AST/REL 232 (Religions of China and Japan)
Dr. Jeff Richey, Instructor (x 3186) and Mr. Jason Adams, Teaching Assistant (859-358-0166)
Berea College, Fall 2006 W 6-9, Draper 205
COURSE DESCRIPTION
COURSE REQUIREMENTS
COURSE CALENDAR
COURSE DESCRIPTION
This course introduces students to the principal religious traditions of East Asia: Confucianism, Taoism,
Buddhism, and Shintō. Through readings in the classical primary
texts of each tradition as well as
attention to ritual and practice, you will discover what East Asians have valued most throughout the
ages. This, in turn, is one way in which to discover what you value most.
This course may be used to fulfill the General Education Program’s International (World Culture) and/or Religion Perspective requirement(s).
Course Goals
• A basic acquaintance with Confucian, Taoist,
Buddhist, and Shintō
traditions in East Asia
• A basic competence in speaking, listening, reading, and writing about
primary
texts
• A basic facility with library resources for the study of primary
texts
Course Materials 1. Wm. Th. De Bary, et al, eds., Sources of Chinese Tradition, vol. I, 2nd ed. (New York: Columbia University Press, 1999) [SOCT]
2. Wm. Th. De Bary, et al, eds., Sources of Japanese Tradition, vol. I, 2nd ed. (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001) [SOJT]
3. Murasaki Shikibu, The Tale of Genji, trans. Edward G. Seidensticker (New York: Vintage Classics, 1990)
4. Eva Wong, trans., Seven Taoist Masters (Boston and London: Shambhala, 1990)
5. Various recommended readings online [WWW] or on reserve at Hutchins Library [R]
COURSE REQUIREMENTS
• Participation
in all class sessions. The instructor reserves the right to reduce
the final grades of students who miss class. Excuses for absences may be
sought, but may not necessarily be granted.
• Submission of weekly responses to assigned readings, e-mailed
to the instructor by noon
most Wednesdays beginning on September 6, and consisting of questions and
concerns raised for you by each week’s assigned readings. Do not summarize
the assigned readings. In order to receive full credit, the text of
each e-mailed response must be no less than 250 words, and should be composed
in clear standard English prose without any mechanical
errors. Each response will be graded pass/fail, and cannot be made
up at a later date.
• Completion of 2 essays, chosen from one pair of topics due prior to midterm (on September 22 and October 13, respectively) and another pair of topics due after midterm (on November 10 and December 8, respectively). Each essay should be submitted as an attached Microsoft Word document e-mailed to the instructor. If you earn a B+ or better on the first essay, you will not be required to write a second essay. Further guidelines
for these essays are available here.
• Completion of 1 final
examination, to be administered from 6 to 8 p.m. on December 13. Further guidelines
for this examination are available here.
Course Assessment
Reading responses = 25% of course grade
Essays = 50% of course grade (25% each)
Final examination = 25% of course grade
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Course Calendar
Week 1: Introduction to the Course
8/30
Lecture: China and Japan (in class)
Recommended:
• David N. Keightley, “Early Civilization in China: Reflections on How It Became Chinese,” in Heritage of China: Contemporary Perspectives on Chinese Civilization, ed. Paul S. Ropp (Berkeley, Los Angeles, and Oxford: University of California Press, 1990), 15-54 [R 951 H548; also available as E-book]
Required:
• Excerpts from the Shujing (Classic of Documents) (SOCT 29-37)
Week 2: What Heaven Wants
9/6
Lecture: Early Chinese Thought (in class)
Recommended:
• Michael J. Puett, “Gaining the Powers of Spirits: The Emergence of Self-Divinization Claims in the Fourth Century BC,” in Puett, To Become A God: Cosmology, Sacrifice, and Self-Divinization in Early China (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2002), 80-121 (R 299.51 P977t)
Required:
• Lunyu (Analects) 2:4, 7:22, 8:19, 11:8, 12:5, 14:37, 16:8, 17:19 (SOCT 46-47, 51-53, 55, 58, 61-62)
• Excerpts from Mozi (Master Mo), “The Will of Heaven” (SOCT 72-74)
• READING RESPONSE DUE BY NOON!
