Lecture on the Lotus Sutra at University of Mississippi at Oxford (April 3, 2017)

I was glad to be invited by the Department of Philosophy and Religion at University of Mississippi at Oxford to deliver a public lecture on the Lotus Sutra. Ole Miss has a beautiful campus. Oxford is famous because William Faulkner, the Nobel Prize Laureate in Literature (1949), lived at Rowan Oak, which I had a chance to visit during my short stay.

Here is the information about the talk:

Title: The Lotus Sutra and Religious Imagination

Abstract: The Lotus Sutra is one of the most influential scriptures in the Buddhist world. However, interpretations about its meaning vary considerably. Some regard it as profound religious teaching, or sophisticated philosophy and some dismiss it as superstitious. In this talk, Dr. Wu attempts to approach the Lotus Sutra from the perspective of religious imagination, a neglected but potentially powerful category in religious studies, to gain new insights into this scripture.  

South China Morning Post on Yinyuan (Ingen): HOW A 17TH-CENTURY MONK IS BOOSTING CHINA-JAPAN TIES

South China Morning Post just published an ediotrial on President Xi Jinping's 习近平 mention of Zen Master Yinyuan (Ingen) 隐元 on 30 APR 2017. The title is

HOW A 17TH-CENTURY MONK IS BOOSTING CHINA-JAPAN TIES BY TAKEHIRO MASUTOMO. Click the link to view.

Videos of Obaku culture special exhibition at Chung Tai World Museum

I heard some of the web links for the Obaku special exhibition at Chung Tai World Museum are not working. http://www.ctwm.org.tw/news_arti.html?id=20 Here are two video reports about the exhibitions.

Willem A. Grootaers 賀登崧 (ウィレム・A・グロータース) ( 1911- 1999)

I am reading Father Willem Grootaers' research on Chinese religion in Xuanhua 宣化, Wanquan 万全, and Datong 大同 recently. He was a linguistic geographer working in China before 1945 and later moved to Japan. His method greatly influenced Japanese linguist geographers and he won a medal from the Japanese emperor (Orders of the Sacred Treasure 三等瑞宝章). There is no entry on him and his complete work in English. The following sources may say a lot about his life.

Works in Dialectology by Reverend Willem A. Grootaers
 by Fumio Inoue
http://innowayf.net/download/Works_in_Dialctology_by_Reverend_Grootaers.pdf

Wikipedia entry in Japanese


Below are two of his popular books in Japanese.

Earth God (Tudigong 土地公) at Taiwan Academia Sinica

Last month, when I attended an Academia Sinica conference on Grid and Cloud in Taiwan, I came across the local Earth God Shrine (Tudigong 土地公 or Fude zhengshen 福德正神)for Academia Sinica. Every locality is supposed to have one, no exception in a place with highly educated people.

Chinese Podcast about Yinyuan and Tea: 小关说（13）茶道 之煎茶道东渡日本-煎茶道 黄檗宗 隐元 卖茶翁

I found an interesting Chinese podcast on everything about the art of tea. One special issue is about Sencha 煎茶道, Obaku  黄檗宗, Yinyuan 隐元, and Baisao 卖茶翁.

Obaku culture special exhibition at Chung Tai World Museum, Nantou, Taiwan 宗風法雨──中台世界博物館黃檗宗展覽企劃活動

Thanks for the comment of Shifu Jiandu, I learn that there is a special lecture series/exhibition on Obaku culture and tea ceremony demonstration held at Chung Tai World Museum from March 4 to April 9, 2017. Check out the following programs at: http://www.ctwm.org.tw/news_arti.html?id=20
http://www.ctwm.org.tw/news_arti.html?id=20