From the Mountains to the Cities : : A History of Buddhist Propagation in Modern Korea / / Mark A. Nathan.

• Superior document: Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter DG Plus eBook-Package 2018
• VerfasserIn: Nathan, Mark A.,
• Place / Publishing House: Honolulu : : University of Hawaii Press, , [2018]; ©2018
• Year of Publication: 2018
• Language: English
• Series: Contemporary Buddhism
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (206 p.) :; 1 diagram

At the start of the twentieth century, the Korean Buddhist tradition was arguably at the lowest point in its 1,500-year history in the peninsula. Discriminatory policies and punitive measures imposed on the monastic community during the Chosŏn dynasty (1392-1910) had severely weakened Buddhist institutions. Prior to 1895, monastics were prohibited by law from freely entering major cities and remained isolated in the mountains where most of the surviving temples and monasteries were located. In the coming decades, profound changes in Korean society and politics would present the Buddhist community with new opportunities to pursue meaningful reform. The central pillar of these reform efforts was p'ogyo, the active propagation of Korean Buddhist teachings and practices, which subsequently became a driving force behind the revitalization of Buddhism in twentieth-century Korea.From the Mountains to the Cities traces p'ogyo from the late nineteenth to the early twenty-first century. While advocates stressed the traditional roots and historical precedents of the practice, they also viewed p'ogyo as an effective method for the transformation of Korean Buddhism into a modern religion-a strategy that proved remarkably resilient as a response to rapidly changing social, political, and legal environments. As an organizational goal, the concerted effort to propagate Buddhism conferred legitimacy and legal recognition on Buddhist temples and institutions, enabled the Buddhist community to compete with religious rivals (especially Christian missionaries), and ultimately provided a vehicle for transforming a "mountain-Buddhism" tradition, as it was pejoratively called, into a more accessible and socially active religion with greater lay participation and a visible presence in the cities. Ambitious and meticulously researched, From the Mountains to the Cities will find a ready audience among researchers and scholars of Korean history and religion, modern Buddhist reform movements in Asia, and those interested in religious missions and proselytization more generally.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Series Editor's Preface -- Acknowledgments -- 1. Buddhist Missions and Dharma Transmissions -- 2. Securing the Freedom to Propagate Buddhism in the Cities in Late Chosŏn -- 3. Monastic Reforms and Buddhist Propagation under Japanese Colonial Rule -- 4. The Influence of Post-Liberation Politics and Power Struggles on Propagation -- 5. Back to the Mountains: Contemporary Korean Buddhist Propagation -- 6. The Past and Future of P'ogyo: Law, Religious Pluralism, and Lay-Monastic Recombination -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index -- About the Author