This exciting third volume of David M. Honey's comprehensive history of Chinese thought begins with China after nomadic invaders overran the northern regions of the historic kingdom. The differentiation between scholarly emphases-northern focus on the traditional pedagogical commentary, and southern classical school's more innovative commentary-led to an emphasis on the interpretation of the overall message of a text, not a close reading of smaller sections. As Honey explains, serious attention to the phonological nature of Chinese characters also began during in this long era. Based on the work of earlier Sui dynasty classicists, Kong Yinga and his committee produced the Correct Meaning commentary to the Five Classics during the early Tang Dynasty, which is still largely normative today. The book demonstrates that the brooding presence of Zheng Xuan, the great textual critic from the Eastern Han dynasty, still exerted enormous influence during this period, as his ritualized approach to the classics inspired intellectual followers to expand on his work or impelled opponents to break off in new directions.

This volume is a systematic and comprehensive introduction to one of the most read texts in South Asia, the Bhagavad-gita. The Bhagavad-gita is at its core a religious text, a philosophical treatise and a literary work, which has occupied an authoritative position within Hinduism for the past millennium. This book brings together themes central to the study of the Gita, as it is popularly known - such as the Bhagavad-gita's structure, the history of its exegesis, its acceptance by different traditions within Hinduism and its national and global relevance. It highlights the richness of the Gita's interpretations, examines its great interpretive flexibility and at the same time offers a conceptual structure based on a traditional commentarial tradition. With contributions from major scholars across the world, this book will be indispensable for scholars and researchers of religious studies, especially Hinduism, Indian philosophy, Asian philosophy, Indian history, literature and South Asian studies.

Volume II of David M. Honey’s comprehensive history of Chinese thought covers a vital 500-year stretch in China’s history, from national unification in 221 BCE to the first post-imperial fragmentation into rival northern and southern polities. This volume discusses the reconstitution of the classics after the textual devastation wrought by the policies of the First Emperor of Qin, who destroyed many of them, and their eventual canonization by the crown during the Western Han period. Honey also examines the professionalization of Chinese classical scholarship as a state-sponsored enterprise, whereby private masters gave way to tenured academicians who specialized in single classical works. This volume also covers the development of various subgenres in the discipline of philology by the three great Eastern Han classicists Liu Xiang in textual criticism, Xu Shen in lexicography, and the polymath Zheng Xuan in the exegesis of virtually all the classics. Honey concludes with an examination of Zheng Xuan as the inspiration for other exegetical modes to explain textual complexities following this era.

The first volume of David M. Honey’s comprehensive history of Chinese thought offers a close study of Confucius, that tradition’s proto-classicist. This opening volume examines Confucius traditions that largely formed the views of later classicists, who regarded him as their profession’s patron saint. Honey’s survey begins by examining how these views informed the Chinese classicists’ own identities as textual critics and interpreters, all dedicated to self-cultivation for government service. It focuses on Confucius’s methods as a proto-classical master and teacher, and on the media in which he worked, including the spoken word and written texts. As Honey explains, Confucius’s immediate motivations were twofold: the moral development of himself and his disciples and the ritual application of the lessons from the classics. His instruction occurred in ritualized settings in the form of a question and answer catechism between master and disciples. This pedagogical approach will be analyzed through the interpretive paradigm of “performative ritual,� borrowed from recent studies of Greek classical drama. The volume concludes with a detailed treatment of a trio of Confucius’s disciples who were most prominent in transmitting his teachings, and with chapters on his intellectual inheritors, Mencius and Xunzi.

This book critically examines the Confucian political imagination and its influence on the contemporary Chinese dream of a powerful China. It views Confucianism as the ideological supplement to a powerful state that is challenging Western hegemony, and not as a political philosophy that need not concern us. Eske Mollgaard shows that Confucians, despite their traditionalist ways, have the will to transform the existing socio-ethical order. The volume discusses the central features of the Confucian political imaginary, the nature of Confucian discourse, Confucian revivals, Confucian humanism and civility, and the political ideal of the Great Unity. It concludes by considering if Confucianism can be universalized as an ideology in competition with liberal democracy.

