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Author: Charles Orzech Publisher: Routledge ISBN: 9781138016002 Category : Languages : en Pages : 240
Book Description
The Chinese Buddhist canon contains more material on ritual and liturgy than it does doctrinal commentary. Despite this fact, most research has focused on doctrinal commentary. This book reconceptualizes the historiography of East Asian Buddhism by shifting the focus of analysis from philosophical texts and doctrine to ritual and practice. Concentrating on ritual and on the creation of new liturgical subjects and new liturgical communities, the author analyses 7th century manuals for performing ritual consecrations which were designed to install a deity in a disciple and to make that disciple a vehicle for divine action. These rituals have often been designated "tantric". In this book, they are examined from the perspective of subject formation in the practice of ritual, not from the perspective of sectarian identification in doctrine. The author argues that the new "tantric" rites are developments of earlier practices surrounding ordination and the use of visions. At the same time, the rites created new social bodies and new public subjects. A focus on such practices and subjects provides a new understanding of the role of liturgy and vision in Chinese Buddhism. The book will be of intreested to academics the field of Buddhism, Chinese religion, Tantric Buddhism, ritual studies and theory and method in the study of religion.
Author: Charles Orzech Publisher: Routledge ISBN: 9781138016002 Category : Languages : en Pages : 240
Book Description
The Chinese Buddhist canon contains more material on ritual and liturgy than it does doctrinal commentary. Despite this fact, most research has focused on doctrinal commentary. This book reconceptualizes the historiography of East Asian Buddhism by shifting the focus of analysis from philosophical texts and doctrine to ritual and practice. Concentrating on ritual and on the creation of new liturgical subjects and new liturgical communities, the author analyses 7th century manuals for performing ritual consecrations which were designed to install a deity in a disciple and to make that disciple a vehicle for divine action. These rituals have often been designated "tantric". In this book, they are examined from the perspective of subject formation in the practice of ritual, not from the perspective of sectarian identification in doctrine. The author argues that the new "tantric" rites are developments of earlier practices surrounding ordination and the use of visions. At the same time, the rites created new social bodies and new public subjects. A focus on such practices and subjects provides a new understanding of the role of liturgy and vision in Chinese Buddhism. The book will be of intreested to academics the field of Buddhism, Chinese religion, Tantric Buddhism, ritual studies and theory and method in the study of religion.
Author: Publisher: BRILL ISBN: 9004340505 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 462
Book Description
Bringing together leading authorities in the fields of Chinese and Tibetan Studies alike, Chinese and Tibetan Esoteric Buddhism engages cutting-edge research on the fertile tradition of Esoteric Buddhism (also known as Tantric Buddhism). This state of the art volume unfolds the sweeping impact of esoteric Buddhism on Tibetan and Chinese cultures, and the movement's role in forging distinct political, ethnical, and religious identities across Asia at large. Deciphering the oftentimes bewildering richness of esoteric Buddhism, this broadly conceived work exposes the common ground it shares with other Buddhist schools, as well as its intersection with non-Buddhist faiths. As such, the book is a major contribution to the study of Asian religions and cultures. Contributors are: Yael Bentor, Ester Bianchi, Megan Bryson, Jacob P. Dalton, Hou Chong, Hou Haoran, Eran Laish, Li Ling, Lin Pei-ying, Lü Jianfu, Ma De, Dan Martin, Charles D. Orzech, Meir Shahar, Robert H. Sharf, Shen Weirong, Henrik H. Sørensen, and Yang Fuxue and Zhang Haijuan.
Author: Wei Wu Publisher: Columbia University Press ISBN: 0231553749 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 221
Book Description
During the Republican period (1912–1949) and after, many Chinese Buddhists sought inspiration from non-Chinese Buddhist traditions, showing a particular interest in esoteric teachings. What made these Buddhists dissatisfied with Chinese Buddhism, and what did they think other Buddhist traditions could offer? Which elements did they choose to follow, and which ones did they disregard? And how do their experiences recast the wider story of twentieth-century pan-Asian Buddhist reform movements? Based on a wide range of previously unexplored Chinese sources, this book explores how esoteric Buddhist traditions have shaped the Chinese religious landscape. Wei Wu examines cross-cultural religious transmission of ideas from Japanese and Tibetan traditions, considering the various esoteric currents within Chinese Buddhist communities and how Chinese individuals and groups engaged with newly translated ideas and practices. She argues that Chinese Buddhists’ assimilation of doctrinal, ritual, and institutional elements of Tibetan and Japanese esoteric Buddhism was not a simple replication but an active process of creating new meanings. Their visions of Buddhism in the modern world, as well as early twentieth-century discourses of nation building and religious reform, shaped the reception of esoteric traditions. By analyzing the Chinese interpretation and strategic adaptations of esoteric Buddhism, this book sheds new light on the intellectual development, ritual performances, and institutional formations of Chinese Buddhism in the twentieth century.
Author: Charles Orzech Publisher: BRILL ISBN: 9004184910 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 1223
Book Description
This volume, the result of an international collaboration of forty scholars, provides a comprehensive resource on Esoteric Buddhism and the Tantras in their Chinese, Korean, and Japanese contexts from the first few centuries of the common era to the present.
