@article{59509e686da74c028669c726b5b7c122,
title = "The materiality of a promise: Interworldly contracts in medieval buddhist promotional campaign imagery",
abstract = "Narratives in the fourteenth-century didactic paintings Shidoji engi e and Yūzū nenbutsu engi preach that supernatural entities are actively involved in Buddhist devotional projects. Vows and other commitments to engage in nenbutsu practice, or to restore a temple, initiate exchanges with the heavens and the netherworld that support their fulfillment. Interworldly networks thereby convey to audiences the rewards of participation in a promotional or fundraising campaign and back that up with the threat of hell. Both image contexts portray documents as a medium for transcending worlds, emphasizing writing in ways that empower campaign documents.",
keywords = "Fundraising, King Enma, Netherworld, Oaths (kishōmon), Promotion (kanjin), Revival narratives (soseitan), Shidoji engi e, Yūzū nenbutsu engi",
author = "Caroline Hirasawa",
note = "Funding Information: Research for this article was supported by generous funding from the Sainsbury Institute for the Study of Japanese Arts and Cultures (SISJAC), the Institute of Comparative Culture (ICC) at Sophia University, and a new faculty grant from Waseda University. Previous drafts were presented at the workshop, “From the Ephemeral to the Eternal: Modest Materialities of the Sacred in Japan” sponsored by SISJAC and the Center for the Study of Japanese Religions at SOAS (2015), the ICC Sacred Materialities Project study group (2016), and the panel, “The Social Lives and Afterlives of Paper, Guts, and Garbage: Materialities of the Sacred in Japan” at the Association for Asian Studies Conference, Seattle (2016). The author is grateful for the stimulating discussions of collaborators and participants at these events. She also extends special thanks to Shidoji for generously granting permission to reproduce scrolls and details from Shidoji engi e, and to The Cleveland Museum of Art and The Art Institute of Chicago for kindly allowing her to reproduce details from the Yūzū nenbutsu engi scrolls in their collections. Funding Information: * Research for this article was supported by generous funding from the Sainsbury Institute for the Study of Japanese Arts and Cultures (SISJAC), the Institute of Comparative Culture (ICC) at Sophia University, and a new faculty grant from Waseda University. Previous drafts were presented at the workshop, “From the Ephemeral to the Eternal: Modest Materialities of the Sacred in Japan” sponsored by SISJAC and the Center for the Study of Japanese Religions at SOAS (2015), the ICC Sacred Materialities Project study group (2016), and the panel, “The Social Lives and Afterlives of Paper, Guts, and Garbage: Materialities of the Sacred in Japan” at the Association for Asian Studies Conference, Seattle (2016). The author is grateful for the stimulating discussions of collaborators and participants at these events. She also extends special thanks to Shidoji 志度寺 for generously granting permission to reproduce scrolls and details from Shidoji engi e 志度寺縁起絵, and to The Cleveland Museum of Art and The Art Institute of Chicago for kindly allowing her to reproduce details from the Yūzū nenbutsu engi 融通念仏縁起 scrolls in their collections. 1. This translation of the term kanjin hijiri is borrowed from Quinter (2015, 5). Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2018 Nanzan Institute for Religion and Culture.",
year = "2018",
doi = "10.18874/jjrs.45.2.2018.341-390",
language = "English",
volume = "45",
pages = "341--390",
journal = "Japanese Journal of Religious Studies",
issn = "0304-1042",
publisher = "Nanzan Institute for Religion and Culture",
number = "2",
}