Eastern Religious Traditions Research Articles

Do Eastern Religious Traditions Stifle or Encourage Corporate Innovation? Evidence from China

ABSTRACT Although the relationship between Western religiosity and innovation is widely investigated, the effect of Eastern religious traditions on corporate innovation remains unexplored. Using a sample of firms listed in Chinese A-share stock exchanges, we find that firms registered in areas with stronger Eastern religious traditions (Buddhism and Taoism) are generally more innovative than firms registered in areas with weaker Eastern religious traditions. This result suggests that Eastern religiosity promotes rather than stifles corporate innovation. We find additional evidence suggesting that Eastern religiosity promotes corporate innovation mainly through the following three channels: (1) fostering nonexclusivity and openness to science and innovation, (2) mitigating agency conflicts, and (3) nurturing commitment and fortitude. JEL Classifications: N35; D81; O31.

Analysis of slavic neo-pagan beliefs through the borrowing of religious and mythological images of indian culture

Introduction. Slavic neo-paganism has been of particular interest to Russian researchers in recent decades. It is still unknown whether there are many representatives of neo-pagan movements in Russia, and the boundaries of this phenomenon are very blurred. As a result, in the scientific community, an ambiguous direction is gaining popularity as folk history, the authors of which advocate the concept of «alternative history». There is an extensive number of «scientific» works and communities based on falsifications and distortion of historical data. One of such trends, in quasi-history, is the early re-creation of Slavic culture, which is increasingly viewed through the prism of Slavic neo-pagan concepts, thereby having a significant impact on Russians' perceptions of traditional Slavic culture. Some Slavic neo-pagan traditions, in addition to the traditional foundations of early Slavic culture, use religious and mythological constructs of other world and national religions. Special importance is attached to the Indian myth-forming component, which unwittingly becomes not only a kind of historical support for the development of pseudo-historical ideas of neo-paganism, but also is the richest source for the development of «Slavic» mythology. Based on this, the analysis of Slavic neo-pagan beliefs through the borrowing of religious and mythological images of Indian culture becomes relevant.Materials and Methods. The methodological basis of the work was the general scientific principles of historicism, consistency, unity and scientific objectivity. Historical and logical methods of scientific research in the study of cultural and religious traditions of Slavic neo-paganism have determined the objectivity and scientific character in the study of this phenomenon.Results. Currently, the problem of modern Slavic neo-paganism lies in the fact that the reconstruction of the true appearance of the bygone culture and mythology of Ancient Russia is an extremely difficult task and requires an objective and comprehensive study of this issue. However, representatives of modern Slavic paganism claim that it is the Slavs who are the original Aryan people, with an ancient and developed culture of many thousands of years. The key sources, among neo-pagan supporters, of the origin of the Slavs and the description of their cultural and religious life are the texts of the «Slavic-Aryan Vedas» and the «Veles Book». «Veles's Book», according to representatives of Slavic neo-paganism, is the scripture of the ancient Aryans and contains particles of Slavic-Aryan wisdom preserved by the Novgorod Magi of the IX century. The «Veles Book» repeatedly contains images and plots borrowed from Eastern religious traditions, in particular from Hinduism. The content of the «Slavic-Aryan Vedas» is quite diverse. They include the Old Norse «Saga of the Inglings» interpreted by A. Khinevich, a recording of Perun's conversation with people in which he tells about the commandments, about past and future events on Earth, about the origin of the Russian people. Other pseudo–historical ideas of the origin of Slavic culture and the borrowing of mythological images of other ethnic groups by it are noted in the collection of epic songs by the Serbian historian Stefan Ilyich Verkovich – «Veda Slovena» (translated into Russian «Veda Slavs»). Attention to the collection «The Veda of the Slavs» was attracted by the enthusiastic historian A.I. Asov, having made several translations from the 1st and 2nd volumes of the book «The Veda of the Slavs». In addition, the trend of folk history is observed in attempts to prove the paramount importance of the «Slavic-Aryan» civilization over other peoples through the semantic similarity of the hydronomic objects. According to ideologists and representatives of Slavic neo-paganism, we can also observe the «Vedic» origins in Ancient Russia in the names of rivers and lakes on the territory of modern Russia.Discussion and Conclusions. The analysis of Slavic neo-pagan traditions revealed a weak reasonableness of the judgments of ideologists and representatives of Slavic neo-paganism about antiquity and the influence of the «Slavic-Aryan» civilization on Ancient India. Proceeding from this, it is also incorrect to assume that Indian deities are prototypes of Slavic gods or included in the Slavic mythology of Ancient Russia, since the described images and attributes of Hindu gods, in the context of traditional historical chronology, appeared much later than the Slavic neo-pagan tradition ascribes to him. At the same time, we cannot exclude the fact that the «Slavic-Aryan Vedas» and the «Veles Book» became not only the basis of a distorted perception of Slavic culture for followers of neo- Pagan traditions, but also brought the «Slavic-Aryan myth», as part of folk history, into the scientific and academic world.

