Natalie Gummer Sūtra Time

Why do stories of past lives and visions of the future play such a central role in many Mahāyāna sūtras In this presentation, I explore how attending to the narrative and performative orchestration of time in the sūtras can enhance our understanding of their promises to transform the present lives of their listeners, readers, and reciters. This exploration also offers fresh perspectives on the ways in which contemporary approaches to narrating the past and the future may offer comparable, if also quite different, resources for altering the present. , mahayana, sutra, spotlightseries