Panel 1 Discussion: Teachings of the Lotus Sutra

The discussion for Panel 1: Teachings of the Lotus Sutra, featuring Eric Tzu-yin Chung 鍾子寅, Venerable Miao Duo 妙多法師, Paul Harrison, Roxanna Pang and Stephen F Teiser. This discussion was chaired by Luisa Elena Mengoni and was held on 15 December 2022 at the British Library's conference 'The Lotus Sutra: The teachings, transmission and material culture of a sacred Buddhist text'.
Organised to celebrate the successful close of the Lotus Sutra Project (2017 - 2022), the conference brought together an international group of scholars and the Project team to present on the impact of the Lotus Sutra as a critical Buddhist text. The conference investigated the teachings of the Lotus Sutra, the Lotus Sutra as represented at Dunhuang, and the methodology and results of the Lotus Sutra Project, which has now conserved, digitised and published nearly 800 Lotus Sutra manuscripts in the British Library’s collections.

[@Insideout9953]

This is an important milestone event for the Lotus Sutra so I see this as a wasted opportunity that questions related to the religious aspect of the Sutra could not be answered properly, correctly, and respectfully, as I suspect the Asian presenters possess limited knowledge of the actual practicing of the Lotus Sutra (quite evident in a couple of the Q&As, and during the presentations which were very general and even half-hearted, displaying the impression of outdated Buddhist practice knowledge which ironically this very Sutra had been trying to correct for eons). I am still very much impressed by the British Library for achieving the feat and organizing the event. Great work.