I will address these questions by investigating Tibetan legal texts from the 17th to 19th centuries and monastic guidelines, and their relevant Indic and Chinese counterparts. This will allow a theorization of Tibetan legal thinking and its Buddhist monastic contexts, and a positioning of Buddhist thinking within a broader socio-legal perspective. This is particularly relevant today, as Buddhist monastics throughout Asia are pivotal in developing laws and regulations (e.g. Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Thailand) and in actively resisting them (e.g. Tibet, China) – and our understanding of these matters hinges on a reliable historical perspective.
This research will also produce important insights into broader issues within Tibetan studies, such as the much-debated relationship between Tibet’s centre and periphery (Goldstein 1971). Studying law codes and local monastic guidelines together will refine our notions of the hegemonic relationships between lay-people and monks and between the Buddhist clergy and the state. In addition to contributing to Buddhist Studies, this research will also advance a nuanced theoretical conceptualisation of the dichotomies of ‘the secular’ and ‘the religious’ at large, in particular with regard to existing notions of law.