking difference” between the Indic Buddhist
.
medical treatment of the pregnant women in the Va-gbhat.a’s As.t.a-nga Hr.dayam, and
the Tibetan treatment of the same in the Four Tantras (dgyud bzhi ). In the Indian text,
the topic of normal pregnancy is addressed alongside fetal development, while the
Tibetan classic mentions only the diseased female body, and not in the context of
embryology (Garrett 2008: 76–84). Fred Smith addresses similar issues regarding nar-
rative choices in traditional embryologies in his comparison of the Anugı‑ta-’s account
-
of rebirth at Maha-bha-rata 14.17–18 with the Ayurvedic classics (Smith 2007). For an
74 Amy Paris Langenberg
in-depth analysis of the negotiated relationship between Buddhist and medical discourse
in early modern Tibet, see Gyatso (2015).
24 I. B. Horner expresses the former view in explaining the Buddha’s reported hesi-
tance to admit women to the order: “[Gotama] himself was convinced that women
are as capable as men of attaining arhatship, but there was the dead-weight of
public opinion to persuade” (Horner 1930: 109–110). Rita Gross writes that liberal
views of women “makes no sense in a social world steeped in androcentrism and
strong gender roles. The equality and common humanity of women and men was
not the Buddha’s major perception about gender, even after his enlightenment”
(Gross 1993: 34). In his typology of Buddhist attitudes towards women, Alan
Sponberg categorizes such derisive rhetoric as “ascetic misogyny” and suggests
that the “psychological demands of ascetic celibacy” go a long way towards
explaining its ubiquity in certain genres of Buddhist texts (Sponberg 1992: 20).
Nancy Schuster (1984) also pursues something like this line of thinking.
25 Based on inscriptional evidence showing that nuns were active as donors, had dis-
ciples, and carried monastic titles, Schopen argues that nuns’ communities were far
from marginal during the first half of the first millennium (Schopen 2004: 329–330).
26 However, Charlene Makley makes the point that Buddhist feminist apologists such
as Rita Gross over-emphasize certain Maha-ya-na scriptures (for instance, the
Vimalakı‑rti-su-tra with its famous body-swapping, monk-humiliating goddess) that
radically question the importance of gender (Makley 2005: 269, note 24).
27 Recent publications concerning nuns and nunneries in Tibetan cultural areas show
how important the Buddhist physiomoral analysis of the female embodiment is in
these contemporary Buddhist communities. Makley observes that, in the Tibetan
area around Labrang, it is assumed that “the female body, burdened by such phy-
siological suffering as menstruation and childbirth, more tightly circumscribes the
mind than a male body” making women’s minds smaller (sems chung-gi ) (Makley
2005: 269–270). Kim Gutschow reports that in Zangskar the sinful (sdig pa can),
woeful (lan chag can), and polluted (grib can) female body is viewed as “a cala-
mity” and “a punishment for previous misdeeds.” Menstruation, childbirth, and
vulnerability to sexual violence, are the central afflictions of female embodiment.
In a region where birth control is little used, infant and maternal mortality rates
high, and ninety percent of women are anemic due to multiple pregnancies and
miscarriages, the equation between the female body and “calamity” is hardly
metaphorical (Gutschow 2004: 212–213). According to Kurtis Schaeffer, similar
statements about the debased nature of the female embodiment are commonplace
in Tibetan hagiography. Schaeffer points to the special poignancy and directness of
such statements in the Life of Orgyan Chokyi, the religious autobiography of a late
18th-, early 19th-century female hermitess from the Dolpo region. He emphasizes
how the text clearly states the explicit association between the female body and
suffering. “This,” writes Schaeffer, “is one of the most important points that can be
drawn from this work in terms of the broader study of Buddhism and gender”
(Schaeffer 2004: 91).
3 Disgust for the Abject Womb

So far, we have examined metaphorical thinking and narrativity in Buddhist

texts about birth. This chapter further addresses the discursive construction of
birth in middle period Indian Buddhist texts, especially the Garbha-vakra-nti-
su-tra, from the point of view of the aesthetics of disgust. The word “aes-
thetics” is employed variously to connote the philosophy of art, the theory of
beauty, and the study of the human sensorium. South Asian Buddhist texts
contain a recurring discourse with obvious aesthetic dimensions − that of the
disgusting body. In Chapter 6 of his Visuddhimagga, for instance, Bud-
dhaghosa lectures on bodily foulness, referencing parasitic worms, dribbling
and oozing effluvia, seeping orifices, greasy films of sweat, and so forth. His
explicit message is that, though people desire one another, if they perceived
the foulness of the body lurking beneath youthful firmness, freshly scrubbed
skin, fragrant oils, and shining ornaments, they would realize that “there is no
place here even the size of an atom fit to lust after” (Buddhaghosa 1976: 345).
But this and other references to the foul body in Buddhist South Asia are
richly descriptive − even, you could say, poetic. Such passages do not merely
argue for or illustrate the disgusting nature of the human body. Rather, with
the help of sensitive auditors (and meditators in Buddhaghosa’s case), they
are generative of disgust. They invite their audiences to respond to them
bodily with closing throat, ringing ears, queasy stomach, wrinkling nose, as
well as an inner turning away that belies fascination.
Buddhist discourses on bodily foulness have commonly been interpreted in
terms of foundational doctrines such as impermanence and suffering, and
traditions of male celibacy (Collins 1997; Hamilton 1995; Sponberg 1992;
Williams 1997). Additionally, certain such passages have been interpreted in
relationship to Buddhist representations of the female. Liz Wilson’s classic
monograph, Charming Cadavers (1996), does the service of distinguishing
between the foulness of the female and male bodies in Indian Buddhism, and
asks why it is that “horrific figurations of the feminine,” as she calls them,
outnumber comparable images of the male body in Buddhist hagiography of
the post-Aśokan period. In his important 1992 on gender and Buddhism,
Alan Sponberg coins the phrase “ascetic misogyny” to typify such “horrific
figurations.” A further strand of scholarly analysis connects the more
76 Amy Paris Langenberg
scatological cases of Buddhist disgust talk to Brahman influence, fingering a
ritual concern for purity and impurity central to that tradition. Sue Hamilton,
for instance, suggests that Buddhaghosa’s extremely negative treatment of the
body is inauthentic, an example of Brahmanized Buddhism, and can be
linked to his Brahman upbringing (Hamilton 1995, 58–60).1 Although Wilson
touches upon it, the aesthetic power of the loathsome − what philosopher of
art Carolyn Korsmeyer has identified as the “savor” of the disgusting − has in
general been neglected in Buddhological scholarship. But Buddhaghosa him-
self acknowledges the savor in the disgusting when, while clearly regarding
the meditative realization of the body’s foulness as a means of battling (not
encouraging) sexual desire, he simultaneously advises against young male
monks contemplating the corpses of women lest necrophilic lust arise. Not
every Buddhist text may compel an overtly aesthetic reading, which focuses
on the “textuality” of the text, its affective dimensions, and its manipulation
of the vibrating space between itself and reader/auditor. Features internal to
Buddhist disgust texts do seem to compel such a reading, however. These
texts do as well as say, reaching right down the gullet and directly affronting
one’s senses.
The chosen object of disgust varies subtly from text to text. Buddhaghosa’s
teaching on graveyard aśubhabha-vana- or “meditation on the inauspicious” is
representative of an important genre of Buddhist disgust texts depicting the
grisly nature of the dying, decomposing, and mutilated body. Liz Wilson’s
work explores Buddhist texts that depict the inner loathsomeness of the sex-
ualized female body. Highly descriptive passages that evoke disgust for the
alimentary body and the aging or sick body can also be found scattered
across Buddhist su-tra, exegetical, and narrative texts. The Garbha-vakra-nti-
su-tra is an example of yet another type of Buddhist disgust text, one that
concerns what Julia Kristeva would call the “abject” maternal body, and is
epitomized by the descriptions of the maternal womb such as the following:

Nanda … that cavity, which is a wound on the body that has arisen from
the maturation of past karma, a dark hole, very disgusting like a toilet,
foul smelling, heaped up with filth, home of many thousands of types of
worms, always dripping, continually in need of being cleaned, vile, always
putrid with semen, blood, filth, and pus, thoroughly putrefied and rotten,
slimy, covered with a perforated skin that is frightful to behold.
(GS 292.1–6; Kritzer 2014: 73)2

This and similar passages can be interpreted in relationship to the aśubha-

bha-vana- tradition of Buddhist meditation, the doctrines of karma and rebirth,
the Buddhist critique of the body as contingent, constructed, and unstable,
and Buddhist misogyny. Although valid and important, these readings are, I
would contend, limited. They deal only with some of the reasons for describ-
ing the maternal womb in the manner exemplified above and do not allow us
to understand the full effects of its repulsive intensity on Buddhist auditors
 Disgust for the Abject Womb 77
3
and readers. Passages such as this one capitalize on a disgust reaction for-
mation centered on female genitalia (as the poet W. B. Yeats has it, “Love has
pitched his mansion in the place of excrement”)4 and a primal recoiling from
what William Ian Miller describes as “rankness, excessiveness, a certain kind
of disorderly productivity and reproductivity that passes beyond lushness into
the rankness of surfeit” (Miller 1997).
The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra is notable for its frequent evocation of disgust in
relationship to the female reproductive body and the birth process that takes
place there. Pursuant of an aesthetic reading of the disgust trope in Buddhist
birth discourse, this chapter explores disgust in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra in
relationship to literary disgust passages from Aśvaghos.a’s Saundarananda and
Harśa’s Na-ga-nanda and through the lenses of Sanskrit poetics and Western
disgust theory. It concludes that, in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, a vomitive
response to the abject mother described therein is, according to the aesthetic
logic of the text, a marker of the greater wisdom of the Buddhist adept, and a
precursor to losing oneself in the transcendent mood of peace. It also argues
that the deployment of the disgust response in the discursive construction of
birth in middle period Indian Buddhist texts had the potential to powerfully
impact how gender was conceptualized, experienced, and performed by Bud-
dhist men and women by reaching right beyond the rational to the lizard
brain.

Justifications for an aesthetic reading of the disgust trope

What is the historical basis for an aesthetic reading of the Garbha-vakra-nti-
su-tra? In fact, the work of Daud Ali, Sheldon Pollock, and Johannes
Bronkhorst has made it impossible to ignore the important influence of an
aesthetically sophisticated court culture on the Buddhist elites who would
have been involved in producing the Buddhist su-tras composed in Sanskrit
that start to appear at the around the turn of the first millennium. The
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra is one such text. It is certain that some Buddhist
monastics, highly educated men like the Buddhist monk Aśvaghos.a (who
may have been a poet at the Kus.a-n.a imperial court), participated in an “aes-
theticized” court society5 if for no other reason than to secure the patronage
of the royal court. In several publications, Daud Ali goes beyond this prag-
matic claim, arguing that the sensibilities and virtues of court society broadly
overlapped with and complimented those of Buddhist monastics (Ali 1998;
Ali 2004). Court society and the monastery were alike in being unproductive
spaces where men could spend free time engaged in ethical self-cultivation,
alike in their cosmopolitan rather than atavistic orientation. If the a-ra-ma or
“pleasure garden” features in ka-vya compositions and Va-tsya-yana’s Ka-ma-
śa-stra as the site where refined pleasures are to be cultivated and pursued,
it figures equally in Buddhist texts as the site of monastic residences and
favored locale for teaching the Dharma (Ali 1998: 174). Though Buddhists
monks and city-dwellers (na-garakas) shared an elite social space, they
78 Amy Paris Langenberg
occupied this space differently, of course. In reading the Ka-maśa-stra and Pa-li-
vinaya side-by-side, Ali notes that for every worldly and pleasure-enhancing
art urged upon the na-garaka by Va-tsya-yana, a parallel practice or behavior
is proscribed in Buddhist monastic discipline. Whereas an urbane towns-
man must ornament and anoint himself, the monk must dress drably and
eschew perfumes and cosmetics. Whereas the urbane townsman must furnish
his public rooms pleasingly with rugs, couches, and cushions, the monk is
specifically forbidden from reclining on a high or broad bed. And so forth. “It
would not be too much …” Ali notes, “to say that the daily routine of the
Buddhist monk formed a complete inversion of the courtier’s life of pleasure”
(Ali 1998: 178) For Ali, this inversion is indicative of a shared idiom, rather
than of incommensurable difference. He also draws parallels between the
courtier’s concern with reading and producing (but not becoming dangerously
seduced by) external love signs (nimitta, aka-ra) as part of a politics of plea-
sure, and the Buddhist practitioner’s detached observation of phenomena
(dharma). Ali’s argument for a “highly complicit relation” (Ali 1998: 179)
between Buddhist and court practices supports an approach that reads Bud-
dhist disgust texts in relationship to aesthetics in addition to doctrine or
ethics.
Sheldon Pollock and Johannes Bronkhorst call attention to an important
historical dimension of the relationship between the aestheticized world of
court society and Buddhist monasticism, speculating on the causes and effects
of the “sanskritization” of Indian Buddhism during the early centuries of the
first millennium. Pollock notes parallel phenomena at the beginning of the
Common Era. On the one hand, the Śaka, Kus.a-n.a and Sa-tava-hana kings
began to use Sanskrit language as a political rather than a liturgical language,
an “instrument of polity” and “source of personal charisma” (Pollock 2006:
73). On the other, Buddhists suddenly began to compose texts in Sanskrit
after preaching and composing texts in a variety of other South Asian lan-
guages and rejecting Sanskrit for half of a millennium. Pollock attributes
these events to the formation of a new worldly cosmopolitanism, something
like the courtly culture and aestheticized political life described by Ali, for
which Sanskrit was the vehicle and the price of admission. He distinguishes
between the use of any particular language as a lingua franca for the sake of
ordinary political and economic transactions (a role he contends Sanskrit did
not play), and the specialized and aesthetically potent literary expression of
political power in a luminous prestige language. He writes, “The work San-
skrit did do was beyond the quotidian and the instrumental; it was directed
above all toward articulating a form of political consciousness and culture,
politics not as transaction of material power – the power of recording deeds,
contracts, tax records, and the like – but as celebration of aesthetic power”
(Pollock 2006: 14). Pollock suggests that in adopting Sanskrit Indian Bud-
dhists did not, in fact, suddenly embrace the vaidika sacrificial worldview of
the Brahmins they had previously rejected. Rather, they made a bid to parti-
cipate in this new poetry of politics and “celebration of aesthetic power”
 Disgust for the Abject Womb 79
(though they interpreted it broadly as including notions of ascetic self-cultivation
and conceptions of transworldly power).
Bronkhorst, who emphasizes the connection between Brahman priests and
the spread of Sanskrit more than does Pollock, explains the situation more
concretely:

The Buddhists might be called upon to defend their interests at the royal
court through legal or philosophical debates in Sanskrit. This left them
little choice. All their textual material had to be available in Sanskrit, and
the Buddhists themselves had to be able to express themselves compe-
tently in that language. The result is known. Sometime during the second
century CE the Buddhists of northwestern India shifted wholesale to Sanskrit.
They did not do so because they liked Sanskrit, or because they liked the
Brahmins whose language it was. Nor did they do so for some inherent
quality that this language supposedly possesses. They did so because they
needed to defend their interests at the royal courts in Sanskrit.
(Bronkhorst 2011: 128–129)

In short, Buddhists became Sanskritists during the first few centuries of

the first millennium C.E., which likely means they became increasingly
sophisticated aesthetes, at least passingly familiar with the rasa theory
expounded in, for instance, the Na-t.yaśa-stra. This shift provides historical
justification for an aesthetic reading of the disgust language of texts like the
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra.
Philosophical and anthropological theories of disgust emerging in Europe
beginning in the mid-18th century provide an additional ahistorical set of
motivations for an aesthetic reading of the disgust trope in Buddhist texts.
Early European theorists (Wincklemann, Mendelssohn, Herder, Lessing)6
focused on aesthetic judgment, producing fine-grained analyses of the classi-
cal canon of beauty in which disgust functions as antithesis and outer
boundary of beauty. Immanuel Kant’s comments on disgust are both the
capstone of this early tradition of German disgust theory and the bridge
between it and later 19th- and 20th-century Western disgust theories. Kant
recognizes the role of disgust in developing a refined aesthetic taste, a faculty
he considers foundational for social coherence among the bourgeois classes
(Menninghaus 2003: 4). Like Kant, later disgust theorists (Freud, Nietzsche,
Bataille, Sartre, Kolnai, Douglas, Kristeva, Rozin, Miller, Nussbaum)7 impli-
cate the disgust reaction in moral, social, and cognitive functions. These more
anthropologically minded theorists insist, each in their own way, that disgust,
a partially conditioned vomitive response to certain sense stimuli, plays a
constitutive role in cognition, meaning-making, and social living. In other
words, for these thinkers, the dynamics of disgust operate far beyond the
rarified world of formal art, governing day-to-day social interactions, inti-
macy, moral development, intellectual attitudes, the assertion of power, and
the dispensing of justice.
80 Amy Paris Langenberg
A full examination of this 250-year-long multifaceted Western conversation
is not possible here, but a few piquant notes are worth rehearsing. The
Austro-Hungarian philosopher, Aurel Kolnai, and the American law pro-
fessor, William Ian Miller, both take a phenomenological approach to the
modalities of the disgust response, cataloguing the sensory inputs and con-
cepts that provoke it. For Kolnai, these include the “circle of associations –
disgust-smell-corruption-secretion-life-nourishment” and well as the “flabby,
slimy, viscous,” the “sticky, semi-fluid and quasi-obtrusively clinging,” bodily
disfiguration, and any excess of fecundity that results in “crawling and
swarming.”8 Kolnai in particular notes the “simply disgusting” nature of
fécondité, citing “disgust at the sight of swelling breasts, swarming broods”
and the fact that “one need only think of the connection to vermin; or of
what is disgusting to the spirit in the idea of effervescent vitality, of a quali-
tatively indifferent, reckless production of embryos and spawn.”9 Miller gives
us a list of binary oppositions, the right-hand element of each lying within the
realm of disgust: inorganic versus organic; human versus animal; dry versus
wet; fluid versus viscid; firm versus squishy; non-adhering versus sticky; still
versus wiggly; uncurdled versus curdled; beauty versus ugliness; ice-cold
versus clammy; hot versus lukewarm (Miller 1997: 38).
The horror of anonymous swarming fécondité, so alien and threatening to
the unitary sovereign self, points to one of disgust’s key functions according
to its Western theorists. As Miller observes, “To feel disgust is human and
humanizing. Those who have very high thresholds of disgust and are hence
rather insensitive to the disgusting we think of as belonging to somewhat
different categories: protohuman like children, subhuman like the mad, or
suprahuman like saints” (Miller 1997: 11). Apropos to these observations,
Miller places three more binaries along the axis of disgust: “one vs. many,”
“us vs. them,” and “me vs. you” (Miller 1997: 38). Freud notes that young
children lack a disgust response and must learn it in order to enter into civi-
lized society.10 Mary Douglas (1966) makes policing bodily pollutants and the
social order isomorphic. In sum, many disgust theorists agree that the disgust
response enables people to mark off the human from the inhuman, the
civilized from the barbaric, the Self from the Other.
The psychoanalytically inclined French feminist philosopher, Julia Kris-
teva, is interested in a subtly different aspect of disgust’s functionality,
emphasizing its role in “abjection.” For Kristeva, the struggle for person-
hood, for becoming “one’s own and clean self, which is the underpinning of
any organization constituted by exclusions and hierarchies” (i.e., civilization),
leads to the abjection of the maternal body from whose “economy of fluidities
and rhythmic impulses” the very young child cannot at first distinguish him-
self (Kristeva 1982: 65; Menninghaus 2003: 371). For Kristeva, the maternal
body never really achieves the status of differentiated and essentialized object
but remains a “vortex of summons and repulsion” that “threatens one’s own
and clean self” (Kristeva 1982: 1, 65). The “primal repression” of the abjected
mother involves symbolically (and physically) protecting the self from its
 Disgust for the Abject Womb 81
milk-engorged, bloody, jelly-like origins, back into which it feels itself con-
tinuously at risk of disappearing (indeed, to which it sometimes wishes to
return in dreams). Disgust for the maternal body (and all of its symbolic
equivalents) is a vital ally in this repressive effort, as it helps to “dam up the
abject or demoniacal potential of the feminine,” and generate “a loathing of
defilement as protection against the poorly controlled power of mothers”
(Kristeva 1982: 65, 77).11 As evidenced by the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra and
related traditions, the maternal body is one of the chief targets of disgust talk
in South Asian Buddhism, which is predicted by Kristeva’s theory.
The French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre also explores disgust in a manner
deeply resonant with South Asian Buddhism. For Sartre, nausea (a feeling-
state closely related to disgust) is the only possible response to the “utter
contingency and senseless facticity” of existence, an existence that is always
too damp, fusty, mealy, tepid, and spongy (Menninghaus 2003: 357). In this
sense, existential nausea is ultimately a beneficial state as it takes one behind
and beyond the deeply tiresome spectacle of ordinary life to an experience of
Pure Being. Seeming to return to the wellspring of European disgust theory
(i.e., 18th-century German aesthetics) at the last, Sartre takes refuge in the
inevitability of art, which, unlike ordinary life, has the beautiful and contra-
disgusting qualities of “hardness, transparency, dryness, and clear coldness”
(Menninghaus 2003: 361). Notably, these qualities are reminiscent of the gem-
like realms where Buddhas dwell according to Maha-ya-na su-tra texts such as
the Sukha-vativyu-ha.
European and American philosophies of disgust suggest a range of possi-
bilities for an aesthetic reading of the disgust trope in Sanskrit Buddhism that
go beyond the theoretical concerns of Sanskrit poetics. In their specifics, many
might prove inappropriate to the South Asian context, their application bring-
ing the risk of repetition of the colonial moment. Still, at the very least, the weight
and bulk of Euro-American disgust theory presses upon us the knowledge that
the dimensionality of Buddhist evocations of the loathsome cannot be encom-
passed by flat doxastic discussions of the impermanent body or reminders that
male celibacy is central to Buddhist monasticism. As these theorists have
recognized, evocations of disgust are eloquent of a broad range of human
concerns – gender hierarchy, sexuality, moral condescension, individuation,
socially significant forms of physical beauty – some of which may be explicitly
named in the texts where they occur, others of which may not be. To ignore
the sensuality and emotional potency of the disgust trope is to miss a key
aspect of textuality in South Asian Buddhism and of the South Asian dis-
course on birth. The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra emits a greasy miasma, a sweetish
whiff of the de trop of embodied existence that ought not to be ignored.

Theorizations of disgust in Sanskrit poetics

Examining how disgust functioned in the aesthetic world of the middle period
to which it belonged provides a less anachronistic, more local approach to the
82 Amy Paris Langenberg
disgust trope in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra. Aśvaghos.a,12 one of the earliest
ka-vya poets known, invokes the foulness of the female body in Canto 8 of his
Saundarananda. 13 This epic poem focuses on the Nanda story that also forms
the frame story of the garbha-vakra-nti teaching in our su-tra text. Nanda, scion
of the Śa-kya clan, has been unwillingly ordained by his half-brother, the
Buddha. Handsome, rich, and besotted, Nanda sits miserably in his hated
monk’s robes, contemplating his beloved, the incomparable Sundarı‑, whom
he longs for day and night. An older ascetic has made a project of the
unpromising Nanda and attempts to convince him to take a more wholesome
view of womankind. “Don’t you see that the body of desirable women is a
filthy streaming house of evil?” (SauN 8.47cd)14 “Let’s distinguish,” he says,
“the purity they are born with” from the shining ointments, cosmetics, and
silks with which they adorn themselves (SauN 8.50d):

If today your Sundarı‑ were naked, dressed only in dirt and excretions, her
nails, teeth, and hair in their natural state, she definitely wouldn’t be your
Sundarı‑. What ardent man (saghr.n.a) would touch a woman, leaking
impurities like a perforated pot, if she weren’t covered with skin, though
it is only as thin as a fly’s wing? If even when you regard the body of
women as a cage of bones covered over with skin you are still pulled about
forcefully by desire, [this shows that] passion is neither warm feeling
(aghr.n.a)15 nor satisfaction.
(SauN 8.51–53)

While an interpretation based on the Buddhist identification of desire with

suffering and the benefits of celibacy would certainly explain the didactic
message of the above passage, it doesn’t address the fact that this evocation of
the disgusting female form is itself embellished and full of guile, like the
entrancing Sundarı‑ herself. We have, for instance, the reference to the thinness
and fragility of her skin, which is compared to a “fly’s wing” − not the wing
of a butterfly but the iridescent wings of an insect that feeds on offal. We also
have the curious image of her “cage of bones” which suggests something
both delicate and entrapping. And then there is the echo of saghr.n.a/aghr.n.a,
two related terms juxtaposed to suggest that ardent feelings are, para-
doxically, not characterized by warm feeling in a positive sense. Furthermore,
this passage, in which Sundarı‑ is imaginatively stripped of her ornaments,
should be considered in relationship to the meanings associated with orna-
mentation in Indian artistic tradition in general. As Vidya Dehejia notes, in
Sanskrit poetics and Indian sculptural tradition ornamentation is neither
superficial nor excessive. Rather it “makes adequate” (alam -
. kara), protects,
perfects, and renders auspicious the human body (Dehejia 2009: 24–25). In
imaginatively stripping a woman of her ornament, the old ascetic proposes a
profound deconstruction of conventional notions of female beauty, but again
“makes adequate” the aesthetic moment using a different mode of artifice:
that of disgust. In sum, to read this passage with concern only for its
 Disgust for the Abject Womb 83
relationship to Buddhist doctrine and practice is surely to miss out on several
layers of meaning.
.
The erotic (śr.nga-ra), the carrying mood or rasa of most works of Sanskrit
literature, is prominent in the Saundarananda, which devotes several chapters
-
to gorgeous descriptions Nanda and Sundarı‑’s love.16 Anandavardhana, the
ninth-century author of the Dhvanya-loka, recognizes the erotic as the most
delicate of all aesthetic moods and also the most likely to appeal to the
audience. He advises that, in general, the delicate flavor of love should not be
combined with the disgusting, which is obstructive to it, because a tasteless
mixture with little aesthetic appeal will result.17 According to the Na-t.ya-
śa-stra, one of the earliest Sanskrit treatises18 to deal with the subject of rasa,
mood or aestheticized emotion, “the reason a meaning (artha) communicates
with the heart is the arising of rasa; [rasa] consumes the entire body like fire
consumes a dry stick” (NŚ 7.7). It is no wonder, then, that aestheticians
foregrounded the erotic but found the bı‑bhatsa rasa, the aesthetic mood of
loathsomeness, troublesome. The Sanskrit term bı‑bhatsa is the desiderative
form of the verb √ba-dh which means “to drive away,” “to repel,” “to remove.”
Indeed, loathsomeness calls for the connoisseur to recoil rather than vibrate
sympathetically. According to Adheesh Sathaye, the poetic engagement with
unpleasurable emotions such as loathsomeness, fear, and grief posed a pro-
blem generally for Sanskrit poets. If the literary experience was meant to
pleasure the reader/auditor and if he in turn was meant to be a partner in the
generation of aestheticized emotion, then what role could unpleasurable rasas
play in the poetic experience (Sathaye: 364)? 19
While a sustained engagement with bı‑bhatsa may have posed certain chal-
lenges within an idealized aesthetic world that placed a high value on refined
pleasure and foregrounded courtly love and heroism, the delicate play of
rasas, one against another, even within a single sentence or stanza, still pro-
vided opportunities for poets to introduce a touch of the disgusting here and
there to good effect. For instance, in a verse quoted by Abhinavagupta, the
-
eleventh-century commentator on Anandavardhana’s Dhvanya-loka, lovely
heavenly maidens look upon and embrace the horrific corpses of warriors
rotting on the battlefield prior to leading them up to Indra’s heaven for their
reward (Ingalls 1990: 527–528). Abhinava insists that here the loathsome is not
obstructive to the erotic because of the intervening rasa of the heroic. A similar
interpretation is difficult for our Saundarananda passage. Nanda is not heroic
and, for Aśvaghos.a, the point of juxtaposing the erotic and the disgusting
seems precisely to be the obstruction of the erotic mood.20
David Gitomer’s work on Bhat.t.a Na-ra-yan.a’s play, the Ven.‑ısam -
. hara (700
AD) suggests another possibility regarding the reception of Aśvaghos.a’s use
of the bı‑bhatsa rasa by aesthetically sensitive audiences (Gitomer 2000).21 In
attempting to interpret a prologue in the Ven.‑ısam - -
. hara involving a raks.asa
(demon) couple who are feasting on corpses of Kaurava warriors slain in the
Maha-bha-rata war, Gitomer explores the comic sentiment in Sanskrit literary
tradition. Surveying works of aesthetics starting with the Na-t.ya-śa-stra,
84 Amy Paris Langenberg
Gitomer finds that the comic is generally identified as things vikr.ta, a term
translatable as “changed,” “altered,” “strange,” or even “deformed,” “dis-
figured,” or “mutilated.” Gitomer applies this tradition to his ra-ks.asa couple,
arguing that their scene weds the humorous and the disgusting to achieve a
flavor of comedy comparable to what is known in European aesthetic tradi-
tion as “the grotesque.” In Sanskrit literary theory, examples of bı‑bhatsa are
invariably drawn from burning-ground or śmaśa-na poetry that describes ra-k-
s.asa adorning themselves with and feasting together on human remains.22
These are, as Gitomer has it, “always witty,” and, because they often parody
the erotic mood in perversely charming ways, “never ultimately disgusting”
(Gitomer 1991: 90; see also Gitomer 2000: 221).
This typical use of the bı‑bhatsa rasa to create grotesque comedy also does
not seem to apply to our passage, however.23 Though the audience might
grimace in bitter agreement, the old monk’s persuasive comments regarding
the inner ugliness of women are not obviously comic in Gitomer’s sense nor
are they particularly witty. Rather, his description of Sundarı‑ as “leaking
impurities like a perforated pot” and reference to touching a flayed woman
are not only genuinely disgusting but also sad for Nanda, whose ethical
worldview is in the midst of collapse.
E. H. Johnston, an early editor of the Saundarananda, suggests that these
and other comments from the old ascetic about female treachery can be descri-
bed as satirical (Johnston 1928: xcvii). It is true that disgust is frequently an
element in Sanskrit literary satire. Fabrizia Baldissera translates an array of
passages from Sanskrit satires written between the sixth and the eleventh
centuries. Her texts lovingly describe disgusting bodies that reflect the moral
rot, hypocrisy, or pathos of their owners. For instance, in the Narmama-la-,
Ks.emendra skewers venal bureaucrats (ka-yastha) “who caused a number of
illnesses, for, like constipated stools, as long as they were in a low position
were very soft, but in a matter of seconds, as soon as they rose up, became
hard” (Baldissera 2009: 96). Linda Covill also believes this section to be
satirical, arguing that “the śraman.a’s opinions are so fanatical and overstated
as to become almost humorous, and are not to be taken at face value” (Covill
2009: 44).24 Covill notes that the monk’s acid attack on women is not attrib-
uted to the Buddha or to any of his better-known disciples and must be
bracketed as narrowly directed at Nanda’s obsessive nature (Covill 2009: 44).
Successful satire requires that the reader/auditor be temporarily implicated
in the crimes of those depicted. This identification is what produces the
uncomfortable smirks of satire. In the case of our Saundarananda passage,
however, the target audience, which is elite and male, is certainly not impli-
cated in Sundarı‑’s crime of loathsome femaleness. They may feel themselves
complicit in Nanda’s romantic nature, or the old ascetic’s misogyny, but these
possibilities also seem unlikely as eroticism is a heroic trait in the aesthetic
world of the court, not a crime, and female inferiority a basic moral truth.
Covill’s apologetic distancing also makes little sense considering how utterly
pervasive such descriptions of women’s bodies and women’s natures are in
 Disgust for the Abject Womb 85
Indian Buddhist literature. In short, I find the argument for satire weak. If
anything, the śraman.a’s speech resembles more closely the Greek genre called
“diatribe.” I return, then, to the conclusion that the erotic mood of the
Saundarananda, prominent in its early cantos, is not parodied or satirized but
vitiated by the disgusting in our passage.25
If the disgusting in Aśvaghos.a’s Saundarananda is not a delicious, just shy
of overripe, undertaste, and if it isn’t grotesque, or satirical, how is it that
Aśvaghos.a’s text achieves aesthetic success (which its survival through the
centuries suggests it must have done)? How might our passage have been
received by a sahr.daya in the aestheticized environment of court society? Here
-
the literary theories of Anandavardhana and Abhinavagupta, though both
inhabited quite a different historical milieu than Aśvaghos.a and were appar-
ently not aware of his works, suggest an alternative that allows us to regard
Aśvaghos.a’s use of the loathsome as innovative rather than irrelevant and
-
dour (Ingalls 1990: 5). Both Ananda and Abhinava argue for the existence of
a ninth aesthetic mood, the peaceful (śa-nta) rasa, even though their critics
object that it does not “appeal to the heart” and cannot be “relished”
-
(rasyama-n.a) (Ingalls 1990: 524).26 For Ananda, the creation of the aesthetic
mood of peace requires the sahr.daya to possess the stable underlying emotion
(stha-yı‑bha-va) of vaira-gya − detachment, aversion, or indifference − a state
related to though less somatic than the stha-yı‑bha-va of bı‑bhatsa, which is
revulsion ( jugupsa-).27 Abhinava suggests that peacefulness can sometimes
take the form of revulsion (jugupsa-) with respect to the sense objects, but
assures us that revulsion never becomes a permanent emotion within the
peaceful mode because “at the final stage of the peaceful it is eradicated”
(Ingalls 1990: 525). According to Adheesh Sathaye, those literary critics that
-
accepted Ananda’s theories of dhvani and rasa agreed that the peace-inducing
other-worldliness of the aesthetic experience meant that even unpleasurable
emotions, potently called forth through language, need not ultimately result in
heightened anxiety or displeasure for the audience (Sathaye 2010: 364). This
is because, as Arindam Chakrabarti eloquently has it, “a simple stable emo-
tion (sthayi bhava) [sic.] is not yet the fully relishable savour called ‘rasa.’
Only when this sentiment is delinked from any egoistic worldly pragmatic
concern and depersonalized, then a certain heart, resonating in sympathy
with other similar hearts, loses itself completely in the wondrous subjective
tasting of the sentiment” (Chakrabarti 2001: 352). In other words, it is not the
stable sentiment itself that one is left with at the conclusion of aesthetic
enjoyment, but the “inward yet unselfish intuitive experience of it”(Chakrabarti
2001: 352).
It is possible to see Aśvaghos.a’s poem, in which Nanda eventually aban-
dons his happy and sexually passionate marriage and settles down to the
-
monastic life, as an early literary work in which Ananda’s and Abhinava’s
ninth aesthetic mood prevails. In the second to last stanza of his poem,
Aśvaghos.a explicitly states its purpose to be moks.a (release) and says that it
has been “fashioned out of the medicine of poetry” but has been composed
86 Amy Paris Langenberg
“for tranquility, not for [sensual] pleasure (rati )” (SauN 18.63). In the Saun-
darananda, the mood of peacefulness is ascendant, with both disgust and the
erotic eradicated in the end. The triumph of the śa-nta rasa, the finest of all
aesthetic enjoyments, does not diminish the emotional importance and power
of the loathsome in Aśvaghos.a’s poem but rather amplifies it. For the reader,
vibrating with the emotions of sensuous Nanda, the erotic pulls one way, the
loathsome the other. Both arouse and thrill the senses and generate a distilled
aesthetic mood, but neither result ultimately in any anxiety or degradation,
because both are experienced in a pure and depersonalized manner. Ideally,
both give way in the final reckoning to the higher pleasure of śa-nta.28 Thus, in
the Saundarananda, and, I suspect, in other South Asian Buddhist contexts
where the intention is that a rarified mood of egoless tranquility should pre-
vail, disgust operates as a modality of heightened aesthetic response rather
than as a damper to it. It is part of the “medicine of poetry.” This under-
standing mitigates against a flat reading that confines itself to the role of
foulness in generating a cool cognitively-based disengagement with the body
and sexuality. Indeed, Abhinavagupta argues extensively that peacefulness is
something that can be aesthetically apprehended, even though it is marked by
the cessation of yearning for sense desires and is marked, in its final stage, by
a cessation of mental action. He even compares the final stage of peacefulness
to sexual climax (which is the final stage of the erotic mood) in that this state
also defies description (Ingalls 1990: 521).
My second example, taken from Harśa’s play Na-ga-nanda, lends support to
this reading. In fact, the Na-ga-nanda analogizes the aesthetic thrill of the
loathsome and erotic rasas all but explicitly. This play tells the story of Prince
Jı‑mu-tava-hana, who falls in love with the Siddha princess, Malayavatı‑. He is
impossibly handsome. She is stunning. Both are pious and morally pure. In
the first half of the play, they pine for one another and then are united. This
romance comprises acts one through three. Acts four and five contain a dif-
ferent sort of narrative. On the day after his wedding to Malayavatı‑, Jı‑mu-ta-
va-hana walks by the seashore with his new brother-in-law. They meet a young
Na-ga prince who has been offered to Garuda by his own father, the Na-ga
king, in hopes of placating the mighty bird and preventing the widespread
destruction of the Na-ga race. Following the example set by the Bodhisattva in
many avada-na and ja-taka narratives, Jı‑mu-tava-hana eagerly offers himself in
the Na-ga prince’s stead. What follows is loathsome indeed. Garuda dips his
beak into Jı‑mu-tava-hana’s torso and consumes his vital innards. We hear of
disembowelment, crown jewels flecked with fleshy bits of scalp, cruel beaks
dripping with gore, the gleaming heaped up piles of bones from past victims,
and so forth. The narrative structure of this interesting and strange play
implicitly equates the thrill of erotic love with the thrill of renunciation in the
form of a bloody Promethean self-sacrifice. This parallel is made explicit in
one passage that seems to epitomize the visceral aesthetic potency of renun-
ciation, and the way that disgust for the body feeds or heightens this thrill.
Here, Jı‑mu-tava-hana, who has a short time previously proclaimed the body to
 Disgust for the Abject Womb 87
be a “storehouse of all uncleanness” (NA 2.47), dons his red wedding gar-
ments and mounts the execution rock. He touches it, enraptured. “Oh the feel
of it!” he breathes. “I don’t think Malayavatı‑, moist with the oil of Malaya
sandalwood, has ever pleased me in the way this torture rock, touched to
satisfy a longed-for desire, gratifies me!” (NA 2.54)29 Garuda then sweeps
down to plunge his beak into the hero’s chest, grip him with his sharp talons,
and bear him up to the mountainside to devour him. A short time later, while
shredding and swallowing him bit by bit, Garuda wonders at the attitude of
his victim, who seems ecstatic, and who “bristles with delight wherever a limb
is not [yet] torn away” (NA 2.63). Rather than abandoning sense contact and
heightened emotion, it seems that the bodhisattva-like Jı‑mu-tava-hana simply
substitutes the delicious experience of a grisly death for all the modalities of
erotic desire. For their part, as sensitive readers, the courtiers of Harśa’s court
are called upon to rise to the aesthetic mood of bı‑bhatsa, to be temporarily
disturbed and destabilized in the special aesthetic space created by the text,
and in the end to taste peace.30

Disgust in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra

The passages just analyzed from Aśvaghos.a’s epic poem and Harśa’s play
exemplify two typical modes of Buddhist disgust talk. One depicts the inner
foulness of the sexualized female (deceptively covered over by young per-
fumed skin), the other the grisly nature of the dying, decomposing, or muti-
lated body. The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra is an especially sustained example of a
third type of Buddhist disgust text: one focused on the reproductive female
body and its functions. Besides the passage cited at the beginning of this
essay, the core text (as opposed to the Nanda frame story) contains numerous
others, large and small, that reference the oozing, stinking, excrement-filled
womb of the mother and the nauseating experiences of birth. For instance,
the Buddha evokes disgust directly in expressing his opinion of birth: “In the
same way that even a little vomit stinks, Nanda, even the momentary con-
ception of a tiny [new] life is suffering.” (GS 251.5–7). The womb is described
repeatedly as a “filthy, putrid, blazing bog” (Kritzer 2014: 51–52), the fetus is
said to crouch between stomach and intestine as though bound and impaled
with a sharp spike (Kritzer 2014: 69), and the experience of the newborn
infant is likened to that of a flayed ox being eaten by insects or a leper with a
decaying, damaged, dripping body suffering under the whip (Kritzer
2014:74). The newborn’s body also becomes a breeding ground for a vast
array of parasitical worms, which burrow into every possible bodily tissue.
Each worm and each bodily tissue is lovingly named and enumerated (Kritzer
2014: 75–80). These more minor evocations of disgust culminate in a symph-
ony of slimy fluids, repulsive odors, and oozing filth later in the text. Long
hyperbolic descriptions of the fetal experience of the womb such as the fol-
lowing are repeated (with variations) four times in the “four garbha-vakra-ntis”
section of the su-tra, and once in the 38th week of the embryology:
88 Amy Paris Langenberg
Covered just by skin, a piled-up mass of excrement, growing hair and
nails and teeth and body hair … (it sits) … in (a place) rotten with the
moistness of rancid snot and putrid, completely filled with fat, pus the
stench of sweat, saliva, bile, phlegm, lungs, small intestine, colon, spleen,
bladder, and many varieties of filth, a dwelling for many thousands of
types of worms that has two very foul-smelling openings, that has many
bone holes and pore holes, and that is defiled by a mass of urine, brains,
brain membrane, and marrow. Because menstrual fluids come forth each
month it expands. Because the various foods of the mother are chewed
fine by the two rows of teeth and swallowed in the throat, and the flavor
of the food, which moistened from below with the filth of the wound that
is the mouth and with spit and, filled with cranial membrane from above,
is like vomit, enters inside from a hole in the umbilical cord, it grows and
transforms [through the embryological stages] … and its arms, legs and
jaws are wrapped in a thin skin covering. It wanders above and below in
a foul-smelling, horrible-smelling, dark, slimy (place) which is like a
toilet.
(Kritzer 2014: 90–91)31

There is no need to quote more, but the passage does continue on. How can
the aesthetics of disgust aid our understanding of this and other disgust texts
that pepper the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra?
According to the conceit of the su-tra, the Buddha preaches the Descent of
the Embryo teaching to his half-brother Nanda, the same Nanda who is the
hero of Aśvaghos.a’s poem.32 The Lord has convinced his half-brother, who in
this telling (as in Aśvaghos.a’s) is terribly in love with his wife Sundarı‑, to
become a monk, but only with the greatest difficulty. Nanda is a man of
strong passions. In fact, in lieu of using reasoned discourse to persuade
Nanda of the virtues of dispassion, the Buddha must slowly wean Nanda
away from his recalcitrant sexual obsession by generating in him a series of
increasingly wholesome substitute emotions. The first of these is family loy-
alty and honor. In order to exploit Nanda’s profound sense of obligation to
Himself as an older male relative, the Lord intentionally leaves Nanda’s house
without his alms bowl, making it necessary for Nanda to follow behind car-
rying it. When the two of them reach the viha-ra, Nanda submits to a hasty
ordination, out of respect for his older brother. Unfortunately, Nanda makes
a terrible monk. He is miserable and disaffected, plotting always to escape
and rejoin his wife. The second substitute emotion is an unfulfilled lust for
heavenly maidens. Playing upon Nanda’s obvious appreciation for beautiful
women, the Lord magically transports Nanda to the heavens, where Nanda’s
passion for Sundarı‑ quickly gives way to a desire for the ravishing divine
maidens who dwell there. Nanda admits that they are more beautiful than
Sundarı‑ to the same degree that Sundarı‑ is more beautiful than a one-eyed
aging she-ape they happen to encounter on the way. The Lord promises these
maidens to Nanda in the next life as a reward for monastic virtue in the
 Disgust for the Abject Womb 89
present one. After his return from the heavens, Nanda stays within the bounds
of monastic discipline for a time. He does so insincerely, however, and only
for the purpose of earning his unchaste reward. The Buddha knows that the
real fruit of such falseness is a tenure in the hell realms, not an orgiastic idyll
in the company of the heavenly maidens (apsaras). Thus, the last passion to
which he submits Nanda is the terror of hell. He magically transports Nanda
to the hell realms, where Nanda spies a fiery cauldron standing empty, ready
to receive him after his death. Nanda generates intense terror. This terror
purifies his heart, softens his resistance, and makes him ready finally to
receive the Dharma. Upon his return from the hell realms, the Buddha gives
him the teaching called Descent of the Embryo.
The ruling rasa of the Descent of the Embryo teaching is bı‑bhatsa, but its
ultimate purpose is to generate in Nanda, and by extension, in the Nandas
making up its audience, the transcendent mood of peace (śa-nta) that dom-
inates the feeling state of a renouncer. In effect, the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra as a
whole (frame story plus embedded teaching) creates a ladder of emotions,
starting with the sexual satiation of a man in love with a particular woman,
progressing through ennobling family loyalty, to a more abstract sexual
longing for divine women, to cosmological terror, and finally to a recoiling
disgust for existence itself (bı‑bhatsa), here evoked by means of revolting
descriptions of the maternal womb. Just as the Buddha softens and prepares
Nanda by degrees, the su-tra also prepares the sensitive auditor for the culmi-
nating emotion of peace (śa-nta) by rousing him to a gradated series of emo-
tions and penultimately to an aestheticized experience of disgust, bı‑bhatsa.
Though rooted in basic emotions such as a primal horror at teeming life, a
distaste for jelly-like ooze, and genital revulsion, the disgust experience this
text provokes is “aestheticized” by virtue of its careful staging and connection
to the higher ideals of the Dharma. The śa-nta rasa that is the culmination of
Nanda’s education, and of the auditors’ reception of the text, is the dialecti-
cally produced product of the bı‑bhatsa rasa. It is therefore experienced as a
heightened aesthetic pleasure, vibrating with feeling, the final delicious decoc-
tion of a complex alchemy of emotion. This final stage, in which revulsion
fades into tranquility but tranquility retains the undertaste of revulsion, is not
dissimilar from the ghoulish ecstasy of the bodhisattva-like Jimu-tava-hana in
Harśa’s Na-ga-nanda and Roquentin’s existential nausea cum apprehension of
Pure Being in Sartre’s La Nausée.
Bı‑bhatsa does additional work for the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra that, while
difficult to conceptualize from the perspective of Sanskrit poetics alone, is
brought into focus by certain theoretical frameworks from the Western dis-
gust tradition. According to Freud, Miller, Kolnai and others, the ability to
experience genital disgust and horror at teeming fecundity marks the distinc-
tion between the human and the inhuman, the civilized and the barbaric.
Kristeva further indicates the ways in which contempt for organic fertility is
coded female and aligns symbolically with the figure of the abject mother. To
reject, therefore, the abject mother, whose repulsive genitals suppurate with
90 Amy Paris Langenberg
life, is to become “one’s own and clean self,” to elevate oneself above incho-
ate, regressive, and dangerous longings. Something like this dynamic operates,
I would suggest, in the Garbha-vakra-nti tradition. In this Buddhist context,
however, the abject maternal body marks not what is inhuman, uncivilized, or
infantile, but what is unawakened, ignorant, desirous. To truly reject the abject
womb is to elevate oneself into an awakened state. A Buddha is, after all, by
definition someone not touched by the filth of the womb. A robust South Asian
Buddhist tradition of depicting all bodhisattvas’ final births as wondrous, pain-
free, and pure, which will be discussed in depth in the next chapter, supports
this additional reading of disgust in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra.
William Ian Miller writes, “To feel disgust is human and humanizing.” In
the affective world of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, this statement must be revised
to read: “To feel disgust is to be awake. To be disgusting is human.” Further-
more, in this tradition it is particularly disgusting to be female and human,
and particularly wise to experience disgust when faced with what is female
and human. Though his disgust may find its beginnings in ordinary affects
like genital-revulsion, the cultivated Buddhist auditor of this text, who iden-
tifies both with Nanda and the suffering fetus, lets go of selfish pragmatic
concerns, joining his heart with other sympathetic hearts, and losing himself
in the wondrous revelry of bı‑bhatsa. In this, he is much like the educated
courtier enjoying a well-written and correctly performed Sanskrit drama. His
revelry softens and refines him, readying him for the even more refined
ecstasy of transcendent wisdom.

