Religion 216: Religions Of China And Japan
Fall 2001
Monday, Wednesday, Friday 10:30 - 11:20
Knapp 302
Professor John Cort
Office: Knapp 310
x6254
E-mail: cort@denison.edu
This course surveys religious traditions in China and Japan. It also surveys religious traditions of China and Japan. These two different prepositions indicate the two separate yet interrelated foci of this course.
On the one hand, we will explore the ways in which the traditions known by Western scholars as Daoism (Taoism), Confucianism, Buddhism, and Shintoism have influenced, informed, and shaped the cultures and civilizations of China and Japan. This task is within the realm of the history of religions, as we study some of the many ways in which people, both individually and collectively, have lived their lives as informed by both ultimate and proximate religious values.
At the same time, in this course we will encounter some of the great religious and philosophical thinking of human civilization. The authors of these classic texts wrestled with questions that, they would argue, are of immediate concern to all people in all places and all times, whether they be in China 2500 years ago, in Japan 1000 years ago, or in Central Ohio today. Accordingly, we will be called to let these texts speak directly to us as human beings, and to encounter the questions and issues therein as ones of immediate and ultimate relevance to our own lives.
Required Textbooks
Christian Jochim, Chinese Religions
Deborah Sommer (ed.), Chinese Religion: An Anthology of Sources
Herbert Fingarette, Confucius--The Secular as Sacred
Mary Evelyn Tucker and John Berthrong (eds.), Confucianism and Ecology
Ian Reader, Religion in Contemporary Japan
H. Byron Earhart (ed.), Religion in the Japanese Experience
Eugen Herrigel, Zen in the Art of Archery
Reader of photocopied articles:
David L. Hall and Roger T. Ames, Thinking Through Confucius, "Some Uncommon Assumptions," 11-25.
Henry Rosemont, Jr., A Chinese Mirror, "Interlude: Modern Western and Ancient Chinese Concepts of the Person," 57-78.
Tu Wei-ming, Way, Learning, and Politics: Essays on the Confucian Intellectual:
"The Way, Learning, and Politics in Classical Confucian Humanism," 1-12.
"The Structure and Function of the Confucian Intellectual in Ancient China," 13-28.
"The Confucian Sage: Exemplar of Personal Knowledge," 29-44.
Michael LaFargue, The Tao of the Tao Te Ching, "Hermeneutics: A Reasoned Approach to Interpreting the Tao Te Ching," 189-95, 200-14.
On occasion additional readings will be handed out in class.
Requirements
China exam
Japan exam
Regular response papers
Informed participation
10-12 page research paper
Grades
| Course Work | Percent |
| China exam | 25% |
| Japan exam | 25% |
| Response papers + participation | 20% |
| Research paper | 30% |
Provisional Class Schedule
China
Introduction to the Course
Monday, August 27
Chinese Cosmology
Wednesday, August 29
A Question of Balance
Jochim 1-22, 110-120, 135-143, 149-156, 160-173, 182-189
Friday, August 31
Continuity of Being
Tu Wei-Ming, "The Continuity of Being" (in Tucker and Berthrong, 105-121)
Jochim 23-76
Monday, September 3
Yin-Yang and I Ching
Sommer 3-6
Jochim 17-19, 32-33
Confucius (Kong Fu-zi, K'ung Fu-tzu)
Wednesday, September 5
Jochim 77-81, 120-27
Hall and Ames, "Some Uncommon Assumptions," (in reader)
Friday, September 7
Sommer 41-48
Henry Rosemont, Jr., "Interlude: Modern Western and Ancient Chinese Concepts of the Person"
Interpreting Confucius
Monday, September 10
Tu Wei-ming, Way, Learning, and Politics: Essays on the Confucian Intellectual, 3 chapters (in reader)
Wednesday, September 12
Fingarette vii-xi, 1-36
Friday, September 14
Fingarette 37-79
Mencius (Mung Zi, Meng Tzu)
Monday, September 17
Sommer 55-62
Jochim 35-6
Confucianism and Ecology
Wednesday, September 19
