Synopses & Reviews
Over the past century, Buddhism has come to be seen as a world religion, exceeding Christianity in longevity and, according to many, philosophical wisdom. Buddhism has also increasingly been described as strongly ethical, devoted to nonviolence, and dedicated to bringing an end to human suffering. And because it places such a strong emphasis on rational analysis, Buddhism is considered more compatible with science than the other great religions. As such, Buddhism has been embraced in the West, both as an alternative religion and as an alternative
to religion.
This volume provides a unique introduction to Buddhism by examining categories essential for a nuanced understanding of its traditions. Each of the fifteen essays here shows students how a fundamental term—from art to word—illuminates the practice of Buddhism, both in traditional Buddhist societies and in the realms of modernity. Apart from Buddha, the list of terms in this collection deliberately includes none that are intrinsic to the religion. Instead, the contributors explore terms that are important for many fields and that invite interdisciplinary reflection. Through incisive discussions of topics ranging from practice, power, and pedagogy to ritual, history, sex, and death, the authors offer new directions for the understanding of Buddhism, taking constructive and sometimes polemical positions in an effort both to demonstrate the shortcomings of assumptions about the religion and the potential power of revisionary approaches.
Following the tradition of Critical Terms for Religious Studies, this volume is not only an invaluable resource for the classroom but one that belongs on the short list of essential books for anyone seriously interested in Buddhism and Asian religions.
Review
“Donald S. Lopez Jr. has written the most gripping intellectual detective story I have read in years. Was the Buddha a man or a god? Europeans starting with Marco Polo could only wonder at first. His statues were everywhere, under scores of different names. But so were the statues of demons and dragons, gods and goddesses—a huge and bewildering pantheon. Was he not just another face in that crowd? He was not, but only the ancient texts could reveal this, and no European knew how to read the languages they were written in. Until, slowly, the Europeans began to learn, and little by little the stone statue began to speak, began to take on flesh, a birthplace, a life span, a history. An extraordinary story, indispensable not just for the study of Buddhism but also for a more general appreciation of the unfinished and ongoing encounter of West and East.”
Review
“From Stone to Flesh is a welcome contribution to our understanding of how Buddhism became known in the West. The vaguest of notions and sheer ignorance were in a relatively short time replaced by an ever clearer picture of the Buddha as a historical and religious figure, known in a wealth of detail that even now we have yet fully to digest. Donald S. Lopez Jr. tells the story very well and at the same time recollects the West’s own struggle to rethink history and religion in the eighteenth and nineteenthcenturies. Theologians too will appreciate From Stone to Flesh as we seek out the roots of the consciousness of religious diversity that so vividly marks our era.”
Review
“Thoroughly researched and highly readable,
From Stone to Flesh tells of a Buddha born of the Western mind—a Buddha created in our own image and trapped in our own preconceptions. A must read for those who think they know who the Buddha really was.”
Review
“This book is a welcome sequel to
The Scientific Buddha— or a ‘prequel,’ since it deals with the period before the discovery of the ‘historical Buddha’ in the mid-nineteenth century. It is vintage Donald Lopez: scholarly, well written, and entertaining. A must read.”
Review
"The highly regarded and prolific Donald S. Lopez Jr. examines the West’s evolving understanding of the Buddha from antiquity to the mid-19th century. In approximately equal parts excerpts from historical writings and erudite commentary, which alternate, Lopez presents reports of European travelers who found what they considered merely pagan idols, later accounts from Catholic missionaries who continued to grapple with a plethora of images, and the 17th-century chronicles by soldiers and bureaucrats of Western empires who began to understand that the many deities represented but one human religious leader. . . . Highly recommended."
