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Anarchy in the Pure Land shows that the modern Chinese reinvention of cult of Maitreya, the future Buddha, functioned as an important site for articulating a Buddhist vision of modernity.
List of contents
- Introduction: How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maitreya?
- Part I: Taixu's Buddhist Radicalism
- Chapter One: Portrait of the Master as a Young Anarchist
- Chapter Two: Disorienting Frameworks
- Part II: The Cult of Maitreya
- Chapter Three: A New Cult for New Buddhists
- Chapter Four: Bodhisattva of Progress
- Part III: Worlds Closing and Opening
- Chapter Five: Future Interrupted
- Chapter Six: Reawakening Maitreya-Legacies Orthodox and Heterodox
- Conclusion: Remembrances of Futures Past
About the author
Justin R. Ritzinger is an assistant professor of Religious Studies at the University of Miami. He received his PhD in the Study of Religion from Harvard in 2010. His work examines the reimagining of Chinese Buddhism in the modern period, particularly in response to novel ideas and values from abroad.
Summary
Anarchy in the Pure Land shows that the modern Chinese reinvention of cult of Maitreya, the future Buddha, functioned as an important site for articulating a Buddhist vision of modernity.
Additional text
This is a work of intellectual history. Although institutional issues are discussed in passing, the primary goal of this book is to explain the context, development, and enduring legacy of Taixu's ideas about, and devotion to, Maitreya. While intellectual history is not the only approach used by contemporary scholars of modern Chinese Buddhism, it is a favored one. Here Ritzinger employs it in classical fashion as he analyzes the development over time of the ideas of a single individual, and the impact that contemporary events and trends had on that individual's thinking. Much of his source material consists of articles from radical and Buddhist journals, and published records of lectures given by Taixu.
