East Asian religions and spiritual beliefs Books

Book SynopsisMaking ingenious use of a wide variety of sources, and old as well as modern technical resources, Kenneth Dean and Zheng Zhenman here set a new standard for an histoire totale for a coherently well-defined cultural region in China.At the same time it deals in-depth with the ongoing negotiation of modernity in Chinese village rituals. Over the past thirty years, local popular religion has been revived and re-invented in the villages of the irrigated alluvial plain of Putian, Fujian, China. Volume 1 provides a historical introduction to the formation of 153 regional ritual alliances made up of 724 villages. Early popular cults, Ming lineages, Qing multi-village alliances, late Qing spirit-medium associations, 20th century state attacks on local religion, and the role of Overseas Chinese and local communities in rebuilding the temple networks are discussed. Volume 2 surveys the current population, lineages, temples, gods, and annual rituals of these villages. Maps of each ritual alliance, the distribution of major cults and lineages, are included. Find information about a film related to the book here.Trade Review"...the overall impression is that this is the product of awe-inspiring labours, and that it provides the raw material for a host of dissertations and books...Together [HO4 22, HO4 23 V.1, and HO4 23 V.2] make the persuasive case that without due consideration to religious life as a vehicle for communal organization and sociality and as a resource for individual and communal self-expression and identity, our analysis both of historical and of contemporary China remains needlessly impoverished." Michael Szonyi, Harvard University, Pacific Affairs: Vol. 85, No. 1 - March 2012 "Dean, Zheng, and their team are still at work, and these volumes represent only the most thoroughly mapped of a series of Putian monographs that are increasingly essential for students of Chinese religion, local history, state and local relations, and emigration during late imperial China and up to the present." Donald Sutton, Carnegie Mellon University, The Journal of Asian Studies, Volume 70/1, February 2011

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Book SynopsisMaking ingenious use of a wide variety of sources, and old as well as modern technical resources, Kenneth Dean and Zheng Zhenman here set a new standard for an histoire totale for a coherently well-defined cultural region in China. At the same time it deals in-depth with the ongoing negotiation of modernity in Chinese village rituals. Over the past thirty years, local popular religion has been revived and re-invented in the villages of the irrigated alluvial plain of Putian, Fujian, China. Volume 1 provides a historical introduction to the formation of 153 regional ritual alliances made up of 724 villages. Early popular cults, Ming lineages, Qing multi-village alliances, late Qing spirit-medium associations, 20th century state attacks on local religion, and the role of Overseas Chinese and local communities in rebuilding the temple networks are discussed. Volume 2 surveys the current population, lineages, temples, gods, and annual rituals of these villages. Maps of each ritual alliance, the distribution of major cults and lineages, are included. Find information about a film related to the book here.Trade Review"...the overall impression is that this is the product of awe-inspiring labours, and that it provides the raw material for a host of dissertations and books...Together [HO4 22, HO4 23 V.1, and HO4 23 V.2] make the persuasive case that without due consideration to religious life as a vehicle for communal organization and sociality and as a resource for individual and communal self-expression and identity, our analysis both of historical and of contemporary China remains needlessly impoverished." Michael Szonyi, Harvard University, Pacific Affairs: Vol. 85, No. 1 - March 2012 "Dean, Zheng, and their team are still at work, and these volumes represent only the most thoroughly mapped of a series of Putian monographs that are increasingly essential for students of Chinese religion, local history, state and local relations, and emigration during late imperial China and up to the present." Donald Sutton, Carnegie Mellon University, The Journal of Asian Studies, Volume 70/1, February 2011 'Ritual Alliances est l'un des livres les plus fascinants et importants parus depuis une décennie, dans le domaine des religions chinoises sans aucun doute, et peut-être des sciences sociales du religieux dans leur ensemble.(...) La masse des données, déjà digérées, systématisées, modélisées, forme le deuxième volume de Ritual Alliances : mille soixante pages décrivant chaque village (quels temples, quels cultes, quels rituels, quels réseaux). Il y a là une source d'informations systématiques qui servira aux chercheurs, occidentaux et chinois, pendant longtemps, mais aussi un modèle méthodologique pour quiconque songe sérieusement à étudier une société locale dans une civilisation à écriture.(...) Mais le plus beau est la façon dont ces données sont synthétisées en une histoire, formant le volume 1. Dans un récit de trois cent trente neuf pages, dense mais clair, Dean raconte l'invention d'une société sur un parcours de dix siècles. (...) On ne peut sans doute pas demander au non-spécialiste de la société chinoise de lire de très près le tome 2, mais on ne peut qu'encourager très vivement l'ensemble des chercheurs en sciences sociales des religions à lire le tome 1 ; ils y trouveront tous un immense profit.' Vincent Goossaert, Bibliographical Bulletin des Archives de Sciences Sociales des Religions

