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CZECHOSLOVAK ACADEMIC STUDY OF BUDDHISM IN THE 1950s AND 1960s: FIELD RESEARCH IN ASIA Lubos Bélka! Masaryk University, Department for the Study of Religions, Brno The article deals with the process of establishing a new branch of the scientific research in Czechoslovakia in 1945 to 1989, the Academic Study of Religions, with special focus on academic Buddhology. Several works have dealt with the similar theme, and therefore we shall not mention the facts that have been published.* The history of Czech study of religions has been recently described in great detail and with due professional care by Toma’ Bubik and Henryk Hoffmann’ with sufficient space devoted to Buddhology and Oriental studies. This contribution is original in that it describes a case study of the field research that took place in Mongolia in the summer 1958, and points out positives and negatives involved in the study in situ. The study is based on the published as well as unpublished materials from the scientific estate of Lumir Jisl, which is part of the family archive.‘ At the time of its origination in the 18" century, academic Buddhology primarily concentrated on the study of texts"; field research started later and in the beginning suffered from substantial prejudice. There were only a few researchers who realized that in order to achieve deep understanding they have to apply another source of scientific information, i.e. the field research, next to the critical study of texts. Buddhology is a discipline belonging to the academic study of religions, which examines Buddhism using scientific methods, without prejudice and outside the de! The publication of the article was supported by the grant INTERVYR — (MUNI/A/0873/2016), Department for the Study of Religions, Faculty of Arts, Masaryk University, Brno, Czech Republic, in 2017. 2 See for instance Zbavitel, DuSan: Oriental Studies in Czechoslovakia. Orbis, Praha 1959; Kolmas, Josef: Buddhist Studies in Czechoslovakia. Bulletin of Tibetology Vol. 11. No. 1. (1974), pp. 5-10; Rozehnalova, Jana: Czech Perspectives on Buddhism, 1860-1989. Journal of Religion in Europe Vol. 1. No. 2. (2008), pp. 156-181; Holba, Jifi: Buddhism and Buddhist Studies in the Czech Republic between the First World War and the Velvet Revolution of 1989. International Journal of Buddhist Thought and Culture Vol. 13. (2009), pp. 35-47; Cirklovä, Jitka: Development of Interest in Buddhism in the Czech Republic. Journal of Global Buddhism Vol. 10. (2009), pp. 5—16. 3 Bubik, Tomas — Hoffmann, Henryk (eds.): Studying Religions with the Iron Curtain Closed and Open. The Academic Study of Religion in Eastern Europe. Brill Publishing House, Leiden 2015. * The author would like to express his thanks to both daughters of Lumir Jisl: Magdaléna Pulicarova and Zuzana Kovanicova for providing the archive documents used for this text. My thanks also extend to Veronika KapiSovska for valuable advice. > Jong de, Jan Willem: A Brief History of Buddhist Studies in Europe and America. Kosei Publishing, Tokyo 1977. 407
