Blurb:

Chapter 9 contains a summary of the arguments made in the earlier parts of the book and final conclusions. In this chapter, I attempt to reconstruct a unique meditative and soteriological paradigm found in early Buddhist and Chan texts. I argue that this paradigm fundamentally differs from the mainstream orthodox Buddhist one. I propose a hypothesis explaining the emergence and development of the latter. I also attempt to explain the relations between Nikāya Buddhism and early Chan and to make sense of the far-reaching similarities between these two traditions.