Customer Reviews

The Buddhist Conquest of China (Sinica Leidensia)

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Still not yet replaced and often cited in contemporary works, it is good news that Brill has decided to republish the 1972 edition (a reprint of the original 2 volume, 1959 edition with "additions and corrections") of this work, with a new, additional introduction by Stephen Teiser, and perhaps combining the text and notes as a single volume. The anticipated publication date is Autumn 2006.

I have been using this book in the course I am taking on Chinese Buddhism at Hong Kong University, and I have to say that the depth of research involved in compiling this book is outstanding and despite being originally published more than three decades ago. This current reprint is as useful as ever in its analysis of early Buddhism in China. It also builds on previous research and shows how prior theories such Liang Qichao's theory of Buddhism being disseminated from the south, through the maritime ports is no longer tenable.

The book makes good use of the textual analysis and also balances it with a good understanding and depiction of the historical period and the political events that characterized each period, which helps place the Buddhism in context as one can start to get lost in the large number of monks and their translations. The part on the period of the three kingdoms was especially good, with the author dealing with each kingdom in turn, and this shed additional light on some of the characters that one may have been acquainted with from the romance of the three kingdom novels - like Cao Cao and Sun Quan and the Sima family.

The book is also very useful in that it includes the Chinese characters for all the names and difficult concepts within the text, unlike some books where you have to flip backwards and forwards to a glossary at the back of the book.