Review
Reviewed Work(s): Ties That Bind: Maternal Imagery and Discourse in Indian Buddhism
by Reiko Ohnuma
Review by: Nirmala S. Salgado
Source: Journal of the American Academy of Religion , March 2014, Vol. 82, No. 1
(March 2014), pp. 279-283
Published by: Oxford University Press
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Book Reviews 279
opportunity to consider a time when a female divine was honored. Also explored
in this chapter are contemporary rituals created to honor the past while reflecting
the composition of individual groups.
This volume concludes with five contemporary case studies from Hinduism,
Buddhism, Christianity, and Islam. All demonstrate how women actively shaped
and/or pushed the boundaries of their respective traditions.
Educators and students alike will find Women and Religious Traditions to be
a useful resource. Extensive bibliographies at the end of each chapter provide a
starting point for student research projects and for instructor course enhance
ment. The films and online resources sections lend themselves to the mixing of
pedagogical methods. Within the body of the text itself, all chapters provide
references to primary documents and sacred texts. Chapters would have bene
fited by the inclusion of a primary document section in each chapter, so that stu
dents could practice the critical textual analysis this volume frequently calls for.
One of the best examples of primary document integration in a women and reli
gion text is Barbara MacHaffie's, Herstory: A History of Women in Christianity.
These additions, along with discussion topics, would improve the pedagogy of
the book for the introductory classroom. Nonetheless, the sheer breadth of the
concepts and traditions in this volume distinguish it as a foundational text for
introductory students as well as a valuable resource for educators.
doi: 10.1093/jaarel/lft096 Jennifer Naccarelli
Advance Access publication January 16, 2014 University of Delaware
Ties That Bind: Maternal Imagery and Discourse in Indian Buddhism.
By Reiko Ohnuma. Oxford University Press, 2012. 262 pages. $99.00.
Reiko Ohnuma's book is based on the premise that Buddhism, though reject
ing the "cult of the mother," considered motherhood a "lingering tie that simply
could not be broken" (5). It attempts a creative exploration into the meaning of
maternal imagery in what is broadly referred to as "premodern South Asian
Buddhism" (6). Ohnuma focuses on select Pali and Sanskrit sources, with some
reference to Tibetan and Chinese texts (in translation) to help "in uncovering
and trying to understand a general 'Indian Buddhist discursive world'" (6). She
seeks to interpret motifs such as "Mother-Love," and "Mothers in Grief," com
pares and contrasts the idea of Maya as the "good mother" with that of
MahaprajapatI Gautami as the "problematic mother," and investigates images of
metaphorical pregnancy and gestation in order to argue that the male monastic
authors of Buddhist texts produced an "elite" and "patriarchal" religion that
aimed to address the sense of "guilt," "indebtedness," and "anxiety" that they
endured in relation to their own mothers (111, 132,185).
Chapter 1 highlights distinctions between Buddhist depictions of "mother
love" and "father-love" as well as "son-love." This chapter argues that the
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280 Journal of the American Academy of Religion
Buddhist view of mother-love is ambiguous. Narratives convey that although a
mother's "particular" love for her only child can be seen (because of its intensity)
as a fitting metaphor of the Buddha's love, it can also point to a samsaric attach
ment that is incompatible with the compassion of the Buddha and the detach
ment of the arhat (likened to "father-love"). Ohnuma proposes that depictions of
the cultivation of loving-kindness (metta) and indeed of all the other "immeasur
ables"—compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity—underline the argument
that mother-love is selfish. Her analysis of "a random scattering of textual pas
sages" (22) suggests that mother-love is ambivalent since it is idealized as both
self-sacrificial and higher than father-love and is denigrated as "spiritually"
impotent in comparison with a "universal" non-attached love. In a similar vein,
Ohnuma points out the ambiguity in the love between mother and son, where
the mother's particular love for a son contrasts starkly with a universal son-love.
In her discussion of mother-love and son-love, it is curious that Ohnuma seems
unaware of a "bodhisattva [who] reflects on the fact that he himself has served. . .
as the mother of all sentient beings" (34). She neglects the image of Cundi (a
form of Avalokitesvara), who is depicted as a compassionate mother of all
beings.
The idea of dichotomous oppositions that appears in her first chapter (e.g.,
"good/bad" mothers, "particular/universal" love, and "mother-love/son-love")
continues to inform chapter 2, which focuses on the attached and grieving
mothers of the Therlgatha in contrast to the "idealized non-grieving father[s]"
(38). Ohnuma—relying on a 1996 cross-cultural study by Susan Starr Sered,
which argues that a mother's grief for a deceased child, though accepted in "folk"
religion, is not adequately accommodated by dominant patriarchal religions—
suggests that many of the grieving mothers of the Therlgatha, such as Ubbiri,
Patacara, and Kisa GotamI, inflict "violence on their own motherhood" (48) in
the process of becoming "de-mothered" and that they embrace the ideals of a
patriarchal Buddhism in which their maternal love is transformed from a partic
ular love for their own children into a universal love for all. However, Ohnuma
points out that unlike most other mothers of the Therlgatha, Vaddhamata and
VasitthI become arhats without abandoning their motherhood. An analysis of
their narratives, together with an examination of the figure of Harltl, whose par
ticular mother-love is embraced as a foundation for a universal Buddhist love,
helps Ohnuma maintain the argument made in chapter 1—that ambiguity in
Indian Buddhism's understanding of mother-love is reflected in variant models
of that love.