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Book SynopsisThe chapters presented in this volume represent a wide variety of Indian diasporic experiences. From indenture labour to the present day immigrations, Indian diasporic narrative is one that offers opportunities to evaluate afresh notions of ethnicity, race, caste, gender and religious diversity. From victim discourse to narratives of optimism and complexities of identity issues, the Indian diaspora has exhibited characteristics that enable us as scholars to construct theoretical views on the diaspora and migration. The cases included in this volume will illumine such theoretical ideas. The readers will certainly be able to appreciate the diversity and the depth of these narratives and gain insight into the social and cultural and religious world of the diaspora.

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Book SynopsisJapan’s Sexual Gods is an authoritative and original work that describes the unique deities represented by sexual objects in certain Japanese shrines and temples. Hundreds of sexual shrines still exist in spite of previous repression and range from the Tagata Shrine with its well-known giant festival phallus to small obscure places. Many also contain female sexual imagery and some phalluses act in a protective role. The study is based on observations of over 500 sexual sites including phallic festivals, many of which are modern inventions created purely for commercial reasons. The study makes an assessment of the place of sexual beliefs in modern Japan and includes almost 300 stunning original photographs, a glossary and a highly detailed map.

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Book SynopsisThis outline of Korea’s civilisation is a cultural history that examines the ways the Korean people over the past two millennia understood the world and viewed their place in society. In the traditional era, the interaction between several broad religious and philosophical traditions and social institutions, state interests and, at times, external pressures, provides the framework of the story. In the modern era, the chief concern is with the rapid and momentous cultural changes that have occurred over the past one and a half centuries in the idea and spread of education, the rise in influence of students, the development of mass culture, the redefinition of gender, and the continuing importance of religion.

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Book SynopsisText and Context in the Modern History of Chinese Religions: Redemptive Societies and Their Sacred Texts is an edited volume (Philip Clart, David Ownby, and Wang Chien-chuan) offering eight essays on the modern history of redemptive societies in China and Vietnam by an international cast of scholars. The focus of the volume is on the texts produced by the various groups, examining questions of textual production (spirit-writing), textual traditions (how to “modernize” traditional discourse), textual authority (the role of texts in making a master a master), and the distribution of texts (via China’s experience of “print capitalism”). Throughout, the goal is to explore in depth what some scholars have called the most vital aspect of Chinese religion during the Republican period.Trade Review"For everybody interested in new religious movements in China, the new book edited by Philip Clart, David Ownby, and Wang Chien-chuan, Text and Context in the Modern History of Chinese Religions: Redemptive Societies and Their Sacred Texts is a gift." -Massimo Introvigne in Bitter Winter, June 27th, 2020 "Clart and Ownby lament in the introduction that "redemptive societies" have thus far received essentially no mention in modern scholarly works of contemporary Chinese history. This volume certainly succeeds in addressing this problem." -Joseph Chadwin in Religious Studies Review, Vol. 46, No. 4 (December 2020) "In brief, this volume is a collection of excellent, fine-grained case studies that will open the way for a comprehensive history of the production, distribution, and use of religious texts in modern China. This may still be on the distant horizon, but Text and Context brings it significantly closer by providing several methodological models and sets of questions that are sure to prove fruitful across the various religious traditions, and by showing how many fascinating sourcess there exist when one looks for them." - Vincent Goossaert in Journal of Chinese Religions, Vol. 49, No. 1 (May 2021)Table of ContentsContents On the Contributors Introduction  Philip Clart and David Ownby 1 Giving Believers Back Their Voice: Agency and Heresy in Late Imperial China  Barend J. ter Haar 2 The Composition and Distribution of the Scriptures of the Tongshanshe, with a Focus on the Ten Thousand Buddha Scripture (1917–1949)  Wang Chien-chuan Translated by David Ownby 3 The Religious Texts of the Moral Studies Society: Print Publications, Photographs, and Visual Presentations  Fan Chun-wu Translated by David Ownby 4 Science and Spirit-Writing: the Shanghai Lingxuehui 靈學會 and the Changing Fate of Spiritualism in Republican China  Matthias Schumann 5 Text and Context: a Tale of Two Masters  David Ownby 6 Transmission and Revision: Scripture Production in the Vietnamese Tứ n Hiếu Nghĩa Movement  Chung Yun-Ying (Translated by Philip Clart) 7 The Bible of the Great Cycle of Esotericism: from the Xiantiandao Tradition to a Cao Ðài Scripture in Colonial Vietnam  Jeremy Jammes and David A. Palmer 8 Text and Context in the Study of Spirit-Writing Cults: a Methodological Reflection on the Relationship of Ethnography and Philology  Philip Clart Index