Tucker and Berthrong, xi-xxxi, 3-33, 105-121
Friday, September 21
Tucker and Berthrong, 37-101
Monday, September 24
Library day
Tuesday, September 25
All Campus Convocation, Goodspeed Lecture
8:00 p.m., Slayter Auditorium
Thomas Coburn, St. Lawrence University
"Liberal Arts Education in a Global Environment: Reflections on an Ellipse"
Wednesday, September 26
Tucker and Berthrong, 123-149, 187-207
Mo Tzu (Mo Zi)
Friday, September 28
Sommer 49-54
Lao Tzu (Lao Zi)
Monday, October 1
Jochim 127-34
Wednesday, October 3
Sommer 71-76
LaFargue, "Hermeneutics: A Reasoned Approach to Interpreting the Tao Te Ching" (in reader)
Friday, October 5
Library session
Chuang Tzu (Zhuang Zi)
Monday, October 8
Jochim 186-189
Sommer 77-84
Daoism Today
Wednesday, October 10
Tai Chi practicum with Dick Kinsley
Readings will be handed out
Look at following web site, especially material on Yang style of Tai Chi:
http://www.chebucto.ns.ca/Philosophy/Taichi
Friday, October 12
Daoism Burning
Monday, October 15
Fall study break
Wednesday, October 17
China quiz
Chinese Buddhism
Friday, October 19
Midterm essay due
Monday, October 22
Jochim 10-12, 42-47, 52-55, 87-91, 102-109, 173-181
Sommer, 119-132, 137-143, 165-168, 239-246
Shinto
Wednesday, October 24
Nature, Gods, and Man in Japan
Earhart, 1-44
Friday, October 26
no class: study day
Monday, October 29
Earhart 196-217, 234-236
Wednesday, October 31
Reader xi-xv, 1-54
Japanese Buddhism
Friday, November 2
Earhart 45-76
Monday, November 5
Earhart 81-98, 157-169, 244-250
Wednesday, November 7
Earhart, 76-80, 99-102, 172-180, 230-233
Friday, November 9
No class: study day
Zen Buddhism
Monday, November 12
Sommer, 155-164
Herrigel, v-ix, 1-52
Wednesday, November 14
Herrigel, 53-90
Friday, November 16
No class: study day
Monday, November 19
No class: research paper due
Thanskgiving break
Contemporary Japanese Religion
Monday, November 26
Reader 55-106
Wednesday, November 28
Reader 107-193
Friday, November 30
Reader 194-243
Monday, December 3
Earhart, 268-290
Wednesday, December 5
Japan quiz
Friday, December 7
Reader 234-243
Earhart 308-12
Response Papers
At least once, and sometimes twice, each week throughout the semester you will be responsible for a one- or two-page written paper in response to the required class readings or films. These papers will form a basis for classroom discussion of the material, and so are due in class on the day assigned.
You will be given general directions for each response paper in advance. At the same time, the response papers are an opportunity for you to engage the course material in a way that enables you to achieve greater clarity concerning your own thoughts, and so there is no "right" or "wrong" response.
These assignments will be not be graded for either content or style, but I will make comments on them. If you hand in the paper in class, you will receive a grade of 4. If the paper is late for any reason, except those verified by a written note from Health Services or a Dean, you will receive a grade of 1. Late response papers will be accepted for one week after the due date. If you do not hand in a paper, you will receive a grade of 0. If it is obvious that you have not done the assignment, and are handing in a paper based on nothing but your own ingenuity and imagination, in all likelihood you will receive a 0. If you hand in every response paper on time throughout the semester, your grade for this portion of the course will automatically be an A.
As a favor to me, I ask that you type and double-space the response papers. This will serve two beneficial functions for you as well: by typing the papers, you will have an easily accessible record of your responses from throughout the semester; and you will learn the valuable skill of being able to compose a paper at the keyboard. Papers that are handwritten, however, will not be penalized.