Buddhist literature as philosophy, buddhist philosophy as literature / edited by Rafal K. Stepien.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Stepien, Rafal K., editor.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Buddhism--Philosophy.

Buddhism.

Buddhist literature--History and criticism.

Buddhist literature.

Physical Description:

1 online resource

Place of Publication:

Albany, New York : State University of New York Press, [2020]

Summary:

Can literature reveal reality? Is philosophical truth a literary artifice? How does the way we think affect what we can know? Buddhism has been grappling with these questions for centuries, and this book attempts to answer them by exploring the relationship between literature and philosophy across the classical and contemporary Buddhist worlds of India, Tibet, China, Japan, Korea, and North America. Written by leading scholars, the book examines literary texts composed over two millennia, ranging in form from lyric verse, narrative poetry, panegyric, hymn, and koan, to novel, hagiography, (secret) autobiography, autofiction, treatise, and sutra, all in sustained conversation with topics in metaphysics, ethics, aesthetics, and the philosophies of mind, language, literature, and religion. Interdisciplinary and cross-cultural, this book deliberately works across and against the boundaries separating three mainstays of humanistic pursuit - literature, philosophy, and religion?by focusing on the multiple relationships at play between content and form in works drawn from a truly diverse range of philosophical schools, literary genres, religious cultures, and historical eras. Overall, the book calls into question the very ways in which we do philosophy, study literature, and think about religious texts. It shows that Buddhist thought provides sophisticated responses to some of the perennial problems regarding how we find, create, and apply meaning - on the page, in the mind, and throughout our lives.

Contents:

Introduction: Philosophy, literature, religion: Buddhism as transdisciplinary intervention / Rafal K. Stepien

Part I: Buddhist literature as philosophy. Transformative vision: Coming to see the Buddha's reality / Amber D. Carpenter

Jatakas and the Abhidhamma: Practical compassion and Kusala Citta / Sarah Shaw

Panegyric as philosophy: Philosophical dimensions of Indian Buddhist hymns / Richard F. Nance

Of doctors, poets, and the minds of men: Aesthetics and wisdom in Asvaghosa's Beautiful Nanda / Sonam Kachru

Buddhist literary criticism in East Asian literature / Francisca Cho

The green bamboo is the Dharmakaya: Waka poetry and the Buddhist imagination in Heian Japan / Ethan Bushelle

Part II: Budhist philosophy as literature. The scandal of the speaking Buddha: Performative utterance and the erotics of the Dharma / Natalie Gummer

The original mind is the literary mind, the original body carves dragons / Rafal K. Stepien

On resolving disputes between literary (Wenzi) and nonliterary (Wuzi) approaches to expressing Zen Buddhist philosophy / Steven Heine

Where "philosophy" and literature converge: Exploring Tibetan Buddhist writings about reality / Yaroslav Komarovski

The Repa and the Chan devotee: Hagiography, polemic, and the taxonomies of philosophical literature / Massimo Rondolino

The autobiographical no-self / C.W. Huntington Jr.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9781438480725

1438480725