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Book SynopsisThis volume is a collection of studies of various religious groups in the changing religious markets of China: registered Christian congregations, unregistered house churches, Daoist masters, and folk-religious temples. The contributing authors are emerging Chinese scholars who apply and respond to Fenggang Yang’s tricolor market theory of religion in China: the red, black, and gray markets for legal, illegal, and ambiguous religious groups, respectively. These ethnographic studies demonstrate a great variety within the gray market, and fluidity across different markets. The volume concludes with Fenggang Yang reviewing the introduction of the religious market theories to China and formally responding to major criticisms of these theories.

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Book SynopsisSanātana Gosvāmin’s Haribhaktivilāsa (ca. 1540) describes the normative ritual life of a Vaiṣṇava devotee. As it is one of the first Sanskrit texts of Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇava tradition begun by Śrī Kṛṣṇa Caitanya (1486–1533) it presents a fascinating meeting between this ecstatic new religious movement and older, Brahminical tradition. On the basis of eleven manuscripts, this important text has now been for the first time been critically edited. In his extensive introduction, Måns Broo engages with many of the questions that have vexed earlier scholars of this text (such as who really was the author?) by exploring its extensive intertextualities.Table of ContentsPreface Introduction  1 Introduction to the Text  2 Who Wrote the Haribhaktivilāsa?  3 Summary of Contents  4 Style and Method of the Text and Commentary  5 Historical Context of the Haribhaktivilāsa  6 The Theology of the Haribhaktivilāsa  7 Intertextualities  8 The Haribhaktivilāsa in Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇava History  9 Sources for the Critical Edition  10 Conventions in the Critical Apparatus and Translation Critically Edited Text and Translation 1 On the Guru  Declaration of Contents  The Reason for Approaching a Guru  Approaching a Guru  The Mandatoriness of Approaching a Guru  Specific Characteristics of a Guru  Characteristics of a Non-guru  Characteristics of a Disciple  Those to Be Rejected  Observation  Specific Rules for Serving the Guru  The Great Sin That Otherwise Will Befall Both  The Disciple’s Prayer  The Greatness of the Lord  The Greatness of Vaiṣṇava Mantras  There, the Greatness of the Twelve-Syllable and the Eight-Syllable Mantras  There Also, That Of The Twelve-Syllable Mantra  Of the Eight-syllable Mantra  That of the King of Mantras, the Anuṣṭubh of Śrī Narasiṃha  The Greatness of Mantras of Rama  The Greatness of Mantras of Lord Gopāla  The Greatness of the Eighteen-Syllable Mantra  Deliberation on Eligibility  The Determination of Siddha, Sādhya and so on  Mantras That Are an Exception to This  Purification of Mantras 2 On Initiation  Rules for Initiation  The Mandatoriness of Initiation  The Greatness of Initiation  The Time for Initiation  Consideration of Days  Consideration of Lunar Mansions  Consideration of Lunar Days  Exceptions  Rules for Constructing the Pavilion  Rules for Fashioning the Pit  Rules for the Initiatory Maṇḍala  The Worship That Is a Part of Initiation  First, the Procedure for Establishing the Waterpot  Rules for Establishing the Conch  Rules for Worshipping the Lord in the Waterpot  Rules for the Initiatory Fire Sacrifice  The Divinities of the Limbs  The Eight Forms  Measures for the Ingredients of the Fire Offerings  Rules for Guru and Disciple  These Were the Duties of the Preceding Day. Now the Duties of the Day of Initiation  Rules for the Anointment  The Mantra of Ceremonial Bathing  Rules for Imparting the Mantra  The Regulations  The Procedure for Initiation in the Blessed Varāha Purāṇa  Simplified Initiation  Instruction  The Greatness of Bestowing the Mantra 3 On Purification  The Mandatoriness of Worship for the Initiated  Sadācāra  The Mandatoriness of Sadācāra  The Greatness of Sadācāra  Daily Duties  The Morning Glorification and Remembrance  First: The Mandatoriness of Remembrance  The Greatness of Remembrance  It Surpasses Bathing at All Tīrthas  It Is Supremely Purifying  It Uproots Sins  It Liberates One