Levi

Japanese: レビ

French orientalist. He studied Sanskrit at the University of Paris, and in 1884 became a member of the Asiatic Society and engaged in researching manuscripts held by the Ministry of India. In 1894 he became a professor at the Collège de France, where he taught Sanskrit, Indology, and linguistics. He was dispatched to India and Japan from 1897 to 1898. He became a professor at the University of St. Petersburg in 1913 and at the University of Strasbourg in 1919. In 1922 he became head of religious studies at the École des Hautes Etudes in Paris. His research covered the entire Indian cultural sphere, including Vedic rituals, classical Indian literature and drama, the history of cultural exchange between Greece and India, comparative studies of Buddhist texts in Sanskrit, Tibetan, and classical Chinese, cataloging of Tibetan and Central Asian texts, and deciphering Tocharian B. During his third visit to Japan in 1927, he was director of the Maison Franco-Japonais, and after returning to Japan he served as vice president of the Asiatic Society of France, and was said to be the pinnacle of French orientalism. His books include Indian Drama (1890), The Theory of Ritual in the Brahmanas (1898), and Materials for the Study of the Yogacara System (1932), and he has also edited and published two volumes of the Mahayana Sutra Commentary.

Levi

French mystic. His real name was Alphonse Louis Constant. He is known for his research on magic and Kabbalah. His major work, Doctrine and Ritual of High Magic (1855-1856), is a fundamental text in this field covering theory and practice. It also had a significant influence on Baudelaire, Mallarmé, Breton, and others.

Source : Heibonsha Encyclopedia About MyPedia Information

Japanese:

フランスの東洋学者。パリ大学でサンスクリットを学び，1884年アジア協会会員となってインド省が所蔵する写本の調査に従事した。1894年コレージュ・ド・フランスの教授となり，サンスクリットやインド学，言語学などを教え，1897年−1898年，インドと日本に派遣された。1913年ペテルブルグ大学，1919年ストラスブール大学教授。1922年からパリ高等研究院の宗教学主任となった。その研究領域は，ベーダ時代の祭式や古典インドの文学・演劇，ギリシア・インド文化交渉史，サンスクリット・チベット語・古典中国語による仏教文献の比較研究，チベット・中央アジア将来の文献の目録化，トカラ語Bの解読など，インド文化圏全域にわたる。1927年の３度目の来日の際は日仏会館館長，帰国後はフランス・アジア協会副総裁を務め，フランスの東洋学の最高峰といわれた。著書に《インド演劇》（1890年），《ブラーフマナにおける祭式の理論》（1898年），《唯識論体系研究資料》（1932年）などがあり，《大乗荘厳経論》２巻などの校訂・出版もある。