The Zen Monastic Experience: Buddhist Practice in Contemporary Korea - Rilegato

Buswell, Robert E.

Rilegato

ISBN 10: 0691074070 ISBN 13: 9780691074078

Casa editrice: Princeton Univ Pr, 1992

Riassunto

Robert Buswell, a Buddhist scholar who spent five years as a Zen monk in Korea, draws on personal experience in this insightful account of day-to-day Zen monastic practice. Buswell's depiction of Zen reveals a religious tradition that differs radically from the stereotype prevalent in the West. Westerners exposed to Zen through English-language materials have been offered a picture of an iconoclastic religion that is bibliophobic, institutionally subversive, aesthetically sophisticated, devoted to manual labor, and intent solely on sudden enlightenment. Its most revered teachers are depicted as torching their sacred religious icons, bullying their students into enlightenment, rejecting the value of all the scriptures of Buddhism, and even denying the worth of Zen itself. In discussing the activities of the postulants, the meditation monks, the teachers and administrators, and the support monks of Song-gwang-sa, a major Korean Buddhist monastery, Buswell challenges much of this picture.
In the "counterparadigm" of Zen offered in the daily lives of the monks, Zen's putative iconoclasts are replaced by resolute members of a community dedicated to a methodical regimen of spiritual training. Zen's apparent bibliophobia pales to reveal contemplatives learned in classical Chinese and often having extensive experience in Buddhist seminaries. And the brash challenge allegedly made to systematizations of religion, even to Zen itself, fades before monks with strong faith in the arduous way of life they have undertaken. The author's treatment lucidly relates contemporary Zen practice to the historical development of the tradition and to Korean history more generally, and his intimate, sympathetic portrayal of the life of modern Zen monks in Korea provides an innovative and provocative look at Zen from the inside.

Su questo libro

Recensione:

"A myth-shattering foray behind the walls of a Korean Zen Buddhist monastery.... Less the sound of one hand clapping than of hands, mind and heart working together to lead a sanctified life--and, as such, a sound corrective to Western misunderstandings about Zen."--Kirkus Reviews

"[This book] is ... forged from [Buswell's] own experience and practice.... He enlivens his study with a detailed personal account of his daily life at Songgwang-sa, one of Korea's main monasteries, and with wry humor.... This book should be read by anyone interested in the daily life of Zen training."--Martine Batchelor, Tricycle: The Buddhist Review

Contenuti:

	List of Plates
	Preface
	Conventions Used
	Introduction: Zen Monasticism and the Context of Belief	3
Ch. 1	Buddhism in Contemporary Korea	21
Ch. 2	Daily and Annual Schedules	37
Ch. 3	Songgwang-Sa and Master Kusan	49
Ch. 4	A Monk's Early Career	69
Ch. 5	The Support Division of the Monastery	107
Ch. 6	Relations with the Laity	135
	Chronology of the Puril Hoe	147
Ch. 7	The Practice of Zen Meditation in Korea	149
Ch. 8	Training in the Meditation Hall	161
Ch. 9	The Officers of the Meditation Compound	203
	Conclusion: Toward a Reappraisal of Zen Religious Experience	217
	Epilogue: Songgwang-sa after Kusan	224
	Appendix: Principal Chants Used in Korean Monasteries	229
	Glossary of Sinitic Logographs	243
	Works Cited	253
	Index	265

Su questa edizione

• Editore: Princeton Univ Pr
• Data di pubblicazione: 1992
• ISBN 10: 0691074070
• ISBN 13: 9780691074078
• Rilegatura: Copertina rigida
• Numero di pagine: 284