NEITHER MONK NOR LAYMAN by Richard M. Jaffe ( 9780691074955 ) - Books & Audio Books at Pickabook.co.uk

Item Details

Title:

NEITHER MONK NOR LAYMAN
CLERICAL MARRIAGE IN MODERN JAPANESE BUDDHISM

By:

Format:

Hardback

List price:	£50.00
We currently do not stock this item, please contact the publisher directly for further information.

ISBN 10:

069107495X

ISBN 13:

9780691074955

Publisher:

PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS

Pub. date:

1 February, 2002

Series:

Buddhisms: A Princeton University Press Series

Pages:

320

Description:

Buddhism comes in many forms, but in Japan it stands apart from all the rest in one striking way - the monks get married. This work addresses the emergence of an openly married clergy as a momentous change in the history of modern Japanese Buddhism. It demonstrates that this shift was not an easy one for Japanese Buddhists.

Synopsis:

Buddhism comes in many forms, but in Japan it stands apart from all the rest in one most striking way--the monks get married. In Neither Monk nor Layman, the most comprehensive study of this topic in any language, Richard Jaffe addresses the emergence of an openly married clergy as a momentous change in the history of modern Japanese Buddhism. He demonstrates, in clear and engaging prose, that this shift was not an easy one for Japanese Buddhists. Yet the transformation that began in the early Meiji period (1868-1912)--when monks were ordered by government authorities to adopt common surnames and allowed to marry, to have children, and to eat meat--today extends to all the country's Buddhist denominations. Jaffe traces the gradual acceptance of clerical marriage by Japanese Buddhists from the premodern emergence of the "clerical marriage problem" in the Edo period to its widespread practice by the start of the Second World War. In doing so he considers related issues such as the dissolution of clerical status and the growing domestication of Japanese temple life. This book reveals the deep contradictions between sectarian teachings that continue to idealize renunciation and a clergy whose lives closely resemble those of their parishioners in modern Japanese society. It will attract not only scholars of religion and of Japanese history, but all those interested in the encounter-conflict between regimes of modernization and religious institutions and the fate of celibate religious practices in the twentieth century.

Illustrations:

6 halftones, 1 line illus.

Publication:

Imprint:

Princeton University Press

Returns:

Non-returnable

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NEITHER MONK NOR LAYMAN (PB)

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