Download or read book Of Gods Gifts and Ghosts written by Terence Heng and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-12-02 with total page 385 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How do individuals inscribe their spiritual identities and diasporic ethnicities in the city? Through a series of sociological and photographic essays, Terence Heng maps the various rituals, collectives, individuals and events that characterise Chinese religion practices in Singapore. From spirit mediums to the Hungry Ghost Festival, each chapter engages with the social, the spatial and the ephemeral, and in so doing it will explore the significance and relevance of Chinese religion in a secular nation-state; reveal the strategies and tactics used by diasporic individuals to perform and retain their identities; uncover the importance of flow and fluidity in the making of sacred space; and evidence the value and efficacy of the use of photographs in social research. Of Gods, Gifts and Ghosts is a ground-breaking exploration into the intersections between visual sociology, cultural geography and creative photographic practice. A visual monograph that gives equal importance to image and text, it interrogates the tensions between sacred and profane, official and unofficial, state and individual, physical and spiritual, peeling away the myriad layers of the spiritual imagination.
Download or read book Gods Ghosts and Gangsters written by Avron Boretz and published by University of Hawaii Press. This book was released on 2010-10-31 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Demon warrior puppets, sword-wielding Taoist priests, spirit mediums lacerating their bodies with spikes and blades—these are among the most dramatic images in Chinese religion. Usually linked to the propitiation of plague gods and the worship of popular military deities, such ritual practices have an obvious but previously unexamined kinship with the traditional Chinese martial arts. The long and durable history of martial arts iconography and ritual in Chinese religion suggests something far deeper than mere historical coincidence. Avron Boretz argues that martial arts gestures and movements are so deeply embedded in the ritual repertoire in part because they iconify masculine qualities of violence, aggressivity, and physical prowess, the implicit core of Chinese patriliny and patriarchy. At the same time, for actors and audience alike, martial arts gestures evoke the mythos of the jianghu, a shadowy, often violent realm of vagabonds, outlaws, and masters of martial and magic arts. Through the direct bodily practice of martial arts movement and creative rendering of jianghu narratives, martial ritual practitioners are able to identify and represent themselves, however briefly and incompletely, as men of prowess, a reward otherwise denied those confined to the lower limits of this deeply patriarchal society. Based on fieldwork in China and Taiwan spanning nearly two decades, Gods, Ghosts, and Gangsters offers a thorough and original account of violent ritual and ritual violence in Chinese religion and society. Close-up, sensitive portrayals and the voices of ritual actors themselves—mostly working-class men, many of them members of sworn brotherhoods and gangs—convincingly link martial ritual practice to the lives and desires of men on the margins of Chinese society. This work is a significant contribution to the study of Chinese ritual and religion, the history and sociology of Chinese underworld, the history and anthropology of the martial arts, and the anthropology of masculinity.
Download or read book A Time of Lost Gods written by Emily Ng and published by Univ of California Press. This book was released on 2020-05-12 with total page 223 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Traversing visible and invisible realms, A Time of Lost Gods attends to profound rereadings of politics, religion, and madness in the cosmic accounts of spirit mediumship. Drawing on research across a temple, a psychiatric unit, and the home altars of spirit mediums in a rural county of China’s Central Plain, it asks: What ghostly forms emerge after the death of Mao and the so-called end of history? The story of religion in China since the market reforms of the late 1970s is often told through its destruction under Mao and relative flourishing thereafter. Here, those who engage in mediumship offer a different history of the present. They approach Mao’s reign not simply as an earthly secular rule, but an exceptional interval of divine sovereignty, after which the cosmos collapsed into chaos. Caught between a fading era and an ever-receding horizon, those “left behind” by labor outmigration refigure the evacuated hometown as an ethical-spiritual center to come, amidst a proliferation of madness-inducing spirits. Following pronouncements of China’s rise, and in the wake of what Chinese intellectuals termed semicolonialism, the stories here tell of spirit mediums, patients, and psychiatrists caught in a shared dilemma, in a time when gods have lost their way.
Download or read book Seeing Ghosts Through God s Eyes written by Mark Hunnemann and published by Aviva Pub. This book was released on 2011-12 with total page 251 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Seeing Ghosts through God's Eyes" documents the explosive rise of interest in ghosts, and how this is affecting tens of millions of Americans concept of spirituality. Despite the fact that ghosts have become ensconced in our culture and contributed to the change in the spiritual landscape in the last few years, the church and media have taken a dismissive posture towards this issue. But the main focus of the book is to answer the question: do ghosts exist? Science,logic,and a biblical worldview are used to analyze this question-a unique methodology is employed which unearths evidence and issues never before discussed. Comprehensive and compelling new paranormal and scientific evidence that answers beyond a reasonable doubt the question of whether ghosts exist. The author proposes an empirically verifiable hypothesis which would PROVE his perspective on ghosts. Lastly, titanic issues are at stake in this debate.
