Blog Entry #7- Group Topic

"The Caves of the Thousand Buddhas” from the Dunhuang and surrounding areas provide socio-political insight into daily life of the people of the Dunhuang. Scripture, art and documents found from the cave sites provide us with examples of how Buddhism influences the Dunhuang in ways other than art.

Minor influences brought to the Dunhuang from Buddhism include the habit of tea drinking, which Buddhists would drink during meditiation in order to assist acheiving enlightenment. More complex influences include that of astronomy. Buddhist paintings discovered along the Silk Road associate each day of the week with regions of the sky and a bodhisattva, as influenced by the Indian Buddhist pantheon (the seven planetary divinities). Manuscripts from the Library Cave combine Buddhist texts with Confucian classics, and contained educational exercises, multiplication tables, and writing practices. Buddhist monasteries even operated schools that taught Confucian classics to its students, in addition to Buddhist texts.

Chinese aristocrats from the northern Silk Road took up horseback riding, falconry and hunting. Many Buddhist paintings depict and describe falconry among the Chinese Tang. Activites for pleasure even possessed Buddhist influence.

As a side note, I found it intriguing that after Tibetans took over Dunhuang in the 8th century there was a paper shortage in China that forced documents to be reused in order to save paper. Therefore, Buddhist texts were often recorded on the backside of secular texts that were kept in the Library Cave.

Blog Entry #6

This image is of Prince Siddhartha, before reaching nirvana and becoming Buddha.

I found the three jewels; Buddha, dharma, and sangha the most interesting concept in this weeks readings. They are called jewels because they are rare and unaccessable. Medical metaphors are often used to associate between the three jewels. The Buddha being the doctor, dharma as the medicine and sangha as nurses. The Buddha's job is to find the Way and then show the path to liberation to others. Dharma acts as the path itself, and sangha are one's compassions along the path. The jewels offer refuge and protection to buddhists, where escape from samsara (cycle of rebirth) and reaching nirvana is the ultimate goal. This is where the idea of reincarnation plays off of the human condition. As stated in previous blog entries, humans are weak and in order to subdue fears of death, the concept of samsara calms human insecurities about the unknown. For this reason, I believe in reincarnation, despite my Roman Catholic upbringing. It is calming to believe that deceased loved ones still roam the earth, either as spirits or as other individuals.

Text and scripture play a large role in any religious tradition, and it was surpiring to read that there are many debates regarding Buddhist scripture, including the language Buddha spoke. Just like the New Testament of the Bible, the dharmabhanaka in Mahayanian Buddhism was composed centuries after the death of Buddha. Therefore, disputes regarding their accuracy become prominent.

I also a interested in why Buddhism flourished in China. The readings state that if the Chinese government had been stronger after the Tang, Buddhism would have never taken hold into China the way it did. This is a perfect example of how politics and government play a larger role in religion than one might assume.

Blog Entry #5

Zoroastrianism is one of the oldest forms of religion, along with Hinduism. Zoroaster is the supreme divinity and Ahura Mazda is the creator, where neither encompass any evil. A large theme of Zoroastrianism is the constant struggle between good and evil forces, where evil forces attempt to create chaos in the universe. In such struggles between good and evil, it is not uncommon to observe the triumph of good over evil, and Zoroastrianism is no exception. From what I understand, after the final defeat of evil, judgement upon the living and dead will occur, just like Christianity.

My favorite part of this article is the 'Basic Observances' section and the theme of fire symbolizing righteousness is clearly very important to the correct practice of prayer and ritual. I also love the idea that after death the soul is believed to walk the earth for three days after death and that during this time the prayers of presits are said to find the wandering soul. On the fourth day, at dawn, the family must gather to bid farewell to the deceased. Ancestor veneration is clearly very important to Zoroastrianism, as well as many other Asian traditions such as Taoism and Confucianism.