Buddhism And Socio Economic Life Of Eastern India

This Book Is The First-Ever Effort To Gauge Buddhism S Impact On Socio-Economic Life Under The Palas In Bengal And The Bhaumakaras Of Orissa.

Excerpt from The Social Organisation in North-East India, in Buddha's Time That I have placed the culture which the Jatakas exhibit in north-eastern India, will, I hope, not provoke any opposition. For although most of the stories contained in our sources are, so far as their contents are con cerned, the common property of the Indian people and were known all over India, yet in the form in which they appear in the Jatakas, they belong to a particular part of India, namely, the north-east, the home of Buddhism. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Where do the Baruas stand in Buddhist religious universe? Could they be categorized as Bengali Buddhists? Such intriguing questions are addressed headlong here and answers are ferreted out of the troves of history. A large swathe of these frankly devout people is now found settled in and around Siliguri town, a gateway to the North-Eastern hinterland. But their antecedents are immensely spectacular, yet problematic. As settlers, how far their religious moorings carry them through the alienated environs of a majoritarian Hindu society? How proficient they are in border maintenance and syncretism? This ethnographic study of Bengali Barua Buddhists gives the reader a critical insight into everyday sociological practices of these struggling survivors of an ancient religion.

Ethno-herpetology studies the relationship between people and reptiles and amphibians and is derived from “ethnic-” - relating to people and culture - and “herpetology” - the study of reptiles and amphibians. Sikkim being a melting pot of ethnic cultures as well as astounding biodiversity, provides exceptional motivation for the exploration of its ethno-herpetology. Since biological and ethnic diversity is often geography-specific, studying this in small geographical regions makes sense, as knowledge of ethno-herpetology varies extraordinarily across geographic boundaries. This book has been envisaged to capture Sikkim’s immense and vibrant ethno-herpetology. It is expected to bring a new understanding of this state’s rich bio-cultural heritage and provide new details and directions to researchers of ethnobiology, zoology, ecology, anthropology, human ecology, and culture. It sincerely hopes to generate greater interest in Sikkim, Ethno-herpetology, and herpetofauna. It has the potential to reward integration with tourism and traditional knowledge.

In the contemporary world the meeting of Buddhism and Islam is most often imagined as one of violent confrontation. Indeed, the Taliban's destruction of the Bamiyan Buddhas in 2001 seemed not only to reenact the infamous Muslim destruction of Nalanda monastery in the thirteenth century but also to reaffirm the stereotypes of Buddhism as a peaceful, rational philosophy and Islam as an inherently violent and irrational religion. But if Buddhist-Muslim history was simply repeated instances of Muslim militants attacking representations of the Buddha, how had the Bamiyan Buddha statues survived thirteen hundred years of Muslim rule? Buddhism and Islam on the Silk Road demonstrates that the history of Buddhist-Muslim interaction is much richer and more complex than many assume. This groundbreaking book covers Inner Asia from the eighth century through the Mongol empire and to the end of the Qing dynasty in the late nineteenth century. By exploring the meetings between Buddhists and Muslims along the Silk Road from Iran to China over more than a millennium, Johan Elverskog reveals that this long encounter was actually one of profound cross-cultural exchange in which two religious traditions were not only enriched but transformed in many ways.

The paradigmatic Buddhist is the monk. It is well known that ideally Buddhist monks are expected to meditate and study -- to engage in religious practice. The institutional structure which makes this concentration on spiritual cultivation possible is the monastery. But as a bureaucratic institution, the monastery requires administrators to organize and manage its functions, to prepare quiet spots for meditation, to arrange audiences for sermons, or simply to make sure food, rooms, and bedding are provided. The valuations placed on such organizational roles were, however, a subject of considerable controversy among Indian Buddhist writers, with some considering them significantly less praiseworthy than meditative concentration or teaching and study, while others more highly appreciated their importance. Managing Monks, as the first major study of the administrative offices of Indian Buddhist monasticism and of those who hold them, explores literary sources, inscriptions and other materials in Sanskrit, Pali, Tibetan, and Chinese in order to explore this tension and paint a picture of the internal workings of the Buddhist monastic institution in India, highlighting the ambivalent and sometimes contradictory attitudes toward administrators revealed in various sources.

Study of theory of Karma with reference to Mahābhārata and works of Paul Ricoeur.