Week 3: Defining Humanity
9/13
Recommended:
• Bryan W. Van Norden, “Mengzi and Xunzi: Two Views of Human Agency,” in Virtue, Nature, and Moral Agency in the Xunzi, eds. T. C. Kline III and Philip J. Ivanhoe (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, 2000), 103-134 (R 181.112 V819)
Required:
• Mengzi (Master Meng) 2A6, 6A1-6A6 (SOCT 129, 147-149)
• Excerpts from Xunzi (Master Xun), “Human Nature Is Evil” (SOCT 179-183)
• READING RESPONSE DUE BY NOON!
Video: Excerpt from Taoism: A Question of Balance (in class; also available as R Video 297.4 L848t)
Week 4: Kingship and Sagehood
9/20
Lecture: Laozi (in class)
Recommended:
• A. C. Graham, “Lao-tzu’s Taoism: The Art of Ruling by Spontaneity” and “Two Political Heresies,” in Graham, Disputers of the Tao: Philosophical Argument in Ancient China (La Salle, IL: Open Court, 1989), 215-235, 292-311 (R 181.11 G738d)
Required:
• Laozi (Old Master) 3, 5, 18, 29, 57, 60, 80 (SOCT 80-81, 84, 86, 90-91, 94)
• Excerpts from Zhuangzi (Master Zhuang) (SOCT 103-104, 105-106)
• Excerpts from Liji (Record of Rites) (SOCT 339-343)
• READING RESPONSE DUE BY NOON!
9/22
ESSAYS ON TOPIC #1 ACCEPTED!
Week 5: China Becomes Buddhist
9/27
Lecture: The Eastward Path of Buddhism (in class)
Recommended:
• Arthur F. Wright, “The Period of Preparation,” in Wright, Buddhism in Chinese History (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1959), 20-41 (R 294.3 W947)
• Donald W. Mitchell, “The Teachings of the Buddha,” in Mitchell, Buddhism: Introducing the
Buddhist Experience (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), 33-63 (R 294.3 M681b)
Required:
• Excerpts from Lihuo lun (Disposing of Error) (SOCT 422-426)
• Huiyuan, “A Monk Does Not Bow Down Before A King” (SOCT 427-429)
• Santian neijie jing (An Initiate’s Explanation of the Three Heavens) (SOCT 401-402)
• Han Yu, “Memorial on the Bone of Buddha” (SOCT 583-585)
• READING RESPONSE DUE BY NOON!
Week 6: Buddhism Becomes Chinese
10/4
Recommended:
• Arthur F. Wright, “The Period of Domestication,” in Wright, Buddhism in Chinese History (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1959), 42-64 (R 294.3 W947)
Required:
• Excerpts from Huayan jing (Flower Garland Sūtra) (SOCT 475-476)
• Excerpts from Renwang jing (Humane King Sūtra) (SOCT 477-480)
• Letter of Amoghavajra to Tang Suzong (SOCT 480)
• Tang Wuzong, “Edict of the Eighth Month” (SOCT 585-586)
• READING RESPONSE DUE BY NOON!
Exercise: Translating Li Bai (in class)
Week 7: Living in the Last Age
10/11
Recommended:
• Alfred Bloom, “The Sense of Sin and Guilt and the Last Age [Mappo] in Chinese and Japanese Buddhism,” Numen 14/2 (July 1967): 144-149 (WWW)
• Jan Nattier, “A Prophecy of the Death of the Dharma,” in Buddhism in Practice, ed. Donald S. Lopez, Jr. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995), 249-256 (R 294.3 B9273)
Required:
• Excerpts from the Miaofa lianhua jing (White Lotus of Sublime Dharma Sūtra) (SOCT 448-450)
• Excerpts from Liuzu tanjing (Platform Sūtra of the Sixth Patriarch) (SOCT 494-504)
• Daochuo, “The Difficult Path and the Easy Path” (SOCT 486-487)
• READING RESPONSE DUE BY NOON!
10/13
ESSAYS ON TOPIC #2 ACCEPTED!
