East Asian Religions Research Articles

Wŏn Buddhism, Christianity, and Interreligious Dialogue

This paper examines the influence of Christianity in the formation of new Buddhism and the reformation agenda of traditional Buddhism during the first half of the twentieth century in Korea. By new Buddhism, I am specifically referring to Wŏn Buddhism (圓佛敎), established by Sot’aesan Pak Chungbin 少太山 朴重彬 (1891–1943) in 1916. Since its foundation, Wŏn Buddhism has grown into one of the four major religious groups in South Korea, along with traditional Buddhism, Catholicism, and Protestantism. The paper begins by reviewing some of major issues in the Buddhist reform movements and Wŏn Buddhism. It then goes on to detail the formalistic similarities between Wŏn Buddhism and Christianity. The next section examines the visible influences of traditional East Asian religions in Wŏn Buddhism. In its final part, the paper considers Sot’aesan’s approaches to different religious traditions and the eclectic nature of Wŏn Buddhism as a possible model for an interreligious dialogue, to include Buddhist-Christian dialogue.

Die altchinesische Religion: Laotse und Konfuzius

The article argues for an integration of East Asian religions in interreligious dialogue, which until now has focused mainly on the Abrahamic religions. This paper wants to present basic information about Taoism and Confucianism and explores a Christian perspective on similarities and differences.

The Study of East Asian Religions and Academic Exchange with East Asian Scholars of Academic Circle of Religious Studies in Korea

The Study of East Asian Religions and Academic Exchange with East Asian Scholars of Academic Circle of Religious Studies in Korea

An Interview with Professor James H. Grayson

James H. Grayson (j.h.grayson@shef.ac.uk) is Emeritus Professor of Modern Korean Studies at the University of Sheffield, England. He earned a BA in Anthropology (Rutgers University, 1962-66), an MA in Anthropology (Columbia University, 1966-68), an MDiv in Systematic Theology (1968 71),and a PhD in the History of Religion (University of Edinburgh, 1976 79). He served as a missionary of the United Methodist Church (USA) to Korea for 16 years (1971-1987). From 1987, he taught Korean history and culture, and East Asian philosophy and religion at the School of East Asian Studies of the University of Sheffield as Lecturer, Senior Lecturer, Reader and Professor. He retired in September 2009. He is married to Dr Ruth Hildebrandt. They have two sons adopted through the Holt Adoption Agency in Seoul. For a list of his major publications, visit http://www.shefKeld.ac.uk/ seas/stafiikorean/grayson.html. This interview is based on two meetings with Professor Grayson in South Korea in 2010 when he was staying in Daegu in order to teach at Keimyung University. The meetings were held at his office at Keimyung University on 29 April and at a coffee shop in Seoul on 29 June, respectively. Recently, Acta Koreana has published an interview with Professor Grayson: Vol.9 No. 2 (2006),pp. 155-182. That interview covers various issues that our readers may also be interested to know, including:1)how he became interested in Korea and his first impressions of the country (pp. 155-157); 2) the development of his academic career from an anthropologist to a scholar in Korean studies (pp. 157-159); 3) the development of the Korean studies program at Sheffield (pp. 159-164); 4) the nature of Korean religion and characteristics of Korean Christianity (pp. 164-168); 5) Korean myths and legends (pp. 169-171);6) next research project on ch udo yebae 卒王0 (pp. 171-176); 7) biggest challenges that Koreans are facing (pp. 176-178); 8) the future of Korean studies in Europe (pp. 178-181);9) advice for young generations in Korean studies (p. 181). The present interview deals with

On the Problem of Material Religion and Its Prospects for the Study of Korean Religion

This paper argues that the “material turn” evident both in recent scholarly studies of East Asian religion (and religious studies more generally) and within the discipline of anthropology holds great promise for the study of Korean religions. The study of material religion raises questions about how aspects of the material world come to be regarded as sacred, how they come to be regarded as empowered and agentive things, how devotees engage material religion through embodied practice and visual regimes of understanding and venerating, and how specific historic moments influence material religion. Anthropology brings to the discussion an awareness of material objects as possible nodes of human relationships, relationships between humans and gods or other entities, and between humans, deities, positive and negative power, and the sacred things themselves. It raises questions about the production, maintenance, and proper disposal of sacred objects. It also brings magic back into the mix as a means of understanding some of the essentially religious ways contemporary people contend with the quirkiness of the market and other uncertainties, and how the modern commodity market itself accommodates the production, appropriation, and consumption of sacred and magical goods.

