Family Matters in Indian Buddhist Monasticisms

Family Matters in Indian Buddhist Monasticisms PDF Author: Shayne Clarke
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
ISBN: 0824840070
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 298

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Book Description
Scholarly and popular consensus has painted a picture of Indian Buddhist monasticism in which monks and nuns severed all ties with their families when they left home for the religious life. In this view, monks and nuns remained celibate, and those who faltered in their “vows” of monastic celibacy were immediately and irrevocably expelled from the Buddhist Order. This romanticized image is based largely on the ascetic rhetoric of texts such as the Rhinoceros Horn Sutra. Through a study of Indian Buddhist law codes (vinaya), Shayne Clarke dehorns the rhinoceros, revealing that in their own legal narratives, far from renouncing familial ties, Indian Buddhist writers take for granted the fact that monks and nuns would remain in contact with their families. The vision of the monastic life that emerges from Clarke's close reading of monastic law codes challenges some of our most basic scholarly notions of what it meant to be a Buddhist monk or nun in India around the turn of the Common Era. Not only do we see thick narratives depicting monks and nuns continuing to interact and associate with their families, but some are described as leaving home for the religious life with their children, and some as married monastic couples. Clarke argues that renunciation with or as a family is tightly woven into the very fabric of Indian Buddhist renunciation and monasticisms. Surveying the still largely uncharted terrain of Indian Buddhist monastic law codes preserved in Sanskrit, Tibetan, and Chinese, Clarke provides a comprehensive, pan-Indian picture of Buddhist monastic attitudes toward family. Whereas scholars have often assumed that monastic Buddhism must be anti-familial, he demonstrates that these assumptions were clearly not shared by the authors/redactors of Indian Buddhist monastic law codes. In challenging us to reconsider some of our most cherished assumptions concerning Indian Buddhist monasticisms, he provides a basis to rethink later forms of Buddhist monasticism such as those found in Central Asia, Kaśmīr, Nepal, and Tibet not in terms of corruption and decline but of continuity and development of a monastic or renunciant ideal that we have yet to understand fully.

Family Matters in Indian Buddhist Monasticisms

Family Matters in Indian Buddhist Monasticisms PDF Author: Shayne Clarke
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
ISBN: 0824840070
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 298

Get Book Here

Book Description
Scholarly and popular consensus has painted a picture of Indian Buddhist monasticism in which monks and nuns severed all ties with their families when they left home for the religious life. In this view, monks and nuns remained celibate, and those who faltered in their “vows” of monastic celibacy were immediately and irrevocably expelled from the Buddhist Order. This romanticized image is based largely on the ascetic rhetoric of texts such as the Rhinoceros Horn Sutra. Through a study of Indian Buddhist law codes (vinaya), Shayne Clarke dehorns the rhinoceros, revealing that in their own legal narratives, far from renouncing familial ties, Indian Buddhist writers take for granted the fact that monks and nuns would remain in contact with their families. The vision of the monastic life that emerges from Clarke's close reading of monastic law codes challenges some of our most basic scholarly notions of what it meant to be a Buddhist monk or nun in India around the turn of the Common Era. Not only do we see thick narratives depicting monks and nuns continuing to interact and associate with their families, but some are described as leaving home for the religious life with their children, and some as married monastic couples. Clarke argues that renunciation with or as a family is tightly woven into the very fabric of Indian Buddhist renunciation and monasticisms. Surveying the still largely uncharted terrain of Indian Buddhist monastic law codes preserved in Sanskrit, Tibetan, and Chinese, Clarke provides a comprehensive, pan-Indian picture of Buddhist monastic attitudes toward family. Whereas scholars have often assumed that monastic Buddhism must be anti-familial, he demonstrates that these assumptions were clearly not shared by the authors/redactors of Indian Buddhist monastic law codes. In challenging us to reconsider some of our most cherished assumptions concerning Indian Buddhist monasticisms, he provides a basis to rethink later forms of Buddhist monasticism such as those found in Central Asia, Kaśmīr, Nepal, and Tibet not in terms of corruption and decline but of continuity and development of a monastic or renunciant ideal that we have yet to understand fully.

Family Matters in Indian Buddhist Monasticisms

Family Matters in Indian Buddhist Monasticisms PDF Author: Shayne Neil Clarke
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780824870966
Category : Buddhist monks
Languages : en
Pages :

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Book Description
Scholarly and popular consensus has painted a picture of Indian Buddhist monasticism in which monks and nuns severed all ties with their families when they left home for the religious life. This romanticized image is based largely on the ascetic rhetoric of texts such as the Rhinoceros Horn Sutra . Through a study of Indian Buddhist law codes, Shayne Clarke reveals that in their own legal narratives, far from renouncing familial ties, Indian Buddhist writers take for granted the fact that monks and nuns would remain in contact with their families.

The Notion of Solitude in Pali Buddhist Literature

The Notion of Solitude in Pali Buddhist Literature PDF Author: Indaka Nishan Weerasekera
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1350426083
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 273

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Book Description
Exploring how notions of solitude in Pali literature are encompassed in various literary forms, such as stock formulae, poetry, narrative, and imagery, this book includes close analysis of some of the most famous Buddhist verses about solitary practice. Indaka Nishan Weerasekera considers how solitude is valued as one significant aspect of the Buddhist path, including how the imagery of landscape, especially the forest, serves to both inspire solitary practice as well as functions as a metaphor for meditation. The author employs a cross-section of primary sources to explore the practical and psychological aspects of solitude in relation to Buddhist meditation, as well as relational/attitudinal concepts such as renunciation or desirelessness, independence, and self-reliance. This 'lonely' aspect of the Buddhist path sits alongside the 'communal' aspect of the Buddhist teachings. Together, they serve to maintain monastic harmony, while the 'social' aspect preserves monastic relations with wider society.

