This book is a serious study of relic veneration among South Asian Buddhists. Drawing on textual sources and archaeological evidence from India and Sri Lanka, including material rarely examined in the West, it looks specifically at the practice of relic veneration in the Sri Lankan Theravada Buddhist tradition. The author portrays relic veneration as a technology of remembrance...(展开全部)

This book is a serious study of relic veneration among South Asian Buddhists. Drawing on textual sources and archaeological evidence from India and Sri Lanka, including material rarely examined in the West, it looks specifically at the practice of relic veneration in the Sri Lankan Theravada Buddhist tradition. The author portrays relic veneration as a technology of remembrance...(展开全部)

Among world religions, only Buddhism and Christianity attach a central significance to the role of relics. These two traditions, however, are different in both conceptual and material terms. In Buddhism, the most sacred relics are those considered parts of the cremated remains of the Buddha – a hair, a tooth, a small fragment of bone – or the tiny bead-like relics generated by ...(展开全部)

Among world religions, only Buddhism and Christianity attach a central significance to the role of relics. These two traditions, however, are different in both conceptual and material terms. In Buddhism, the most sacred relics are those considered parts of the cremated remains of the Buddha – a hair, a tooth, a small fragment of bone – or the tiny bead-like relics generated by ...(展开全部)

This volume seeks to answer the question of how the Buddhist monks in today's Sri Lanka—given Buddhism's traditionally nonviolent philosophy—are able to participate in the fierce political violence of the Sinhalese against the Tamils.

Whether chanted as devotional prayers, intoned against the dangers of the wilds, or invoked to heal the sick and bring ease to the dead, incantations were pervasive features of Buddhist practice in late medieval China (600-1000 C.E.). Material incantations, in forms such as spell-inscribed amulets and stone pillars, were also central to the spiritual lives of both monks and lay...(展开全部)

Whether chanted as devotional prayers, intoned against the dangers of the wilds, or invoked to heal the sick and bring ease to the dead, incantations were pervasive features of Buddhist practice in late medieval China (600-1000 C.E.). Material incantations, in forms such as spell-inscribed amulets and stone pillars, were also central to the spiritual lives of both monks and lay...(展开全部)

Ritual manuals are among the most common and most personal forms of Buddhist literature. Since at least the late fifth century, individual practitioners—including monks, nuns, teachers, disciples, and laypeople—have kept texts describing how to perform the daily rites. These manuals represent an intimate counterpart to the canonical sutras and the tantras, speaking to the lived...(展开全部)

Ritual manuals are among the most common and most personal forms of Buddhist literature. Since at least the late fifth century, individual practitioners—including monks, nuns, teachers, disciples, and laypeople—have kept texts describing how to perform the daily rites. These manuals represent an intimate counterpart to the canonical sutras and the tantras, speaking to the lived...(展开全部)

Rewriting Buddhism is the first intellectual history of premodern Sri Lanka’s most culturally productive period. This era of reform (1157–1270) shaped the nature of Theravada Buddhism both in Sri Lanka and also Southeast Asia and even today continues to define monastic intellectual life in the region. Alastair Gornall argues that the long century’s literary productivity was not...(展开全部)