While Gong Zizhen (1792-1841) has been acclaimed as a patriotic poet and a prophet of revolutions and modernity in China, his Buddhist thoughts and practices have often been either overlooked or misunderstood. Why did Gong profess his devotion to Tiantai Buddhism in particular, and yet why did he choose to criticize the Lotus Sutra, the most sacred scripture for Tiantai? This research investigates Gong's unique Buddhism in relation to modern religiosity and modern Buddhist Studies.

Dr. Lang Chen is a research fellow at the Lieberthal-Rogel Center for Chinese Studies. Before joining the University of Michigan, she was an assistant professor at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University. She received her PhD in religious studies at Yale University and worked as a postdoctoral fellow for the Asia Research Institute at the National University of Singapore. She is working on her book project on Tiantai Buddhism in late imperial China.

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