All is change - the two - thousand - year journey of buddhism to the west - Lawrence Sutin
All is change - the two - thousand - year journey of buddhism to the west - Lawrence Sutin
Format 416 pages, Hardcover
Published August 30, 2006 by Little, Brown and Company
ISBN 9780316741569 (ISBN10: 0316741566)
Condition: Very Good+. This book is in an excellent condition. The DJ has only some very slight signs of wear and the pages are clean, intact and the spine remains perfect. This book has clearly been well maintained and looked after thus far. The book is protected with a Cellophane cover.
The modern-day creation of a distinctly Western Buddhism is arguably the most significant spiritual development of our time. Few realize, however, that the complicated dance between Western and Eastern religions has gone on for more than two millennia. ALL IS CHANGE is the definitive account of the two-thousand year transmission of Buddhism to the West. From the early exchanges between the Classical Greeks and the Buddhists of India to the encounters between Buddhist and Christian traders and missionaries in China to the influence of Buddhism on Western philosophers and the current fascination with the Dalai Lama, this is a riveting tale of the seekers, sages, explorers and charlatans through whom Buddhism has made its way to become a part of the cultural landscape in the West.
Sutin gives a remarkably full overview in the interaction of Buddhism and Western civilization. It's a kind of history writing that takes real literary sensitivity. To pull this off, Sutin has to attain helpful insight into the history of nations, art, literature, theology, philosophy and spiritual practice. For quite a while he catalogs the sporadic encounters between Westerners and Buddhists, detailing the almost stupefying misunderstanding that prevailed down to the late 1800s. Then we have a rising chorus of personal adventures and biographical sketches, showing those who popularized Buddhism in the West as teachers, charlatans, scholars, novelists, or history-changing activists. Even a partial role call of the people involved looks momentous for world history: Nyogen Senzaki, D.T. Suzuki, Helena Blavatsky, Paul Carus, Lafcadio Hearn, William James, Alexandra David-Neel, Okakura Kakuzo, Friedrich Max Muller, Christmas Humphries, Hermann Hesse, Nikos Kazantzakis, Alan Watts, T. Lobsang Rampa, Carl Jung, Thomas Merton, Allan Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, Thich Nhat Hahn, Gary Snyder, E.F. Schumacher, Chogyam Trungpa, Rita Gross, Jack Kornfeld, Geshe Wangyal, Maureen Stuart, Richard Baker, Pema Chodron, Joanna Macy and the 14th Dalai Lama. The story is huge, and it's told by a historian with a keen eye for turns in popular culture.