Plato and Hermes in Mani’s Prophetology: a possible adaptation to the theurgical milieu

The aim of this article is to set forth conjectures that are likely to explain the inclusion of Plato and Hermes as heralds of Mani in the testimony of Ephrem of Syria. This incorporation should be set against the background of the Syrian religious milieu, which was influenced by both Hellenistic philosophy and Eastern religious traditions. Therefore, it would be better to seek a religious and philosophical environment wherein Plato and Hermes were associated. Keywords: Manichaeism, apocalypticism, theurgy, hermetism, Merkabah mysticism, late platonism.

Against what?

Against <i>what</i>?

Crossing the Borders: Beckett in the Eastern World

Beckettian scholars are of the view that Beckett is an autonomous artist and has never been a religious scholar, so his works should be read as an artistic expression without using any 'religious barometer. Beckett's obsessed quest about theology and his selected plethora of references about Christianity and God almost always capture the attention of critics by encouraging them to read Beckett through a religious angle. Such a stance of Beckett leads the scholars to categorise him as a secular writer who freely deals with religious themes. It is interesting to note that most of Beckett's religious scholarship revolves around Christianity and Western critical traditions. This means that Beckett's connection with other religions or religious traditions has been overlooked. This paper examines Beckett's attachment with religions, namely Buddhism, Hinduism, and Taoism. In conclusion, the paper advocates that Beckett was aware of Eastern religious traditions.

Inhabiting (CC.) ‘Religion’ in Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit to Develop an Ambedkarite Critique of the Blasphemous Nucleus of Upanishadic Wisdom

This paper begins with several opening passages from the most esoteric writings in Hinduism’s vast, ancient religious-philosophical heritage, namely the Upanishads. The aim is to reveal certain essential connections between the primordial relation between self and sacrifice while exploring uncanny paradoxes of eternity and time, immortals and mortals and their secret linkages. The work is entirely philosophical in its intent and does not aspire to defend a faith-perspective. The horizon for this exposition follows the spirit of Ambedkar’s critique of Brahmanic superiority inherent in this entire system of religious thought: we must expose what lies in the heart of modern Hinduism to reveal its inner-contradictory entanglements, which are not exactly innocuous. A phenomenological-deconstructive inspiration motivates our own critical theoretical-philosophical conceptualizations beyond Ambedkar’s basic attestation to liberate India from Hinduism. The enterprise derives from a speculative appropriation and extension of the depths of (CC.) ‘Religion,’ the penultimate chapter of Hegel’s indomitable Phenomenology of Spirit (1807). The aim of the paper is to advance new philosophical theses in an unrelenting metaphysical critique of Hinduism– beyond Ambedkar’s writings–but also in a manner that is irreducible to the Western philosophical cosmos within which the nineteenth-century Hegel inhabited. The paper argues that the internal contradictions and aporias of mortality, immortality, self, bodyhood, time, and eternity in the Hindu Upanishads can be contrasted with Hegel’s speculative Western-Christological propositions to expose a greater metaphysical complexity that escapes Eastern and Western religious and philosophical traditions alike. Therefore, the paper falls within the scope of comparative philosophies of religion.

Intuitive forecasting and analytical reasoning: does investor personality matter?

