The first broad study of Japanese mandalas to appear in a Western language, this volume interprets mandalas as sanctified realms where identification between the human and sacred occurs. The author investigates eighth to seventeenth century paintings from three traditions: Esoteric Buddhism, Pure Land Buddhism, and the kami worshiping (Shinto) tradition. It is generally recognized that many of these mandalas are connected with texts and images from India and the Himalayas. A pioneering theme of this study is that, in addition to the South Asian connections, certain paradigmatic Japanese mandalas reflect pre-Buddhist Chinese concepts, including geographical concepts. In convincing and lucid prose ten Grotenhuis chronicles an intermingling of visual, doctrinal, ritual, and literary elements in these mandalas that has come to be seen as characteristic of the Japanese religious tradition as a whole.
Japanese Mandalas, Elizabeth ten Grotenhuis, University of Hawaii Press, 227 pp, $29.95
Dr. Elizabeth ten Grotenhuis is Professor Emerita of Japanese art history and an Associate in Research at the Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies at Harvard. She received her undergraduate and graduate degrees from Harvard University, and is the author and editor of many publications, including Japanese Mandalas: Representations of Sacred Geography and Along the Silk Road. Elizabeth was a founding member of the board of Yo-Yo Ma�s Silk Road Project, and remains active on that board today.
Dr. ten Grotenhuis is currently Head of Birches School, a co-educational, independent elementary school located just outside Boston.
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| Preface |
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| Introduction | 1 | Ch. 1 | The Taima Mandara | 13 | Ch. 2 | The Diamond World Mandala | 33 | Ch. 3 | The Womb World Mandala | 58 | Ch. 4 | The Mandala of the Two Worlds in Japan | 78 | Ch. 5 | Mandalas of Individual Deities | 96 | Ch. 6 | Pure Land Mandara in Japan | 122 | Ch. 7 | The Kami-Worshiping Tradition: Kasuga | 142 | Ch. 8 | The Kami-Worshiping Tradition: Kumano | 163 |
| Afterword | 183 | App | Chronologies for East Asia | 185 |
| Notes | 187 |
| Selected Bibliography | 207 |
| Index | 215 |
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