From Benares to Beijing

This volume brings together thirteen essays by leading scholars of Chinese and Indian civilization from Europe, North America and Asia. The essays cover a wide range of topics in Indian and Chinese religion and culture and offer fresh insights into the study of the Asian traditions.The essays in this volume together address both a specialist audience in presenting the latest findings of scholarly research and a general audience in offering the study of the past as a model for understanding developments in Asia today. The topics covered include a discussion of the role of women in Chinese religion, attitudes towards language and translation in Indian Buddhism, early Taoist thought, issues in Buddhist epistemology, miracly working images in medieval China, the history of Ch'an Buddhism, the process through which Buddhism was introduced to China, and art criticism in classical China.