10/18
MOUNTAIN DAY – NO CLASS SESSION
Week 8: The Three Teachings
10/25
Lecture: Seven Taoist Masters in Context (in class)
Recommended:
• Judith A. Berling, “When They Go Their Separate Ways,” in Meeting of Minds: Intellectual and Religious Interaction in East Asian Traditions of Thought, eds. Irene Bloom and Joshua A. Fogel (New York: Columbia University Press, 1997), 209-237 (R 181 M495 1997)
Required:
• Seven Taoist Masters (entire novel)
• READING RESPONSE DUE BY NOON!
Week 9: The Land of Wa
11/1
Lecture: Top 3 Things To Remember About Early Japan (in class)
Recommended:
• Michael Hoffman, “Cultures Combined in the Mists of Time: Origins of the China-Japan Relationship,” Japan Focus, February 3, 2006 (WWW)
Required:
• Excerpts from Weizhi (History of the Kingdom of Wei) (SOJT 6-8)
• Excerpts from Nihongi (Chronicles of Japan) (SOJT 14-15, 27-28)
• “The Great Exorcism of the Last Day of the Sixth Month” (SOJT 34-36)
• READING RESPONSE DUE BY NOON!
Video: Excerpt from Japan: The Electronic Tribe (in class; also available from Hutchins Library -- Video 952 J11e)
Week 10: Culture Shock
11/8
Lecture: Japan Before, During, and After the Nara Period
Recommended:
• Matsumae Takeshi, “Early Kami Worship,” in The Cambridge History of Japan, Vol. I: Ancient Japan, eds. John Whitney Hall, et al (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 317-358 (R 952 C178 v.1)
Required:
• “The Seventeen-Article Constitution of Prince Shōtoku” (SOJT 51-54)
• “The Merger of Buddhist and Shintō Deities” (SOJT 121)
• Empress Shōtoku, “Edict on the Great Thanksgiving Festival” (SOJT 341-342)
• Kūkai, “The Mendicant’s Speech” (SOJT 158-162)
• READING RESPONSE DUE BY NOON!
11/10
ESSAYS ON TOPIC #3 ACCEPTED!
Week 11: The Awareness of Transience
11/15
Handout: Maps of Heian-kyo
Recommended:
• Ivan Morris, “Religions,” in The World of the Shining Prince: Court Life in Ancient Japan (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1964), 89-122 (R 952.01 M876w 1994)
Required:
• Murasaki Shikibu, The Tale of Genji (entire novel)
• READING RESPONSE DUE BY NOON!
11/22
THANKSGIVING HOLIDAY – NO CLASS SESSION
Week 12: Back to Basics
11/29
Lecture: Between Emperors and Shoguns: Japan, 1185-1600 CE
Recommended:
• Joseph M. Kitagawa, “The Pure Land, Nichiren, and Zen: Religious Movements in Medieval Japan,” in Kitagawa, Religion in Japanese History (New York: Columbia University Press, 1966), 87-130 (R 291.095 K62r)
Required:
• Hōnen, “One-Page Testament” (SOJT 226)
• Excerpts from Dōgen, Bendōwa (How to Practice Buddhism) (SOJT 320-325)
• Excerpts from Nichiren, Risshō ankoku ron (Rectification for the Peace of the Nation) (SOJT 296-302)
• READING RESPONSE DUE BY NOON!
Video: The Principles and Practice of Zen (in class; also available as R Video 294.392 P957 1988)
Week 13: The Return of the Native
12/6
Recommended:
• Kuroda Toshio, “Shintō in the History of Japanese Religion,” trans. James C. Dobbins and Suzanne Gay, in Religions of Japan in Practice, ed. George J. Tanabe, Jr. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1999), 451-467 (R 200.952 R382)
Required:
• Excerpts from Jien, Gukanshō (Jottings of a Fool) (SOJT 254-257)
• Excerpts from Kitabatake Chikafusa, Jinnō shōtōki (Chronicle of the Direct Descent of Gods and Sovereigns) (SOJT 358-363)
• Excerpts from Yoshida Kanetomo, Yuiitsu Shintō myōbō yōshū (Essentials of Prime Shintō) (SOJT 346-356)
• READING RESPONSE DUE BY NOON!
Video: Excerpt from The World at War: Japan (1941-1945) (in class; also available as Video 940.53 W927)
12/8
ESSAYS ON TOPIC #4 ACCEPTED!
12/13
FINAL EXAMINATION
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