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Johannes Bronkhorst

Portrait of Johannes   Bronkhorst

Johannes Bronkhorst (born 17 July 1946, Schiedam, The Netherlands) is a Dutch Orientalist and Indologist specializing in Buddhist studies and early Buddhism.

Emeritus professor of Sanskrit and Indian Studies at University of Lausanne (he retired in 2011), he studied Mathematics, Physics, and Astronomy at Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam before moving to India, where he took to Sanskrit and Pāli, first at the University of Rajasthan (Jaipur), then the University of Pune (M.A. 1976, Ph.D. 1979). In Pune he read with traditional Sanskrit scholars, specializing in Sanskrit grammar and Indian philosophy. Back in the Netherlands, he did a second doctorate (1980) at the University of Leiden. 

His publications encompass a wide range of topics, including indigenous grammar and linguistics, the interaction between Brahmanism, Buddhism, and Jainism and their philosophical schools and religious practices. Amongst these:

  • How the Brahmins Won From Alexander to the Guptas. Brill. 2016.
  • Buddhism in the Shadow of Brahmanism. Leiden – Boston: Brill. (Handbook of Oriental Studies 2⁄24.). 2011.
  • Language and Reality: On an episode in Indian thought. Leiden — Boston: Brill. 2011.
  • “The spread of Sanskrit.” From Turfan to Ajanta. Festschrift for Dieter Schlingloff on the Occasion of his Eightieth Birthday. Ed. Eli Franco and Monika Zin. Lumbini International Research Institute. 2010. Vol. 1. pp. 117 – 139.
  • “Ritual, holophrastic utterances, and the symbolic mind.” Ritual Dynamics and the Science of Ritual. Volume I: Grammar and morphologies of ritual practices in Asia. Ed. Axel Michaels and Anand Mishra. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. 2010. pp. 159 – 202.
  • “What did Indian philosophers believe?” Logic and Belief in Indian Philosophy. Ed. Piotr Balcerowicz. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass. 2009 [2010]. (Warsaw Indological Studies, 3.) pp. 19 – 44.
  • Greater Magadha. Studies in the culture of early India. Leiden – Boston: Brill. 2007. (Handbook of Oriental Studies, Section 2 South Asia, 19.)
  • “Vedānta as Mīmāṃsā.” Mīmāṃsā and Vedānta: Interaction and Continuity. Ed. Johannes Bronkhorst. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass. (Papers of the 12th World Sanskrit Conference, 10.3.) 2007. pp. 1 – 91.
  • “Systematic philosophy between the empires: some determining features.” Between the Empires: Society in India 300 BCE to 400 CE. Ed. Patrick Olivelle. Oxford etc.: Oxford University Press. 2006. pp. 287 – 313.
  • Sylvain Lévi et les origines du théâtre indien. Asiatische Studien/​Études Asiatiques 57(4), 2003, 793 – 811.
  • Etymology and magic: Yāska’s Nirukta, Plato’s Cratylus, and the riddle of semantic etymologies. Numen 48, 2001, 147 – 203.
  • “Abhidharma and Jainism.” Abhidharma and Indian Thought. Essays in honor of Professor Doctor Junsho Kato on his sixtieth birthday. Ed. Committee for the Felicitation of Professor Doctor Junsho Kato’s Sixtieth Birthday, Nagoya. Tokyo: Shuju-sha. 2000. pp. 598 – 581.