Buddhism: Critical Concepts in Religious Studies, Volume VIII

Volume VIII of Buddhism: Critical Concepts in Religious Studies examines Buddhism in China, East Asia, and Japan through a selection of major twentieth- and early twenty-first-century studies. Edited by Paul Williams, the volume moves beyond a simple narrative of Buddhist transmission from India to East Asia and instead highlights processes of adaptation, contestation, reinterpretation, and institutional formation. Its studies address textual transmission, relic and stūpa cults, sacred geography, political patronage, Huayan doctrinal development, Shinran and Japanese Pure Land Buddhism, Chan institutions, gender, self-immolation, Buddhist–Daoist interaction, and the construction of medieval Japanese orthodoxy. The volume is particularly valuable because it combines philological, historical, sociological, doctrinal, and historiographical approaches, showing how Buddhism became embedded within Chinese and Japanese societies while simultaneously transforming the religious landscapes into which it entered. As the final volume of the collection, it completes the series’ broad survey of Buddhist traditions from their Indian origins to their diverse historical expressions across Asia.