Notes
1 There are compelling reasons to locate the origins of at least some gendered dis-
courses on bodily foulness not in Brahminism, but in the Buddhist tradition’s own
ambivalent relationship to women, an argument I develop in Chapter 6.
2 Kritzer’s translation. Similar language occurs at Kritzer (2014: 90–91, 94, 95).
3 Buddhaghosa’s treatise contains a similar passage, as does Vasubandhu’s Abhid-
-
harmakośabha-s.ya, See also Candrakı‑rti’s commentary on Aryadeva’s Catuḥśataka,
-
Candragomin’s Śis.yalekha, and Śantideva’s Bodhicaryavata-ra. This is not an
-
exhaustive list.
4 From Yeats’s poem “Crazy Jane talks with the Bishop.”
5 Daud Ali includes in “court society” not only the king and other denizens of the
palace itself but also the wealthy city-dwellers (na-garaka) who were “part of the
court’s wider social penumbra” and made up the ruling classes in early India (Ali
1998: 166).
6 See Menninghaus (2003) and Korsmeyer (2011).
7 This is not meant to be an exhaustive list. See Menninghaus (2003); Nussbaum
(2004); Miller (1997); Douglas (1966); Rozin and Fallon (1987); Kristeva (1982).
8 From Kolnai’s masterpiece, “Der Ekel.” Translated and quoted in Menninghaus
(2003: 17–18).
9 Translated and quoted in Menninghaus (2003: 18).
10 For Freud on disgust see Miller (1997: 109–115) and Menninghaus (2003: 183–226).
11 In her famous work on purity and pollution, the anthropologist Mary Douglas
says something similar. She contends that conditioned disgust responses police
 Disgust for the Abject Womb 91
social distinctions in cases where legal or ritual demarcations are vague, ambiva-
lent, or weak. For instance, menstrual blood is more heavily laden with notions of
impurity in social environments in which women hold symbolic or legal power. In
this way, disgust makes it possible to disdain and partially turn away from sexually
mature women as the periodic source of repellent filth without actually hating
them, enslaving them, or acting to destroy them. See Douglas (1966, 2002: 140–158)
and “Menstruation and Couvade” in Douglas (1975). South Asian Buddhist
notions of female impurity will be explored at length through the lens of Douglas’s
theory in Chapter 6.
12 Scholarly consensus places Aśvaghos.a in the first century, and possibly at the court
of the emperor Kanis.ka (127–140 C.E.), but this is far from certain. Patrick Olivelle
believes that he may have lived somewhat later (Aśvaghos.a 2008: xix–xx). Colo-
phons identify Aśvaghos.a as Suvarn.a-ks.‑ıputra from Sa-keta, ancient capital of
Kosala (and modern day Ayodhya). For a review of scholarship on the Saundar-
ananda, including scholarly discussions about the identity of its author, and a
useful study of its main themes, see Covill (2009).
13 The passage used as an example in this paper is from Canto 8, entitled “The
Attack on Women,” (strı‑vigha-ta) of the Saundarananda. Another similar passage
occurs in Canto 5 of the Buddhacarita (“The Departure,” abhinis.kraman.a) and
describes the bodhisattva gazing upon sleeping courtesans not with desire but with
disgust: “another girl likewise was lying there, her hair disheveled and hanging
loose, her clothes and ornaments slipping down from her waist, her necklaces
scattered, like a statue of a girl trampled by an elephant; although genteel and
endowed with beauty, others were snoring with their mouths agape, without any
shame and out of control, with limbs distorted and arms extended, sleeping in
immodest pose; others looked revolting, lying as if dead, their jewelry and their
garlands fallen down, unconscious, with eyes unblinking, the whites gazing in a
fixed stare; another was lying as if she was drunk, mouth wide open and saliva
oozing, legs wide open and genitals exposed, body distorted, looking repulsive”
(BC 5.58–61). Olivelle’s translation. Canto 9 of the Saundarananda contains refer-
ences to the impurity and unattractiveness of Nanda’s own male body, but, in
these, bodily loathsomeness is referenced but not aesthetically called forth through
language. See, for instance, SauN 9.25–27 and 9.37.
14 Translations are mine unless otherwise noted.
15 Johnston, an editor of the Saundarananda, says the feminine noun ghr.n.a-: “is the
term for the compassionate disgust felt by a man of true insight for the objects of
mundane existence; e.g. on seeing a woman, an ordinary man may take a liking or
dislike to her or may be unmoved, but in any case he is subject to the conception
(parikalpa) he has formed of her as a woman. The man of insight on the other hand
looks on her as a mere aggregate of the elements and impure at that, and the feeling of
ghr.n.a- arises in him” (Johnston 1928: 157). He doesn’t provide a reason for conflating
what could be seen as alternative rather than complementary meanings of ghr.n.a-
(emotional warmth, disgust) in his definition (“compassionate disgust”). He seems to
base this reading on his understanding of the male Buddhist ascetic’s posture towards
the opposite sex. I have never come across any compelling evidence that the Buddhist
rhetoric of the loathsome female body contains an element of compassion. Franklin
Edgerton’s Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Dictionary does not contain an entry for ghr.n.a-,
aghr.n.a, or saghr.n.a.
Dhanañjaya (tenth century) states that either śr.nga-ra or vı‑ra should be the pre-
.
16
dominant rasa. Bhoja (11th century) states that in fact all rasas are manifestations of
.
“a higher-order passion (śr.nga-ra)” (Sathaye 2010).
17 But an obstructing rasa may be seasoned with the erotic if the purpose is to
increase its appeal. Thus, the Dhvanya-loka reads, “A touch of the erotic is not a fault
92 Amy Paris Langenberg
if done in order to beautify the poem so as to attract the audience-to-be-improved”
(Ingalls 1990: 529).
18 The dating of this text is problematic. Ali, following D. C. Sircar, places the two
recensions available to modern scholarship in the early Gupta period (Ali 2004: 80
n. 39).
19 According to the Na-t.ya-śa-stra, only low-caste characters and women are supposed
to express or invoke the emotions of disgust and fear (Bharata 1986: 67).
20 The disconnect between the ascetic ethic professed by monastic characters in the
Saundarananda, and the world of refined but politically charged human inter-
change found at court may help to explain the widespread lampooning of reli-
gious mendicants, monks, and nuns in classical literary works of India (Siegel
1987: 208–229).
21 Also alert to the sometimes thin membrane between disgust and humor, Anne
Monius discusses satirical uses of disgust and fearsomeness in Śaivite and Jain
literature from medieval South India (Monius 2004).
22 For examples of the cemetery theme, see Vidya-kara (1965: 398–401).
23 Unlike many Sanskrit dramas, maha-ka-vyas are not usually funny. Peterson attri-
butes the seriousness of tone in court epic to “its fully idealized world” (Peterson
2003: 12).
24 I find Covill’s suggestion of humor opaque. I don’t think that Covill is suggesting
that here the poet means to introduce a formal element of humor by invoking the
ha-sya rasa proper. Does she mean that the apparent fanaticism of the passages in
question is humorous to us, the contemporary reader? It is not clear.
25 It is interesting to consider Aśvaghos.a’s humorless use of disgust to vitiate the
erotic in light of Ali’s analysis of the aestheticized politics of the court and
Johannes Bronkhorst’s emphasis on the necessity for Buddhists to cope with an
increasingly “brahminized” royal court during the first centuries of the first mil-
lennium. One wonders if, in using disgust in a non-comedic vein, Buddhist court
poets and intellectuals were not opening themselves to ridicule as too self-serious
or inappropriate and tasteless? What is worse in a group then being the one who is
not funny and does not get the jokes? If they were out of step with the idiom of the
erotic, were they not also out of step with the dynamics of power as described by
Ali? Moreover, if their rhetoric of female bodies violated so fundamentally what
Gitomer, following Bakhtin, calls the “canonical body” of the Sanskrit literary
tradition – that is, the gorgeous, nonmaternal, sexually ripe, unchangingly youthful
female form – were they not at odds with the gender regime of the powerful? See
also Dehejia (2009). Of course, one brief example from one Buddhist poem is not
enough to make this case. It is worthwhile to note, however, that the very element
that I find be absent in Aśvaghos.a’s ra-ks.as-ization of desirable women – humor –
is present in unflattering accounts of women’s physiognomy in less elevated Buddhist
narrative traditions.
26 This ninth rasa was first introduced by Udbhat.a in the eighth century. Udbhat.a
was one of the first to import rasa theory from the realm of drama into the study
of literature generally.
27 Emily Hudson says that Abhinava posits śama, not vaira-gya as the stable under-
-
lying emotion of śa-nta. Her interpretation follows Ananda rather than Abhinava.
- - -
In his study of the śanta rasa in the Mahabharata, Gary Tubb follows Abhinava’s
view instead (Hudson 2013: 58–59, especially note 18).
-
28 On the subject of śa-nta, Anandvardhana comments, “It is characterized by the full
development of the happiness that comes from the dying off of desire.” He then
quotes a well-known verse from the Maha-bha-rata epic: “‘The joy of pleasure in this
world and the greater joy of pleasures found in heaven are not worth a sixteenth of
the joy that comes from the dying of desire’” (Ingalls 1990: 520).
29 Compare Bhagavad Gı‑ta- 6.28.
 Disgust for the Abject Womb 93
30 Abhinavagupta attributes the following verse to Bharata: “The emotions arise
from peace, each from its peculiar cause, and when the cause has ceased, they melt
back into peace” (Ingalls 1990: 521).
31 Kritzer’s translation. A passage of this type occurs in Tohoku 57 at gka’ ’gyur (stog
pho brang bris ma), vol. 37 (Ga), 408a.
32 See gka’ ’gyur (stog pho brang bris ma), vol. 37 (Ga), 387b-434b. For a full translation
of the Nanda frame story recorded in Tohoku 57, see Langenberg (2008).
4 The Inauspicious Mother

While the suppurating mother of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra may be “abject”

according to the theoretical constructs of Western disgust theory, in South
Asian terms, she is more likely to be regarded as inauspicious and impure.
Her inauspicious qualities are examined here, while her impurity is taken up
in Chapter 6. I use the words “auspicious” and “inauspicious” to lift into
view a capacious and somewhat amorphous idea that I believe to be both
widely prevalent and of great significance for gender in ancient South Asia.
The Indic terms typically translated by the English word “auspicious” –
.
Sanskrit words like mangala, śubha, kalya-n.a, kuśala, and bhadra – carry
semantic associations that include good fortune, well-being, virtue, appro-
priateness, prosperity, and abundance, and are broadly applied to people, places,
things, events, actions, attitudes, and timeframes. As a descriptor or property,
“auspiciousness” is particularly important in the ritual traditions of Vedic and
village religion. For instance, in the Aśokan edicts, we hear of women engaging
.
in mangala-n.i (assorted auspicious ceremonies) on the occasions of marriage
.
or the birth of a son. Indian Buddhist texts also use words such as mangala,
- 1
śubha, kalyan.a, kuśala, and bhadra but in a deracinated way. Just as the
notion of purity is famously “spiritualized” in classical Indian Buddhism,
auspiciousness is explicitly theorized as having to do with morally wholesome
thoughts and behavior rather than practices, people, and objects that bring
good fortune and abundance of life in the discourses and in exegetical works
-
like those of Aryadeva, Candrakı‑rti, and Śa-ntideva or the Pa-li at.t.hakatha-s
(Gethin 2004; Harvey 2010; Jenkins 2010). The Samma-dit.t.hi-sutta from the
Majjhima-nika-ya explains the root of auspiciousness (kusalamu-la)2 to be non-
.
greed, non-hate, and non-delusion (Harvey 2010: 176). The Mangala-sutta,
- .
another text located in the Pali canon, defines auspiciousness (mangala) gen-
erically as doing good deeds, discussing the truth, ascetic practice, detachment
from the world, respect, humility, contentment, gratitude, patience, obedience,
-
and the like (Hallisey 2007). In his commentary on Aryadeva’s Catuḥśataka,
‑
Candrakırti avers the power of a certain great bodhisattva’s “auspicious roots”
(T. dge ba’i rtsa ba) to “turn back sam -
. sara” (T. ‘khor ba la rgyab kyis phyogs pa)
for 100,000 eons. He further declares that even conventionally inauspicious
actions such as killing are auspicious for bodhisattvas who have
 The Inauspicious Mother 95
compassionate intentions and can control their minds, enabling them to cause
the cessation of sam - ldog pa’i rgyu) for “birthlings” (skye ba can
. sara (‘khor ba
rnams).3 While texts like the Mangala-sutta and Candrakı‑rti’s commentary must
.
be acknowledged as normative articulations of what auspiciousness ought to con-
.
note for Buddhists, their understanding of mangala, kuśala, śubha, or kalya-n.a is not
the one utilized for the sake of the present analysis, even though it concerns
Buddhist texts. I justify this by arguing that, as with the spiritualization of
.
purity, the moral reframing of mangala/kuśala in Indian Buddhist sources is
only partial. Other South Asian understandings of auspiciousness and its
dynamics are often implicit in middle period Indian Buddhist sources. Prop-
erly understanding perspectives on birth and maternity in the Garbha-vakra-nti-
su-tra or narratives of the Buddha’s nativity requires consideration of these
broader South Asian understandings of auspiciousness, not just scholastic
discussions of wholesome mental states.
To that end, I have developed an account of “auspiciousness” that departs
significantly from that of Candrakı‑rti or the Mangala-sutta. My account is
.
based on a wide range of primary sources and scholarly studies of auspi-
ciousness in South Asia, which will be referenced in detail later in the chapter.
Briefly, I submit that what is “auspicious,” broadly speaking, in ancient South
Asia includes everything that promotes cyclical fecundity, abundance, growth,
social harmony, and the glory of powerful men, everything that is bright,
gracious, pleasing, and beautiful. These are all properties or things linked
positively to female sexuality. These are also all properties or things inherently
unstable, subject to decay, and requiring ritual maintenance. The power of this
type of auspiciousness is not that of causing the cessation of sam -
. sara. On the
contrary, this type of auspiciousness, widely attested in South Asian sources,
including Buddhist sources, is more likely to characterize actions or qualities
or things that perpetuate the cycle of embodied existence by valorizing and
maximizing sexual virility, the fecundity of women, and the abundance of
flocks and herds.
If we examine the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra in the context of this broader
South Asian view of auspiciousness, fecundity, and female sexuality, it
becomes strikingly clear that, in a reversal of Vedic-Hindu notions that the
birth of children is impure but usually auspicious, the Garbha-vakra-nti ren-
ders birth ugly, unpleasant, and death-like and thus wholly inauspicious. Of
course, the text does indicate, in the context of its recounting of the four
garbha-vakra-ntis, that an auspicious state in Candrakı‑rti’s sense can be
achieved if the fetus is morally wholesome and mentally controlled enough to
maintain awareness during the painful and confusing experiences of concep-
tion, gestation, and birth. This is an exceptional situation, however and the
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra is generally more concerned with ordinary beings, for
whom it deems birth to be inauspicious both in Candrakı‑rti’s sense and in the
sense I delineate as being typical of the broader South Asian context.
Narrative traditions of telling what one might assume to be auspicious
Buddhist births, particularly the Bodhisattva’s birth from Ma-ya- Devı‑’s body,
96 Amy Paris Langenberg
further complicates the picture. Śa-kyamuni’s extraordinary conception,
gestation, and birth contrast strongly with the fetal tale narrated in the
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, a contrast that illuminates aesthetic and symbolic
choices made by Buddhist authors in describing the processes of gestation
and birth. Although ordinary birth is impure and the cause of great distress,
and extraordinary birth is the opposite, it turns out that both events are
similar in their exclusion of auspiciousness (by the broad South Asian defini-
tion), a principle normally associated with healthy birth in ancient (and con-
temporary) South Asian contexts. Furthermore, neither the supremely
virtuous and beautiful mother, Maha-ma-ya- Devı‑, nor the heedless and
abject mother of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra are genuinely auspicious, as I
define it here (although Ma-ya- certainly meets Candrakı‑rti’s definition of
auspiciousness).
Of course, the texts considered here do not render up what I have termed
“the inauspicious mother” (in the broader South Asian sense, not Candrakı‑rti’s)
directly or explicitly. In other words, they do not describe birth and maternity
as inauspicious in so many words. In order to clearly apprehend the inauspi-
ciousness of birth and the maternal body in Buddhist texts on birth, a situa-
tion that stands in contrast to Brahman householding texts or village ritual
practices, certain hermeneutic keys are here applied. Anthropologists working
in contemporary Hindu contexts, who have theorized the notion of “auspi-
ciousness” in very useful ways, supply one bunch of keys. By developing a rich
account of South Asian auspiciousness that is applicable, I argue, to the
ancient context, the striking inauspiciousness of birth in Indian Buddhist texts
leaps into view. Another hermeneutic key is supplied by the anthropologist,
Maurice Bloch, whose notion of “rebounding violence” links the religious
pursuit of extra-social transcendence to social concerns like material produc-
tion and biological reproduction. In addition to affording a comparative per-
spective, Bloch’s theory provides a functionalist language for elucidating how
and why the South Asian auspiciousness principle is excluded from Buddhist
accounts of birth, to be replaced by the deracinated and spiritualized Bud-
dhist version. Transformations of the South Asian auspiciousness principle in
Buddhist birth texts are seemingly a negative for the rank and file of Buddhist
women, who are thoroughly debased as slime-filled vessels of misery.
Glimpsed through Bloch’s theoretical lens, however, these transformations
can be recognized as a helpful contribution to the construction and main-
tenance of an ascetic femininity in monastic Buddhist contexts. The latter, a
vital component of my larger argument, is introduced here, and further
developed in Chapter 6.

The Buddha’s Garbha-vakra-nti

While the Bodhisattva’s birth is treated in a variety of biographical texts, my
analysis will focus on the account located in Sanskrit versions of the Buddha’s
.
life, particularly the Sanghabhedavastu4 and the Lalitavistara.5 This is not the
 The Inauspicious Mother 97
place for a detailed history of all textual traditions associated with the Bud-
dha’s life, but some text historical treatment of the birth stories under exam-
ination here is essential to show that they and the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra
occupied more or less the same cultural arena and are thus meaningfully
compared. A major sutta/a-gama source for the story of the Bodhisattva’s
special nativity is the Maha-vada-na-su-tra (Pa-li: Maha-pada-na-sutta) from the
Dı‑gha collection.6 This tradition of narrating Bodhisatta’s special birth is
probably a product of the Aśokan period, assuming its canonical form
somewhat later (Reynolds 1976: 43).7 Frank Reynolds links the importance of
Lumbinı‑ as a pilgrimage center to the elaboration of biographical traditions
regarding the Buddha’s birth and childhood in both Sanskrit and Therava-da
traditions, noting: “In the Sanskrit traditions and in the lay oriented and non-
sectarian iconographic traditions, accounts of the Buddha’s royal genealogy
and new elaborations involving signs, miracles and portents indicative of the
Buddha’s greatness in relation to both gods and men soon produced a rich
and complex cycle of Buddha lore” (Reynolds 1976: 44).
The importance of the Maha-vada-na-su-tra to Indian Buddhists is evidenced
by its inclusion in a collection of six excerpted texts from the Dı‑rgha-gama
called the S.atsu-trakanipa-ta. This collection is well represented in manuscript
remains from Central Asia, demonstrating that the Maha-vada-na-su-tra itself
.
was well known and often copied (Salomon 2004). Here, I use the Sanghabheda-
- - -
vastu account of the Buddha’s biography from the Mulasarvastivada-vinaya,
rather than the Maha-vada-na-su-tra as a primary point of comparison with the
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra because it shares a Mu-lasarva-stiva-da affiliation with
that text. Although its narration is somewhat fuller and more elaborate, it
follows the script of what are declared in the Dı‑rgha-gama text to be fixed
features (dharmata-) for the birth of an advanced bodhisattva entering his final
embodied life. These include the rule that his conception be accompanied by
blinding radiance and an earthquake, that he be protected from the time of
his descent by the four devaputra gods, that he be undefiled by bodily fluids
while residing in the womb and resemble an eight-faceted jewel, that his
mother follow the five precepts and be incapable of lust from the time of
his conception forward, that she give birth standing up, that his birth (like his
conception) be accompanied by a worlds-penetrating radiance and an earth-
quake,8 that he emerge from his mother’s body unstained by bodily fluids,
that he be bathed by two warm and cool celestial streams of water upon his birth,
and that he take seven strides unaided upon his birth. In many cases, parti-
.
cular phrases and sentences in the Maha-vada-na-su-tra and Sanghabhedavastu
- - - .
are identical. Fukita regards the Turkestan Mahavadana-sutra and the San-
ghabhedavastu account to be two recensions of the same text (Fukita 2003:
xxi). One significant difference between the Dı‑rgha-gama and Vinaya tradi-
tions, however, is that the Maha-vada-na-su-tra uses the Buddha Vipaśyin as its
.
model for a Buddha’s life story, whereas the Sanghabhedavastu takes Śa-kya-
muni himself as its exemplar. Other relevant similarities and differences will
be noted in the footnotes, but not usually in the main body of the text.
98 Amy Paris Langenberg
The other text used here as a point of comparison, the Lalitavistara (“The
Graceful Display”), follows the canonical narrative more or less but is poeti-
cally exuberant and extravagant in its imagery. This is partially attributable to
the fact that the Lalitavistara incorporates more theologically developed,
some have claimed Maha-ya-na, notions regarding the Bodhisattva’s omnis-
cience, near-perfection, and merely altruistic compliance with the ways of the
world (loka-nuvartanakriya-dharmata-) into older traditions of the Buddha’s
biography found in the Sarva-stiva-da a-gamas.9 Still, scholars associate the
Lalitavistara with the same broad Sarva-stiva-da intellectual tradition and
North Indian milieu that originated the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra (Luczanits
2010: 53; Winternitz 1972: vol. 2, 31). It is likely that the authors or redactors
of the Lalitavistara were aware of some version of the birth story found within
the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, if not the text itself, and virtually certain that the
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra authors knew the narrative traditions surrounding the
.
Buddha’s birth, including something close to the Sanghabhedavastu version
and perhaps the traditions of the Lalitavistara as well. The Lalitavistara is
also referenced here as a point of comparison to the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra
because its poetic exuberance makes even plainer what exactly distinguishes
the birth of an extraordinary being from ordinary birth in classical Indian
Buddhist understandings.
The Bodhisattva’s experience of conception, gestation, and birth narrated
.
in the Sanghabhedavastu and Lalitavistara differs from the ordinary birth
experience recounted in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra in virtually every way. For
instance, whereas ordinary beings are unconsciously driven to their next
rebirth by the force of karma, the Bodhisattva is able to deliberately select the
family of the Śa-kya King Śuddhodana from among many candidates as a result
.
of his abundant wholesome roots. In the Sanghabhedavastu, this decision is
based on matters of caste, lineage, and the prosperity of the Śa-kya lands.10
The Lalitavistara mentions the complete purity (kulapariśuddhi ) of Śud-
dhodana’s clan and its being adorned with the 64 attributes (catus.s.as.t.ya-ka-raiḥ)
(Vaidya 1958b: 16.16–17).11
According to the Tohoku 57 version of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, the male
transmigrating being feels overwhelmed by lust for his mother-to-be and
generates hostility towards his father upon seeing them engaged in sexual
union. By contrast, the Bodhisattva disinterestedly selects Maha-ma-ya- Devı‑ for
her superlative beauty, virtue, and selflessness, but participates in no unseemly
Oedipal drama (Vaidya 1958b: 17.15–23; Goswami 2001: 29–35).12 In fact,
according to the Lalitavistara, he witnesses no parental sexual act at all.
Maha-ma-ya- has retired to the rooftop of her palace, away from her husband, in
order to undertake a regimen of fasting and austerities at the time of the Bodhi-
sattva’s conception (Vaidya 1958b: 29.26–27; Goswami 2001: 48–49).13 Con-
ception occurs asexually in the Lalitavistara when the Bodhisattva enters the right
side of Maha-ma-ya-’s womb in the form of a six-tusked white elephant, a
dreamlike experience she finds joyful and sublime.
 The Inauspicious Mother 99
Ma-ya-’s sexual abstinence at the time of conception is more in doubt in the
.
Sanghbhedavastu. In fact, she seems to have had sex with King Śuddhodana
the very night of the Bodhisattva’s conception. The text tells us that, “Rush-
ing up to the rooftop to be alone with Ma-ya- Devı‑, [the king] sported, took
pleasure in, and dallied with his wife” (Gnoli and Venkatacharya 1977: 36).
This event coincides with or even precipitates the bodhisattva’s undertaking of
the five “surveyings” (avalokana) of caste, country, time, lineage, and woman
from Tus.ita. The text also informs us that Śakra, realizing the Bodhisattva
intends to descend into Ma-ya-’s womb, undertakes to purify it (Gnoli and
Venkatacharya 1977: 40). Again, though the text does not say so explicitly,
this event may be related to the sexual activity alluded to earlier as it may be
that Śakra feels compelled to clear Ma-ya-’s womb of sexual fluids in preparation
for the Bodhisattva’s descent. Śa-kra’s purification of Ma-ya-’s womb is a detail
missing from the Lalitavistara, which, as we shall see, ensures the Bodhisattva’s
purity through other means.14
Both birth narratives defy the most basic embryological truth as put forth
in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra and elsewhere – that the fetus is a being under-
going radical change. Working comparatively in Buddhist hagiography,
Vanessa Sasson observes, “Although fetuses may be the perfect expression of
transformation, this fetus required none. He had reached his full potential
even before he was born, and thus, in a sense, he never really was a fetus”
(Sasson 2009: 59).15 The Lalitavistara asserts that: “The body of the future
Bodhisattva did not take the form of kalala, arbuda, ghana, and peśı‑. He
simply appeared there, all his limbs, digits, and physical characteristics
.
already perfect” (Paraśura-ma 1958b: 50.7–8). The Sanghabhedavastu notes
- -
that Maya could see him, already fully developed (antaḥkuks.igata paripu-rn.a)
within the womb (Gnoli and Venkatacharya 1977: 42). According to Giulio
Agostini’s comparison of certain legal and scholastic discussions of abortion
and embryology, a distinction exists in several traditions between very young
embryos, who are yet to develop the five limbs (two legs, two arms, and a
head), and fetuses with limbs (praśa-kha) (Agostini 2004). For instance, one
.
probably Maha-sa-nghika text16 says embryos at the kalala, arbuda, ghana, and
‑
peśı stages of development are fluid, in possession neither of breath (pra-n.in)
nor of a full complement of indriyas (sense faculties), and therefore not yet
fully human (manus.ya). The killing of embryos at this early stage does not
count, as homicide (manus.yavadha) and therefore does not constitute a pa-ra--
jika offense for monks and nuns or a serious precept violation for laypeople
and novices (Agostini 2004: 66–67). André Bareau also notes this distinction
between the early fluid embryo, and the later fetus with five limbs (praśa-kha)
.
among the Maha-sa-nghikas, reporting that, according to that school, bodhisattvas
miraculously enter the womb at the praśa-kha stage (Bareau 1955: 63–64).
. .
Though not affiliated with the Maha-sa-nghika school, the Sanghabhedavastu
and Lalitavistara appear to also follow this tradition of distinguishing
between inchoate embryos and five-limbed fetuses. At his garbha-vakra-nti, the
Bodhisattva descends fully formed, never progressing through the liquid
100 Amy Paris Langenberg
stages of the early embryo. Indeed, the Lalitavistara exaggerates his maturity.
In that text, he does not grow at all, and is immediately endowed with all
human powers.
The Bodhisattva is also impressive as a newborn. Lion-like, he is immedi-
ately able to walk and talk, taking his first steps unassisted, and declaring his
greatness and his intentions to accomplish miraculous feats such as putting an
.
end to rebirth.17 According to the Sanghbhedavastu, his very first action is to
establish authority by summarily banishing from the birthplace Śakra, lord of
the gods, who has acted as midwife to his birth and may try to claim the
upper hand (Gnoli and Venkatacharya 1977: 44). Moreover, “It is a fixed
feature: once born, the Bodhisattva walks seven steps, not supported by
anyone. He surveys the four directions and says, ‘This eastern (pu-rva) direc-
tion [means] I will be the first gone (pu-rvam -
. gama) to nirvan.a. This southern
‑
(daks.in.a) direction [means] I will be venerated (daks.in.ıya) by the whole world.
This western (paścima) direction [means] this will be my last (paścima) rebirth.
This northern (uttara) direction [means] I will rise above (uttaris.ya-mi ) this
ongoing flow of existence.’” (Gnoli and Venkatacharya 1977: 45). According
to the Lalitavistara, “Having surveyed the directions this wise being gave
forth a profound utterance: ‘I am the best in the entire world. I am the
most splendid among everyone. I am the guide, and this birth is my last’”
(Vaidya 1958b: 67.23–26). By contrast, the newborn infant described in the
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra lies helpless wherever he is set down, unable to defend
himself against the painful ministrations of mother and nurse, or the attacks
on his person by parasites and demonic spirits.
Not only is the fetal Bodhisattva always fully a person and never subhu-
man (manus.yavigraha)18 in the Buddhist hagiographical texts examined here,
his experience of the womb is free of the usual impurities. According to the
.
Sanghabhedavastu:

It is a fixed feature (dharmata-): when the bodhisattva was encased in his

mother’s womb, he was unsmeared by womb impurity, semen impurity,19
blood impurity, or any other type of harmful impurity. When a pearl is
affixed to a piece of silk, the pearl is not defiled by a silk nor the silk by
the pearl; in the same way when the bodhisattva was encased in his
mother’s womb he was unsmeared by womb impurity, semen impurity,
blood impurity, or any other type of harmful impurity. Just like a pearl he
was.
(Gnoli and Venkatacharya 1977: 42)20

In the Lalitavistara the Bodhisattva is actually encased within a ratnavyu-ha or

“jeweled structure,” also referred to in the text as paribhoga (“object of
enjoyment,” possibly in this context “pleasure palace”).21 This perfumed
device, a miniature tiered pagoda (ku-t.a-gara) constructed from pure sub-
stances like gold, sandalwood, and translucent gem stones, and containing a
throne sized for a six-month-old infant, was brought from heaven for the
 The Inauspicious Mother 101
-
Bodhisattva’s fetal sojourn in order to solve the problem raised by Ananda in
the following passage:

The Tatha-gata has said that it is remarkable how repulsive are mothers as a
class, and how prone to passion. But this, Lord, is even more amazing! How
could the lord, who transcends all the worlds, have emerged from Tus.ita
heaven as the bodhisattva (only) to reach the womb of his mother, located on
the right side, inside of a foul- smelling human body?
(Vaidya 1958b: 47.11–14)

In response to this question, the Buddha summons the deity Brahma, who
had carried the ratnavyu-ha up to the heaven called Tra-yatrim . śa after the
bodhisattva’s birth and had it there enshrined. The Buddha asks him to
retrieve the wondrous object so that the gathered monks and deities might
observe its construction. It is made of triple nested pavilions, each fragrant
with sandalwood, the color of cat’s eye, and blazing like gold. It is shining,
glowing, resplendent, unflawed, and fragrant. Furthermore, that jeweled
palace is “strong and unbreakable like a diamond, but pleasant to the touch
like the downy inside of a seed pod (ka-cilindaka)” (Vaidya 1958b: 49.10–11).22
Inside this silky soft, fragrant, luxurious and light-filled jeweled tabernacle,
the embryonic bodhisattva is well protected from the indignities of the
ordinary womb.
Implicit is a comparison to the ordinary embryo’s residence, that dark
vessel of blood and excrement so vividly rendered in the Garbha-vakra-nti-
su-tra. Whereas the womb stinks like vomit, the ratnavyu-ha is suffused with the
light scent of sandalwood. Whereas the womb is a container for semen, blood,
and other impure substances, the ratnavyu-ha is lined with soft, lovely, and pure
materials. Whereas the womb is a wound and given to decay, the ratnavyu-ha is
solid and indestructible. Whereas the womb is fetid and swampy, the ratnavyu-ha
is clean, comfortable and dry. In one way, however, the ratnavyu-ha and the
loathsome human womb are identical: the ordinary embryo’s descent into the
unfortunate womb is the direct result of his previous actions, and the Bodhi-
sattva’s wondrous ratnavyu-ha and its joys are also the collected fruit of all his
previous virtuous deeds (Vaidya 1958b: 49.26–50.10).
As the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra also makes clear, the ordinary fetus’s nutri-
tional dependence on the mother’s rasa-laden blood and digestive apparatus
makes him vulnerable to pain, contamination, and degradation. Often as not,
he suffers from her choice of diet, not to mention the banal discomfort of
dwelling below her stomach and above her intestines. The Lalitavistara pro-
vides a solution to these troubles. On the night of his descent into the womb,
a great lotus rises from the depths of the sea to Brahma’s heaven. It is filled
with a divine elixir distilled from “whatever vital sap (ojas)23 or cream
(man.d.a) or juice (rasa) there is in all the worlds” (Vaidya 1958b: 49.15–17).
Brahma pours this magnificent substance into a cat’s eye vessel and offers it
to the Bodhisattva. All of this occurs as a result of the Bodhisattva’s many
102 Amy Paris Langenberg
past virtuous deeds. Furthermore, only the Bodhisattva is capable of digesting
this elixir, and one great honeyed drop is all he needs to nourish him
.
throughout the ten months of his gestation. The Sanghabhedavastu mentions
what seem to be similar preparations for the Bodhisattva’s tenure in the
womb. According to that tradition, Śakra, lord of the gods, realizing that the
Bodhisattva intends to take birth in the womb of Ma-ya- Devı‑, resolves to
purify her womb and make a collection of ojas (ojopasaṃḥa-ra), presumably to
provide sustenance to the Bodhisattva in the womb, though the text is not
explicit on this matter (Gnoli and Venkatacharya 1977: 40).
In both traditions, Ma-ya-’s womb is transparent, the effulgent Bodhisattva
glowing visibly within. According to the Lalitavistara, the fetal Bodhisattva
dwells seated on the right side of Ma-ya-’s womb,24 “brilliant like gold”
(ja-taru-pamiva), greeting and indicating seats for all of the many kings, bod-
hisattvas, gods, yaks.as, and na-gas who come to visit him in utero, even offer-
ing them teachings in the Dharma. When it is time for them to depart, he
extrudes his golden hand beyond the wall of his mother’s womb without
causing her any injury and gives a regal wave in dismissal (Vaidya 1958b:
51.1–52.31). The Lalitavistara consistently describes the bodhisattva as ema-
nating light, as brightening his environment, and as transparent to his mother,
who watches him delightedly inside his diminutive jeweled palace:

The Bodhisattva, residing in his mother’s womb, had a body that could
be seen from five miles (yojana) away, like the peaks of a mountain that
appear from even a mile away as a great heap of fire in the darkest night.
The body of the Bodhisattva, residing in his mother’s womb, was clear,
beautiful, shining, and wonderful to see. He shone exceedingly bright,
seated in the manner of a sage in that excellent pavilion, like noble gold set
with cat’s eye. The Bodhisattva’s mother also, sitting and meditating, saw
him in her womb.
(Vaidya 1958b: 50.17–21)
.
The Sanghabhedavastu compares the Bodhisattva in his mother’s womb to an
eight-faceted pellucid jewel, affixed to a five-colored string. The text tells us
that any man with the power of sight can see that “this is the jewel, this the
string” (Gnoli and Venkatacharya 1977: 42).25 Although what corresponds to
the gem, what to the string in this analogy is not clear to me, the notion that
the Bodhisattva catches the light and is clearly discernable is certainly inten-
ded.26 The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, on the other hand, gives us images of
darkness and obscurity. The only light source mentioned are the fires of
maternal digestion that roast the fetus as if he were in hell. The fetus makes
himself known only through his dark cravings and he is reached only by the
blindly probing hands of a midwife. These images of the effulgent, gem-like
fetus challenge the opacity and obscurity of pregnancy and invert it. In
ordinary pregnancy, the mother is known, the fetus invisible. Here, it is the
shining fetus who steps forward and displays himself. The mother’s body
 The Inauspicious Mother 103
forms only a backdrop, an insubstantial tissue to which the gemlike Bodhisattva
is affixed.
The Bodhisattva brings about moral as well as visual illumination while in
utero. Ma-ya- Devı‑ experiences a special state of spontaneous mental purity
while pregnant. Descriptions of Ma-ya-’s special state of mind can be seen as a
variation on the literary and medical theme of heart-sickness during pregnancy
(daurhṛda/dohada). According to this tradition, a pregnant woman is suffused
with her embryo’s longings, which must be satisfied for the good of the child.27
In Ma-ya-’s case, certain urges are increased, but others are brought to heel
.
during her pregnancy. According to the Sanghbhedavastu, “It is fixed feature:
when the bodhisattva resided in his mother’s womb, his mother, as long as she
lives, commits to the five precepts … . She does not kill living creatures and
she does not take what is not given. She does not tell lies. She has no longing
for wine. She abstains from non-celibacy and sexual love.” She does not even
have the thought of lust for men (Gnoli and Venkatacharya 1977: 42–43).
According to the Lalitavistara, she doesn’t experience hunger or thirst and is
no longer subject to “feminine tricks, dishonesty, jealousy, or the emotional
defilements peculiar to women” (Vaidya 1958b: 53.5–6). She acquires healing
powers28 and devotes herself, heart and soul, to the discipline of the five pre-
cepts. She experiences no sexual desire, nor, despite her beauty, is she
sexually attractive to men. The ordinary pregnant woman described in the
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra experiences no such mental transformation. She may
effectively suffer as a result of the polluted mind-stream of her embryo, but
only if his past errors result in miscarriage or stillbirth, not because of
dohada/daurhr.da, which that teaching does not admit to be a feature of
pregnancy.
Though miraculously free of the more typical and sometimes low cravings
thought to plague ordinary pregnant women (the desire for meat or other
particular foods, wine, sex, or even blood), Ma-ya- is not without irrepressible
.
dohada, or pregnancy longings.29 According to the Sanghabheda tradition,
she experiences several strong desires during her pregnancy, which King
Śuddhodana hastens to satisfy, lest his son be born deformed. The first is a
longing to drink water from the four great oceans. This is so, the king’s wise
ministers inform him, because “having gone forth [into homelessness, his son]
will apprehend completely an ocean of wisdom” (Gnoli and Venkatacharya
1977: 43). She also desires to free the prisoners, and to give alms and generate
merit, which Śuddhodana accomplishes on her behalf. This latter urge is also
a feature of Ma-ya- Devı‑’s pregnancy in the Lalitavistara. Finally, she longs to
see the royal parklands, and to take up residence there. Śuddhodana requests
her father, King Suprabuddha, to ready the park called Lumbinı‑. After jour-
neying to that park, the pregnant Ma-ya- glimpses an Aśoka tree in bloom and
stops there, wishing to give birth (prasavituka-ma-) (Gnoli and Venkatacharya
1977: 44). As noted by Hubert Durt, the Lalitavistara does not formally
employ the motif of dohada and does not reference all five pregnancy urges
.
mentioned in the Sanghabhedavastu (Durt 2003: 44).
104 Amy Paris Langenberg
Most of the best-celebrated narrations and all artistic renderings of the
Buddha’s nativity depict a non-vaginal birth (ayonija).30 For instance, the
Lalitavistara assures us that “when ten months were complete, he emerged
from the right side of his mother” (Vaidya 1958b: 61.21). Instead of using the
birth canal, the extraordinary child emerges painlessly and harmlessly from
his mother’s right side and is received by various deities. Minoru Hara attri-
butes the tradition of the Buddha’s nonvaginal birth to a pan-Indian tradition
that associates the crushing journey down the birth canal with the shuttering
of memory and awareness (Hara 1980: 156–157). Because the Buddha avoids
the noxious, squeezing environment of the birth canal when he exits Ma-ya-’s
womb, he is able to enter into the world in a state of total awareness (although
he seems to partially forget who he is as he grows into a child). Non-vaginal
birth also has clear implications for physical purity. According to the
Lalitavistara, the Buddha draws an explicit connection between moral
impurity and the taint of ordinary birth, and emphasizes how important it is
that the purity of his own birth be known and understood:

[There will come a time when deficient false monks will] not believe that
the purity of the bodhisattva’s descent into the womb was such. They will
gather together and say to one another privately, “Hey, look. It is so
dishonorable that the Bodhisattva possessed such power even while
residing in the womb of his mother, covered over with the scum of urine
and feces. He emerged from the right side of his mother’s womb,
unsmeared with the filth of the womb? How does that work?” These
deluded men will not realize that the bodies of virtuous beings are not
generated in the scum of urine and feces.
(Vaidya 1958b: 64.4–8)31

The vagina is the location of sexual intercourse, an activity laden with both
physical and psychological impurity, and is near other sites where human
waste is voided. In addition, the often lengthy process of ordinary vaginal
birth is generally accompanied by the release of bodily substances of various
kinds. By emerging quickly and cleanly from Ma-ya-’s side, the Bodhisattva at
least partially avoids these associations.32 Even though we are continually
assured in the Lalitavistara that he both dwells within and emerges from his
mother’s body unbesmirched, all the same, two celestial streams of water
appear, one cool, one warm, to cleanse his already clean body directly after
.
the birth. This bathing trope also appears in the Maha-vada-na-su-tra, the San-
-
ghabhedavastu, and the Mahavastu, despite, again, assertions of the Bodhi-
sattva’s immunity to uterine filth.33 Notably neither the sutta/a-gama tellings
.
of the Bodhisattva’s nativity nor the Sanghabhedavastu actually specify a non-
- -
vaginal birth, though Maya always accomplishes the job standing up, a
required feature of a Bodhisattva’s nativity.34 In the San.ghabhedavastu, he is
received upon a strip of antelope hide by Śakra himself, who has magically
assumed the appearance of an elderly midwife for the occasion (Gnoli and
 The Inauspicious Mother 105
35
Venkatacharya 1977: 44). If the birth is indeed vaginal, Śakra does a yeoman’s
job here.
One of the strangest features of the Bodhisattva’s conception and nativity is
its punctuality. The Lalitavistara specifies, for instance, that the bodhisattva
descends into his mother’s womb on the fifteenth day of the bright fortnight
of the month of Viśa-kha- (Vaidya 1958b: 43.1–6). The Pa-li Maha-pada-na-sutta
tradition specifies a dharmata- that bodhisattvas will be born after exactly ten
months’ residence in the womb, no more, no less.36 The Maha-vada-na-sutta
mentions the bodhisattva’s ten-month gestation, although not as a fixed fea-
ture (dharmata-) of his birth (Fukita 2003: 87). The Lalitavistara also men-
tions that the special child is born after ten months exactly (Vaidya 1958b:
61.21). Furthermore, according to both the Vinaya and the sutta/a-gama tra-
ditions, there is a fixed feature (dharmata-) that the Bodhisattva’s mother shall

Figure 4.1 Second-century C.E. frieze from Gandha-ra depicting the birth of Śa-kyamuni
Buddha.
Source: Photograph © The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
106 Amy Paris Langenberg
die and ascend to heaven exactly seven days after his birth (Fukita 2003: 87–88;
Gnoli and Venkatacharya 1977: 51). Nonetheless, hagiographies in which the
Bodhisattva is born non-vaginally generally take care to specify that the Bodhi-
sattva emerges without harming his mother in any way.37 According to the
Maha-vastu, the dharmata- regarding a Buddha’s mother’s death directly influ-
ences the Bodhisattva’s choice of human womb. Following Jones’s translation,
the text says that the Bodhisattva “sought a mother who should be gracious,
of good birth, pure of body, tender of passion, and short-lived, of whose span
of life there remained only seven nights and ten months” (Jones 1952, vol. 2, 3).

Auspiciousness in South Asian religion

.
A 16th-century Thai commentary on the Pa-li Mangala-sutta recounts the
circumstances leading to the Buddha’s preaching of that text. During the
Buddha’s time, groups of wealthy people regularly gathered all over Jampudvı‑pa
to hear auspicious stories like the Ra-ma-yan.a. One day, one among them
.
asked: “what is it that is called an auspicious thing (mangala)?” (Hallisey
2007: 299) One person answered that “an auspicious thing was something
that could be seen, as when someone in this world wakes up and sees a young
bird, or a woodapple stalk, or a pregnant woman, or infants decorated with
necklaces and bangles, or pots full of water, or a fresh sheatfish, or a thor-
oughbred horse, or a chariot drawn by a thoroughbred horse, or a brahman”
(Hallisey 2007: 300). Others answered that it was something that could be
heard like happy words, or smelled like sandalwood, or touched like freshly
reaped wheat. No agreement could be reached and no one had sufficient
proof for their views, so the matter was taken up with Śakra, lord of the gods,
and finally brought to Buddha himself, who settled the question by preaching
.
the Mangala-sutta. This commentarial text is a nice illustration of differences
between common and official Buddhist understandings of auspiciousness, as
well as the difficulties encountered in attempting to definitively explain what
.
type of a thing is mangala. According to this late medieval Thai text, the
Buddha provided the definitive answer. While I acknowledge this Buddhist
.
canonical answer, here I reopen the great debate about mangala.
Purity, not auspiciousness, has long been the topic of special concern in the
anthropological study of South Asia. The sociologist Louis Dumont fore-
grounded purity as the central value of Hindu society in his major study,
Homo Hierarchicus (1966). Dumont’s important work initiated a flurry of
scholarly research on caste and purity. The field experiences of anthro-
pologists such as Frederique Apffel-Marglin, M.N. Srinivas, Veena Das, and
T. N. Madan eventually led them to challenge, however, the hegemony of
purity as an explanatory tool for Hindu society. Their fieldwork revealed
another central social value for Hindu ritual life, which they identified as
“auspiciousness.” In 1985, the research interests of Apffel-Marglin, Madan and
others resulted in a conference and a seminal volume on the subject entitled
Purity and Auspiciousness in Indian Society (Carman and Apffel-Marglin
 The Inauspicious Mother 107
1985). The anthropologist T. N. Madan tells us that auspiciousness is asso-
ciated with kings, the home, married women, young prepubescent girls, mar-
riage, fertility and agriculture. It is also associated with pilgrimage sites,
sacred rivers, particular astrological conjunctions, gold and silver, jewels,
consecrated earthen pots containing medicinal herbs, water from sacred
rivers, and dried fruits (Madan 1987: 50–55).38 Madan emphasizes the close
association between auspiciousness and time. He points out that the terms
.
like śubha or mangala, both words that refer to prosperity and good fortune,
are often applied not to substances but to astrological events, particular
points of the calendar, or life-cycle events. In addition, auspiciousness is
situational. For instance, the birth of a son is almost always auspicious,
except when a particular astrological event makes him a potential threat to
his parents’ wellbeing. Such a son, born under a dark star as it were, must be
neutralized through corrective ritual action (Madan 1987: 55). Similarly,
death is almost always inauspicious, except when a wife dies before her hus-
band and children. In such a case the woman has avoided the greater nega-
tivity of widowhood, or of outliving her children, making her death in some
measure auspicious (Madan 1987: 56). Madan’s analysis highlights the con-
textual and time-sensitive nature of auspiciousness. Something auspicious can
quickly turn into something inauspicious with the tick of the clock, the
rotation of the Earth, or just a change in location.
In her landmark study of the devada-sı‑ at the Jaganna-tha temple in Puri, Fre-
derique Apffel-Marglin emphasizes the strong connection between sexuality
and auspiciousness in South Asia. Despite their impure and unmarried status, the
devada-sı‑ – the ritual wives of the god Jaganna-tha and consorts to the king and
temple priests – are worshiped as living goddesses by pilgrims, possess the
exclusive right to sing the auspicious songs (mangala gı‑ta-) at lifecycle rites
.
for Brahman households, and are known generally as “auspicious women”
(mangala na-rı‑) (Apffel-Marglin 1985: 98–113). The devada-sı‑ women are dis-
.
tinct from ordinary wives in that they are not allowed to bear children.
Despite their association with fertility and sexuality, the Puri devada-sı‑, ser-
vants of Laks.mı‑, also abstain from participation in ritualizations of birth.
They attend marriages, initiations, and temple dedications, but not birth cer-
emonies. Apffel-Marglin takes as an example their circumspect role in the
ritual of Naba Kalebara, during which the wooden images housed in the
Jaganna-tha temple in Puri die and are reborn. The devada-sı‑ sing auspicious
songs during this process in order to cover up the inauspicious sounds of the
necessary axe work, but they are allowed neither to visually witness the work,
nor to enter the enclosure where it is carried out.
Apffel-Marglin’s rejection of a simplistic or rigid binary structuralism in her
analysis of auspiciousness in Puri ritual life, is instructive. Like Madan,
Apffel-Marglin emphasizes the dynamic, processual, and context-sensitive
nature of auspiciousness. She observes, “It seems clear that birth and death,
decay and renewal, are intimately intermeshed enough to be one process …
The opposition between auspiciousness and inauspiciousness is not an
108 Amy Paris Langenberg
exclusive binary one, but one that lacks a fixed boundary between the two
poles. Such a lack of separation or boundary between signs allows them to
carry meanings of dynamism, such as the flow of time, processes of growth,
maturation and decay, or a dynamic force like śakti” (Apffel-Marglin 2008:
48–49).39 Junctures during which the principles of auspiciousness and inaus-
piciousness are simultaneously and powerfully in play, as during birth, repre-
sent moments of great potentiality and great danger. Such junctures illustrate
auspiciousness’s problematic nature: while it can be stabilized ritually, it is
inherently dynamic. Auspiciousness is valued and promoted in the ritual world
Apffel-Marglin describes, evidence that enshrined within the ritual system of
Puri is a communal acknowledgement that change, while dangerous, is also
necessary for life.
These observations about the nature of auspiciousness and its relationship
to fertility, life events, and the passage of time, have developed out of field-
work undertaken in the 20th century and cannot be applied naively or in a
direct fashion to the ancient period. Anthropology happens to be the dis-
ciplinary context in which sustained attention to the ritual functioning of the
auspiciousness principle has emerged. Though no comprehensive studies that
critically examine the notion and ritual function of auspiciousness during the
premodern period exist, it is indisputable that notions of auspiciousness were
present.40 A cluster of terms from the classical Sanskrit lexicon denote something
very like the anthropological notion of auspiciousness. These include but are
.
not limited to śubha, mangala, kalya-n.a, kuśala, bhadra, svasti, and r.ddhi.
According to Monier-William’s Sanskrit-English dictionary, what is śubha is
“splendid, bright, beautiful, suitable, agreeable, auspicious, fortunate, prosperous,
.
and good.” The terms mangala and kalya-n.a are common synonyms of śubha.
Kuśala refers to what is right and proper, but also to well-being. Bhadra is
defined as “blessed, auspicious, fortunate, prosperous, happy.” Svasti is glos-
sed as “well-being, fortune, luck, success, prosperity,” r.ddhi as “increase,
growth, prosperity, success, good fortune, wealth, and abundance.” According
to the second-century grammarian Patañjali, treatises that have “auspicious
.
beginnings, middles, and endings,” in other words, that start with mangala
words such as vr.ddhi (“increase”) “make heroes, and promote long life, with
the further result that their readers become endowed with auspicious qualities
as well” (Minkowski 2008: 22). Drawing on the Vedic ritual manuals, Jan
Gonda emphasizes the role of the Brahman priest in determining auspicious
moments for certain important events or undertakings. He also mentions the
importance of special words such as the syllable aum in ritually creating and
sustaining auspiciousness.41 Maha-bha-rata scholar, Alf Hiltebeitel, mentions
.
the 12 mangala things touched by Yudhis.t.hira after surviving the great battle
at Kuruks.etra, among which were flower garlands, “well-adorned auspicious
maidens,” and “auspicious birds” (Hiltebeitel 1985: 41).
R.g-veda 6.28 credits auspicious (bhadra) wives with making their adolescent
husbands “hot as Fire,” and winning them livestock such as horses, cattle and
sheep (Whitaker 2011: 174, n. 71). Timothy Lubin draws our attention to
 The Inauspicious Mother 109
.
Aśoka’s disparagement of mangala (assorted auspicious ceremonies) that he
says women perform upon the birth of a son or a marriage and that he
describes as “numerous, diverse, vulgar, and pointless” (Lubin 2013: 36). In
dharmaśa-stra traditions, fertile wives are said to enjoy a special relationship
with auspiciousness as they are held to be the source of many auspicious
things including nutritional sustenance, offspring, pleasure, longevity, and the
comfort of the home. Serinity Young ascribes this special relationship to the fact
that “women are believed to possess part of the sacred powers of creation …
which endows them with the power to confer blessings, especially of fertility,
and other forms of wealth, as well as to curse” (Young 2004: 23–24).
According to the lawgiver Manu, whose lawbook is loosely contemporaneous
with the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra:

On account of offspring, a wife is the bearer of many blessings, worthy of

honor, and the light within a home; indeed, in a home no distinction at
all exists between a wife (strı‑) and Śrı‑, the Goddess of Fortune. She
begets children; and when they are born, she brings them up – day in, day
out, the wife, evidently, is the linchpin of domestic affairs. Offspring, rites
prescribed by Law, obedient service, the highest sensuous delights, and
procuring heaven for oneself and one’s forefathers – all this depends on
the wife.
(Olivelle 2005: 191)

Likened to a lamp, the woman’s fertile presence is a talisman protecting the

home from evil, and inviting blessings. Therefore, wives should be honored.
According to Manu, “If men want to become prosperous … they should
always honor the women on joyful occasions and festive days with gifts of
adornments, clothes, and food” (Manu 2005: 111). The gr.hyasu-tra of the
-
Apastamba school designates women to be the authority on auspicious rites
. -
(mangala). The Apastamba-dharmasu-tra, moreover, officially recognizes and
authorizes such rites, deeming the auspicious folk practices of women to be a
supplement to the Atharva-veda, and, as Lubin describes it “the capstone of
dharma study” (Lubin 2013: 37–38).
.
If women are known to be steady purveyors of mangala, the rites that
ensure auspiciousness, this is in part because auspiciousness, especially the
type associated with women, is by nature unpredictable, time-sensitive,
changeable, and requires ritual attentiveness. For instance, in the Śrı‑mad Devı‑
Bha-gavata-pura-n.a, the goddess manifests as Gr.ha Laks.mı‑, the auspicious
Goddess of the house, but Śrı‑ Laks.mı‑ is also considered cañcala- (moving,
unsteady), and must be continuously requested by her devotees to remain
steadfast (Rhodes 2010: 27–30, 21). Draupadı‑, heroine of the Maha-bha-rata
epic, and polyandrous wife to the five Pa-n.d.ava brothers, embodies many of
the vicissitudes of auspiciousness/inauspiciousness mentioned by Madan and
Apffel-Marglin (Hiltebeitel 1980; Hiltebeitel 1981; Hiltebeitel 1985).
Although associated with the unambiguously auspicious deity Laks.mı‑,
110 Amy Paris Langenberg
Draupadı‑, is not only frequently impure but also often associated with inauspi-
cious states and violence. According to Hiltebeitel, she is represented as an
inauspicious woman separated from her husband (virahin.‑ı) after her humiliation
in the Kaurava palace, and remains so until, at great cost, that humiliation is
avenged and her husbands are restored to their thrones (Hiltebeitel 1981: 184–
185). Draupadı‑ also urges her husbands not to negotiate with the Kurus, but
to avenge her mistreatment violently (Mbh 5.80.33–36, 39). All of her sons
die in the great battle and, because of a curse, she herself becomes barren.
The violence of Draupadı‑ lends her an awesome beauty. This sort of myster-
ious and violent beauty is echoed in the epic’s descriptions of Earth, with which
Draupadı‑ is consistently identified, during the battle: “Wet with red blood sprung
from the bodies of men, horses, and elephants, the Earth was like an all-accessible
resplendent girl attired in burnished gold, garlands, and red garments.”42 After the
long period of violence and exile are over, her auspicious status as royal wife is
ultimately restored. Her hair is washed and bound and she again dons colorful
clothing and enters a pure state. In this way, Draupadı‑, once a fertile and beautiful
young wife to five men, now the experienced matriarch of the Pa-n.d.avas, embo-
dies the changeability of auspiciousness/inauspiciousness and the way it cuts
across purity concerns.43 By necessity, Draupadı‑ enters a prolonged state of
impurity subsequent to the interruption of her menstrual observances when she is
humiliated at the hands of the Kauravas at the beginning of the war. She con-
tinues to suffer, and even encourages bloodshed, but still succeeds in regaining
her throne and ensuring her family’s future, if not her own. Draupadı‑ must deal in
impurity and violence in order to set Yudhis.t.hira back on the throne, perpetuate
the Pa-n.d.ava line, avenge her own humiliation, and restore herself to auspi-
cious wifehood.44 In this way, she is an epic version of any ordinary wife, who
must have dealings with the violence and cyclic impurity of life in order to
ultimately promote auspiciousness in her home.
For the purposes of the present discussion, I synthesize these scattered
premodern articulations of “auspiciousness” and shape them into a definition
with the aid of modern anthropological observations about the auspiciousness
principle in South Asian ritual life. I define auspiciousness as that which
promotes cyclical fecundity, abundance, growth, social harmony, and the
glory of powerful men. Auspicious things are bright, gracious, pleasing, and
beautiful, but their beauty is quite often of the perishable or changeable sort.
Auspiciousness is highly time-sensitive and requires maintenance. Auspicious-
ness is linked to the female reproductive body. Inauspiciousness, on the other
hand, is that which leads to infertility and the destruction of life. Inauspicious
things are dark, gruesome, frightful, or ugly in aspect. Like auspiciousness,
inauspiciousness is time-sensitive, temporary and must be managed. Like
auspiciousness, inauspiciousness is also linked to the female reproductive
body. While auspiciousness can be conceptually distinguished from inauspi-
ciousness, in actuality the two cannot be separated. The former turns quickly
into the latter as a result of the inevitable intrusion of death, ritual error,
changes in location, planetary movements, the passage of time, the breaking
 The Inauspicious Mother 111
of rules, and many other causes. Because of the time and context-sensitive
nature of auspiciousness, the auspicious wife turns easily and quickly into an
inauspicious hag. In the blink of an eye, the lotus-like Laks.mı‑ transforms
herself into Alaks.mı‑, Pa-palaks.mı‑, or Nirr.tı‑. Maintaining auspiciousness
requires constant vigilance, foresight, ritual competence, and the interference
of Brahman priests.45 It is precisely this unpredictability and changeability in
the householder life, the constant need for maintenance from one day to the
next, and the inevitable defeat of one’s efforts when the planets turn and death
approaches, the role of the female body in its maintenance, and the house-
holder’s ritual dependence on a priestly class, that the sage Gautama found so
utterly unsatisfactory. The unending task of maintaining auspiciousness runs
counter to the renunciatory ethic in a more direct way than high caste
concerns about ritual purity.
I define or characterize auspiciousness/inauspiciousness in this way because
it provides a useful hermeneutic for analyzing the way classical Buddhist
treatments of birth impact gender. Although I do believe that Vedic-Hindu
traditions historically contiguous to the Buddhist traditions examined here
articulate the principle of auspiciousness/inauspiciousness in relatively con-
sistent ways, I don’t claim that classical Buddhist texts themselves explicitly
theorize that principle in the sense I am using it. Indeed, the Samma-dit.t.hi-
sutta, the Mangala-sutta, and Candrakı‑rti’s Catuḥśataka-t.‑ıka- constitute evidence
.
that they do not. Nonetheless, the strategic “hermeneutic of auspiciousness”
employed here, inspired anachronistically by 20th-century anthropological
studies of South Asia but developed in conversation with historically appro-
priate sources, affords a revealing prospect on Buddhist traditions of narrat-
ing birth and understanding female embodiment, and I proceed with it for
that reason.

“Auspiciousness” in Buddhist birth stories

The “suffering is birth” metaphor in canonical and extra-canonical accounts
entails the view that ordinary birth is never auspicious, whatever ordinary
people think. The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra includes imagery and plot elements
that remove the possibility that birth can ever be considered an auspicious event.
For instance, our text telescopes birth and death through its references to
organic decay and bodily putrefaction. Even when healthy, the womb is said
to be full of semen, blood, and pus, a fetid swamp, or an oozing wound.
Furthermore, according to the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, newborn bodies, no
matter how smooth and perfect, are as subject to decay as old ones. In fact
the newborn is instantly colonized by 80,000 tiny parasitic creatures feeding
off of its small body as if from a corpse. Its apertures are prone to fetid
leaking and its composting waste products are covered merely by a fly-wing
thin layer of tissue and skin. The state of being alive and being dead are,
according to the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, never very different, even when life is
fresh, perfect, and brand new.
112 Amy Paris Langenberg
The experience of dying and being born are also quite similar in the
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra’s assessment as far as the amount of physical and emo-
tional pain involved. The womb is not regarded as a warm, cozy, and safe
cradle for the developing fetus. On the contrary, the fetus experiences almost
constant pain and discomfort during its tenure there. In the first few weeks, it
feels as if it were being roasted alive in a frying pan. When the fetus grows
larger, it feels cramped and pressed upon. The fetus also experiences pain if
the mother eats inappropriate food, has sex, walks quickly, runs, sits or lies
down for a long time, or jumps up and down. Sometimes the fetus dies in the
womb, in which case it is carved up by the midwife and extracted piece by
piece. After birth, it also experiences a variety of tortures. The physical suf-
fering of the mother is mentioned in passing, especially when the fetus dies in
utero and must be removed by the midwife, but the contentments of a healthy
pregnancy, the triumph of a successful childbirth, and the peace of a nursing
newborn go unmentioned. Survival and sickness are equated, as are growth
and decay, birth and death. Maternal nurturance is equated to maternal
violence. In short, birth is dark, gruesome, frightful, and ugly, and closely
linked to death and destruction. The poles of creation and destruction are
moved together until they overlap. Childbirth, and by close association fertility
and female sexuality, are collapsed into death, rendering them permanently
inauspicious.
If, in its resemblance to death, ordinary birth is depicted in the Garbha--
.
vakra-nti-su-tra as permanently inauspicious, we might expect the Sanghabhe-
davastu and Lalitavistara to depict the birth of the Bodhisattva, destined as he
is for non-death (amr.ta), as auspicious. It is true, that words such as śubha and
.
mangala often appear, along with many other positive adjectives, to characterize
the events surrounding the bodhisattva’s birth. According the Lalitavistara, the
.
townspeople of Kapilavastu experience all sorts of mangala events, including
heavenly music, divine flowers falling from the sky, timely rains, and regularity
in the seasons, during Ma-ya-’s pregnancy. The Śa-kya kingdom enjoys a period of
abundance and peace at the time of the Bodhisattva’s birth. Thirty-two good
omens (pu-rvanimitta) appear and an explosion of fertility occurs in the sur-
rounding area. Five hundred sons and ten thousand girls, including the Bodhi-
sattva’s future wife, Yaśodhara-, are born to noble families. Ten thousand horses
are born, the Buddha’s horse Kan.t.haka among them, as well as one thousand
elephants. In addition, a forest of sandalwood trees appears and five hundred
.
gardens (Goswami 2001: 79–80, 93–94). The Sanghabhedavastu also tells of
divine blooms falling from the sky and superior sons being born to neigh-
boring kings at the time of the Bodhisattva’s birth (Gnoli and Venkatacharya
1977: 44–46).46 The appearance of auspicious signs is a standard feature of
most hagiographic accounts of the Bodhisattva’s nativity.47
Upon closer examination, however, the situation appears to be ambivalent.
While Indian Buddhist narratives of the Buddha’s nativity employ the lan-
guage of auspiciousness, and list the various auspicious signs, portents, and
effects that accompany the bodhisattva’s rebirth among the Śa-kyas, hints of
 The Inauspicious Mother 113
inauspiciousness lurk and key aspects of auspiciousness are notably absent.
Here I use the term “auspiciousness” in the sense outlined above: that which
promotes cyclical fecundity, abundance, growth, social harmony, and the
splendid power of kings. Auspicious things are bright, gracious, pleasing, and
beautiful, but their beauty is of the perishable or changeable sort. Inauspi-
ciousness occurs when the ritual measures taken to ensure the auspiciousness
of the home break down, or as a result of an abnormal cosmic event. Con-
sider, then, Lalitavistara’s description of Śuddhodana’s thoughts when Maha--
ma-ya- summons him after her dream of the white elephant. In the text, he appears
to interpret the summons as a sexual invitation, a sign that she had ended her
austerities. “Delighted,” (prahars.itamana-), his body trembling (a-kampitaśarı‑ra)
he quickly rises from his “auspicious seat” (bhadra-sana), abandoning his royal
duties in haste, but then hesitates inexplicably at the gate of the Aśoka grove,
unable to enter, filled with strange uncertainty (Vaidya 1958b: 43.20–24). The
confused Śuddhodhana mutters to himself:

I, famously confident in war, cannot remember my body so heavy as it is

today, even while standing at the head [of armies]. I do not have the
power to enter my own family’s home today. Why are my limbs in this
state? Whom shall I ask?
(Vaidya 1958b: 43.24–27)

As Madan observes, albeit in a modern context, turning towards home and

wife should be intrinsically auspicious for a householder.48 Manu also
emphasizes the wife’s importance as the embodiment of Śrı‑ and the source of
all good things. Here Śuddhodana appears to sense that Ma-ya- has changed in
some profound sense and is no longer simply his wife, sexual partner, and the
mistress of his home.
King Śuddhodana’s inexplicable unease is not the only inauspicious portent
recorded in traditional tellings of the bodhisattva’s nativity. One dharmata-
(fixed feature) of a bodhisattva’s final birth involves the concurrence of
earthquakes, an event that in Vedic ritual lore is deemed inauspiciously
abnormal and necessitates rituals of expiation or pacification (Gonda 1980: 3,
241, 286, 288, 400, 468). While the extraordinary child is accompanied by
many auspicious portents, the disruption this child will bring not only to King
Śuddhodana’s marriage and household but also to his kingdom is also fore-
shadowed inauspiciously. By these measures, the birth of the Bodhisattva is at
best simultaneously inauspicious and auspicious.
It may, in fact, be more suitable to view the Bodhisattva’s final birth as
neither inauspicious nor auspicious. The cyclicality, changeability, and con-
tingency of embodied existence, an essential element of the auspiciousness/
inauspiciousness principle as I define it here, are absent from accounts of the
Buddha’s birth. The Buddha chooses his womb by methodically comparing
the available options against his checklist of requirements (his future home
must be prosperous; his parents must be virtuous, noble, and well off, and so
114 Amy Paris Langenberg
forth). According to the Lalitavistara, his time in the womb lasts for exactly
ten lunar months to the day, at the conclusion of which he very punctually takes
birth. This predictably distinguishes the Bodhisattva from ordinary fetuses who
emerge on their own time, sometimes gestating for less than ten months,
sometimes longer. Furthermore, the Bodhisattva, does not really grow in
his mother’s womb as ordinary fetuses do. Rather, he enters, stays, and
.
emerges as a fully formed mature being. The Lalitavistara and Sanghabheda-
vastu both tell us that, having emerged from Ma-ya-’s body, the infant Bodhi-
sattva takes seven steps in each of the cardinal directions and proclaims this
to be his last birth. A Bodhisattva’s final birth is predictable and static, always
the same in Buddhist tradition. In fact, according to canonical sutta/a-gama
sources it is always characterized by a discrete set of “fixed features” (dhar-
mata-). It is a perfect event, a telos, and so falls outside of auspiciousness/
inauspiciousness, which is by definition processual, linked to the rise and fall
of fortunes and to cyclical processes such as the rotation of the planets, and to
transitional moments.
Certain female-inflected elements of auspiciousness – sexuality, ripe but
fragile beauty, cyclical fecundity, the circulation of nourishing substances
through person and world − are also absent or dealt with ambivalently in the
.
accounts of the Bodhisattva’s conception and birth found in the Sanghabhe-
.
davastu and Lalitavistara. Although the Sanghabhedavastu references con-
jugal activity on the night of the Bodhisattva’s conception,49 it also describes
Śakra cleansing the womb of any sexual fluids before the Bodhisattva’s des-
cent. The absence of sexual union (maithuna) and sexual fluids is explicit in
the Lalitavistara; the Buddha’s conception is asexual according to that tradi-
tion as both Ma-ya- and Śuddhodana have undertaken religious austerities at
the time of the Bodhisattva’s conception and are celibate. In the Lalitavistara,
Ma-ya- desires no sexual contact her husband from the time the Bodhisattva
enters her womb.50 According to the canons of Indic wifehood, Ma-ya-’s sexual
unavailability, attributable to religious vows rather than the cyclical impurity
of menstruation, renders her pure but inauspicious. Furthermore, Ma-ya-’s
beauty, though extraordinary, is not of a ripe and perishable nature. Rather,
she is forever preserved in a state of chaste beauty because she ascends to
heaven shortly after her child’s birth. There is never any danger of her grow-
ing stout, soft, wrinkled, and finally old (Ohnuma 2012: 79–82, 113–119).51
Maha-ma-ya-’s experience of pregnancy is marked neither by shared and cir-
culating energies nor dynamic change. The Bodhisattva is sequestered from
his mother’s body like a luminous, perfectly complete pearl hidden in an
oyster, not dependent upon it for its nourishing fluids and warmth. He does
not grow from his parents’ sexual fluids, nor does he feed on the nutritional
.
juices in his mother’s blood stream in utero. The Sanghbhedavastu states more
than once that the blessed being resides “fully-formed” (paripu-rn.a) within his
mother’s womb “as if encased” (kośogata iva) (Gnoli and Venkatacharya
1977: 42, 45). In the Lalitavistara, the Bodhisattva actually resides in a jew-
eled tabernacle, which, though beautiful and lined with soft things, cannot be
 The Inauspicious Mother 115
called organic or life-giving. It is neither animal nor even vegetable, but
mineral; a jewel-like structure, solid and indestructible as a diamond. The
Bodhisattva is thereby shut off from the warm, living body of his mother,
interned in a perfect, clean, but sterile box. His mother has neither the power
of life nor death over him. It is not she who protects him from malignancy,
but his own greatness, and the four directional deities sent to guard mother
and child. All of these features indicate that the pregnant Ma-ya- has only the
appearance of an auspicious Laks.mı‑ of the house, source of all good things.
Functionally, she is not.
Neither can the pregnancy of Ma-ya be called inauspicious. Hers is neither a
dangerous pregnancy nor a bloody birth. It does not occur under a malevo-
lent constellation. On the contrary, the pregnant Ma-ya- experiences unpar-
alleled wellbeing in body and mind. She does not become stretched and heavy
and anxious. When the Bodhisattva emerges, he does so without injuring her
in any way. The Lalitavistara insists, “the side of his mother’s abdomen was
undamaged and unhurt − as she was before, so she was after” (Vaidya 1958b:
69.17–18). Neither mother nor child experiences fatigue, discomfort or injury.
The mother doesn’t groan, lose blood, or weaken. The child emerges unna-
turally strong, issuing sonorous proclamations in full grammatically correct
sentences rather than throaty cries of shock. In general, the Bodhisattva’s
conception, gestation, and birth is simply untouched by the unpredictability
and vulnerability that, in their attempts to promote and safeguard auspi-
ciousness, ordinary householders and their wives constantly combat through
ritual observance.
As the French Indologist Alfred Foucher observes, the Bodhisattva’s birth
is so abnormal that one wonders why hagiographers didn’t dispense with the
element of the human womb altogether:

He, the supreme being, could have done without a mother as well as a
father and been reborn by a spontaneous birth, which is the privilege of
the gods. Without further ado, he could have been born in the marvelous
lotus that produced the precious drop of nectar that fed him during his
mother’s pregnancy. Why didn’t the legend simply take this way out
instead of becoming involved with a hybrid kind of generation that was
neither entirely human nor entirely divine?
(Foucher 1963: 28)

Foucher is referencing the fact that divine beings are born spontaneously
(upapa-duka/opapa-tika), according to canonical texts, and that various
Maha-ya-na su-tras pose floragenesis as the solution to the problem of being of
woman born (Teiser 2006). Answering his own question, Foucher proposes
that the Bodhisattva is born from a human womb in order to give heart to
ordinary followers wishing to emulate his achievements (Foucher 1963: 28).
This argument is hard to make stick, as the special child and mother both
dispense with the most basic features of the embodiment process. The child
116 Amy Paris Langenberg
neither grows nor changes nor displays the merest dependence on his human
container. In the Lalitavistara, the figure of Ma-ya-, with her jeweled casket
and transparent, backlit belly, is a sort of human luminaria-cum-walking
palace, her important parts made of precious minerals and scented woods, not
human flesh.52
In summary, neither the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra nor the two hagiographic
birth narratives considered here depict birth as impure and mostly auspicious,
which is its normal status according to Vedic-Hindu ritual traditions. The
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra departs from this assessment of childbirth through its
metaphorical identification of birth and suffering; birth is impure and thor-
oughly inauspicious rather than impure and mostly auspicious. The Lalitavis-
.
tara and Sanghabhedavastu are ambivalent with respect to the Bodhisattva’s
special birth. They depict the modalities of auspiciousness/inauspiciousness
associated with birth in ordinary householder contexts – cyclical growth and
increase, sexuality – as alien to the Bodhisattva’s nativity, and to the spiritual
ideal he exemplifies. The heavy use of conventional symbols of auspiciousness in
the Lalitavistara is distracting but not conclusive. I suggest that it is best
interpreted as a superficial compliance with Sanskrit literary conventions, a
Trojan horse that conceals a strategic erasure of female sources of
auspiciousness.

