Religions of Japan in Practice: 17 (Princeton Readings in Religions) - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0691057893 ISBN 13: 9780691057897

Publisher: Princeton University Press, 1999

Synopsis

This anthology reflects a range of Japanese religions in their complex, sometimes conflicting, diversity. In the tradition of the Princeton Readings in Religions series, the collection presents documents (legends and miracle tales, hagiographies, ritual prayers and ceremonies, sermons, reform treatises, doctrinal tracts, historical and ethnographic writings), most of which have been translated for the first time here, that serve to illuminate the mosaic of Japanese religions in practice. George Tanabe provides a lucid introduction to the "patterned confusion" of Japan's religious practices. He has ordered the anthology's forty-five readings under the categories of "Ethical Practices" "Ritual Practices" and "Institutional Practices" moving beyond the traditional classifications of chronology, religious traditions (Shinto, Confucianism, Buddhism, etc), and sects, and illuminating the actual orientation of people who engage in religious practices. Within the anthology's three broad categories, subdivisions address the topics of social values, clerical and lay precepts, gods, spirits, rituals of realization, faith, court and emperor, sectarian founders, wizards, and heroes, orthopraxis and orthodoxy, and special places. Dating from the eighth through the twentieth centuries, the documents are revealed to be open to various and evolving interpretations, their meanings dependent not only on how they are placed in context but also on how individual researchers read them. Each text is preceded by an introductory explanation of the text's essence, written by its translator. Instructors and students will find these explications useful starting points for their encounters with the varied

About this title

About the Author

George J. Tanabe, Jr., is Professor and Chair in the Department of Religion at the University of Hawaii. Having research interests covering doctrinal and practical issues in medieval and modern Japan, he is the author of MyÉe the Dreamkeeper, coeditor of The Lotus Sutra in Japanese Culture, and coauthor of Practically Religious: Worldly Benefits and the Common Religion of Japan.

From the Back Cover

"Religions of Japan in Practice demonstrates the wide variety of topics and source materials being studied by current scholars of Japan. More important, its very diversity demands that we rethink scholarly categories and boundaries within the field of Japanese religious studies. Both teachers and students will find much that is new and fascinating."--William M. Bodiford, University of California, Los Angeles

Edition details

• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Publication date: 1999
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0691057893
• ISBN 13: 9780691057897
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 584
• Editor: Tanabe George J.