Chapters 3-5 compare and contrast images of Maya, Siddhartha's birth
mother—the "good" mother, who conveniently had an early death, preempting
in her renunciant son any lingering ties of "guilt, anxiety, and indebtedness" (89)
—with Mahaprajapati, the "(not-quite) 'bad'" milk-mother (68), who by living
on becomes a "displaced" and "problematic" mother engendering such ties.
These chapters are perhaps the most thought-provoking in the book, being
central to Ohnuma's overall discussion of "ties that bind." By insightfully juxta
posing analyses of the narratives of Siddhartha's two mothers, the author
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Book Reviews 281
provides a new contribution to the field. Dichotomous oppositions play out once
again in her analysis. Here the "short-lived" Maya, who is spiritually stunted and
reduced to an idealized "Maternal Function" (67), is but a "romantic fantasy"
(111), whereas the "long-standing" and autonomous MahaprajapatI, who is "not
merely" a mother (131), embodies the spiritual potential of all women and
becomes a "stand-in for Womanhood as a whole" (130). Nevertheless, these
chapters attest to weaknesses that are present elsewhere in Ohnuma's work. For
example, to assume something about the "thoughts and feelings of the monks
who authored the texts"—in relation to both their own mothers and "women in
general" (132)—and its connection to how Buddhist monks "typically" related to
laywomen and nuns (133) calls for some imaginative leaps and questionable
thinking. Such broad and tenuous generalizations about the feelings of monks
also occur elsewhere in her book (9,212).
Ohnuma argues that "the very existence of female monasticism . . . can be
directly linked to the debt the Buddha owed MahaprajapatI for her mothering
and his anxiety of its repayment" (68). However, as is mentioned in Analayo's
Comparative Study of the Majjhima-nikaya (2011; 813n275), several versions of
the Vinaya and of other narratives about the founding of the order of nuns indi
cate that the Buddha had already benefited MahaprajapatI by establishing her at
an advanced level of understanding in the dharma before she received the ordi
nation. Consequently, Ohnuma's argument in chapter 4—centering on the
development of contrasting notions of so-called debt in the Mahasamghika
Lokuttaravada Bhiksuni Vinaya and the Ahguttara Nikaya that concern
accounts about the "guilt" and "anxiety" of the Buddha—is questionable. So is
the idea that the texts concerned—even "without addressing the question of their
precise historical relationships"—evidence "a continuum of increasing discom
fort with the son's debt towards his mother" (105). Ohnuma claims that "virtu
ally no attention has been paid to the fact that the opening section of the
[Dakkhinavibhanga Sutta] seems to have a close relationship to the story estab
lishing female monasticism" (103). In doing so, she overlooks Liz Williams'
"A Whisper in the Silence: Nuns before MahapajapatI?" (2000) as well as
Analayo's erudite "Theories on the Foundation of the Nuns' Order: A Critical
Evaluation" (2008)—both of which discuss the establishment of female monasti
cism in relation to those very narratives.
Chapter 6 considers five narratives on pregnancy that are depicted as meta
phors of enlightenment: (1) Sujata's gift of milk-rice that nourishes the ascetic
"embryonic buddha" (136) until his birth as a fully enlightened Buddha; (2)
Yasodhara's pregnancy with Rahula, which parallels Siddhartha's six-year search
for enlightenment; (3) Mahayana depictions of the bodhisattva as a pregnant
woman "'giving birth' to buddhahood" (146); (4) the "Perfection of Wisdom"
(Prajnaparamita) as the "mother" of all buddhas; and (5) the "Mahayana notion
of tathagata-garbha," translated as "'Tathagata-womb' (in the sense of 'having a
Tathagata within the womb') or 'Tathagata-embryo' (in the sense of 'having a
Tathagata as embryo')" (154). Despite the apparent parallelism between biologi
cal processes and enlightenment that may be found in those narratives, Ohnuma
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282 Journal of the American Academy of Religion
argues that the accounts reveal a complicated hierarchy in which the male
(father or son) figure tends to be "spiritualized" at the expense and erasure of the
mother. She proposes that because pregnancy is often viewed from the perspec
tive of the embryonic son rather than that of the mother, in some instances gesta
tion should be considered a more apt metaphor of enlightenment than
pregnancy. This chapter, like others before it, relies for its analysis on the use of
dichotomous oppositions—viz., those of female passivity/male activity, female
pregnancy/male asceticism, physicality/spirituality, pain/joy, ignorance/wisdom,
and suffering mother/rescuing (or obligated) son (143-149). In addition to sug
gesting a possible reinterpretation of pregnancy as metaphor, Ohnuma proposes
that an emotive resonance, reflecting the displacement of the "lingering emo
tions" of the son (151), pervaded the metaphorical and ultimately encouraged
the devaluation of the mother in favor of the father (160) and promoted a male
lineage succession. She supports this idea with references to studies of Tibetan
tulku lineages and other secondary sources about male lineages (160-164).
