抄録
In issues 216-217 of Mikkyo Bunka the author discussed the philosophical viewpoints having been held within Indian Buddhism by the three yanas of Sravakayana, Paramitayana, and Vajrayana. In the present article the author will discuss in outline the view of the position occupied by women in Vajrayana. This is a timely and cutting edge issue that involves questions revolving around feminism and postmodernism. First and foremost, we are all either male or female. Feminists have declared that textual studies forming the foundation of the humanities cannot avoid the issue of gender, but that an awareness of this has not been present initially in such studies. Some cultures have a symbol system focused on women such as is typified by the worship of the Madonna, yet contradictorily those societies in practice suppress women and take away their right to discourse. Feminism accuses the history of Indian Buddhism as being strongly androcentric, and further criticizes the cultural paradigm within Indian Buddhism in which statements of gender inequality have resorted to the shields of emptiness and transcendent practices to rationalize the suppression of women by men. Based on such criticisms, the author will present a general idea of the view of women within Vajrayana, and will provide a foundational report to serve as the basis for a constructive dialogue to approach this issue.
In the first section the author provides an outline of discrimination against women in the history of Indian Buddhism. The second section will examine passages on the yogini and dakini deities developed in Vajrayana. Section three will study textual passages delineating the living yoga consorts treated as the physical manifestations of such deities. Section four will present passages describing the women who participated on an equal footing with men in the ganacakra tantric rite. In conclusion, the author will demonstrate the ideal of the female principle having been incorporated in Vajrayana doctrine and the indispensability of women in actual religious practices, in particular, the high degree of gender equality described in ganacakra meetings.
