Power Wealth And Women In Indian Mahāyāna Buddhism

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Power, Wealth and Women in Indian Mahayana Buddhism

Douglas Osto
Power Wealth and Women in Indian Mahayana Buddhism Book PDF

Author : Douglas Osto
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 201 pages
File Size : 49,5 Mb
Release : 2008-11-19
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9781134018796

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Power, Wealth and Women in Indian Mahayana Buddhism by Douglas Osto Pdf

This book examines the concepts of power, wealth and women in the important Mahayana Buddhist scripture known as the Gandavyuha-sutra, and relates these to the text’s social context in ancient Indian during the Buddhist Middle Period (0–500 CE). Employing contemporary textual theory, worldview analysis and structural narrative theory, the author puts forward a new approach to the study of Mahayana Buddhist sources, the ‘systems approach’, by which literature is viewed as embedded in a social system. Consequently, he analyses the Gandavyuha in the contexts of reality, society and the individual, and applies these notions to the key themes of power, wealth and women. The study reveals that the spiritual hierarchy represented within the Gandavyuha replicates the political hierarchies in India during Buddhism’s Middle Period, that the role of wealth mirrors its significance as a sign of spiritual status in Indian Buddhist society, and that the substantial number of female spiritual guides in the narrative reflects the importance of royal women patrons of Indian Buddhism at the time. This book will appeal to higher-level undergraduates, postgraduates and scholars of religious studies, Buddhist studies, Asian studies, South Asian studies and Indology.

Power, Wealth and Women in Indian Mahāyāna Buddhism

Douglas Osto
Power Wealth and Women in Indian Mah y na Buddhism Book PDF

Author : Douglas Osto
Publisher : Taylor & Francis US
Page : 177 pages
File Size : 53,5 Mb
Release : 2008
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 0415480736

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Power, Wealth and Women in Indian Mahāyāna Buddhism by Douglas Osto Pdf

This book examines the concepts of power, wealth and women in the important Mahayana Buddhist scripture known as the Gandavyuha-sutra, and relates these to the text’s social context in ancient Indian during the Buddhist Middle Period (0–500 CE). Employing contemporary textual theory, worldview analysis and structural narrative theory, the author puts forward a new approach to the study of Mahayana Buddhist sources, the ‘systems approach’, by which literature is viewed as embedded in a social system. Consequently, he analyses the Gandavyuha in the contexts of reality, society and the individual, and applies these notions to the key themes of power, wealth and women. The study reveals that the spiritual hierarchy represented within the Gandavyuha replicates the political hierarchies in India during Buddhism’s Middle Period, that the role of wealth mirrors its significance as a sign of spiritual status in Indian Buddhist society, and that the substantial number of female spiritual guides in the narrative reflects the importance of royal women patrons of Indian Buddhism at the time. This book will appeal to higher-level undergraduates, postgraduates and scholars of religious studies, Buddhist studies, Asian studies, South Asian studies and Indology.

Buddhist Practice and Visual Culture

Julie Gifford
Buddhist Practice and Visual Culture Book PDF

Author : Julie Gifford
Publisher : Taylor & Francis
Page : 249 pages
File Size : 51,5 Mb
Release : 2011-03-16
Category : Art
ISBN : 9781136817960

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Buddhist Practice and Visual Culture by Julie Gifford Pdf

Providing an overall interpretation of the Buddhist monument Borobudur in Indonesia, this book looks at Mahayana Buddhist religious ideas and practices that could have informed Borobudur, including both the narrative reliefs and the Buddha images. The author explores a version of the classical Mahayana that foregrounds the importance of the visual in relation to Buddhist philosophy, meditation, devotion, and ritual. The book goes on to show that the architects of Borobudur designed a visual world in which the Buddha appeared in a variety of forms and could be interpreted in three ways: by realizing the true nature of his teaching, through visionary experience, and by encountering his numinous presence in images. Furthermore, the book analyses a particularly comprehensive and programmatic expression of Mahayana Buddhist visual culture so as to enrich the theoretical discussion of the monument. It argues that the relief panels of Borobudur do not passively illustrate, but rather creatively "picture" selected passages from texts. Presenting new material, the book contributes immensely to a new and better understanding of the significance of the Borobudur for the field of Buddhist and Religious Studies.

