The Anthropology of Eastern Religions

Murray J. Leaf

doi:10.5771/9780739192412

Summary

The world’s “great” religions depend on traditions of serious scholarship, dedicated to preserving their key texts but also to understanding them and, therefore, to debating what understanding itself is and how best to do it. They also have important public missions of many kinds, and their ideas and organizations influence many other important institutions, including government, law, education, and kinship. Anthropology of Eastern Religions: Ideas, Organizations, and Constituencies is a comparative survey of the world’s major religious traditions as professional enterprises and, often, as social movements. Documenting the principle ideas behind eastern religious traditions from an anthropological perspective, Murray J. Leaf demonstrates how these ideas have been used in building internal organizations that mobilize or fail to mobilize external support.

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Bibliographic data

Copyright year: 2014
ISBN-Print: 978-0-7391-9240-5
ISBN-Online: 978-0-7391-9241-2
Publisher: Lexington, Lanham
Language: English
Pages: 177
Product type: Book Titles

1. Contents No access
2. List of Illustrations No access
3. Preface No access
4. Acknowledgments No access
1. Related Approaches No access
2. “Higher” Traditions in General No access
3. The Theory No access
4. Using the Theory No access
5. Common Themes No access
6. The Order of Description No access
7. Further Reading No access
8. Notes No access
1. Indus Valley Ideas No access
2. South Asian Texts and Sects No access
3. Translation Issues No access
4. The Vedas No access
5. The Upanishads No access
6. Organizations, Personnel, and Constituency of Vedanta No access
7. Conclusion No access
8. Further Reading No access
9. Notes No access
1. The Jain Tradition No access
2. The Buddhist Tradition No access
3. Buddhist Ethics: The Middle Way No access
4. Conclusion No access
5. Further Reading No access
6. Notes No access
1. Hinduism, Hindu Society, and Caste No access
2. Sikhism: Living Bhakti No access
3. Conclusion No access
4. Further Reading No access
5. Notes No access
1. Taoism No access
2. Confucianism No access
3. Legalism No access
4. Buddhism in China No access
5. Conclusion No access
6. Further Reading No access
7. Notes No access
1. Background No access
2. Shinto No access
3. Japanese Buddhist Sects No access
4. Zen No access
5. Bushido No access
6. Conclusion No access
7. Further Reading No access
8. Notes No access
1. Religion and Social Development No access
2. Religion and Ethics No access
3. Final Thought No access
Bibliography No access Pages 169 - 172
Index No access Pages 173 - 176
About the Author No access Pages 177 - 177