Auspicious protectors of Buddhist monuments

The Indic principle of auspiciousness, an indwelling quality common to mar-
ried women, mothers of sons, kings, fatted cattle, and the goddess Laks.mı‑,
has been theorized in 20th-century ethnographic studies of regional Hindu
ritual practice. Its ritual requirements are articulated in the gr.hyasu-tras and
dharmaśa-stras, its linguistic manifestations praised by grammarians, and its
divine personifications narrated in premodern epic and devotional texts like
the Maha-bha-rata and the Devı‑ Bha-gavata-pura-n.a. Here I have argued that
Buddhist accounts of birth, which can be taken as narrative expressions
relating to the core metaphor “suffering is birth,” alter this principle sub-
stantially, winnowing out its associations with female sexuality, maternal
nurturance, and human fertility.
Auspiciousness is not just a narrative trope or a principle articulated in
ritual texts, however. It also receives very striking visual expression at both
Hindu and non-Hindu sites. Visual expressions of auspiciousness are fairly
consistent across the ancient Indian religious landscape, regardless of sectar-
ian affiliation. From before the turn of the first millennium, sinuous beauties
and lovingly entwined couples were regularly displayed on the exterior walls
or gateways of stu-pas and temples, where scholars believe they performed an
apotropaic function (Agrawala 1983: 34; Bautze-Picron 2010: 203–209;
Donaldson 1975; Dehejia and Coburn 1999: 369–377). Particularly promi-
nent were the so-called śa-labhañjika- (branch-bending) figures, sexually mature
women gracefully grasping the branch of a flowering tree, touching the trunk
 The Inauspicious Mother 117
with one foot, or, entwined with the tree (Bautze-Picron 2010; Dehejia and
Coburn 1999: 369–372; Roth 1957; Vogel 1912). Typically, these women are
shown with one hand stretched over the head in order to grasp the tree
branch, and the other somewhere near the pubis. Sometimes they even pull
their lower garments down at the hip to as if to reveal more of their lower
bodies, or undo the knot altogether (Bautze-Picron 2010: 199–200). These
figures make a visual connection between the erect splendor of the flowering
tree, which, it is implied, responds to the woman’s touch, and the nubile
sexuality and fertility of the beautiful, almost naked, semi-divine woman. In
fact, śa-labhañjika- figures are sometimes described as dohada because of the
intimate heart connection they share with their tree.53 The branch-bending
motif is so pervasive in classical and medieval temple sculpture that the
term śa-labhañjika- eventually came to connote simply “statue” (Dehejia and
Coburn 1999: 371). The protective function of auspicious female figures was
formalized in scholastic texts codifying the production of art and archi-
tecture (śilpa-śa-stra). Vidya Dehejia notes, for instance, that the Śilpa
Praka-śa (“Light on Art”), a sculptural and architectural manual from the
11th century, “categorically states that figures of women are a prerequisite
on the walls of temples” (Dehejia and Coburn 1999: 371). These auspicious
female figures repel malign influences from religious sites while performing a
variety of charming and rather ordinary actions, including looking into
mirrors, adorning themselves with blossoms, grasping branches, brooding
pensively, dancing, drumming, or holding children.
The presence of auspicious Laks.mı‑-like figures on the gateways and exter-
nal walls of Hindu temples is not surprising considering Hinduism’s rich and
long-standing articulation of auspiciousness as a coveted religious value
and ritual principle. Buddhist monuments were also protected by auspicious
śa-labhañjika-s, however, and from a very early period. The gates and pillars of
Buddhist stu-pas at Bha-rhut and Sa-ñchı‑, both dating from before the turn of
the millennium, are adorned with exquisite semi-divine women in sinuous,
branch-bending poses. This motif can also be readily seen at other Buddhist
places such as Candraketugarh, Kauśa-mbı‑, and in early (pre-second-century)
Mathura-. A previous generation of scholars, including Jean Phillippe Vogel
and Étienne Lamotte, expressed surprise and distaste at sexualized female
forms displayed at early Buddhist sites and assumed them to have been an
offense to Buddhist orthodoxy as recorded in canonical texts. Vogel writes, “If
we recall the prohibition preserved in the Pa-li canon and ascribed to the
Buddha himself of decorating the monasteries with effigies of males and
females, it marks a degradation to find the sacred shrines of Mathura-
enclosed by railings exhibiting woman – that snare of Ma-ra and hindrance to
salvation – in the greatest variety of graceful attitudes” (Vogel 1912: 327).
Scholars have devised a variety of explanations for their presence at early
Buddhist monuments.54 A. K. Coomaraswamy explains this phenomenon as
evidence of the gradual assimilation of monastic Buddhism into popular
Indian religious life, and the simultaneous monasticization of local spirit
118 Amy Paris Langenberg

Figure 4.2 First-century C.E. sandstone figure of śa-labhañjika- yaks.‑ı from stu-pa 1 at
Sa-ñcı‑.
Source: Photograph © The Trustees of the British Museum / Art Resource, NY.

cults. He also alludes to the importance of female worshippers in enlivening

deity worship at ancient Buddhist sites:

At first sight, these śa-labhañjika- figures seem to be singularly out of place

if regarded with the eyes of a Buddhist or a Jaina monk. But by the time
 The Inauspicious Mother 119
that a necessity had arisen for the erection of these great monuments,
with their illustration of Buddhist legends and other material … Buddhism
and Jainism had passed beyond the circle of monasticism, and become
popular religions with a cult. These figures of fertility spirits were present
here because the people are here. Women, accustomed to invoke the
blessings of a tree spirit, would approach the railing pillar images with
similar expectations.
(Coomaraswamy 1928: 85)

Sukumar Dutt also interprets the presence of semi-divine women and other
non-monastic motifs at Buddhist monument sites as evidence of Buddhism’s
popularization. He also suggests it to be the product of unsupervised out-
sourcing. He observes that, while many of the monks were literate, most
would not have had the skills to carve in stone. Thus they relied on local
artisans versed in regional sculptural idioms, but ignorant of the fine points of
Buddhist philosophy and doctrine:

The stu-pa-decorators evidently knew the main legends of the Lord, a

number of Ja-taka stories, the sacred symbols and their significance. But
their work is untouched by the influence of monkish learning; it gives no
hint of the special interpretations and doctrinal matters developed in the
monks’ Abhidhamma philosophy. Evidently their faith was intimate with
life, forming one complex – the sacred unsifted from the profane, and the
ideal elements of Buddhism promiscuously blent with folk-cults folk
superstitions and concepts alien from canonical teachings.
(Dutt 1962: 121)

Vidya Dehejia draws our attention to inscriptional evidence indicating that

each pillar, crossbar and coping length at, for instance, Bha-rhut was paid for
by a different individual. Buddhist monuments such as Bha-rhut and Sa-ñchı‑
stand, therefore, as symbols of complex agency. They are “a result of com-
munity patronage,” and reflect community values (Dehejia 1997: 2). For
Dehejia, the complex agency involved in Buddhist monument building is one
reason inter alia to regard the function of auspicious female figures at Bud-
dhist sites is a question for which “there is no single simple answer; rather it
requires acknowledgment of the fact that more than one set of priorities was
in play” (Dehejia 1997: 5).
Robert DeCaroli argues that Buddhist monastics assimilated popular forms
of deity worship, including the worship of ambivalent fertility goddesses like
Ha-rı‑tı‑, deliberately as a way of ensuring continued lay support (DeCaroli
2004). This assimilation was, for DeCaroli, part of a strategy, not merely the
result of a natural historical process of popularization. Buddhist narrative
traditions include many stories about the Buddha’s skill in pacifying blood-
thirsty tree spirits (yaks.a/yaks.‑ı) and dangerous serpent deities (na-ga). Such
stories charter a kind of monastic cooption of local deity worship. In return
120 Amy Paris Langenberg
for the cooperation of local spirits and their acceptance of a vegetarian diet,
they are promised a share of the monks’ and nuns’ alms at shrines within or
near monastic complexes. In this way, the Buddhist community situated
itself at a fruitful nexus of exchange. It appeared to negotiate with and
control a variety of troublesome spirits on the laity’s behalf, and, in doing
so, further motivated lay generosity. As DeCaroli has documented, the
physical record seems to support this interpretation of the relationship
between Buddhism and popular spirit religion during the middle period. For
instance, at Bha-rhut, a number of male tree spirits are depicted on the vedika
railing surrounding the main stu-pa as if for the protection of the Buddha
relics interred there. The semi-divine women adorning the gates would have
fulfilled approximately the same purpose. By drafting local spirits into the ser-
vice of the Buddha in a centralized location, the status of the popular spirit
religion is subordinated to Buddhism in a highly visible and public fashion.55
Some monastics must have participated in the cultic aspects of local Bud-
dhism described above (DeCaroli 2004; DeCaroli 2011; Schopen 2002; Scho-
pen 2009; Schopen 2012). We know from the Bha-rhut inscriptions that some
monks and nuns even commissioned yaks.‑ı images. The Ha-rı‑tı‑ shrine at
Ajanta provides another tangible example of how the worship of female
spirits developed within Buddhist contexts, and how one particular Buddhist
community incorporated a semi-divine female living within their midst
(Cohen 1998). Still, although not all ancient visitors to Buddhist sites would
have perceived a contradiction in the presence of female or sexualized ima-
gery, certain ascetically-minded monks must have felt greatly alienated by the
sexually imposing women standing guard at the gates of monasteries, and the
real women who, surrounded perhaps by a gaggle of noisy leaky children,
smeared them with vermillion. In fact, there is some evidence that a subtle
critique of Ha-rı‑tı‑ worship and similar popular practices for promoting ferti-
lity developed within the monastic community. This critique is the subject of
the next chapter. For now, it is enough to note the contrast between the tex-
tual and material treatments of auspiciousness during this period. Texts such
as the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra reject the doctrine of the auspicious female body,
even while, as the historian D. D. Kosambi has it, “magnificent women in
opulent but highly revealing costumes, and their handsome male companions
stretched unbroken from Gandha-ra and Bha-rhut to Ajanta and Amara-vati”
(Kosambi 1966: 179). At least some monks, especially those involved in the
changes that gave rise to Maha-ya-na Buddhism, made no place for “magnifi-
cent women,” human or semi-divine, in their vision of the Buddhist path. The
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, with its firm rejection of female auspiciousness, can be
read as an expression of this critical mood. Indeed, it makes the perfect
protest pamphlet, reminding all ascetics everywhere, in frank, even strident
language, about the true inner nature of the fertile female body.
In a 2010 essay, art historian Claudine Bautze-Picron notes historical var-
iations on what she calls the “woman under tree” theme across ancient Bud-
dhist India, distinguishing between Greco-Indian sculptural traditions in
 The Inauspicious Mother 121
Gandha-ra and “India proper,” and between earlier and later sculptural
trends. She argues that the audaciousness of auspicious female figures at
Buddhist sites became somewhat muted over time. In Gandha-ran images,
which are both Greek-influenced and somewhat later than those seen at
Bha-rhut and Sa-ñchı‑, the female body is often swathed in drapery. Also the
auspicious “woman under tree” typically stands in front of the tree trunk in
Gandha-ra and in central India starting in the second or third centuries C.E.,
concealing what Bautze-Picron sees as the obvious phallic dimensions of the
tree imagery. According to Bautze-Picron, the frank sexuality and bold femi-
nine power of the earlier yaks.‑ı images is less overt in general in the second or
third centuries C.E. onwards. They tend to be placed lower to the ground,
symbolizing their association with ordinary life, not the grander processes of
cosmic creation. In many contexts the lone female figure is replaced by a
maithuna couple, implying that auspiciousness associated with fertility and
reproductive fertility is to be shared with the male figure (Bautze-Picron 2010:
208). In Gandha-ra, dionysian scenes often replace the Indic “woman under
tree” motif altogether.
In a further, curious development, Queen Ma-ya- herself becomes the iconic
śalabhañjika- figure starting in the Gupta period. This development appears to
-
undermine my assertion that Ma-ya- Devı‑ is not an auspicious figure per se in
the hagiographies examined here. If she is depicted as a tree-grasping woman,
she must have been generally regarded as auspicious. Actually, the presence of
the śa-labhañjika- Ma-ya- in Buddhist art is a complication, but not a repudia-
tion of my argument. As argued above, the textual and visual records do not
need to be made to agree in function. In fact, the material record bears witness
to a process of negotiation between monastic values and lay yearnings and is
not a strict expression of elite textual views. In any case, the material record
may actually reflect in a dilute manner the ambivalence I see in hagiographic
depictions of Ma-ya-. If Bautze-Picron’s analysis is correct, the śa-labhañjika-
theme became subtly muted by the second or third centuries C.E., its overtly
sexual dimensions somewhat reduced. By the Gupta period, depictions of a
placid, lovely, but aloof Ma-ya- politely giving birth while standing to grasp
a tree branch, the Bodhisattva diving cleanly out of her side to be received by
a pair of male deities, became commonplace. Speaking of these standard
visual depictions of the Buddha’s birth, Bautze-Picron writes, “Ma-ya-
appears like an eternal virgin hiding the trunk of the tree when she gives birth
to her son, her function is not anymore to arouse desire, she is reduced to
the sole consequence of being the mother of the Buddha” (Bautze-Picron
2010: 208). Ma-ya- may be a śa-labhañjika-, but only in the somewhat sani-
tized and reduced Buddhist sense discerned and articulated by Bautze-Picron.

The rebounding violence of gender

.
Comparing accounts of birth in the Lalitavistara and Sanghabhedavastu tra-
- - -
ditions to the Garbhavakranti-sutra highlights their contrasting aesthetic and
122 Amy Paris Langenberg
narrative programs. In particular, this contrast highlights differences and simila-
rities with respect to what I have termed “auspiciousness.” The Garbha-vakra-nti-
su-tra discourse renders ordinary birth thoroughly inauspicious, that is to say,
.
linked with death, decay, and ugliness. The Lalitavistara and Sanghabheda-
vastu traditions of narrating the bodhisattva’s birth render that most
excellent event, birth in its ideal form, neither auspicious nor inauspicious. It
is inorganic, asexual, linear, and characterized by neither change nor
growth.
The anthropologist Maurice Bloch has proposed that the symbolic subjec-
tion of ordinary forms of productivity and reproductivity to a higher, trans-
cendent order, are a common element of religious life in a variety of cultures
and time periods. In Prey into Hunter: The Politics of Religious Experience,
which is based on a series of lectures he delivered at the University of
Rochester in 1987, Bloch describes an “irreducible core of the ritual process”
visible in a strikingly wide array of unrelated religious traditions, including
Orokaiva initiation, Ladakhi marriage, post-Meiji restoration Japanese Bud-
dhism, Dinka expiatory rituals, Hindu funerary practice, and Paul’s epistles
(Bloch 1992: 1). He proposes that the “startling quasi-universality” of this core
ritual form “derives from the fact that the vast majority of societies represent
human life as occurring within a permanent framework which transcends the
natural transformative process of birth, growth, reproduction, ageing and
death” (Bloch 1992: 3). The ritual process or “idiom” he describes is, as he
characterizes it, one of “rebounding violence.” Its purpose is to provide a
means to transcend the instability and meanness of biological existence
through the ritual creation of enduring intergenerational continuity and
spiritual transcendence.
The processes of “rebounding violence” proceed through two distinct
phases. In the first phase, what Bloch calls “native vitality” is ritually killed or
subsumed, allowing religious subjects to pass beyond the contingencies of
everyday life to enter a life-transcending, often disembodied state. The end
product of this first phase is communion with what is permanent or immortal,
and this is often achieved through physical deprivation and symbolic death.
Bloch gives the example of Orokaiva initiation in which the initiates, all
children, are hunted in a mock pig hunt by ancestral spirits (initiated adults
dressed like birds) who then “spirit” them away from the village to a special
hut in the forest. There they undergo various deprivations and are educated in
the ways of the spirit world. Through these terrifying experiences they are
believed to shed their pigness (vitality and mortality) and take on bird-like
characteristics (transcendence and spirituality).56
If they are to continue to live in community, having children and producing
wealth, spiritually active people cannot, however, remain in the symbolic
death of the first phase. Or to put it another way, the transcendent world of
the initiated must be brought in touch with and made relevant to the ordinary
world in order to satisfy “the politico-social requirement of constructing a
totality of living beings, which is, unlike its constituent parts, permanent”
 The Inauspicious Mother 123
(Bloch 1992: 4). Not only must the initiates return, they must dominate. In
order to accomplish this they reconquer the ordinary forms of life they have
abandoned by returning to the village and consuming new forms of vitality
external to themselves. This second phase culminates in the transformed sub-
ject re-entering ordinary life through another act of aggression or consump-
tion and infusing that life with a measure of transcendence and permanence
learned or attained during the first phase. In the New Guinea example, the
initiates return to the village completely altered and must immediately hunt
and feast upon some of the village pigs. This literal act of violence followed
by consumption allows them to regain some measure of their “pigness,”
bringing about a separation from the spirit world symbolized by the forest
and a re-entry into normal village life. From this moment forth, however, the
initiates are free to return to the forest at any point to commune with the
ancestral spirits. They will never again be fully pig-like in nature. They have been
transformed from prey into hunters, from helpless, feckless children into
powerful adults.
Sometimes the consumption of external vitality in phase two is a precursor
not to political domination, but to the perpetuation and shoring up of the
patrilineal family. This is the case, for example, in Ladakhi marriage rituals,
during which the groom “invades” his bride’s house and symbolically cap-
tures her. In this instance of rebounding violence, the external vitality to be
consumed is the exogamous, and therefore alien woman. According to Bloch’s
theory, patrilineal descent is often a twofold process of killing native vitality
by inhibiting the grown son’s identification with his mother’s side through a
variety of ritual actions, and then capturing and consuming external vitality
in the form of exogamous reproducing female bodies.57 In this way, the per-
manence and transcendence of male descent is asserted over and above the
fickle contingencies of merely personal and emotional human connection with
the mother and her kin.
From the perspective of Bloch’s theory, classical Indian Buddhist monasti-
cism can be said to exhibit what he would term a “millenarian” stance
towards the idiom of rebounding violence, in which the second phase is
entered into only weakly or not at all in an attempt to abandon an unsa-
tisfactory earthly existence. Buddhist monastics engage fully in the first phase,
the eradication of native vitality, by subordinating their appetites and
desires to the higher values of discipline and knowledge. In doing so, they
attempt to kill off their immature, passionate, vital selves and enter a path
that they hope leads to deathlessness. These feats are accomplished ritually
through monastic rites of ordination and moral cleansing, but also in other
ways through specialized forms of self-discipline. Through such practices,
Buddhist monastics leave the world and enter, if not a permanent place of
transcendence, then at least a staging area on the way to that place. As for the
second phase, like other millenarians, Buddhist monastics are supposed to
cultivate an extremely hesitant attitude towards any subsequent consumption
of external vitality. For example, they are supposed to consume only
124 Amy Paris Langenberg
moderate amounts of food and employ minimal levels of violence in obtaining
food and other material goods. For instance, they are supposed to beg for sus-
tenance, rather than cultivate or raise it. If possible, they should avoid meat.
If not, at least the animal should not be killed for their sakes. In theory, they
do not marry or have sex. In theory, they do not go to war or engage in
political expansionism.
In order for an institution or social group to survive, however, some form
of consumption is always necessary. Buddhist monks consume alms, of
course, as part of a coded exchange with lay supporters. Perhaps the most
dramatic act of consumption on the part of Buddhist monasticism is its
absorption of other people’s children as novices, a set of practices that will be
partially addressed in the next chapter. Unavoidable, this consumption of
external vitality is consensual, undertaken with a minimum level of aggression
and domination. Furthermore, male novices are preferred historically over
their female counterparts, whose alien nature and reproductive vitality are
more potent and troublesome from the monastic perspective. Thus, in its
classical form, Indian Buddhist monasticism emphasizes the first phase, in
which its members leave the sexually reproducing, materially consuming
world in search of transcendence, and minimizes as much as possible the
second phase, which involves a triumphant return to world for the purposes
of political and social thriving.
Bloch recognizes the expression of the rebounding violence idiom in at least
some non-ritual cultural forms. In the last chapter, entitled “Myth,” Bloch
addresses the way in which myth offers a freer arena than ritual for expressing
“what ifs?” The most important question to be explored in myth is, to para-
phrase Bloch, “What if the idiom of rebounding violence that dialectically
creates and maintains human social life, situating us meaningfully in rela-
tionship to the cosmos, were forgotten, ignored, or no longer existed?” It is
helpful to view the Buddhist rhetoric of birth as expressed in Buddhist
“myths” such as the Lalitavistara and the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra as speculative
.
imaginings of this type. Read in this way, the Lalitavistara and Sanghabhe-
davastu ask: what if, like a Buddha, one were to enter into the first phase,
consume one’s native vitality, enter a transcendent and unchanging spir-
itualized state, and stay there, never to return to the violent world of con-
sumption and reproduction? The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra asks, on the other
hand: what if, like a suffering fetus, one existed in a banal female-gendered
world without transcendence or purity, continually consuming and being
consumed without respite? Such mythological “what if” imaginings of worlds
existing beyond or bereft of human ritual interference make the most sense in
relationship to social worlds in which related religious practices are concretely
enacted. In the Indian context, for instance, the speculative re-examinations
of and rejections of fertility as a basic human good evident in the Buddhist
accounts of birth analyzed above can be related to the hesitant, millenarian
attitude of Buddhist monastics towards the violence and consumption needed
to enter into Bloch’s second phase fully. Sexuality, aggression, feasting, and
 The Inauspicious Mother 125
other risky behaviors characteristic of the second phase are correctly timed
and skillfully managed by the auspiciousness-seeking householder in hopes of
achieving prosperity, political power, and many sons, but carefully avoided by
millenarian monastics. The worldview that attends a monastic posture
towards the violence and sexuality necessary for full social involvement is
imaginatively explored in Buddhist birth “myths.” We see this in their inver-
sions and transformations of the principle of “auspiciousness.” The ordinary
fetus is permanently and irredeemably inauspicious, and immune to ritual
remediations. The special fetal Bodhisattva transcends auspiciousness
altogether.
In the social world of ancient Buddhist India, lay and monastic values and
aspirations appear to have been compatible in important ways. Like Buddhist
ascetics, the laity also would have sought forms of transcendence and positive
continuity from life to life. For Buddhist communities, such aspirations were
officially understood and pursued in terms of merit accumulation and spiri-
tual lineage. Buddhist monasteries and the literary and ritual traditions they
were able to sustain and propagate were an important resource in the pursuit
of these shared lay-monastic goals. The monastic ethic did not harmonize
with lay aspirations in all areas, however. Whereas laypeople living in house-
holds would have been likely to regard the coveted young and fertile female
body as a source of auspiciousness, the Garbha-vakra-nti and many other
canonical and extra-canonical texts from early Indian Buddhism indicate that
at least some monastics were encouraged to regard such bodies with suspi-
cion. In the eye of a celibate Buddhist ascetic, that squalling newborn son was
akin to a slime-covered worm writhing in the excrement of sam -
. sara, his tri-
umphant mother’s body no different from a pus-filled malodorous corpse.
Still, Buddhist lay supporters would have continued to participate in various
forms of local spirit veneration, and even Vedic-Hindu styles of sacrificial
religion, in order to promote fertility and accomplish other aims. Some of
these ritual observances would even have been carried out at Buddhist mon-
asteries or at stu-pas. Monastic/lay interactions around fertility rituals will be
discussed in the next chapter. Here, it is enough to mention that at least some
monks were skeptical about such practices.
Among other things, the suppression of auspiciousness as a coveted value
in classical Buddhist accounts of birth makes possible a valuation of mother-
hood quite different from that of, for instance, Brahman dharmaśa-stra texts.
In Buddhist texts, the reproductive female body is a source of potent impur-
ity, as it sometimes is in Brahman contexts, but is also, as a site of the mys-
terious, unpredictable, and violent processes of death and rebirth,
irredeemably inauspicious. The mother is not celebrated as the life-giving
vessel of future generations, the Laks.mı‑ of the home, and she does not enjoy
the reflected glow of creation. Women will procreate, as this cannot be
entirely avoided, and yet they are to enjoy no glory for doing so, at least not
officially. To the extent that such elite monastic views impacted ordinary
Buddhist lay women, this situation would appear to be a negative. As the
126 Amy Paris Langenberg
material record shows, however, the situation regarding auspiciousness even
in pious Buddhist households would have been complex, with many laypeople
still participating in ritual manipulations of auspiciousness.
Moreover, as Foucault’s work on sexuality reminds us, power/knowledge
regimes are never merely restrictive but always generative. Discursive pro-
grams are the womb of new life forms, so to speak. Although restrictive, even
oppressive to women, the Buddhist discourse of childbirth also provides the
setting for several uniquely Buddhist persons to emerge onto the scene, both
inside and outside of texts. Here we meet one of these: the inauspicious
mother. As a shadowy figure whose value as a reproducer is reduced to
nothing, the inauspicious (and, as we discovered in the last chapter, abject)
mother presents an interesting ambivalence. Her apparent odium resolves into
potentiality when considered through Bloch’s lens. If mothers are not charged
with auspiciousness, something similar to what Bloch terms “vitality,” what
point is there in controlling them via the ritual processes of, as Bloch styles it,
“rebounding violence”? If a mother is simply a benighted biological reprodu-
cer and not a coveted goddess of auspiciousness, what is to be gained from
ritually consuming or conquering her, putting her in the service of the com-
munity, in a public and visible way? She is to be expiated, and only partially
reincorporated. In a Buddhist monastic setting, this “expiation” is accom-
plished through specialized forms of nonviolent religious discipline, not
through ritualized communal violence and domination. Moral discipline
and meditation on the body’s loathsomeness are two means by which
celibate monks eliminate all physical and mental connections with the sexu-
ality of women. For their part, celibate nuns, purged of their potential for
auspiciousness/inauspiciousness through Buddhist initiation and moral dis-
cipline, are incorporated into the Buddhist monastic patrilineage, but non-
violently and non-sexually. Once there, they play no role as sexual partner or
reproducer.
One consequence of the dropping of auspiciousness as a female-gendered
religious value inside Buddhist monastic communities is the possibility of new
types of femaleness, ones not so tightly bound to the biological production of
children for the patrilineal, patriarchal family as they are in, for instance,
Brahmanic social contexts. There is no evidence that ordinary Buddhist
mothers were actually viewed as inauspicious in Indian Buddhist contexts.
Indeed, the material evidence that fertility worship was a feature of localized
Buddhist worship and the ubiquity of auspicious female figures at stu-pa sites
in ancient India suggests that inauspicious mothers existed mainly as textual
constructs, or “what if” imaginings, but that most Buddhist laywomen still
lived according to the canons of auspiciousness. Another sort of woman, one
indebted to the textual imaginings of inauspicious mothers described here
was, however, a reality in historical Buddhist communities. Buddhist nuns
definitely existed, and still do. These special female persons were not glorified
for their fertility and therefore were capable of at least partially stepping
outside of the social constructs of patriarchial religion. Their duties as
 The Inauspicious Mother 127
daughters of the Buddhist monastic patrilineage were defined in nonsexual
ways, opening up a space for a new kind of femaleness to emerge, one not
circumscribed so completely by reproductive capacities.

Notes
1 Tibetan translators used the word dge ba to render these Sanskrit terms.
2 Harvey follows other scholars in translating kusala as “wholesome” (175–176).
3 Bstan ‘gyur (sde dge), volume 103, 93b. This certain bodhisattva is a ship captain
who kills a sailor having the intention of slaying the five hundred bodhisattvas that
happen to be on board. The ship captain does this out of compassion to save the
sailor from suffering for five hundred kalpas in the Avı‑ci hell. For further discus-
sion, see Jenkins. Sincere thanks to Stephen Jenkins for so generously sharing with
me his unpublished notes on the relevant section of Candrakı‑rti’s byang chub sems
dpa’i rnal ‘byor spyod pa bzhi brgya pa’i rgya cher ‘grel pa.
4 Gnoli and Venkatacharya (1977). Prior to the discovery of the Gilgit texts, the
.
Sanghabhedavastu narration of the Buddha’s life was accessible only in Tibetan
and Chinese. There are two Chinese versions from the Tang and Song dynasties
respectively. The Tibetan translation is summarized in Rockhill (1884). For a text
historical account of this tradition see Durt (2002: 59–60).
5 The Lalitavistara was edited and partially translated by Ra-jendrala-la Mitra in
1881–1886, based on Nepalese manuscripts. Salomon Lefmann edited and par-
tially translated this text into German in 1875. P.E. Foucaux published a complete
French translation in the Annals du Musee Guimet (vols. 6 and 19) in 1884 and
1892. In 1987, the Mithila Institute of Post-Graduate Studies and Research in
Sanskrit learning published an edition of the Lalitavistara, based mainly on Lefmann’s
edition, in consultation with Mitra’s edition. Bijoya Goswami published a com-
plete English translation of the text in 2001. My translations are based on the
online and printed Mithila Institute edition in consultation with Goswami’s
translation. An online text is located at http://www.dsbcproject.org/node/4076.
6 The Pa-li Maha-pada-na-sutta has been translated into English by Rhys-Davids and
Walshe. A related text, the Acariyabbhuta-sutta, occurs at Majjmiha-nika-ya iii.118
(MN 123). It tells of the special birth of Gotama, not Vipaśyin Buddha. Refer-
ences to the Fukita edition of the Maha-vada-na-su-tra are based on both the online ver-
sion at http://gretil.sub.uni-goettingen.de/gretil/1_sanskr/4_rellit/buddh/mavadsuu.htm
and the published edition. No English translation of the Maha-vada-na-su-tra exists.
7 See also Bareau (1962, 1974).
8 DN ii.107–109 explains the eight causes of earthquakes. Six of the eight are
moments in a Buddha’s life, including conception, birth, enlightenment, and death.
See Ciurtin (2009) for a comparative study of Buddhist earthquakes.
9 Dating of this text is difficult. Goswami puts it in the first or second century A.D.
(Goswami 2001: v), as does Winternitz. Noting the importance of Buddha images
and narrative scenes in Gandha-ra, Winternitz argues, “everything favours the
supposition that the period of the development of the Gandha-ra art, that is, the
first two centuries of the Christian era, is also the period of the earlier Maha-ya-na
texts which deal with the Buddha legend” (Winternitz 1972: vol. 2, 255). Luczanits
is even more cautious: “In an earlier recension the Lalitavistara was a Sarva-stiva-da
text, but it has been reworked and extended several times. The extant Maha-ya-na
su-tra, however only was finalized in the late seventh or early eighth century and is
thus not much older than its Tibetan translation” (Luczanits 2010: 53).
.
10 The Sanghabhedavastu describes the five “surveyings” (avalokana) of the bodhi-
sattva before his descent from Tus.ita. The five include surveyings of caste, country,
128 Amy Paris Langenberg
time, lineage, and woman (Gnoli and Venkatacharya 1977: 36). The Maha-vastu
mentions only four, leaving out the surveying of women (Jones 1952: vol. 2, 1). The
Lalitavistara mentions the same four: time, great continent, kingdom, and lineage
(Goswami 2001: 24).
11 The 64 attributes include inter alia: education, lack of cruelty, nobility, many
women, many men, lack of poverty, politeness, intelligence, bravery, and support of
ascetics (Goswami 2001: 28–29). See also the 60 qualities of the Bodhisattva’s
family mentioned in the Maha-vastu (Jones 1952: vol. 2, 1–2).
12 The 32 good attributes of Ma-ya Devı‑ include high birth, beauty, a smiling face,
modesty, good manners, learning, a good nature, etc. (Goswami 2001: 29–30). The
Maha-vastu emphasizes the fact that the bodhisattva’s mother is, in addition to
being high born, beautiful, and modest, short lived (Jones 1952: vol. 2, 3).
13 The Maha-vastu also has Ma-ya- retire to a palace rooftop, where she is chaste and
observes the precepts (Jones 1952: vol. 2, 5–6).
14 The Maha-vada-na-su-tra contains no reference to the king’s dalliance with the Bod-
hisattva’s mother, the five or four surveyings, or the devendra’s efforts to prepare
.
her womb. The Sanghabhedavastu tells of Ma-ya-’s strange and elevating dreams on
that night, including a vision of a six-tusked elephant entering her womb, the sen-
sation of flying up into the upper atmosphere, the sense of climbing a great rocky
mountain, and the impression of being honored by a great crowd of people.
15 In her 2012 study of “maternal imagery and discourse in Indian Buddhism,” Reiko
Ohnuma notes many of the thematic elements of the Buddha’s nativity remarked
upon here, including a disavowal of any birth impurity, the fetal bodhisattva’s
developmental precocity, the glowing transparency of Ma-ya-’s womb, and Ma-ya-’s
early death (Ohnuma 2012: 66–85, 134–164). Willem Bollée (2005), Hubert Durt
(2002; 2003), Minoru Hara (1980; 2009), and Vanessa Sasson (2009) also note
many of these themes.
16 This text is Jayaraks.ita’s Sphut.a-rtha- Śrı‑ghana-ca-rasam ‑ -
. grahat.ıka, a commentary on.
a non-extant verse text for instructing novices that is probably from the Maha-sa-n-
ghika school. Agostini finds a similar view in a text from the Tibetan ‘dul ba by the
twelfth century monk Sunayaśrı‑ entitled the Upasakasam -
. varas.t.aka (which ought
to be Mu-lasarva-stiva-da associated but may not be).
17 Obeyesekere mentions a ja-taka text in which he is described as coming “out of his
mother’s womb not only unstained, but stretching his hands and legs, just like a
man descending a ladder” (Obeyesekere 1973: 225).
18 According to Agostini, a certain distinction between the manus.yavigraha (huma-
noid) state and manus.ya (human) state proper appears in the Vinaya and scholastic
discussions on the subject of abortion (Agostini 2004: 73–74).
19 The word I am translating (following Fukita and Salomon) as “semen impurity” is
juvramala. In the Maha-vada-na-su-tra, this juvra appears rather as jubhra. Juvra/
jubhra is obscure. Fukita proposes that this is a Ga-ndha-rı‑ transformation of the
Sanskrit śukra (“semen”) (Fukita 2003: 56, n. 4). Salomon doubts this etymology
as too convoluted, but agrees that this word probably does mean “semen”: “jubhra-
might be a slang or taboo form, phonetically patterned after standard śukra, which
somehow made its way into Buddhist Sanskrit.” (Salomon 2004: 819).
20 Parallel passage at Fukita (2003: 56).
21 As Radich and Granoff point out, the “jeweled womb” trope can be found else-
where in Indian Buddhist tradition: in the Upa-yakauśalya-su-tra and, more famously,
in the vision of Ma-ya-’s womb found in Gan.d.avyu-ha (Granoff 1998: 356–491; Gran-
off 2004; Radich 2015: 124–129). Radich interprets the “jeweled womb” trope in
the light of docetic Buddhology, Granoff in the light of the visionary in Indian
Buddhism. See also Strong (2004: 60–64) for a discussion of the “jeweled womb”
as relic and reliquary.
22 Monier-Williams’s Sanskrit-English dictionary has ka-kaciñcika for ka-cilindaka.
 The Inauspicious Mother 129
23 In the medical literature, ojas is equated with rasa, which in that technical context
refers to the distilled and transmuted essence of food that is the first of the seven
dha-tus or tissues of the body. The other six, related to one another hierarchically
and causally are: blood, flesh, fat, bone, marrow, and semen (Larson 1993: 114).
Ojas gives the body unctuosity and tautness of flesh. Lack of ojas leads to wasting,
is in cases of consumption (ra-jayaks.man) (Zimmermann 1987: 177–178). Ojas/rasa
is related mythologically to soma and semen (Zimmermann 1987: 220–221). In the
R.g-veda, ojas connotes hypermasculine virile strength and competence in battle
and is especially associated with the god Indra, who is considered sexually potent,
bull-like, and “possessed of 1000 testicles” (sahasramus.ka) (Whitaker 2011: 30–31,
133–146).
24 In this sense, the Bodhisattva does follow the rules, as male fetuses are also said to
occupy the right side of the womb in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra and in the Caraka-
sam - -
. hita. The Mahavastu says the Bodhisattva having entered his mother’s womb
“does not occupy a position that is either too high or too low. He does not lie on
his face, nor on his back, nor on his left side nor squatting on his heels. But he sits
in his mother’s right side with his legs crossed” (Jones 1952: vol. 2, 14).
25 The Maha-vada-na-su-tra passage is virtually identical, but includes a verse praising
the gem-like effulgent fetus who resembles a ray of sunlight and is visible, fully-
formed, to his mother (Fukita 2003: 58). The Maha-vastu compares the Bodhi-
sattva in his mother’s womb to gold and gemstones: “Just as though a gem of beryl
in a crystal casket were placed in her curving lap, so does his mother see the
Bodhisattva like a body of pure gold illumined in her womb” (Jones 1952: vol. 2, 15).
26 The commentarial author of the Pa-li Nida-na-Katha- offers his own confident read-
ing of this analogy. According to him, “the Bodhisatta who lay in her womb was
clearly visible like a yellow thread passed through a clear crystal” (Jayawickrama
2000: 69).
27 A body of scholarship exists on or related to the dohada theme in Indic literature
(Bloomfield 1920; Böhtlingk 1901; Durt 2002; L. Wilson 2013). For the medical
view on dohada/daurhr.da, see for instance CS Śa-rı‑rastha-na 4.15. Notably, Caraka
calls this state not daurhr.da (“sick hearted”) but dvaihr.dayya (“felt in two hearts”).
28 Discussed at length in Durt (2003).
29 Durt mentions a number of mothers featured in Buddhist ja-taka stories or com-
mentaries who experience dohadas, sometimes good but mostly bad. A pious woman
like Phusatı‑, mother of Vessantara, carrying a virtuous fetus (in Phusatı‑’s case the
Bodhisattva himself) may, like Ma-ya-, desire to offer alms to religious mendicants or
the poor. Alternatively, benighted mothers carrying lesser beings, such as outcaste
women or female jackals, may crave food that requires a “predatory act.” The
patricide king Aja-taśatru’s mother craved her own husband’s blood while pregnant
(Durt 2002: 53–59). On the medical side, Suśruta mentions that the mother’s desire
to eat the meat of an ox indicates a vigorous child. SS Śa-rı‑rastha-na 3.25.
30 BC 1.9–11. Jones (1952: vol. 2, 18). Foucher is of the opinion that this tradition
relies on the Vedic precedent of Indra’s birth, and that “it was absolutely necessary
that the Buddha’s birth be superhuman” (Foucher 1963: 30).
31 A similar sentiment is expressed at Vaidya (1958b: 61.21–22).
32 According to the Maha-vastu, “Tatha-gatas are born with a body that is made of
mind, and thus the mother’s body is not rent, nor does any pain ensue” (Jones
1952: vol. 2, 18).
33 In the vinaya, the Bodhisattva is said to emerge “as if encased” (kośogata iva)
(Gnoli and Venkatacharya 1977: 45).
34 Fukita (2003: 62); Gnoli and Venkatacharya (1977: 45); Walshe (1987: 204). See
also Jones (1952: vol. 2, 18).
35 In Gandha-ran art and subsequent Indic Buddhist artistic traditions, Indra and/or
Brahma are depicted at the right side of Ma-ya- during the birth. Though not
130 Amy Paris Langenberg
.
disguised as an old midwife as he is in the Sanghabhedavastu, Indra receives the
child on a cloth. To Ma-ya-’s left are depicted various women who support her
(Bautze-Picron 2010: 210–211).
36 Maha-pada-na-sutta ii.14.
37 Vaidya (1958b: 69:17–18); Jones (1952: vol. 2, 18); BC 1.9; Foucher (1963: 30).
The Sanskrit Maha-vada-na-sutta includes a verse that might allude to link between
a Buddha’s birth and his mother’s ordained demise shortly thereafter. The full
verse reads: vidhr.tya ma-sa-m - - -
. hi daśaiva kuks.ya vipaśyimata asamam
- - -
. prajata kaya-
sya bheda-t tridaśopapanna- devanika-ya- bhagavajjanetrı‑ (Fukita 2003: 87–88). The
phrase ka-yasya bheda-t read as “after the separation from the body” would refer
simply to Vipaśyin’s mother’s separation from her human body before joining the
divine host and is certainly a less controversial reading, given that the bulk of
Buddhist hagiography denies any causal connection between the Bodhisattva’s birth
and his mother’s death. Still one wonders whether it is also possible to read this
phrase as “after the rupture of her body,” taking it to refer to the more visceral
splitting of the body that she endures.
38 Das places auspiciousness on the side of life, and on the right side of the body,
which she associates with the married deities, Brahman priests, marriage, child-
birth, mother goddesses, and even low-caste ritual attendants such as barbers and
washermen (V. Das 1982: 143).
39 Apffel-Marglin makes distinctions between the goddesses who are traditionally pro-
pitiated regarding matters of fertility and safe childbirth in Puri, and the quintessen-
tially auspicious goddess, Laks.mı‑. While Laks.mı‑ and her attendants, the devada-sı‑,
promote wealth, prosperity, and social harmony, they do not rule over childbirth
(Apffel-Marglin 2008: 43–47). Marriage is, of course, conceptually, legally, and
ritually linked to childbirth, but informants tell Apffel-Marglin that the latter is not
as auspicious as the former (Apffel-Marglin 2008: 43). In fact, by Apffel-Marglin’s
reckoning, birth appears to be more similar to ancestor worship in its ambivalence.
40 Historians such as Alf Hiltebeitel have noted the relevance of the notion of auspi-
ciousness to the premodern context. Hiltebeitel contributed an article to the above-
mentioned volume addressing the issue of purity and auspiciousness in the epics. In
this and other articles, Hiltebeitel has frequently mentioned his intuitions regarding
the close relationship between epic themes and modern popular religious practice.
41 For instance, just as a student of the Veda must separate his recitation of Vedic
texts from ordinary speech with an utterance of the syllable aum, householders
must utter that syllable strategically before mentioning an auspicious word like svasti
or r.ddhi during the performance of auspicious ceremonies (Gonda 1980: 261).
42 Mbh 8.68.34. Translated in Hiltebeitel (1980: 107).
43 In her 2004 study Courtesans and Tantric Consorts: Sexualities in Buddhist Nar-
rative, Iconography, and Ritual, Serinity Young focuses at times, as I do in the
present chapter, on auspiciousness in Indian Buddhism. She does not, however,
distinguish impurity and inauspiciousness in her analysis. For instance, she also
argues that texts depict Ma-ya- is inauspicious, but attributes this to their “emphasis
on her polluted state” (Young 2004: 38).
44 One particularly graphic example of Draupadı‑’s complex relationship to pollution in
the Maha-bha-rata occurs when Yudis.t.hira is struck in the face by the Matsya King,
Vira-t.a. Draupadı‑ catches the impure blood from his injured nose in a golden cup.
Yudis.t.hira then comments to Vira-t.a, “Surely, if that blood from my nose had fallen on
the earth, you and your kingdom, O king, would undoubtedly have perished.” The
implication, according to Hiltebeitel, is that the blood of that hero is powerful and, had
it touched the ground, could have loosed destructive forces on the Matsya kingdom.
Draupadı‑ prevents this from happening, safeguarding the Pa-n.d.avas’s gestation in the
womb of Matsya so necessary to their survival and rebirth as a family lineage
(Hiltebeitel 1981: 196).
 The Inauspicious Mother 131
45 Mary McGee explains the women’s vrata practices she studied in contemporary
Maharashtra are performed on precisely these terms. Women regularly and punctu-
ally perform vratas in order to maintain (not acquire) the health and good fortune
of their families (saubha-gya) (McGee 1991).
46 The Maha-vastu speaks of the simultaneous birth of 500 Sa-kyan young men (with
Sundarananda at their head), 500 maidens (“with Yaśodhara- at their head”), 500
male servants (“with Chandaka at their head”), 500 horses (“with Kanthaka at
their head”), 500 elephants (“with Candana at their head”), and 500 stores of
treasure (Jones 1952: 22).
47 BC I.21–27. The Nida-nakatha- also tells of 32 auspicious omens at the time of the
Bodhisatta’s conception (Jayawickrama 2000: 68).
48 “The Kashmiri Brahmans, who do not normally undertake a journey away from
home except at an auspicious moment, do not consider it equally necessary to time
similarly the return home, which is always auspicious” (Madan 1987: 57).
49 The Buddhacarita also seems to leave open the possibility that the Bodhisattva’s
conception was not asexual: “That ruler of men, sporting with his queen, enjoyed,
as it were, Vaishravana’s sovereign might; free from sin, then, she produced the fruit
of her womb, as knowledge does, when united with trance” BC 1.3 (Aśvaghos.a
2008: 3).
50 According to the Maha-vada-na-sutra/Maha-pada-na-sutta traditions, it is a rule that
the pregnant Ma-ya-devı‑ engages in no sexual misconduct and suffers not mental
attachment to men (Fukita 2003: 60; Walshe 1987: 203).
51 According to Willem Bollée, Buddhaghosa places Ma-ya-’s age at 40 or 50 at the
time the bodhisattva descended into her womb (9, n. 21).
52 In The Gan.d.avyu-ha-su-tra’s description of Ma-ya- is even more freakish than the
Lalitavistara. Here, Ma-ya-’s womb magically expands so that it easily contains
the Bodhisattva and his huge retinue of bodhisattvas, who walk about and discuss
the dharma. Meanwhile, from the outside, Ma-ya- is apparently unchanged (Lopez
2004: 133–134).
53 This connection between the bursting lushness of tree and woman is sometimes
made explicit, as in both the Ma-lavika-gnimitra and Meghadu-ta by the fifth-century
poet Ka-lida-sa, in which the tree is described as craving and responding to the
woman’s touch (Dehejia and Coburn 1999: 370). For an extensive survey of Jain,
Buddhist, literary and śilpa-śa-stra texts on śa-labhañjika-, see Roth (1957).
54 Vogel and Roth both reference a story from the Avada-naśataka to explain the ori-
gins of śa-labhañjika- motif. In story number fifty-three, we hear about a flower
festival called sa-labhañjika- during which time a young girl fell out of a tree and
died after having offered śa-la blossoms to the Buddha. She was born into the
heaven of the thirty-three gods. They conclude that this story describes a popular
festival or, as Roth terms it, an “auspicious game” in ancient North India invol-
ving flower-plucking. According to Vogel and Roth, it is simply this game that
forms the background of the Buddhist story about Ma-ya- giving birth while
grasping the branch of a flowering tree in an auspicious grove (Roth 1957: 98;
Vogel 1912: 201–203). At one point, Roth appears to locate the origins of the śa-l-
abhañjika- motif in the maternal yearnings of young girls: “the sa-labhañjika- game,
played when the Sa-l-trees were in their full blossoming time, was interwoven with
the desires and hopes of young women to have children, as pure, beautiful and gay
as the blossoms of the Sa-l-tree” (Roth 1957: 98).
55 DeCaroli’s theory accords with but also goes beyond other scholars’ observations
about the ritual function of the auspicious female figure at Indic temple and
monument sites (Shaw 2006: 86; Young 2004: 24–41).
56 Bloch takes pains to explain that pigs are considered closely related to humans in
Orokaiva society. This view results in part from the dearth of large mammals in
Papua New Guinea. Therefore, pigs “stand out” as the animal species most similar
132 Amy Paris Langenberg
to humans. They live in the village beneath the houses and, in many cases, eat the
same food as the human villagers. The Orokaiva particularly stress the similarities
between human babies and piglets. Apparently, it is not unusual for piglets and
babies to be nursed together by a human mother, and piglets are referred to as the
“children” of their owners. Birds, on the other hand are associated with the sky
and the spirit world (Bloch 1992: 13).
57 The Greeks, for instance, glorified patriliny and considered the necessity of being
born from the mother’s womb a bestial trait. In the Golden Age, women did not
exist, and men were immortal. Nancy Jay, who makes much of the Greek example
in her monograph on gender and sacrifice writes, “The social and religious con-
tinuity of the patrilineal family gives males an attenuated form of immortality in
the institutionalized succession of fathers and sons. The beasts, recognizing no
fathers, have no continuity at all to mitigate the individual mortality. On the other
hand, if children only resembled their fathers perfectly they would be identical
younger versions, cloning younger exact duplicates in their turn, and the Golden
Age of male immortality would have returned. It is only mothers, bearing mortal
children, who dim this glorious vision of eternal and perfect patriliny” (Jay 1992:
31). Marriage and sacrifice alone separate man from beast, since it is only through
them that sex is regulated and intergenerational continuity through the paternal
line maintained.
5. Auspicious Ascetics1

