Download or read book Miracles of Book and Body written by Charlotte Eubanks and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2011 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This is an exciting exploration of the world of Buddhist attitudes towards religious texts, from Indian scriptures to Japanese medieval tales. Its emphasis on discursive strategies—how Buddhist texts function and what they expect of their readers/users (especially, the connection between books, their content, and their readers' bodies)—is a welcome new perspective."—Fabio Rambelli, author of Buddhist Materiality "Miracles of Book and Body is fluidly written and engaging. This book brings the reader to an awareness of the range and foci of medieval 'popular' readings of sutra literature, and Eubanks provides an important perspective to interpreting these narratives that is original and stimulating."—Thomas W. Hare, author of Zeami: Performance Notes "Charlotte Eubanks' sophisticated, insightful and readable study of the physicalities of sutra texts and sutra recitation makes sense of some of the strangest phenomena in medieval Japan. By disentangling the literal and metaphorical meanings in Buddhist setsuwa, Eubanks explains such things as how memorizing a text is an embodiment thereof, how texts can become sentient beings, and why the scroll is an appropriate format for recording dharma. Her work is both important and engaging."—Margaret H. Childs, University of Kansas "Drawing on an impressive range of Mahayana scriptures and medieval Japanese didactic tales, Eubanks unpacks recurrent tropes correlating text and flesh to reveal surprising connections among the literary, material, and ritual dimensions of Buddhist textual culture. Elegantly written and theoretically astute, this volume will be welcomed not only by specialists in Buddhist literature but also by readers interested in broader issues of text-based religious practice."—Jacqueline Stone, author of Original Enlightenment and the Transformation of Medieval Japanese Buddhism

Download or read book Sermons of a Buddhist Abbot written by Sōen Shaku and published by . This book was released on 1906 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Annotation First published in 1906, SERMONS OF A BUDDHIST ABBOT remains one of the best introductions to Buddhist thought for a Western audience. Presented with an incisive new foreword by one of today's foremost scholars of Buddhism and Japanese religion, it contains the lectures and articles of the Japanese Zen abbot Soyen Shaku, whose talks in the United States first popularized Buddhism. Foreshadowing the attitude and method of many contemporary teachers, Shaku advocates an approach to religious life that stresses personal understanding based on practice and experience, rather than the acceptance of received creeds and doctrines. His lucid explanations make use of Western religious, philosophic, and psychological references to clarify the ideas central to understanding of Mahayana Buddhism, which is the basis of all schools and denominations.

Download or read book American Sutra written by Duncan Ryūken Williams and published by Belknap Press. This book was released on 2019-02-19 with total page 401 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Winner of the Grawemeyer Award in Religion A Los Angeles Times Bestseller “Raises timely and important questions about what religious freedom in America truly means.” —Ruth Ozeki “A must-read for anyone interested in the implacable quest for civil liberties, social and racial justice, religious freedom, and American belonging.” —George Takei On December 7, 1941, as the bombs fell on Pearl Harbor, the first person detained was the leader of the Nishi Hongwanji Buddhist sect in Hawai‘i. Nearly all Japanese Americans were subject to accusations of disloyalty, but Buddhists aroused particular suspicion. From the White House to the local town council, many believed that Buddhism was incompatible with American values. Intelligence agencies targeted the Buddhist community, and Buddhist priests were deemed a threat to national security. In this pathbreaking account, based on personal accounts and extensive research in untapped archives, Duncan Ryūken Williams reveals how, even as they were stripped of their homes and imprisoned in camps, Japanese American Buddhists launched one of the most inspiring defenses of religious freedom in our nation’s history, insisting that they could be both Buddhist and American. “A searingly instructive story...from which all Americans might learn.” —Smithsonian “Williams’ moving account shows how Japanese Americans transformed Buddhism into an American religion, and, through that struggle, changed the United States for the better.” —Viet Thanh Nguyen, author of The Sympathizer “Reading this book, one cannot help but think of the current racial and religious tensions that have gripped this nation—and shudder.” —Reza Aslan, author of Zealot

Download or read book Rennyo and the Roots of Modern Japanese Buddhism written by Mark L. Blum and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2006 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Rennyo Shonin (1415-1499) is considered the 'second founder' of Shin Buddhism. This book deals with the major questions surrounding the phenomenal growth of Hongaji under Rennyo's leadership, such as the source of charisma, the soteriological implications of his thought against the background of other movements in Pure Land Buddhism, and more.