PurposeIn spite of an intuitive appeal regarding association between personality and investment efficacy, there is a dearth of empirical support for the effects of theoretically meaningful personality difference on intuitive and analytical ability, which further explains investment efficacy. The current study aims to explore this link using multi-method analysis.Design/methodology/approachIn Study 1, the experimental protocol captures intuitive responses of naïve investors in four different investment horizons and maps the findings with personality constituents of the Big Five (Costa and McCrae, 1992), while in Study 2, survey of active investors seeks their preference for intuition or deliberation (PID, Betsch, 2004) in decision-making, along with measuring their investment efficacy and analysing the results on the basis their personality Type A vs Type B.FindingsSubjects with lower extraversion tend to have superior forecasting accuracy for gold and dollar, while those with lower neuroticism have tendency of superior forecasting for dollar and Nifty index in mid-term investment. Further, in Study 2, the results indicate superior intuitive ability, analytical ability and investment efficacy of Type B investors.Originality/valueThe study is unique in two ways. One, it explores the role of personality in ambidextrous decision-making framework, where rationality and intuition iteratively operate in a parallel, yet synchronous, fashion. Two, the study attempts to examine the role of personality in the unique socio-cultural context of an emerging economy such as India with Eastern religious traditions, having strong implications on the personal characteristics of the decision agents.

The Dark Side of Dharma

In contemporary Western society, meditation techniques that were previously taught within the context of Eastern religious traditions are now increasingly being practiced in secular settings. While the boundary between the secular and the religious is blurred, popular meditation techniques such as Transcendental Meditation, vipassana, and mindfulness are generally promoted as being derived from Eastern religions, but inherently non-religious, aligned with Western psychology, and suitable for a general audience. Over approximately forty years, thousands of research studies suggest that there are many psychological and physiological benefits associated with these forms of meditation; however, a small but growing literature indicates there could also be adverse effects. In Eastern religious traditions, difficulties associated with meditation are acknowledged, and are usually understood to be milestones on the path to enlightenment, the result of improper practice, or due to individual differences. However, in a Western secular context, negative effects associated with meditation have largely been overlooked. This article argues that this is in part due to the fact that in contemporary Western society the goal of meditation has shifted from enlightenment to symptom relief and personal transformation, leading to the assumption that meditation is harmless and 'good for everyone'.

Do religious and conscious investors make better economic decisions? Evidence from India

Investment decision-making in India is different from the world and is affected by social settings. Religion lies at the core of the prevailing socio-cultural environment strengthening social-norms and belief-system, while consciousness is considered core ingredient of life which improves awareness beyond the physical plane, not attributable to cortical processes. Although socio-cultural influence on economic behaviour is quite discernible in countries following eastern-religious traditions, yet studies examining its impact on decision efficacy are scant. Present research addresses this and explores causal role of religiosity and consciousness in shaping investor’s intuitive and analytical abilities.Following a multi-step procedure with qualitative procedure – using engaged scholarship of experts in participative research model and quantitative assessment – surveying investors, the role of these innate behavioural variables in investment decision making has been examined. The paper also validates ambidextrous decision-making style in investment efficacy where intuition improves analytical thinking which further enhances investment efficacy.

Enlightenment and individuation: syncretism, synchronicity and beyond.

This paper opens with a personal introduction to the topic of syncretism within the context of a comparison of enlightenment associated with Eastern religious traditions and individuation as experienced through Jungian analysis. A brief exploration of the recent scholarly revival of interest in syncretism follows. Some close parallels with Jungian theory are highlighted, especially in the work of Timothy Light. Applications to the syncretic trends in Tang culture along the Silk Road(s) suggest deeper patterns of interconnectedness lie at the heart of these trends. A complex systems view highlights similarities between syncretic connections and non-local aspects of synchronistic field events. The final section attempts to extend this approach to innovation in general terms through the recently articulated concept of the 'adjacent possible' from the writing of Stuart Kauffman. From this, the notion of a collective pre-conscious dimension to the psyche is extrapolated. The unifying thread of acausal emergent forms provides a potential synthetic network for these phenomena.