Download or read book Needles Herbs Gods and Ghosts written by Linda L. BARNES and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2009-06-30 with total page 475 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When did the West discover Chinese healing traditions? Most people might point to the "rediscovery" of Chinese acupuncture in the 1970s. In Needles, Herbs, Gods, and Ghosts, Linda Barnes leads us back, instead, to the thirteenth century to uncover the story of the West's earliest known encounters with Chinese understandings of illness and healing. A medical anthropologist with a degree in comparative religion, Barnes illuminates the way constructions of medicine, religion, race, and the body informed Westerners' understanding of the Chinese and their healing traditions.
Download or read book Gods Demons Spirits written by Dr. Abraham Kovoor and published by Jaico Publishing House. This book was released on 2000-03-01 with total page 350 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Gods, Demons and Spirits is a worthy successor to the bestseller BEGONE GODMEN. In it, Dr. Abraham Kovoor, the famed rationalist, continues his relentless crusade against charlatans and miraclemen with greater vigour. It is a scathing exposure of the conning methods employed by pseudo-gods, bogus gurus and assorted fakes to entrap their gullible victims.
Download or read book Legends of Gods and Ghosts Hawaiian Mythology written by William Drake Westervelt and published by . This book was released on 1915 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Becoming Enlightened written by His Holiness the Dalai Lama and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2009-01-06 with total page 275 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Becoming Enlightened, His Holiness the Dalai Lama powerfully explores the foundation of Buddhism, laying out an accessible and practical approach to age-old questions: How can we live free from suffering? How can we achieve lasting happiness and peace? Drawing from traditional Buddhist meditative practices as well as penetrating examples from today's troubled planet, he presents step-by-step exercises designed to expand the reader's capacity for spiritual growth, along with clear milestones to mark the reader's progress. By following the spiritual practices outlined in Becoming Enlightened, we can learn how to replace troublesome feelings with positive attitudes and embark on a path to achieving an exalted state -- within ourselves and within the larger world. Full of personal anecdotes and intimate accounts of the Dalai Lama's experiences as a lifelong student, thinker, political leader, and Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, Becoming Enlightened gives readers all the wisdom, support, guidance, and inspiration they need to become successful and fulfilled in their spiritual lives. This is a remarkable and empowering book that can be read and enjoyed by seekers of all faiths. Readers at every stage of their spiritual development will be captivated by His Holiness the Dalai Lama's loving and direct teaching style.
Download or read book UFOs Ghosts and a Rising God written by Chris Hallquist and published by Reasonable Press. This book was released on 2009-04 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Anthropology of Religion Charisma and Ghosts written by Stephen Feuchtwang and published by Walter de Gruyter. This book was released on 2010-06-29 with total page 222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It has been said that Chinese government was, until the republican period, government through li. Li is the untranslatable word covering appropriate conduct toward others, from the guest rituals of imperial diplomacy to the hospitality offered to guests in the homes of ordinary people. It also covers the centring of self in relation to the flows and objects in a landscape or a built environment, including the world beyond the spans of human and other lives. It is prevalent under the republican regimes of China and Taiwan in the forming and maintaining of personal relations, in the respect for ancestors, and especially in the continuing rituals of address to gods, of command to demons, and of charity to neglected souls. The concept of ‛religion’ does not grasp this, neither does the concept of ‛ritual’, yet li undoubtedly refers to a figuration of a universe and of place in the world as encompassing as any body of rite and magic or of any religion. Through studies of Chinese gods and ghosts this book challenges theories of religion based on a supreme god and that god’s prophets, as well as those like Hinduism based on mythical figures from epics, and offers another conception of humanity and the world, distinct from that conveyed by the rituals of other classical anthropological theories.
Download or read book The Ambivalences of Rationality written by Geoffrey Ernest Richard Lloyd and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2018 with total page 137 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Cross-cultural examination of notions and practices of rationality in ancient and modern societies, drawing on philosophy, ethnography and cognitive science.
Download or read book Encyclopedia of Spirits written by Judika Illes and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2010-09-14 with total page 1076 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Enter the World of Spirits! The Encyclopedia of Spirits is a comprehensive and entertaining A to Z of spirits from around this world and the next. Within these pages meet love goddesses and disease demons, guardians of children and guardians of cadavers. Discover Celtic goddesses and goddesses of the Kabbalah, female Buddhas, African Powers, Dragon Ladies, White Ladies, Black Madonnas, the Green Man, the Green Fairy, lots and lots of ghosts, djinn, mermaids, fairies, and more. From the beneficent to the mischievous, working with these spirits can bring good fortune, lasting love, health, fertility, revenge, and relief. Discover: The true identities of over one thousand spirits (as well as their likes and dislikes) How to communicate with specific spirits for your own benefit How to recognize these spirits when they manifest themselves The mythological and historical events associated with specific spirits The colors, days, numbers, and astrological signs associated with specific spirits The Encyclopedia of Spirits also provides an overview of the role of spirit communication throughout history and a general guide to working with spirits. No matter what your life's problems or desires, this book can guide you to the right spirits who can help fulfill your dreams. For the spiritual adept, the amateur, or the simply curious, the Encyclopedia of Spirits will inform, inspire, and delight.
