Power, Wealth and Women in Indian Mahayana Buddhism

This book presents the most detailed and theoretically sophisticated study of the important Mahayana Buddhist scripture Gandavyuha-sutra. The author puts forward a new approach to the study of Mahayana Buddhist sources, the `systems approach¿, by which literature is viewed as embedded in a social system, and he analyses the key themes of power, wealth and women to its social context in ancient India.