Reading List 001: Modern Chinese Buddhism
People interested in Buddhism or East Asia often ask for recommended reading on such and such topic but it is hard to come up with a good and comprehensive list on the spot. I intend this series of posts to focus on topics from East Asia, Buddhism, and history that may be useful to both scholars and the general public.
- Carter, James. Heart of Buddha, Heart of China: The Life of Tanxu, a Twentieth Century Monk. Oxford University Press, 2014.
- Chia, Jack Meng-Tat. Monks in Motion: Buddhism and Modernity Across the South China Sea. Oxford University Press, 2020.
- Fisher, Gareth. From Comrades to Bodhisattvas: Moral Dimensions of Lay Buddhist Practice in Contemporary China. University of Hawaii Press, 2014.
- Goossaert, Vincent, and David A. Palmer. The Religious Question in Modern China. University of Chicago Press, 2011.
- Hammerstrom, Erik J. The Huayan University Network: The Teaching and Practice of Avataṃsaka Buddhism in Twentieth-Century China. Columbia University Press, 2020.
- ---. The Science of Chinese Buddhism: Early Twentieth-Century Engagements. Columbia University Press, 2015.
- Kiely, Jan, and J. Brooks Jessup. Recovering Buddhism in Modern China. Columbia University Press, 2016.
- Makeham, John. Transforming Consciousness: Yogacara Thought in Modern China. Oxford University Press, 2014.
- Nedostup, Rebecca. Superstitious Regimes: Religion and the Politics of Chinese Modernity. Harvard University Asia Center, 2009.
- Ownby, David. Making Saints in Modern China. Oxford University Press, 2017.
- Pittman, Don Alvin. Toward a Modern Chinese Buddhism: Taixu’s Reforms. University of Hawaii Press, 2001.
- A great biography of Taixu.
- Ritzinger, Justin. Anarchy in the Pure Land: Reinventing the Cult of Maitreya in Modern Chinese Buddhism. Oxford University Press, 2017.
- An interesting work on how though Taixu has come to be synonymous with a secular modernity he held many views typically labeled as superstitious.
- Scott, Gregory Adam. Building the Buddhist Revival: Reconstructing Monasteries in Modern China. Oxford University Press, 2020.
- Tarocco, Francesca. The Cultural Practices of Modern Chinese Buddhism: Attuning the Dharma. Routledge, 2007.
- Tuttle, Gray. Tibetan Buddhists in the Making of Modern China. Columbia University Press, 2005.
- Wu, Wei. Esoteric Buddhism in China: Engaging Japanese and Tibetan Traditions, 1912–1949. Columbia University Press, 2024.
- One of the only works discussing Chinese interest in Tibetan AND Japanese esoteric Buddhism though only briefly on the latter. To my knowledge the only other work on this is in Japanese.
- Welch, Holmes. The Buddhist Revival in China. Harvard University Press, 1968.
- A foundation work on this period of Chinese Buddhism covering several topics from international affairs to monastic organization that is still discussed by scholars of the period today.
- Yang, Mayfair Mei-hui. Chinese Religiosities: Afflictions of Modernity and State Formation. University of California Press, 2008.