In his Faculty Research Lecture on March 10, Gregory Schopen
hopes to illuminate a little-known aspect of Buddhism: the fact
that it was one of the earliest social organizations in India to
develop what might be called a corporation. By Ajay Singh AS ONE
OF the world's leading authorities on Buddhism, Gregory Schopen
has shattered many myths, notably the notion that Buddhist monks
in ancient India renounced money and property. While his
painstaking research certainly helped Schopen demystify
monasticism in the land of Buddhism's birth, he owes his
remarkable academic success not so much to scholarship as to his
grandfather, a cowboy in South Dakota. "He told me something
that I've never forgotten and which, though it seems very
simple, has governed my entire scholarly life," said Schopen, a
specialist in Indian Buddhist Studies who chairs the Department
of Asian Languages and Cultures. "He said, 'Don't pay too much
attention to what people say, but watch what they do,' and that,
in some ways, is all I've done