How Ajatasatru Was Reformed: The Domestication of Ajase and Stories in Buddhist History

Ajatasatru, King of Magadha during the last years of the lifetime of the Buddha, is often held by Buddhist tradition to have killed his father and usurped the throne....The story ... is of particular interest for several reasons.... It has survived and spread in many forms for two and a half millennia. Along the way, it has passed through most of the Buddhist world and has been associated with some of the most epoch-making doctrinal developments in Buddhist history. The history of this narrative thus provides us with a useful opportunity to study in microcosm some large trends in the history of Buddhism, and to consider the role played in a number of developments by narrative materials. In the modern world, moreover, the same narrativve was used in the attempts of Japanese thinkers to address the problem of the universality of Freud's Oedipus complex, to supplement that theory, and to chaacterise special features of their own culture."--Chapter One. iii, 202 pages ; 26 cm. With bibliography and index.