Jialin Cao

This dissertation explores the worship of “Five Great Wisdom Kings (Vidyārāja)” in early Heian Japan from 794 to 1185 CE, examining how their ritual wrath generated new vocabularies and technologies for governing the realm and managing social crises. By tracing their formation in Chinese sūtras and ritual commentaries, their liturgical spaces in the new capital of Heiankyō, and their institutionalization in temple networks sponsored by the Fujiwara regents, the study shows how their wrath helped to integrate and channel social disorder into the Buddhist moral-cosmological order. The project further contends that the Japanese development of the five deities precipitated new ritual strategies that transformed how violence in all its forms–political, natural and religious–was interpreted, combatted, and instrumentalized. In turn, these strategies helped shape nascent forms of political practice distinctive to Heian Japan, while setting precedents for the court’s responses to turmoil, disaster, and spirits affliction for centuries to come.