A BIBLIOGRAPHICAL SURVEY OF BUDDHIST RITUAL TEXTS FROM KOREA

Henrik H. Sorhnshn

Introduction

In the West, Korean Buddhism as an independent area of research was not "discovered" until the late 1950s. However, more than a decade passed before the first substantial monographs appeared, and so it was not until the end of the 1970s that the growing interest among scholars in Europe and U.S.A. became readily apparent. This interest, which has resulted primarily in a number of studies on the Korean Son jjli Buddhist tradition, finds its wider expression in a range of topics, including the study of the Korean Tripitaka AHÀJilfS (hereafter K.), important scriptures, monks' Buddhist hermeneutics, the esoteric Buddhist tradition (Kor. milgyo $5$k), and Buddhist art and architecture.

The present survey is based on materials compiled during two field trips to Korea (R.O.K.) during September-December 1988, and again in January 1990. My original purpose was to gather material for a book on the history of Korean Buddhism, but it soon became apparent that in order to get hold of essential source material, I would first have to see what was really there. In other words, I had made the mistake of assuming that the standard compilations of Korean Buddhist texts were comprehensive, when in fact they are only representative at best and insufficient at worst. With this in mind, I set out to explore some of the most important temple libraries, university libraries and private collections in order to collect additional material.

It so happens that one of the areas of Korean Buddhism that has been most effectively ignored both in the standard compilations of Korean Buddhist sources and in contemporary Korean scholarship, is that of rituals and related practices. Inspired by the sheer bulk of untouched, and to me completely novel source materials that I first came across in the library of Songgwang Temple $;ïMh': in South Chôlla province near Sunch'ôn HKX, I decided to start working on the texts pertaining to Korean Buddhist rituals. As a first step towards uncovering the ceremonial aspect of the Buddhist tradition it soon became necessary to compile a bibliographical survey to be used as a guide to the written material extant today.

It must be said at the outset that the present survey is not inclusive, for I am fairly certain that there are ritual works hidden in the temples throughout Korea that remain unknown to both me and the few local experts in the field, but I trust that the most important works, a good number of the lesser ritual texts, and even a few

Cahiers d'Extrême-Asie 6 (1991-1992) : 159-200