In an essay entitled “Truth and Power,” Foucault wonders “why the West has
insisted for so long on seeing the power it exercises as juridical and negative
rather than as technical and positive” (Foucault 1980: 121). In particular,
Foucault wonders why restrictions on sexuality have been interpreted as
repressive when “‘sexuality’ is far more of a positive product of power than
power was ever repression of sexuality” (Foucault 1980: 120). There is an
analogy to be drawn between the impact on sexuality of Victorian discourses
and technologies of sex and the way in which the Buddhist discourse of birth
impacted birth practice. From a Foucauldian point of view, it is not at all
surprising that the powers of monastic adepts were called upon in cases of
infertility or repeated infant mortality in ancient India. Like Victorian pedia-
tricians and gynecologists, Buddhist adepts regarded themselves, and were
apparently regarded as technically proficient in the very processes they sought
to suppress. As the existence of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra clearly illustrates,
some Buddhist monastics became expert in birth as a result of their efforts to
triumph over birth. This chapter explores the complicated ways in which this
expertise was extended to Buddhist ritual spaces during the middle period,
and the role of narrative in framing and authorizing Buddhist fertility rituals.
It is no longer news that Buddhist monks and monasteries participated in
any number of ritual interactions with local spirits and local communities in the
ancient Indic milieu (Cohen 1998; DeCaroli 2004; DeCaroli 2011; Granoff
2000; Granoff 2001; Granoff 2003; Muldoon-Hules 2014; Rees and Yoneda
2013; Schopen 2002; Schopen 2012; Strong 1992). For the Buddhist commu-
nity to thrive, it had to meet the ritual needs of the laity as well as those of
monastics. Working from middle period and early medieval narrative texts,
Phyllis Granoff has suggested, however, that Buddhists and Jains did censor
certain village rituals, including auspicious rituals performed for the purpose
of procuring children, as part of their effort to distinguish themselves from
Vedic-Hindus (Granoff 2001: 114–118). Indeed (though Granoff herself does
not cite this example), the ninth rock edict of the third-century B.C.E. Buddhist
emperor, Aśoka, explicitly criticizes the diverse auspicious rituals (uca-vacam.
.
mangalam . ) performed by ordinary people, especially women, upon the birth
of a son, etc. (Cunningham: 77–80; Lubin 2013).2 But Granoff also avers that
134 Amy Paris Langenberg
ritual practice is not a stable marker of sectarian identity, and that we shouldn’t
be surprised to find descriptions of Jains (her primary focus) performing the
same rituals they purport to reject.3
Here, I build upon Granoff’s insight, maintaining that the ambivalence
Buddhist authors evince towards these common types of rituals is not an
indication that Buddhists eschewed fertility or child protection rituals as a
strict rule but rather evidence of their creative attempts to reconcile perfor-
mance of such rituals with the Buddhist discourse of birth. As we have seen,
this is a discourse that comprehends fertility and birth (along with its cor-
ollaries, sexuality and marriage) in terms of suffering, not auspiciousness. If,
therefore, monastic communities involved themselves in fertility and child
protection rituals (which they did), they would have simultaneously distanced
themselves from, critiqued, or apologized for their participation in said rituals
(which they also did). In fact, discursive strategies such as characterization,
dramatic irony, and conceptual reframing that put a spin on things are typical
of middle period Buddhist narratives describing monastic involvement rituals
of fertility and child protection. Such strategies subtly acknowledge and dic-
tate the terms of the conflict between auspicious rituals and negative Buddhist
views of fertility and sexuality. This fascinatingly complex, contradictory, and
subtle discourse features a special type of Buddhist adept. He is the auspicious
ascetic, who somehow combines in one person conflicting philosophies of
.
kuśala/mangala. He is controlled in mind and morally wholesome, but also a
.
master of various mangala effective in bringing about pregnancies and
protecting children in utero.
As mentioned above, Buddhist practices aimed at promoting the successful
birth of children and those who perform them are treated in complex ways
and with obvious ambivalence in Sanskrit and Pa-li narratives. An important
example is the myth cycle of Ha-rı‑tı‑, an Indic disease goddess associated with
fertility who is ubiquitous in the Buddhist textual and sculptural record from
the middle period.4 According to the Mu-lasarva-stiva-da-vinaya,5 after mis-
carrying a child in a previous embodiment, Ha-rı‑tı‑ angrily vows to be reborn
as a child-eating demoness with 500 demon sons. She is subsequently born as
a yaks.‑ı with 500 sons in the city of Ra-jagr.ha, and eventually succumbs to an
overpowering urge to capture and consume the city’s young children. Only the
Buddha is able to cure her craving for the flesh of children by kidnapping her
.
beloved youngest child, Priyankara. After the Buddha finally returns the baby
- ‑ ‑
to the frantic Harıtı, and reminds her that the children she consumed also
had mothers who loved them, she is chastened. She promises to cease her
murderous ways and act instead as guardian to the Buddhist monastic com-
munity. In return, the Buddha pledges that the community will henceforth
provide her and her children with sustenance in the form of food offerings. In
this way, the Mu-lasarva-stiva-da narrative tradition assigns the formerly
autonomous deity to the role of dharma protector.
This role does not, however, negate or even dilute her association with fer-
tility and childhood disease. Chinese pilgrims to India report on her ongoing
 Auspicious Ascetics 135

Figure 5.1 First-century B.C.E. Ha-rı‑tı‑ with children from Swat Valley, Gandha-ra.
Source: Photograph © Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

role as fertility and disease goddess. The seventh-century monk Yijing

recounts the story of how the Buddha tamed Ha-rı‑tı‑, enlisting her to protect
.
the sangha. He describes her worship by monastics and laypeople thus: “The
sick and those without children offer her food to obtain their wishes” (Beal
1958: 160, note 96). Xuanzang, too, reports on lay people who desire
136 Amy Paris Langenberg
offspring propitiating the “mother of the demons” (a common epithet of
Ha-rı‑tı‑ in Chinese sources) with offerings in Gandha-ra (Beal 1958: 160).
Inscriptional evidence also supports Ha-rı‑tı‑’s ongoing association with fertility
and protection from disease (Quagliotti 1999: 54; Fussman 1989: 10–11;
Carter 1993: 355, n. 13; Konow 1969: 124–27; Lamotte 1988: 689).
The Mu-lasarva-stiva-da narrative legitimizes Ha-rı‑tı‑ worship in monastic or
Buddhist cultic contexts and encourages Buddhist lay people to believe that
her infanticidal excesses will be curbed and regulated only in Buddhist set-
tings. For their part, Buddhist monks are given the message that they need
not shrink from acting in the role of priest, possibly even laying the repro-
ductive aspirations of lay sponsors before her, as she is a perfectly legitimate
monastic protector (Cohen 1998). Still, it is difficult to avoid the impression
that some lingering distaste adheres to the figure of Ha-rı‑tı‑, literally “the
snatcher,” in monastic contexts. Historically, Ha-rı‑tı‑ images were kept waiting
on monastery porches, assigned a corner of the mess hall, assigned to sub-
sidiary shrines, or kept at home to guard the women and children. Further-
more, her narrative serves to remind us that she is a deity with a dark past,
that her adherence to the Dharma was coerced, and that her relationship to
the Buddhist community is contractual.
Another well-known and ambivalent Indian Buddhist figure associated
.
with the business of childbirth is the ex-serial murderer, Angulima-la, who,
-
according to the Majjhima-nikaya (ii.97–105), performs an act of truth (sac-
cakiriya-) in order to help a woman in the throes of a difficult and dangerous
labor.6 The stories of Ha-rı‑tı‑ and Angulima-la have both received ample scho-
.
larly attention. This chapter will focus instead on the interpretive dynamics
surrounding issues of lay fertility in two other Indian Buddhist story cycles:
Pa-li versions of the traditional tale of the laywoman Suja-ta-’s offering to the
Bodhisattva on the eve of his enlightenment, and Sanskrit avada-na passages
in which Aniruddha and other monastic elders assist in child protection
through the prenatal initiation of children.
Story traditions concerning Suja-ta- and the practice of prenatal pledging are
discussed here because of their discursive complexity, not because they pro-
vide evidence of monastic involvement in rituals performed to ensure fertility,
safe childbirth, and the protection of very young children from the middle
period of Indian Buddhism. Minor rules from vinaya traditions, which refer-
ence and ordain quite specific behaviors, provide more concrete evidence for
monastic involvement in auspicious rites. In the Mu-lasarva-stiva-da tradition,
for instance, the nun Sthu-lananda- is censored for carrying what appears to be
a ritual vessel used for blessing and protecting children (Schopen 2009). The
Pa-li-vinaya contains a rule that allows monks to tread upon pieces of white
cloth (something ordinarily forbidden to monks) if requested to do so by
childless laypeople as part of an auspicious ritual (Schopen 2012).7 Other
texts and archeological evidence provide further evidence of Buddhist mon-
astic involvement in auspicious rituals. For instance, in her study of Buddhist
adaptations of brahmanical marriage ritual, Karen Muldoon-Hules mentions
 Auspicious Ascetics 137
the Abhisama-ca-rika-, a Buddhist sectarian text containing specific dedicatory
verses to be recited at marriages, births and other life-cycle events in upa-saka
households, another good piece of evidence for monastic participation in
mangala (Muldoon-Hules 2014: 214). Inscribed images of Ha-rı‑tı‑ and reports
.
from the Chinese prilgrim Xuangzang of a Ha-rı‑tı‑ cult in Northern India
during the middle period also indicate monastic and Buddhist lay involve-
ment in localized cults of fertility and child protection. Additionally, arche-
ological studies of Buddhist sites from the middle period have unearthed a
large number of terracotta figurines depicting the goddess Naigameśa, who is
believed to have been associated with pregnancy and childbirth (Rees and Yoneda
2013). Taken as a whole, these various traces and references constitute strong
evidence for monastic involvement in auspicious rites.
The two story cycles examined here constitute a different type of evidence
about monastic involvement in auspicious rituals than the intriguing assem-
blage of data just reported. They are multivalent story cycles that convey
complex information about how monastic intellectuals and storytellers came
to frame and justify Buddhist monastic participation in auspicious rituals. In
them, monastics’ discomfort with their own adaptations of or concessions to
fertility and child protection ritual is not only expressed but also managed
through various discursive strategies. A monk who could bring about a preg-
nancy, ease childbirth, or protect an infant boy from the fever goddess would
never want for a meal or a robe, so monastics had much to gain from neu-
tralizing any discomfort around performing rituals of reproduction and child
protection. Reading these old Buddhist stories with special attention paid to
strategies of distancing, critique, and apology elucidates important dimen-
sions of an ancient Indian monastic Buddhism that comprised not only phi-
losophy and ascetic discipline, but also a symbolically complex, richly
narrated, and thickly ritualized religious system, the coveted outcomes of
which were not always necessarily consistent with Buddhist monasticism’s
core attitudes towards the reproductive female body.
Unwinding the discursive and literary contrivances that swaddle Buddhist
narratives involving fertility and childbirth reveals a surprising figure − a
Buddhist adept who is not only a master of virtue and wisdom, but also,
however reluctantly, village-style auspiciousness. Recent studies of Buddhist
hagiography by Reiko Ohnuma and John Powers might be said to corrobo-
rate this observation (Ohnuma 2012; Powers 2009a). As Ohnuma and Powers
both observe, the Buddha, prototypical Buddhist adept, is himself portrayed
in Indian Buddhist textual tradition as sexual, virile, and fecund in all the
.
right ways. For instance, Ohnuma points out several details from the San-
ghabhedavastu, the text whose birth narrative was analyzed in the last chap-
ter. There, the Bodhisattva proves his manhood on the eve of his departure by
inseminating Yaśodhara-, dreams about his own masculine potency and power
in the form of a “blade of grass rising up out of his navel, standing upright
until it reached the sky,”8 and, upon returning to Kapilavastu after the
enlightenment, asserts his vital, seminal (but female-exclusive) connection to
138 Amy Paris Langenberg
Ra-hula by feeding him an aphrodisiac sweet sent by lonely Yaśodhara-
(Ohnuma 2012: 144–145). The traits ascribed to the Buddha in the narratives
studied by Powers and Ohnuma − sexual potency, fertility, youthfulness, and
physical beauty − are directly related to South Asian auspiciousness. Here,
the focus is on ambivalent narrative accounts of monastic involvement in
fertility practices, rather than celebratory images of auspicious Buddhist
adepts. Nonetheless, these are related tropes. In Foucauldian terms, the asce-
tic critique of ordinary fertility as a coveted goal was far more productive of
sexual and reproductive life in ancient India than it ever was repressive. Thus,
if the phallus of Śiva, another famous ancient Indian ascetic figure, is vast,
ever erect, and full of power, it should not surprise us to learn from the
.
Sanghabhedavastu that so is the male potency of the Buddha. The Buddhist
discourse of birth produces not only celibate monks and inauspicious women,
but auspicious ascetics as well.

Suja-ta-’s oblation
Irony is the feigned ignorance or dissimulation that is operative in literary
contexts when actions or words have the opposite effect of what is literally
intended. In situations of dramatic irony, the actor is unaware of a truth to
which the audience has special access. Some (but not all) tellings of a tradi-
tional story about the laywoman Suja-ta-’s offering of milk rice to the Bodhi-
satta directly prior to his enlightenment employ dramatic irony in a manner
relevant to the topic of fertility rites in Buddhist narrative.9 In the Pa-li ver-
sions of this tale found in the Nida-nakatha- (the introduction to the past life
stories or ja-taka) and the Manorathapu-ran.‑ı (a commentary on the Anguttara-
.
- - -
nikaya), both attributed to Buddhaghosa, Sujata’s female servant meets a
gaunt yet magnetic stranger sitting in meditation under a tree. Although we,
the audience, understand that this stranger is the future Buddha, she mistakes
him for a powerful yakkha (here, a tree spirit) she believes has blessed her
mistress with a felicitous marriage and healthy baby son (Jayawickrama 2000:
90–92; Strong 2008: 58–60; Walleser and Kopf 1924: 402–404).
When Suja-ta-’s servant happens upon him, the Bodhisatta is sitting on the
bank of the Nairañjara- River, having recently forsaken his rigorous auste-
rities. As a result of finally taking nourishment, he emits a golden glow and
displays the 32 marks of a great man. He occupies a caitya or tree shrine for a
local tree spirit to whom Suja-ta- had previously made a vow. “If, once I am
married to someone of the same caste, my first child is a son,” she had pro-
mised, “I will make a food offering to you every year.”10 She subsequently
married a man of equal rank, and bore a healthy son, to whom she gave
the name of Yasa. Planning to perform her obligatory offering on the full-moon
day of Visa-kha, the very moment the Bodhisatta is concluding his six years of
austerities, she carefully prepares a rich offering of milk-rice (pa-ya-sa)11 in a
golden bowl. The four directional guardians fortify it with oja (S. ojas), a vital
sap and source of power, realizing to whom the offering will be made.12 When
 Auspicious Ascetics 139
Suja-ta-’s servant girl sees the Bodhisatta seated at the caitya she believes him
to be the yakkha descended from his sacred banyan tree and hastens to inform
her mistress. Suja-ta- personally attends upon the “yakkha,” offering the golden
bowl of pa-ya-sa she has already prepared in fulfillment of her vow. She is
aware of many auspicious portents, and clearly overjoyed by his presence, but
does not recognize the figure under the tree for the Bodhisatta he is or
Buddha he will shortly become.13 She receives no religious teaching, and
makes no religious vow.14 Before departing, she does, however, express a hope
that implies a parallelism between her marital felicity and his spiritual
accomplishment: “Even as my wish has been fulfilled may yours as well be
fulfilled!” (Jayawickrama 2000: 92; Strong 2008: 60).15 In fact, Suja-ta- even-
tually becomes a student of the Dharma and a stream winner, but only after
her child has grown and joined the order, not as an immediate result of her
early encounter with the Bodhisatta. After she leaves, the Bodhisatta rolls the
rice milk oblation she has offered into rice balls or pin.d.as, four according to
the Manorathapu-ran.‑ı and 49 according to the Nida-nakatha-. This supernaturally
fortified meal sustains the Buddha through the night of his awakening and
during the 49 days afterwards while he sits in meditation.
This confusion of the Bodhisatta for the tree spirit Suja-ta- believes has given
her a son is the central irony of the Suja-ta- tale in these two fifth-century Pa-li
commentaries. Suja-ta- and her maid mistake the Bodhisatta, impressively
radiating the power of his six years of wisdom seeking, for a deity of the type
commonly consulted in matters of fertility, childbirth, and childhood illness.
The Bodhisatta, celibate and removed from worldly concerns for all these six
years, had nothing to do with the pregnancy. In fact, he is on the verge of
unlocking the secret to bringing the cycles of birth and death, generation and
decay to a halt. Since Sanskrit versions of this story do not contain this ele-
ment of mistaken identity,16 it is fair to assume that its inclusion by Pa-li
commentarial authors is intentional. By playing on elements of village ferti-
lity practice as well as sexual and reproductive symbolism drawn from Vedic
ritual, Pa-li versions of this old Buddhist story about the first laywoman
double as sly Buddhist commentary on the aims and effectiveness of such
rituals.
Suja-ta- is supposed to be just a village woman worshipping a local god at a
village shrine, not a bra-hman.‑ı participating in a Vedic rite. Still, especially
given the growing association between bra-hman.a tradition and Indian Bud-
dhism through the early centuries of the first millennium, to suggest that
Vedic-Hindu symbolism and the ritual role ascribed to women in Vedic-
Hindu ritual carries over to this Buddhist narrative text, however loosely or
imprecisely, does not seem far-fetched. Many Buddhist scholars, including
Buddhaghosa (the putative author of these commentaries), are said to have
been raised in the Brahman tradition. Even in the absence of a bona fide
Brahman education, there is no reason to think mid-first millennium Buddhist
authors or audiences would not have grasped the basic structures and aims of
Vedic-Hindu ritual. A broad familiarity with and instinctive understanding of
140 Amy Paris Langenberg
Vedic-Hindu symbolic resonances would have been sufficient for the purposes
of this Buddhist critique.
Grain and milk are heavily laden with sexual and reproductive symbolism
in Vedic ritual lore.17 In ritual contexts, milk (payas), the Sanskrit word for
which means “something expressed” and can signify both milk and semen,
often operates as a soma and semen substitute (Doniger 1980: 20–28; Zim-
mermann 1987: 221–222). In the Nida-nakatha- version, the milk Suja-ta- uses in
preparing her pa-ya-sa (something made from payas) is particularly potent as
she has obtained it through a process the text names “recycling the milk”
(khı‑raparivattana) (Fausböll 1877: 91). She feeds the milk of 1,000 cows to
500 cows, the milk of those 500 cows to 250, and so on down to eight cows.
Suja-ta- then boils this super-enriched milk with rice over a smokeless fire.
While it boils, its bubbles all rise and turning auspiciously to the right. The
four guardian deities, including Brahma and Sakka, then further empower
Suja-ta-’s pa-ya-sa by infusing it with a vital essence or oja.
In Vedic-Hindu ritual practice and mythology, any woman who consumes
the leftovers from a supercharged oblation of the type offered by Suja-ta- would
surely become pregnant. The trope of pregnancy through oblation eating,
which finds a mythic prototype in the Vedic goddess Aditi, is played out in
epic literature and elsewhere.18 Suja-ta-’s oblation would also have been seen as
conducive to fertility from an ancient medical point-of-view. Physiologically,
many medical authorities hold oja (S. ojas), which the directional deities add
to Suja-ta-’s pa-ya-sa, to be the essence remaining after semen has been distilled
from the body’s tissues. Some call it the essence (sa-ra) of semen (R. Das 2003:
530–532; Zimmermann 1987: 177–178). Its ingestion would be akin to a
procreative act. In Suja-ta-’s case, however, the aim of bearing a son has
already been accomplished, and not, presumably through the offices of the
actual (as opposed to intended) oblation recipient, the Bodhisatta. Further-
more, the imposter recipient of her ritual efforts consumes every bit of the
potent oblation, full as it is of fungible, fertility-promoting substances, and
traps it within his own powerful male body by means of his perfect sexual
continence. No oblation leftovers (prasa-da) are to be had (Pinkney 2013). As
regards her own ongoing aims and desires as an auspicious young wife and
mother, Suja-ta-’s act of worship is a dead end.
When Suja-ta- makes her offering no husband or male relative is present. She
and her young female servant face the strange presence under the tree on
their own. This gender dynamic, in which a female worshipper approaches a
male deity is, I suggest, also significant within the context of Vedic-Hindu
ritual traditions. Stephanie Jamison tells us that almost every action of the
sacrificer’s wife in Vedic-Hindu rites increases the power of the ritual to bring
about generativity and fecundity of all types. Many of her actions are charged
with sexual symbolism, as when, for instance, she symbolically copulates with
the altar broom or performs a repeated ritual action called “grasping from
behind” (anva-rambhana) (Jamison 1996: 53–55, 59–61).19 As was explored in
the previous chapter, in Vedic-Hinduism women’s ritual roles are often tied to
 Auspicious Ascetics 141
their auspicious sexuality and power as reproducers.20 The Suja-ta- story, in
which an auspicious wife and her maid are the ritual actors, appears to
exaggerate the traditional association of women with sexuality and fecundity
in Vedic-Hindu ritual by doubling up on female agency and excluding male
relatives from the ritual entirely. In casting the Bodhisattva as the consumer
and neutralizer of Suja-ta-’s super-potent oblations, however, it also intimates
the ascetic’s dominion over female fertility and sexuality. In the narrative,
Suja-ta-’s auspicious powers are pitted against the ascetic might of the Bodhisattva,
and he emerges the winner.
Suja-ta- is traditionally held to be the first female lay devotee of the Buddha
by virtue of the milk-rice she offers him just prior to his enlightenment. Hans
Penner (2009) argues that the Suja-ta- episode acts as a template for the lay-
monastic relationship, one in which a gift is made to the renouncer in
exchange for the promise of spiritual merit. Penner’s structuralist interpreta-
tion emphasizes the polarity of householder/renouncer, and the way this
relationship is cemented through an asymmetrical gift exchange in which the
recipient benefits in this life, the donor in the next. While this interpretation
may work well for some versions of the episode, and certainly conforms with
the Buddhist tradition of regarding Suja-ta- as the first Buddhist laywoman,
Pa-li versions of this tale actually say nothing about Suja-ta- earning merit. By
attending to the particulars of each telling of Suja-ta-, and especially the dif-
ferences between the Pa-li and Sanskrit Buddhist traditions, a different Suja-ta-
from the one Penner and others describe presents herself. She is not, as the
Pa-li commentators narrate it, the paradigmatic Buddhist laywoman because
she exchanges gifts for merit; rather, she is “typical” (in the eye-rolling sense),
because she looks upon a future Buddha not as a precious source of wisdom,
but as an agent of fertility.
Ultimately, Suja-ta-’s ritual fails to proceed according to the usual Vedic-
Hindu or village patterns. Rather than consuming a subtle portion and
returning the rest to fuel the cycles of terrestrial fecundity, the “deity” swal-
lows up Suja-ta-’s super-potent oblations and traps them in his hyper-continent
body, but not, just to further prove his point, without first transforming them
into something reminiscent of funerary offerings.21 Here, commentators are
not critiquing the efficacy of ritual action in general, or questioning the power
of rice and milk oblations to nourish various types of beings, whether they be
living or dead, gross or subtle. In fact, Suja-ta-’s offering is so ritually potent
that it is said to sustain the Buddha in perfect health for 49 days after his
enlightenment. The efficacy of Suja-ta-’s oblation is not in question.22 The
commentators’ ironic critique is aimed rather at underlying Vedic-Hindu
assumptions about the sources and functionality of ritual power. In these Pa-li
commentaries, the Buddhist Great Being trumps the local deity, the Buddhist
ascetic brings more vital power to the ritual than the auspicious wife, and
potent offerings serve to nourish a monk’s ascetic practice rather than fill a
woman’s womb. I suggest, then, that we should not read this Pa-li version of
Suja-ta-’s story as a paradigm of gift exchange between laypersons and
142 Amy Paris Langenberg
monastics, but rather as an attempt by Buddhist monastic storytellers to
subvert Vedic-Hindu ritual theories and priorities, and those of village wor-
ship, through dramatic irony, thereby critiquing fecundist understandings of
auspicious ritual power. In this version of things, a Buddhist adept consumes
the fecund powers of nature, sex, and women’s bodies, transforming them into
fuel for his own path.

Child-pledging
The Pa-li Suja-ta- narrative works in the mode of dramatic irony to create a
sense of critical aloofness regarding the worship of yaks.as associated with
Buddhist sites or villages occupied by Buddhist lay supporters. In this section,
I use the term “conceptual reframing” to characterize the discursive move
made in a series of Sanskrit avada-nas that repurposes the prestigious mon-
astic ritual of going forth (pravrajya-) for fertility and child-protection.23 In
two different avada-nas featuring the elder Aniruddha,24 infertile couples are
able to conceive only after committing any child that might be born to Anir-
uddha’s care to serve as his “following-after-ascetic” (paśca-cchraman.a, here-
after translated as “monastic attendant” or “monastic servant”), a low-status
monastic initiate who serves as attendant to a senior monk.25 Other tales of
pre-natal pledging26 include the initiation stories of Upagupta,27 Dhı‑tika,28
.
and Sangharaks.ita,29 a Karmaśataka story about a young disciple of Śa-ripu-
tra’s called “Little Eye,”30 and a story from the Upagupta cycle involving
twin tigers reborn in the womb of a bra-hman.‑ı woman.31 A similar pattern is
repeated in all such stories (although infertility or childhood illness is not
explicitly at issue in every example): a lone senior monk approaches a
household equipped with clairvoyant knowledge about the spiritual potential
of the family but unaccompanied by a monastic servant or paśca-cchraman.a.
In response, the householder pledges his unborn child to serve the elder as his
paśca-cchraman.a. The elder then emphasizes the solemn nature of this vow.
The monk is fed. The child is born and grows up. When the child is about
seven, the elder returns to claim him as his own monastic servant.32 Ritually
speaking, the senior monk assumes a position parallel to that of the disease
goddess Ha-rı‑tı‑ in these stories. Offerings are made to him in the child’s name
in return, it is implied, for safe passage through pregnancy, birth, and early
childhood, but he retains special and enduring rights over the child.33
The Sumanas-avada-na from the Avada-naśataka (second century C.E.)34 is
illustrative of this Buddhist narrative trope.35 It tells of a wealthy householder
in Śra-vastı‑ who marries a woman from a suitable family. He is delighted by
her, enjoys her, and makes love to her. Sons are born but they all die. The
elder Aniruddha, one of the Buddha’s senior disciples, is a regular visitor in
that home. One day, a thought occurs to the depressed householder: “The
elder Aniruddha is called ‘the great master [whose past virtuous deeds] are
ripe.’ I will make a proposal to him as follows: if a son is born to me, I will
give that son to him as a monastic servant (paśca-cchraman.a)” (Speyer 1992:
 Auspicious Ascetics 143
67, lines 10–11; Vaidya 1958a). Having approached Aniruddha with a food
offering (pin.d.aka), the childless householder makes his request. Aniruddha
agrees but then, perhaps recalling the strong bonds of parenthood, adds, “but
remember your promise.” In due time, the householder’s wife becomes preg-
nant, and a beautiful and special boy baby is born. His birth ceremony ( ja-ti-
maha) is performed, and he is named Sumanas (“Fair-minded”). Aniruddha
is respectfully summoned and the boy is ritually “returned” (nirya-tita), a word
choice indicating that, with the symbolic offering of the boy, a debt has been
paid.36 Aniruddha then provides red-brown robes (ka-s.a-ya-n.i ), as is the duty of
a monastic preceptor, and wishes the child a long life. The boy remains with
his parents until the age of seven, at which point he is entrusted to the care of
Aniruddha. Aniruddha causes him to go forth and teaches him mental focus
(manasika-ra). Sumanas practices hard and soon realizes the unstable nature
of cyclic existence. He destroys all the psychic poisons (kleśa) and achieves
sainthood.
Another avada-na collection known as the Karmaśataka contains a similar
story involving, again, the elder Aniruddha, and a boy called Pu-rn.a. A rich
but childless householder in Śra-vastı‑ is distraught over the sterility of his
marriage. The elder Aniruddha realizes that this childless householder is des-
tined to be converted by a śra-vaka and not by the Buddha himself. After
coming to his house to preach the Dharma many times, Aniruddha arrives
one day absolutely alone, without a monastic attendant, which appalls the
householder. Aniruddha explains that, while he does not currently have a
monastic attendant to accompany him on his begging rounds, it is within the
householder’s power to furnish him with one. The householder responds that
should a son be born to him, he will give him gladly. Aniruddha warns him
not to forget the promise. A little later, the wife of the householder becomes
pregnant and has a son who receives the name Pu-rn.a (“full,” “accom-
plished,” “complete”) since his parents’ wish has been fulfilled.37 The child is
subsequently initiated into the Buddhist monastic community.
Though the dominant explanation for infertility and miscarriage in the
ancient South Asian context references ambivalent, potentially infantophagic
spirits like Ha-rı‑tı‑, Buddhist pledging stories appeal mainly to karma as a
causal explanation for these events. The dominant logic of these tales indi-
cates that a child’s good luck at entering a human womb and surviving
gestation, birth, and childhood has little to do with a senior monk’s influence
over malign beings, but everything to do with the child’s own past virtuous
actions. Whatever virtue there was in the child’s past deeds has led him safely
through the dangers of the birth process into the protective embrace of the
.
Buddhist sangha, where he will experience a state of security more profound
than what his own family could hope to offer him. His parents have only to
stand back and allow it. Also according to the logic of these stories, pledging
a fetus or pre-committing a child not yet conceived to the monastery is the
ultimate act of child protection, one that protects not from temporary illness
or simple death, but from something much worse: the suffering that comes
144 Amy Paris Langenberg
from ignorance and desire and repeated death. Just as the Vedic life cycle rites
or sam - -
. skaras remove what Manu calls the baijika and garbhika impurity (the
impurity that comes from seed and womb) (Manu 1.27), the initiation of a
child ritually removes the taint of the mental poisons (kleśa).38 This con-
ceptual reframing of what childless lay people likely interpreted as an effective
ritual of child protection explains the protective capacities of monastic ritual
in a manner that appeals not to magic or supernatural entities, but to basic
Buddhist principles such as the law of cause and effect or the role of desire,
hatred, and ignorance in causing suffering.
In general, Buddhist narratives often express skepticism about supernatural
intercessions in the processes of birth by giving pride of place to quasi-naturalistic
explanations of conception. As we have already seen, a common Buddhist
formulation teaches that successful conception results from the presence of
semen, blood, a healthy fertile womb, and a transmigrating being. In a repe-
ated stock passage from the avada-na literature describing the plight of infer-
tile couples, this rationally based account is preferred, and though the image
of the gandharva is put to work metaphorically, the interfering presence of
malign spirit-deities is dismissed as superstition:

[Despite] making love, no son or daughter was born to [the householder].

With his head in his hands, he brooded: “My household is endowed with
many blessings. But I have no son, no daughter. After my death, saying
‘He is childless,’ they will take everything from me and it will become the
king’s property.” He is told by ascetics, priests, and friendly well-meaning
relatives: “Make a request to the deity. It is believed by many that when
one propitiates [the deity], sons and daughters are born.” It is not so. If it
were so, everyone would have one thousand sons, and they all would be
like cakravartin kings. Daughters and sons are born when three factors
come together. Which three? The fluids of the mother and father unite,
the mother is in a fertile period, and a transmigrating being is present.
Sons and daughters are born if these three factors come together.39

The dismissive tone of this passage indicates that the quasi-naturalistic explana-
tion of conception is the more intellectually prestigious one in Buddhist monastic
culture, however common magical explanations or appeals to the supernatural
might be. Though this type of passage does not occur in the pledging stories cited
above, it occurs in other stories from the collections in which pledging stories
occur, and so shares with them the same narrative space.
A passage from the Abhidharma-maha-vibha-s.a-, one of the foundational
abhidharma compendiums of the Sarva-stiva-da school, does link healthy
pregnancies and births with the magical qualities of Buddhist initiation. The
topic of pre-committing unborn children or infants is raised within the con-
text of a discussion about whether one must produce the vocal act oneself in
order legitimately to take refuge. When the mother accepts “refuge and dis-
cipline” on behalf of a child “not yet born or too small,” this is an example of
 Auspicious Ascetics 145
one person producing the vocal act of refuge for another. Is it valid? No,
according to this text: “He [i.e., the child] obtains neither refuge nor dis-
cipline, not being equipped with thought.” However this practice is still
recommended for several reasons. One reason involves its effect on the world
of gods and spirits: “If the mother or other people take refuge and discipline
for the infant, it is also the case that the gods and spirits protect the child, so
that since he has taken refuge, the gods and spirits who respect the [Three]
Jewels would protect the baby and see to it that he doesn’t die or become
sick” (Vallée Poussin 1932: 83–84, my translation from the French). Accord-
ing to the Abhidharma-maha-vibha-s.a-, then, monks are able to create a barrier
through the ritual acts of refuge and initiation, protecting the infant from
certain “gods and spirits” (the ones, like Ha-rı‑tı‑, who can be made to respect
the Buddha, Dharma and Sangha). Still, even this Maha-vibha-s.a- passage
supplements its argument that taking refuge and discipline protects a fetus
from child-snatching deities and spirits with the more orthodox assertion that
the fetus’s good deeds in past lives protect it in utero and lead to its fortunate
relationship with the Three Jewels. It also suggests that, from a practical
standpoint, child initiation is beneficial because it provides parents moral
leverage when children misbehave later in life (Vallée Poussin 1932: 83).
These various efforts to interpret through the lens of Buddhist doctrine and
monastic ritual (and thereby legitimize) practices related to fetal and child
protection suggest that commentators and storytellers wished to justify or
apologize for the practice of child pledging. One avada-na account expresses
monastic discomfort with child pledging more directly in the form of a mul-
tivalent and acerbic comment by the crusty Śa-riputra during negotiations
.
for his paśca-cchraman.a, Sangharaks.ita, found at Divya-vada-na 23. When the
devout householder Buddharaks.ita expresses surprise that Śa-riputra has come to
his house alone, with no monastic attendant trailing behind (a deliberate
choice on the part of Śa-riputra, of course), the elder retorts, “Householder, do
you think our monastic attendants (paśca-cchraman.a) come from spreading
ka-śa grass or kuśa grass? The monastic attendants we have we get from
people like you” (Cowell and Neil 1886: 330).40 This quip can be read in at
least two ways. On the one hand, Śa-riputra seems to be alluding to the sorts
of rituals laypeople perform prior to, during, and after the birth of a child.
Many of these involve spreading kuśa grass around the ritual area. We monks
don’t do these sorts of things, Śa-riputra says, because we are not in the busi-
ness of having children. But Śa-riputra could also be referring to spreading
grass on the seat of meditation or instruction. Boris Oguibenine points out
that references to arranging a seat (typically of grass) for a new disciple con-
notes his imminent initiation and instruction.41 In this reading, Śa-riputra’s
comment would mean something like, “What, stupid, do you think children
appear magically when we make ready to initiate them?” Either of the two
.
possibilities would indicate Śa-riputra’s uncomfortable awareness of the san-
gha’s dependence on the reproductive capacities of the laity, which is in any
case explicit in the second half of his statement. Verbally skilled, Śa-riputra lets
146 Amy Paris Langenberg
slip a peevish comment that expresses his impatience with this uncomfortable
yet necessary foray into the householder’s business of reproduction.
Śa-riputra’s impatience appears to be justified. While pious, the house-
holders depicted in Buddhist pledging stories are of dubious understanding.
Narrators portray a situation in which it is unclear whether householders
initiate their sons out of an earnest faith in the monastic ethical world view,
or because they regard Buddhist elders as providers of protective charms and
powerful rituals. John Strong trenchantly observes that, in some of these
stories, “[parents] could give birth to a live son, ironically, only by giving him
up to the Sangha and thereby tapping the powers of the monks, and through
them the powers of benevolent deities” (Strong 1992: 59). Aniruddha’s warn-
ing to Sumanas’s father to “remember his promise” is suggestive of his
awareness that parents might equivocate when the time for handing over the
child actually arrives. The merchant, Gupta, reneges on his agreement with
the elder Śa-n.akava-sin several times before finally relinquishing his third-born
son, Upagupta. In other such narratives, parents sometimes actually termi-
nate the arrangement altogether. After being collected at the required time by
Aniruddha and taken to the monastery, for instance, little Pu-rn.a works so
hard at his duties that he becomes exhausted and falls ill. With Aniruddha’s
permission, the parents collect their sick boy and bring him home to be
nursed. He is said to recover, convert his family to Buddhism, and become an
arhant, but his parents do not return him to monastic life. Instead, shortly
thereafter, he enters nirva-n.a, here a euphemistic reference to death.42
The accounts of child pledging found in Buddhist avada-na literature
describe what appear to be rituals of fetal and child protection based on a
centrally important Buddhist monastic ritual, namely monastic initiation. The
benefits and efficacy of this ritual are explained in this literature according to
the logic of moral causality (karma). Buddhist elders and the unborn
encounter one another in the Dharma because past actions make it inevitable.
Buddhist initiation provides protection insofar as it cleanses the child’s mind
of poisons. References to persistent lay belief in supernatural beings and their
power to disrupt pregnancies indicate, however, that Buddhist storytellers
were aware of disparities in lay and monastic accounts of these ritual inter-
changes. Parental ambivalence around losing sons to the monastery is also
indicative of disparities between lay and monastic perspectives on prenatal
pledging. The occasional note of distaste or condescension in reference to lay
attitudes towards and monks’ involvement in the business of having children
adds further complexity to these stories.

Monastic birth experts

Narratives about Suja-ta- and child-pledging express the dignified and skeptical
aloofness of monastics called upon to participate in auspicious rituals of the
village type, to tolerate marginalized members of their own community eking
out a living through such rituals, or to perform monastic rituals that address
 Auspicious Ascetics 147
the problems of infertility and childhood illness but were poorly understood
by parochial lay people. I have argued that many normative Indian Bud-
dhist writings from the middle period of Indian Buddhism, including the
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, voice a critique of auspiciousness, a rejection of sexu-
ality, and a distaste for child-bearing. Beautiful young mothers are foul sacks
of dung, the fetus is a lonely wanderer without succor, the child-filled home is
cramped and squalid, the fertile wife and mother is best viewed as a demon-
ess, and so forth. While Robert DeCaroli, Richard Cohen, Gregory Schopen,
and others demonstrate that actual Buddhist monks were enmeshed in local
cults that often sought to promote the fertility of the land and the fecundity
of wives and livestock, no one has claimed that their involvement in the
concerns of local village religion implied a simultaneous abandonment of
ascetic attitudes towards sexuality and reproduction. On the contrary, some
.
have suggested that the Buddhist sangha’s prosperity, popularity, and social
relevance eventually spurred a backlash, a retrenchment of ascetic rigor that many
scholars now see as characteristic of the early Maha-ya-na period (Boucher 2008;
Ray 1994; Schopen 2004). The complex narratives discussed here can be seen
as symptomatic of emerging fault lines within the monastic milieu during the
middle period of Indian Buddhism, areas of tension between the renuncia-
tory values that inspired its ascetic wing, and the well-fleshed, full-blooded
religious culture that ensured its continued prosperity.
Indian Buddhist institutions straddled the ideal of renunciation and the
fecundist social ethic of the laity, in part by sponsoring storytellers to explain,
excuse, make fun of, and reinterpret what people actually did in their homes,
monasteries, and places of worship. It would have been difficult, without the
help of clever bards, for a monastic community with ascetic roots and ascetic
core values to make room for the lushly symbolic and celebratory ritualism
surrounding matters of sexuality, childbirth, child protection, and childhood
in Vedic and village Hinduism. But Buddhist storytellers were able to put the
piquant details of childbearing and its attendant ritual practices to excellent
use. Their sarcastic humor and sense of irony apologized for Buddhists
monks’ meddling in matters of sexuality and childbearing while keeping open
the option of doing it again. Their feats of conceptual reframing and subtle
expressions of disapproval neutralized the taint of sexuality and childbearing
without calling for a disadvantageous moratorium on monastic involvement
in vital lay concerns around fertility and infant survival.
I submit that the core ascetic values that made it necessary for bards to
create discursive distance between self-respecting monastics and the lay-oriented
rituals in which they sometimes participated also dictated the terms for that
very involvement. In other words, monks and nuns performed fertility rituals
not only because it was materially advantageous to do so, but also because
their ascetic discipline and culture (what he might call the Buddhist monastic
power/knowledge regime) actually provided them the means to do so. The
practice of child-pledging, which seamlessly transforms an orthoprax Buddhist
monastic ritual into what is essentially a ritual of fertility and child-protection, one
148 Amy Paris Langenberg
apparently perceived by desperate lay people to be exceptionally effective, is a
clear example of this. The monastic critique of childbearing, monastic invol-
vement in fertility and child protection rituals of various types, and the bardic
“spin” on that involvement evinced in Buddhist narratives are all part of the
same Buddhist discourse of birth, all manifestations of the same knowledge
system. Like Victorian educators, pediatricians, and gynecologists, monastics
were specialists in precisely the areas of experience that they were intent on
suppressing and controlling: birth and all of its corollaries (wombs, blood and
blood substitutes, semen and semen substitutes, sex, sons).43 The Suja-ta- story,
with its ripe sexual imagery and detailed description of an auspicious ritual,
skillfully marshaled to create an ironic tableau, exemplifies this expertise. In
short, the restriction and critique of birth in monastic settings necessitated
a specialized knowledge of birth theory and practice, which, in turn, made it
logical for the laity to call upon Buddhist monastic individuals to act as fer-
tility ritual celebrants, and for monastics to comply, however reluctant they
may have been. The repressive Buddhist birth discourse, with its critical bite,
medical detail, dramatic yarns, and subtle sarcasm, did not, in the end, sup-
press monastic involvement in matters related to fertility and childbearing.
Rather, it created the conditions for various types of “auspicious” monks,
purveyors of mysteriously potent ritual powers and well-told tales, to operate
in middle period communities.

