The Transformation and Transregional Spread of the Ming Buddhist Tripiṭaka

Speaker: Jiang Wu | 吴疆, Regents Professor, Dept. of East Asian Studies and Director of Center for Buddhist Studies, Harvard University

This lecture explores the transformation and transregional spread of the Ming Buddhist Tripiṭaka, arguing that the late Ming marked the starting point of the modernization of the Chinese Buddhist canon. After briefly outlining the traditional structure of the canon—its tripartite division (經, 律, 論), case organization, catalogue traditions and woodblock printing practices—the Jingshan Canon (径山藏) or Jiaxing Canon (嘉興藏), whose string-bound format (方冊), rationalized catalogues, standardized case divisions and regulated page grids reflect a new consciousness of typographical order and reproducibility. The disciplined use of Song-style typeface and refined layout further stabilized the canon as a coordinated publishing enterprise rather than an accumulated scriptural archive.

The lecture then traces the transmission of this Ming bibliographical model to early Edo Japan in the Ōbaku Canon (黄檗藏), where Ming structural principles were preserved and technically consolidated. Finally, drawing on Wu's first-hand examination of the Ōbaku Canon presented to the India Office Library in 1875 by the Iwakura Mission—conducted at the British Library in February 2026—the talk considers the canon’s entry into modern library systems. By foregrounding catalogues, layout, typeface, and institutional reclassification, this talk reframes the Ming Buddhist canon as the structural foundation of canonical modernity and highlights its continuing relevance for librarians and curators working with Ming printed works and manuscripts.

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Dr. Jiang Wu (Harvard University, 2002) is currently a Regents’ professor in the Department of East Asian Studies, director of Center for Buddhist Studies. He published in areas such as seventeenth-century Chinese Buddhism, especially Chan/Zen Buddhism, the role of Buddhist canons in the formation of East Asian Buddhist culture, and the historical exchanges between Chinese Buddhism and Japanese Buddhism. Other interests include Confucianism, Chinese intellectual history and social history, and the application of electronic cultural atlas tools in the study of Chinese culture and religion. His first book Enlightenment in Dispute: The Reinvention of Chan Buddhism in Seventeenth-century China was published by Oxford University Press in 2008. His Leaving for the Rising Sun: Chinese Zen Master Yinyuan and the Authenticity Crisis in Early Modern East Asia (Oxford, 2016; 384 pages) won the inaugural Tianzhu Best Book in Chan Studies Award. In addition, he has published widely in the field of Buddhist canon studies, including Spreading Buddha’s Word in East Asia: The Formation and Transformation of the Chinese Buddhist Canon (Columbia 2016), Reinventing the Tripitaka: Transformation of the Buddhist Canon in Modern East Asia (Lexington 2017), Chinese Buddhist Canon Research Newsletters (since 2021). In addition, he is active in digital projects related to spatial analysis and wellbeing research by editing The Formation of Regional Religious Systems in Greater China (Routledge 2022), The Digital World in an Age of Uncertainty: Humanizing Technology for Wellness, Resilience, and Creativity (IEEE 2022). He is currently completing Encyclopedia of Hangzhou Buddhist Culture and a monograph on the origin and history of the Obaku Canon in China, Japan, and Britain. He was a Guggenheim fellow in 2023.