Download or read book Presenting Japanese Buddhism to the West written by Judith Snodgrass and published by Univ of North Carolina Press. This book was released on 2003 with total page 374 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Japanese Buddhism was introduced to the West during the World's Parliament of Religions, in the 1893 Columbian Exposition. In describing and analysing this event, this text challenges the view of Orientalism as a one-way process by which Asian cultures are understood through Western ideas.

Download or read book The Dao Companion to Japanese Buddhist Philosophy written by Gereon Kopf and published by Springer. This book was released on 2019-06-03 with total page 737 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The volume introduces the central themes in and the main figures of Japanese Buddhist philosophy. It will have two sections, one that discusses general topics relevant to Japanese Buddhist philosophy and one that reads the work of the main Japanese Buddhist philosophers in the context of comparative philosophy. It combines basic information with cutting edge scholarship considering recent publications in Japanese, Chinese, English, and other European languages. As such, it will be an invaluable tool for professors teaching courses in Asian and global philosophy, undergraduate and graduate students, as well as the people generally interested in philosophy and/or Buddhism.

Download or read book Miraculous Stories from the Japanese Buddhist Tradition written by Keikai and published by Psychology Press. This book was released on 1997 with total page 348 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When we read about the profundity and complexity of the Buddhist tradition, we are hard pressed to imagine how the earliest Japanese priests propagated this tradition and how the common people accepted it. Kyokai's collection of 'miraculous stories throw much light on this.

Download or read book Critical Readings on Pure Land Buddhism in Japan written by Galen Amstutz and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2020-06-08 with total page 466 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Pure Land was one of the main fields of mythopoesis and discourse among the Asian Buddhist traditions, and in Japan of central cultural importance from the Heian period right up to the present. However, its range, inconsistency, variability, and complexity have tended to be misevaluated. The pieces reproduced in this set, organized both chronologically and thematically, have been chosen as linchpin works accentuating the diversity of what evolved under this heading of Buddhism. Special attention is given to the traps into which Western observers may fall, the role of the large True Pure Land (Jōdoshinshū) school, and the richness of Tokugawa and twentieth-century developments. These selections of previously published articles will serve as an essential starting point for anyone interested in this perhaps underestimated area of Buddhist studies.

Download or read book Buddhism and Buddhists in Japan written by Robert Cornell Armstrong and published by . This book was released on 1927 with total page 168 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Intended to furnish accurate and trustworthy, though brief and popular presentations of the actual religious life of each great region of the non-Christian world. It purposes to give to students of religion in the West, and particularly to young missionaries who are planning to go to the Far East, a vivid idea of the religious conditions which exist in Japan and some understanding of the hold of Buddhism upon thsoe who follow it."--Preface.

Download or read book Library of Congress Subject Headings written by Library of Congress and published by . This book was released on 2010 with total page 2056 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Living Images written by Robert H. Sharf and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 2001 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The essays in this volume focus on the historical, institutional, and ritual context of a number of Japanese Buddhist paintings, sculptures, calligraphies, and relics?some celebrated, others long overlooked.

Download or read book Discourse and Ideology in Medieval Japanese Buddhism written by Richard K. Payne and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2006-04-18 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The medieval period of Japanese religious history is commonly known as one in which there was a radical transformation of the religious culture. This book suggests an alternate approach to understanding the dynamics of that transformation. One main topic of analysis focuses on what Buddhism - its practices and doctrines, its traditions and institutions - meant for medieval Japanese peoples themselves. This is achieved by using the notions of discourse and ideology and juxtaposing various topics on shared linguistic practices and discursive worlds of medieval Japanese Buddhism. Collating contributions from outstanding scholars in the field of Buddhist Studies, the editors have created an important work that builds on preliminary work on rethinking the importance and meaning of Kamakura Buddhism published recently in English, and adds greatly to the debate.

Download or read book Zen Buddhism Japan written by Heinrich Dumoulin and published by World Wisdom, Inc. This book was released on 2005 with total page 560 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this second volume of his classic history, one of the world's foremost Zen scholars turns his attention to the development of Zen in Japan.

