内容简介

The most striking feature of Wutong, the preeminent God of Wealth in late imperial China, was the deity's diabolical character. Wutong was perceived not as a heroic figure or paragon of noble qualities but rather as an embodiment of humanity's basest vices, greed and lust, a maleficent demon who preyed on the weak and vulnerable. In "The Sinister Way", Richard von Glahn examines the emergence and evolution of the Wutong cult within the larger framework of the historical development of Chinese popular or vernacular religion - as opposed to institutional religions such as Buddhism or Daoism. Von Glahn's study, spanning three millennia, gives due recognition to the morally ambivalent and demonic aspects of divine power within the common Chinese religious culture.

作品目录

作者简介

Richard von Glahn is Professor of History at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is the coeditor of The Song-Yuan-Ming Transition in Chinese History (2003) and the author of Fountain of Fortune: Money and Monetary Policy in China, 1000-1700 (California, 1996) and The Country of Streams and Grottoes: Expansion, Settlement, and the Civilizing of the Sichuan Frontier in ...

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精彩摘录

至少从周朝早期起，中国人就认为文明与野蛮在世间进行着残酷的斗争。由上天指定的开明君主运用自己的权威使天下变得匀称、规则、安宁，但这种理想的境界始终面临着无序之力的干扰。对于一个以服从和等级制度立身的文明来说，失常和偏差意味着严峻的挑战，因此在周朝，圣王的形象首先是征服蛮荒之地及蛮夷之人的教化者，这也就不足为奇了。

——引自第87页

到17世纪(或许更早),人们在东岳寿诞之日行的忏仪中出现了一些极端的苦修行为，例如有些人会用火炙烧自已的肉体,然后把铁钩穿入手臂和胸前的皮肤,再在钩上挂上灯盏,从而把自己变成“肉身灯”。

——引自第188页