from All Misfortune  It Uproots Bad Habits  It Causes All Auspiciousness  It Bestows the Fruits of All Holy Observances  It Causes the Excellence of Rituals  It Surpasses All Rituals  It Removes All Fears  It Awards Liberation  It Propitiates the Lord  It Leads One to the Vaikuṇṭha World  It Leads to Sameness of Form  It Subdues the Blessed Lord  It Is the Highest Fruit in Itself  Morning Obeisances  The Prayer  Words of Obeisance  The Morning Meditation  The Greatness of Meditation  It Destroys Sins  It Removes the Faults of the Kali Age  It Gives One Eligibility for All Rituals  It Affords One Liberation  It Brings One to Vaikuṇtha  It Leads to Sameness of Form  It Awards the Highest Fruit on Its Own Accord  Waking the Blessed Lord  Removing Nirmālya  Cleansing the Blessed Mouth  The Greatness of Offering the Blessed Tooth-Twig  The Auspicious Nīrājana  The Preliminaries of the Morning Bath  Rules for Attending to the Call of Nature  Rules for Cleansing  When Only Passing Urine  Rules for Ācamana  Vaiṣṇava Ācamana  Rules for Brushing the Teeth  The Mandatoriness of Brushing the Teeth  Days When the Tooth-Twig Is Forbidden  The Substitute for These Days  The Exception to This  Tooth-Twigs  Arranging the Hair and so Forth  Bathing  The Mandatoriness of Bathing  The Greatness of Bathing  Rules for Bathing  A Detail  Further Details  The Mantra for Taking the Lord’s Foot-Water on the Head  The Greatness of Sprinkling Oneself with the Lord’s Foot-Water  And Its Mandatoriness  The General Libation to the Gods and Others  Vedic Sandhyā  Tantric Sandhyā  Its Rules  The Kāma Gāyatrī  Another Opinion on the Rules for Tantric Sandhyā  Rules for Worship of the Lord in Water  Specific Libations to the Gods and Others  Considering the Proper Attitude at Bathing and so on 4 On the Ornaments of the Vaiṣṇava  Cleaning the Lord’s Temple  The Greatness of Cleaning the Temple  The Greatness of Plastering  The Greatness of Sprinkling  The Greatness of Maṇḍalas  Characteristics of a Svastika  Hoisting Flags, Banners and so on  The Greatness of Hoisting Flags  The Greatness of Hoisting Banners  The Greatness of Raising Festoons of Leaves and Trunks of Banana Trees  Cleaning the Seat, Vessels, Clothes and so on  The Seat  Metal Vessels  Clothes and so on  Grains and so on  Picking Flowers, Tulasī and so on for the Sake of Worship  Rules for Bathing at Home  Bathing with Warm Water  The Forbidden Days  Bathing with Myrobalan  Bathing with Sesame  Bathing with Oil  The Greatness of Anointing with Tulasī Water  Rules for Wearing Clothes  The Seat  Rules for the Seat  The Rules for the Twelve Tilakas  The Crown Mantra  The Mandatoriness of the Vertical Marks  The Greatness of the Vertical Mark  Rules for Drawing the Vertical Mark  The Mandatoriness of the Empty Middle Portion of the Vertical Mark  Therefore, the Statement on the Characteristics of Hari’s Temple  Regarding the Rules for Which Fingers to Use When Applying Tilaka  The Types of Clay for the Vertical Mark  There, the Greatness of Gopīcandana  The Greatness of the Vertical Mark Made with Gopīcandana  The Greatness of Marks Made with Mud from the Roots of Tulasī  The Mandatoriness of Wearing the Mudrās  The Greatness of Wearing the Mudrās  Rules for Wearing the Mudrās  Characteristics of the Disc and so on  Wearing Mālās and so on  Rules for Wearing Mālās  The Mandatoriness of Wearing Mālās  The Greatness of Wearing Mālās  Rules for Performing Sandhyā at Home  Worship of the Blessed Guru  The Greatness of the Blessed Guru  The Exception to This  The Result of Not Devoting Oneself to the Guru 5 On the Objects  Worship at the Gate  Worship Inside the House  The Seat for Worship  The Seat Mantra  Seats  Specific Faults and Merits of Seats  Placing the Vessels  The Vessels and Their Greatness  Establishing the Auspicious Pitcher  The Ingredients for Arghya and so on  The Auspicious Peace  Removal of Obstacles  Bowing to the Blessed Gurus  Bhūtaśuddhi  And This is the Procedure  Prāṇāyāma  The Greatness of Prāṇāyāma  First, Mātṛkā Nyāsa  The Inner Mātṛkā Nyāsa  Keśavādi Nyāsa  The Meditation  The Blessed Forms  The Śaktis  Tattva Nyāsa  A Further Special Form of Prāṇāyāma  The Times, Numbers and so on  Pīṭha Nyāsa  The Pīṭha Mantra  Remembering the Sage and so on  Aṅga Nyāsa  Akṣara Nyāsa  Pada Nyāsa  Rṣyādi Nyāsa  The Five Mudrās  