Confucian and Stoic Perspectives on Forgiveness explores the absence of forgiveness in classical Confucianism and Roman Stoicism as well as the alternatives to forgiveness that these rich philosophical traditions offer. After discussing forgiveness as it is understood in contemporary philosophy, Sean McAleer explores Confucius' vocabulary for and attitude toward anger and resentment, arguing that Confucius does not object to anger but to its excesses. While Confucius does not make room for forgiveness, McAleer argues that Mencius cannot do so, given the distinctive twist he gives to self-examination in response to mistreatment. Xunzi, by contrast, leaves open a door to forgiveness that Mencius bolted shut. The book then proceeds to the Roman Stoics-Musonius Rufus, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, and Seneca-arguing that their distinctive conceptions of value and wellbeing rule out forgiveness, though like the Confucians the Stoics offer alternatives to forgiveness well worth considering. The book ends by comparing the two traditions, arguing that while Stoicism helps us navigate many of the turbulent waters of everyday life, Confucianism enjoys advantages when we interact with those to whom we are bound by ties of affection and intimacy.

Experience Serenity and Hope Daily "The Woman's Book of Joy is like a comforting friend supporting us in our struggles." -Mandy Keast-Southall, therapist and yoga teacher When you learn to tap into the deep wellspring of joy that is within you, nothing is impossible. A book of joy. Women have a great many challenges to deal with in their lives. Among the most ubiquitous of those challenges is self-care. Too often, we are focused on caring for others and not ourselves. Low self-esteem, anxiety, and depression are all too common when our lives are less fulfilling than they could be. Yet deep within, women have a tremendous spiritual resource a capacity for real joy that is not dependent on anything external. It is always available, regardless of circumstances. Find your inner spirituality. Many self-help books can lead people into further self-judgement. Instead, The Woman's Book of Joy encourages and inspires women to care more deeply for themselves and to face life's challenges with courage and joy. It's a practical motivational book for accessing inner wisdom, enhancing self-esteem, overcoming sorrow, and deepening relationships. Thinking deeply. The meditations and affirmations in this book will provide you with the opportunity to contemplate a wide range of topics, including: Developing awareness Letting go Believing in your dreams Living in the now Finding your true purpose Practicing kindness Being optimistic Trusting the universe Appreciating life's blessings If you found joy in meditation books and inspirational books for women like I've Been Thinking..., Journey to the Heart, and Each Day a New Beginning, you'll be encouraged and uplifted by The Woman's Book of Joy.

The Philosophy of Rabindranath Tagore (1918) is an academic study by Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan. Published at the beginning of his career as one of India's leading professors of comparative religion, the work is a masterful investigation of the teachings of poet-philosopher Rabindranath Tagore. In 1913, Tagore was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, making him the first lyricist and non-European to be awarded the distinction. Over the next several decades, Tagore wrote his influential novel The Home and the World (1916), toured dozens of countries, and advocated on behalf of Dalits and other oppressed peoples. "Rabindranath's teaching, with its vital faith in the redeeming power of the spiritual forces and their up-building energy, has a particular value at the present moment, when the civilized world is passing through the crucible of a ghastly war which, whether or not it purges the nations of their pride and hate, lust for gold and greed of land, at least proclaims, in no uncertain tones, the utter bankruptcy of materialism." In this masterwork of twentieth century criticism, Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan explores the philosophical teachings of Rabindranath Tagore, a leading artist and intellectual of modern India. Divided into five chapters, the book explores the interrelation of poetry and philosophy in Tagore's work, his influence on Indian culture, and the meaning of his contribution to the nations of the world. With a beautifully designed cover and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan's The Philosophy of Rabindranath Tagore is a classic of Indian literature reimagined for modern readers.

