„Legenden aus der Frühzeit des japanischen Buddhismus“
日本国現報善悪霊異記
translated by Hermann Bohner (1884-1963)
The site you are currently viewing is entirely in German, with a few Japanese Kanji thrown in. It is an online reproduction of Prof. Hermann Bohner’s 1934 translation of the Japanese book Nihon Ryōiki, originally written by the monk Kyōkai at the end of the Nara-Era (before 820), being the oldest piece of setsuwa literature surviving.
The title has been rendered into English as Miraculous stories from the Japanese Buddhist tradition – the Nihon ryōiki of the monk Kyōkai; by Nakamura Kyoko Motomochi. Her translation, when compared to Bohners’s has shortcomings. The book was published in a first edition Cambridge 1973 (Harvard University Press), secondly Richmond (UK) 1997 (Curzon), 322 p., ISBN 0-7007-0449-3
For research on the Nihon Ryō-iki, even if you are not reading German, you might find the following sections helpful:
- Modern Bibliography,
- Bibliography of later Japanese works,
- Bibliography of preceeding Sino-japanese works, and
- Links
A truely complete bibliography (approx. 1250 titles) of Japanese materials on the NR, up to 2004, has been compiled by Prof. M. Terakawa’s formerly of Doshisha Women's College.
