ABSTRACT
It has long been recognized that literary texts played a central role in the imperial Chinese polity. The most familiar example of this is the examina tion system of late imperial China, where the primary road to honor, power, and wealth lay through the mastery of a prescribed body of texts. The link between literary attainments and political power, however, long antedated the formal system of awarding office through performance on written exami nations. In fact it dated back to the beginning of the empire and remained, in varying forms and degrees, fundamental to the Chinese social and political order. As Buddhism developed in China, its texts became entangled in this linkage of letters and authority, and the questions of textual authenticity or validity became political issues. Consequently the study of Buddhist apocrypha in China cannot be separated from the broader questions of the relations of “scriptural” texts to political authority.