Priceless Wisdom from a Modern Tao Te Ching Odyssey "...this book will completely absorb your attention from the beginning..." -Emanuele Pettener, PhD, assistant professor of Italian and writer in residence at Florida Atlantic University #1 New Release in Chinese Poetry, Asian Poetry, and Tao Te Ching A literary memoir like no other, Monk of Park Avenue recounts novelist and martial master Monk Yon Rou's spiritual journey of self-discovery. Learn from Yon Rou as he tackles tragedy and redemption on an unforgettable soul-searching odyssey. A spiritual journey with extraordinary encounters. Yon Rou's memoir is a kaleidoscopic ride through the upper echelons of New York Society and the nature-worshipping, sword-wielding world of East Asian religious and martial arts. Monk of Park Avenue divulges a privileged childhood in Manhattan, followed by the bitter rigors of kung fu in China and meditations in Daoist temples. Join Yon Rou's adventure as he encounters kings, Nobel laureates, and the Mob. Witness this martial master's incarceration in a high-mountain Ecuadorian hellhole and fight for survival in Paraguay's brutal thorn jungle. Meet celebrities along the way. A story of love, loss, persistence, triumph, and mastery, The Monk of Park Avenue is peopled with the likes of Milos Forman, Richard Holbrooke, Paul McCartney, Warren Beatty and now-infamous opioid purveyors, the Sackler Family. Yun Rou's memoir is no mere celebrity tell-all, but a novelist and martial master's path to self-discovery. The Monk of Park Avenue offers you: Paths for personal and spiritual growth Anecdotal stories of self-discovery and insights into how to live An eloquent, candid exploration of spiritual transformation If you loved Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, To Shake the Sleeping Self, or Lao Tzu by Ursula K. Le Guin, you'll love The Monk of Park Avenue. Also, be sure to read Monk Yon Rou's Mad Monk Manifesto, winner of both the Gold & Silver 2018 Nautilus Book Award.

This book is a study of the methodological, metaphysical, and epistemological work of the Eastern Han Dynasty period scholar Wang Chong. It presents Wang's philosophical thought as a unique and syncretic culmination of a number of ideas developed in earlier Han and Warring States philosophy. Wang's philosophical methodology and his theories of truth, knowledge, and will and determinism offer solutions to a number of problems in the early Chinese tradition. His views also have much to offer contemporary philosophy, suggesting new ways of thinking about familiar problems. While Wang is best known as a critic and skeptic, Alexus McLeod argues that these aspects of his thought form only a part of a larger positive project, aimed at discerning truth in a variety of senses.

Lao Tzu's Tao Te Ching is the source of Zen Buddhism, and is probably the most broadly influential spiritual text in human history. Complete & Unabridged. Part of the Macmillan Collector's Library; a series of stunning, cloth-bound, pocket-sized classics with gold foiled edges and ribbon markers. These beautiful books make perfect gifts or a treat for any book lover. This edition is translated and introduced by David Hinton. Fluent in ancient Chinese and an acclaimed poet, he skilfully reveals how remarkably current and even innovative this text is after 2500 years. According to legend, Lao Tzu left China at the age of eighty, saddened that men would not follow the path to natural goodness. At the border with Tibet, a guard asked him to record his teachings and the Tao Te Ching is what he wrote down before leaving. Lao Tzu's spirituality describes the Cosmos as a harmonious and generative organism, and it shows how the human is an integral part of that cosmos.

This book offers an original phenomenological description of mindfulness and related phenomena, such as concentration (sam�dhi) and the practice of insight (vipassan�). It demonstrates that phenomenological method has the power to reanimate ancient Buddhist texts, giving new life to the phenomena at which those texts point. Beginning with descriptions of how mindfulness is encountered in everyday, pre-philosophical life, the book moves on to an analysis of how the Pali Nik�yas of Theravada Buddhism define mindfulness and the practice of cultivating it. It then offers a critique of the contemporary attempts to explain mindfulness as a kind of attention. The author argues that mindfulness is not attention, nor can it be understood as a mere modification of the attentive process. Rather, becoming mindful involves a radical shift in perspective. According to the author’s account, being mindful is the feeling of being tuned-in to the open horizon, which is contrasted with Edmund Husserl’s transcendental horizon. The book also elucidates the difference between the practice of cultivating mindfulness with the practice of the phenomenological epoché, which reveals new possibilities for the practice of phenomenology itself. Phenomenological Reflections on Mindfulness in the Buddhist Tradition will appeal to scholars and advanced students interested in phenomenology, Buddhist philosophy, and comparative philosophy.