Notes
1 Sections of this chapter were originally published in History of Religions, vol. 52/4,
© 2013 by University of Chicago Press.
2 Lubin translates Rock Edict IX as follows: “It happens that people perform var-
ious ceremonies in the case of sicknesses, in marrying and giving in marriage, at
the birth of a son, or when setting out on a journey. On these and other occasions,
people perform various ceremonies. But in these, women perform numerous,
diverse, vulgar, and pointless ceremonies. Now ceremonies should certainly be
performed, but ceremonies like these bear little fruit” (Lubin 2013: 36).
3 Karen Muldoon-Hules’s research suggests that middle period monks received
donations of meals in connection with upa-saka weddings and ritually dedicated the
resulting merit. It appears, however, that monastics refrained from actually officiating
at weddings (Muldoon-Hules 2014: 212–217).
.
4 The story of a demon mother hushing her crying child, Priyankara, in the night so
they can hear the edifying recitations of the visiting monk, Aniruddha, is found in
the Sanskrit tradition of the Sam -
. yukta-agama. This story is also cited in the
Maha-prajñaparamita-śa-stra (attributed to Na-ga-rjuna) and Xuanzang’s Maha-vibha--
s.a-śa-stra (Peri 1917: 34–37). The Lalitavistara mentions Ha-rı‑tı‑ as the mother of 500
yaks.a sons who, along with Pa-ñcika and other yaks.a commanders, conspires to
escort the bodhisattva from the city on the night of the Great Departure, sup-
porting the hooves of his mount, Kan.t.haka (Goswami 2001: 192). The Maha-vastu
mentions a Ha-rı‑tı‑-like yaks.inı‑ whose 1,000 sons descend upon Vaiśa-lı‑ after her
death and steal the vitality (ojas) of the people there. No one is able to quell the
demonic horde except the Buddha (Senart 1897: 253–254). Brief mention of Ha-rı‑tı‑
can be also found in the dha-ran.‑ı chapter of the Saddharmapun.d.arı‑ka-su-tra where a
group of raks.ası‑s led by one Kuntı‑ pledge to protect the dharma teachers from all
 Auspicious Ascetics 149
manner of malign beings. The Maha-ma-ya--su-tra reprises the tale of her conversion
in verse (Peri 1917: 30–31). The snakebite text, the Maha-ma-yurı‑, also prescribes
methods for pacifying her and counts her among those deities present at the bod-
hisattva’s birth (Peri: 27). For Ha-rı‑tı‑ images, see for instance Czuma 1985: 22,
Plates 74, 7, 80; Ingholt 1957, Plates 340, 342, 344; Zwalf 1996: 44–5, especially
Plate 92; Spink 2007: 1–36. Important studies of Ha-rı‑tı‑ include Bivar 1970; Cohen
1998; DeCaroli 2004; Foucher 1917; Misra 1981; Mitra 1990; Ohnuma 2007b; Peri
1917; Rospatt 2009; Schopen 2012; Shaw 2006.
5 The Ha-rı‑tı‑ story is found at Bka’ ’gyur (sde dge par phud) Da 144b.5 or Bka’ ’gyur
(stog pho brang bris ma) Tha 215b.5. Peri provides an account of Yijing’s Chinese
translation of the Mu-lasarva-stiva-da-vinaya, which contains an epilogue missing in
the Tibetan version. Some of the missing material is present in various commentaries
on Gun.aprabha’s Vinayasu-tra preserved in Tibetan. For details see Schopen (2012).
.
6 Studies of Angulima-la include Ana-layo (2008d); Ana-layo (2015); Galasek (2015)
Gombrich (1996); L. Wilson (2011).
7 Cullavagga v.2.127–129. A description of Prince Bodhi laying a white cloth on the
ground and requesting the Buddha to walk over it is also found at Majjhima-
nika-ya ii.91.5–8. The Majjhima-nika-ya At.t.hakatha- explains that he did this in
hopes that good fortune in the form of a son would result (Bhikkhu Bodhi and
.
Bhikkhu Ña-n.amoli 2005: 1291). Sangha-disesa IV from the Pa-li Vinaya tells of a
barren woman approaching “a monk dependent on her family” and asking him
“How could I, honored sir, bear (a child)?” He answers, “For this, sister, give the
highest gift … sexual intercourse” (Horner 2012–2014: vol. I, 222–223). The focus
here is on providing an example of lewd talk, which is then proscribed. The highly
rhetorical nature of this passage makes it less useful as evidence that monks
concerned themselves with alleviating laywomen’s fertility issues.
8 Gnoli and Venkatacharya 1977: 82. Ohnuma’s translation. This image is part of
dream in which Siddha-rtha sees himself “using the great earth as an enormous
couch, with Sumeru, the King of the Mountains, as an all-pervading pillow, with
his left arm resting in the eastern great ocean, his right arm resting in the western
great ocean, his two feet resting in the southern great ocean” (Ohnuma 2012: 144).
It is true that the image of a grass blade (tr.n.a) suggests delicacy, not size and
power. Monier-Williams suggests, in fact that, the word tr.n.a is often used meta-
phorically to mean something minute or worthless. Within the context of this passage,
which clearly evokes imagery of size and power, tr.n.a probably just means a long
growing plant blade, without any connotation of weakness.
9 I am far from the first scholar of Buddhism to take note of this interesting and
complicated story. For various interpretations of Suja-ta-’s oblation see Cole (2006:
338–341); DeCaroli (2004: 107–115); Ohnuma (2012: 135–139); Penner (2009: 30–31,
202–203); Strong (2008: 58–60).
10 Walleser and Kopf (1924: 402). Her vow is the same in the Nida-nakatha-, except
she puts a number on it, promising to “spend a hundred thousand” (Fausböll
1877: 68; Jayawickrama 2000: 90; Strong 2008: 59).
11 Walleser and Kopf (1924: 68); Fausböll (1877: 402). The word pa-ya-sa (S. pa-yasa)
refers to something made from milk. It is related to the Sanskrit word, payas,
which means milk or semen.
12 Walleser and Kopf (1924: 40)2. In the Nida-nakatha-, the directional guardians
collect oja enough for all the men and gods of the four continents and 2,000
surrounding islands and add it to the pa-ya-sa.
13 The Nida-nakatha- simply states rather mysteriously that “The Great Being looked at
Suja-ta-. She understood what it meant” (Jayawickrama 2000: 92; Fausböll 1877: 69).
According to the Manorathapu-ran.‑ı “When she saw the Great Being, there arose
in her an overpowering gladness” (Strong, The Experience of Buddhism: 59. Walleser
and Kopf 1924: 403).
150 Amy Paris Langenberg
14 According to the Manorathapu-ran.‑ı, however, the chance meeting between the
bodhisattva and Suja-ta- is itself the result of a past intention or adhika-ra to be a
Buddhist laywoman, declared in the time of the Buddha Padumuttara.
15 Fausböll (1877: 69–70); Walleser and Kopf (1924: 403).
16 The Maha-vastu has Suja-ta- suffering alongside the Bodhisattva during the six years
of his penance in the forest as a result of a religious vow she has taken. When she
presents the milk-rice, she demonstrates a fairly specific knowledge of his path:
“Partake of this sweet milk-rice and become the destroyer of the conduit that for-
merly irrigated existence, and attain immortality, the griefless state, in a grove in
the king’s domain.” No mention whatsoever is made of a child (Jones 1952: vol. II,
196). In the Buddhacarita she is called Nandabala-. In its brief description, she is
both joyful and faithful and, by eating her offering, the bodhisattva “cause[s] her
to obtain the reward of her birth” (kr.tva- tadupabhogena pra-ptajanmaphala-m . sa
ta-m). Although this statement is usually interpreted to be a reference to the merit
she will gain through her offering, the Pa-li stories open up the possibility that jan-
maphala may refer to the reward of successful childbirth rather than a better
rebirth. No specific mention is made of a child, however (Aśvaghos.a 2008: 365). In
the Lalitavistara, Suja-ta- feeds 500 bra-hman.as daily, a way of feeding the Bodhi-
sattva by proxy. At the conclusion of his fast, she prepares the honeyed milk-rice.
Upon noting auspicious portents, she thinks, “Since such signs have been seen,
without doubt the Bodhisattva will attain highest complete awakening after eating
this food.” Here the offering is linked directly to his status as an enlightened being.
Again, no mention is made of a child (Lefmann 1902: 264–272). For an English
translation of the Suja-ta- section of this text see Goswami (2001: 247–53).
17 See Wendy Doniger’s work on the symbolic equation of milk, soma, and semen in
Vedic and post-Vedic texts (Doniger 1980: 17–61). Jamison also provides many
examples of these equivalences (Jamison 1996: 55–59, 51–53). A locus classicus for
the association of pa-yasa with fecundity is the Br.hada-ran.yaka-upanis.ad 6.4.13–18,
which prescribes the ritual feeding of rice, mixed variously with water, milk, and ghee,
to women immediately after their menstrual periods in order to promote fertility.
18 According to the Maitra-yan.‑ı-sam -
. hita, Aditi gives birth to three sets of twin sons
after cooking three rice porridges (odana), offering them to the gods, and eating
the leftovers. The fourth time, she decides to eat the rice porridge before making an
offering. The fourth set of twins are aborted by their brothers. With intervention,
they both survive (Jamison 1991: 205).
19 In this latter action, she holds the sacrificer’s clothing or a sacrificial implement in
order to infuse ritual actions with her auspicious sexuality.
20 Suja-ta- is specifically said to perform her ritual worship of the tree spirit on the full
moon day, a day when Brahmans would also have been performing an important
nonsanguinary śrauta ritual, the darśapu-rn.ama-sa. This Brahman ritual contains
appeals to the Vedic deities to increase fecundity, and ritual actions that, according
to Jamison’s analysis, magically connect the sacrificer and the ritual itself to the
sexual and generative power of women (Jamison 1996: 42–62).
21 DeCaroli takes his analysis of the Suja-ta- story in a somewhat different direction
than I do, emphasizing the funerary nature of the 49 pin.d.as in the Nida-nakatha-
(DeCaroli 2004: 110–111). In the Brahman śra-ddha ritual, the symbolism of the
pin.d.a is generative and embryological (Knipe 1977). Alexander Von Rospatt sug-
gested to me that “the pin.d.as serve … to reconstitute the body of the Buddha just
as they do in death rituals for the ancestors and hence can be understood in terms
of gestation and deification” (personal email communication, May 2, 2011). As a
cautionary note, it should be noted, however, that pin.d.apa-ta is the standard Pa-li
word for alms food. Pin.d.a by itself is a standard metonymic term for food, not
unlike the English use of “bite” or “bread” to refer to food in general. Thanks to
Ana-layo and James Fitzgerald for reminding me of these uses.
 Auspicious Ascetics 151
22 In his discussion of the significance of stu-pa destruction in several Vinaya stories,
Schopen also argues that middle period monastics were not critics of but, on the
contrary, appeared to harbor great respect for the power of ritual action, and that
their understanding of ritual efficacy is in line with brahmanical understandings of
the same. In his sources, the destruction of both a brick stu-pa and a temporary
stu-pa made of food “effect a definitive change in one thing by manipulating
another; in the one case a person is destroyed by the destruction of kneaded food;
in the other this is effected by the destruction of an arrangement of bricks; in both
cases the persons destroyed is – from our point of view – already dead. Here I think
it is important to note that both kneaded food and arranged bricks are also employed
in brahmanical rites for manipulating the ‘dead.’ The most obvious, is the use of balls
of rice to ‘be’ the dead in the sapin.d.a ritual” (Schopen 2004: 346–347).
23 Strong’s attention to this topic was important to the early stages of my research
(Strong 1992: 59, n. 6–9).
24 Aniruddha (Pa-li: Anuruddha), one of the ten principal disciples of the Buddha and
a member of the Śa-kya clan, is famous for his mastery of the divine eye and his
cultivation of the four foundations of mindfulness. In a number of ja-taka tales, he
is identified with Sakka, the lord of the heaven of the 33. He also seems to have been
particularly magnetic and handsome for, in many narratives, women are drawn to
him. For a summary of Pa-li accounts of Anuruddha, see Nyanaponika and
Hecker (1997: 183–210).
.
25 The “following-after-ascetic” (paśca-cchraman.a) is described at Anguttara-nika-ya
-
iii.137 and in the avadana literature as a low-rank servant and student, often very
young, who accompanies a senior monk on begging rounds to carry the alms bowl,
and to alert his master should he be in danger of breaking a vow. Schopen is of the
opinion that the term paśca-cchraman.a is better translated as “attending menial” or
“menial” because the basic meaning of śraman.a is “laboring” or “exerting effort”
and those designated as such seem to often have been young boys initiated for the
purpose of performing menial tasks around the monastery (Schopen 2012). For a
more thorough discussion of the ritual status of children in Indian Buddhist mon-
asteries than is offered here, see Langenberg (2012). I have chosen to translate this
term as “following-after-ascetic” or “monastic servant” because in Buddhist
contexts śraman.a generally means simply “monk,” “renouncer,” or “ascetic.” Also,
while these boys’ status in the monastery was undoubtedly low, they were
nonetheless official members of the monastic community.
26 An interesting variation on these child-pledging stories, in which the Dharma
comes to the rescue of infertile families and their vulnerable offspring, occurs in
AŚ 73, studied by Karen Muldoon-Hules. A couple has difficulty conceiving and
makes offerings to the gods in order to finally receive the blessing of a girl child.
The father, who has made a threat to turn mother and child out of the house of a
girl should be born, does not carry through with it when it is clear that she is an
extraordinary baby. She is born dressed in pure white clothing, which never
becomes dirty and grows along with her. Later the child, who is named Śukla-,
enters the monastic life, in part, it seems, to relieve her father of some troublesome
complications related to her marriage (Muldoon-Hules 2014: 202–203).
27 Divya-vada-na 26. Cowell and Neil (1886: 351–556).
28 Dhı‑tika’s ordination story is found in the Aśokara-ja-vada-na, Taisho 2042 (50):
126a–b. It is translated in Strong (1992: 134–135).
29 Divya-vada-na 23. Cowell and Neil (1886: 329–331).
30 A story about a little dog that loves the elder Śa-riputra and becomes his monastic
attendant after being reborn in his former mistress’s womb is found at Karmaśataka
2, Bka’ ’gyur (sde dge par phud) Ha 5b.7. Summarized in Feer (1901: 63–64).
31 This story occurs in the Chinese Aśokara-ja-vada-na. Upagupta finds the two star-
ving cubs then causes them to be reborn in the house of a Brahman family. The
152 Amy Paris Langenberg
family pledges one of the twins to Upagupta. The other twin does not wish to be
left alone, however. Upagupta initates both boys at eight years. Taisho 2042 (50)
121b–22b. Translated in Strong (1992: 134).
32 Seven years or old enough to scare crows is the minimum age for Buddhist initia-
tion according to the Vinaya. For a full discussion of the crow-scaring age rule, see
Langenberg (2012).
33 Two reliquary inscriptions from the Sa-ñchı‑ and Andheri Topes in Central India
mention Ha-ritı‑putasa (belonging to the son of Ha-ritı‑), which could mean, as
Quagliotti suggests, that the entombed was a devotee or ward of the goddess
(Quagliotti 1999: 54).
34 AŚ 82. Speyer (1992: 68, line 2 through 69, line 2); Vaidya (1958a: 204, lines 7–20).
A shorter version of the story of Sumanas is also found at Karmaśataka 10. The
Sumanas-avada-na is discussed as an example of child initiation in Langenberg
(2012). Schopen also covers some of the same ground including reference to the
Sumanas-avada-na and the role of Ha-rı‑tı‑ as child protector in monastic contexts
(Schopen 2012).
35 In the Pa-li tradition of the Dhammapadat.t.hakatha-, Aniruddha and Sumanas, here
known as Anuruddha and Sumana, were also destined to be linked as master and
student. In that version of the story, Sumana is initiated as a young boy of seven but
we hear nothing of infertility, child-protection, or pre-natal pledging (Buddhaghosa
1921, 3:XXV.12).
36 This word is sometimes used in donative inscriptions. Consider, for instance, sava-
traten.a niyatito vihare matapitu puyae devadato (Konow 1969: 100, XXXVII, 6). I
am grateful to Jason Neelis for alerting me to this usage.
37 Bka’ ’gyur (sde dge par phud), Ha 11a.3. Summarized at Feer (1901: 58–57).
38 For a fuller discussion of possible continuities between Vedic-Hindu lifecycle rites
and Buddhist initiation, see Langenberg (2012). John Strong argues that the ritual
of ordination is properly understood as a culmination, rather than a beginning,
that bestows not just the status of monkhood, but of ideal monkhood, that is
arhatship. It is, in effect, a ritualization of arhatship (Strong 1992: 86–89).
39 Vaidya (1958a: 299). Vaidya compiled this and other common stock passages in an
appendix (labeled punaḥ punaḥ prayukta-na-m - śa-na-m su-cı‑) to his addition of
. katham . .
the AŚ, although he doesn’t give citations to specific avada-nas. Among the places
in his edition where something close to this passage can be found are AŚ 3 (p. 7,
lines 10–2), AŚ 21 (p. 56, lines 20–30) and AŚ 73. Another example of this type of
statement can be can be found in Divya-vada-na 1, Kot.ikarn.a-vada-na (Cowell and
Neil 1886: 1).
40 I would like to acknowledge Professor James Fitzgerald’s invaluable assistance in
puzzling out this passage.
41 Both seat arranging and the first time instruction of a new disciple are designated
by causative forms of the Sanskrit verb pra √ jña- (“to instruct”) (Oguibenine 1983).
42 Karmaśataka 3. Feer (1901: 65).
43 Qing period China provides a fascinating example of a monastic community that
really did quite literally specialize in “female troubles.” The monks of the Bamboo
Grove Monastery in Zhejiang Province were famous for their expertise in fuke or
women’s reproductive health. Some Qing period observers were critical of the
Bamboo Grove monks’ gynecological activities, finding them contradictory to
Buddhist teachings. Some suspected the monks of sexual impropriety and criticized
them for exposing themselves to “female pollution” (Wu 2000: 46–47). Yi-li Wu,
who has studied the Bamboo Grove history, does not mention any ambivalence on
the part of the monks themselves.
6. Female Impurity and the Female
Buddhist Ascetic1

A consensus is emerging in recent scholarship on the early and middle periods

of Indian Buddhism that nuns were a significant and respected presence in
Buddhist communities. Up through the fourth or fifth centuries C.E., inscrip-
tions indicate that nuns were active sponsors of religious art on a par with
monks (Schopen 1997) and may have been powerful enough to cut into the
resources available to support monks’ communities (Schopen 2004). Jinah
Kim uses inscriptions, manuscript colophons, and illustrations of female
donors to argue that Buddhist nuns were and continued to be active as donors
and sponsors well into the medieval period (Kim 2012). Preeminent nuns are
lauded, their accomplishments listed, in canonical texts preserved both in Pa-li
and Chinese (Ana-layo 2014a; Ana-layo 2014b; Blackstone 1998; Collett
2014a). Furthermore, close readings of vinaya materials indicate that female
monastic culture was distinctive (Finnegan 2009; Langenberg 2013a) and,
though problematic for the male community, legally accommodated by mon-
astic authorities nonetheless (Ana-layo 2008a–2008; Clarke 2014; Jyväsjärvi
2011; Langenberg 2013b).
So far, I have argued that the Buddhist master metaphor “birth is suffer-
ing” implies that the female embodiment is problematic, the source of all
suffering. Ja-taka and avada-na literature teaches that femaleness, like rebirth
in the animal realm, is a karmic disadvantage that has the tendency to
endure across lifetimes. The female form, closely associated with abun-
dance and fertility in ancient Indic contexts, is, moreover, inauspicious in
elite Buddhist accounts. In some Buddhist narratives, in fact, fecundity is
transferred to the figure of the male ascetic. And ancient Indian Buddhist
discussions of birth brim with vivid descriptions of repulsive female impu-
rities. For instance, references to the disgusting and impure nature of the
female reproductive body are a prominent feature of the Garbha-vakra-nti-
su-tra. There the vaginal opening to the womb is described, inter alia, as: “a
dark hole, very disgusting like a toilet, foul smelling, heaped up with filth,
home of many thousands of types of worms, always dripping, continually in
need of being cleaned, vile, always putrid with semen, blood, filth, and pus”
(Bka’ ’gyur, stog pho brang bris ma, Ta, 207b.6–208a.1). How should we
reconcile the vibrancy and respectability of ancient nuns’ communities with
154 Amy Paris Langenberg
the extremely negative entailments of the Buddhist birth discourse for femaleness
as a general category?
Scholars have coped with such contradictions variously. Many have focused
on or given priority to one situation, ignoring the other (call this approach
one). Others have asserted an authoritative and authentic Buddhist view, often
attempting to discern the Buddha’s own position on women in order to do so
(call this approach two). Yet others have simply pointed to the diversity and
contradictory nature of Buddhist views in general (approach three), or
attempted to construct a chronology in which a liberal position on women
eventually gives way to monkish misogyny (approach four). Alan Sponberg’s
oft-cited round up of early Buddhist attitudes towards the feminine (published
in 1992) combines approaches two, three, and four in a manner that is com-
pelling for many scholars of Buddhism. Sponberg contends that the original
and most authentic Buddhist attitude towards women is that of “soter-
iological inclusiveness,” the view that men and women are identical in their
capacity for ignorance and suffering and have access to the same awakened
state. He and many other scholars of Buddhism attribute this view to the
Buddha himself, or at least to the very earliest community. According to
Sponberg’s scheme, as Buddhist orders established themselves during the sev-
eral centuries after the Buddha’s death, built monasteries, increased in num-
bers, accumulated wealth, and ceased to wander, nuns were subjected to
“institutional androcentrism,” epitomized by the eight “rules to be respected”
(gurudharma/garudhamma) that subordinate the female to the male commu-
nity. This, according to Sponberg, was the product of Buddhist sensitivity to
public opinion. Dependence on patronage required the Buddhist monastic
community to entomb their spiritual egalitarianism inside the androcentric
structures of ancient Indian society. Simultaneously, says Sponberg, the psy-
chological pressures of male celibacy gave rise to “ascetic misogyny,” includ-
ing scatological rants against women and their filthy bodies. To Sponberg, this
view is even less supportable in Buddhist contexts than institutional andro-
centrism, since clinging to sex distinction is a mark of ignorance, at least
according to the certain Maha-ya-na strains of Buddhist thought (Sponberg
1992: 22–23). Sponberg’s is a narrative of decline in which a radical and
idealistic movement gradually succumbs to conservative social pressures and
misogynistic habits of mind.2 But his narrative does not explain why state-
ments pertaining to female impurity and inferiority are present in early layers
of the sutta/a-gama tradition − coexisting with the possibility of female spiri-
tual achievement from the beginning − nor does it allow for the fact that the
vinaya tradition is rigorously inclusive of women, however paternalistic
(Ana-layo 2014b; Collett 2014b; Finnegan 2009; Jyväsjärvi 2011; Langenberg
2013a, 2013b; Langenberg 2014).
This chapter explains the apparent contradiction between a viable nuns’
order and ancient Indian Buddhist views of the female differently, drawing on
Foucault’s insights about the generative nature of restriction and discipline. It
is through various forms of discipline, born from particular regimes of
 Female Impurity and the Female Buddhist Ascetic 155
knowledge, that various types of selfhood become possible and then socially
real. Ironically, the Buddhist mode of fencing womanhood round or “dis-
ciplining” it (in the broad Foucauldian, not specific vinaya sense) as morally
inferior, impure, limited in mental capacity, sexually dangerous, and so forth,
may simultaneously have created a separate place for women to stand in
Buddhist society, however problematic, thereby making them eligible to be
members of Buddhist monastic communities in ancient India. Put simply,
specifying what a woman is is a preliminary and necessary (but not sufficient)
step towards creating for them a formally recognized community, creating a
religious culture that regards them as a legitimate community (however hier-
archical), and establishing legal support for their community. Thus, this
chapter brings to its conclusion a major thesis of this study − that Buddhist
birth discourse, so seemingly negative for women, can be viewed as suppor-
tive, even constitutive of the institution of female monasticism in ancient
India, and of ancient monastic female personhood itself. If the Buddhist
discourse of birth had not successfully critiqued and undermined positive values
traditionally associated with the reproductive female body (auspiciousness,
beauty, periodic purity), ancient South Asian women would have found it far
more difficult to go forth into homelessness. In the end, the classical Buddhist
discourse of birth taken broadly also made it conceptually possible for mon-
astic women to substitute Buddhist forms of discipline for other modes of
behavior definitional to North Indian womanhood at the time. With inherited
notions of virtuous femininity rendered untenable by the Buddhist analysis of
suffering and embodiment, Buddhist nuns were free to enter into a new feminine
life. This new life was leavened by a monastic discipline that relieved them of
the burdens of auspiciousness, beauty, sexuality, and the time-consuming
cycles of purity and impurity.
Previous chapters have tackled the topics of disgust and inauspiciousness.
This chapter examines the topic of female impurity, situating the fevered
references to foulness found in the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra (and in other similar
though generally briefer treatments from Buddhist su-tra and exegetical texts)
within the larger context of purity concerns voiced across Buddhist genres. It
makes use of Mary Douglas’s structuralist-functionalist analysis of pollution
belief to connect different sorts of Buddhist impurity talk to various Buddhist
social environments. In addition to clarifying Buddhist ideas about female
impurity in general, this analysis reveals a special lifting of purity constraints
within the female monastic community, whatever the rhetoric of texts like the
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra. Taken together with a decentering of female beauty as
constitutive of identity and a dropping of auspiciousness as an important
religious value, this lifting of purity constraints constitutes the opening of a
capacious moral space for Buddhist monastic women, a discursively gener-
ated form of life in which they might substitute alternative Buddhist con-
structions of femaleness, virtue, and freedom for those available to house-holding
women. Though it may have involved internalizing certain negative views of
femaleness, this different moral space would have provided an opportunity,
156 Amy Paris Langenberg
rare enough in the ancient world (or, indeed, the modern one!), for women to
enter into a formally acknowledged and well-articulated female vocation not
based on the disciplines of wifehood and motherhood. Once inside, women
were in a better position to talk back to the tradition amongst themselves,
work around its misogyny in their own self-understandings, and assert agency,
at least within their communities.

Mary Douglas and Buddhist blood taboo

It has not always been evident to scholars that ideas regarding female
impurity hold any place of importance in classical (pre-Tantric) Indian Bud-
dhism, which includes no pollution-based dietary laws, often explicitly asserts
purity to be a feature of the mind (not the body), and is critical of Brahmanic
ritual.3 Although assertions to the effect that monastic communities must be
morally clean in behavior, descend from an untainted ordination lineage, and
be accurate purveyors of the pure Dharma can be found in Buddhist sources,
such purity talk does not much resemble the ritual concerns of upper-caste
Vedic-Hindus (Tambiah 1985: 101). Correct diet for Buddhist monks specifi-
cally includes the leftover food of others, a source of nutrition that grievously
violates Brahmanic dietary injunctions. According to the highest ascetic
ideals, a monk’s robes are patched together from cast-off rags found in rub-
bish heaps or even in cemeteries, a practice that appeared to have troubled
Vedic-Hindu patrons, and more conventional monastic administrators, at
times (Schopen 2006). Referring to a Visuddhimagga passage, Stanley Tam-
biah notes that the many rules on the deportment, dress, and feeding of
monks constitute a Buddhist rhetoric in which purity is defined entirely by
behavior, not ritual status:

The controlled behaviour of the bhikkhu, in demeanour, dress, gestures

and eating is beautifully discussed in this passage which gives us some
sense of the modulated even finicky, majestic even aristocratic, manners
inculcated in men who are at the same time ascetic renouncers positively
contaminating themselves with the contemplation of decay and the
stench of death, and appropriating the rags of the charnel house for their
patched-up robes.
(Tambiah 1985: 97)

The deliberate and regulated dress and manner of a monk marks him as
.
belonging to the particular social group that is the Buddhist sangha. His vio-
lation of dietary rules and sartorial concerns sets him apart from caste society.
Pure, in these Buddhist contexts, refers to virtuous conduct and unbroken
religious authority, not bodily integrity during ritual observance.
The tendency to remove purity from the domain of ritual practice and
reestablish it as a feature of the mind is an important thread of Buddhist
purity discourse.4 According to the Dhammapada, for instance:
 Female Impurity and the Female Buddhist Ascetic 157
By oneself is wrong done, by oneself is one defiled.
By oneself wrong is not done, by oneself, surely, is one cleansed.
One cannot purify another,
Purity and impurity are in oneself [alone].5

Buddhist teachings advise the practitioner on various methods of ethical

and cognitive self-purification. Such passages refer to cleansing mind, body,
and speech of desire, hatred, and ignorance in their various forms. Though
moral perfection is imagined to produce, via the rebirth process, a beautiful
and perfumed physical form, such a state cannot be obtained through ritual
bathing or other pseudo-levitical observances. This Buddhist spiritualization
of purity has encouraged an assumption on the part of some scholars that
physical references to the uncleanness of women’s bodies and reproductive
fluids are not native to the Buddhist tradition proper. In addition, the analogy
of Christianity has been readily available, especially to earlier generations of
scholars. Just as the cleansing revelations of the New Testament were sup-
posed to have rendered the old Israelite holiness laws irrelevant, the Buddha’s
insights into the truths of suffering and causality were supposed to have
superseded the old Brahmanic purity laws.
And yet, in texts on ascetic practice, such as the Satipat.t.ha-na-sutta or the
Visuddhimagga, the corruptibility and impermanence of the body is articu-
lated using a strongly physicalized language of impurity. Digestion, sexuality,
and necrosis are rendered with a high level of descriptive detail and
awareness of these processes is endowed with significance for Buddhist prac-
tice (Collins 1997; Dessein 2014; Hamilton 1995; Mrozik 2006; Olivelle 1995;
Williams 1997). As Liz Wilson has documented in her monograph, Charming
Cadavers, this Buddhist rhetoric of bodily impurity is applied with special
zeal and creativity to the female body, particularly in narrative genres. The
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra can be fitted into this general type of Buddhist purity
talk − ascetic discourses of the impure female body. Although it does mention
mental impurity on occasion, and male bodily impurity in others, it dwells in
greatest detail on the disgusting nature of a woman’s innards. In fact, in the
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, the female womb is a kind of cipher for the human
body. It refers to womb and vagina as the great “wound cavity of the body”
(lus kyi rma’i sbubs), conflating wound, body, and womb in a way that adapts
traditional Buddhist imagery of body as wound to the Garbha-vakra-nti’s
special focus on the female reproductive body.6
The spiritualized Buddhist discourse of bodily impurity, which is supposed
to provide support to spiritual practice, not to the social order, has generally
been assumed to stand in contrast to the purity concerns of high-caste Vedic-
Hindus, especially in its alleged gender and caste neutrality. After all, didn’t
the Buddha teach that all bodies, male or female, Brahman or Can.d.a-la, are
equally foul? For this reason also, it is common for practitioners and scholars
of South and Southeast Asian Buddhism, even some interested in gender, to
question the authenticity of the references to impurity found in Buddhist texts
158 Amy Paris Langenberg
(or manifested in contemporary practice) and to attribute them to the influ-
ence of the purity-obsessed caste Hindus (Dessein 2014: 124–125; Gutschow
2004: 207; Hamilton 1995: 59–60; Sponberg 1992: 24; Trainor 1993: 70;
Tuladhar 2008: 69–74; Young 2004: 179–185). Anyone who compares Brah-
man and Buddhist discussions of female purity from the classical period as is
done here will, however, begin to doubt that Indian Buddhist treatments of
female impurity can be dismissed as inauthentically Buddhist or simply laid
at the feet of Brahmanism. Brahman legal texts:

1 attribute female impurity to the god Indra’s wrongdoing, not the sins of
women;
2 deal with female menstrual and birth impurity as temporary and washable;
and
3 often declare women to be inherently pure.

In Buddhist contexts, on the other hand, the impurity of women tends to be

presented as:

1 a symptom of women’s past moral errors;

2 the source of human impurity in general; and
3 a life-long state.

These significant differences render the attribution of Buddhist notions of

female impurity to the early influence of Brahman ritual traditions untenable,
especially given the ways in which early Buddhists criticized and self-consciously
rejected other features of Brahman ritual tradition.
Actually, classical Indian Buddhism offers a range of statements about
female impurity, some that spiritualize the notion of purity, and others that
do not; some that intensify purity talk, others that minimalize it. In certain
early discourses attributed to the Buddha, the moral significance of female
embodiment, with its womb and its blood, is apparently downplayed and
women are declared capable of achieving all the spiritual fruits of monastic
life, including the highest fruit of arhatship.7 In the monastic legal tradition of
the vinaya, female blood is not afforded symbolic importance, although it is
often said in passing to be the product of moral taint. A series of careful rules
legislate its practical management. By contrast, certain Maha-ya-na and non-
canonical mainstream texts such as the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra employ very
intense rhetoric regarding the blood-filled female body, likening it to an out-
house, cesspool, or rotting cadaver, and blaming the female womb for human
impurity in general.
Mary Douglas’s sophisticated explanation of purity belief offers an inter-
pretive framework that illuminates and explains varieties of purity talk in
classical Indian Buddhism without resorting to a Sponbergian narrative of
decline. In her seminal work, Purity and Danger: An Analysis of the Concepts
of Pollution and Taboo, Douglas argues that “religious beliefs express
 Female Impurity and the Female Buddhist Ascetic 159
society’s awareness of itself” (Douglas 1966: 101). Religious systems draw on
emotionally powerful ideas and images selectively in order to express not the
idiosyncratic concerns of individuals but the vital concerns of the social group
as a whole. For the early Douglas, the body is the paradigmatic source of
such viscerally resonant symbols. Her slogan is “talk about the body is talk
about society.” For instance, bodily fluids, like menstrual blood, saliva, and
semen, pass in and out of the body, symbolizing the breaches of the social
body at points of vulnerability and exchange. Douglas observes, “It seems
that our deepest fears and desires take expression with a kind of witty aptness.
To understand body pollution we should try to argue back from the known
dangers of society to the known selection of body themes and try to recognize
what appositeness is there” (Douglas 1966: 121).
A key component of Douglas’s pollution theory concerns the notion of
anomaly. For Douglas, impurity is always connected to classification systems.
Matthew Bagger, who has applied Douglas’s theories to the topic of religious
paradox, explains the basis for this connection as follows: “the practical
necessity of rendering a society stable and the psychological satisfaction of
achieving consonance tend in conjunction to produce a correspondence
between the society’s formal pattern of social relations and the seams of its
constructed universe” (Bagger 2007: 41). For Douglas, impure things are
anomalies that do not conform to accepted notions of cosmological and
social order. Ultimately, pollution beliefs derive their power not only from
deeply held cosmological beliefs, but also from the fact that they continuously
express and sustain social structures, flagging transgressions and guarding
points of entry, especially when other political and social sanctions are not
very strong, direct, or complete (Douglas 1966: 132). Thus, pollution practice
“arises from the desire to keep straight the internal lines of the social system,”
tapping into strong emotions like horror and disgust in order to accomplish
this work (Douglas 1966: 140). The impurity of menstrual blood fits with these
concerns, as this blood crosses the body’s envelope when it shouldn’t. This is
because menses indicates the absence of pregnancy and lactation, which in
most patriarchal societies are the ideal states for a married woman in her
fertile years.
Douglas’s addresses the ritual functions of female blood at several points in
Purity and Danger. She hypothesizes that it is a source of pollution in socie-
ties in which the approved relationship between men and women affords
women access to certain kinds of power despite clear ideologies of male
superiority (Douglas 1966: 140–58). In these situations, even though the
social rules may be clearly defined and legally enforced, the community
complains of and flags (but does not fully resolve) its internal gender dis-
sonance through ideas of sexual pollution.8 Minor female rebellions are
quelled every time purity rules remind women of their social location. In
Purity and Danger, Douglas also contrasts religious systems in which unclean
things such as menstrual blood are always abominated and “composting
religions” in which they are viewed as dangerous but also paradoxically
160 Amy Paris Langenberg
revered as sacred (Douglas 1966: 167). In composting religions, unclean
things are viewed ambivalently as a source of danger and a potential source
of tremendous power. These more complete religions recognize that the dis-
integration and lack of order inherent in impurity is also redolent with
regrowth and renewal. Just as rotting waste breaks down in the compost pile,
loses its foulness, and becomes a richly nutritious source of new life in time, in
composting religions what is scrupulously avoided under ordinary circum-
stances is faced, honored, and even consumed under special ritual conditions.
Thus, “that which is rejected is ploughed back for a renewal of life” (Douglas
1966: 167). In a composting religion, female blood is likely to be respected
as a source of life, even while it is feared as contaminating.
In later work, Douglas further develops these powerful theses regarding
pollution and society (Douglas 1975: 276–318).9 She eventually argues that in
societies in which outsiders such as exogamous wives, converts, or slaves are
regularly incorporated into core institutions, taboo things are treated posi-
tively, though with caution, as symbols that mediate between human society
and the gods, or other manifestations of the divine. When venerated as sacred
mediators, taboo things provide access to power. In societies that must guard
their gates against intruders, and are regularly threatened by outsiders, taboo
things are consistently abominated and deemed impure. They are not toler-
ated as mediating symbols. All social systems exist somewhere on this con-
tinuum, with one end representing total xenophobia accompanied by the
abomination of anomalous or impure things, the other free and open borders
accompanied by a veneration of the same (Douglas 1975: 281). Here Dou-
glas’s theory predicts that female blood is likely regarded as a filthy abomi-
nation in an endogamous society, as dangerous but powerful in an exogamous
society. In this new theoretical development, which links the sacralization of
the impure to social concerns more closely, Douglas is able to incorporate her
earlier observations that female blood is the object of religious respect in
composting religions but also often a tool of social control into one theory.
Mary Douglas’s linking of social porousness to the presence or absence of
sacred mediating symbols is an excellent fit for the ancient Indian Buddhist
material if the social “others” who must be incorporated or repelled are taken
to be women as a class. Her correlation of the presence or absence of sacred
mediating symbols with social systems of varying degrees of socio-political
openness provide a neat gradient upon which to situate three basic attitudes
towards female impurity present in or contiguous to the classical Indian
Buddhist tradition. Brahman treatises on Dharma, in which the impurity of
women is viewed ambivalently as both dangerous and auspicious, reflect a
social context in which women are taken into the very heart of male elite
society, where they play a vital political and religious role. Lay supporters of
Buddhist monasteries would have displayed, to greater or lesser degrees, the
attitudes towards female blood found in such texts. Buddhist vinaya texts, on
the other hand, reflect a social context in which women are admitted into the
community yet kept carefully separate from elite males in a parallel and
 Female Impurity and the Female Buddhist Ascetic 161
legally subordinate sub-institution. They play no vital role in male religious
organization, which functions more or less independently from the female
community. Buddhist lawgivers’ blasé attitudes toward menstrual blood
reflect, in accordance with Douglas’s scheme, their acceptance of women’s
well-circumscribed participation in monastic institutions. At the far end of the
spectrum, certain exegetical treatises and Maha-ya-na or late mainstream
su-tras such as the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra advocate stricter asceticism and even
austere forest-dwelling, or tout a new pure land theology or vision of the
bodhisattva path that banishes women from the upper reaches of attainment
(D. Boucher 2008; Ray 1994; Schopen 2004). In these, the female reproduc-
tive body is often abominated and treated not as a source of life but as a filthy
thing that leads only to death and disorder. Each of these three cases –
Brahman purity laws, Buddhist monastic law for women, and male ascetic
religious discourse – express distinct views on female impurity, and are
broadly linked to a distinct socio-moral vision. Each represents a particular
point on Douglas’s spectrum of pollution belief and practice ranging from the
veneration to the abomination of female blood.
In using her theory to understand and explain modalities of Indian Bud-
dhist purity thought, I push Douglas’s anthropology to its limits, judging in-
dwelling socio-ethical worldviews, not only live communities, to be “social
environments.” This allows for several “social environments” existing within
the same physical environment, as when a cloistered ascetic shares monastic
space with a forward thinking monastic administrator. In his application of
Douglas to the social attitudes of individual mystics, Bagger makes a similar
interpretive move, noting that “attitudes towards [social] exchange exert their
influence at every scale. Whole societies, institutions within society, and even
relatively solitary thinkers feel the pressures to ground their social pre-
occupations in nature and reason” (Bagger 2007: 44). Here I take Bagger’s
point yet further by proposing that several social sub-environments, each with
their own analysis of “nature and reason,” can co-exist even within the same
individual. For instance, the same monastic scholar might vest the topic of
female blood with minimal emotional energy when redacting the vinaya in the
morning, but compose a disquisition on female foulness when writing su-tra
commentaries in the afternoon. Similarly, a young Brahman boy conditioned
to view the female reproductive body as sacred but dangerous might learn to
abominate it when he later becomes a forest monk. In fact, social environ-
ments are rarely as monolithic, hegemonic, or absolute as the early Douglas
tends to assume. Most people pass between social sub-environments routinely
in the course of a day, as when they travel from work to home, classroom to
dorm, or from a single sex to a mixed sex grouping. The Buddhist social sub-
environments explored here, Brahman inflected house-holding, female-inclusive
monasticism, and rigorous male asceticism are more a matter of moral-social
outlook than physical location. Each productive of a distinct view of female
impurity, they are segmentations of the larger Buddhist social environment.
162 Amy Paris Langenberg
Brahmans on female impurity
According to multiple Brahmanic sources, menstruation in women is the
result of the god Indra’s ancient Brahmanicide.10 After killing the Brahman
son of the god Tvas.t.r., the creatures of the world blame him and call him a
Brahman-killer. Indra is desperate to rid himself of this great sin and runs to
the women, who collectively agree to take over one third of his moral burden
in exchange for the boons of fertility and sexual pleasure.11 Thus, according
to the dharmasu-tra of Vasis.t.ha, a Brahman text on dharma (religious duty),12
“Every month, the sin of killing a learned Brahman becomes manifest. For
that reason, one should not eat the food of a menstruating woman. She has
taken on the mark (ru-pa) of Brahman-killing itself.”13 Menstruation, which,
in Buddhist sources is generally taken as evidence of individual moral mis-
conduct and ignorance, is here the result of the violent act of a male god.
Women take on this sin knowingly and voluntarily, after receiving in return
two boons of their own choosing − the ability to bear children and the capa-
city to experience sexual pleasure. Vasis.t.ha makes clear that the sin respon-
sible for the impure nature of menstruation is of an adventitious quality and
not intrinsic to women. Furthermore, while this mark of sin temporarily pre-
vents the menstruating woman from participating in family and religious life,
at the end of her period of impurity she sheds not only this borrowed guilt but
her own sins as well.14
Brahman manuals provide specific instructions for coping with the impurity
that accompanies monthly bleeding.15 These texts are concerned primarily
with the ritual status of the high-caste male, and with the reproductive
necessity of taking maximum advantage of female fertility, believed to be at
its peak during the days following monthly bleeding. The menstruating wife is
instructed to wear a stained garment (malavadva-sas) for three nights and to
refrain from bathing, anointing herself with oils or perfumes, touching the
fire, laughing, and household work. On the fourth day, she bathes and shampoos
her hair, brushes her teeth, and replaces the stained garment with a clean one.
These actions signal to her husband that her period of impurity is at an end,
and that she is once again sexually available (Hüsken 2001: 89–92).16 In fact,
the period of three days (during which the wife performs a mild sort of
penance) and the ritual bath at the end of the three-day period remove all
trace of Indra’s sin, even, according to some lawgivers, if the blood has not
actually ceased to flow.
While undeniably paternalistic and androcentric, these Brahman traditions
value female sexuality and fertility. A menstruating woman’s capacity to pol-
lute the high caste male is feared, and yet female bleeding is viewed with some
ambivalence. Women, for instance, are declared pure not despite monthly
bleeding, but because of monthly bleeding. The lawgiver Baudha-yana is not
alone in commenting on the menstrual flow’s efficacy in periodically washing
away women’s sins so that women “never become sullied,” even in the case of
rape, abduction or adultery.17 During sex, legitimate wives are pure by
 Female Impurity and the Female Buddhist Ascetic 163
18
definition, except if they are menstruating or have just given birth. In fact,
the auspicious wife, who is purified by her marriage ceremony and periodi-
cally cleansed by her monthly flow appears to represent to these authors a
feminine apotheosis of purity. Baudha-yana and Vasis.t.ha draw attention to the
durable blessings girls receive at marriage as a result of their ritual union with
three gods: “The Moon granted them purification; Gandharva, a sweet voice;
and Fire, the capacity to eat anything. Women, therefore, are free from
taint.”19 Vasis.t.ha even suggests that a woman’s purity surpasses that of the
back of a cow and the feet of a Brahman and that she is “pure all over.”20
Such statements are made with the goal of perpetuating the ritual ascendency
and robust thriving of upper-caste patrilineages, not uplifting women. None-
theless, they still have the effect of assigning a positive value to the female
reproductive body, thus contrasting sharply with Indian Buddhist treatments
of female sexuality and fertility. In Brahman law, female impurity is both
feared and respected, reflecting Brahman society’s acknowledgement of the
immense good generated by these outsiders in its midst. Here menstrual
blood is a “positive mediator” (Douglas 1975: 289). A boundary-crossing
fluid redolent with the symbolism of divine power and fecundity, it has
received the imprint of a social vision in which exchanges with an outside
group, in this case women, are regarded as beneficial and necessary, however
risky.