Review
"Donald S. Lopez Jr. offers an expertly crafted history of the Buddha that has been left by the wayside and forgotten. Lopez masterfully stitches together obscure and esoteric texts from missionaries, diplomats, travelers, and others, giving them room to breathe and speak for themselves, instead of overwhelming his readers with historical analysis. There is a profound satisfaction in accompanying Lopez in his journey to find the historical Buddha, whom Westerners first denounced as an idolater and demon and, much later, came to praise his teachings. This is an exceptional and even riveting account of Western civilization's attempts to reconcile a foreign religion with its own beliefs, as well as an insightful view into how historical development has shaped Western knowledge of the world."
Review
“In describing this emergence of the Buddha from the fog of confusion, misunderstanding, and ignorance, and his transformation ‘from stone to flesh, Donald Lopez has written a book not only of great scholarship but also of great wisdom.”
Review
“From Stone to Flesh tells a complicated tale. It is, like the authors many previous works, fascinating, erudite, and engagingly written. Readers will come away enriched by it, often astonished, and occasionally exasperated. The book is not a biography of the Buddha in the usual sense, although it does recount many wonderfully varied biographies of the Buddha. Nor is it a history of Buddhism either, exactly, although readers will be enchanted by intriguing and little-known facts about the history of Buddhist ideas, texts, and societies. Rather, it is more properly a history of the Buddha himself, specifically of how we have come to know—or at least think we know—the historical founder of a world religion called Buddhism.”
Review
"Lopez is a lively scholar, always worth reading."
Synopsis
This volume provides a unique introduction to Buddhism by examining categories essential for a nuanced understanding of its traditions.
Synopsis
We have come to admire Buddhism for being profound but accessible, as much a lifestyle as a religion. The credit for creating Buddhism goes to the Buddha, a figure widely respected across the Western world for his philosophical insight, his teachings of nonviolence, and his practice of meditation. But who was this Buddha, and how did he become the Buddha we know and love today? Leading historian of Buddhism Donald S. Lopez Jr. tells the story of how various idols carved in stone—variously named Beddou, Codam, Xaca, and Fo—became the man of flesh and blood that we know simply as the Buddha. He reveals that the positive view of the Buddha in Europe and America is rather recent, originating a little more than a hundred and fifty years ago. For centuries, the Buddha was condemned by Western writers as the most dangerous idol of the Orient. He was a demon, the murderer of his mother, a purveyor of idolatry. Lopez provides an engaging history of depictions of the Buddha from classical accounts and medieval stories to the testimonies of European travelers, diplomats, soldiers, and missionaries. He shows that centuries of hostility toward the Buddha changed dramatically in the nineteenth century, when the teachings of the Buddha, having disappeared from India by the fourteenth century, were read by European scholars newly proficient in Asian languages. At the same time, the traditional view of the Buddha persisted in Asia, where he was revered as much for his supernatural powers as for his philosophical insights.
From Stone to Flesh follows the twists and turns of these Eastern and Western notions of the Buddha, leading finally to his triumph as the founder of a world religion.
About the Author
Donald S. Lopez Jr. is the Arthur E. Link Distinguished University Professor of Buddhist and Tibetan Studies in the Department of Asian Languages and Cultures at the University of Michigan. He is the author, editor, or translator of a number of books, including The Madman’s Middle Way, Critical Terms for the Study of Buddhism, Introduction to the History of Indian Buddhism,In the Forest of Faded Wisdom: 104 Poems by Gendun Chopel, and Buddhism and Science: A Guide for the Perplexed, all published by the University of Chicago Press.
Table of Contents
Introduction: Impressions of the Buddha
Donald S. Lopez Jr.
Buddha
Donald S. Lopez Jr.
Art
Charles Lachman
Death
Jacqueline I. Stone
Economy
Gustavo Benavides
Gift
Reiko Ohnuma
History
Timothy Barrett
Institution
Timothy Brook
Pedagogy
Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick
Person
William Pietz
Power
Craig J. Reynolds
Practice
Carl Bielefeldt
Ritual
Robert H. Sharf
Sex
Janet Gyatso
Word
Ryuichi Abé
Modernity
Marilyn Ivy
Contributors
Index