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Buddhism Betrayed?
This volume seeks to answer the question of how the Buddhist monks in today's Sri Lanka—given Buddhism's traditionally nonviolent philosophy—are able to participate in the fierce political violence of the Sinhalese against the Tamils.
The Buddhist Viṣṇu
John Holt's groundbreaking study examines the assimilation, transformation, and subordination of the Hindu deity Visnu within the contexts of Sri Lankan history and Sinhala Buddhist religious culture. Holt argues that political agendas and social forces, as much as doctrinal concerns, have shaped the shifting patterns of the veneration of Visnu in Sri Lanka. Holt begins with a comparative look at the assimilation of the Buddha in Hinduism. He then explores the role and rationale of medieval Sinhala kings in assimilating Visnu into Sinhala Buddhism. Offering analyses of texts, many of which have never before been translated into English, Holt considers the development of Visnu in Buddhist literature and the changing practices of deity veneration. Shifting to the present, Holt describes the efforts of contemporary Buddhist monks in Sri Lanka to discourage the veneration of Visnu, suggesting that many are motivated by a reactionary fear that their culture and society will soon be overrun by the influences and practices of Hindus, Muslims, and Christians.
Re-exploring the Links
The island of Ceilao occupied a permanent and singular place in the political imagination of early modern Portugal. Concurrently, the Portuguese left a strong imprint in the Sri Lankan collective memory of the period. Five centuries later, a group of historians, art historians, anthropologists, and linguists reflect on the multiple dimensions of this phenomenon by rethinking texts and maps, ruined churches and ivory caskets, oral tales and Creole communities. Authored by 15 international scholars, Re-exploring the Links is divided in four parts: "Political Realities and Cultural Imagination"; "Religion: Con. ict and Interaction"; "Space and Heritage: Construction, Representation"; "Language ...
The Adaptable Peasant
This study analyses how in early colonial times, the peasant society of Sri Lanka underwent fundamental changes in the land tenure system as it faced the arrival of the Dutch East India Company administration's merchant capitalism.
Sri Lanka--Ethnic Fratricide and the Dismantling of Democracy
Focusing on the historical events of post-independence Sri Lanka, S. J. Tambiah analyzes the causes of the violent conflict between the majority Sinhalese Buddhists and the minority Tamils. He demonstrates that the crisis is primarily a result of recent societal stresses—educational expansions, linguistic policy, unemployment, uneven income distribution, population movements, contemporary uses of the past as religious and national ideology, and trends toward authoritarianism—rather than age-old racial and religious differences. "In this concise, informative, lucidly written book, scrupulously documented and well indexed, [Tambiah] trains his dispassionate anthropologist's eye on the tang...
Buddhism Transformed
In this study a social and cultural anthropologist and a specialist in the study of religion pool their talents to examine recent changes in popular religion in Sri Lanka. As the Sinhalas themselves perceive it, Buddhism proper has always shared the religious arena with a spirit religion. While Buddhism concerns salvation, the spirit religion focuses on worldly welfare. Buddhism Transformed describes and analyzes the changes that have profoundly altered the character of Sinhala religion in both areas.
Sri Lanka
In the past decade, Sri Lanka has been engulfed by political tragedy as successive governments have failed to settle the grievances of the Tamil minority in a way acceptable to the majority Sinhala population. The new Premadasa presidency faces huge economic and political problems with large sections of the island under the control of the Indian Peace-Keeping Force (IPKF) and militant separatist Tamil groups operating in the north and south. This book is not a conventional political history of Sri Lanka. Instead, it attempts to shed fresh light on the historical roots of the ethnic crisis and uses a combination of historical and anthropologial evidence to challenge the widely-held belief tha...
Progressive Revelation,
Some of the fundamental questions that millions have asked throughout mankind’s history is “If God exists, who is He? how can I know Him? is it possible to imagine Him? how can I talk to Him? Is God another of our mental categories and, therefore product of our imagination, a figment of our brain chemistry, or does God really exist and has communicated with us in a verifiable and objective manner revealing to us who He really is? If such communication has already occurred, then, in what manner has it happened? If it already occurred, what has God revealed about Himself that helps us understand who He is; what is His ultimate Essence? We hope the reflections presented in this book will provide a satisfactory answer that fills our daily pilgrimage with optimism until we attain the presence of our Creator.
A Divine Invitation to Create a New World
Television, radio, newspapers or the internet show a daily dismal world scenario. Every week, every month there is a major civil conflict or a terrorist attack somewhere. All over the world innocent are imprisoned, women are victims of domestic violence, are forced into underpaid labor or sex work. Children are still dying by the millions before they are five years old due to unsanitary conditions, lack of safe drinking water or malnourishment. Malaria and HIV-AIDS kill millions yearly and thousands of adolescents are kidnapped to become rebel soldiers. Autocratic governments deny democratic participation to the majority and suppress ferociously any popular peaceful manifestation. The worlds...