In chapter 7, Ohnuma maintains that breastfeeding as a metaphor of the
Buddha's teaching activity did not become popular in Indian Buddhism
because that tradition generally envisioned the Buddha as a father rather than as
a mother. However, she argues that in certain other contexts—such as in
Sri Lanka, where the Buddha has sometimes been compared to a mother, and
in Southeast Asia, where women have a "traditionally high status" (170)—there
is a more direct connection between the imagery of both breastfeeding and
indebtedness to the mother and the Buddha's teachings. She proposes that the
acceptance of Buddhism in Southeast Asia is explained by a "project of displace
ment" (171), which both accommodates the indebtedness of a novice monk
toward his mother and displaces it by linking it to a commitment to Buddhism.
In her comparison of breastfeeding to the bodily self-sacrifice of the bodhisattva,
Ohnuma furthers the development of dichotomous oppositions by contrasting
the Buddha to the bodhisattva. Whereas the bodily gift of the bodhisattva (akin
to the milk of the breastfeeding mother) is seen as "inferior," "physical," and
"female," that of the Buddha's dharma is seen as "superior," "spiritual," and
"male" (173-174). Nevertheless, Ohnuma maintains that that dichotomous
imagery provides a space for depictions of the maternal in Buddhism to "migrate
upward" and adapt to contexts in which women's "status" was higher than it was
in "early India" (179).
In chapter 8, Ohnuma ties into a growing body of research that suggests that
Buddhist texts, which provide a partial view of how Buddhism was practiced on
the ground, tend to downplay the familial connections and embeddedness
of Buddhist monastics. Finding recourse to contemporary ethnographic studies
of Thai, Tibetan, and Taiwanese renunciants, she argues that the discourse on
motherhood on which her previous chapters focus "must have lying underneath
it an on-the-ground reality far more complex" than what is found in the texts
(203), and thus she affirms the imaginative emphasis of her work. Here and else
where, Ohnuma admirably admits the tentative nature of her interpretations
(e.g., 127, 139, 162). In her concluding chapter she seeks to connect Buddhist
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Book Reviews 283
doctrines, and the Buddhist imagery of motherhood, with a feminist ethics of
care, and she hastily addresses notions of "struggle," "rights," and "opportuni
ties." Ohnuma suggests that "modern feminism's struggle with the 'impossibility
of motherhood' is really not so different from a similar struggle among premo
dern Indian Buddhist monastics" (205) in its negotiation of women's identity
and difference.
One may balk at some of the assumptions implicit in Ohnuma's work—e.g.,
her constant references to what "the Buddhist tradition" (e.g., 9, 34-35, 50-51,
66-68, 170, 212; emphasis added) did or did not intend to do (despite explicitly
stating that she does not mean "that 'the Buddhist tradition' was some kind of
omniscient author" [69]), her omission of the image of Cundi as the bodhi
sattva-mother, her misconstrual of certain narratives, her reliance on dichoto
mous oppositions that fly in the face of more-nuanced Buddhist teachings of
dependent origination (pratitya samputpada) and skillful means (upaya), and
her unquestioning use of Freudian psychological categories. Nevertheless,
Ohnuma's book introduces some compelling arguments about how maternal
imagery may be presented in a wide array of Buddhist texts, and it should be con
sidered recommended reading for upper-level undergraduates and graduate stu
dents in the fields of Buddhism and women's and gender studies.
doi: 10.1093/jaarel/lft067 Nirmala S. Salgado
Advance Access publication October 31,2013 Augustana College, Rock Island, Illinois
Darwinism and the Divine: Evolutionary Thought and Natural Theology.
By Alister E. McGrath. Wiley-Blackwell, 2011. 320 pages. $34.95.
Darwinism and the Divine: Evolutionary Thought and Natural Theology, by
Alister E. McGrath, is an expanded version of the author's 2009 Hulsean
Lectures at the University of Cambridge marking the 200th anniversary of
Darwin's birth and the 150th anniversary of the publication of On the Origin of
Species. The twin aims of the book are "to identify the forms of natural theology
that emerged in England over the period 1690-1850 and how these were affected
by the advent of Darwin's theory," and "to explore and assess twenty-first
century reflections on the relation of evolutionary thought and natural theology"
(xiii). The book thus has both historical and contemporary foci, with the former
intended to inform the latter.
Part I is entitled, "Conceptual Clarifications: On the meaning of terms."
Chapter 1, "Natural Theology: A Deeper Structure to the Natural World,"
explores the multiple meanings of the term "natural theology." According to
McGrath, "natural theology" extends beyond the attempt to prove God's exis
tence on the basis of purely rational arguments (a common but overly narrow
construal of the term) to the more expansive notion that "there exists some link
between the world we observe and another transcendent realm" (12). While
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