Sustained Experiential Learning: Modified Monasticism and Pilgrimage

AbstractThis article outlines a template for sustained experiential learning designed to provide a context for learning the affective and performative as well as intellectual power of religion. This approach was developed for a traditional academic framework, adapting pedagogies developed for experiential learning, aesthetic training, and study abroad, and draws on personal experiences of teaching East Asian religions. The approach integrates intellectual learning with out of class experience to stimulate and enrich the highly personal and often significant questions that may arise upon studying religion and encountering religious practices both in and out of the classroom.

Who Hears?: A Zen Buddhist Perspective

Western psychologists and neurologists have attempted to use their concepts to explain East Asian religions for more than seventy-five years. Carl Jung (1875-1961) wrote a long foreword to Richard Wilhelm's The Secret of the Golden Flower back in 1931, which gave many readers in Europe and the Americas their first glimpse of philosophical Daoism.1 A generation later, Erich Fromm's conversations with D. T. Suzuki were recorded in Zen Buddhism and Psychoanalysis.2 In our own time, the Dalai Lama's collaborative work with neuroscientists and psychologists has received widespread attention,3 while academia has given James H. Austin's Zen and the Brain hearty approval.4 The process of mutual understanding between Western scientists and teachers of East Asian religion is still incomplete, however, and in earlier times it had barely begun. I remember my amusement back in the 1970s, watching a video of monks trailing streams of wires attached to biofeedback instruments while they were walking formally and solemnly. Even in those early days it was apparent to me that for all their academic credentials, the scholars had started with an ignorance of the subject of their study. They were successful in measuring something in the brain relating to a samadhi condition, but while the monks may have grounded themselves more or less in a settled practice, who is to measure their appreciation of the mejiro chirping in the camellia bush just outside? Great masters of Zen, Zhaozhou, and Deshan and their successors did not talk about being settled, any more than neuroanataomists discuss the importance of the alphabet. The chirping of the mejiro might have reminded the monks of a case, a case that would lie in a dimension even further from the world of wires and dials. Who is the master of hearing that sound?3 This was the gist of a question by Bassui Tokusho Zenji a question that became a public case, one koan among many other koans that have not been studied by science. It is time for such a study. My directory of Chinese koans holds more than 5,500 neatly framed traditional stories set forth to guide the student.6 The modern Zen teacher is conversant with some 550 of these koans, a number that is sufficient if ... if .... There are several caveats. If the teacher treats koans as historical artifacts, then the stories are no

Sacred Writings of East-Asian Religions in the Context of Comparative Cultural Studies

Sacred Writings of East-Asian Religions in the Context of Comparative Cultural Studies

The Eminent Monk: Buddhist Ideals in Medieval Chinese Hagiography (review)

