Read Books Online and Download eBooks, EPub, PDF, Mobi, Kindle, Text Full Free.
Faith Myth And Reason In Han China
Download Faith Myth And Reason In Han China full books in PDF, epub, and Kindle. Read online Faith Myth And Reason In Han China ebook anywhere anytime directly on your device. Fast Download speed and no annoying ads. We cannot guarantee that every ebooks is available!
Book Synopsis Faith, Myth, and Reason in Han China by : Michael Loewe
Download or read book Faith, Myth, and Reason in Han China written by Michael Loewe and published by Hackett Publishing. This book was released on 2005-01-01 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In his classic study of the cultural history of Han China, Michael Loewe uses both archaeological discoveries and written records to sketch the conceptual background of various artifacts of the Han period, and shows how ancient Chinese thought is as much informed by mythology as it is dependent on reason. Originally published as Chinese Ideas of Life and Death: Faith, Myth and Reason in the Han Period (202 BC-AD 220), this edition includes a new Preface that discusses relevant discoveries made since the first publication and an updated list of other works on relevant topics.
Book Synopsis Chinese Ideas of Life and Death by : Michael Loewe
Download or read book Chinese Ideas of Life and Death written by Michael Loewe and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-09-03 with total page 175 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Many of the basic characteristics of Imperial China took shape during the Han period (202 BC-AD 220). This book, first published in 1982, is a key contribution to our understanding of China’s cultural history. It explains the conceptual background of many of the artefacts of China’s past, and calls on the written word of the philosopher, poet and historian, and on cultural treasures revealed by archaeologists.
Book Synopsis Divination, Mythology and Monarchy in Han China by : Michael Loewe
Download or read book Divination, Mythology and Monarchy in Han China written by Michael Loewe and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1994-09-15 with total page 394 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Chinese empires were established by force of arms, but sustained by religious rites and intellectual theory. The four centuries from 206 BC to AD 220 witnessed major changes in the state cults and the concepts of monarchy, while various techniques of divination were used to forecast the future or to solve immediate problems. Michael Loewe examines these changes and the links between religion and statecraft. While both mythology and the traditions nurtured by the learned affected the concept and practice of monarchy throughout the period, the political and social weaknesses of the last century of Han rule bring into question the success that was achieved by the imperial ideal. Nevertheless, that ideal and its institutions were of prime importance for the understanding of Han times and for the influence they exercised on China's later dynasties.
Book Synopsis The Government of the Qin and Han Empires by : Michael Loewe
Download or read book The Government of the Qin and Han Empires written by Michael Loewe and published by Hackett Publishing. This book was released on 2006-09-15 with total page 250 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this concise volume, Michael Loewe provides an engaging overview of the government of the early empires of China. Topics discussed are: the seat of supreme authority; the structure of central government; provincial and local government; the armed forces; officials; government communications; laws of the empire; control of the people and the land; controversies; and problems and weaknesses of the imperial system. Enhanced by details from recently discovered manuscripts, relevant citations from official documents, maps, a chronology of relevant events, and suggestions for further reading keyed to each topic, this work is an ideal introduction to the ways in which China’s first emperors governed.
Book Synopsis The Cambridge History of Ancient China by : Michael Loewe
Download or read book The Cambridge History of Ancient China written by Michael Loewe and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1999-03-13 with total page 1192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Cambridge History of Ancient China provides a survey of the institutional and cultural history of pre-imperial China.
Book Synopsis The Cambridge History of China: Volume 1, The Ch'in and Han Empires, 221 BC-AD 220 by : Denis Twitchett
Download or read book The Cambridge History of China: Volume 1, The Ch'in and Han Empires, 221 BC-AD 220 written by Denis Twitchett and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1986-12-26 with total page 1032 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume begins the historical coverage of The Cambridge History of China with the establishment of the Ch'in empire in 221 BC and ends with the abdication of the last Han emperor in AD 220. Spanning four centuries, this period witnessed major evolutionary changes in almost every aspect of China's development, being particularly notable for the emergence and growth of a centralized administration and imperial government. Leading historians from Asia, Europe, and America have contributed chapters that convey a realistic impression of significant political, economic, intellectual, religious, and social developments, and of the contacts that the Chinese made with other peoples at this time. As the book is intended for the general reader as well as the specialist, technical details are given in both Chinese terms and English equivalents. References lead to primary sources and their translations and to secondary writings in European languages as well as Chinese and Japanese.