Secular Beats Spiritual: The Westernization of the Easternization of the West by Steve Bruce

Reviewed by: Secular Beats Spiritual: The Westernization of the Easternization of the West by Steve Bruce Nathan Garcia (bio) Secular Beats Spiritual: The Westernization of the Easternization of the West. By Steve Bruce. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017. 203pp. $34.95 Steve Bruce is a leading figure in secularization theory. His most recent work Secular Beats Spiritual: The Westernization of the Easternization of the West straight-forwardly responds to a common critique of secularization theory which promulgates a "not-decline-just-change" (14) attitude. Simply, this attitude declares that Western spirituality is not waning so much as it is experimentally separating from traditional Christianity and flirting with various New Age and Eastern spiritual practices and beliefs. Bruce comes armed with his extensive research to emphatically declare, "False!" Bruce employs ample evidence, ranging from the anecdotal to years-long quantitative studies, to gauge the trajectory and nuances of new spiritual movements. His critics must surely commend his research if not his conclusions. However, as with any important social analysis, definitions and scope are key. In this respect Bruce's own secular inclinations are most evident. He distinguishes between reli gion and spirituality with a nifty separation of exteriority and interiority, respec tively. Secularism, furthermore, is merely the absence of the religious and spiri tual (16). His definitions undoubtedly facilitate his case. Moreover, while Bruce commonly uses the term West he almost-exclusively focuses his analyses on the United Kingdom, while only occasionally mentioning the United States and entirely ignoring continental Europe. His rationale is that the UK is largely a secular state and therefore a better site for his analyses of religion's fate. Second, the UK is small enough to more accurately measure trends and "degrees of penetration" (vii). His presumption that the UK is a forerunner to the rest of the West allows him to avoid the demographic and religious nuances of other complex Western societies. After establishing his analytical framework, Bruce begins by exploring popular New Age movements in the UK in chapter two, primarily from the 1960's and 70's. He concludes that the popular movements belied a loyal community of adherents. [End Page 274] Movements either exaggerated their membership, participation was half-hearted, or their large membership quickly dropped off. The few that have survived have done so by incorporating secular ideas and have been made amenable for individual alteration. Chapters 4–6 examine Eastern religious traditions in the UK. Chapter 4 explores Hinduism's presence, influence, and communities in the UK. Bruce focuses particularly on meditation and yoga as Hindu practices having achieved mainstream popularity. Nevertheless, these practices have been largely stripped of their religious origins, while analogously the Hindu-inspired communities achieved enduring success because "the movements require the least sacrifice and that can most readily be fitted into a secular life" (79). Chapter 5 explores Buddhist communities and practices. Bruce sketches a history of Buddhism in the UK, concluding that while more successful in converting native Britons, it has not come close to filling the Christian gap. He focuses on mindfulness as the primary Buddhist contribution, recognizing that it too has become a largely "secular psychotherapy" (103). Curiously, he spends the least amount of time on Islamic influence in the UK. In ten pages, Bruce observes that Islam is the largest of these Eastern religions in the UK, but its participants are not converts or natural-born British. He concludes that Islam nevertheless remains a miniscule portion of the overall population, and further, its dogmatic and monotheistic similarities to Christianity prevent it from entering mainstream secular culture. Islam's exponential rise in continental Europe and the Christian response go unmentioned. Bruce flexes his analytical muscles in chapter 7. He reviews numerous studies and statistics gauging spiritual commitment within spiritual communities and across the whole British population. The most comprehensive spiritual studies confirm two truths: 1) they exaggerate the importance of spiritual communities, and 2) the numbers reveal a small number of spiritual consumers. In short, all evidence indicates a decline in those identified as religious and spiritual, with no reason to expect change in the future. The final chapter summarizes his thesis and main arguments, while providing a commentary on what Bruce...

A Response to The Oxford Handbook of Religious Conversion from two Perspectives

This review considers the The Oxford Handbook of Religious Conversion (Rambo and Farhadian 2014) from the perspective of Western counseling practice and its applicability to Eastern religious traditions. The Handbook presents a nuanced approach to conversion that emphasizes its complex and dynamic qualities, providing counselors/pastors with practical perspectives to enhance their understanding of people in various stages of a conversion career. By addressing non-Abrahamic traditions, The Handbook also looks at “conversion” from a wider perspective, raising issues about whether it can legitimately be applied to traditions that do not share Western religious assumptions (such as exclusivity) and religious identity. From both perspectives, The Handbook challenges readers to expand their perspectives and rethink their preconceived notions of religious conversion, especially those assumptions based on Western Protestant interpretation of the story of Paul’s conversion.