Reviewed by: The Eminent Monk: Buddhist Ideals in Medieval Chinese Hagiography John R. McRae (bio) John Kieschnick . The Eminent Monk: Buddhist Ideals in Medieval Chinese Hagiography. Kuroda Institute Studies in East Asian Buddhism, no. 10. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 1997. vii, 218 pp. Paperback $27.00, ISBN 0-8248-1841-5. The circumstances of this review are a bit unusual. I received the request to prepare it in the fall of 2003, by which time several reviews of this 1997 publication had already appeared. Also, I am on the board of directors of the Kuroda Institute for the Study of Buddhism and Human Values, and, although T. Griffith Foulk and Daniel Stevenson evaluated the manuscript (p. vii), I was one of those who supported its selection for publication. In addition, I am also a good friend of the author—which is frequently the case in our small but geographically dispersed field. Therefore, in the following paragraphs I will comment not only on the book but on its earlier reviews, and I will report on e-mail exchanges I have had with the author in the context of preparing my own comments. By doing so I hope to contribute to, not only the appreciation of this single volume, but a better understanding of how the book review process works. The Eminent Monk is a study of an important genre of Chinese Buddhist writing, the series of Gaoseng zhuan texts produced in the sixth, seventh, and tenth centuries. Other than its introduction and conclusion, the three major chapters of Kieschnick's book are devoted to the themes of asceticism, thaumaturgy, and scholarship. The book is very well produced, with very few typographical errors, and it includes excellent back matter: a glossary of Chinese characters, extensive bibliography, and well-done index. The book is gracefully written and if anything too brief, with only 145 pages of text (plus 38 pages of notes). The earliest review of The Eminent Monk was by Eric Reinders, published on November 13, 1998, in the online Journal of Buddhist Ethics (http://www.gold.ac.uk/jbe/5/rein1.html). Along with introductory and concluding paragraphs, Reinders comments on each of the book's three major chapters, briefly describing the content, quoting a favorite passage, and pointing out some of the implications of Kieschnick's work. It is an entirely positive review, without any hint of criticism—the only irony being when he describes the author as "true to his Stanford [End Page 121] training" (p. 2) in not taking Chan or other types of Buddhist hagiographies at face value. Reinders concludes: One strength of this book is its consciousness of difference, the juggling of diverse voices and implied audiences. Clearly Kieschnick is concerned throughout with the sitz im leben of these texts, concerned with the facts not of the events described but of the descriptions themselves. Yet, whenever possible, he generalizes cautiously about the real social practices that gave these stories meaning. He is also quite adept at highlighting Chinese Buddhism as a negotiation of Indian and Chinese elements. Another strength, which quickly persuaded me to order this book for use in a lower-division class on East Asian religion, is the readability of the prose, light in its theoretical touch and interspersed with some great stories. (p. 2 ) We will return below to the distinction between Kieschnick's attention to both the descriptions of events and the social practices behind those descriptions. Reinders' decision to order the book for classroom use is also instructive regarding the tone and style of the book, which is readable and not theoretically heavy-handed. In James A. Benn's review of The Eminent Monk in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (vol. 8, pt. 3 [November 1998]: 496-498), content summary is mixed with judicious praise and criticism. Benn opens by observing how remarkable it is that Kieschnick is the first scholar to present the biographies as the collections themselves do, "as mixtures of fact and legend" (p. 496). In his description of Kieschnick's chapter on asceticism, Benn observes that the analysis would have been improved by careful consideration of Indian precedents, by consulting such works as...

Bibliography on East Asian religion and philosophy

General works on philosophy and religion in Asia - Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism Chinese/Confucian understanding in religion business and economic ethics in Asia human rights in the East Asian context Asian women's philosophy and theology selected countries of East Asia - China (Jesuit approach to evangelization in China, other works on China and Roman Catholicism, China and Protestantism, other workds on China and Christianity, culture and philosophy), Japan (Buddhism, Shintoism, Confucianism, Christianity, other works on Japanese culture, philosophy and religion), Korea (Buddhism, Christianity, Confucianism, Minjung theology, women's issues and feminist theology, Sharmanism, other works) East Asia internet resources (subject-areas, discussion/news groups, online journals and newsletters, East Asian English-language newspapers, libraries and university web pages, search engines).

Feminism and World Religions (review)

