New Perspectives on Dunhuang Studies

Author: Rong Xinjiang
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 2002-09-01
Features: in the 21st century will open up new horizons and remain full of vitality. The Centennial of Dunhuang Studies—A Contribution from Overseas Sinology. This book introduces new materials and issues in Dunhuang documents, the discovery of Dunhuang and its academic significance. In 2000, the Gansu People's Publishing House launched a series of "Dunhuang Culture Books," which received praise from academia and readers. Recently, the Gansu Education Press published the "Dunhuang Studies Series." The publication of these two series has strengthened our confidence in creating a new for Dunhuang studies. The "Dunhuang Studies Series" is edited by Professor Ji Xianlin, President of the Dunhuang-Turfan Society, and consists of 12 monographs and collections of essays, with most authors being middle-aged and young scholars with outstanding achievements. This series covers various aspects of Dunhuang studies, including Dunhuang theory, the history of Dunhuang studies, historical events in Dunhuang, Dunhuang language and script, popular literature in Dunhuang, Dunhuang children's education books, Dunhuang cave art, Dunhuang and Sino-Western exchanges, Dunhuang murals and music-dance, and Dunhuang astronomy and calendar. It relativelyly reflects the new achievements and research trends in Dunhuang studies over the past 20 years and generally demonstrates the overall academic level of the new generation of Dunhuang scholars in China. Due to space limitations, this article cannot provide a comprehensive and detailed review of every work in this series, but can only share some preliminary reflections on its common characteristics.
First, the issue of new materials, new perspectives, and new topics in Dunhuang studies. As is well known, as a "new trend in world academia" that emerged in the early 20th century, the formation and development of Dunhuang studies are inseparable from the discovery of "new materials." Our predecessors devoted almost their entire lives to collecting, organizing, and conducting pioneering research on ancient documents unearthed from the Mogao Caves. After the 1980s, with the publication of many large-scale Dunhuang cave art catalogs and editions, access to Dunhuang materials greatly improved, and hundreds of works on Dunhuang studies emerged. Some scholars then believed that there were no more "new" materials and that the organization work was almost complete, leaving only "filling the gaps" with little room for further innovation. In reality, the materials in Dunhuang documents are closely related to the researchers' perspectives, viewpoints, and chosen topics. On one hand, there are many familiar materials that contain new insights, the key being their discovery. On the other hand, with the gradual publication of Russian Dunhuang manuscripts and British Dunhuang manuscripts numbered 6981 and beyond, which had long been shrouded in mystery, numerous exciting new materials continue to emerge. Take Rong Xinjiang's "New Perspectives on Dunhuang Studies" and Chen Guocan's "New Evidence on the History of Dunhuang Studies" as examples. They not only present new materials used by the authors but also develop entirely new themes and conclusions based on existing materials. For instance, the murals of the Mogao Caves, which have existed for hundreds or even thousands of years at the foot of the Mingsha Mountains, have been observed, copied, and studied by many, yet Shi Weixiang, who spent over 40 years with them, still continuously extracted materials and proposed unique insights. In his "Studies on the History of Dunhuang and Mogao Cave Art," there is an article titled "Line Drawing and Modeling," which, though not long, concisely raises the significant topic of "tracing modeling through line drawing" in the history of Chinese painting. Another example is Zheng Ruzhong's research on ancient music-dance in "Studies on Dunhuang Murals and Music-Dance," which is based on his years of painstaking investigation of 492 caves and firsthand data. From the murals, he identified 44 types of musical instruments, over 4,000 instruments, over 3,000 performers, and over 500 ensembles, and even discovered new musical instrument illustrations, providing precious new materials for rewriting the history of ancient Chinese musical instruments. In Deng Wenkuan's "Studies on Dunhuang and Turpan Astronomy and Calendar," the author's collation and examination of a small fragment of an printed calendar from the Russian collection Цх.02880 allow him to determine it as a detailed calendar for the eighth year of the Dading era (834), pushing back the evidence of by 34 years. In other works in the series, there are many such innovative examples. If we pay a little attention, new materials, perspectives, and topics in this series are everywhere. I believe this is one of the charms of Dunhuang studies.
