Overview
The Vessantara Jataka tells the story of Prince Vessantara, who attained the Perfection of Generosity by giving away his fortune, his children, and his wife. Vessantara was the penultimate rebirth as a human of the future Gotama Buddha, and his extreme charity has been represented and reinterpreted in texts, sermons, rituals, and art throughout South and Southeast Asia and beyond. This anthology features well-respected anthropologists, textual scholars in religious and Buddhist studies, and art historians, who engage in sophisticated readings of the text and its ethics of giving, understanding of attachment and nonattachment, depiction of the trickster, and unique performative qualities. They reveal the story to be as brilliantly layered as a Homeric epic or Shakespearean play, with aspects of tragedy, comedy, melodrama, and utopian fantasy intertwined to problematize and scrutinize Theravada Buddhism's cherished virtues.
Full Product Details
Author: Steven Collins
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Imprint: Columbia University Press
Dimensions:
Width: 15.20cm
, Height: 1.50cm
, Length: 22.90cm
Weight: 0.496kg
ISBN: 9780231160391
ISBN 10: 0231160399
Pages: 232
Publication Date: 29 March 2016
Audience:
General/trade
,
General
,
Postgraduate, Research & Scholarly
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active
Availability: Out of stock
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Language: English
Reviews
Readings of the Vessantara Jataka will undoubtedly become a classic in the study of Buddhist biographical literature and its cultural contexts. The collection brings together excellent essays that show us how a central Buddhist narrative can resonate profoundly across a spectrum of dramatic, ethical and cultural modalities. Leading scholars with extensive knowledge in their fields contributed to this volume and their essays draw on their broad expertise in the study of Buddhism in Southeast Asia. -- Juliane Schober, Director of the Center for Asian Research and Professor of Religious Studies at Arizona State University This volume, taken as a whole, starts with some basic questions: what accounts for the tremendous popularity of the Vessantara Jataka in the Buddhist world? How and why did it become a tale better known even than the life story of the Buddha? In addressing these issues, the individual contributors go on to reveal and analyze the multiple (and often ambivalent) ways in which the story has been open to interpretation and to enactment in ritual, art, and society, in both classic and modern times. Readings of the Vessantara Jataka is a path-breaking work that will long endure as a go-to reference for anyone interested in this most significant and popular of Buddhist stories. -- John S. Strong, Charles A. Dana Professor and Chair of Asian Studies at Bates College The central figure in the Buddhism of Southeast Asia, Sri Lanka, and even parts of Nepal is, as this book demonstrates, Prince Vessantara as much as it is the Buddha himself. Vessantara is not only a prince, but is a Bodhisattva, a Buddha-to-be. He must fulfill a last 'perfection' before he can become a Buddha, that is, he must demonstrate that he is supremely 'generous' and able to give away all his belongings as well as his wife and children. As Collins observes in his introduction Vessantara, it could be argued, has what Greek tragedy referred to as a tragic fault; indeed a number of them. He is juxtaposed with the Brahmin Jujaka, who succeeds at his wife's bidding, in getting Vessantara to give him his two children. According to Bowie, Jujaka appears in northern Thai sermons given by monks in a comedic style as a trickster figure. The contributions to this book discuss the various ways in which Vessantara's story is presented in ritual and ritual-linked art, as well as in vernacular texts and show how this story in various manifestations has contributed to shaping popular understandings of kingship, social order, familial relations, and gender as well as Buddhist doctrines. This book is highly recommended not only for scholars interested in Buddhism as it is practiced, but also for courses on Buddhism and society, religious studies, and anthropology and religion. -- Charles Keyes, Professor Emeritus of Anthropology and International Studies, University of Washington
This volume, taken as a whole, starts with some basic questions: what accounts for the tremendous popularity of the Vessantara Jataka in the Buddhist world? How and why did it become a tale better known even than the life story of the Buddha? In addressing these issues, the individual contributors go on to reveal and analyze the multiple (and often ambivalent) ways in which the story has been open to interpretation and to enactment in ritual, art, and society, in both classic and modern times. Readings of the Vessantara Jataka is a path-breaking work that will long endure as a go-to reference for anyone interested in this most significant and popular of Buddhist stories. -- John S. Strong, Charles A. Dana Professor and Chair of Asian Studies at Bates College Readings of the Vessantara Jataka will undoubtedly become a classic in the study of Buddhist biographical literature and its cultural contexts. The collection brings together excellent essays that show us how a central Buddhist narrative can resonate profoundly across a spectrum of dramatic, ethical and cultural modalities. Leading scholars with extensive knowledge in their fields contributed to this volume and their essays draw on their broad expertise in the study of Buddhism in Southeast Asia. -- Juliane Schober, Director of the Center for Asian Research and Professor of Religious Studies at Arizona State University
This volume, taken as a whole, starts with some basic questions: what accounts for the tremendous popularity of the Vessantara Jataka in the Buddhist world? How and why did it become a tale better known even than the life story of the Buddha? In addressing these issues, the individual contributors go on to reveal and analyze the multiple (and often ambivalent) ways in which the story has been open to interpretation and to enactment in ritual, art, and society, in both classic and modern times. Readings of the Vessantara Jataka is a path-breaking work that will long endure as a go-to reference for anyone interested in this most significant and popular of Buddhist stories. -- John S. Strong, Charles A. Dana Professor and Chair of Asian Studies at Bates College Readings of the Vessantara Jataka will undoubtedly become a classic in the study of Buddhist biographical literature and its cultural contexts. The collection brings together excellent essays that show us how a central Buddhist narrative can resonate profoundly across a spectrum of dramatic, ethical and cultural modalities. Leading scholars with extensive knowledge in their fields contributed to this volume and their essays draw on their broad expertise in the study of Buddhism in Southeast Asia. -- Juliane Schober, Director of the Center for Asian Research and Professor of Religious Studies at Arizona State University The central figure in the Buddhism of Southeast Asia, Sri Lanka, and even parts of Nepal is, as this book demonstrates, Prince Vessantara as much as it is the Buddha himself. Vessantara is not only a prince, but is a Bodhisattva, a Buddha-to-be. He must fulfill a last 'perfection' before he can become a Buddha, that is, he must demonstrate that he is supremely 'generous' and able to give away all his belongings as well as his wife and children. As Collins observes in his introduction Vessantara, it could be argued, has what Greek tragedy referred to as a tragic fault; indeed a number of them. He is juxtaposed with the Brahmin Jujaka, who succeeds at his wife's bidding, in getting Vessantara to give him his two children. According to Bowie, Jujaka appears in northern Thai sermons given by monks in a comedic style as a trickster figure. The contributions to this book discuss the various ways in which Vessantara's story is presented in ritual and ritual-linked art, as well as in vernacular texts and show how this story in various manifestations has contributed to shaping popular understandings of kingship, social order, familial relations, and gender as well as Buddhist doctrines. This book is highly recommended not only for scholars interested in Buddhism as it is practiced, but also for courses on Buddhism and society, religious studies, and anthropology and religion. -- Charles Keyes, Professor Emeritus of Anthropology and International Studies, University of Washington
Author Information
Steven Collins is Chester D. Tripp Professor in the Humanities at the University of Chicago, where he teaches in the Department of South Asian Languages and Civilizations and in the Divinity School. His books include Selfless Persons: Imagery and Thought in Theravada Buddhism and Nirvana and Other Buddhist Felicities: Utopias of the Pali Imaginaire.
