Abstract
We are not inclined to think of Buddhist treatises as narrative texts. But upon a closer look, we discover that they often contain numerous and extended narrative passages as in, for example, the Hizōhōyaku, an important work of the 9th-century Japanese monk Kūkai. Despite its narrative passages, though, this work does not primarily aim at recounting a story. It rather tries to convince the reader of certain doctrinal truths that are not narrative in character. But the narratives in the text certainly play a role in the intended persuasion. The present paper attempts to elucidate the interplay of narration and persuasion in the Hizōhōyaku. It defines three persuasive functions of the narratives in the work at hand: First, some narratives in the text exemplify causal laws. Second, the text’s narratives show the process to be warranted by which the narrator has acquired the convictions he defends in his paper. And third, some narratives explain how the causal laws developed in the first place.
Kaufmann, Paulus