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Living Karma: The Religious Practices of Ouyi Zhixu
Contributor(s): McGuire, Beverley (Author)

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ISBN: 0231537778     ISBN-13: 9780231537773
Publisher: Columbia University Press
OUR PRICE: $31.49  

Binding Type: Open Ebook - See All Available Formats & Editions
Published: August 2014
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Temporarily out of stock - Will ship within 2 to 5 weeks

Click for more in this series: Sheng Yen Series in Chinese Buddhist Studies
Additional Information
BISAC Categories:
- Religion | Buddhism - History
- History | Asia - China
- Religion | Buddhism - Rituals & Practice
Dewey: 294.392
Series: Sheng Yen Series in Chinese Buddhist Studies
Physical Information: 240 pages
Themes:
- Cultural Region - Chinese
- Religious Orientation - Buddhist
Features: Bibliography, Glossary, Illustrated
 
Descriptions, Reviews, Etc.
Publisher Description:

Ouyi Zhixu (1599-1655) was an eminent Chinese Buddhist monk who, contrary to his contemporaries, believed karma could be changed. Through vows, divination, repentance rituals, and ascetic acts such as burning and blood writing, he sought to alter what others understood as inevitable and inescapable. Drawing attention to Ouyi's unique reshaping of religious practice, Living Karma reasserts the significance of an overlooked individual in the modern development of Chinese Buddhism.

While Buddhist studies scholarship tends to privilege textual analysis, Living Karma promotes a balanced study of ritual practice and writing, treating Ouyi's texts as ritual objects and his reading and writing as religious acts. Each chapter addresses a specific religious practice--writing, divination, repentance, vows, and bodily rituals--offering first a diachronic overview of each practice within the history of Chinese Buddhism and then a synchronic analysis of each phenomenon through close readings of Ouyi's work. This book sheds much-needed light on a little-known figure and his representation of karma, which proved to be a seminal innovation in the religious thought of late imperial China.

 
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