|
|
Product Description
From the first century, when Buddhism entered China, the foreign religion shaped Chinese philosophy, beliefs, and ritual. At the same time, Buddhism had a profound effect on the material world of the Chinese. This wide-ranging study shows that Buddhism brought with it a vast array of objects big and small--relics treasured as parts of the body of the Buddha, prayer beads, and monastic clothing--as well as new ideas about what objects could do and how they should be treated. Kieschnick argues that even some everyday objects not ordinarily associated with Buddhism--bridges, tea, and the chair--on closer inspection turn out to have been intimately tied to Buddhist ideas and practices. Long after Buddhism ceased to be a major force in India, it continued to influence the development of material culture in China, as it does to the present day.
At first glance, this seems surprising. Many Buddhist scriptures and thinkers rejected the material world or even denied its existence with great enthusiasm and sophistication. Others, however, from Buddhist philosophers to ordinary devotees, embraced objects as a means of expressing religious sentiments and doctrines. What was a sad sign of compromise and decline for some was seen as strength and versatility by others. Yielding rich insights through its innovative analysis of particular types of objects, this briskly written book is the first to systematically examine the ambivalent relationship, in the Chinese context, between Buddhism and material culture.
Features
- Used Book in Good Condition
Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought
- "This Culture of Ours": Intellectual Transitions in T'ang and Sung China
- Curators of the Buddha: The Study of Buddhism under Colonialism
- The Cloudy Mirror: Tension and Conflict in the Writings of Sima Qian (SUNY series in Chinese Philosophy and Culture)
- How Zen Became Zen: The Dispute over Enlightenment and the Formation of Chan Buddhism in Song-Dynasty China (Kuroda Studies in East Asian Buddhism)
- The Eminent Monk: Buddhist Ideals in Medieval Chinese Hagiography (Kuroda Studies in East Asian Buddhism)
- India in the Chinese Imagination: Myth, Religion, and Thought (Encounters with Asia)
- China: A History (Volume 1): From Neolithic Cultures through the Great Qing Empire, (10,000 BCE - 1799 CE)
- The Death of Woman Wang
- The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism
- Art in China (Oxford History of Art)
*If this is not the "The Impact of Buddhism on Chinese Material Culture (Buddhisms) (Buddhisms: A Princeton University Pr" product you were looking for, you can check the other results by clicking this link
.
Details were last updated on Dec 25, 2024 21:39 +08.
