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Over vacation I read, Religion and Society in Tang and Sung China edited by Pat Ebrey and Peter Gregory. It was on the required list for SOAS. And while she didn't recommend it to me, my professor edited it, so I thought it was going to be pretty good. I have to say it was!
The book is divided up into 9 chapters, each a different essay by a different author. Chapter 1 is an general introduction to the background of the time. It was a good view of the time, and then more closely the state of Buddhism, Taoism, Popular Religion and Confucianism at the time.
Chapter 2 by Terry F. Kleeman is The Expansion of the Wen Ch'ang Cult. He looks at the development of a local diety from a "fearsome serpent simply called The Viper" to a fully formed just God Patron of the Examinations and Judge of Morality. The essay was a very interesting and insightful look of the spread of religion, how Taoism changed and influenced the local religions, and how it was possible for such a diversity in beliefs about a god, and among his worshipers to exist side by side.
Chapter 3 was by Valerie Hansen, who has written the best book on Popular Sung religion (according to my teacher). Her article was about city Gods and how they came to be. She traced their history over time, and argued that they originated from a Buddhist deity, Vaisravana. Her essay also looked at how Buddhism dealt with local Gods, often having priests convert local gods to Buddhism. She followed the rise of wall and moat gods, how they were incorporated by both the official religion and also Taoism.
Stephen Teiser wrote on the The Growth of Purgatory. His was a truly fascination article. Looking at how the beliefs grew and changed and why. And also the reaction to these new beliefs. He used the Scripture of the Ten Kings, which has ten judges punishing the deceased. Such scriptures were used at services for the dead by their families. Families were encouraged to burn money to ease the suffering of their relatives. These beliefs were not simply Buddhist or Taoist but influenced both views. It was a very interesting article, and made me really want to read his book on the Ghost festival.
Foulk's article on Chan Buddhism and monastic practice was not so interesting to me. It was a good article, just not a subject I'm as interested in. He made the very important point though that many of the Song sources about the history of Chan are unreliable when they refer to the Golden Age of the Tang, and looked at the difference in Tang sources, and tried to have a clearer picture of what things were actually like at the time.
Ebrey had another chapter on the responses of the State to popular funerary practices. I found this article really interesting. She showed what practices were being criticized by officials in the Sung and what responses were given. One of the most significant of these being the role of geomancy which had become so popular that people would leave their relatives unburied for years and years to be able to find the most auspicious site for their burial. Often these sites were beneficial to the descendants and had little to do with the comfort of those who were being left unburied often for more than 10 years. The Confucians of course thought this was all very un-filial.
Chapter 7 was written by Judith Boltz. It was all about the power struggles of officials over the areas they were assigned to. The struggle in this case however took the form of venegeful spirits and gods of an area. It was a fascinating look at both exorcism rituals used at the time, popular spiritual beliefs, and how these blended into the actual mundane experiences of the people at the time. She used many sources in the form of stories told. Including a collection of such stories which sounded fascinating. I think need to do a search for more articles by her as this was definitely one of my favorites in the book. At the end of the essay, she looked particularly at the different examples of thunder rites used to exorcise local spirit shrines. She concluded that these rites could have been helped with the use of gunpowder, recently discovered at that time.
Judith Berling, wrote about the Taoist master Pai Yu. Her article was much closer to a biography and looked at the role of sacred places and poetry in Taoism of the time.
In the last chapter Linda Walton wrote about Southern Sung Academies and how they could be viewed as religious institutions dedicated to spreading neo-Confucian ideas. They resembled religious monasteries in many ways, often taking the physical location of popular monasteries. While not being the focus of her article I was left with the impression that these academies were the governments attempts to subdue that local religion of the people and replace it with their own beliefs.
I got this book from the UW library and am definitely going to have to try and track down a copy for myself. It was very wonderful. It wasn't at all hard to see why it was on the list.
The book is divided up into 9 chapters, each a different essay by a different author. Chapter 1 is an general introduction to the background of the time. It was a good view of the time, and then more closely the state of Buddhism, Taoism, Popular Religion and Confucianism at the time.
Chapter 2 by Terry F. Kleeman is The Expansion of the Wen Ch'ang Cult. He looks at the development of a local diety from a "fearsome serpent simply called The Viper" to a fully formed just God Patron of the Examinations and Judge of Morality. The essay was a very interesting and insightful look of the spread of religion, how Taoism changed and influenced the local religions, and how it was possible for such a diversity in beliefs about a god, and among his worshipers to exist side by side.
Chapter 3 was by Valerie Hansen, who has written the best book on Popular Sung religion (according to my teacher). Her article was about city Gods and how they came to be. She traced their history over time, and argued that they originated from a Buddhist deity, Vaisravana. Her essay also looked at how Buddhism dealt with local Gods, often having priests convert local gods to Buddhism. She followed the rise of wall and moat gods, how they were incorporated by both the official religion and also Taoism.
Stephen Teiser wrote on the The Growth of Purgatory. His was a truly fascination article. Looking at how the beliefs grew and changed and why. And also the reaction to these new beliefs. He used the Scripture of the Ten Kings, which has ten judges punishing the deceased. Such scriptures were used at services for the dead by their families. Families were encouraged to burn money to ease the suffering of their relatives. These beliefs were not simply Buddhist or Taoist but influenced both views. It was a very interesting article, and made me really want to read his book on the Ghost festival.
Foulk's article on Chan Buddhism and monastic practice was not so interesting to me. It was a good article, just not a subject I'm as interested in. He made the very important point though that many of the Song sources about the history of Chan are unreliable when they refer to the Golden Age of the Tang, and looked at the difference in Tang sources, and tried to have a clearer picture of what things were actually like at the time.
Ebrey had another chapter on the responses of the State to popular funerary practices. I found this article really interesting. She showed what practices were being criticized by officials in the Sung and what responses were given. One of the most significant of these being the role of geomancy which had become so popular that people would leave their relatives unburied for years and years to be able to find the most auspicious site for their burial. Often these sites were beneficial to the descendants and had little to do with the comfort of those who were being left unburied often for more than 10 years. The Confucians of course thought this was all very un-filial.
Chapter 7 was written by Judith Boltz. It was all about the power struggles of officials over the areas they were assigned to. The struggle in this case however took the form of venegeful spirits and gods of an area. It was a fascinating look at both exorcism rituals used at the time, popular spiritual beliefs, and how these blended into the actual mundane experiences of the people at the time. She used many sources in the form of stories told. Including a collection of such stories which sounded fascinating. I think need to do a search for more articles by her as this was definitely one of my favorites in the book. At the end of the essay, she looked particularly at the different examples of thunder rites used to exorcise local spirit shrines. She concluded that these rites could have been helped with the use of gunpowder, recently discovered at that time.
Judith Berling, wrote about the Taoist master Pai Yu. Her article was much closer to a biography and looked at the role of sacred places and poetry in Taoism of the time.
In the last chapter Linda Walton wrote about Southern Sung Academies and how they could be viewed as religious institutions dedicated to spreading neo-Confucian ideas. They resembled religious monasteries in many ways, often taking the physical location of popular monasteries. While not being the focus of her article I was left with the impression that these academies were the governments attempts to subdue that local religion of the people and replace it with their own beliefs.
I got this book from the UW library and am definitely going to have to try and track down a copy for myself. It was very wonderful. It wasn't at all hard to see why it was on the list.