Book Synopsis Routledge Handbook of Chinese Medicine by : Vivienne Lo
Download or read book Routledge Handbook of Chinese Medicine written by Vivienne Lo and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2022-06-20 with total page 1128 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Routledge Handbook of Chinese Medicine is an extensive, interdisciplinary guide to the nature of traditional medicine and healing in the Chinese cultural region, and its plural epistemologies. Established experts and the next generation of scholars interpret the ways in which Chinese medicine has been understood and portrayed from the beginning of the empire (third century BCE) to the globalisation of Chinese products and practices in the present day, taking in subjects from ancient medical writings to therapeutic movement, to talismans for healing and traditional medicines that have inspired global solutions to contemporary epidemics. The volume is divided into seven parts: Longue Durée and Formation of Institutions and Traditions Sickness and Healing Food and Sex Spiritual and Orthodox Religious Practices The World of Sinographic Medicine Wider Diasporas Negotiating Modernity This handbook therefore introduces the broad range of ideas and techniques that comprise pre-modern medicine in China, and the historiographical and ethnographic approaches that have illuminated them. It will prove a useful resource to students and scholars of Chinese studies, and the history of medicine and anthropology. It will also be of interest to practitioners, patients and specialists wishing to refresh their knowledge with the latest developments in the field. The Open Access version of this book, available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives 4.0 license
Download or read book Ways of Heaven written by Roel Sterckx and published by Basic Books. This book was released on 2019-09-17 with total page 383 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A brilliant history of ancient China's masters of philosophy -- and how they help us understand China todayIn Ways of Heaven, leading China scholar Roel Sterckx offers an engrossing introduction to classical China's world of ideas. Drawing on evocative examples from philosophical texts, literature, and everyday life over centuries of Chinese history, Sterckx introduces major thinkers and traditions, illuminates key concepts like the dao, qi, yin, and yang, and examines questions of leadership, social order, death, nature, and more. He also reveals how these ideas shape contemporary China, from table manners at a traditional banquet, to the Chinese obsession with education and family, to the rhetoric of political leaders and the nation's grand strategy.Essential reading for students, travelers, businesspeople, and anyone curious about this rising global power, Ways of Heaven shows that to comprehend China today we must learn to think Chinese.
Book Synopsis The Mingqi Pottery Buildings of Han Dynasty China, 206 BC -AD 220 by : Qinghua Guo
Download or read book The Mingqi Pottery Buildings of Han Dynasty China, 206 BC -AD 220 written by Qinghua Guo and published by Liverpool University Press. This book was released on 2016-01-01 with total page 507 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An enormous number of burial objects have been unearthed from ancient tombs in archaeological excavations in China. These mingqi were made in all kinds of materials and in a broad range of forms, techniques and craftsmanship. In this book Quinghua Guo examines a particular type of mingqi -- pottery building. The striking realism of the pottery buildings suggests that they were modelled after actual buildings. They bring to life courtyard houses, manors, towers, granaries and pigsty-privies, as well as cooking ranges and well pavilions. These pottery buildings, previously little known, preserve knowledge of antiquity and demonstrate the architectural quality and structural variety of the period. The author identifies the typology of the pottery buildings they signify in terms of ontology and semiology, in order to provide a conceptual map for classification, and identifies building systems reflected by the mingqi to detect architectonic systems of the Han dynasty. Key features of this volume include: Cross-disciplinary research -- architectural study interlocking with archaeological study; architectural study interlocking with graphic study. The Han pottery buildings are important architectural models from the ancient world, and are contrasted with wooden houses of Middle-Kingdom Egypt and brick buildings of the Minor civilisation, Crete, allowing cross-cultural comparisons.
Book Synopsis And Man Created God by : Selina O'Grady
Download or read book And Man Created God written by Selina O'Grady and published by Macmillan + ORM. This book was released on 2013-03-26 with total page 578 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: At the time of Jesus' birth , the world was full of gods. Thousands of them jostled, competed and merged with one another. In Syria ecstatic devotees castrated themselves in the streets to become priests of Atargatis In Galilee, holy men turned oil into wine, healed the sick, drove out devils, and claimed to be the Messiah. Every day thousands of people were leaving their family and tribes behind them and flocking into brand new multi-ethnic cities. The ancient world was in ferment as it underwent the first phase of globalisation, and in this ferment rulers and ruled turned to religion as a source of order and stability. Augustus, the first emperor of Rome (though he never dared officially to call himself so) was maneuvering his way to becoming worshipped as a god – it was one of the most brilliant makeovers ever undertaken by a ruler and his spin doctors. In North Africa, Amanirenas the warrior queen exploited her god-like status to inspire her armies to face and defeat Rome. In China the usurper Wang Mang won and lost his throne because of his obsession with Confucianism. To explore the power that religious belief has had over societies through the ages, Selina O'Grady takes the reader on a dazzling journey across the empires of the ancient world and introduces us to rulers, merchants, messiahs, priests and holy men. Throughout, she seeks to answer why, amongst the countless religious options available, the empires at the time of Jesus ‘chose' the religions they did? Why did China's rulers hitch their fate to Confucianism, a philosophy more than a religion? And why was a tiny Jewish cult led by Jesus eventually adopted by Rome's emperors rather than the cult of Isis which was far more popular and widespread? The Jesus cult , followed by no more than 100 people at the time of his death, should, by rights, have disappeared in a few generations. Instead it became the official religion of the Roman Empire. Why did Christianity grow so quickly to become the predominant world religion? What was it about its teachings that so appealed to people? And Man Created God looks at why and how religions have had such an immense impact on human history and in doing so uncovers the ineradicable connection between politics and religion - a connection which still defines us in our own age. This is an important, thrilling and necessary new work of history.