Nirvana Road: Dissociative Experiences Predict “Eastern” Beliefs About Postmortem Existence

ABSTRACTThree studies (N = 338) tested the idea that endorsement of postmortem beliefs most closely associated with Eastern religious traditions (that is, continuation of consciousness and the explicit dissolution of personal identity, possibly via reincarnation) would map onto a history of dissociative experiences. As hypothesized, a history of dissociative (including depersonalization/derealization) experiences, as well as altered experience of body/space/time during a discrete positive episode, predicted endorsement of “Eastern” postmortem beliefs among religiously heterogeneous (non-Buddhist, non-Hindu) participants. This relationship became stronger when dissociative tendencies were heightened following a traumatic loss (i.e., the suicide of a close other within the past year; Study 3). In contrast, dissociative tendencies did not predict belief in either annihilation or postmortem continuation without identity loss, most typically linked to atheism and Western religious traditions, respectively. These results suggest that some metaphysical beliefs may be embraced because they “make sense” in light of personal experience.

Roundtable on Eastern Traditions

The following is a roundtable discussion, where contributors to the panel on "eastern religious traditions" respond to each others work.

Heidegger East and West: Philosophy as Educative Contemplation

Resonances between Heidegger's philosophy and Eastern religious traditions have been widely discussed by scholars. The significance of Heidegger's thinking for education has also become increasingly clear over recent years. In this article I argue that an important aspect of Heidegger's work, the relevance of which to education is relatively undeveloped, relates to his desire to overcome Western metaphysics, a project that invites an exploration of his connections with Eastern thought. I argue that Heidegger's desire to deconstruct the West implies the deconstruction of conventional views of learning because both aim to undercut the representational nature of thinking in order to recover thinking as a form of contemplation. Consequently, education should not be conceived as the acquisition of a more or less correct mental picture, but suggests the opposite: the relinquishing of all images in a contemplative aporia.

Luz da Pedra

The stone lanterns are traditional elements of oriental style gardens. The article introduces the exploitation of its signs in history, the material forms in the visual arts in Eastern religious traditions, and the expansion of their cultural archetypes

The enrichment of magical thinking through practices among Reiki self-healers

Reiki is an example of a spiritually based healing context, which offers an entry into the magical thinking through the ritual initiation. There are several practices like Reiki in the field of new spirituality. Their backgrounds are situated in a variety of religious traditions, although many religious ideas in the field are based on assimilation of ideas and practices familiar in Eastern religious traditions. Why is Reiki so particularly famous in the field? It would seem that Reiki is very flexible and easily integrated to other practices. One factor which explains the popularity of Reiki has to do with healing. Healing, as well as illness and sickness, involving pain and relief from pain, are universal experiences felt by everyone. Complementary and alternative ways of healing are as popular among ordinary folk now as they have been throughout the history of medicine. Even medical nursing staff participate in Reiki courses in their leisure time. One reason for the popularity might also be that Reiki courses are open to everybody. Everybody can learn to heal. After initiation, participants are promised, and believed, to be rewarded for the ability to heal themselves and those near to them with the help of cosmic energy.The focus of this article is the enrichment of magical thinking among Reiki self-healers.The term ‘enrichment’ refers to an observable thickness (or density) of spontaneous reasoning going along lines of magical trains of thought. This includes, for example, assumptions of agency and magical contagion.

Secrets of the Oracle: A History of Wisdom from Zeno to Yeats (review)

