Book Review: Living Buddhas: The Self Mummified Monks Of Yamagata, Japan By Ken Jeremiah

st AsianLong after death, these ascetics continue to be revered as Living Buddhas!

Coincidental to the recent review of ‘The Old Jōruri Puppet Play ‘The Tale Of The High Priest Kōchi’ (himself a sokushinbutsu, or living mummy) at Diverse Japan this is, according to the author, the first English language book on the subject of the self-mummifying Buddhist monks of Yamagata Prefecture of North-Western Japan who, long after death, continue to be revered as Living Buddhas and are little known to the outside world. An earlier English language 20 page article from 1962 does exist, written by Ichirō Hori and entitled ‘Self-Mummified Buddhas in Japan. An Aspect of the Shugen-Dō (“Mountain Asceticism”) Sect’ (History of Religions, Vol. 1, No. 2. (Winter, 1962), pp. 222-242. The University of Chicago Press) and this is included in

DVD Review: Spice And Wolf Season One Collection

Hunting riches more precious than gold!

Japan has a rich history of worshipping fox deities, and in Spice and Wolf, the villagers of an old town are ravaged by a wolf that eats all their corn, so that they have nothing when it comes to their harvest at the end of the year. The villagers and the wolf decide to come to an arrangement once they know she is actually a corn goddess, if they pray to the wolf for a good harvest, then the wolf will only eat a small amount of corn, leaving the rest to them. After several years of plentiful corn, the villagers grow careless, and stop praying to the goddess, called Holo, and she decides she might be

Lecture: Zen – Its Practice and Philosophy for Everyday Life

26 April 2012, 6:45pm

The Oriental Club, Stratford House, 11 Stratford Place, London W1C 1ES

In this talk, the Reverend Sokun Tsushimoto, a Zen master of the Rinzai School and qualified medical doctor, will provide insight into the essence of Zen, its traditional practices and discipline. He will also discuss his role as both clinician and priest in the context of birth, aging, sickness and death.

Zen is one of the main schools of Buddhism and originally came to Japan from China in the 13th century. Over time, a