JJRS > Volume 25 Issue 3-4 The Gender of Buddhist Truth: The Female Corpse in a Group of Japanese Paintings

Chin, Gail

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Japanese Buddhism is generally considered to be misogynist in nature. Scholars, who are familiar with paintings of the female body in nine aspects of decay, called kusōzu, believe that these paintings represent the sexist nature of Buddhism. In an attempt to interpret the paintings within religious and cultural historical contexts, this paper examines a series of these paintings with respect to the legend of the ninth-century poet, Ono no Komachi, and Tendai thought on original enlightenment (hongaku).