Reviewed by: Secrets of the Oracle: A History of Wisdom from Zeno to Yeats David Gay W. David Shaw. Secrets of the Oracle: A History of Wisdom from Zeno to Yeats. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2009. 387 pp. The subtitle of this book suggests a chronological history of wisdom from the ancient to the modern world; however, its overall structure is more complex than simple chronology. History pertains to the author’s assessment of the current condition of wisdom, as he “explores the changing languages of seers and poets in an age beguiled by technocrats and sophists, when wisdom itself is in widespread retreat” (6). The book is thus an “an elegy, a lament for lost wisdom” (3). Focusing for the most part on Victorian and Modern texts, and incorporating a wide range of literary, philosophic, and religious comparisons, Shaw has constructed an extensive taxonomy that provides scope for comparative analysis, critical classification, and personal reflection on the subject of wisdom. The design of the book sheds light on its purpose. Conceptually, Shaw calls his study “a sceptic’s companion” to Charles Williams’s The Descent of the Dove as it traces descent as both “the lineage and decline” of wisdom (3). Shaw’s major influence, however, is Northrop Frye, whom he calls [End Page 224] his “intellectual father” (x) and “Canada’s most celebrated wisdom writer” (6). Frye is the subject of chapter 14, but his influence is pervasive in the argument of the book and apparent in its symmetrical and sequential design. Frye’s term for this kind of relationship was “preceptor”: just as Frye recreated Blake’s claims for the radically imaginative potential of the Bible in the twentieth century, so too does Shaw recreate Frye to recover the potential of literary wisdom in the twenty-first. Hence, in a passage on Wallace Stevens, Shaw observes that, “Knowledge is discovery, but wisdom is remembrance” (156). This precept (and Shaw’s style is appropriately proverbial, witty, personal) constructs the basic relationship between past and present that criticism maintains. This dialectic of discovery and remembrance grounds the questions Shaw pursues. He asks how “an oracle that reinvents its world can both find something and recreate it? How can truth be discovered and refashioned at the same time?” (9). This dialectic generates the shaping forces of his study. If the aphorism is the mode of wisdom, then the oracle is the mode of prophecy. Assimilating Frye’s phases of revelation in The Great Code, Shaw suggests that wisdom “individualizes the law and is geared toward the past” while prophecy “individualizes the revolutionary impulse, and is geared toward the future” (6). These biblical precepts are not limiting but promote comparisons between Koheleth (Ecclesiastes) and Buddha, among others. Wisdom writing of transformative power would require a writer with “a genius for inventing oracles” and a “talent for minting fresh, arresting aphorisms” (7). Transformative power, however, tests the boundaries between sacred and secular literature that Frye maintains by reserving the term “kerygma” for the sacred. If Frye considers literature a rhetorical analogue of sacred truth, or a “secular scripture,” Shaw establishes kerygma as a parameter of various conjunctions and transmissions of oracular and aphoristic texts in Western and Eastern religious, philosophical, and literary traditions. Hence, the “oracles and aphorisms discussed in this book form part of a personally selected kerygmatic anthology” (4). The book consists of eighteen chapters in four main sections, with each section addressing an aspect of the history of wisdom. Part one, “An Owl for Apollo: Wisdom and the Poets,” begins with the formative influence of five philosophers on five poets: Schleiermacher on Browning, Scotus on Hopkins, Bradley on Eliot, Berkeley on Yeats, James on Frost. These relationships yield interesting readings, as when Shaw observes James’s influence on the nature of nouns in Frost’s “The Mountain” or argues that Bradley, the subject of Eliot’s doctoral dissertation, may be the “compound [End Page 225] ghost” of “Little Gidding.” A comparison of Tennyson and Zeno in terms of the temporality of “infinite regress” leads to a sequence of temporal-oracular categories: the sublime is “dying to time”; the beautiful is “making peace with time”; the grotesque is the...

Is There a Korean Contribution to U.S. Pastoral Theology?

South Korea is a unique convergence of eastern and western religious traditions: 30% of South Koreans call themselves Christian, 30% Buddhist, and everyone is strongly influenced by the active traditions of Confucianism and Shamanism. Based on 8 months of research in South Korea, this paper explores three perspectives on the relationship of Christianity to traditional Asian religions: 1) Is Christianity saving Korean spirituality from the failures of Confucianism, Buddhism and Shamanism? 2) Is Christianity destroying Korean spirituality because of its connections with modernism and its rejection of historic Korean religions? 3) Is a deeper Korean spirituality transforming both Christianity and Asian religions into something that will help the world heal from the contradictions of modernism?

Religiously oriented mindfulness‐based cognitive therapy

The interface of religiously accommodative and oriented treatments and the cognitive-behavioral tradition is explored. In terms of Hayes' characterization of the evolution of the cognitive-behavioral tradition through three waves, considerable theoretical, clinical, and empirical work emerged to support a religiously accommodative cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) during the second-generation CBTs. Rather than including religion and spirituality, the third-wave CBT traditions have engaged in spiritual themes inspired heavily from Eastern religious traditions. The authors discuss the application of a religiously congruent third-wave cognitive therapy with a depressed conservatively Christian client. Some conceptual challenges and rationales for adopting such treatments with Christian or other theist clients are described.