Buddhist Feminisms and Femininities

Karma Lekshe Tsomo
Buddhist Feminisms and Femininities Book PDF

Author : Karma Lekshe Tsomo
Publisher : State University of New York Press
Page : 356 pages
File Size : 48,8 Mb
Release : 2019-01-01
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9781438472577

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Buddhist Feminisms and Femininities by Karma Lekshe Tsomo Pdf

Silver Medalist, 2020 Independent Publisher Book Awards in the Religion (Eastern/Western) Category This groundbreaking book explores Buddhist thought and culture, from multiple Buddhist perspectives, as sources for feminist reflection and social action. Too often, when writers apply terms such as "woman," "femininity," and "feminism" to Buddhist texts and contexts, they begin with models of feminist thinking that foreground questions and concerns arising from Western experience. This oversight has led to many facile assumptions, denials, and oversimplifications that ignore women's diverse social and historical contexts. But now, with the tools of feminist analysis that have developed in recent decades, constructs of the feminine in Buddhist texts, imagery, and philosophy can be examined—with the acknowledgment that there are limitations to applying these theoretical paradigms to other cultures. Contributors to this volume offer a feminist analysis, which integrates gender theory and Buddhist perspectives, to Buddhist texts and women's narratives from Asia. How do Buddhist concepts of self and no-self intersect with concepts of gender identity, especially for women? How are the female body, sexuality, and femininity constructed (and contested) in diverse Buddhist contexts? How might power and gender identity be perceived differently through a Buddhist lens? By exploring feminist approaches and representations of "the feminine," including persistent questions about women's identities as householders and renunciants, this book helps us to understand how Buddhist influences on attitudes toward women, and how feminist thinking from other parts of the world, can inform and enlarge contemporary discussions of feminism.

The Oxford Handbook of Buddhist Practice

Kevin Trainor,Paula Arai
The Oxford Handbook of Buddhist Practice Book PDF

Author : Kevin Trainor,Paula Arai
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 689 pages
File Size : 55,7 Mb
Release : 2022
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9780190632922

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The Oxford Handbook of Buddhist Practice by Kevin Trainor,Paula Arai Pdf

"This Handbook provides a state-of-the-art exploration of several key dynamics in current studies of the Buddhist tradition with a focus on practice. Embodiment, materiality, emotion, and gender shape the way most Buddhists engage with their traditions, in contrast to popular representations of Buddhism as spiritual, disembodied, and largely devoid of ritual. This volume highlights how practice often represents a fluid, dynamic, and strategic means of defining identity and negotiating the challenges of everyday life. Essays explore the transformational aims of practices that require practitioners to move, gesture, and emote in prescribed ways, including the ways that scholars' own embodied practices are integral to their research methodology. The chapters are written by acknowledged experts in their respective subject areas and taken together offer an overview of current thinking in the field. The volume is of particular value to scholars who seek an orientation to current perspectives on important conceptual, theoretical, and methodological concerns that are shaping the field in areas outside their primary expertise. The inclusion of substantial, up-to-date bibliographies also makes the volume an important guide to current scholarship"--

Yoga Powers

Knut A. Jacobsen
Yoga Powers Book PDF

Author : Knut A. Jacobsen
Publisher : BRILL
Page : 532 pages
File Size : 42,5 Mb
Release : 2011-10-06
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9789004214316

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Yoga Powers by Knut A. Jacobsen Pdf

A neglected topic in the research on yoga and meditation traditions, the extraordinary capacities called yoga powers are at the core of the religious imagination in the history of religions in South Asia. Yoga powers explained the divine, the highest gods were thought of as great yogins, and since major religious traditions considered their attainment as an inevitable part of the salvific process the textual traditions had to provide rational analyses of the powers. The essays of the book provide a number of new insights in the yoga powers and their history, position and function in the Hindu, Buddhist and Jain traditions, in classical Yoga, Haṭha Yoga, Tantra and Śaiva textual traditions, in South Asian medieval and modern hagographies, and in some contemporary yoga traditions.

I Hear Her Words

Alice Collett
I Hear Her Words Book PDF

Author : Alice Collett
Publisher : Windhorse Publications
Page : 316 pages
File Size : 53,7 Mb
Release : 2021-06-15
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9781911407720

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I Hear Her Words by Alice Collett Pdf

Is there gender equality in Buddhist traditions? What do Buddhist texts say about women? This book tells the stories of many inspiring Buddhist women who overcame attempted constraint to gain liberation and become esteemed teachers. An ideal introduction to gender studies in Buddhism and the history of women in the tradition.

