Konjaku Monogatari Shu in scholar appreciation: Main issues and problems

“Konjaku monogatari-shu”, a collection of Japanese Buddhist setsuwa tales composed in XII c., has been studied by Japanese scholars using Western methodology from the end of XIX and the beginning of XX cc. That is also the time when Western scholars start mentioning it in their works. From the very beginning untill recent times publications dealing with “Konjaku” gave special attention to the appraising of the text: the authors speculated if we could put this record amidst other chefs d’oeuvres of Japanese literature, its main outcomes? Review of those speculations shows us some particularities of the history of XX c. Japanese studies. Depending on the period when this of those study was made we can find there problems of the origins of “Konjaku”, should they be found in folklore or in the literature, of the religious and artistic tasks of “Konjaku”. The answers to all these questions are determinative to a large extent for the suggestions made by scholars about the circumstances of creation of “Konjaku”, its author(s), its composition in the whole and the meaning of its particular tales.