Routledge Critical Studies in Buddhism
About the Book Series
Routledge Critical Studies in Buddhism is a comprehensive study of the Buddhist tradition. The series explores this complex and extensive tradition from a variety of perspectives, using a range of different methodologies. The series is diverse in its focus, including historical, philological, cultural, and sociological investigations into the manifold features and expressions of Buddhism worldwide. It also presents works of constructive and reflective analysis, including the role of Buddhist thought and scholarship in a contemporary, critical context and in the light of current social issues. The series is expansive and imaginative in scope, spanning more than two and a half millennia of Buddhist history. It is receptive to all research works that are of significance and interest to the broader field of Buddhist Studies.
Some of the titles in the series are published in association with the Oxford Centre for Buddhist Studies, which conducts and promotes rigorous teaching and research into all forms of the Buddhist tradition.
Editorial Advisory Board:
James A. Benn, McMaster University, Canada
Rupert Gethin, University of Bristol, UK
Peter Harvey, University of Sunderland, UK
Sallie King, James Madison University, USA
Anne Klein, Rice University, USA
Lori Meeks, University of Southern California, USA;
Ulrich Pagel, School of Oriental and African Studies, UK
John Powers, Australian National University, Australia;
Juliane Schober, Arizona State University, USA
Vesna A. Wallace, University of California, Santa Barbara, USA
Michael Zimmermann, University of Hamburg, Germany
Buddhist Hermits in Eastern Tibet: Saint-Making and Ascetic Performance
1st Edition
By Magdalena Maria Turek
June 20, 2025
Buddhist Hermits in Eastern Tibet explores the ritual and social empowerment of Buddhist monastics devoted to meditation under a charismatic master. Based on ethnographic research at a remote hermitage in Yushu Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, Qinghai province in China, this book examines ...
Buddhism in the Nordic Countries
1st Edition
Edited
By Jørn Borup, Mitra Härkönen, Knut A. Jacobsen, Katarina Plank
May 30, 2025
This book provides new unprecedented research on Buddhism in the five Nordic countries Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden. Aiming at comparisons between the different Nordic countries, the chapters identify possible unique characteristics of Nordic Buddhism. Buddhism in the Nordic ...
Buddhism, Cognitive Science, and the Doctrine of Selflessness: A Revolution in Our Self-Conception
1st Edition
By Hugh Nicholson
August 26, 2024
This book examines the relationship between Buddhist philosophy and scientific psychology by focusing on the doctrine of No-self. The hypothesis is that No-self can function as an instrument of counter-induction, that is, an alternative conceptual scheme that exposes by contrast the intuitive or "...
Buddhist Architecture in America: Building for Enlightenment
1st Edition
By Robert Gordon
August 26, 2024
This book is the first comprehensive overview of Buddhist architecture in North America and provides an analysis of Buddhist architecture and communities. Exploring the arrival of Buddhist architecture in America, the book lays out how Buddhists have expressed their spiritual beliefs in structural ...
Indian Buddhist Studies on Non-Buddhist Theories of a Self: The Studies of Śāntarakṣita and Kamalaśīla on the Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika, Mīmāṃsā, Sāṃkhya, Jain, Vedānta and Vātsīputrīya Theories of a Self
1st Edition
By James Duerlinger
May 27, 2024
This book addresses prominent views on the nature of the self in Indian philosophical traditions and presents Buddhist critiques of those conceptions through the translation and commentary on Śāntarakṣita’s chapter in the Tattvasaṃgraha on theories of a self and Kamala-śīla’s commentary on it in ...
Reimagining Chan Buddhism: Sheng Yen and the Creation of the Dharma Drum Lineage of Chan
1st Edition
By Jimmy Yu
May 31, 2023
This book is the first socio-intellectual history of the Dharma Drum Lineage of Chan (Zen), a new lineage of Buddhism founded by the late Chinese Buddhist cleric, Sheng Yen (1931–2009)—arguably one of the most influential Chan masters in contemporary times. The book challenges the received academic...
Buddhist Visions of the Good Life for All
1st Edition
Edited
By Sallie B. King
January 09, 2023
This book highlights what Buddhism has to offer for "living well" here and now—for individuals, society as a whole, all sentient beings and the planet itself. From the perspectives of a variety of Buddhist thinkers, the book evaluates what a good life is like, what is desirable for human society, ...
Early Buddhist Meditation: The Four Jhanas as the Actualization of Insight
1st Edition
By Keren Arbel
September 27, 2018
This book offers a new interpretation of the relationship between 'insight practice' (satipatthana) and the attainment of the four jhànas (i.e., right samàdhi), a key problem in the study of Buddhist meditation. The author challenges the traditional Buddhist understanding of the four jhànas as ...
Tibetan Buddhism in Diaspora: Cultural re-signification in practice and institutions
1st Edition
By Ana Lopes
January 22, 2018
The imperialist ambitions of China – which invaded Tibet in the late 1940s – have sparked the spectacular spread of Tibetan Buddhism worldwide, and especially in western countries. This work is a study on the malleability of a particular Buddhist tradition; on its adaptability in new contexts. The ...
Women in Pāli Buddhism: Walking the Spiritual Paths in Mutual Dependence
1st Edition
By Pascale Engelmajer
January 22, 2018
The Pāli tradition presents a diverse and often contradictory picture of women. This book examines women’s roles as they are described in the Pāli canon and its commentaries. Taking into consideration the wider socio-religious context and drawing from early brahmanical literature and epigraphical ...
Reason and Experience in Tibetan Buddhism: Mabja Jangchub Tsöndrü and the Traditions of the Middle Way
1st Edition
By Thomas Doctor
October 23, 2017
Based on newly discovered texts, this book explores the barely known but tremendously influential thought of the Tibetan Buddhist teacher, Mabja Jangchub Tsöndrü (d. 1185).This Tibetan Buddhist master exercised significant influence on the interpretation of Madhyamaka thinking in Tibet during the ...
Death and Reincarnation in Tibetan Buddhism: In-Between Bodies
1st Edition
By Tanya Zivkovic
October 12, 2017
Contextualising the seemingly esoteric and exotic aspects of Tibetan Buddhist culture within the everyday, embodied and sensual sphere of religious praxis, this book centres on the social and religious lives of deceased Tibetan Buddhist lamas. It explores how posterior forms – corpses, relics, ...