Robert F. Rhodes – författare

The Ojoyoshu, written by the monk Genshin (942–1017), is one of the most important texts in the history of Japanese religions. It is the first comprehensive guide to the doctrine and practice of Pure Land Buddhism written in Japan and so played a pivotal role in establishing this form of Buddhism in the country. In Genshin's Ojoyoshu and the Construction of Pure Land Discourse in Heian Japan, the first book in English on the Ojoyoshu in more than forty years, Robert Rhodes draws on the latest scholarship to shed new light on the text, its author, and the tumultuous age in which it was written.Rhodes begins by providing substantial discussion on the development of Pure Land Buddhism before the Ojoyoshu's appearance and a thorough account of Genshin's life, the full details of which have never before been available in English. Japan in the tenth century was marked by far-reaching political, social, and economic change, all of which had a significant effect on religion, including the emergence of numerous new religious movements in Kyoto. Pure Land was the most popular of these, and the faith embraced by the Tendai scholar Genshin when he became disaffected with the growing factionalism at Enrakuji, Tendai's central temple. A significant portion of Rhodes' study is a wide-ranging examination of the Ojoyoshu's Pure Land teachings in which he describes and analyzes Genshin's interpretations of Pure Land cosmology and nenbutsu practice. For Genshin the latter encompassed an extensive range of practices for focusing the mind on Amida Buddha—from the simple recitation of Namu Amidabutsu (“recitative nenbutsu”) to the advanced meditative practice of visualizing the buddha (“meditative nenbutsu”). According to the Ojoyoshu, all of these are effective means for ensuring birth in Amida's Pure Land.This impressively researched and updated treatment of the formative text in the Japanese Pure Land tradition will be welcomed by all scholars and students of Japanese religions. It also offers a fascinating window into Heian (794–1185) religious life, which will be of interest to anyone concerned with medieval Japan.

Four Shin Buddhist thinkers reflect on their tradition's encounter with modernity.Cultivating Spirituality is a seminal anthology of Shin Buddhist thought, one that reflects this tradition's encounter with modernity. Shin (or Jodō Shinshū) is a popular form of Pure Land Buddhism, the most widely practiced form of Buddhism in Japan, but is only now becoming well known in the West. The lives of the four thinkers included in the book spanned the years 1863–1982, from the Meiji opening to the West to Japan's establishment as an industrialized democracy and world economic power. Kiyozawa Manshi, Soga Ryōjin, Kaneko Daiei, and Yasuda Rijin, all associated with Kyoto's Ōtani University, dealt with the spiritual concerns of a society undergoing great change. Their philosophical orientation known as "Seishinshugi" ("cultivating spirituality") provides a set of principles that prioritized personal, subjective experience as the basis for religious understanding.In addition to providing access to work generally unavailable in English, this volume also includes both a contextualizing introduction and introductions to each figure included.