Practically Religious: Worldly Benefits and the Common Religion of JapanPraying for practical benefits (genze riyaku) is a common religious activity in Japan. Despite its widespread nature and the vast numbers of people who pray and purchase amulets and talismans for everything from traffic safety and education success to business prosperity and protection from disease, the practice has been virtually ignored in academic studies or relegated to the margins as a uh_product of superstition or an aberration from the true dynamics of religion. Basing their work on a fusion of textual, ethnographic, historical, and contemporary studies, the authors of this volume demonstrate the fallacy of such views, showing that, far from being marginal, the concepts and practices surrounding genze riyaku lie at the very heart of the Japanese religious world. They thrive not only as popular religious expression but are supported by the doctrinal structures of most Buddhist sects, are ordained in religious scriptures, and are promoted by monastic training centers, shrines, and temples. |
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... problem , and this deepened her faith . Soon she was advocating its values to other friends and col- leagues and advising them to come with her to meetings in order to deal with their own problems and desires . In various publications ...
... problem is that academic studies of religion have tended , especially from the nineteenth century onward , to ... problems created by early conceptualizations of " religion " within a basically Christian theological framework . Indeed ...
... problem in accept- ing the idea that religion may be concerned with worldly benefits as normative.37 Indeed , this is its raison d'être : Shinto deities are con- stantly invoked for the benefits they are believed to provide , while the ...
... problems and has been at various times in the past affiliated with different Buddhist sects - first the Tendai sect and then the Myōshinji branch of the Rinzai Zen Bud- dhist sect . In the modern era it separated itself from the Rinzai ...
... problems , to petitioners . This in itself is an indication of the central role the concept of benefits plays in Japanese religion : it is the concept of benefits , based on faith in the power of a Buddhist deity , that has been the ...
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Practically Religious: Worldly Benefits and the Common Religion of Japan Ian Reader,George J. Tanabe No preview available - 1998 |