Procedure for Meditating on the Blessed Lord  The Inner Sacrifice  The Procedure for Prayer  Establishing the Conch  Worship of the Seat in One’s Own Body  Mantra Aṅga Nyāsa, Etc., on the Limbs of the Lord  Internal Worship with External Items  The Greatness of the Internal Sacrifice  The External Worship  The Objects of Worship  The Blessed Forms  Characteristics of the Blessed Forms  The Twenty-Four Forms of the Siddhārta Saṃhitā  The Śālagrāma Stones  Their Merits and Faults Connected with Colour and so on  And These Faults Relate to Worshipping with Desires  Their Different Names Depending on Their Different Characteristics  The Greatness of the Śālagrāma Stone  The Special Result of Worshipping Many  The Prohibition against Buying or Selling Them  The Prohibition against Installation  The Best of All Objects  The Mandatoriness of Worshipping the Śālagrāma Stone  The Greatness of Uniting the Śālagrāma Stone with the Stone Marked with the Discs of Dvārakā  The Characteristics of the Stone Marked with the Discs of Dvārakā  The Greatness of the Stone Marked with the Discs of Dvārakā  Their Different Fruits according to Their Different Number of Discs  Faults and Merits and Whether to Worship or Not Depending on Colour and so on Appendix 1: The Greatness of the Ten-Syllable Mantra Appendix 2: The Meditation on Kṛṣṇa in Gautamīya Tantra 10.142cd–159ab Appendix 3: Maṇḍalas in the Text Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisFew religious innovations have shaped Chinese history like the emergence of spirit-writing during the Song dynasty. From a divinatory technique it evolved into a complex ritual practice used to transmit messages and revelations from the Gods. This resulted in the production of countless religious scriptures that now form an essential corpus, widely venerated and recited to this day, that is still largely untapped by research. Using historical and ethnographic approaches, this volume for the first time offers a comprehensive overview of the history of spirit-writing, examining its evolution over a millennium, the practices and technologies used, and the communities involved.Table of ContentsAcknowledgments List of Figures and Tables Note on Formal Conventions Dynastic Table 1 Introduction to the Volume  Matthias Schumann and Elena Valussi Part 1 Overview Papers 2 Making the Gods Write: A Short History of Spirit-Written Revelations in China, 1000–1400  Vincent Goossaert 3 Spirit-Writing Practices from the Song to Ming Periods and Their Relation to Politics and Religion  Wang Chien-chuan 王 見川 4 Women, Goddesses, and Gender Affinity in Spirit-Writing  Elena Valussi Part 2 Changing Techniques and Practices 5 Terminology and Typology of Spirit-Writing in Early Modern China: A Preliminary Study  Hu Jiechen 6 The Transcendent of the Plate The Lingji zhimi 靈乩指迷 (Instructions on the numinous stylus) and the Reform of Spirit-Writing Techniques during the First Half of the Twentieth Century  Fan Chun-wu 范 純武 Part 3 Spirit-Writing and the Literati Elites in Late Imperial China 7 Instantiating the Genealogy of the Way: Spirit-Writing in the Construction of Peng Dingqiu’s Confucian Pantheon  Daniel Burton-Rose 8 A Credulous Skeptic: Ji Yun on the Mantic Arts and Spirit-Writing  Michael Lackner 9 The Liu-Han Altar: Between a Literati Spirit-Writing Altar and Popular Religion  Zhu Mingchuan 朱 明川 Part 4 Spirit-Writing and Redemptive Societies 10 “Protecting the Dao and Transmitting the Classics” The New Religion to Save the World and the Confucian Dimension of Spirit-Writing in Republican China  Matthias Schumann 11 Spirit-Writing and the Daoyuan’s Gendered Teachings  Xia Shi 12 The Phoenix Perches in the Land of the Kami: Spirit-Writing from Yiguandao to Tendō  Nikolas Broy Part 5 Local Communities and Transregional Networks 13 The Nineteenth Century Spirit-Writing Movement and the Transformation of Local Religion in Western Guangdong  Ichiko Shiga 14 The Rise of Spirit-Writing Cults in Chaozhou: Reassessing the Role of Charitable Halls  Li Guoping 李 國平 15 Spirit-Writing Altars in Contemporary Hong Kong: A Case Study of Fei Ngan Tung Buddhism and Daoism Society  Luo Dan 羅 丹 16 A Motley Phoenix? On the Diversity of Spirit-Writing Temples and Their Practices in Puli, Taiwan  Paul R. Katz Index

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