Foucault, Buddhism and Disciplinary Rules

Malcolm Voyce
Foucault Buddhism and Disciplinary Rules Book PDF

Author : Malcolm Voyce
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 293 pages
File Size : 42,9 Mb
Release : 2016-12-01
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9781317133773

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Foucault, Buddhism and Disciplinary Rules by Malcolm Voyce Pdf

This book suggests that previous critiques of the rules of Buddhist monks (Vinaya) may now be reconsidered in order to deal with some of the assumptions concerning the legal nature of these rules and to provide a focus on how Vinaya texts may have actually operated in practice. Malcolm Voyce utilizes the work of Foucault and his notions of 'power' and 'subjectivity' in three ways. First, he examines The Buddha's role as a lawmaker to show how Buddhist texts were a form of lawmaking that had a diffused and lateral conception of authority. While lawmakers in some religious groups may be seen as authoritative, in the sense that leaders or founders were coercive or charismatic, the Buddhist concept of authority allows for a degree of freedom for the individual to shape or form themselves. Second, he shows that the confession ritual acted as a disciplinary measure to develop a unique sense of collective governance based on self regulation, self-governance and self-discipline. Third, he argues that while the Vinaya has been seen by some as a code or form of regulation that required obedience, the Vinaya had a double nature in that its rules could be transgressed and that offenders could be dealt with appropriately in particular situations. Voyce shows that the Vinaya was not an independent legal system, but that it was dependent on the Dharmaśāstra for some of its jurisprudential needs, and that it was not a form of customary law in the strict sense, but a wider system of jurisprudence linked to Dharmaśāstra principles and precepts.

Amaravati

Jas Elsner
Amaravati Book PDF

Author : Jas Elsner
Publisher : Reaktion Books
Page : 718 pages
File Size : 47,9 Mb
Release : 2024-07-06
Category : Art
ISBN : 9781789149081

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Amaravati by Jas Elsner Pdf

A visual exploration of the Buddhist stupa or reliquary mounds at one of ancient India’s most remarkable monuments at Amarāvatī. In this book, Jaś Elsner presents a fresh perspective on the rich visual culture of ancient South Asia, connecting the stupa’s artistic innovations with advancements in Buddhist philosophy and practice. He offers new insights into early Buddhist art in South India, as well as a new understanding of the relationship between early Buddhism and its material culture. The photographs collected here, particularly those featuring objects from the British Museum in London, reveal in detail how the stupa communicated Buddhist teachings and practices to its followers, making this book an invaluable resource for students and scholars alike.

The Buddha's Footprint

Johan Elverskog
The Buddha s Footprint Book PDF

Author : Johan Elverskog
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 192 pages
File Size : 45,8 Mb
Release : 2020
Category : Asia
ISBN : 9780812251838

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The Buddha's Footprint by Johan Elverskog Pdf

"An environmental history of Buddhism. The book addresses the basic concerns of environmental history: the history of human thought about "nature" or "the environment"; the influence of environmental factors on human history; and the effect of human-caused environmental changes on human society"--

Dialogue in Early South Asian Religions

Brian Black,Laurie Patton
Dialogue in Early South Asian Religions Book PDF

Author : Brian Black,Laurie Patton
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 278 pages
File Size : 51,5 Mb
Release : 2016-03-09
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9781317151425

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Dialogue in Early South Asian Religions by Brian Black,Laurie Patton Pdf

Dialogue between characters is an important feature of South Asian religious literature: entire narratives are often presented as a dialogue between two or more individuals, or the narrative or discourse is presented as a series of embedded conversations from different times and places. Including some of the most established scholars of South Asian religious texts, this book examines the use of dialogue in early South Asian texts with an interdisciplinary approach that crosses traditional boundaries between religious traditions. The contributors shed new light on the cultural ideas and practices within religious traditions, as well as presenting an understanding of a range of dynamics - from hostile and competitive to engaged and collaborative. This book is the first to explore the literary dimensions of dialogue in South Asian religious sources, helping to reframe the study of other literary traditions around the world.

Buddhism in the Shadow of Brahmanism

Johannes Bronkhorst
Buddhism in the Shadow of Brahmanism Book PDF

Author : Johannes Bronkhorst
Publisher : BRILL
Page : 302 pages
File Size : 47,6 Mb
Release : 2011-02-14
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9789004201422

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Buddhism in the Shadow of Brahmanism by Johannes Bronkhorst Pdf

This book deals with the confrontation of Buddhism and Brahmanism in India. Both depended on support from the royal court, but Buddhism had less to offer in return than Brahmanism. Buddhism developed in a manner to make up for this.

