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Mingtang and Buddhist Utopias in the History of the Astronomical Clock:The Tower, The Armillary Sphere constructed by Empress Wu by Antonino Forte was loaned to me by my professor to use as a source for my essay on Empress Wu. He studied with Forte in Japan, and it's a signed copy, so I had to be Very Careful! But the amusing part was that he said it was not all that accurate, and that Forte would always respond to any criticism with further explanation. (Fortuantly he won't be reading this review.)
The book itself while an incredibly detailed work seemed to be lacking in focus. The emphasis was on the building of the Mingtang during the reign of Empress Wu, but also what the Mingtang meant, contained, and what was written about it when. There seemed to be a scarity of sources that were linked together in an incredibily detailed argument. However, the importance of different bits, and the implications of the arguments were often confusing. Forte spent a great deal of time talking about the Buddhist influences on the Mingtang, it was constructed by a Buddhist, but was a building that had sacred Confucian origins. Forte tends to focus on the Buddhist rather than the Confucian influences of the building, but neglects to mention that the original Mingtang building, from the Han was constructed before Buddhism was popular or prevelant in China, and therefore these were new ideas. The debate focuses around a separate building that may have been included in the Mingtang complex, or may have been seen as a separate building. From Forte's work, this building was a tall tower that housed a large statue of the Buddha and was included in the Mingtang complex. This Tiantang was a representation of a pure land paradise for the buddha Maitreya, who was associated with milleneriainsim and with the Empress during this time. Other scholars disagree about the nature of this building and believe that the Mingtang refers to a single structure and should not include other buildings. Forte also claims that the Dayi included was an astronomical clock but I feel rather confused about the thrust of his arguments in this regard.
The book is interesting in that it has several quotes from Wu herself, in chinese with English translations. It is nice to be able to get that close to the original sources with my own very limited knowledge. Forte is definitly a scholar who knows and understand a great deal about the time period. Unfortunatly the attention to detail and the structure of the book can make it quite difficult to follow his argument. I throughly enjoyed his first work, which was much easier to read and more coherently argued. I feel like perhaps it is an Italian cultural difference as I noticed the same divergence and attention to details that seem irrelevant and out of place to me in my professors lectures from time to time.
I hope that I am able to use it in my essay, though personaly I much prefered the explanation given in Offereings of Jade and Silk though that might be simply due to the fact it was easier and more straightforward! Still it's good to read a challenging book, I wish I had more time to get my head clearer with the arguments being made. Hopefully my professor won't be in a huge rush to get it returned.
The book itself while an incredibly detailed work seemed to be lacking in focus. The emphasis was on the building of the Mingtang during the reign of Empress Wu, but also what the Mingtang meant, contained, and what was written about it when. There seemed to be a scarity of sources that were linked together in an incredibily detailed argument. However, the importance of different bits, and the implications of the arguments were often confusing. Forte spent a great deal of time talking about the Buddhist influences on the Mingtang, it was constructed by a Buddhist, but was a building that had sacred Confucian origins. Forte tends to focus on the Buddhist rather than the Confucian influences of the building, but neglects to mention that the original Mingtang building, from the Han was constructed before Buddhism was popular or prevelant in China, and therefore these were new ideas. The debate focuses around a separate building that may have been included in the Mingtang complex, or may have been seen as a separate building. From Forte's work, this building was a tall tower that housed a large statue of the Buddha and was included in the Mingtang complex. This Tiantang was a representation of a pure land paradise for the buddha Maitreya, who was associated with milleneriainsim and with the Empress during this time. Other scholars disagree about the nature of this building and believe that the Mingtang refers to a single structure and should not include other buildings. Forte also claims that the Dayi included was an astronomical clock but I feel rather confused about the thrust of his arguments in this regard.
The book is interesting in that it has several quotes from Wu herself, in chinese with English translations. It is nice to be able to get that close to the original sources with my own very limited knowledge. Forte is definitly a scholar who knows and understand a great deal about the time period. Unfortunatly the attention to detail and the structure of the book can make it quite difficult to follow his argument. I throughly enjoyed his first work, which was much easier to read and more coherently argued. I feel like perhaps it is an Italian cultural difference as I noticed the same divergence and attention to details that seem irrelevant and out of place to me in my professors lectures from time to time.
I hope that I am able to use it in my essay, though personaly I much prefered the explanation given in Offereings of Jade and Silk though that might be simply due to the fact it was easier and more straightforward! Still it's good to read a challenging book, I wish I had more time to get my head clearer with the arguments being made. Hopefully my professor won't be in a huge rush to get it returned.