Many suttas of the P?li Canon report on how Buddha conversed with Brahams, ascetics and housekeepers about religious matters. In this volume Caroline Widmer studies the extant literary traces concerning religious differences. Perhaps the oldest complete transmission concerning Buddhism is found in the P?li Canon, which contains literary-narrative disputes with other religions from an emic perspective. The suttas describe, for example, how Buddha met with representatives of other religious groups and discussed with them. Caroline Widmer looks at the extent to which religious differentiation was present during these encounters and how the religious "other" was depicted. She is primarily interested in presenting a narrative analysis of such suttas and in solving the question of their function within the Buddhist tradition.