Second, the history of Dunhuang studies and the theory of the discipline. Over the past, due to unsuitable conditions, the study of the history of Dunhuang studies and the construction of its disciplinary theory were not on the agenda. As a result, whether Dunhuang studies could be established as an independent discipline has always been questioned. In recent years, many researchers have begun to pay attention to and value this issue. In addition to specialized explorations, they have also focused on the historical context and related theories while conducting specific research. For example, Liu Jinbao's "Comprehensive Introduction to Dunhuang Studies" is an expansion and revision of the author's "Introduction to Dunhuang Studies" published in the early 1990s. In addition to supplementing new materials and recent academic information, it more consciously highlights the framework, content, and general theory of the academic history. Another example is Rong Xinjiang's "New Perspectives on Dunhuang Studies," the second part of which is a dedicated paper on the history of Dunhuang studies, and the fourth part consists of essays written in different styles commemorating predecessors in the history of Dunhuang studies or reflecting on their works. This is also indispensable content for writing the history of Dunhuang studies. For this reason, we must also mention Lu Qingfu and Wang Jiqing's "Biographies of Chinese and Foreign Dunhuang Scholars," which is an expanded edition of the 1989 edition "Biographies of Famous Chinese and Foreign Dunhuang Scholars." The compilers paid special attention to organizing and analyzing materials and evaluating the subjects from the perspective of academic history, striving to restore the historical truth of some figures and events. Of course, the deficiency of this book lies in insufficient excavation and utilization of new materials (especially historical archives). We must admit that the study of the academic history of Dunhuang studies is still in its infancy, and the theory of Dunhuang studies is relatively fragmented, far from being systematic, scientific, and mature, but we have indeed taken an important and encouraging step.
Third, the relationship between Dunhuang studies and other disciplines. In recent years, scholars have repeatedly called for "Dunhuang studies to return to the disciplines." In fact, this is aimed at two tendencies: one tendency overemphasizes the independence and uniqueness of Dunhuang studies, neglecting their internal connections with other disciplines, resulting in the disconnection of research in its branches from related disciplines, making it easily become rootless and sourceless, and losing the advantage of comparative research. Another tendency is that some researchers in other disciplines, whether they overlook or disregard (or fail to utilize) Dunhuang's valuable materials and research achievements, thus automatically closing a path to innovation. From this series, we happily see that Dunhuang scholars are working to overcome these tendencies, striving to place each Dunhuang topic within a broader historical and cultural context and making it an organic and distinctive part of the history of each discipline. For example, Sun Xiushen's "Studies on Dunhuang and Sino-Western Exchanges" particularly emphasizes examining Dunhuang within the scope of the Silk Road and the Hexi cultural circle. Zheng Acai and Zhu Fengyu's "Studies on Dunhuang Children's Education Books" focus on integrating Dunhuang's children's education books into the broader context of ancient Chinese children's education. Professor Zhang Hongxun's "Studies on Popular Literature in Dunhuang" includes a very relevant preface: "Since Dunhuang literature is a literary phenomenon, it is closely linked to other literatures of the same era. Understanding and researching Dunhuang literature should not and cannot be separated from the overall literary development history of that era." Therefore, from any perspective, Dunhuang literary phenomena must be macroscopically observed within the broader context of Chinese literature before they can be studied and explored." Dunhuang literature is the same, and so are other branches of the discipline. Zheng Ruzhong, a researcher specifically studying the music-dance images in Dunhuang murals, is actually focused on supplementing and rewriting the history of Chinese music. This is very clearly stated in his preface. In Huang Zheng's "Studies on Dunhuang Language and Script," the author explicitly states that studying Dunhuang language and script is aimed at "filling the gaps in linguistics," while its research scope is almost identical to traditional Chinese linguistics, phonology, lexicology, grammar, rhetoric, calligraphy, etc., and its research methods are also inherited in the same vein. Jia Yingyi and Qi Xiaoshan's "Buddhist Art from India to Xinjiang in China" is the only work in this series not marked with "Dunhuang." However, the rich materials and detailed analysis in the book vividly prove the genetic relationship between Dunhuang art and Buddhist art in India and Xinjiang in China, and we need to greatly broaden our perspective on studying Dunhuang art.
After completing "Mingsha Collection," I wanted to devote my main efforts to the study of Sino-Western cultural exchange history. However, on June 22, 2000, the centennial anniversary of the discovery of the Dunhuang Cave Manuscripts, many special publications, conferences, and discussions were held in the following period. As a writer who has long been engaged in Dunhuang studies, it was only natural for me to make new contributions to the centennial celebration of Dunhuang studies. Therefore, I adjusted my research plan and shifted the focus of a stage of my research to the history of Dunhuang studies, writing several related articles. These articles form the main body of this book, i.e., the second group of essays, and the title of this book is "New Perspectives on Dunhuang Studies," also for this reason. In fact, I originally wanted to compile a small book titled "Crescent Moon Collection" from the small articles I wrote outside of "Studies on the Guiyi Army History," "Record of Overseas Dunhuang-Turfan Documents," and "Mingsha Collection," mainly recent book reviews and reflections on the research achievements of Dunhuang predecessors. It was later suggested by Professor Liu Jinbao that I decide to collect these small articles into this "New Perspectives on Dunhuang Studies" and include them in the "Dunhuang Studies Series." The first group of articles in this book is mainly historical, including "Revisiting the Treasure of the Dunhuang Cave Manuscripts" and "Famen Temple and Dunhuang," which are actually supplements to "The Nature and Causes of the Closure of the Dunhuang Cave Manuscripts" included in "Mingsha Collection." The third group of articles are book reviews, mainly focused on Dunhuang studies, with some on Turpan and other regions in Xinjiang. The last part consists of articles written in different styles, commemorating predecessors in the history of Dunhuang studies or reflecting on their works.