英文摘要
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Scriptures-chanting is an important and major component of Daoist ritual. The essential Daoist fasting ritual (zhai 齋), is composed of two main segments at its inception, i.e., "enacting the Dao" (xing Dao 行道) and "chanting scriptures" (zhuanjing 轉經). To this day, scripture recitation is still an indispensable part of Daoist fasting and offering liturgies (zhaijiao keyi 齋醮科儀). However, scripture recitation is not part of the early Daoist practice, nor is it commonly seen across Daoist scriptures. How exactly does this rite eventually develop into an essential practice found in major scriptures? This article studies scripture recitation rites held during the fasting and offering liturgies and undertakes a preliminary investigation of their content, characteristics, and their changes and developments. The investigation focuses specifically on the following three aspects, 1) the formulation and content of Pre-Tang recitation rite, when it was first paired with the rite of "enacting the Dao"; 2) the late Tang scripture recitation rite arranged and standardized by Du Guangting 杜光庭and the specific content of the Southern Song rite, "ritual for ascending to the altar to chant the scriptures" (shengtan zhuanjing yi 陞壇轉經儀), which is considered a continuation of this earlier tradition; 3) the development and changes of scripture recitation rituals after the Yuan and Ming dynasties.
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