Book Synopsis Folk Literati, Contested Tradition, and Heritage in Contemporary China by : Ziying You
Download or read book Folk Literati, Contested Tradition, and Heritage in Contemporary China written by Ziying You and published by Indiana University Press. This book was released on 2020-02-11 with total page 254 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this important ethnography Ziying You explores the role of the "folk literati" in negotiating, defining, and maintaining local cultural heritage. Expanding on the idea of the elite literati—a widely studied pre-modern Chinese social group, influential in cultural production—the folk literati are defined as those who are skilled in classical Chinese, knowledgeable about local traditions, and capable of representing them in writing. The folk literati work to maintain cultural continuity, a concept that is expressed locally through the vernacular phrase: "incense is kept burning." You's research focuses on a few small villages in Hongtong County, Shanxi Province in contemporary China. Through a careful synthesis of oral interviews, participant observation, and textual analysis, You presents the important role the folk literati play in reproducing local traditions and continuing stigmatized beliefs in a community context. She demonstrates how eight folk literati have reconstructed, shifted, and negotiated local worship traditions around the ancient sage-Kings Yao and Shun as well as Ehuang and Nüying, Yao's two daughters and Shun's two wives. You highlights how these individuals' conflictive relationships have shaped and reflected different local beliefs, myths, legends, and history in the course of tradition preservation. She concludes her study by placing these local traditions in the broader context of Chinese cultural policy and UNESCO's Intangible Cultural Heritage program, documenting how national and international discourses impact actual traditions, and the conversations about them, on the ground.
Book Synopsis The Confucian-Legalist State by : Dingxin Zhao
Download or read book The Confucian-Legalist State written by Dingxin Zhao and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2015-09-22 with total page 473 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In The Confucian-Legalist State, Dingxin Zhao offers a radically new analysis of Chinese imperial history from the eleventh century BCE to the fall of the Qing dynasty. This study first uncovers the factors that explain how, and why, China developed into a bureaucratic empire under the Qin dynasty in 221 BCE. It then examines the political system that crystallized during the Western Han dynasty, a system that drew on China's philosophical traditions of Confucianism and Legalism. Despite great changes in China's demography, religion, technology, and socioeconomic structures, this Confucian-Legalist political system survived for over two millennia. Yet, it was precisely because of the system's resilience that China, for better or worse, did not develop industrial capitalism as Western Europe did, notwithstanding China's economic prosperity and technological sophistication beginning with the Northern Song dynasty. In examining the nature of this political system, Zhao offers a new way of viewing Chinese history, one that emphasizes the importance of structural forces and social mechanisms in shaping historical dynamics. As a work of historical sociology, The Confucian-Legalist State aims to show how the patterns of Chinese history were not shaped by any single force, but instead by meaningful activities of social actors which were greatly constrained by, and at the same time reproduced and modified, the constellations of political, economic, military, and ideological forces. This book thus offers a startling new understanding of long-term patterns of Chinese history, one that should trigger debates for years to come among historians, political scientists, and sociologists.
Book Synopsis Death in Ancient China by : Constance Cook
Download or read book Death in Ancient China written by Constance Cook and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2017-06-20 with total page 300 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This richly illustrated book provides a glimpse into the belief system and the material wealth of the social elite in pre-Imperial China through a close analysis of tomb contents and excavated bamboo texts. The point of departure is the textual and material evidence found in one tomb of an elite man buried in 316 BCE near a once wealthy middle Yangzi River valley metropolis. Particular emphasis is placed on the role of cosmological symbolism and the nature of the spirit world. The author shows how illness and death were perceived as steps in a spiritual journey from one realm into another. Transmitted textual records are compared with excavated texts. The layout and contents of this multi-chambered tomb are analyzed as are the contents of two texts, a record of divination and sacrifices performed during the last three years of the occupant’s life and a tomb inventory record of mortuary gifts. The texts are fully translated and annotated in the appendices. A first-time close-up view of a set of local beliefs which not only reflect the larger ancient Chinese religious system but also underlay the rich intellectual and artistic life of pre-Imperial China. With first full translations of texts previously unknown to all except a small handful of sinologists.