This book represents the first critical edition and scholarly annotated translation of a pioneering report on the predicament of cross-cultural understanding at the dawn of globalization, titled "A Brief Response on the Controversies over Shangdi, Tianshen and Linghun" ("Resposta breve sobre as Controversias do Xamty, Tien Xin, Lim hoen"), which was written in China by the Sicilian Jesuit missionary Niccolo Longobardo (1565-1654) in the 1620s and profoundly influenced Enlightenment understandings of Asian philosophy. The book restores the focus on Longobardo's own intellectual concerns, while also reproducing and analyzing all the Chinese-language annotations on the previously unpublished Portuguese and Latin manuscripts. Moreover, it meticulously modernizes all romanizations with standard Hanyu pinyin and identifies, on the basis of archival research, most of Longobardo's Chinese interlocutors, thus providing new insights into how the Jesuits networked with Chinese scholars in the late Ming. In this way, it opens up this seminal text to Sinologists and global historians exploring Europe's first intellectual exchanges with China. In addition, the book presents four introductory essays, written by the editors and two prominent scholars on the Jesuit China mission. These essays comprehensively reconstruct the historical and intellectual context of Longobardo's report, stressing that it cannot be viewed purely as a product of Sino-European cultural exchange, but also as an outgrowth of both exegetic debates within Europe and of European experiences across Asia, especially in Japan. Hence this critical edition will greatly contribute to a more globalized view of the Jesuit China mission.

This book traces the trajectory of traditional Chinese ethics from West Zhou Dynasty (1046-771 BC) through Qing Dynasty (1616-1912) and covers a myriad of Chinese philosophers who have expressed their ideas about the relationships between Heavenly Dao vs. Earthly Dao, Good vs. Evil, Morality vs. Legality, Knowledge vs. Behavior, Motive vs. Result, Righteousness vs. Profitability, Rationality vs. Animality. In this book, the readers can find Confucius's discussion on Rite and Benevolence, Lao Zi's meditation on Inaction of Great Dao, Zhuang Zi's elaboration on "Transcendental Freedom", Mohist utilitarian "Universal Love", and Mencian theory of "Primordial Good Humanity", to name just a few phenomenal figures. A compact yet elaborate, panoramic yet profound guidebook to traditional Chinese ethical thought, this book is an excellent window to showcase traditional Chinese mental and spiritual legacy. Composed, translated, and proofread by brilliant scholars, it produces a fluent and coherent English discourse of Chinese morality and ethics, nimbly spinning together the threads of Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism, and other ideological schools with brief references to the historical situation. Consequently, it provides English readers, especially those curious about Chinese psychology and rationality, with thought-provoking and horizon-expanding perspectives, and provides Chinese readers, especially those of philosophy and translation, with a great number of typical and characteristic quotes of archaic Chinese that have never been translated before. Ultimately, it is a fundamental threshold to learning about Chinese people, Chinese culture, Chinese morality, Chinese mentality, Chinese policy, and Chinese diplomacy.

If we thought that reality were changeable, fragile, and fleeting, would we take life more seriously or less seriously? This book contemplates the notion of "hakanasa," the evanescence of all things, as understood by the Japanese. Their lived responses to this idea of impermanence have been various and even contradictory. Asceticism, fatalism, conformism. Hedonism, materialism, careerism. What this array of responses have in common are, first, a grounding in "hakanasa," and, second, an emphasis on formality. "Evanescence and Etiquette" attempts to illuminate for the first time the ties between an epistemology of constant change and Japan's formal emphasis on etiquette and visuality.

This book examines the theory of consciousness developed by the school of Recognition, an Indian philosophical tradition that thrived around the tenth c. CE in Kashmir, and argues that consciousness has a linguistic nature. It situates the doctrines of the tradition within the broader Indian philosophical context and establishes connections with the contemporary analytic debate. The book focuses on Utpaladeva and Abhinavagupta (tenth c. CE), two Hindu intellectuals belonging to the school of Recognition, Pratyabhijñ� in Sanskrit. It argues that these authors promoted ideas that bear a strong resemblance with contemporary ‘higher–order theories’ of consciousness. In addition, the book explores the relationship between the thinkers of the school of Recognition and the thought of the grammarian/philosopher Bhartṛhari (fifth c. CE). The book bridges a gap that still exists between scholars engaged with Western traditions and Sanskrit specialists focused on textual materials. In doing so, the author uses concepts from contemporary philosophy of mind to illustrate the Indian arguments and an interdisciplinary approach with abundant reference to the original sources. Offering fresh information to historians of Indian thought, the book will also be of interest to academics working on Non-Western Philosophy, Comparative Philosophy, Indian Philosophy, Religion, Hinduism, Tantric Studies and South Asian Studies.