Toward a Modern Chinese Buddhism: Taixu's Reforms

Don A. Pittman

Published by University of Hawaii Press 2001

Toward a Modern Chinese Buddhism

Taixu's Reforms

Don A. Pittman

https://doi.org/10.1515/9780824865269

Overview
Contents

About this book

The Venerable Master Taixu (1890–1947) is the most important and controversial Chinese Buddhist reformer of the twentieth century. Viewed as dangerously rash by conservative Buddhists, irrelevant by secular humanists, and spiritually misguided by Christian missionaries, Taixu was nevertheless committed to forging a socially engaged form of Buddhism and to organizing a Buddhist mission in the West. His bold and inventive "Buddhist revolution" continues to shape aspects of a revitalized Buddhism in East Asia and around the world. The present volume is the first major study in English to focus on the charismatic reformer and his teachings and provides a comprehensive and absorbing interpretation of Taixu’s aims and the divisive controversies that surrounded him. This nuanced work is richly documented with quotations from Taixu’s own writings and from various Chinese intellectuals and evangelists of the period.

As the most politically involved of all the Buddhist leaders in the Republican period, Taixu sought to present Mahâyâna Buddhism as the core of a new Chinese culture and the only adequate foundation for a truly global civilization. Distancing himself from those masters who focused on otherworldly paradises and stressed dependence on celestial buddhas and bodhisattvas, he emphasized what could actually be accomplished in this world through the work of thousands of living bodhisattvas dedicated to building a pure land here and now. A realist who acknowledged the complexities of the human condition in an increasingly interdependent and violent world, Taixu was also a utopian who tried to imagine how Buddhists could begin to realize their ultimate ideals—ideals that in fact lay beyond the preservation of institutional Buddhism itself.

Students of Buddhism, Chinese religion, contemporary Chinese history and culture, and Taiwan studies will welcome this study of a crucially important and intriguingly complex individual whose life encapsulates many of the forces and possibilities apparent within Chinese Buddhism in the contemporary world.

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Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Acknowledgments Publicly Available Download PDF	ix
A Note On Romanization Publicly Available Download PDF	xi
INTRODUCTION In Search Of A New Buddhism Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
CHAPTER 1. Defending The Dharma In A Revolutionary Age Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	13
CHAPTER 2. The Sound Of The Tide For A New China Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	61
CHAPTER 3. An Ecumenical Vision For Global Mission Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	105
CHAPTER 4. Mahâyâna And The Modern World Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	153
CHAPTER 5. A Creative Recovery Of Tradition Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	196
CHAPTER 6. Taixu’S Legacy Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	255
Notes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	299
Glossary Of Chinese Characters Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	353
Selected Bibliography Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	363
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	379

Language: English
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
Audience: Professional and scholarly;
Pages
- Main content: 420

eBook

Published: February 1, 2001
ISBN: 9780824865269