Book Synopsis Discourses of Purity in Transcultural Perspective (300–1600) by :
Download or read book Discourses of Purity in Transcultural Perspective (300–1600) written by and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2015-04-21 with total page 380 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: While comparative studies on purity and impurity presented in the last decades have mostly concentrated on the ancient world or on modern developments, this volume focusses the hitherto comparatively neglected period between ca. 300 and 1600 c. E. The collection is innovative because it not only combines papers on both European and Asian cultures but also considers a wide variety of religions and confessions. The articles are written by leading experts in the field and are presented in six systematic sections. This analytical categorization facilitates understanding the functional spectrum that the binomial purity and impurity could cover in past societies. The volume thus presents an in-depth comparative analysis of a category of paramount importance for interfaith relations and processes of transfer. Contributors are: Aziz al-Azmeh, Matthias Bley, Sven Bretfeld, Miriam Czock, Licia Di Giacinto, Hans-Werner Goetz, Elisabeth Hollender, Nikolas Jaspert, Stefan Köck, Stefan Leder, Hanna Liss, Christopher MacEvitt, Hermann-Josef Röllicke, Paolo Santangelo, and Ephraim Shoham-Steiner.
Book Synopsis A Communion of Subjects by : Paul Waldau
Download or read book A Communion of Subjects written by Paul Waldau and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2009-05-22 with total page 721 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Communion of Subjects is the first comparative and interdisciplinary study of the conceptualization of animals in world religions. Scholars from a wide range of disciplines, including Thomas Berry (cultural history), Wendy Doniger (study of myth), Elizabeth Lawrence (veterinary medicine, ritual studies), Marc Bekoff (cognitive ethology), Marc Hauser (behavioral science), Steven Wise (animals and law), Peter Singer (animals and ethics), and Jane Goodall (primatology) consider how major religious traditions have incorporated animals into their belief systems, myths, rituals, and art. Their findings offer profound insights into the relationship between human beings and animals, and a deeper understanding of the social and ecological web in which we all live.
Book Synopsis The Early Chinese Empires by : Mark Edward Lewis
Download or read book The Early Chinese Empires written by Mark Edward Lewis and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2010-10-30 with total page 334 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 221 bc the First Emperor of Qin unified the lands that would become the heart of a Chinese empire. Though forged by conquest, this vast domain depended for its political survival on a fundamental reshaping of Chinese culture. With this informative book, we are present at the creation of an ancient imperial order whose major features would endure for two millennia. The Qin and Han constitute the "classical period" of Chinese history--a role played by the Greeks and Romans in the West. Mark Edward Lewis highlights the key challenges faced by the court officials and scholars who set about governing an empire of such scale and diversity of peoples. He traces the drastic measures taken to transcend, without eliminating, these regional differences: the invention of the emperor as the divine embodiment of the state; the establishment of a common script for communication and a state-sponsored canon for the propagation of Confucian ideals; the flourishing of the great families, whose domination of local society rested on wealth, landholding, and elaborate kinship structures; the demilitarization of the interior; and the impact of non-Chinese warrior-nomads in setting the boundaries of an emerging Chinese identity. The first of a six-volume series on the history of imperial China, The Early Chinese Empires illuminates many formative events in China's long history of imperialism--events whose residual influence can still be discerned today.
Author :Garret P. S. Olberding Publisher :State University of New York Press ISBN 13 :1438443919 Total Pages :290 pages Book Rating :4.4/5 (384 download)
Book Synopsis Dubious Facts by : Garret P. S. Olberding
Download or read book Dubious Facts written by Garret P. S. Olberding and published by State University of New York Press. This book was released on 2012-12-04 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What were the intentions of early China's historians? Modern readers must contend with the tension between the narrators' moralizing commentary and their description of events. Although these historians had notions of evidence, it is not clear to what extent they valued what contemporary scholars would deem "hard" facts. Offering an innovative approach to premodern historical documents, Garret P. S. Olberding argues that the speeches of court advisors reveal subtle strategies of information management in the early monarchic context. Olberding focuses on those addresses concerning military campaigns where evidence would be important in guiding immediate social and political policy. His analysis reveals the sophisticated conventions that governed the imperial advisor's logic and suasion in critical state discussions, which were specifically intended to counter anticipated doubts. Dubious Facts illuminates both the decision-making processes that informed early Chinese military campaigns and the historical records that represent them.