Download or read book Buddhism and Medicine in Japan written by Katja Triplett and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2019-11-18 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book demonstrates the close link between medicine and Buddhism in early and medieval Japan. It may seem difficult to think of Japanese Buddhism as being linked to the realm of medical practices since religious healing is usually thought to be restricted to prayers for divine intervention. There is a surprising lack of scholarship regarding medicinal practices in Japanese Buddhism although an overwhelming amount of primary sources proves otherwise. A careful re-reading of well-known materials from a study-of-religions perspective, together with in some cases a first-time exploration of manuscripts and prints, opens new views on an understudied field. The book presents a topical survey and comprises chapters on treating sight-related diseases, women’s health, plant-based materica medica and medicinal gardens, and finally horse medicine to include veterinary knowledge. Terminological problems faced in working on this material – such as ‘religious’ or ‘magical healing’ as opposed to ‘secular medicine’ – are assessed. The book suggests focusing more on the plural nature of the Japanese healing system as encountered in the primary sources and reconsidering the use of categories from the European intellectual tradition.

Download or read book Studies in Japanese Buddhism written by August Karl Reischauer and published by . This book was released on 1917 with total page 398 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book A Cultural History of Japanese Buddhism written by William E. Deal and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2015-03-31 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Cultural History of Japanese Buddhism offers a comprehensive, nuanced, and chronological account of the evolution of Buddhist religion in Japan from the sixth century to the present day. Traces each period of Japanese history to reveal the complex and often controversial histories of Japanese Buddhists and their unfolding narratives Examines relevant social, political, and transcultural contexts, and places an emphasis on Japanese Buddhist discourses and material culture Addresses the increasing competition between Buddhist, Shinto, and Neo-Confucian world-views through to the mid-nineteenth century Informed by the most recent research, including the latest Japanese and Western scholarship Illustrates the richness and complexity of Japanese Buddhism as a lived religion, offering readers a glimpse into the development of this complex and often misunderstood tradition

Download or read book Original Enlightenment and the Transformation of Medieval Japanese Buddhism written by Jacqueline I. Stone and published by University of Hawaii Press. This book was released on 2003-05-31 with total page 578 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Original enlightenment thought (hongaku shiso) dominated Buddhist intellectual circles throughout Japan’s medieval period. Enlightenment, this discourse claims, is neither a goal to be achieved nor a potential to be realized but the true status of all things. Every animate and inanimate object manifests the primordially enlightened Buddha just as it is. Seen in its true aspect, every activity of daily life—eating, sleeping, even one’s deluded thinking—is the Buddha’s conduct. Emerging from within the powerful Tendai School, ideas of original enlightenment were appropriated by a number of Buddhist traditions and influenced nascent theories about the kami (local deities) as well as medieval aesthetics and the literary and performing arts. Scholars and commentators have long recognized the historical importance of original enlightenment thought but differ heatedly over how it is to be understood. Some tout it as the pinnacle of the Buddhist philosophy of absolute non-dualism. Others claim to find in it the paradigmatic expression of a timeless Japanese spirituality. According other readings, it represents a dangerous anti-nomianism that undermined observance of moral precepts, precipitated a decline in Buddhist scholarship, and denied the need for religious discipline. Still others denounce it as an authoritarian ideology that, by sacralizing the given order, has in effect legitimized hierarchy and discriminative social practices. Often the acceptance or rejection of original enlightenment thought is seen as the fault line along which traditional Buddhist institutions are to be differentiated from the new Buddhist movements (Zen, Pure Land, and Nichiren) that arose during Japan’s medieval period. Jacqueline Stone’s groundbreaking study moves beyond the treatment of the original enlightenment doctrine as abstract philosophy to explore its historical dimension. Drawing on a wealth of medieval primary sources and modern Japanese scholarship, it places this discourse in its ritual, institutional, and social contexts, illuminating its importance to the maintenance of traditions of lineage and the secret transmission of knowledge that characterized several medieval Japanese elite culture. It sheds new light on interpretive strategies employed in pre-modern Japanese Buddhist texts, an area that hitherto has received a little attention. Through these and other lines of investigation, Stone problematizes entrenched notions of “corruption” in the medieval Buddhist establishment. Using the examples of Tendai and Nichiren Buddhism and their interactions throughout the medieval period, she calls into question both overly facile distinctions between “old” and “new” Buddhism and the long-standing scholarly assumptions that have perpetuated them. This study marks a significant contribution to ongoing debates over definitions of Buddhism in the Kamakura era (1185–1333), long regarded as a formative period in Japanese religion and culture. Stone argues that “original enlightenment thought” represents a substantial rethinking of Buddhist enlightenment that cuts across the distinction between “old” and “new” institutions and was particularly characteristic of the medieval period.