Women under the Bo Tree: Buddhist nuns in Sri Lanka

ISBN-13: 9780521461290 / Angielski / Twarda / 1994 / 308 str.

Tessa J. Bartholomeusz

Opis

Tessa Bartholomeusz explores the relationship between female world-renunciation in Buddhist Sri Lanka and attitudes about women and the religious vocation. She gives a history of Buddhist female renouncers in Sri Lanka and recounts her own field experiences of contemporary Buddhist women who have chosen to live celibate and cloistered lives. By presenting the point of view of the women themselves and describing their role and vocation in present-day Sri Lanka, the author puts a new perspective on the island's Buddhist culture.

Recenzje

"Women under the Bo Tree is a fascinating account of the life of an unusual institution, the history of which sheds a great deal of light on the position of women in contemporary Theravada Buddhist cultures. By perusing the historical record and recovering the voices of nineteenth and twentieth-century lay nuns, their supporters, and their critics, and also by interviewing contemporary lay nuns, Bartholomeusz provides us with an insightful account of this self-declared monastic community." Journal of the American Academy of Religion

Spis treści

Preface; Acknowledgments; Notes on pronunciation; Dramatis personae; Part I; Introduction: The tradition of Buddhist female renunciation in Sri Lanka; 1. The ancient order of nuns in Sri Lanka; 2. Nineteenth century Ceylon: the emergence of the lay nun; 3. Theosophists, educators and nuns; 4. The Sanghamitta Sisterhood; Part II; 5. The Institutionalisation of tradition; 6. The lay nun in transitional Ceylon; 7. The Dasa Sil Mata in contemporary Sri Lanka; 8. Novitiates, western lay nuns, and cave dwellers; 9. The Sri Lankan Bhikkhuni Sangha: trends and reflections; Epilogue: Women under the bo tree; Appendices; Notes; Bibliographies; Index.