An Indian Tantric Tradition and Its Modern Global Revival

D.E. Osto
An Indian Tantric Tradition and Its Modern Global Revival Book PDF

Author : D.E. Osto
Publisher : Taylor & Francis
Page : 213 pages
File Size : 52,9 Mb
Release : 2020-03-06
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9781000049237

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An Indian Tantric Tradition and Its Modern Global Revival by D.E. Osto Pdf

This book analyzes the contemporary global revival of Nondual Śaivism, a thousand-year-old medieval Hindu religious philosophy. Providing a historical overview of the seminal people and groups responsible for the revival, the book compares the tradition’s medieval Indian origins to modern forms, which are situated within distinctively contemporary religious, economic and technological contexts. The author bridges the current gap in the literature between "insider" (emic) and "outsider” (etic) perspectives by examining modern Nondual Śaivism from multiple standpoints as both a critical scholar of religion and an empathetic participant-observer. The book explores modern Nondual Śaivism in relation to recent scholarly debates concerning the legitimacy of New Age consumptive spirituality, the global spiritual marketplace and the contemporary culture of narcissism. It also analyzes the dark side of the revived tradition, and investigates contemporary teachers accused of sexual abuse and illegal financial activities in relation to unique features of Nondual Śaivism’s theosophy and modern scholarship on new religious movements (NRMs) and cults. This book shows that, although Kashmir Śaivism has been adopted by certain teachers and groups to market their own brand of "High Tantra," some contemporary practitioners have remained true to the system’s fundamental tenets and teach authentic (albeit modern) forms of Nondual Śaivism. This book will be of interest to academics in the fields of religion and Asian philosophies, especially South Asian, tantric, neo-tantric and yoga philosophies, alternative and New Age spiritualities, religion and consumerism, and NRMs and cults. Winner of the inaugural 2021 New Zealand Asia Society Book Award, second prize.

The Buddhist Art of Living in Nepal

Lauren Leve
The Buddhist Art of Living in Nepal Book PDF

Author : Lauren Leve
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 315 pages
File Size : 54,9 Mb
Release : 2016-08-05
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9781317308911

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The Buddhist Art of Living in Nepal by Lauren Leve Pdf

Theravada Buddhism has experienced a powerful and far-reaching revival in modern Nepal, especially among the Newar Buddhist laity, many of whom are reorganizing their lives according to its precepts, practices and ideals. This book documents these far-reaching social and personal transformations and links them to political, economic and cultural shifts associated with late modernity, and especially neoliberal globalization. Nepal has changed radically over the last century, particularly since the introduction of liberal democracy and an open-market economy in 1990. The rise of lay vipassana meditation has also dramatically impacted the Buddhist landscape. Drawing on recently revived understandings of ethics as embodied practices of self-formation, the author argues that the Theravada turn is best understood as an ethical movement that offers practitioners ways of engaging, and models for living in, a rapidly changing world. The book takes readers into the Buddhist reform from the perspectives of its diverse practitioners, detailing devotees' ritual and meditative practices, their often conflicted relations to Vajrayana Buddhism and Newar civil society, their struggles over identity in a formerly Hindu nation-state, and the political, cultural, institutional and moral reorientations that becoming a "pure Buddhist"—as Theravada devotees understand themselves—entails. Based on more than 20 years of anthropological fieldwork, this book is an important contribution to scholarly debates over modern Buddhism, ethical practices, and the anthropology of religion. It is of interest to students and scholars of Asian Religion, Anthropology, Buddhism and Philosophy.

Engendering the Buddhist State

Ashley Thompson
Engendering the Buddhist State Book PDF

Author : Ashley Thompson
Publisher : Routledge
Page : 249 pages
File Size : 46,9 Mb
Release : 2016-04-14
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9781317218197

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Engendering the Buddhist State by Ashley Thompson Pdf

Drawing from more than a decade of field and archival research, this monograph concerns Cambodian cultural history and historiography, with an ultimate aim of broadening and deepening bases for understanding the Cambodian Theravadin politico-cultural complex. The book takes the form of an interdisciplinary analysis of performative and representational strategies for constituting social collectivities, largely developed at Angkor. The analysis involves extended close readings of a wide range of cultural artefacts including epigraphic and manuscript texts, sculpture and ritual practices. The author proposes a critical re-evaluation of dominant paradigms of Cambodian historiography in view of engendering new histories, or hybrid histories, which make room for previously absent perspectives and voices, while developing new theoretical tools engaging with and partially derived from "indigenous" narrative practices in the broadest sense. In this history-making process the historical event is shown to never be entirely separable from its aesthetic representation. Particular attention is paid to the roles of sexual difference in such (re)constructions of history. The book presents a theory of power capable of accounting for the historical phenomena by which vernacular cultures appropriate, subvert and submit to cosmopolitan forces. It charts out a novel approach to the study of classical Southeast Asian materials, and is of interest to students and scholars of Asian Art, Religion and Philosophy, Buddhism and Southeast Asian History.