Download or read book Range of Ghosts written by Elizabeth Bear and published by Tor Books. This book was released on 2012-03-27 with total page 335 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A powerful new fantasy from Hugo award–winning author Elizabeth Bear, Range of Ghosts creates a world both deep and broad, where a sorcerer-prince seeks world domination for the glory of his God. Temur, grandson of the Great Khan, is walking from a battlefield where he was left for dead. All around lie the fallen armies of his cousin and his brother who made war to rule the Khaganate. Temur is now the legitimate heir by blood to his grandfather's throne, but he is not the strongest. Going into exile is the only way to survive his ruthless cousin. Once-Princess Samarkar is climbing the thousand steps of the Citadel of the Wizards of Tsarepheth. She was heir to the Rasan Empire until her father got a son on a new wife. Then she was sent to be the wife of a Prince in Song, but that marriage ended in battle and blood. Now she has renounced her worldly power to seek the magical power of the wizards. These two will come together to stand against the hidden cult that has so carefully brought all the empires of the Celadon Highway to strife and civil war through guile and deceit and sorcerous power. The Eternal Sky Trilogy #1 Range of Ghosts #2 Shattered Pillars #3 Steles of the Sky At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
Download or read book For Gods Ghosts and Ancestors written by Janet Lee Scott and published by Hong Kong University Press. This book was released on 2007-05-01 with total page 360 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Offerings of various kinds – food, incense, paper money and figures – have been central to Chinese culture for millennia, and as a public, visual display of spiritual belief, they are still evident today in China and in Chinatowns around the world. Using Hong Kong as a case study, Janet Scott looks at paper offerings from every conceivable angle – how they are made, sold, and used. Her comprehensive investigation touches on virtually every aspect of Chinese popular religion as it explores the many forms of these intricate objects, their manufacture, their significance, and their importance in rituals to honor gods, care for ancestors, and contend with ghosts. Throughout For Gods, Ghosts and Ancestors, paper offerings are presented as a vibrant and living tradition expressing worshippers' respect and gratitude for the gods, as well as love and concern for departed family members. Ranging from fake paper money to paper furniture, servant dolls, cigarettes, and toiletries – all multihued and artfully constructed – paper offerings are intended to provide for the needs of those in the spirit world. Readers are introduced to the variety of paper offerings and their uses in worship, in assisting worshippers with personal difficulties, and in rituals directed to gods, ghosts, and ancestors. We learn of the manufacture and sale of paper goods, life in paper shops, the training of those who make paper offerings, and the symbolic and artistic dimensions of the objects. Finally, the book considers the survival of this traditional craft, the importance of flexibility and innovation, and the role of compassion and filial piety in the use of paper offerings.
Download or read book Kings Gods Spirits from African Mythology written by Jan Knappert and published by VNew York : Schocken ; Vancouver : Douglas & McIntyre. This book was released on 1986 with total page 92 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A collection of African myths, legends and fables about gods, spirits, ghosts, heroes, and animals.
Download or read book God s Ghostbusters written by Thomas Horn and published by Anomalos Publishing. This book was released on 2011-09 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Recently some 300 exorcists flocked to Poland for a week-long congress to examine the current fashion for vampirism the world-over and the apparent connection between this fascination and a surge in demonic possession. This comes as the world is experiencing an explosion of ancient occultism combined with wicked fascination for ghosts and all things paranormal. In the United States alone, there are now more than two hundred thousand registered witches and as many as 8 million unregistered practitioners of “the craft.” On college and high school campuses, vampires, werewolves, and other “creatures of the night” are esteemed as objects of desire and idolized by young men and women who view them as cult icons of envious mystical power. Church goers are enchanted by the darkness as well. An April 13, 2011 article “Mysticism Infecting Nazarene Beliefs” was preceded only a few days before by a Telegraph article describing how a “surge in Satanism” inside the church has sparked a “rise in demand for exorcists” within traditional religious settings.” Why is this happening now? God’s Ghostbusters provides shocking answers in this collaborative work by Gary Bates, Chuck Missler, Gary Stearman, Thomas Horn, Nita Horn, Russ Dizdar, Donna Howell, Derek Gilbert, Sharon Gilbert, Michael Hoggard, Noah Hutchings, Terry James, John McTernan, Jeff Patty, Fred DeRuvo, and Douglas Woodward.
Download or read book Encyclopedia of Spirits and Ghosts in World Mythology written by Theresa Bane and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2016-03-09 with total page 179 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Of all the anomalous phenomenon reported, ghost sightings are by far the most common. The words "ghost" and "spirit" are used interchangeably in American English but in other cultures the lingering souls of the departed are not to be confused with ancestral spirits, demonic spirits, numens or poltergeists. This encyclopedia lists hundreds of entities of the spirit realm--from aatxe to zuzeca--from world mythology and folklore.
