Fathering Your Father: The Zen of Fabrication in Tang Buddhism by Alan Cole - 2009-02

Condition: clean copy.
Content:This book offers a provocative rereading of the early history of Chan Buddhism (zen). Working from a history-of-religions point of view that asks how nd why certain literary tropes were chosen to depi9c the essence of the Buddhist tradition to Chinese readers, this analysis focuses on the narrative logics of the early Chan genealogies: the seventh- and eighth-century lineage texts that claimed that certain high-profile Chinese men were descendants of Bodhidharma and the Buddha. Reversing the standard 'religious experience first, texts second' approach, this book argues that early Chan's image of the perfect-master-who-owns-tradition was in fact constructed for reasons that have little to do with Buddhist practices, new styles of enlightened wisdom, or 'orthodoxy' and much more to do with politics, property, geography and new forms of writing.
342 pages, Chinese glossary, references, index.