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Dr. Eng Jin Ooi

Dr. Eng Jin Ooi

Education Background

  • Ph.D. in Buddhist Textual Studies (Mahidol University)
  • M.A. in Buddhist Studies (PGIPBS, University of Kelaniya)
  • Bachelor of Pharmacy (Hons.) (Universiti Sains Malaysia)

Courses Taught

  • Religions, Ethics and the Business World (CRRS 310)
  • Human Rights and Human Dignity (CRRS 224)
  • Concepts of Life and Death in Science and Religion (CRRS 226)

Areas of Research Interest

  • Buddhism in South and Southeast Asia, focuses on Buddhism as a practiced religion from medieval times up to the pre-modern era.
  • South and Southeast Asia manuscript cultures include textual criticism, transmission, and philology in the Middle Indic languages, i.e. Pāḷi and Sanskrit.
  • Early Buddhist epigraphy and history in South and Southeast Asia focusing on Thai-Malay Peninsula

Awards

  • Khyentse Foundation Award for Outstanding Ph.D. Dissertation in Buddhist Studies for the year 2022
  • Dean’s List Award, Faculty of Graduate Studies, Mahidol University, recognized as an outstanding student for the Academic Year 2021
  • The Ratchadapisek Somphot Postdoctoral Fellowship Award from Chulalongkorn University, Thailand, in 2022.

Current Research Projects

  • Critical study of the Milinda-Nāgasena textual tradition preserved in different manuscript recensions and different genres of texts in Southeast Asia (2023 – 2028)
  • Critically edit and translate the Pāli Milindapañha Saṅkhepa – the Brief Version of Questions of Milinda, based on several Khom and Mon script manuscripts. (2022 – 2025)
  • Examine the presentations (in visual art and textual tradition) and transmissions of certain Buddhist dhāraṇīs (mantra), their rituals, and practices in South, East, and Southeast Asia. (2024 – 2026)
  • Participate in the excavation and investigation of a 7th to 8th centuries-Buddhist stupa on Bukit Choras, Kedah (2024 – 2028)
  • Investigate the textual traditions of Dharmacakra inscriptions of Thailand (2024 – 2025)

Selected Publications

2024

  • Ooi, Eng Jin and Nasha Rodziadi Khaw. 2024 (accepted and in press). “Perlis clay sealings from Perlis, Malaysia, and the wider world of the Bodhigarbhālaṅkāralakṣa-dhāraṇī.” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society.
  • Skilling, Peter and Eng Jin Ooi. 2024 (accepted and in press). “Sap Champa: A Centre of Buddhist Culture in Ancient Siam and Its Pāli Inscription Sap Champa 3.” Annual Report of The International Research Institute for Advanced Buddhology at Soka University (ARIRIAB).

2023

  • Ooi, Eng Jin, Andrew Schumann, and Natchapol Sirisawad. 2023. “Defining a meṇḍaka question in the Questions of Milinda and its commentarial texts.” Journal of Indian Philosophy, 51: 567–589. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10781-023-09543-7 or https://rdcu.be/dgCzF

2022

  • Ooi, Eng Jin. 2022. “Transmission of the Milindapañha.” Buddhist Studies Review, Vol. 39.1: 67–111. https://doi.org/10.1558/bsrv.18893
  • Ooi, Eng Jin. 2022. “Aspiring to be a Buddha and Life before Liberation: The Colophons of the Siamese Questions of King Milinda.” Manuscript Studies: A Journal of the Schoenberg Institute for Manuscript Studies, Vol 7, No. 1: 104–129. https://doi.org/10.1353/mns.2022.0002
  • Ooi, Eng Jin. 2022. “Why is the forward sequence of Dependent Origination the wrong path? An annotated translation of the Commentary to the Nidānasaṃyutta’s Discourse of the (Two) Paths.” Journal of the Philosophy and Religion Society of Thailand. Vol. 17 No. 1 (2565): 40–57. https://so04.tci-thaijo.org/index.php/parst/article/view/256630

2021

E-mail

engjin.ooi@mahidol.ac.th

A brief biography

          Dr. Eng Jin Ooi is a faculty member of the College of Religious Studies at Mahidol University in Thailand. Initially trained as a pharmacist in Malaysia, Eng Jin obtained his doctorate in Buddhist Textual Studies from Mahidol University in 2021. His thesis, “The Transmission of the Milindapañha with a Comparative Analysis of the Siamese Recensions,” under the supervision of Giuliano Giustarini, Peter Skilling, and Kengo Harimoto, won both the Khyentse Foundation Award for Outstanding Ph.D. Dissertation in Buddhist Studies in 2022 as well as the Dean’s List Award the same year. Before his current position, he was a Research Fellow at the Chulalongkorn University in Thailand.

          His research interests are textual criticism and philology of Pāli and Sanskrit texts, early Buddhist epigraphy, and archaeology in South and Southeast Asia. Among his recent publications are the “Transmission of the Milindapañha” in Buddhist Studies Review; “Defining a Meṇḍaka Question in the Questions of Milinda,” in the Journal of Indian Philosophy; and “Clay Sealings from Perlis, Malaysia, and the wider world of the Bodhigarbhālaṅkāralakṣa-dhāraṇī,” in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society.

          Currently, he is editing and translating an abridged version of the Pāli Questions of Milinda from several Southeast Asian manuscripts; examining the different textual traditions of the Siamese Milindapañha; studying the practice of certain dhāraṇī cultures across Asia, and participating in the excavation of an early centuries-Buddhist stūpa in Kedah, Malaysia.