論文

《人間佛教》學報‧藝文第38期

Lewis R. Lancaster

Founder & Director, Electronic Cultural Atlas Initiative (ECAI) Emeritus Professor, UC Berkeley

《佛教海線絲綢之路》第三章——教大圓環的弘傳和發展

妙凡、蔡孟樺主編

The spread of the Buddhist movement throughout the peninsula and across to Sri Lanka was impressive. However, a far greater challenge awaited the tradition outside the cultural and linguistic domains of India. The “Great Circle”would carry Buddhist ideas and practices thousands of miles away from India. New homes for it were found along the coasts and rivers, wherever merchants needed to go. Eventually, the arcs of the “Great Circle” of Buddhism would encompass the whole of Southeast Eurasia. One portion of the arc went from the West Coast of India up the Indus Valley and around the far end of the Himalayas to the Tarim Basin leading to Chang’an (Xi’an), a route of more than 4,000 miles. The connecting maritime segment of the “Great Circle” started on the western shores of India, circling the peninsula and Sri Lanka up the East Coast to the Bay of Bengal and then moving East around the coastlines of Bangladesh, Myanmar, Malay Peninsula, across to Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam, before turning north to East Asia and the ports of China, Korea, and Japan. The circumference of both arcs land and sea, measured enough miles to encircle the equator of the earth; the indented shorelines contained 20,000 miles of surface, five times the land route mileage.

Lewis R. Lancaster, " The Buddhist Maritime Silk Road (3): The Great Circle of Buddhism and Its Rim, " 《人間佛教》學報‧藝文第38期 (2022): 178-197COPY