Author: Karil J. Kucera Publisher: Cambria Press ISBN: 1621967131 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 414
Book Description
Includes 159 color images. Baodingshan consists of a monastic complex and two rock-carved areas, Little Buddha Bend and Great Buddha Bend, located in Dazu in western China and dates from the Southern Song period. The complex is fundamentally different from earlier Buddhist rock-carved sites in China in its construction and layout. Foregoing traditional niche-based iconography for large, deeply cut reliefs reaching dimensions as great as eight meters high by twenty meters wide, within Baodingshan's Great Buddha Bend, the carved works flow from one tableau into another. The site contains both texts and images related to the main schools of Buddhist thought. This book presents an integrated analysis of all of the components of Great Buddha Bend within the greater Baodingshan site, something that was lacking in earlier studies. Written to provide guidance to the site for a wide spectrum of readers-specialists and non-specialists alike-it provides a clear explanation of the major iconographic features of the imagery as well as translations of the numerous accompanying carved Buddhist texts. It also presents the basic tenets of Pure Land, Chan [Zen], Huayan and Esoteric Buddhism in order to explain the features of these sects as seen represented in visual as well as textual form at the site. Lastly, with its focus on ritual use and audience reception from the 12th to the 21st century, this study provides a new model for the discussion and evaluation of other religious sites as entities that organically evolve over time. This study also includes new translations of both the inscribed Buddhist texts and secular inscriptions carved at the site dating from the twelfth through the twenty-first centuries-inscriptions left by educated elite, soldiers, and government officials, highlighting regional issues related to continuity and change made visible at Baodingshan.
Author: Richard K. Payne Publisher: Oxford University Press ISBN: 0199351589 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 449
Book Description
Throughout human history, and across many religious cultures, offerings are made into fire. The essays collected in Homa Variations provide detailed studies of this practice, known in the tantric world as the "homa," from its inception up to the present.
Author: Jinhua Chen Publisher: Taylor & Francis ISBN: 1003853552 Category : Religion Languages : en Pages : 354
Book Description
This book explores trans-cultural and cross-border transmission and transformation of Esoteric Buddhism in East Asia, focusing on its manuscript culture and the transborder transmission of Esoteric Buddhist texts. In East Asia, Esoteric Buddhism’s influences can be seen across all levels of society: not only in that it achieved a recognizable sectarian identity, but also because elements of esoteric teachings were absorbed by other religious schools, influencing their philosophical tenets and everyday practices. The influence was not confined to the religious sphere: scholars have been paying more and more attention to the significance of Tang Esoteric Buddhism in relation to material culture and the dissemination of Esoteric Buddhist technologies in South, Central, and East Asia. No matter how one looks at a maṇḍala—an integral feature of esoteric practice—or the uncannily expressive statues of Buddhas, Bodhisattvas or Yidam that come in all shapes and sizes, or the murals that depict the variegated, mysterious themes of the esoteric tradition, one can always recognise the profound connection between art and Esoteric Buddhism. Esoteric Iifluences also abound in East Asian literature across different genres, displaying its unique characters both in poetry and prose. Likewise, in architecture, one can readily make out the enigmatic, colorful and distinctive elements characteristic of the esoteric tradition. Monks initiated into the esoteric lineages not only brought Buddhist classics and practices to China but also advanced knowledge in astronomy, calendarial calculations and mathematical theories. The chapters in this volume focus on two major aspects of textual Esoteric Buddhism—its manuscript culture and transborder transmission. This book will be beneficial to advanced students and researchers interested in Religious Studies, History and Buddhist studies. It was originally published as a special issue of Studies in Chinese Religions.
Author: Vincent Goossaert Publisher: BRILL ISBN: 1684176530 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 368
Book Description
For two millennia, Chinese society has been producing divine revelations on an unparalleled scale, in multifarious genres and formats. This book is the first comprehensive attempt at accounting for the processes of such production. It builds a typology of the various ritual techniques used to make gods present and allow them to speak or write, and it follows the historical development of these types and the revealed teachings they made possible. Within the large array of visionary, mediumistic, and mystical techniques, Vincent Goossaert devotes the bulk of his analysis to spirit-writing, a family of rites that appeared around the eleventh century and gradually came to account for the largest numbers of books and tracts ascribed to the gods. In doing so, he shows that the practice of spirit-writing must be placed within the framework of techniques used by ritual specialists to control human communications with gods and spirits for healing, divining, and self-divinization, among other purposes. Making the Gods Speak thus offers a ritual-centered framework to study revelation in Chinese cultural history and comparatively with the revelatory practices of other religious traditions.
Author: Michel Strickmann Publisher: ISBN: 9781503617797 Category : RELIGION Languages : en Pages : 432
Book Description
This book argues that the most profound and far-reaching effects of Buddhism on Chinese culture occurred at the level of practice, specifically in religious rituals designed to cure people of disease, demonic possession, and bad luck. This practice would leave its most lasting imprint on the liturgical tradition of Taoism. In focusing on religious practice, it provides a corrective to traditional studies of Chinese religion, which overemphasize metaphysics and spirituality. A basic concern with healing characterizes the entire gamut of religious expression in East Asia. By concentrating on the medieval development of Chinese therapeutic ritual, the author discovers the germinal core of many still-current rituals across the social and doctrinal frontiers of Buddhism and Taoism, as well as outside the Buddhist or Taoist fold. The book is based on close readings of liturgies written in classical Chinese. The author describes and translates many of them, analyzes their structure, and seeks out nonliturgical sources to shed further light on the politics involved in specific performances. Unlike the few previous studies of related rituals, this book combines a scholar's understanding of the structure and goals of these rites with a healthy suspicion of the practitioners' claims to uniqueness.
Author: Charles Orzech
Author: Charles Orzech
Author: 
Author: Wei Wu
Author: Charles Orzech
Author: Karil J. Kucera
Author: David George Johnson
Author: Richard K. Payne
Author: Jinhua Chen
Author: Vincent Goossaert
Author: Michel Strickmann