Female impurity and celibate male asceticism

Although scholars have sometimes blamed Buddhist impurity talk on Brah-
man purity concerns, Buddhist texts contain a rhetoric of female impurity
that is quite distinct from priestly opinions on the matter. Even sutta/a-gama
(texts putatively recording the Buddha’s teachings) from the early canon cau-
sally connect the reproductive functions of the female body to the inherent
and invasive impurity of sam -
. saric existence. This sort of thinking is then ela-
borated and intensified in certain Maha-ya-na su-tras and scholastic treatises,
which express deeply negative views of the female body and its products, abom-
inating rather than venerating. Douglas’s theory predicts that such views
would emerge from social environments whose boundaries must be safe-
guarded from female penetration, not a terrible description for the sorts of
elite male monastic or forest hermitage environments that many scholars
think produced the Maha-ya-na (D. Boucher 2008; Harrison 1987; Ray 1994;
Schopen 2004; Silk 2002).
The male ascetic texts considered here tend not to focus on uterine blood
specifically, but refer in broader terms to the impure womb and vagina, or
impure female fluids, or the impure female body. These texts also do not
concern rituals or specific menstrual practices, so Douglas’s anthropological
concept of “blood taboo” must be interpreted liberally if it is to be useful.
“Blood” must be understood metonymically to connote the female reproduc-
tive body in general, and “taboo” must be taken to refer to emotional
164 Amy Paris Langenberg
attitudes and cognitive acts, rather than concrete ritual acts or behaviors
alone. I do not consider these adjustments to represent a misapplication of
Douglas’s theory since Douglas herself fully recognizes the cognitive
dimensions of ritual actions and the deep structural correspondence between
categories of things.
The association of reproductive processes (which are often conflated with
female bodies in general) and spiritual blight appears to build momentum
and crystallize around certain tropes during the classical period of Indian
Buddhism when the major Maha-ya-na su-tras and certain important works of
abhidharma were produced. The cosmological implications of the belief that
the womb and the sexual fluids deposited there indelibly soil human existence
are played out directly and indirectly in a variety of scriptural and scholastic
contexts. For instance, scholastic literature such as Vasubandhu’s Abhidhar-
makośabha-s.ya (“Commentary on the Treasury of Metaphysics”) and main-
stream discourses such as the Sarva-stiva-da Loka-upapatti-su-tra (“Su-tra on the
Arising of the World”), articulate the cosmological superiority of divine
realms in terms of special types of birthing (Teiser 2006; Teiser 2007: 94–95).
In these realms, infantile gods appear spontaneously on the knees of their
parents, eschewing intimate contact with the mother’s body. A new
Maha-ya-na Buddhist cosmology in which multiple Buddhas occupy multiple
Buddha fields, each with its own enlightening qualities, allows for yet other
ways to imagine and express belief in the three-way coincidence of womb, sin,
and filth. With the exception of the Buddha Aks.obhya’s realm, Abhirati, the
pure lands that make up the Maha-ya-na cosmos are free of female inhabitants,
which eliminates any danger of impurity from women altogether.21 In Abhirati
itself, the children are born without pain, and the women do not menstruate
(Harrison 1987: 78).
More direct articulations of the link between human impurity, sin and their
origins in the female womb appear in exegetical and philosophical texts.
-
Candrakı‑rti’s commentary on Aryadeva’s Catuḥśataka (“Four Hundred
Verses”) is a representative example of this rhetoric.22 He comments satiri-
cally upon the caste pretensions of Brahmans, born from the filthy womb just
like any leather worker or latrine sweeper:

Someone before he was born lived inside his mother’s womb – which is
like an outhouse – between her intestines and stomach. Like a dung
worm, he was nourished by the fluid of her waste products. It is only
from ignorance that he thinks “I am pure.”
(Lang 2003: 180)

Here, Candrakı‑rti dispels the false idea that the body can exist in a pure state.
Bodies are impure not because of what people do or do not do with them, but
by their very nature. In particular, bodies are rendered indelibly impure by the
fluid-filled crucible in which they are fashioned.23 In short, all human impur-
ity can be blamed on the womb. Canonical precedence for Candrakı‑rti’s logic
 Female Impurity and the Female Buddhist Ascetic 165
can be located in the Aggañña-sutta (DN 27) and the Assala-yana-sutta (MN
93), both of which remind auditors that Brahmans, too, are womb-born and
therefore have no special claim to superior purity.
In a variety of Buddhist texts from the classical and early medieval periods,
the sense of revulsion and moral contempt that is to be associated particularly
with female parts and fluids is punched up several notches by means of bar-
oquely disgusting descriptive language. This poetry of the foul, discussed from
an aesthetic rather than a functionalist point of view in Chapter 3, appears to
be a stylistic innovation of Buddhist literature from this time, appearing in
both mainstream and Maha-ya-na literature. In his Śiks.a-samuccaya (“Com-
pendium of Teachings”), Śa-ntideva quotes a text24 in which the Lord Buddha
attempts to dissuade the king from indulging his lust, marveling at the
besotted fools who, by uniting with woman’s body, “have the same sort of
enjoyment as a worm on a dunghill. [The female body is] like a painted pot of
worms wheresoever it be seen, full of urine and ordure, or a skin inflated with
wind … Unsavoury as ordure are women!” The Buddha continues, “Who
penetrates a body which is but a receptacle for impurity, receives like fruit to
that which he does” (Bendall and Rouse 1971: 85–86).25 As mentioned above,
in these types of passages, specific reference to menstrual blood, or the blood
of childbirth is replaced by a more generalized treatment of female filth. We
encounter the idea that vagina and womb or the female body (again, womb
and woman are conflated through synecdoche) is full of feces, urine, vomit
and pus, in addition to blood. I interpret this expanded language to be the
product of poetic license rather than something of technical import. The basic
message about the primordial impurity of the female reproductive body is the
same as if only blood were mentioned. Sometimes, however, the equation
made between moral taint, general filth, and female blood is quite explicit as
in Candrakı‑rti’s comparison of the vagina to an outhouse entrance: “Even
worse are sores inside her body that were acquired through past karmic
action and cannot be healed” (Lang 2003: 166, 254). This passage is then
followed by a reference to female monthly bleeding.
The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra can be situated at this extreme end of male
ascetic impurity talk. The fluids and bodily organs associated with the female
reproductive body are consistently deemed impure or extremely impure through-
out the text. In sections describing conception the father and mother’s sexual
fluids and the embryo as it comes into being, semen and blood are commonly
referred as the mother’s and father’s “filth” (mi gtsang ba) (GS 238.10 ff ). In
weeks one through four, the embryo is said to suffer inside the womb, which is
described as a “filthy, rotting, smoldering swamp” (GS 252.3–4 ff ). Intermittently
during the weeks 17 through 30, various winds arise whose purpose is to
“thoroughly cleanse” (yongs su byang bar byed) the fetus’s sense organs,
blood, skin, nails, head hair, and body hair (GS 270.8 ff ). For instance, in
week 18, a wind arises called “Without Stain” (dri ma med pa), which scours
clean the fetus’s sense organs in just the same way, the text contends, as a
brisk wind might blow an obscuring cloud away to reveal the shining face of
166 Amy Paris Langenberg
the sun or moon (GS 272.6–273.3). These passages suggest an ever increasing
differential between the fetus’s purity and that of its disgusting maternal host.
This differential is realized by the fetus himself when, in week 37, it conceives
the three “unmistaken ideas” (phyin ci ma log pa’i ‘du shes) of filth (mi gtsang ba),
foul smell (dri nga ba), and escape (‘byung ba) (GS 290.6–7). After the child is
born, it is fed by the mother on the “filth of her own blood” (rang khrag gi dri
ma) which, the text assures us, is how the noble Dharma and Vinaya describe
mother’s milk (GS 298.3).26
This type of impurity talk climaxes in a text describing a midwife cutting a
dead fetus out of womb located in week thirty-eight of the embryology, a very
similar section describing a midwife delivering a live fetus located in the four
garbha-vakra-ntis section (Kritzer 2014: 73, 91), and a long colorful summary
of the horrifically disgusting and painful nature of gestation and birth repeated
with variations three times in the same section (Kritzer 2014: 90–91, 94, 95).
One such passage has already been quoted at length in chapter three. In these
descriptions, the womb is characterized as “a wound on the body,” “heaped
up with filth,” “home of many thousand of types of worms,” “always putrid
with semen, blood, filth, and pus,” and so forth (Kritzer 2014: 73). The fetus,
who is force-fed via the umbilical cord on the vomit-like masticated and spit-
infused food of the mother, and apparently fattened on accumulated men-
strual blood, “wanders above and below in a foul-smelling, horrible-smelling
dark, slimy (place) which is like a toilet” (Kritzer 2014: 91). As discussed in
Chapter 1, a thematically and aesthetically similar passage is quoted (though
without attribution) in Vasubandhu’s Abhidharmakośabha-s.ya.
Kritzer has taken the trouble to tabulate the various pejorative terms for
the vaginal entrance to the womb found in both long versions of the
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra and in Vasubandhu’s quotation, in English, Sanskrit,
and several Tibetan variants. These include, in Sanskrit and English: “like a
shit hole” (varcasku-pa iva), “fiercely malodorous” (ugradurgandha), “filthy”
(samala), “constantly leaking” (nityasra-vin.i), “slimy” (picchila), and
“stewed in, degraded by, and drenched in semen, blood, saliva, and phlegm”
(śukraśon.italasika-mala-sam 27
. klinna-viklinna-kvathita) (Kritzer 2014: 22). As
Kritzer analyzes with much rigor, these phrases employed to describe the
vagina and womb are parallel to identical or nearly identical phrases employed
to describe the foulness of the human body generally in the Visuddhimagga,
Śiks.a-samuccaya, Milindapañha, Śatasa-hasrika- Prajña-pa-ramita-, and even
Harśa’s play, the Na-ga-nanda. Thus, a connection between human bodily
impurity and female reproductive impurity is made through the deployment
of specific and parallel stock locutions.
The moral state of the male practitioner is always the real concern of this
distinctive Buddhist discourse of female impurity. From the perspective of
soteriology, the sinfulness of women, with their loathsome vaginas and filthy
blood, is important mainly in that contact with impure female parts results
from and leads to the same sort moral degradation that brought about
women’s low female embodiment to begin with. It also leads inevitably to yet
 Female Impurity and the Female Buddhist Ascetic 167
further harmful contact with the benighted female body during the process of
rebirth. To quote a literary text from the eleventh century, “those attached to
the yoni (female genitals) are reborn in the yoni” (Avada-nakalpalata- 10.78a;
Ks.emendra 1959: 331). In this view, mere contact with reproductive female
bodies, whose profound existential impurity is contagious, leads to spiritual
danger. While men’s bodies and sexual fluids are also described as impure, female
impurity is viewed as both aboriginal and intractable, the ultimate source of
all impurity, whether male or female. This view is reflected in the Maha-ya-na
opinion that rebirth into a male body is necessary for Buddhahood.
The impurity texts cited here would have been produced within elite male
ascetic communities of some description, probably established monasteries
with libraries, or possibly in forest hermitage settings. They are mostly su-tra
texts and scholastic works, but the monks who wrote the vinayas could also
have read or even written these more androcentric types of texts. The
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, for instance, was definitely known to vinaya compilers
as one of its redactions is found in the Mu-lasarva-stiva-da-vinaya. This Bud-
dhist discourse of female impurity not only reflects the attitudes assumed by
the male ascetic community but also aids in its constitution and continued
viability. In fact, as Sponberg suggests, this type of impurity talk may have
been indispensable for summoning up cognitive boundaries when physical
separation from women was not as absolute as many male ascetics wished
.
(Sponberg 1992: 20). Sanga-disesa IV of the Pa-li-vinaya, which effectively for-
bids monks to use their status to persuade women to have sex with them,
perfectly exemplifies this function. The monk Uda-yin has propositioned a
female donor, suggesting that she provide for him not robes, bowl, lodgings or
medicine, but “what is hard to come by.” When she complies, leading him to
an inner chamber and lying on the bed at the ready, Uda-yin overcomes his
own urges through impurity talk. “Who would touch this foul-smelling
wretch?” he cries and “depart[s] spitting” (Horner 2012–2014: 223).28 But the
rhetoric of female impurity fulfills a social function as well as a psychological
function. It is a language that delineates the goals of male asceticism over and
against the physical presence of women, providing protection for the male
ascetics that is both discursive, and practical. Indeed, the texts cited here,
including the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, can only be described as abominating
the female reproductive body, blood and all, a purity discourse that mirrors a
social sub-environment that rigorously excludes the female other. This is just
as Douglas’s theory predicts.

Female impurity in Vinaya texts for nuns

Brahman legal texts express awe mingled with fear in legislating and theoriz-
ing female impurity. Brahman lawgivers are composters of the potent pollu-
tions associated with female reproductive functions, isolating them, managing
them, folding them back in, and then harvesting the rich fruits they bring.
Buddhist male ascetics, for whom women are not useful, hold the female
168 Amy Paris Langenberg
Other at bay through discursive acts of abomination. But Brahman and celi-
bate male ascetic discourse are not the only modes of conceptualizing female
impurity in ancient Buddhist contexts. Buddhist lawgivers writing rules for
nuns display neither fear nor respect in legislating the female body. This
situation accords with what Douglas’s pollution theory would predict. While
Buddhist monastic law accommodates women, it admits them only into a
peripheral and parallel institution where they do not perform any vital func-
tion for the dominant male community. Thus, in Buddhist bhiks.un.‑ı-vinaya
texts, female blood sits at the midpoint of Douglas’s spectrum from xeno-
phobic to inclusive social groupings. It is neither abominated nor venerated,
but treated neutrally as a thing of practical consequence but no real symbolic
or ritual importance.
All of the sectarian Buddhist vinayas contain some combination of the
following:

1 a rule requiring nuns to wear a menstrual cloth of some type, with

specifications about how this is to be done;
2 a rule forbidding nuns to keep communally owned menstrual cloths
beyond a certain period of time;
3 rules about how these are to be washed; and
4 rules barring women from the community who menstruate either too
much, or not at all.
(Heirman 2002; Horner 2012–2014; Kabilsingh 1988;
Langenberg 2016; Roth 1970; Tsomo 1996)

A pra-yaścittika rule from the Mu-lasarva-stiva-da-vinaya, for instance, says

that “When a nun does not keep a special cloth to conceal her menstrual
flow,” and “attach it with a string” it is an offense requiring expiation
.
(pra-yaścittika 144. Bka’ ’gyur, sde dge par phud, Ta 20.a5). The Maha-sa-nghika-
- ‑
lokottaravada Bhiks.un.ı-vinaya allows nuns to use a cloth shaped like an axle
pin (a-n.icolaka) during their periods in order to avoid staining seats and bed-
ding (Prakı‑rn.aka 15; Roth 1970: 309). The corresponding rule from the Pa-li-
vinaya also uses the term a-n.icolaka (Horner 2012–2014 (2013): vol. V, 374).
Given the immense importance assigned to female effluvia both in Brahman
legal tradition, and in non-legal Buddhist texts, the matter-of-fact tone and
technical specificity with which Buddhist vinaya sources treat the matter of
menstruation invites comment. If the Buddha himself, to whom vinaya texts
are attributed, is being made to advise women on the practical dimensions of
menstrual hygiene in the manner of a middle school health teacher, one
wishes to understand why.
Tibetan translators have rendered the technical term for the special cloth
rajaścod.a worn by Mu-lasarva-stiva-da nuns as sme gab, literally, “a cover for
sorrow.”29 The canonical commentary for the Mu-lasarva-stiva-da rule provides
a fuller context for this requirement, a possible clue about the reasons for the
 Female Impurity and the Female Buddhist Ascetic 169
Tibetan translator’s choice of sme gab, and more information regarding the
intent behind the legislation of menstruation in the vinaya. It reads:

For women, every month blood trickles out due to the degenerative force
of previous karma. Because of this, the lord advised (nuns) to wear a
special cloth (sme gab) for concealing the menstrual flow. At the time he
said to “keep a special cloth” [the Lord knew] it was sure to fall if [a nun]
put it on and walked, so, at the same time he instructed [nuns to] “keep a
special cloth,” he [also] said to “attach it with a string.” Because nobody
stopped her, Sthu-lananda- went out to beg for alms with blood trickling
down onto her calf. Brahmans and householders, seeing her, asked,
“Venerable lady, why is there blood on your calf ?” She answered, “If you
don’t know, ask your mother! Ask your sister! Ask your daughter!” “You
insult all of our homes!” they complained, muttering and recriminating.
At that time, the nuns told the lord, and the lord … established a further
precept: “If nuns don’t keep a special cloth, it is an offense.” Even then,
Sthu-lananda- said, “What is called a ‘special cloth’ (sme gab) is a cover
for the unhappiness of women. What if I don’t wear one?” [The lord
said,] “If you don’t acquire one, ‘it is an offense,’ as stated before.”
(Bka’ ‘gyur, sde dge par phud, Ta 299a7–299b.6)

Here, Sthu-lananda- (“Fat Nanda-”), a feisty and coarse woman who appears
often in the vinaya to exemplify how nuns should not behave, fails to wear her
menstrual cloth when she goes into the town of Śra-vastı‑ to beg alms.30 She is
menstruating, and blood runs freely down her legs, attracting the attention of
Brahmans and householders. When they ask her about the blood, she crassly
suggests they ask their female relatives. Sthu-lananda- creates a public dis-
turbance, forcing the Buddha to issue a precept absolutely requiring all nuns to
keep a menstrual cloth. Even then, rebellious Sthu-lananda- objects, saying that
the cloth merely conceals the sorrow of women, something which she appar-
ently would prefer to put on display. In another text, located in the skandhaka
.
rather than the pra-timoks.a-vibhanga portion of the Mu-lasarva-stiva-da-vinaya,
the rule about the string is repeated. This time the Buddha employs the fuller
and more descriptive phrase, “undergarment for concealing the sorrow of
female genitals” (mo mtshan gyi sme gab) (Bka’ ’gyur, sde dge par phud, Da
153a.7–153b5).
Among other things, this story suggests that avoiding public opprobrium is
one important reason for the legislation of nuns’ menstruation. The medieval
vinaya commentator Gun.aprabha clusters the requirement that nuns wear a
menstrual cloth with several other rules in a way that is instructive. Nuns, he
says, must keep a special garment for concealing the menstrual flow, and tie it
on with a string. They must wash and dye it from time to time. They must
also keep a bathing robe (udakaśat.ika-). They may not have their soiled
clothing washed by a washerman (but must do it themselves). He then iden-
tifies this grouping of rules, suggesting that all pertain to concealing and
170 Amy Paris Langenberg
guarding the bhaga, or female sexual organ (Vinayasu-tra 2.2343–2.2348;
Jyväsjärvi 2011: 603). Gun.aprabha’s mention of a legal category called
“guarded female sexual organs” (guptibhaḥga) suggests that these rules are an
expression of concern about managing the monastic bhaga, which, along with
all of its products and functions, must be concealed, contained, and protected
to the satisfaction of public opinion in order for the monastic community to
function. Any hint that monastic bhagas might be uncontrolled and unguar-
ded makes maintaining harmonious lay/monastic relations more difficult. As
part of this task of rendering innocuous the monastic bhaga, monastic lawgivers
instituted laws for the management of nuns’ menstrual blood.
In her comparative study of a rule from the Pa-li-vinaya and Brahman
household ritual, Ute Hüsken provides further clues for interpreting men-
strual rules in vinaya sources. Pa-cittiya 4731 says that, “When a nun uses the
household cloth without relinquishing it, it is an offense requiring expia-
tion.”32 Hüsken suggests that the “household cloth” is a communally kept
menstrual garment to be used by visiting nuns for three nights and then
washed on the fourth and relinquished to another nun (Hüsken 2001: 86–7).33
This idea of the “household cloth” as such is missing from the Mu-lasarva-sti-
va-da-vinaya, though there is a rule about relinquishing the communally
owned menstrual cloth, in which Sthu-lananda- also stars (Bka’ ’gyur, sde dge
par phud, Ta 299b.6–300a.6). Similarly, the idea of the “household cloth” is
missing from the Maha-sa-nghika-lokottarava-da Bhiks.un.‑ı-vinaya, but there is
.
mention of relinquishing the communally owned menstrual rags buried in a
passage about where and how nuns should wash their menstrual cloths (pra-
kı‑rn.aka 18; Roth 1970: 310). Hüsken proposes that the household cloth is, at
least in the context of the Pa-li rule, a nod to the Brahman practice that
requires the menstruating wife to use a “stained garment” (malavadva-sas) for
three days and wash it on the fourth, signaling to her husband the return of
her sexual availability (Hüsken 2001: 89–90). She further argues that the ori-
ginal function of the household cloth was ceremonial rather than practical,
designed to set the minds of ritually observant lay hosts at ease when poten-
tially menstruating nuns came to stay (Hüsken 2001: 95). The Dharma-
guptaka-vinaya seems to support this interpretation in specifying that a
menstruating nun visiting a lay-donor must inform her host of her status and
ask permission before taking a seat (Heirman and Torck 2012: 29).34
A requirement for nuns’ admission into the order in the Mu-lasarva-stiva-da
tradition is normal menstruation. The Mu-lasarva-stiva-da-vinaya contains two
passages in which the community is forbidden to initiate women who either
menstruate too much, or not at all. The woman who continuously menstru-
ates is forbidden because her lower garment is always soiled and attracts flies.
The woman who has no menstrual blood at all is also forbidden because her
condition encourages her to take on airs and behave arrogantly towards her
elders and betters (Bka’ ’gyur, sde dge par phud, Da 152b.3–153a.2). These
and several other Mu-lasarva-stiva-da-vinaya texts assume a link between ame-
norrhea and spiritual attainment.35 Cessation of menstruation sometimes
 Female Impurity and the Female Buddhist Ascetic 171
corresponds to cessation of desire. An ordinary unenlightened woman who
fails to menstruate is therefore in a position to claim spiritual attainments she
doesn’t possess, or to tease older more accomplished nuns who still menstru-
ate. She is therefore barred from the nuns’ community. Furthermore, either
condition – lack of menstruation or excessive menstruation – would feed the
public perception that monastic bhagas might be abnormal, thereby alienating
monastic women even further then they already are from commonly accepted
lay understandings of female virtue. This, again, might potentially disrupt lay
support for monastic communities.
These vinaya texts deal with menstruation in a practical manner with rela-
tively little in the way of broad theorizing about female impurity, though a
recurrent theme does occur, at least in the Mu-lasarva-stiva-da-vinaya, in which
menstruation is linked to past sin. An elaborate poetics regarding the impur-
ity of the female body is entirely missing from the canonical commentaries.36
The practical procedures prescribed by the monastic law books reflect the
monastic community’s desire to maintain positive and fruitful interactions
with the laity. In particular, Buddhist vinaya laws on menstruation evidence
lawmakers’ sensitivity to the difficult position of female monastics, who must
project womanly virtue, proper decorum, and sexual unavailability when
making their alms rounds among the laity.37
Although Buddhist menstrual law is responsive to the outward structures of
Brahman menstrual law, it fails to adopt core aspects of Brahman theory
about the nature of menstrual blood, namely its dangerousness, its association
with auspicious female traits, its washability, its association with Indra’s sin (not
that of women), and its purifying effect. Buddhist menstrual law is con-
structive for Buddhist communities in that it formalizes menstrual behavior in
a manner designed to harmonize relations between female monastics and lay
patrons. Regularizing menstrual procedures also clarifies and strengthens
relations between the male and female communities because regulating the
behavior of monastic women safeguards male monastic communities, who
might be blamed for nuns’ offenses, from public opprobrium. In vinaya law
female blood is not, however, symbolically important. It is neither respected,
nor abominated. According to Douglas’s view, its relatively unmarked sym-
bolic status reflects the legally controlled and carefully regulated incorpora-
tion of women, not into the heart of male monastic society, but into its
margins. The attitude they display towards female impurity indicates that
monastic lawgivers regarded monastic women’s presence as adequately cir-
cumscribed, their social significance as modest. Monastic women required, in
short, no special additional management via “blood taboos.”

Neither auspicious nor inauspicious and unconcerned with ritual purity

To summarize, the Buddhist birth discourse found in the Garbha-vakra-nti-
su-tra and elsewhere in South Asian Buddhist textual traditions establishes
female persons to be deeply impure by virtue of their primal role in the
172 Amy Paris Langenberg
processes of sam -
. sara. This is an overarching theme that has been noted by a
number of Buddhism scholars interested in gender. As the above analysis
indicates, at least three approaches to female impurity are pertinent to the
ancient Indian Buddhist community. Vedic-Hindus regarded the impurity of
women ambivalently as both dangerous and powerful, reflecting a social
context in which women were taken into the very heart of male elite society.
For instance, high-caste householders depended on their wives to produce
sons, maintain the purity of the household, and assist in certain ritual obser-
vances, all vital and central concerns. As Douglas’s theory predicts, Brahman
pollution belief and practice, in which menstrual blood simultaneously puri-
fies and pollutes, composts rather than shuns female dirt. The Brahman con-
text also resembles Douglas’s description of societies in which male
superiority is potentially undercut by female power. The highly articulated
pollution ideology and elaborate ritual practices that characterize Brahman
religious life serve to ride herd on women, whose female substances and
processes are simultaneously feared and valued.
The abomination of the female body found in the literature of male asceti-
cism represent the antithesis of the “composting religion” practiced by Brah-
mans. In certain Maha-ya-na texts in particular, many of which advocate
renewed ascetic discipline and austere forest-dwelling, the female sexual and
reproductive body is abominated and treated not as a source of life but as a
thing that leads only to death and disorder. Such texts reflect an elite ascetic
environment in which male celibacy is rigorously defended on every level. In
this environment, women are regarded as a threat to the highest spiritual
aspirations of the community. Here, Douglas’s theory predicts a strong ten-
dency to police the no man’s land between male asceticism and the demonic
female through an intense and unambivalent rhetoric of female pollution. The
doctrine of the foul blood and excrement-filled womb, source of all human
impurity, provides the arsenal.
Buddhist vinaya texts for nuns, on the other hand, reflect the social context
of mainstream monasticism in which women are admitted into the larger
group but are not considered necessary to the functioning of that group. They are
kept carefully separated from elite males in a parallel and legally subordinate sub-
institution. Although superior male authority is undisputed in Buddhist
monastic contexts, male control of women is neither as relentless, personally
overbearing, nor physically encroaching as it would be in a Brahman house-
hold as women are always kept at arm’s length, giving rise to fewer daily disputes
and less need for intricate pollution practices as a tool of social negotiation.
According to Douglas’s theories, such a situation should result in minimal con-
cern about menstrual pollution since no daily conflict between male privilege
and female access to power exists. Indeed, such is the case. Female impurity is
not regarded with ambivalent awe as fertility is neither coveted nor admired by
monastic legislators. In vinaya texts for nuns, menstrual blood is matter-of-
factly acknowledged and duly regulated by rules that are designed to manage
 Female Impurity and the Female Buddhist Ascetic 173
public relations; it is treated neither as a cosmic abomination, nor as a sacred
mediating symbol.
Throughout this study, I have used the term “Buddhist birth discourse” to
refer to a complex mentality that pervades Buddhist discussions of childbirth.
This mentality encompasses the metaphor “suffering is birth” (Chapter 1), the
conviction that birth is nonetheless an opportunity for karmic advancement
(Chapter 2), a cultivated aesthetic of disgust for the abject maternal body
(Chapter 3), the assertion that birth is not auspicious (Chapter 4), and a cer-
tain ambivalence regarding monastic participation in rites of fertility and
child protection (Chapter 5). The indelible impurity of the female body is also
a central component of the middle period Indian Buddhist discourse of birth.
Although ideas about the karmic stickiness and disgusting impurity of the
female condition may have had the effect of making Buddhist monastic
women feel bad about themselves, such ideas were also constitutive of what it
meant to be female, and how femaleness was to be distinguished from male-
ness, in middle period Indian Buddhism. It is important to remember that
defining what a woman is, good or bad, and how she is different from a man,
was a prerequisite for the project of propagating female monastic institutions.
At the end of chapter two, and here again in a more Foucauldian idiom, I
contend that, ironically, this Buddhist method of fencing femaleness round or
“disciplining” it (in the broad Foucauldian, not specific vinaya sense) may
simultaneously have made women more eligible to be members of a monastic
community in ancient India. Just as Victorian ideas about sexuality deemed
the homosexual to be a degenerate, Indian Buddhist ideas about birth deemed
women to be impure and morally/cosmically less than men. Without Victor-
ian heteronormativity there would be no “homosexual” as such, only men
who have sex with other men. Similarly, without the Buddhist discourse of
birth, there would be no bona fide Buddhist females to occupy nunneries, just
amorphous crowds of beings with breasts and vaginas. Womanhood, which is
not conceptualized in terms of sexuality and fertility within monasticism as it
is in, for instance, Brahman legal texts, could not be left undefined. Mon-
asticism is, after all, an institution partly organized along gender lines. Buddhist
birth discourse offers karmic status and inherent impurity as an over-arching
defining rule of femaleness. The Buddhist discourse of birth can be regarded
as constituting the ideological grounds of what Foucault refers to as a “tech-
nology of power,” a series of beliefs and practices operating within Buddhist
communities by which female ascetic persons, acknowledged to be capable of
spiritual achievement, are objectivized as different from male ascetic persons
and thereby made visible as a group requiring its own community (Foucault
1988: 18).
Foucault’s distinction between “technologies of power” and “technologies
of the self” are useful concepts for further parsing the relationship between
the Buddhist birth discourse and nuns’ experience within monastic contexts.
Foucault articulated two modalities of discipline − one operating on the
individual from without, the other operating within the individual. He called
174 Amy Paris Langenberg
these two “technologies of power” and “technologies of the self” respectively.
“Technologies of power” are methods that “objectivize” the subject, submit-
ting him to “certain ends or domination” (Foucault 1988: 18). “Technologies
of the self” “permit individuals to effect by their own means or with the help
of others a certain number of operations on their own bodies and souls,
thoughts, conduct, and way of being, so as to transform themselves in order
to attain a certain state of happiness, purity, wisdom, perfection, or immor-
tality” (Foucault 1988: 18). Occupying the discursive arenas of monastic dis-
cipline and Buddhist soteriology, nuns were subjected to certain forms of
discipline (again in the broad Foucauldian sense, not just the narrow vinaya
sense) from without, but they also would have engaged in various forms of
ethical self-cultivation, what we might indigenously term “yogas.” In other
words, Buddhist nuns would have been disciplined through senior teachers
and administrators to cooperate with certain ordained rules of behavior and
certain authoritative understandings of the Buddhist path, but they must also
have been self-discipliners, interpreting and internalizing the same in order to
shape their own “ethical substance” (Foucault 1985: 26).
As we have seen, middle period Buddhist monasticism excluded auspi-
ciousness from its general formulations of womanhood, even the special
womanhood of Maha-ma-ya-, and limited the relevance of impurity in the
interior of the nuns’ community. A Buddhist aesthetic of disgust undermined
the close South Asian association between the ripe and sexualized female
form and beauty. These subtle but hugely significant shifts in how femaleness
was interpreted and managed in Buddhist ascetic contexts made it more
likely, I propose, that monastic women might transform what Foucault calls their
“ethical substance” or, as Butler would have it, “perform” their gender differently
than householder women. In the absence of auspiciousness/inauspiciousness
and purity/impurity (both bulky concepts), and in an aesthetic system in
which even young fertile women were inherently disgusting and not beautiful,
a capacious new moral and psychological space opened up for monastic
women. This is a space defined neither by cyclical purity nor by auspicious-
ness, nor by sexual desirability. In this space, monastic women had the
opportunity to engage in other alternative “technologies of the [female] self,”
both in obedience to and in conversation with Buddhist discipline and Bud-
dhist doctrines. Some trace of an emergent critical judgment, a genealogical
critique that, according to Foucault, enables a group of people to occasionally
“go in an entirely different direction,” (Scott 2007: 29) is tangibly present in
Sthu-lananda’s question: “What is called a ‘special cloth’ (sme gab) is a cover
for the unhappiness of women. What if I don’t wear one?”
The exact nature of female Buddhist monastic self-technologies and how
they might have been different from the monastic technologies of monks is
not fully known, but has begun to be studied in greater depth by vinaya
scholars,38 students of the Therı‑ga-tha- and its commentary,39 and scholars
interested in other texts about ancient Buddhist nuns.40 A comprehensive
analysis of the ancient nuns’ “technologies of the self” are beyond the scope
 Female Impurity and the Female Buddhist Ascetic 175
of the present study, but the relatively light menstrual regulations for nuns
discussed above would be one aspect of their specifically female Buddhist
monastic self-disciplining, as would the rules relating to nurturing monastic
children studied by Shayne Clarke (2014: 120–149), and the desexualized
daily toilette noted by Ali. Certainly, their alternative disciplines were
informed by understandings of happiness, wisdom, and perfection that were
significantly different from those of ordinary women (and also those of mon-
astic men). In particular, the dropping of auspiciousness, beauty, and cyclical
purity as important values in the Buddhist nunnery would have had great
significance and profound implications for ancient women, trained their
whole lives for certain types of wifehood and motherhood.
According to my analysis, Buddhist monasticism, the institutional bearer of
the classical Buddhist discourse of birth, constituted a rare opportunity for
ancient women, the chance to live a life of at least partial independence
from what the feminist anthropologist Gayle Rubin has referred to as the
“traffic in women.” The letting go of feminine beauty ideals, the shedding
of auspiciousness as a coveted value, and the disregard of cyclical menstrual
impurity would have been fundamental to their social and psychological
freedom as monastic women, however incomplete that liberty might have
been. In a celebrated text from the Sam -
. yukta-agama (also found in the
- -
Sam . yutta-nikaya), the realized nun Soma declares that “[Once] the mind
has entered a [concentrative] attainment, what has a female appearance to
do with that?” (SN i.129; Ana-layo 2014b: 122). The idea that ancient Bud-
dhist nuns like Soma- were in some sense critics of the mainstream gender
norms of their times, radical female individuals who did not understand
themselves in terms of beauty, auspiciousness, and cyclical impurity, allows
for an interpretation of this and other similar texts that need not assert gender
equality as a core principle in classical Buddhist teachings.41

