玛雅艺术中的祭祀披风

古代中美洲各个不同文化在贵族的礼仪服饰上共享很多传统。文化中的礼仪服装的相互关系以及跨越时空的仪式活动连续性展示了它们之间内在的历史联系。这篇文章意在探究玛雅早期壁画和后奥尔梅克石碑雕刻中刻画的礼仪服装所表现的象征对应关系的内涵。这些服装的样式和象征内涵衍生于早期奥尔梅克的鸟神祭祀的装束。至后盛期,玛雅祭祀披风在样式和象征意义方面呈现多样化特征。但是,它们仍然出现在一些类似SanBartolo壁画里祭祀活动的场合。     

Remaking a Kabbalist: Manuscript and Print Cultures in Early Modern Italy

Jewish History - The dissemination of Safedian Kabbalah in late sixteenth- and early seventeenth-century Italy represents a critical turning point in the history of modern Kabbalah. Several...     

试论台湾佛教四大道场崛起的原因

台湾南部的佛光山、东部的慈济功德会、北部的法鼓山、中部的中台山,是台湾当代佛教崛起的四大道场,它掌握了台湾佛教界的大部份社会资源,已成台湾佛教发展的方向。这四大道场在短期内崛起有着多方面原因,如:有明确的目标、有各自的鲜明特点、创办者都是经营管理大师、有高超的口才、注意对人才吸收培养、注意与祖国大陆保持沟通和联系、积极向海外拓展、努力适应台湾社会的变化、与社会产生互动等。     

礼仪中的鲜花——试析佛教建筑中的花卉母题

在中、印很多古代石窟或寺院建筑的屋顶、立柱等部位,经常会看到很多花卉图案,笔者认为它与佛教的一项重要礼仪,即散花供养密切相关。本文从经典出发,阐明散花供养在佛教中的重要作用,并结合中、印石窟建筑以及斯里兰卡地面寺院建筑的具体实例,探讨散花礼仪在建筑中的体现及其功能。     

Art, Practical Knowledge and Aesthetic Objectivity

It seems often to have been assumed by art theorists and aestheticians that concepts of art and the aesthetic are related, if not actually identical. In recent times, however, David Best has criticized this widespread assumption in the interests of marking a quite radical distinction between artistic and aesthetic concerns. But this claim may be considered problematic in turn, not only in terms of its denial of the conventional conception of art as implicated in the production of aesthetic effects, but also because it obscures our understanding of the objectivity of aesthetic judgement – and hence, ultimately, of the rational basis of artistic appreciation and endeavour. In the light of some critical attention to Joseph Dunne's recent work on practical reason in Aristotle, the following paper argues that a suitably modified notion of phronesis may provide the key to understanding the relationship of aesthetic sensibility to artistic knowledge.     

蒙古地区佛教艺术与弥勒造像--以北京雍和宫弥勒大佛、内蒙梵宗寺弥勒佛为中心

本文阐述了佛教艺术在蒙古地区的传播过程和弥勒造像的缘由。在元朝以前蒙古帝国的蒙哥汗赐予藏传佛教噶玛噶举派的噶玛拔希为“国师”,并授与玉印,担任起总领天下释教的重任。以此为契机,蒙藏地区佛教诸派先后都产生了活佛转世制度,达赖、班禅、章嘉、哲布尊丹巴等大活佛,极大地影响了蒙藏地区的政治、宗教与文化。并详细客观地解释考证了北京雍和宫和内蒙古梵宗寺的弥勒造像的历史,宗教仪轨与艺术特征。     

A Case Study of the Decline of the Buddhist Funeral Ritual,the Guangdong Yuqie Yankou

This article contextualizes the decline of the Buddhist death ritual, the Guangdong Yuqie Yankou (廣東瑜伽焰口), through an examination of external and internal factors that might have affected its development in contemporary Hong Kong. During the last two decades, its popularity has dramatically declined, so much so that it now occupies an insignificant place among the pool of local funeral rituals. Its waning is not only a result of changing socioeconomic factors, such as contemporary lifestyles, commercialization of the funeral industry, ‘fast-food’ mortuary practices, and diminished religiosity of the Hong Kong laity, but is also caused by the scarcity of presiding Buddhist masters and competition from Buddhist rituals imported from other provinces of China. These intertwining factors have worked together to foster the decline of the ritual. The data for this ethnographic study were mainly collected in interviews and through the observation of participants.     

Transcendental Meditation,Reiki and Yoga: Suffering,Ritual and Self-Transformation

The paper explores three practices of eastern spirituality taken up by westerners for apparently secular purposes. As an 'emic' account that proceeds inductively from the author's experience, it shows how each of these practices is an attempt to change the meaning of suffering through the creative medium of ritual. Rituals are often used as initiations from one form of subjectivity to another. Yoga, Transcendental Meditation, and Reiki are undertaken as means of self-transformation. They may be adopted as 'magical' ways of achieving personal aims, but they also have the potential to take practitioners beyond the ego towards 'sacred' understandings or 'otherness'. The sacred (or 'spiritual'), however, is not necessarily 'the good'. The paper considers the effects of these practices. Do they become forms of self-mastery and power for the individual ego or do they hold out the promise of a more ethical self (in Lévinas's sense of 'ethics')? In other words, do they help resolve the problem of suffering through creating a more communicative body and a self-for-others?