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dc.contributor.advisorLimberis, Vasiliki, 1954-
dc.creatorKunu, Vishma
dc.date.accessioned2020-11-04T16:09:58Z
dc.date.available2020-11-04T16:09:58Z
dc.date.issued2018
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12613/3149
dc.description.abstractThis study brings excerpts from the Acts of Thomas (Act 1.11-16 and Act 3.30-33) together with two Buddhist jātakas (Udaya Jātaka - #458 and Visavanta Jātaka -#69) to consider how stories might have been transmitted in the early centuries of the common era in a milieu of mercantile exchange on the Indian Ocean. The Acts of Thomas is a 3rd century CE Syriac Christian text concerned with the apostle Thomas proselytizing in India. The jātakas are popular didactic narratives with a pronounced oral dimension that purport to be accounts of the Buddha’s previous lives. Syriac Christians possessed knowledge about Indian religious practices linked to renunciation, and it is plausible that they adapted Buddhist jātakas to convey Christian ideas in the account of Thomas journeying to India and converting people there. Epigraphic evidence from the western Deccan in India attests to yavana, or Greek, patronage of Buddhist institutions in cosmopolitan settings where ideas and commodities circulated. Against the grain in scholarship on early Christianity that tends to privilege Latin and Greek sources, this project moves the lens of analysis eastward to consider Indian influence on early Christianity as expressed in the Acts of Thomas. A literary comparison of the texts under consideration with reference to the historical and cultural context of exchange reveals similar models of renunciant practices in Buddhism and Christianity that establishes new grounds for consideration of interconnectivity across ‘East’ and ‘West.’
dc.format.extent190 pages
dc.language.isoeng
dc.publisherTemple University. Libraries
dc.relation.ispartofTheses and Dissertations
dc.rightsIN COPYRIGHT- This Rights Statement can be used for an Item that is in copyright. Using this statement implies that the organization making this Item available has determined that the Item is in copyright and either is the rights-holder, has obtained permission from the rights-holder(s) to make their Work(s) available, or makes the Item available under an exception or limitation to copyright (including Fair Use) that entitles it to make the Item available.
dc.rights.urihttp://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
dc.subjectReligion
dc.subjectAsian Studies
dc.subjectComparative Religion
dc.subjectActs of Thomas
dc.subjectIndian Buddhism
dc.subjectIndian Ocean Trade
dc.subjectJataka
dc.subjectRenunciation
dc.subjectSyriac Christianity
dc.titleRenunciant Stories Across Traditions: A Novel Approach to the Acts of Thomas and the Buddhist Jātakas
dc.typeText
dc.type.genreThesis/Dissertation
dc.contributor.committeememberBingenheimer, Marcus
dc.contributor.committeememberBlankinship, Khalid Yahya
dc.contributor.committeememberPiera, Montserrat
dc.description.departmentReligion
dc.relation.doihttp://dx.doi.org/10.34944/dspace/3131
dc.ada.noteFor Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) accommodation, including help with reading this content, please contact scholarshare@temple.edu
dc.description.degreePh.D.
refterms.dateFOA2020-11-04T16:09:58Z


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