Notes
1 Sections of this chapter were originally published in the Journal of the American
Academy of Religion, vol. 84/1, © 2016 by Oxford University Press.
2 In Sponberg’s estimation, the emergence of Tantric schools of thought that tie
liberative gnosis to the integration of male and female, a vision of freedom he dubs
“soteriological androgyny,” represents a reaffirmation of the “noble aspirations” of
Buddhism to allow a place for women (Sponberg 1992: 28).
3 For one of the few devoted studies on this topic, see Tambiah (1985). Tambiah
comments on the subversion and mocking of Brahman notions of purity on pp. 95–96.
Obeyesekere (1973) is also helpful with respect to South Asian Buddhist views of
female impurity. For more general treatments see Faure (2003: 66–73); L. Wilson
(1996: 41–57); Young (2004: 179–189).
4 In his compendium of Buddhist terms taken over from Brahmanical sources, K. R.
Norman notes that “in brahmanism, śuddhi refers primarily to a ritual condition.
The Buddha made purity a strictly moral concept. The aim was purity of
thought” (Norman 2012: 198).
176 Amy Paris Langenberg
5 Dhammapada 165. Carter and Pa-lihawadana (2000: 31) quoted in Gutschow
(2004: 200).
6 The image of a wound is an important Buddhist metaphor for the body found in
Vasubandhu’s Abhidharmakośabha-s.ya, the Milindapañha, and the Visuddhimagga
(Kritzer 2014: 23).
7 The Buddha’s assertion that women can indeed achieve all four fruits of the mon-
astic life (stream-winning, once-returning, non-returning, and arhatship) can be
found in the story of the founding of the nuns’ order at An.guttara-nika-ya 4.277
and in the Chinese translation of Madhyama-a-gama 116 and in the Cullavagga
(Horner 2012–2014: vol. V, 352–356).
8 In an essay published two years after Purity and Danger entitled “Couvade and
Menstruation,” Douglas again addresses the topic of female blood taboos, restat-
ing that they are frequently deployed to manipulate interpersonal relationships and
arguing that, when displayed in public rituals, they can be read as statements about
normative social structure, especially the relationship between men and women
(Douglas 1975: 61).
9 My reading of Douglas has been greatly influenced by Bagger’s application of
Douglas’s theories to the religious uses of paradox in his monograph The Uses of
Paradox: Religion, Self-Transformation, and the Absurd. For an exceptionally clear
discussion of “Self-evidence” in relationship to varieties of mystical practice, see
Bagger (2007: 40–47).
10 This well-known story appears in the Taittirı‑ya-sam -
. hita and is retold in various
texts including the Maha-bha-rata and the Bha-gavata-pura-n.a.
11 The Buddhist Pa-li discourses know of this exchange, but present the women’s
.
choice as spiritually damning. See Anguttara-nika-ya 2.6.10. “Monks, womenfolk
end their life unsated and unreplete with two things. What two? Sexual intercourse
and child-birth. These are the two things” (Woodward 1979: 72).
12 Olivelle’s editions of the Ma-nava-dharmaśa-stra, and the dharmasu-tras are my primary
sources for this section.
13 Vasis.t.ha Dharmasu-tra 5.6–10. Olivelle loosely dates Vasis.t.ha to the 200-year
period between 100 B.C.E. and 100 C.E. Olivelle (2003: 4–10, 375).
14 Vasis.t.ha 5.5, 28.4. Olivelle (2003: 374–375, 456–457).
15 According to Ute Hüsken, the Vaikha-nagr.hyasu-tra and the Baudha-yanagr.hyasu-tra
(1.722–35) give the most detailed information about menstrual practices, but the
-
Apastambagr.hyasu-tra, the Hiran.yakeśigr.hyasu-tra, and the Vasis.t.hadharmasu-tra also
list some observances for menstruating women (Hüsken 2001: 91).
16 Of the dharmasu-tra authors, only Vasis.t.ha includes any detailed instructions for
menstruating women. Vasis.t.ha 5.6–7.
17 Baudha-yana 2.4.4. Vasis.t.ha 5.5, 28.4. Manu 5.108.
18 Vasis.t.ha 28.8. Baudha-yana 1.9.2.
19 Vasis.t.ha 28.6. Baudha-yana 2.4.5.
20 The original is: medhya- sarvataḥ. Medhya also means “fit for sacrifice.” Vasis.t.ha 28.9.
21 The longer Sukha-vativyu-ha, while not specifically describing Amita-bha’s realm as
free of women, records the great bodhisattva’s vow that, upon reaching enlight-
enment, any women who hear his name will “despise their female nature,” and not
assume another female body (Cowell 1969: 19). The Lotus-su-tra also endorses this
view (Hurvitz 2009: 146, 269).
22 Compare Śa-ntideva’s Bodhicarya-vata-ra 8.60: “Is it that you do not like a dirty
worm born in filth because it’s only tiny? It must be that you desire a body, likewise
born in filth, because it is formed from such a large amount!” (Śa-ntideva 1996: 93).
23 Although his discussion details physical filth, moral filthiness is also implied, and
Candrakı‑rti draws no significant distinction between the two, as is typical of clas-
sical Buddhist ethical thought. As recent work on somatized conceptions of virtue
in Indian Buddhism (what Susanne Mrozik has called “physio-morality”) has
 Female Impurity and the Female Buddhist Ascetic 177
illustrated, Candrakı‑rti’s close linking of physical features and moral status is
traditional (Mrozik 2007; Powers 2009b).
24 Udayanavatsara-ja-paripr.ccha-.
25 See also Paul (1985: 25–59).
26 See MN i.265–266.
27 My translations with reference to Kritzer’s.
28 According to Shayne Clarke, Uda-yin, a member of the group-of-six (a cohort of
problematic monks whose antics are often narrated and then legislated against in
the vinayas), is the “archetypical lecherous monk whose actions bring about most
of the ecclesiastical rules relating to sexual matters” (Clarke 2014: 106).
29 A passage from Gun.aprabha’s Vinayasu-tra, an important vinaya digest from the
Mu-lasarva-stiva-da tradition, gives us the Sanskrit term, which means “that which
conceals the menstrual flow.” Vinayasu-tra 2.2343.
30 See Ohnuma (2013) and Schopen (2007, 2008, 2009, 2010) for further examples
and analysis of Sthu-lananda-’s transgressions.
31 A pa-cittiya is a minor type of offense requiring just expiation. The Mu-lasarva-stiva-da
rule discussed above, pra-yaścittika 144, is from the same class of rules.
Avasathacı‑vara is the Pa-li term translated here as “household cloth.” For similar
-
32
rules in vinaya traditions not mentioned here, see Tsomo (1996: 115); Kabilsingh
(1988: 314).
33 In the commentary of this rule it is Thullananda- (Sanskrit: Sthu-lananda-) who
annoys her fellow nuns when she fails to relinquish the communally owned
“household cloth” after the prescribed three days. Vin. iv.303.20–25. Horner
(2012–2014: vol. III, 198).
34 T.1428, p.732a29-b6. Cited at Heirman and Torck (2012: 53 n. 12). The Brahman
“stained cloth” signals sexual unavailability of the wife. The presence of the
household cloth, guarding monastic bhagas, as it were, might have similarly signal
nuns’ sexual unavailability in a public setting. Certain types of women were sexu-
ally unavailable in ancient India. One category of sexually unavailable women
comprised those “guarded” (raks.ita-, gupta-) by another man, whether father, hus-
band, or son. According to traditions like the Ka-masu-tra, female ascetics were to
be categorized with sexually available women. Sanskrit dramas also portray female
ascetics as morally suspect (Jyväsjärvi 2011). Though the many vinaya prescrip-
tions that place the nuns community under the guardianship and control of the
monk’s community indicate that Buddhist monks regarded themselves, however
unwillingly, as guardians of monastic women, it is likely that many in the ancient
context thought of Buddhist nuns as “unguarded,” or at least as insufficiently
guarded. If a nun could be provided the legal standing of a menstruating woman,
however, her sexual unavailability would be significantly bolstered. In fact, as
Hüsken points out, many of the scripted behaviors of nuns resemble those of
menstruating householder women (Hüsken 2001: 95–96). They are not permitted
to spin thread, go to the forest, sleep in the daytime, run, or busy themselves with
household affairs. They do not make fires or cook for men, and they do not eat
throughout the day. They do not comb or braid their hair, anoint themselves, or
bathe outside of the prescribed times. They do not serve water or fan their men-
folk, or sit together with them in intimate settings. Creating the vague, perhaps
unconsciously recognized, outward impression of potential menstrual impurity,
and guarding the monastic bhaga with a Buddhist version of a Brahman wife’s
“stained cloth,” may have been helpful in protecting these socially marginal
women against the real possibility of sexual assault.
35 “In Śra-vastı‑, because of not being without passion, as a result of past bad actions,
from time to time nuns bled from their genitals” (Bka’ ’gyur, sde dge par phud, Da
153a.7). “Not being free of all passion, the nuns sometimes bled” (Bka’ ’gyur, sde
178 Amy Paris Langenberg
dge par phud, Ta 299a7). “For women, because of degenerate past karma, every
month blood trickles out” (Bka’ ’gyur, sde dge par phud, Ta 299.a7–299b.1).
36 One redaction of the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra is, of course, located in the Ks.udrakavastu
section of the MSV. It is an interpolation and was not integrated in any mean-
ingful way into the legal sections of the MSV. The marked difference between its
treatment of the female body, and legal prescriptions regarding menstruation are
itself evidence of this.
37 I make a fuller argument that Buddhist lawmakers’ were responsive to common
and widely accepted Brahman-inflected mores for female behavior in their attempts
to carve out a viable social position for Buddhist nuns in Langenberg (2013a). In
their study of bodily care in Indian and Chinese monastic texts, Heirman and
Torck draw attention to an example from the Mu-lasarva-stiva-da-vinaya in which an
even more obvious effort is made to accommodate the rigorous purity concerns of
Brahmans. In this story, a Brahman makes the decision to join the monastic order
after watching Śa-riputra undertake an extensive cleansing ritual upon relieving
himself in the toilet. This ritual involves the use of meticulously counted lumps of
earth and carefully poured water in a planned sequence of actions. Upon hearing
about this occurrence, the Buddha is said to “praise the limitless importance of
purity in monastic discipline” (Heirman and Torck 2012: 72–73).
38 Relevant works include (but are not limited to) Clarke (2014); Finnegan (2009);
Heirman (2008); Hüsken (1997); Hüsken (2001); Jyväsjärvi (2011); Langenberg
(2013a, 2013b); Schopen (1997, 2004, 2008, 2009).
39 Including (but not limited to) Blackstone (1998); Collett (2014b); Hallisey (2015);
Norman (1971); Pruitt (1998).
40 Including (but not limited to) Ana-layo (2011a, 2011b, 2014a, 2014b); Muldoon-Hules
(2014); Skilling (2001a); Walters (2014).
41 Kevin Trainor proposes a different analysis of Soma-’s statement which he suggests
is an example of the “normative Therava-da tradition” moving “beyond the rele-
vance of categories of gender to a universalized perception of the composite and
transient nature of all phenomena” (Trainor 1993: 71). Here, Trainor does not
claim gender equality to be a value of the early community, but he side-steps the
issue of gender by suggesting that the “normative” tradition somehow transcends
issues of gender through its critique of the body and of phenomenal existence.
Postpartum

Birth (ja-ti ), along with sickness, old age, and death, define human suffering,
which itself constitutes the most basic truth of human experience in classical
Indian Buddhism. The Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra is devoted to a phenomen-
ological account of the rebirth process. Despite (or because of) its quasi-
medical content, this text epitomizes a Buddhist truth: human suffering is
linked in its very structure and logic to the fact of birth, and to be liberated is
to go utterly beyond birth. Although the Indian Buddhist tradition enumer-
ates various modes and species of birth, the one it holds to be most pertinent
to our human situation is sexual conception via the vulva of, 38 weeks of
gestation within the womb of, and painful emergence from the vagina of an
ordinary human mother. A major premise of this book is that conceptualizing
existential suffering in terms of birth, and spiritual liberation against birth,
impacts how femaleness and maleness are negotiated in Indian Buddhist
texts, and, in all likelihood, how gender was performed in actual middle
period Buddhist communities.
Although classical Indian Buddhism upholds gender as a basic organizing
principle, it hollows out formations of maleness and femaleness and rebuilds
them from the inside. Among other things, the relationship between auspi-
ciousness, purity, and beauty − three powerfully meaningful ritual and aes-
thetic principles in ancient South Asia − and femininity is different in
Buddhist monasticism than in, for instance, certain Vedic-Hindu or court lit-
erary contexts. In Indian Buddhist accounts of birth such as the Garbha--
vakra-nti-su-tra and the birth section of the Buddha’s hagiographies such as the
.
Sanghabhedavastu and Lalitavistara, reproductive women, including Ma-ya-
Devı‑ herself, are not auspicious. Logical links between non-virtuous action
and the female body drawn in avada-na and ja-taka literature mark women as
indelibly impure, over and above the cyclical or situational impurity asso-
ciated with menstruation and childbirth in ancient South Asia. A Buddhist
poetry of disgust transforms the beautiful sexualized and fertile female form
into something ugly and repugnant. This Buddhist rhetoric of birth, and the
gender concepts it supports, made a difference for ancient monastic men and
women of the middle period. Monastic men, already celibate, had to work all
the harder to maintain a state of moral aloofness from sexual reproduction
180 Amy Paris Langenberg
since their specialized knowledge, acquired through sophisticated Buddhist
knowledge traditions such as the Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra, made them birth
experts. They became masters of that which they sought to avoid. For their
part, monastic women were potentially relieved of the heavy burden of aus-
piciousness but handed a life-long rather than a periodic impurity. Their
female bodies were no longer measured along a gradient of aesthetic pleasure.
Such interpretive shifts allowed for new self-understandings and new perfor-
mances of their female gender that aided women in their efforts to create a
female-gendered space within monastic Buddhism. The evidence for ancient
Indian monastic women talking back to the tradition, creating positive space
out of the seeming negativities of “not beautiful,” “not pure,” and “not auspi-
cious” is not explored in any depth here, although several other works of scho-
larship have begun to tell that story, each according to its own lights
(including, but not limited to Blackstone 1998; Collett 2016; Finnegan 2009;
Langenberg 2013a; Langenberg 2014).
In a manifesto arguing the centrality of critique to the project of writing
history, the historian Joan Scott explains that history as critique “is not a
question of judging whether the actions of men and women in the past were
good or bad from some contemporary ethical perspective,” but rather “asking
what the sources of those values are, how they have come into being, what
relationships they have constituted, what power they have secured … the
attempt is to make visible the premises upon which the organizing categories
of our identities (personal, social, national) are based and to give them a his-
tory” (Scott 2007: 34–35). Scott calls up Foucault as an exemplary practi-
tioner of the type of history writing she valorizes. As a fundamental feature of
his history writing, Foucault critiques the humanistic assumption that the self
is autonomous, willful, ahistorical, universal, and marked by reason, theoriz-
ing in its place a subjective agency that is generated discursively and in rela-
tionship to power in a historically specific manner. He gives personhood itself
a history. History as critique does not regard the goal of history writing to be
the accurate recovery of a truth lost to the past. According to Foucault,
“what we have to do is not recover our lost identity, or liberate our
imprisoned nature, or find out the fundamental truth of ourselves; but go in
an entirely different direction … We have to produce something that doesn’t
yet exist and of which we can have no idea what it will be” (quoted in Scott
2007: 29).
A radical critique of subjectivity is enshrined in the heart of Buddhist phi-
losophy as the famous Buddhist doctrine of ana-tman (“no-self”). This critique
of the self becomes an orthodoxy in Indian Buddhism, with conservative,
stabilizing regulatory norms built up around it. The Buddhist doctrine of
no-self raises a fundamental question about the nature of human experience
for elite Buddhist practitioners, but other logically related and equally desta-
bilizing critiques of constructed identity tend not to be undertaken in classical
Buddhist contexts. Illogically, but strategically, socially risky questions about
gender are often tabled. Despite the doctrine of ana-tman (“no-self”), sorting
 Postpartum 181
people as male, female, or indeterminate is still deemed useful and necessary
in su-tra and vinaya texts. Social hierarchies are upheld and even correlated
with states of virtue, especially in Buddhist narratives known as avada-na
and ja-taka. This does not mean, however, that new wine is not poured into
the old flask of gender in classical Indian Buddhism. Indirectly, its strategic
deployment of a discourse on birth through argumentation, imagery, meta-
phor, and storytelling does entail a “radical” interpretation of femaleness,
even if the importance of binary gender as a fundamental principle is upheld.
Here, I argue that this interpretation may well have given ancient women a
critical lever with which to pry up the edges of and peer beneath some orga-
nizing epistemes of their world, to gain something like a critical distance from
the social norms that would have been important to their self-understanding
and to their society’s understanding of them as women. I refer, in particular,
to notions of periodic blood impurity, female beauty, and auspiciousness. In
their place, ancient Buddhist women received information about the inferior
karmic status of women, the great cosmic suffering and impurity originating
in their female bodies, the inherently disgusting nature of human reproduc-
tion, and the innate purity of every human mind. Such formulations are
simultaneously cause for an ambivalent evaluation of the female embodiment
and a profound opportunity to think and act differently with respect to fem-
ininity. Women who took them up might be said to have experienced a sort of
liberation – not necessarily in the Buddhist soteriological sense, and not in the
20th-century feminist sense, but in a sense unique and particular to female
Indian Buddhist monasticism of the middle period.
The notion of history-writing as “asking what the sources of [our] values
are, how they have come into being, what relationships they have constituted,
what power they have secured” that Scott develops in conversation with
Adorno, Foucault, Marx, Derrida, and others is centered in the intellectual
traditions and concerns of modern Europe and America. When it comes to a
historical project that takes premodern Asia as its subject, the situation is some-
what more complex. This genealogical project concerns a cultural history that
is not the precursor of the intellectual tradition authorizing its history writing
and philological methodology. In my history writing, I am not making “visi-
ble the premises upon which the organizing categories of our identities (per-
sonal, social, national) are based” but taking a look at the organizing
categories of another rather distant human consortium. This project has
therefore involved a multiplicity of tasks of the type enumerated in Pollock’s
theorization of “future philology.” The texts themselves had to be under-
stood, to the greatest extent possible, on their own terms, but the hermeneu-
tical categories applied also had to be, to the greatest extent possible,
explicitly acknowledged. In other words, the “textual meaning,” the “con-
textual meaning,” and the “philologist’s meaning” have all been in play. As
Pollock notes, when the philologist’s meaning is made explicit − when the
Indian past is not viewed as a dead object splayed, pinned, and available to
direct observation, but as something that can only be learned reflexively by
182 Amy Paris Langenberg
engaging our own intellectual values − a productive conversation ensues
between the premodern and the contemporary.
This study of the Buddhist discourse of birth amounts to a genealogy of
gender in middle period Indian Buddhism, but is not a social history in any
positivist sense. The Buddhist discourse of birth and the linked formulations
of gender are read here mainly as potentialities and possibilities, ways of
being offered in Buddhist texts that Buddhists would have manifested in their
lives in a variety of ways. Ultimately, the ancient Buddhist theorizations of
gender explored here are important not because they fill out blank spots in
our history-writing or correct untruths but because of the sharp and powerful
lever such sophisticated thinking provides for critically evaluating gendered
thinking (and acting) in general. Since Elizabeth Cady Stanton, feminists have
regarded religion as a main-stage of gender construction, an alluring spectacle
and stern classroom in which people in society have received and heeded
powerful messages about what makes a person a man, a woman, or neither.
“Gender” has long since been accepted as a mainstream and valued theore-
tical approach in many Religious Studies sub-fields. Buddhist Studies has lagged
somewhat in engaging the category of gender in careful ways, but is now
improving its own contributions in this area. The massive textual corpus of
classical Indian Buddhism, whose knowledge traditions have influenced vast
swaths of Asia, provides a sophisticated (and civilizationally important) set of
materials for apprehending gender in all its historical variability. This is
impossible, however, if, ignoring the crucial importance of the “philologist’s
meaning,” gender scholars employ liberal feminist goals and concepts uncri-
tically, thereby blocking access to contextual meanings and erasing themselves
in a way that is detrimental to the reflexive project of writing history.
Classical Indian Buddhists did not deny the relevance of gender identity,
whatever philosophical resources may have been present in their tradition for
doing so. They did, however, participate in a modification of gender’s con-
tents. It was a case, I have submitted, of new wine poured into the old flask.
At the risk of belaboring the metaphor, whether the wine was sweet, or the
flask capacious, is not as germane for scholarship on gender and Buddhism as
the processual details of how the wine and flask were made, how the wine
poured. The discourse of birth was constitutive of various gendered sub-
jectivities within Indian Buddhist contexts. The centrality of the birth trope
sets Indian Buddhist gender constructions apart from those more typically
analyzed by contemporary gender theorists. In ancient Buddhist India, het-
erosexuality alone does not undergird, as Judith Butler puts it, “the very
thinking of what is possible in gendered life” (Butler 1999: viii), nor is it, as
Catherine MacKinnon has it, “the primary process of the subjection of
women” (quoted in Scott 1986: 1058). Rather, classical Buddhist femininity
and masculinity depend at least in part on conceptualizations of the human
birth process, which itself metaphorically structures Buddhist understanding
of spiritual freedom in a basic way. Because of this difference, the Indian
Buddhist example provides a rare opportunity for generating less
 Postpartum 183
anachronistic and parochial understandings of the processes of gender. The
making of gender is an ancient art and remains a central preoccupation of
human culture today. Penetrating the mysteries of gender in all its local
manifestations past and present holds out the promise of fermenting future
meads more pleasurable and liberating than what is currently on offer.
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Index
Abhidharmakośabha-s.ya 20, 36, 43, 46–7,
49, 52.n7, 71.n4, 164
Abhidharma-maha-vibha-s.a- 144–5
abhidharma texts: birth in 32, 36,
47; female bodies in 164;
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra’s influence
on 43
Abhinavagupta 83, 85–6, 93.n30
Abhirati 164
abjected mother 76–7, 80–1, 89–90, 96,
126, 173
abjection, and disgust 80
Acariyabbhuta-sutta 127.n6
Aditi 140, 150.n18
aesthetic power 76, 78
aesthetics, use of term 75
ageing-and-death 33
Aggañña-sutta 22.n9, 165
aggregates 4–5, 32, 53.n25, 54.n39
-
Anandavardhana 83, 85
ana-tman 45, 180
androcentrism 2, 68–9, 74.n24, 154, 162
.
Angulima-la 136, 149.n6
Aniruddha 136, 142–3, 146, 148.n4,
151.n24, 152.n35
anomalies 159
antara-bhava 20, 38, 43, 46–7, 49,
55.nn42,45
Appleton, Naomi 57–8
arhatship 74, 152.n38, 158
ascetics: female 6, 8–9, 14, 21 (see also
nuns); male 9, 161, 163, 167, 172; use
of term 22.n10; see also monastic
Buddhism
Aśoka 133
aśubhabha-vana- 76
Aśvaghos.a 77, 82–3, 85–8, 91.n12,
92.n25
auspicious ascetics 134, 137
auspiciousness: and Buddha’s birth
113–14; Buddhist understandings of
106, 111, 125–6, 147; Hindu visual
expression of 116; ornamentation as
82; South Asian concept of 94–6,
106–8, 110, 112–13
avada-na: birth narrative in 58; and
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra 56–7, 62, 69;
social status and virtue in 181
a-vasthika interpretation 44, 54.n34
-
Ayurvedic texts 53.n27, 62, 66, 69, 72.n14
- -
Ayya Tatha-loka- 23.n17
Bagger, Matthew 159, 161, 176.n9
Baudha-yana 162–3
Bautze-Picron, Claudine 116–17, 120–1
bhadra 94, 108
Bha-rhut 117, 119–21
bhikkhunı‑ see nuns
bı‑bhatsa rasa 83–5, 87, 89–90
birth: in Buddhist canonical discourses
see Buddhist discourse of birth; four
types of 32, 36, 166; history of 3–5; as
inauspicious 96; nonvaginal 104;
repeated 58 (see also rebirth);
undesirability of 38
birth canal, journey along 39, 62–3, 67,
104; see also vagina
birth defects 61–2
birth impurity 128, 158
birth metaphor 3, 28–31, 50–1
birth narratives: Buddhist 144; of
enlightened beings 36–7, 71.n4, 95–6,
116; moral knowledge in 64–5
birth process: and dependent arising 32,
34–5; Manobhu-mi description of 43;
spiritual and moral functions of 62;
sub-metaphors of 45; as suffering 37,
41, 47

Bloch, Maurice 96, 122–4, 126,
131–2.n56
blood, female 158–61, 165, 168, 171; see
also menstrual blood
blood taboos 163, 171
Blue Beryl 25.n29, 41
Bodhisattva: death of mother 102, 105–6,
128.n12, 130.n37; as fetus 22.n8,
100–3, 114–15, 125, 128.n15; gender
of 71.n7; in ja-taka 57–8; sexual
conception of 131.n49; special birth of
36–7, 97–9, 104–5, 112–16; surveyings
of 99, 127–8.n10; see also the Buddha
Bodhisattva path 71.n3
bodily fluids 41, 97, 159
Brahma- 30, 129.n35, 140
Brahmanism: creation as birth in 30;
female impurity in 158, 161–3, 171–2
Brahman priests 79, 108, 111, 130.n38
breastfeeding 39
the Buddha: attitude to women 23.n17,
74.n24, 154, 176.n7; on auspiciousness
106; conception and birth narratives
5, 36–7, 50, 63, 96–7 (see also
Bodhisattva); depiction of birth 104,
121; and Ha-rı‑tı‑ 134–5; previous lives
as woman 71.n7; and Suja-ta- 139–41;
as virile 137–8
Buddhacarita 91, 131.n49, 150.n16
Buddhaghosa: on birth 4–5, 26; on
bodily foulness 75–6; and Brahman
tradition 139; on rebirth 46, 54.n37,
54–5.n40
Buddhism: feminist interpretations of
13–14; humanistically and
philologically trained scholars of 23–4.
n19; world before 71.n2; see also
Indian Buddhism; Maha-ya-na Bud-
dhism; South Asian Buddhism; Ther-
ava-da Buddhism; Tibetan Buddhism
Buddhist discourse of birth 21, 31–5,
173; and auspiciousness 96, 116, 124–5;
disgust trope in 77; early influences on
17–18; and female asceticism 8, 153–4;
and fertility rituals 133–4, 148; in
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra 20, 27–8, 49–50;
and gender 6, 12, 20, 59–60, 171–2,
179, 182; narratives in 64–5
“Buddhist feminism” 1–2, 14–17,
74.n26
Buddhist laywomen 126, 141, 150.n14
Buddhist master metaphor 33, 50, 56,
153; see also “suffering is birth”
Index 205
Buddhist monasticism see monastic
Buddhism
Buddhist monastic women see nuns
Buddhist monuments 116–19
Buddhist scriptures: birth in 4–6, 8, 11,
96; disgust in 76, 78–9, 87; gender in
13, 15, 17; in Sanskrit 78
Buddhist Studies 14–15, 182
Butler, Judith 12–13, 174, 182
Candrakı‑rti 90, 94–6, 111, 164–5,
176–7.n23
Caraka-sam -
. hita 40, 54.n38, 73.n19
causation, stanza on 26
celibacy: female 126; male 75, 81, 154,
172
childbirth see birth
child pledging 136, 142–7, 151.n26; see
also monastic Buddhism, children in
child protection rituals 21, 134, 136–7,
142–8, 173
Christianity 157
classification systems 159
cloth: household 170, 177.nn32–4;
special 168–9, 174 (see also menstrual
practices); white 136, 149.n7
Collett, Alice 13–14, 23n.15, 23–4n.19
composting religions 159–60, 172
conception: asexual 98, 114; modes of 53.
n24; quasi-naturalistic explanations of
144; requirements for 34, 36–8, 43, 47–8,
52.n17; through oblation eating 140
conceptual reframing 142
contextual meaning 11, 17, 181–2
cosmology, Buddhist 4, 59
court culture 77–8, 85, 90.n5
“creation is birth” 30–1
darśapu-rn.ama-sa 150.n20
dependent arising 27, 31–5, 41, 43–5,
52.n7, 54.n34
Descent of the Embryo Scripture see
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra
devada-sı‑ 107, 130.n39
Devadu-ta-sutta 35, 38
Dhammananda, Bhikkhuni 1–2, 14
Dharmaguptaka-vinaya 170
dharmaka-ya 20
dharmata- 97, 100, 103, 105, 113–14
Dı‑rgha-gama 97
disgust: aesthetics of 5, 75, 77, 81–2, 88,
174, 179 (see alsobı‑bhatsa rasa);
compassionate 91.n15; Douglas on
206 Index
91.n11; and the erotic 82–7, 92.n25;
Western tradition of 79–81, 89
docetic Buddhologies 22.n4, 50, 128.n21
dohada 103, 117, 129.nn27,29
Douglas, Mary: on female blood 159–61,
163–4, 171–2, 176.n8; on pollution 80,
90–1.n11, 155; on purity 158–9
Draupadı‑ 109–10, 130.n44
dukkhasee suffering, Buddhist doctrine of
Dumont, Louis 106
earthquakes 97, 113, 127.n8
eight heavy rules seegurudharma/
garudhamma
embodiment 28, 42, 57–9, 115, 155
embryology: Buddhist 18, 65–7, 73.n23,
99–100; stages of 53.n27, 72–3.n15
emergent concepts 29
emergent experiences 31, 47
epistemes 9, 27, 51.n2, 181
ethical substance 174
ethics, Buddhist 58, 65
exegetical texts 42–3, 49, 76, 155, 161, 164
fecundity: cyclical 52.n17, 95, 110, 113–14;
and male ascetics 153; and ritual see
fertility rituals
female body: Brahman discourse of 163;
Buddhist discourse of 2–3, 19, 33, 92.
n25, 153, 164–7, 172–3, 181 (see also
monastic Buddhism, and female
body); depiction at sacred sites
116–17, 119–21, 126; disgust for 70–1,
76, 82, 84–5, 87, 91.n13; in Indian
Buddhism 21; in Tibetan Buddhism
74.n27; see also vagina; womb
female genitalia 77, 167, 169; see also
vagina; yoni
female impurity 21, 91, 125, 154–8,
160–3, 166–8, 171–2, 175.n2, 179
feminism: and language 68;
secular-liberal 2, 12–17, 182
feminist theology 23.n16
fertility, and auspiciousness 108
fertility goddesses 119
fertility rituals 125–6, 133–4, 137–42,
147–8
fetal life narratives 5, 62–3, 69
fetus: contingent personhood of 48–9;
death of 45, 166; five-limbed 99;
gender of 56, 66, 68, 72.n15, 129.n24;
knowledge and forgetting of 62–3;
protection of 145–6; purity of 166;
suffering of 39–40, 56, 72.n14, 90, 124
fixed features seedharmata-
floragenesis 115
focalization 12, 63, 68–70
Foucault, Michel: on discipline 173–4; on
discourse 56; on epistemes 51.n2; on
genealogical approach 20; as history
writer 180; on knowledge and power
6–10; on sexuality 3–4, 22.n1, 29, 31,
133
Foucher, Alfred 115
foulness, poetry of 165
Freiberger, Oliver 22.n10
Freud, Sigmund 8, 79–80, 89
Gan.d.avyu-ha-su-tra 131.n52
gandhabba/gandharva: as metaphor 144;
as requirement of conception 34, 36,
47–8; theory of 41, 46–7
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra: aesthetic reading
of 77, 79; and auspiciousness 95,
111–12, 116, 120–2, 124–5, 147; birth
narrative in 56–8, 62–3, 67–70, 98;
early texts of 18–19; female body as
disgusting in 76–7, 81, 87–90, 153–7,
165, 167; fetal gender in 73.n20; and
Indian tradition 17–18, 27–8; influence
on abhidharma writers 45, 47; lack of
attention to 19–20; medical authority
of 25.n29; metaphors in 31, 50–1;
Oedipal drama in 46, 49, 98;
pregnancy in 3, 65–7, 99, 101–3, 161;
sub-metaphors in 47–9; suffering in
37–41, 179; terms for vagina in 166;
textual meanings of 11–12; and vinaya
167; on virtue and fetal attributes 61–2
Garbhopanis.ad 62–3
Garrett, Frances 65, 73.n23
gender, as theoretical approach 182–3
gendered Buddhist persons 6, 9, 21, 180–1
genealogical method 8–10
Granoff, Phyllis 133–4
grass: blade as phallic symbol 137,
149.n8; in fertility rituals 145
Greek mythology, women in 132.n57
grotesque, the 69, 84–5
Gun.aprabha 149.n5, 170, 177.n29
gurudharma/garudhamma 14, 23.n14, 154
Gyalwang Karmapa 1
hagiography, Buddhist 75, 99–100, 106,
112, 115, 130.n37, 137
Ha-rı‑tı‑ 6, 119–20, 134–7, 135, 145,
148–9.n4, 152.n33
helplessness 35, 38, 100, 123

hermeneutic auspiciousness 111
Hindu ritual see Vedic-Hindu ritual
history. as critique 180
homosexuality 7–8, 173
human body: as disgusting 75–6, 84, 90.
n1; impurity of 157, 166; and
metaphor 29; and religious symbols
159; sins and virtues marked on 58–9,
61; see also female body; male body;
maternal body
humanism, European 15–16
human life, Buddhist interpretation of
8–9, 27
Hüsken, Ute 170
identitarianism 12
identity formation 56, 58, 69
impermanence 27, 38, 75, 157
inauspicious mother 96, 126
Indian Buddhism: ancient social life of
8–10; ascetics and monastics in 22.
n10; auspiciousness in 94–5, 126, 147;
on birth and conception of Buddha
37, 98; birth trope in 3–6, 18–19, 26–7,
29, 50, 64–5; and bra-hman.a tradition
139; female impurity in 156, 158,
160–1; fertility rituals in 136; gender in
15–17, 49, 173, 178.n41, 179, 181–3;
middle period of 11, 22.n12; monastic
and lay values 125; nuns in 153;
pregnancy in 73.n22; rebirth process in
56; sanskritization of 78–9; on virtue
and the body 61
Indra 83, 129.n23, 129–30.n35, 158, 162,
171
intermediary bodies 18
interpretation, South Asian traditions of 12
irony 134, 138–9, 142, 147
Islamist movements 13–14
Jainism 18, 119, 131, 133–4
ja-taka stories 36, 56–8, 65, 69, 119, 181
Ja-takatthavan.n.ana- 57–8, 71.n7
ja-tisee birth
karma, sources of doctrine 18
Karmaśataka 142–3
kleśa 143–4
knowledge, and narrative 64
knowledge systems 7, 9, 148
Kolnai, Aurel 80
Kristeva, Julia 76, 80–1, 89
Kritzer, Robert 12, 18–20, 45
Ks.emendra 57, 84, 167
Index 207
kuśala 94–5, 108, 134
Lakoff, George and Mark Johnson 28–9
Laks.mı‑ 107, 109, 111, 115–17, 125,
130.n39
Lalitavistara: auspiciousness in 112–13,
116, 121–2, 124; Buddha’s birth
narrative in 96, 98–102, 104–5,
114–15; Ma-ya- Devı‑’s pregnancy in
103, 114, 116; Suja-ta- in 150.n16;
translations of 127.n6
liberal feminism 2, 16, 21
Lubin, Timothy 108–9
Madan, T. N. 106–7, 109, 113
mae chi 24.n22
Maha-na-radakassapaja-kata 59–60, 62
Maha-nida-na-sutta 34–5, 44
Maha-paranirva-n.a-maha-su-tra 37, 50
.
Maha-tan.ha-sankhaya-sutta 34–6, 44
- -
Mahavadana-sutra 26, 97, 104, 127.n6,
128.n14
Maha-vastu 106, 129.n24, 131.n46,
148.n4, 150.n16
Maha-ya-na Buddhism 19–20, 163–4, 167,
172
Mahmood, Saba 12–13, 16
male body: of Buddha 140, 167; images
of 75; and virtue 59–60
Ma-navadharmaśa-stra 30
.
mangala 94–5, 106–9, 112, 137
Manobhu-mi 43, 46
marriage rituals 136, 148.n3, 163
maternal body 5, 76, 80–1, 96, 173
Ma-ya- Devı‑ 95–6, 98–9, 102–4, 114–15,
121, 131.nn50,52
mediating symbols 160, 173
Menninghaus, Winfried 79–81
menstrual blood 88, 91.n11, 159, 161,
163, 165–6, 170–2
menstrual practices 168–71, 176.n15
menstruation: in Brahmanism 158,
162–3; Buddhist discourse on 74, 164,
171; cessation of 170–1
metaphor: and human reproduction
29–31 (see also birth metaphor); use of
term 28–9
metaphorical thinking 28, 35, 45, 56
Milinda-pañha 36, 47, 49, 166, 176.n6
milk: mother’s 34, 39, 67–8, 166 (see also
breastfeeding); in Vedic ritual 138,
140–1
millenarianism 123–4
Miller, William Ian 77, 80, 90
208 Index
misogyny 28, 74–5, 84, 154, 156
misperceptions, eight 67
monastic attendants/servants
seepaścacchraman.a
monastic bhaga 170–1, 177.n34
monastic Buddhism: and ascetics 22.n10;
children in 145, 152.n34, 175; children
in; and court society 77–8; and female
body 126, 137, 152.n43, 161–3, 167,
171, 174, 179–80; initiation into
144–6, 152.n32 (see also child
initiation); involvement in rituals
133–4, 136–8, 146–8, 151.n22; and lay
people 141; and purity concerns
156–7; and rebounding violence
123–4; social influence on 117,
119–20, 154; women’s experience in
2–3, 21, 155, 171–3, 175 (see also
nuns)
Mrozik, Susanne 58–9
Mu-lasarva-stiva-da Vinaya: avada-nas in
57; and Brahman purity concerns
178.n37; Buddha’s biography in 97;
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra in 19, 24.n27,
178.n36; Ha-rı‑tı‑ in 134, 136, 149.n5; on
menstruation 167–71
myth 124–5
na-ga 119
Na-ga-nanda 86–7, 166
Naigameśa 137
Nanda: Buddha expounding embryology
to 38–42, 47–8; disgust and the erotic
82–9; frame story of 3, 37, 57, 68;
marks of perfection 59, 61
narrative: as mediation 68; plot and
discourse in 63–4
newborn infants 3; Bodhisattva as 100;
degradation of 35, 38–9, 53.n22,
72.n14, 111; and gender 73.n20;
metaphors for 31, 87
Nida-nakatha- 138–40, 150.n21
nuns: ancient communities of 14, 16–17,
23.n15, 74.n25, 153; freed from purity
constraints 126–7, 155–6, 174–5, 180;
menstrual practices of 168–73; ordina-
tion of 1–2; postcolonial scholarship on
16; self-discipline of 174; subordination
to monks 23.n14, 24.n22, 154, 172,
177.n34; in Thailand seemae chi
oblation eating 140
Ohnuma, Reiko 57–8, 71.n.2, 73.n.22,
137–8
ojas 65, 73.n15, 101–2, 129.n23, 137–8,
140, 148.n4
ordination, bhikkhunı‑ 1–2
ornamentation 82
Orokaiva initiation 122–3, 131–2.n56
Pa-li discourses, birth in 4
parasitical worms 39, 72.n14, 75, 87
paśca-cchraman.a 142–3, 145, 151.n25
pat.iccasamuppa-dasee dependent arising
patriarchy 2, 16, 126
peace, transcendent mood of seeśa-nta
Penner, Hans 141
perfections, ten 57–8
philologist’s meaning 10–12, 17, 181–2
philology 10–11, 15, 17, 181
physiomorality 57, 59,176–7.n23
pin.d.a 72, 139, 150–1.n21
pledging, prenatal, see child pledging
pollution 90.n10, 103, 130.n44, 155,
158–62, 172
power, Foucault on 6–9, 20, 173–4
pratı‑tyasamutpa-dasee dependent arising
pravrajya- 142
pregnant women 40, 69, 73.n23, 103,
106; cravings of seedohada
pretas 18
Puri, ritual of 107–8, 130.n39
purity: and auspiciousness 106, 110,
130.n40; spiritualization of 94–5,
156–8, 175.n4
Radich, Michael 22.n4, 37, 50
ratnavyu-ha 100–1
rebirth, gender change during 60, 71.n8
rebirth process 31, 46, 56–7, 157, 179
rebounding violence 96, 121–4, 126
reproductive health 152.n43
ritual processes, irreducible core of 122
Sakka 36, 140, 151.n24
Śakra 102, 105, 114
Sakyadhita International 1–2, 23.n18
śa-labhañjika 116–17, 118, 121,
131.n54
Salgado, Nirmala 2, 12, 16
Sama-dhira-ja-su-tra 5
sam -
. sara: birth in 33–4; women’s
reproductive organs as 56, 70
Sam - -
. yutta-nikaya 4, 26–7, 175
- ‑
Sañchı 21, 117–19, 121
.
Sanghabhedavastu: asexual conception in
114, 128.n14; auspiciousness in 112,
121–2, 124; Buddha’s birth narrative

in 96–100, 102–4; Buddha’s manhood
in 137–8
Sanskrit: courtly use of 77–9;
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra in 3, 18
Sanskrit poetics 77, 81–4, 89, 92.n25
śa-nta 77, 85–6, 89, 92.n28
Śa-riputra 145–6
Sartre, Jean-Paul 79, 81, 89
Sarva-stiva-da tradition 20, 24.n27, 46, 98
satire 84–5
S.atsu-trakanipa-ta 97
Saundarananda 77, 82–6, 91.n13, 92.n20
Schopen, Gregory 51.n4, 147
self: Buddhist critique of 180;
technologies of the 173–4
self-discipline 8, 123, 174–5
self-historicization 11
self-reflexivity 12, 15, 17, 21
semen: in Buddhist embryology 43, 48;
and milk 140, 149 n11, 150.n17; and
ojas 129.n23; as pollution and taboo
159; womb as befouled with 45, 49, 72,
76, 101, 111, 165–6
sense faculties 4, 34, 42–4, 99
sex: in Buddhist discourse 5; Foucault on
3–4, 6–7
sexuality: and auspiciousness 107; in
Buddhism 19; and disgust 81, 86;
female 7, 51, 95, 112, 116, 162–3;
Foucault on 7–9, 29, 31, 126;
Victorian ideas about 133, 173
sil matas 16
Śiva, phallus of 138
skandhas 44, 46, 55.n43
social environments 50, 62, 91.n11, 155,
161, 163, 167
social harmony 95, 110, 113, 130.n39
social status, in Buddhist teaching 47,
58–61, 181
soteriology: and embryology 64–5; and
female embodiment 3, 154, 166–7
South Asian Buddhism: birth trope in 27;
classical 26
spirit possession, birth as 31, 45–6
spirit religion 119–20
Sponberg, Alan 74–5, 154, 158, 167,
175.n2
Sri Lanka, nuns in 16
states of life, ten 42, 54.n32
Sthu-lananda- 169
stu-pas 117–19, 151.n22
śubha 94–5, 107, 112
subjectivity 6, 8–10, 23, 180, 182
Śuddhodana 98–9, 103, 113
Index 209
suffering, Buddhist doctrine of 16, 31
“suffering is birth” 21; and auspiciousness
111; in Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra 37, 41–2,
50; as master metaphor 28–9, 31–2,
56, 153; origins of concept 26–8; in
Vasubandhu 45
Suja-ta- 136, 138–42, 146, 148, 149.nn9,
13, 150.nn14, 16, 20–1
Sukha-vativyu-ha 81, 176.n21
Sumanas-avada-na 142–3, 146,
152.n34
Sundarı‑ 59, 61, 82–4, 88
taboo 158, 160, 163–4
Tantric Buddhism 175.n2
tatha-gatagarbha 5, 20, 37, 50
temporal distortion 69–70
textuality 10–12, 76, 81
textual meanings 10, 12, 181
Thailand 1, 24.n22
theology 23.n16
Therava-da Buddhism: and Bodhisattva
path 71.n3; ordination of women in 1;
on rebirth process 46–7, 54–5.n40
Tibetan Buddhism: ordination of women
in 1, 74.n27; pregnant women in
73.n23
torture victim, baby as 31, 49, 69–70
trans-exclusionary radical feminism
22–3.n13
trees, and śa-labhañjika- 116–17, 121,
131.n53
tree spirits 119, 138–9, 150.n20
unmistaken ideas, three 40, 166
Upagupta 142, 146, 151–2.n31
vagina: as impure 104, 157, 163, 165;
pejorative terms for 166; as pressing
device 31, 58, 63; see alsoyoni
vaginal birth 22.n4, 104–5
Vasis.t.ha 162–3, 176.n16
Vasubandhu: on dependent arising 43–5;
on female bodies 164, 166; and
Garbha-vakra-nti-su-tra 3
Vedic-Hindu ritual: and auspiciousness
116; Buddhist attitudes to 125,
139–42; death rites 18; initiation 30;
and purity 144, 156–7, 172; women’s
roles in 140–1
vinaya texts: and birth of Bodhisattva
105; menstruation in 167–9, 171–2;
monastic rituals in 136; on nuns 14,
21, 153–4, 160–1
210 Index
virtue, and social status 58–61
Visuddhimagga 54.n40, 75, 156–7, 166,
176.n6
vitality, in Bloch’s theory 122–4, 126
vrata 131.n45
Wilson, Liz 75–6, 157
woman, as universalized category 12–13
womb: as disgusting or impure 31, 38–9,
45, 49, 72.n14, 87–8, 101, 163–6, 172;
jeweled 128.n21; of Ma-ya- Devı‑
131.n52; purification of 99–100, 114;
soteriological-transcendent 50
wounds 45, 76, 88, 101, 157, 176.n6
yaksı‑ 21, 102, 119–21, 134, 142,
148.n4
“Ye dharma-” stanza 26
Yoga-ca-rabhu-mi 43, 47, 55.n53
yoni 32–3, 36, 52.n8, 167