Buddhist Encounters and Identities Across East Asia

Buddhist Encounters and Identities Across East Asia PDF Author: Ann Heirman
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004366156
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 453

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Book Description
Encounters, networks, identities and diversity are at the core of the history of Buddhism. They are also the focus of Buddhist Encounters and Identities across East Asia, edited by Ann Heirman, Carmen Meinert and Christoph Anderl. While long-distance networks allowed Buddhist ideas to travel to all parts of East Asia, it was through local and trans-local networks and encounters, and a diversity of people and societies, that identities were made and negotiated. This book undertakes a detailed examination of discrete Buddhist identities rooted in unique cultural practices, beliefs and indigenous socio-political conditions. Moreover, it presents a fascinating picture of the intricacies of the regional and cross-regional networks that connected South and East Asia.

Buddhism in Court

Buddhism in Court PDF Author: Cuilan Liu
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0197663338
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 289

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Book Description
Buddhism in Court is the first English language study of the legal interaction between Buddhism and the state in China. It uncovers a long-overlooked Buddhist campaign for clerical legal privileges that aimed to make ordained Buddhist monks and nuns immune from facing trials and punishment in the state court.

Tantric Traditions in Transmission and Translation

Tantric Traditions in Transmission and Translation PDF Author: David B. Gray
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199763690
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 393

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Book Description
This volume explores the movement of tantric Buddhist traditions through time and space, from the early history of tantric Buddhism to the present day. These studies investigate the development of tantric Buddhist traditions in India, their dissemination into Central and East Asia, and exchanges between tantric Buddhist and rival religious traditions. From the hyper-masculine Buddha to the ritualized bodies of the siddhas, the first chapter traces shifts in Indian Buddhist ideal masculinities. The second chapter explores the intersection of Buddhism and Śaivism in early medieval India through the evolving figure of the yoginī. Another chapter explores how tenth- and eleventh-century scholars and translators in Tibet "purified" a Buddhist deity that showed signs of Śaiva Hindu origins. Two chapters use often-overlooked Tibetan and Chinese materials to explore the influence of incantations and ritual manuals on the formation of early tantric Buddhist literature. The volume's longest chapter is a detailed history of Vajrayāna Buddhism in Nepal. The work concludes with two studies of hybridity and transformation in East Asia: one on the Homa of the Northern Dipper, a fire ritual which passed from India to China to Japan, adapting to Daoist, Buddhist, and Shintō contexts; and another on the True Buddha School, a contemporary Chinese transformation of Vajrayāna Buddhism.

The Theory of the Four Stages of Liberation in Pāli Literature

The Theory of the Four Stages of Liberation in Pāli Literature PDF Author: Amrita Nanda
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3031558731
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 356

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Book Description


New Perspectives in Modern Korean Buddhism

New Perspectives in Modern Korean Buddhism PDF Author: Hwansoo Ilmee Kim
Publisher: State University of New York Press
ISBN: 1438491336
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 289

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Book Description
New Perspectives in Modern Korean Buddhism moves beyond nationalistic, modernist, and ethnocentric historiographies of modern Korean Buddhism by carefully examining individuals' lived experiences, the institutional dimensions of Korean Buddhism, and its place in transnational conversations. Drawing upon rich archives as well as historical, anthropological, and literary approaches, the book examines four themes that have gained attention in recent years: perennial existential concerns and the persistent relevance of religious practice; the role of female Buddhists; clerical marriage and scandals; and engagement with secular society. The book reveals the limits of metanarratives, such as those of colonialism, nationalism, and modernity, in understanding the complex and contested identities of both monastics and laity, thus demanding that we diversify the methods by which we articulate the history of modern Korean Buddhism.

Women in Early Indian Buddhism

Women in Early Indian Buddhism PDF Author: Alice Collett
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199326134
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 289

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Book Description
The path of practice as taught in ancient India by Gotama Buddha was open to both women and men. The texts of early Indian Buddhism show that women were lay followers of the Buddha and were also granted the right to ordain and become nuns. Certain women were known as influential teachers of men and women alike and considered experts in certain aspects of Gotama's dhamma. For this to occur in an ancient religion practiced within traditional societies is really quite extraordinary. This is apparent especially in light of the continued problems experienced by practitioners of many religions today involved in challenging instilled norms and practices and conferring the status of any high office upon women. In this collection, Alice Collett brings together a sampling of the plethora of Buddhist texts from early Indian Buddhism in which women figure centrally. It is true that there are negative conceptualizations of and attitudes towards women expressed in early Buddhist texts, but for so many texts concerning women to have been composed, collated and preserved is worthy of note. The simple fact that the Buddhist textual record names so many nuns and laywomen, and preserves biographies of them, attests to a relatively positive situation for women at that time. With the possible exception of the reverence accorded Egyptian queens, there is no textual record of named women from an ancient civilization that comes close to that of early Indian Buddhism. This volume offers comparative study of texts in five different languages - Gandhari, Pali, Sanskrit, Chinese and Sinhala. Each chapter is a study and translation, with some chapters focusing more on translation and some more on comparisons between parallel and similar texts, whilst others are more discursive and thematic.

Early Buddhist Oral Tradition

Early Buddhist Oral Tradition PDF Author: Bhikkhu Analayo
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 1614298270
Category : RELIGION
Languages : en
Pages : 323

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Book Description
Introduction -- 1. The Recital of the Monastic Rules -- 2. Discourse and Verse Collections -- 3. Memory Errors -- 4. Systematization -- 5. Additions and Innovations -- 6. Implications of Orality -- Conclusion -- Abbreviations -- Notes -- References -- Index -- About the Author.