Reviewed by: Feminism and World Religions Jordan Paper Feminism and World Religions. Edited by Arvind Sharma and Katherine K. Young. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1999. Pp. x + 333. The editors of Feminism and World Religions, Arvind Sharma and Katherine K. Young, both at McGill University, have been editing anthologies, as well as an [End Page 118] annual journal, on the subject of "women and religion" in its various modes and variations, for a number of years. This new iteration is particularly specific to its avowed topic and a valuable addition to the genre. In-depth contributions were solicited for the "Religions of the Book" and for South and East Asian religions. As with any anthology, no matter how well planned, individual treatments will invariably reflect the differences in the interests and methodologies of the various authors. All of the treatments here, however, do focus on history and ideology. All were ostensibly written by insiders, although what this actually means varies from tradition to tradition. Katherine Young has contributed an excellent, analytical introduction to both the topics of the book and the individual chapters. She has also authored an in-depth "Postscript" (thirty-four pages) concerning a number of contemporary issues relevant to the volume's theme and the issue of "insiders." She addresses such problems as "the politics of identity," "the proper sphere for feminism," "the tension between revolution and reform," and the "polarization between men and women." I will begin with the chapters on the Religions of the Book, although this does not accord with the order in the anthology. "Feminism in Judaism," by Ellen M. Umansky, is possibly the most succinct introduction available from the last two decades to the extraordinary number of changes, as well as the lack of change, in some varieties of this religion. The contribution by the well-known Rosemary Radford Ruether, "Feminism in World Christianity," briefly traces the roots of Christian feminism from the time of the New Testament and then surveys developments in the United States and feminist theology in Europe, moving on to what many such surveys ignore: the Middle East, Africa, Asia, and Latin America. "Feminism in Islam" by Riffat Hassan focuses on the nature of androcentrism in Islam. She juxtaposes the Hadith literature against the Qur'ān, and finds that the negative attitudes toward women are not in the Qur'ān but are based on a questionable interpretation of a few Hadith statements. She analyzes three basic theological assumptions and finds all wanting: the issue of woman's creation, the issue of woman's "guilt" in the "Fall" episode, and the issue of the purpose of woman's existence. She concludes with a fascinating comparison of the issue of women's sexuality as found in the Qur'ān and in the history of Islam. South Asia is dealt with in two very different approaches. Vasudha Narayanan's "Brimming with Bhakti, Embodiments of Shakti: Devotees, Deities, Performers, Reformers, and Other Women of Power in the Hindu Tradition," is a full (fifty-three pages) and engaging exposition of the subject from a variety of perspectives as delineated in the chapter's title. It is a lucid and comprehensive analysis of a most complex issue; indeed, she begins with a survey of the problem of identifying "Hinduism" in and of itself. Rita M. Gross, in her "Strategies for a Feminist Revalorization of Buddhism," quite properly, given her own cultural milieu, speaks not of Buddhism in Asia, but of how Buddhism can be in the West. She argues here, as she has in a relatively recent book, Buddhism after Patriarchy, that the androcentrism, even aspects of misogyny, that is found in the development of Buddhism, does not follow from essential Buddhist ideology, and it need not be continued in the present. [End Page 119] The remaining two chapters, on China, are more problematic than the preceding ones. The two authors of "Feminism and/in Taoism," Karen Laughlin and Eva Wong, are both connected with the International Taoist Tai Chi Society, which can be perceived as far removed from the continuing aspects of Daoist religion on both the Chinese mainland and Taiwan. Their focus is on the classical texts of Daoist...

Sacred Space: Shrine, City, Land

The way we understand particular spaces is mediated by our perceptions of the difference between the sacred and the profane. Throughout history, different peoples have revered vastly diverse spaces as sacred for vastly diverse reasons. In Sacred Spaces, Benjamin Z. Kedar and R. J. Zwi Werblowsky have compiled a wide-ranging collection of essays exploring a broad array of ancient and contemporary holy places. The book reviews sacred spaces of the ancient religions--Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and Indian and East-Asian Religions--and discusses how these spaces have been conceptualized and experienced. Chapter topics include an investigation of the role of charismatic dreams in the creation of sacred sites in present-day Israel; an analysis of cities as cultic centers in Germany and Italy during the Middle Ages; a history of the sacred Mount Hiko in Japan; and a study of the Muslim holy cities as foci of Islamic revivalism in the eighteeth century. Sacred Spaces provides readers with original and illuminating examples of the myriad ways in which we perceive and construct sacred space.

An introduction to Caodaism II. Beliefs and Organization

The religion of Cao-Dai is fundamentally, and deliberately, syncretic. Since it includes Christ and Moses (but for some reason, not Muhammad) in its pantheon, the Western student might be tempted to see it as essentially an attempt to bridge the gulf between East and West by finding a sort of middle way between Christianity and Buddhism. It is possible that some Caodaists who have acquired a thorough Western education in France but maintained their religious belief do in fact see it in those terms, but most of the Caodaist literature indicates that the real basis of the syncretism is an attempt to bring together the three religions of the Sino-Vietnamese tradition. In this attempt, Christianity has only a peripheral position, and nothing has been adopted from Christian teachings that would seriously clash with the underlying doctrinal tolerance of East Asian religions. The most important feature of Caodaist syncretism is that it brings together elements of Taoist spirit-mediumship with a concept of salvation that was originally Buddhist. If any one of the three Sino-Vietnamese religions may be said to be dominant in Caodaism it is religious Taoism; but since the Caodaists themselves frequently refer to their religion as ‘reformed Buddhism’, that is a point which must be demonstrated rather than taken for granted. I propose to analyse some of the most obvious elements of Caodaism under four headings: spirit-mediumship; the Cao-Dai and other spirits; salvation and the apocalyptic aspect; and hierarchy and organization. A concluding section will deal briefly with the possible relationship between Caodaism and certain religious sects in China.